The night Gareth Thomas’s wife left him for good, he sprayed the inside of her wardrobe with her Chanel Coco Mademoiselle, climbed in, pulled her clothes off the hangers and lay down like a baby, clutching them to him like a comforter.
When solace wouldn’t come, he staggered to the swimming pool of his house in Toulouse, where he was playing for one of the best rugby teams in the world, armed with a bottle of vodka in one hand and a full bottle of pills in the other. The intention was to drown. He’d dressed especially, in his best grey suit issued by the Welsh Rugby Union to all its international players, and a pair of black patent leather lace-ups.
It was the first