Mad About You

by Mhairi McFarlane

He was the man who endlessly asked what she wanted yet somehow never thought about what she wanted.

Being a grown-up was so strange. In someone’s life and their bed constantly for two years, and then suddenly unable to offer them so much intimacy as a coffee.

She didn’t mean that unkindly: he wanted that, and she wanted it for him.

Harriet had confused her refusal to admit to loneliness for not being lonely.

Maybe she was cursed to never belong anywhere.

This was what was called a “hard reset,”

“Are you making other people’s feelings your problem again?”

She wasn’t sure she understood Jon anymore. Perhaps she never had.

“I did say I’d fight for you.”

How could she have got him so wrong? How could she have got it so wrong, again? What was wrong with her?

“Are you all right?” Harriet nodded and gripped her elbows with her hands. It was a surge of fight or flight, that was all; from experience she knew she just had to ride it out.

Jon had triggered a panic response in her, stirred up feelings she’d not experienced for a long time.

I feel quite freaked out and very stupid for not being aware of it.”

“Some people don’t let you leave well, I’m afraid. They don’t do easy endings.”

Counterintuitively, I’ve found being excessively paranoid and a cheater tends to go together. They’re judging you by their own standards.”

the flex of accusing someone of your own bad behavior.

this was what she needed to hear, to prove to herself that her heartbroken ex could be manipulative and selfish.

Don’t appear on my doorstep again. Don’t contact me. Respect my decision that we are over . . . and that’s not going to change.”

You don’t get to carry on making demands of me and setting rules. You don’t seem to understand that my telling you where I was living was up to me. I don’t have ongoing obligations to you.”

It leaves me wondering what this was all about, if you ever loved me. I don’t know who you are.”

I’m not massively sure of who you are.”

“Used me to get over something. Or someone.”

about her lack of possessions suggesting she was running away.

“D. H. Lawrence said, ‘Women in their nature are like giantesses. They will break through everything and go on with their own lives.’ I never knew what he meant until now.”

“You’re a free agent, and so am I. Message fully received, Harriet. Remember that’s what you said.”

He is misaligned.”

proof I have the worst judgment in men?”

What you have is trust that has been abused. Men aren’t your fault.”

“I never thought you appreciated him, and it was agonizing to watch. I could see him striving, so hard, for you to love him the way he loved you.

You made him feel like he wasn’t worthy of you, like he wasn’t enough for you.

Relationships are about being right for each other, being happy.”

Asserting yourself doesn’t make you cruel, and by that same measure, setting a boundary didn’t make you rude.

In reality, Jon and I are two people who had a relationship that ran its course.

“You were happy enough bumping along with the fancy holidays right until he wanted serious commitment.

So, this is what it feels like when someone’s on your side.

This time, she really, definitely didn’t care.

“You’re not curious?” Sam said. “Erm . . . yes, of course, but also not really. It feels too much like glorying in the worst day of someone else’s life, to be honest.” “You’re very principled,” Sam said. “Gossip doesn’t usually involve celebrating people’s best days.”

the customers are always right. You know your own minds.”

“Emotional and physical energy aren’t separate things.”

that was Scott. Always great in your crisis. Always exploiting an opportunity.

the great joy of seeing Danny find his equal match and balance in Fergus.

didn’t throw him even slightly off-balance. Of course not: he’d have to care what she thought for that.

Had he changed? Was that possible? Was Harriet a very bad chemical reaction?

I’m free. He is history.

He’s someone else’s problem. And even as she thought the thought, she knew that was why he was still her problem.

Gethin was easy to have around. He seemed far more interested in others than talking about himself, always a positive sign in a man,

Harriet enjoyed watching Gethin respond to Lorna, impressed by her but not at all intimidated.

Whole truth and nothing but the truth.

No one ever told me what he was like. She deserves the warning I never got.

“You know how advice works, don’t you? The only advice people ever take is the advice they want to hear.”