In the middle of the night I am poked brusquely in the ribs. "What?" I sleep-slur, head still full of that dream I was having about Kim Wilde. [1] "What is it?"
"You were snoring," J tells me.
"But I don't snore," I say.
"It would appear that you do now," she says. She is sitting up. It looks like she has been sitting up for some time.
"Did my snoring stop you sleeping?"
"It stopped me reading."
"Bloody hell. How loud was I snoring?"
She puts her book down. [2] "You know when you are under the flightpath of planes that are just about to land? Yes? Well, that loud. The windows were rattling."
I sit up myself. "Never." She nods to say cross my heart and hope to die.
"So I snore now. You never stop changing, do you?"
She does not seem impressed by this positive spin on the subject.
A though occurs. "Is snoring genetic?" I ask. "What if this is the latest thing I've inherited from my dad? Like male pattern baldness [3] and being Northern Irish?"
A memory comes to me. Of a trip up north with my parents back in the late eighties. J and I were living together in Stirling by this point. I think even my parents knew that there was only one bed in the house. But when it came to the B&B in Archer they decided we shouldn't share the same room. So J was packed off with mum and I got to share a bed with my dad.
It wasn't awkward or anything but my dad snored. I'd always known my dad snored. I'd grown up hearing him through the wall. But never at this proximity. It was like sharing a bed with a silage blower, an opera singer aiming for the high notes and a steam whistle. All going at the same time.
I didn't sleep. I couldn't sleep. I felt like I'd been sonically tortured. The rest of the holiday I walked around like a sleep-deprived zombie with bigger bags than a Louis Vuitton advert.
I came away from that night with renewed respect for my mum. How had she managed all those years of married life without sleep? Because how could you sleep when your husband is breaking every health and safety noise regulation in the book?
Maybe now it's my turn. And what will that mean for my marriage? What if J isn't as tolerant as my mum? Maybe she'll go off and find some quieter sleeper to spend her nights with. Has excessive and noisy snoring ever been used as grounds for divorce?
I turn over and close my eyes. At least there's one consolation I think to myself. There's one person who won't hear me when I snore. Me.
I close my eyes and drift off again. "Now Kim, what was that you were saying about hardy perennials?"
[1] Wash your mind out. We were just sharing gardening tips if you must know.
[2] Child 44 by Tom Rob Smith. J says it's very good.
[3] Though I'm still only at the start of that journey thankfully.
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