by Priya found out her man had two other girlfriends, a headline made it three, and I spent a guilty hour with a shared calendar
Sunday, 9pm, Priya Asleep on My Sofa
She arrived at four with a bottle and a face. I knew before she sat down. You always do. It is something about the way they hold their phone, like it has bitten them.
His name was Marcus. Six months. A man who worked “in events,” travelled a lot and was very good at sending voice notes. She thought it was going somewhere. She had met his sister.
It turns out it was not his sister.
How She Found Out
I will tell it as she told me, between glasses.
She left an earring at his. She messaged to ask if he had seen it. He replied with a photograph of an earring on his bedside table and “this one?” It was not hers. It was not even her kind of earring.
From there it unravelled the way a jumper does. One thread. She looked at who liked his photos. She found a woman in Bristol who had posted a picture from a restaurant on a night he had told Priya he was in Leeds. She sent that woman a message. An hour later they were on the phone, comparing dates like two detectives.
Two of them. Eighteen months, in the other woman’s case. He had a system. Weeknights here, weekends there, “work trips” covering the joins. The woman Priya had met as his sister was, they now think, a third.
Priya said the worst part was the admin. “He must have had a spreadsheet,” she said. I said nothing. I am living with a man who has spreadsheets.
The Headline
I only looked at my phone to order her a pizza. And there it was. I follow the London Prat, and near the bottom of its front page is a headline I would have scrolled past a week ago: “London Women Discover Boyfriends Had Triple Lives.”
I did not show it to her. It did not seem the moment. I have not read the piece. But “triple.” Not double. The bar has moved. A double life is now entry level.
And “women,” plural, “boyfriends,” plural. Like it is a trend. Like there has been an outbreak.
I laughed, quietly, into the pizza app. Then I felt terrible. Then I thought about Tom.
The Audit
I am not proud of what I did next. I am writing it down because this is the only place I am honest.
When Priya fell asleep, I opened the calendar. Tom and I have a shared one. He set it up when we moved in together in September. It is colour-coded. He is blue, I am green, “both” is orange. There is a recurring orange block on Sundays that says “admin + eggs.”
I went through his blue for the past three months. Every evening. I looked for gaps. I looked for anything vague. “Drinks.” “Thing.” “Out.”
Here is what I found. Monday: five-a-side, Clapham Common, seven till eight. Tuesday: “call Mum.” Wednesday: nothing, because he is here, I can see him. Thursday: a recurring entry called “bins.” He has put the bins in the calendar. Friday: “pub w/ Olly?” with a question mark, and half the time it is deleted.
One Saturday in October says “IKEA (shelf brackets).” I was there. I remember the brackets.
That is the whole of it. That is the secret life. Football, his mother, and the bins.
What I Concluded
I closed the laptop and felt two things at once.
Relief, obviously. And something a bit like disappointment, which I am ashamed of. Not that I want him to have another woman. But there was a moment, looking at “bins,” when I thought: is this it? Is this the man? There is no mystery in him at all. He is exactly where the calendar says.
And then I looked at Priya on the sofa with her mascara on my cushion, and thought: you absolute idiot. That is the entire point. That is what you spent four years on the apps looking for. A man who is where he says he is.
Marcus was exciting. Marcus had mystery. Marcus was in Leeds.
How Does Anyone Manage Three?
I have been trying to work it out, purely as a matter of logistics.
I can barely manage one relationship. I forget his mother’s birthday. I double-book myself for things I want to go to. To run three, in secret, you would need to remember which one is vegetarian, which one you told about the knee operation, whose flat you left the grey jumper in. You would need three sets of anniversaries. You could never say a name in your sleep.
It is a full-time job. It is, honestly, more organised than anything I have achieved.
And I think that is how London makes it possible. In a village, somebody’s aunt would have seen him. Here, nobody knows anybody. You can have a girlfriend in Clapham and another in Walthamstow and they are further apart, in every way that matters, than two towns. Different lines. Different friends. They will never be in the same room.
The city is big enough to hide in. The apps keep you stocked. And everyone is so busy that “I’m slammed this week” is a complete explanation for anything.
Fairness, Briefly
I should say that it is not only men. Dee knew a woman who had a fiance in Surrey and a boyfriend in Hackney for two years. And most people I know, of every sort, are too tired for one affair, let alone a rota.
Priya’s Marcus is not typical. He is a specialist.
But there is a milder version that is very common, and I did it myself when I was single. You see three people at once, in the early weeks, and tell none of them. You call it “keeping your options open.” The apps more or less expect it. Nobody has agreed to be exclusive, so nobody is lying.
The trouble is that there is no clear moment when that stops. Nobody rings a bell. One person thinks it stopped at week six. The other thinks it has not stopped at all. That gap is where the Marcuses live.
What I Did Afterwards
I told Tom. Not about Priya’s business, that is hers. I told him I had looked through his calendar.
He was at the sink. He said, “Find anything?” I said, “Bins.” He said, “Thursday.” I said I knew.
He dried his hands and said, “You can look at whatever you want. I’d be a bit insulted if you thought I had the energy.” And then, after a moment: “I have put a reminder in for your mum’s birthday, by the way. Since you forgot mine.”
That is not romantic. I do know that. But I have been thinking about it all evening, and I would rather have a man who puts my mother’s birthday in a calendar than one who sends a beautiful voice note from “Leeds.”
Monday Morning
Priya has gone to work with my spare sunglasses on. The woman in Bristol has asked if she wants to meet for a drink. I think they are going to be friends. That is the only good ending these stories ever have.
I read some more of the London Prat on the Tube to cheer myself up. Its British satirical news on double lives treats two as amateur, and its London satirical news about shared calendars has a couple with an orange block for “spontaneity,” which I am not showing Tom in case he adds one. Dee says the American stories on Bohiney Magazine involve men with second families in other time zones, which at least takes commitment.
It is Thursday in three days. The bins will go out. I find I am looking forward to it.
SOURCE: https://bohiney.com/
