I am totally fascinated by marriages and long-term relationships. This may be because I can never get past about three years with a person before I’m running for the hills, and, if I’m honest, prefer living by myself with a dog or cat, and that may be because ten years of 1980s UK boarding schools left me with a host of emotional and commitment issues, but that’s for therapy not for CrimeReads, and the fact remains that I can totally popcorn out studying other people’s relationship dynamics.
How do people do it? Throw their entire lot in with one person – all their money, trust, love, time – and not want to kill them before a decade is done? Turns out, that in both real life and fiction, marriage and murder – or at the very least, deceit – go hand in hand, and whether its watching true crime documentaries or movies about wicked spouses, or picking up the latest psych thriller to read on a beach, from Gaslight to Gone Girl and beyond, we’re all here for it, obsessed with relationships that aren’t what they seem
But while it’s no secret that marriages can go from undying love to murder very swiftly – just take a look at Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn half a Millenia ago – what is it about love gone bad that’s so compelling? Maybe it’s because, while these stories are extreme, they’re also so relatable. There but for the grace of God, go I. After all – and I say this only a little bit tongue in cheek – if our partners could read our every thought, well, how many marriages would be left standing? Aren’t secrets and lies in a lot of ways the bedrock that keeps a good marriage healthy? No? Okay, hear me out.
For starters, let’s be honest, most relationships are born on a bed of white lies. In that glorious madness of the beginning, we strive to present the very best version of ourselves, tweaked to impress the object of our desire. We airbrush out parts of our history. We always look our best. We pretend to like some of the things they do (I once said I liked classical music at the start of a relationship figuring I’d learn to love it. I didn’t. It was a very, very long three years of concertos) and contort ourselves at all hours of the day and night to impress with our sexual prowess.
Of course, lies will out. And while our own faux-perfection isn’t sustainable, neither is our partner’s. When those rose-tinted glasses slip away the truth of a person is never as glorious as the illusion. And in the main, that comes as a massive relief to both parties. Nobody has to pretend to be perfect anymore. We can all sink into the sofa in sweatpants eating a takeout and heave a sigh of relief. But still – those lies were there. The ability to lie to each other has been established from the off.
Then mortgages and children and career pressures come along, and years can go by until you don’t recognise yourself anymore, let alone the person you’re living with. You only ever talk about the kids. You eat dinner in front of the TV and sex is down to twice a month if you’re lucky and it’s predictable and routine and you find yourself thinking about that man or that girl from Accounts or whatever just to get there. You tell yourself that’s fine, it’s normal, you’re both just tired. It will get better. But sometimes, just sometimes, you look at him or her and just wonder how different life would be if you’d never met. The old secrets are long gone, but in this new exhaustion, could there be new ones brewing?
There has never been a time where it has been easier to keep secrets from a spouse or partner and it has never been easier for those secrets to creep into existence. Cheating is on tap in our modern world. There are even apps for it. If you go away for work and meet someone you have a spark with, then social media, mobile phones, messaging, email makes it too easy to stay in touch without your partner knowing.
And what’s a little harmless flirtation after all? you tell yourself as you text while changing a baby’s diaper in the middle of the night. This person sees you and you’ve forgotten how good that feels. Everyone wants to be wanted, right? It’s a chance to pretend to be your best self again. To feel young again. Whole relationships can be carried out in secret in your phone – emotional infidelity is a thing – and then who knows where that new rush of passion might lead? What mistakes might be made? What dark decisions? What if it’s not you but your partner who’s behaving oddly? Placing his phone face down? Coming home late from work? How do you deal with that? Ignore? Confront? Investigate? Or plan a slow revenge? Or do they gaslight you? Convince you it’s all in your head?
Of course, in reality most of us don’t have the energy or inclination for all that, and are happy to rub along as we are in a quiet contentment rather than a heady mix of passion and danger, but it’s fun to read fiction about what happens to those who take that leap – what could happen to us – especially as it’s only a hair’s breadth away from our own potential experiences.
Not every betrayal in a marriage is about sex, of course. There’s also money. Once, when I was living with someone, he suggested we have a joint bank account and I was aghast. That was a bigger commitment than marriage as far as I could see – to pool all your money rather than splitting the bills. Maybe that happens less these days but still – most of the arguments I see in my long-term married friends are about how they’re spending the disposable income. Wanting different things. Cars. Holidays. Extension on the house. But at least they’re honest about where the money’s going. I have another friend who after her divorce realised her husband had syphoned off hundreds of thousands of dollars to stop her – the mother of his children – getting half of it. Charmer, eh?
Makes you wonder, doesn’t it? How can you be sure your husband or wife doesn’t have a secret credit card? How many debts do you have as a couple? Is one of you more of a spender? Are you the nag or the one hiding pairs of Jimmy Choos at the back of the wardrobe? Are you worried your partner will find out? Oh, and how’s their life insurance looking?
Of course, when we’re going into relationships, standing at the altar, gazing into each other’s eyes on the happiest day of our lives, we’re not thinking that potentially one day that endearing habit they have of not quite putting the jar lids back on properly so something smashes every time you take it out of the refrigerator will make you want to stab them in the eye with spoon, or that they’ll look at you and think just how much nicer life would be if you weren’t there but they didn’t have to go through the pain of a divorce, and that’s why even the super-rich and famous (Looking at you Bennifer round 2) don’t always get a prenup, but you’ve got to wonder if that Till death do us part line was added to the vows by someone with a sense of humour. Because familiarity breeds contempt, and as everyone knows, sex, money and revenge are the main motives for murder, and who could ever betray you as much as a spouse?
So yes, marriages are a great set up for a thriller, and we love reading about the lengths these betrayals can go to. But I do wonder if there’s an upside to them for the long term marrieds and co-habiters amongst us?
Maybe, in this world where we’re encouraged to want a perfect life where we’re 100% happy all the time and so many other attainable things, reading about couples who are truly awful to each other make us forgive the snoring and the toenail clippings and the sweatpants and the little pot bellies, and the stubbly legs, and all the other slack habits that come once we’ve slid into being comfortable with each other. Maybe we remember that spark that started the whole thing. Maybe we remember it’s better to have someone you can laugh with until you cry rather than someone with washboard abs that makes you so flustered you can’t talk. To hold hands with into old age. To trust.
Or, of course, maybe it’s better to just get a dog.
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