Penny? Dreadful!

I'd like to thank Randi for her editorial help. Any mistakes that remain are mine. Anyone who knows Shrewsbury will recognise the locations. However, all characters are not based on anyone living or deceased. And you'll love the Coleham Pumping Station which is operated by a team of dedicated volunteers.

Penny Dreadful was not her real name, obviously. Her real name was Penelope Jones. She had been married to her husband, Roger Jones, for seven years. Her behaviour had, for several of those years, been pretty dreadful, even though Roger hadn't known that at the time.

They had had a good, loving marriage, but the problem was that although Penny (to use an old expression) scrubbed up well, she was, to use another equally old expression, no better than she should be.

She had cheerfully acknowledged to having been a bit of a slut whilst she had been a student at the John Moores University in Liverpool (a university named after a home shopping catalogue magnate, a bit like the Montgomery Ward building at Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois), but as Roger had studied for his degree at The University of East Anglia in Norfolk, he had never heard of what debauched behaviour she had gotten up to from any mutual friends.

After they had both graduated and returned to their hometown of Birmingham, they had met, started dating, got married and moved to Shrewsbury, a market town and the county town of Shropshire, a county to the north of Birmingham. Shrewsbury was only 47 or so miles from Birmingham, and was a good town for a young married couple to settle in.

They both had good jobs, although under the lockdown Penny had found herself furloughed, whilst Roger was able to work from home.

Shrewsbury had a good nightlife, a theatre, art galleries, a couple of cinemas and not one but two Wetherspoon pubs (one was a fairly large hotel), a large number of other bars and pubs and a great deal of original medieval architecture. Besides which, Chester and Liverpool weren't all that far away, nor was Manchester and Birmingham was close enough. And there were two cinemas in Telford, which was between Shrewsbury and Birmingham.

However, the Coronavirus lockdown meant they were trapped in their three bedroom detached house that was just over the other side of the river, in Longden Coleham.

She had come to him, two weeks into the lockdown. It was just a little after breakfast. "Roger," she'd said to him. "I need to go shopping. They are only allowing one member of each family to go into a shop, and as you have a call this afternoon with your colleagues in California, I think it's best if I do the shopping.

"I need to visit Wilko, Morrison's and perhaps Sainbury's and Boots, too. Maybe even The Range. I expect to have to queue for at least 30 minutes to an hour at each shop, so I don't expect to be home early. In fact, I expect to be away for a total of up to four or five hours or so, but it depends how it goes, really, I suppose."

He kissed her goodbye and she looked at him, with a long, lingering look. He couldn't understand why. Not until later. She climbed into her Audi and drove off, heading into the town of Shrewsbury.

He wondered why she was looking so pensive? Was it the Coronavirus lockdown? Some experts had speculated that some people might suffer mental ill-health as a result of the isolation brought about by the virus shutdown, but surely not Penny? She'd be good, he reasoned. A nice gin and tonic with a couple of cubes of ice was their medicine of choice. He chuckled to himself as he closed the front door behind her.

He decided against checking on the news, as there was nothing but bullshit about the lockdown, plus the activities of some fools who were breaking the lockdown rules and who the press had dubbed as COVIDiots. He grinned, he quite liked that term for them.

Every day, he and Penny took a long walk; they'd go through Longden Coleham, passing the Cross Foxes, then over the English Bridge, then through town, go past the Boathouse, walk round with the River Severn to their left, pass the Crown pub and then back home. Along with every other restaurant or pub, all of those watering holes were closed due to the lockdown. He especially missed the beers at the Cross Foxes and the home cooked food at the Crown.

Sometimes they went the other way round, just to vary their walking route. They noticed that the usual British reticence had been, in the main, replaced with cheery greetings and admonitions to "stay safe" and calls of "God Bless!" Obviously, at a safe social distance. So, he had mused to Penny one evening, perhaps the pandemic was having a positive impact, at least on British society?

Penny had nodded absently as they had returned to their house in Belle Vue Road.

An hour after she left on her shopping trip, he walked up the stairs to clean his teeth in the ensuite bathroom that was off the main bedroom and he saw, propped up on the pillows, a large A4 sized white envelope that bore the large laser printed notice: "Please read me."

He walked over to the bed, opened the envelope, which wasn't sealed, took out the contents and began to read. What he began to read made him sit heavily on the side of the bed.

"My darling, dearest Roger. This is the hardest thing that I have ever had to do, writing this letter to you.

I am typing it on my computer and printing it out, because if I wrote it out in pen and ink I doubt that I could do it without sobbing my heart out and dripping tears on the pages and smearing the ink.

Although I still love you a very, very great deal, I am leaving you for another man, a man who, and this is no slight on you, I love more than I love you. And yes, clichéd though this might be, it is Phillip, your best friend from childhood, the man who was your best man at our wedding.

And despite what you might, wrongly, suppose, I still consider that you were my best man at our wedding.

Please do understand, Phil and I never intended for this to happen, it's just that we fell in love. He is the love of my life, my soul mate, my man of my destiny. The man of my fate.

