Read Online The Man Who Forgot His Wife by John O'Farrell - Free Book Online

were right. Everyone knows it never rains in Ireland. Famous for its desert-like conditions. That’s how Bob Geldof developed his interest in droughts.’
    Another violent gust of wind makes the tent shudder and then the guy ropes break free on one side, the poles fall inwards and the roof collapses on top of us. I swear loudly, sounding momentarily scared, which prompts shrieks of laughter from Maddy, who is still enjoying the effects of a bottle of white wine shared as the sun went down
.
    Now I attempt to right the tentpoles from inside, but the gale pulls the tent flat again, as a stream of water flows on to our things. Maddy laughs all over again, then sticks her head out of the tent to see what she can see
.
    ‘Maybe you should go out and try to fix it from the outside?’ she suggests
.
    ‘Why me?’
    ‘Well, because I don’t want to get my T-shirt wet – whereas you can go out there like that.’
    ‘But I’m completely naked!’
    ‘Yeah, well, there’s not going to be anyone out there on a night like this, is there?’ she points out. ‘Go on, I’ll have a towel ready for when you come back in!’
    And so my pale, naked frame steps out into the night to do battle against the wind and rain as Maddy zips the door closed behind me. It is then, from inside the tent, that Maddy hears an elderly-sounding Irish man non chalantly ask me if I am ‘all right there’
.
    ‘Oh, hello, er, yes, thank you very much. Our tent blew over in the storm …’
    ‘Ah, well, I saw that you’d camped down here,’ the old man muses from the shelter of a golfing umbrella, ‘so I thought I’d better check you hadn’t blown away, like.’
    I can just hear Maddy giggling inside the tent – she had obviously seen him coming and deliberately set me up
.
    ‘Not yet!’ I quip, and my fake laughter goes on far too long
.
    ‘There’s a barn up the lane. I’d say you could always move up there if you want.’
    ‘Thank you, that’s very kind.’
    ‘But you don’t want to be prancing about in this weather stark-bollock-naked. You’ll catch your death of cold.’
    I hear another snort of laughter as I stand there in the driving rain, trying to make casual chit-chat with a local farmer while cupping my hands over my genitals
.
    ‘Oh, this? Well, I didn’t want to get my clothes wet, you see. But good advice – I’ll get back inside right now. Thanks for checking on us!’
    The guy ropes are never re-set, and the tent stays collapsed on us all night, but it doesn’t matter that we barely sleep and have to dry out our things tomorrow, because right now all we want to do is laugh and laugh. I suppose we are showing each other how upbeat we can be in the face of adversity. Maddy doesn’t mind that I ignored her advice and was proved wrong; nothing is going to be allowed to spoil our happiness. We are young and can doze with canvas on our faces, and arms half wrapped around one another; we are immunized against discomfort by the euphoria of just being together
.
    ‘I’ve had a memory!’ I exclaimed, running out of the bathroom. ‘I’ve just recovered a whole episode of my life!’ Gary and Linda were delighted for me, though their joy was slightly tempered by the vision of an almost naked man laughing manically and dripping foamy bathwater all over their kitchen floor. In fact, I wondered if being stripped and soaking wet was the association that triggered the memory, but somehow I knew that it was having seen Maddy. Linda fetched me her pink towelling dressing gown, and put the hand towel I had used to protect my modesty straight into the washing machine.
    We sat around their kitchen table and they assured me that this was only the beginning, that other memories would surely start to flow back.
    ‘That lady’s bathrobe rather suits you, Vaughan,’ said Gary, ‘’cos you always had a bit of a thing about dressing up in women’s clothes.’
    Linda laughed, then reassured me that I had not actually been a