Deranged Marriage Read Online Free PDF

him; I didn’t expect I’d have to. And I certainly had no inkling at that time that he would ever, ever hurt me.
    We returned from travelling and George got ready to start his law degree in London, while I looked for a job. I soon found one as a lowly office junior in a respectable PR firm. I had chosen PR as my career path at the same time George chose law.
    ‘Why public relations?’ he asked.
    ‘Because I think it’ll be quite glamorous.’ I had read about all sorts of media careers, and thought that PR sounded the most exciting. I had done my homework, and decided that I would rather work than study. I wasn’t sure why I shunned university, despite my parents and George’s views, but I wanted to start making a career for myself. I was too ambitious for education, or at least too impatient. I had never been in love with school and therefore I knew I didn’t want to go to university. Despite the efforts of everyone around me, I stood my ground.
    So as George moved into student halls, I moved in with Lisa, bought my first suit, started work and got on with my life. I saw George about once a week. It was an enduring, special friendship.
    I felt as if no one would ever understand me as he did. I knew no one would care for him the way I did. The only thing missing in our platonic love affair was physical attraction. It’s hard for me to understand this. George was nice looking even when he and Samantha were together. He was tall, had very blond hair, he wore glasses which made him look cute rather than geeky. At twelve, he was considered a good catch. As we grew up, he improved. He got taller, broader, he changed his glasses so he always looked trendy and he didn’t suffer from spots. He grew into his face which was quite a serious one, but also warm. All the girls liked him, but I didn’t, couldn’t fancy him, although I used to wish I could. I believed that falling in love with my best friend would be the most sensible thing I could do. However, I have never been particularly sensible and neither of us showed the remotest signs of doing that.
    Post-Harry I spent a lot of time with George, crying and lamenting. Uncannily he had just split up with his first university girlfriend, so we were a mutual depression zone. It was around that time that we made our marriage pact.
    ‘No one will ever love me,’ I cried with a lip that could win the world record for trembling.
    ‘No one will love me either,’ he replied, although he didn’t cry.
    ‘I love you,’ I said, shakily.
    ‘I love you too, but I don’t want to shag you.’ Never one to mince his words was our George. So, we decided, after drinking in the student bar, that we would design a contingency plan for ourselves. If our twenty-year-old prediction came true and no one would ever love us, then we would love each other and despite the fact that we didn’t want to have sex, we would get married. We both found the idea hysterically funny, and like any discussion you have when under the influence, we thought we were geniuses. It didn’t matter if no one wanted to marry me because George would. Even though I didn’t want to marry him.
    In a drunken state we found our way back to George’s room, where he typed out our arrangement on his computer and printed a copy. At this stage I would like to add an additional marriage-pact proviso: don’t ever make one with a law student.
    I remember the look on the man’s face when we rushed into the off-licence to buy six cans of Stella and ask him if he would witness our marriage-pact agreement. Although stunned, he agreed and signed it, probably because we were buying some-thing and, after all, the customer is always right. Even when they are clearly bonkers.
    In our drunken state, we found our way to the photocopier at the all-night library and made a copy for each of us. We were so drunk that I was sure that the wording made no sense, although George thought the word ‘decree’ was appropriate and I had no