Part 3-in which he wants to talk....

You'll be proud to hear i didn't cave in. I managed to resist the urge to pick up the hand set and dial his oh-so familiar number.

I didn't have to.

He called me!

If I'm honest I'd have to say it was looking like i was going to call him. By 6.30pm I'd already downed two and a half glasses of red wine and was perched animatedly on the edge of the sofa with the remote control in one hand and my phone in the other.

'When 'The Simpson's' is over I'm gonna do it'! I had affirmed aloud, although i really had no clue what Homer and Co. were up to in this episode, so lacking in concentration as i was, just before the shrill 'brrrriing' of the land-line pierced my thoughts.

His mobile number showed up on the screen and i froze. I swear i stopped breathing for at least a minute! In my anxiety i switched the volume on the television up to 'full' by mistake, and, as i hit the answer button on the receiver and said 'hello', Mark was greeted with a chorus of the theme from the 'Itchy and Scratchy Show'. It used to make him laugh.

'What the hell's going on there?' were his unexpected first words. Not exactly what i had been hoping for.

I explained that it was nothing, just the telly. My heart skipped a beat. His voice! It was so real, so familiar. It was as if I'd been waiting my whole life to hear it.

'Ruby-we need to talk'

Of course we did, i agreed. And relief flooded through me like a river bursting through a weak damn. At last he had come to his senses! I'd always known he would. He was my Mark and i knew him better than anyone. Thank God it was all over!

But then he threw me a curve-ball.

'We're going to have to decide what we'll do about the house' he seemed to be saying.

In my mind i was answering. 'Well, we'll live in it of course-or were you thinking we could move?. But i didn't speak.

'Ruby, i can't afford to keep paying half of the mortgage there and pay rent here. Do you want to sell up, or buy me out'?

And they were my choices laid bare. As simple as that. After five years together, three years of marriage, we had somehow come to this. And the choices really weren't mine.

He was going, there was nothing i could do. And although it didn't make any sense-suddenly it did make sense!

God! It's over!

He agreed to allowing me some time to think-how very gracious of him!

I hung up the phone and took another big slug of wine.

I had held off from name calling for too long now...it was time to ring the girls.....