I am so, so sorry to leave you in this abrupt and, I admit, utterly cowardly way. But I could not do it in person, to see your kind, lovely, loving face as I told you that I was leaving you for your best friend, I could not have done that to you.

And yes, Phil does still consider you to be his best friend, even though he and I both know that, at least in the short term, you will no longer consider him to be your best friend. Who am I trying to kid? You will possibly hate him forever. And probably me, too, for that matter.

I know that you had suspicions about the relationship between us, Philip and I, but we were able to convince you that you were mistaken and paranoid and wrong about us.

When we realised that what we had been doing was, in effect, gaslighting you and that our efforts to twist your reality around so that truth became lies and facts blurred into fiction had caused you to have your nervous breakdown, we were horrified. Please let me tell you that Philip and I were absolutely mortified and beside ourselves with grief and regret over what we had caused to happen to you.

This is why we both got together and paid for your therapy with the counsellor, Diana Baker. Because we both felt so terribly guilty about what we had done to you. It caused some rows between Phil and I, but fortunately or unfortunately depending on one's viewpoint, we got through it and remained together as a couple, Phil and I.

We actually had counselling ourselves because of what we had done to you, both as a couple and by ourselves. Before you start to wonder, we didn't have the counselling with Diana Baker, as we felt that would have been wrong and would have been taking the piss out of you, and we both felt badly enough about how we had treated you, without doing something like that.

Besides, I doubt that Diana would have allowed that to happen. In case you are wondering, we had our counselling with some older, hippy chap over the border in Wales, in Machynlleth.

We cooled our relationship for a while, when you were ill. We just didn't feel right in continuing having a full sexual relationship whilst you were ill, and that your illness had been, in effect, at our causing. Obviously, we still continued having sex, but not as often. Sorry to have to reveal this, but I feel I need to be honest and not prevaricate, here.

After you got better and were able to stop taking the medication from the Doctor, Phil and I re-started our relationship. Well, it hadn't ever stopped, really, to be perfectly honest.

I suppose that without the COVID-19 lockdown starting we would have continued on as before, me sneaking off to have time with Phil and then coming back to you. But those first two weeks of the lockdown, being forced not to be with my Phil at all, trapped with you, my loving but clueless spouse, made me realise that I needed to leave you and to go and live with Phil at his cottage near Machynlleth.

I feel that I need to offer you some level of reassurance, here. You have done nothing wrong. Absolutely nothing. Phil is not more handsome than you, and I'm not sure if you men are really concerned or worried about this kind of thing, but his penis is not much larger than yours, nor does he make love better than you do. It's just that he and I have fallen in love and that's all there is to it, really.

Phil and I know that my leaving you alone at the time of lockdown is a very, very cruel thing to do. So to try and make your solitude and loneliness a little bit easier to cope with we have paid for yearlong subscriptions in your name for Amazon Prime, Netflix, Britbox, BFI Player and Now TV. Just to keep your mind off things, a bit.

Also, and we aren't taking the piss, really, we have opened and paid for a couple of accounts with dating apps for you. Obviously, you might not be wanting to look for dates under the circumstances of how we are splitting up and the bloody lockdown, but we felt that option should be there for you, if you want to take advantage of it.

And it's obvious that you'll be feeling hurt, bewildered and confused about what is happening to you. There are a number of websites set up to help people who, and it's sticking in my throat, this, it really is, have been cheated on by their wife or husband. Why does this stick in my throat? Because I don't really like to think of myself as being a cheater. But that's what I am. A cheater.

Anyway, there's a smaller envelope inside the larger envelope and in it there are all the account details for the TV and film services, plus the website details for the website that is aimed at spouses who have been cheated on.

We thought about opening an account for you there, but we decided that would be too rude and presumptuous of us, so we are just supplying you with the website address. If you want to visit them and maybe sign up for an account, that's entirely your decision.

Clearly you will need some counselling to help you get through this, so we have paid for up to 20 sessions for you with Diana. I know you liked her and built up a good rapport with her. I liked her when I had that joint session with you and her. I expect she will be very cross with me for what I have done. Oh, well. I'm sure she'll cope.

I know that you were very interested when we visited the Victorian Steam Pumping Station round the corner from our house, last year. After the Coronavirus lockdown is over, why don't you find out about volunteering, there? The chaps we spoke to seemed to get on very well with you, so I think you'd fit in well with them, even though you'd be the youngest one there!

Please, Roger, don't hide yourself away. You must seek out a new woman, one who can be more faithful to you than I was capable of being. Perhaps at some point down the line you, Phil, myself and your new woman can all meet up together and have dinner. Perhaps it might even become a regular thing?

I do know that, despite what you might think or believe, Phil still values your friendship very much, so he and I would like that to happen and for us to, somehow, if this isn't too much of an imposition on you, keep in touch in some way.

All my love,

Penny

PS I am not looking at a divorce at the moment, but if you want a divorce, I'll perfectly understand why and I hope it could be as amicable as possible.

PPS because I knew you might be relying on the shopping I said I'd bring, I have arranged for a delivery from Morrisons, but they can't get here until 11PM tonight.

Roger carefully put the letter down on what had been Penny's pillow, which still carried her scent. 'Funny,' he thought, 'I never realised that betrayal smelt of Lancôme.'

He walked down into the lounge, picked up his phone and scrolled through his contacts until he found the number for Diana, his counsellor.

She answered after a couple of rings: "Hi... Roger? Long time no speak. Is everything okay?" She sounded doubtful. Former clients rarely, if ever, phoned her to say how well they were doing.

"Hi, Diana. No. Not really. Penny has left me. It turns out that my suspicions were correct. She and Phil were, are, having an affair. She has left me for Phil.

"But they have very kindly pre-paid for some counselling sessions for me with you."

"The fucking bastards!" Diana shouted. "Guilt money? So that was why my bank account was suddenly healthier than I was expecting it to be, this morning?

"After I messed up so badly with you the last time, after all, I didn't spot that they really were cheating on you, do you want me to help you? If not, I know several other therapists who could help you, a couple over in Telford and another in Bridgnorth, who could work with you?"

"No, thank you Diana. You couldn't know that they were cheating on me. You are a counsellor not a bloody private eye. Besides, you know my whole backstory, and I feel comfortable with you. When can we start, please?"

"I can book you in at 11AM tomorrow, I can either do Zoom, Google Groups, Microsoft Teams, Skype or WhatsApp. Which do you prefer, Roger?"

"Let's go for it with Zoom. It's what I'm used to for work."

"Great," replied Diana. "To be perfectly honest, I think I'd prefer to send that blood money back to them and not charge you for your sessions. That way they'll not be able to pay away the guilt. Plus, due to the fact that I feel awkward about having not sussed things out last year when I was counselling you, I think I should cover the cost of your counselling. Maybe see you as an NHS patient, perhaps?"

"Okay, Diana, I'll leave that up to you. But I think you should keep the money. After all, what happened wasn't your fault."

"Oh, Roger! Bless you for saying that! On your advice, I'll keep the money. And I'll see you tomorrow at 11AM. I have your email address, so I'll send you the Zoom invitation over."

They ended the call.

Shrewsbury is not far from Machynlleth, just under an hour and a half on the A458, so by the time Roger had read the letter, Penny was well on her way to the home of her lover. Phil lived in a pleasant cottage up a mountainside not far from the town.

She knew she had crossed the border several miles previously when she saw the multilingual sign: "Croeso i Gymru: Welcome to Wales." It never ceased to intrigue Penny that the Welsh language was so complicated that Wales could be either Cymru or Gymru, depending on the circumstances. Plus the word "araf" which meant "slow" was painted on the roads at intervals.

As she approached the start of the lane leading to the cottage she saw that it was blocked by two cars bearing the words "Heddlu" and "Police."

As she stopped, two uniformed police officers approached her. "Excuse me, madam, but could you please state your business, today?"

She replied, easily, because she had no sense of foreboding, "Yes, officer. I live with my... boyfriend up at Ty Bach Cottage, in Mynydd Lane, just behind you."

"Ty Bach, you say?" The officer's voice sounded strained. "I'm sorry, madam, but there's been a bit of an incident, I'm afraid. The owner of the cottage, Phylip Pryce, is in hospital, over at the Royal Shrewsbury Hospital, taken by air ambulance, he was. He got into a fight this morning with a local farmer. Seems the farmer caught Mr. Pryce at it with his wife and the farmer took an exception to it!"

His colleague shouted at him in Welsh: "Rydych chi'n damnio idiot! Rydych chi'n siarad gyda'i gariad! Dangos rhywfaint o barch!"

The original officer went bright red and stumbled out an apology. "Sorry, miss, but the cottage is a crime scene at present. You can't go there."

"But where can I go? What can I do?"

The officer, trying to be helpful, said: "Take the A458 to Shrewsbury and follow the signs to the hospital, in Shrewsbury?"

She nodded, thanked them and turned around. She was in tears as she drove away. One of the things that her time with Philip, or Phylip, as the Welsh spelt the name, had taught her was enough conversational Welsh to realise that the other policeman had shouted at his colleague: "You damn idiot! You're talking to his girlfriend! Show some respect!"

But was she Philip's girlfriend? Really? No! Not really! She had burnt her bridges with Roger and had found out that her supposed lover, Phil Pryce had been, apparently, screwing his way through the neighbouring farmers' wives.

She stopped at the end of the lane. Now sobbing, shamed and facing the possibility of being homeless in her bloody Audi during the lockdown, as hotels weren't taking bookings, she did the only thing she could. She inputted the Royal Shrewsbury Hospital into her car's navigation system and headed back toward Shrewsbury.

"Let's see that bastard worm his way out of this," she said to a startled crow on a hedgerow as she started her journey back to Shrewsbury.