An Almost Perfect Holiday

by Lucy Diamond

  It had come as the most enormous shock to her, two months into her university course, to discover that she was four months pregnant. As if Aidan was calling back from the grave, a hand reaching out to grab her by the ankle as she’d made her escape. You can’t get rid of me that easily. He always did have to have the last word, and here it was: real and unavoidable. Literally a part of her now.

  Life before then had been something of a Choose-Your-Own-Adventure game – this is what I want to study! This is where I want to live! This is where I’m going out tonight! – but all of a sudden, it was as if the choices had been taken away. She had dropped out, deferring her place on the course, telling none of her new friends the reason why. Then, having miserably confessed the situation to her dad, she went to stay with her aunt in Dorset for the duration of the pregnancy. It had felt as if she were a fallen woman from a cheap Victorian novel as she grew larger and larger, lonelier and lonelier, waddling unhappily through the streets of picturesque honey-coloured cottages for something to do while she saw out her confinement. No, she didn’t want the baby, she told the midwives – she was too young; how could she manage on her own? – and opted instead to give it away to be adopted.

  ‘It’ – that was how she had seen the baby back then. Right up until the moment he was born and she was confronted by his curly black hair and his angry red face, when she realized, with a punch of emotions, that he was a he, not an it. He was a real small person. Her and Aidan’s son.

  She had never even held a baby before then. She had not expected to be quite so entranced by this tiny warm being that her body had miraculously known how to assemble. It had taken her by surprise just how miniature and perfect he was. The softness of his skin, the whorl of dark hair on his head and the way his wet pink mouth opened and closed like a fish. His shoulders had been so little! His tummy rounded like a peach. She had marvelled at his ears, so delicately curled.

  Two days they’d had together, a bubble of time when the outside world had receded, when she held her baby and fed him and gazed at him. Her dad came to visit her, and Danny too, plus her aunt, but that was it. Nobody else seemed to exist. Then the brisk, matronly woman from social services had arrived with her clipboard and forms and plucked him away – ‘Come on then, little one,’ she had said kindly enough – and Olivia started to wonder if she was making a terrible mistake in letting him go.

  ‘Wait,’ she said, already missing the warm weight of him in her arms. It no longer seemed to matter that she was only nineteen and that she’d had to drop out of university for this. ‘I think I’ve changed my mind.’

  But the woman was presumably used to bewildered post-partum mothers calling these things when they too noticed the sudden emptiness in their arms, and she reminded Olivia of the new family that had been approved for the baby, how they lived in a lovely house with a big garden, how they’d already decorated a nursery for him and picked out his name – Leon. They were grown-ups with plenty of money and could give him, in other words, all the things that single, teenage, penniless Olivia couldn’t.

  And so she’d squashed down her feelings and let him go. Off to his new family and painted nursery and big garden, off to his life of plenty, without her. Because let’s face it, she’d only muck things up anyway, she’d only let him down somewhere along the line, just like her own mother had in fact. Was it her imagination or had the baby yelled something out as the woman departed with him? A cry of protest, she’d thought – Take me back to my mother! – although maybe it had been an angry one, directed at her: How could you do this to me?

  Afterwards the guilt had been terrible. It had swallowed her up whole for months. She still thought about him whenever April came around with its cherry blossom and tulips, still remembered the warm, milky solidity of his small body. Wondered if she had made a mistake. Told herself she probably had. It was why she had been so determined, so dogged that she would be the best mother ever, second time around with Stanley and Harry. But seeing them growing up milestone by milestone – first teeth and first words, crawling and then walking – only compounded her feelings of shame, reminding her of what she had missed by giving Leon away.

  What was done was done, she reminded herself now, motionless in the driver’s seat of her car as other vehicles zoomed by. She couldn’t change what had happened even if she wanted to – and now that she’d told Lorna and Roy her secret, there would be no more denial or pretending. She’d given them Leon’s birth date and the name of the hospital, details that would hopefully act as signposts if they went looking for him. It was up to them now.

  Rain started pattering against the roof, leaving thin diagonal streaks across the windscreen. She felt very far away from the rest of the world all of a sudden, a small sad satellite spinning alone in the darkness. Mack had been kind when she had eventually told him about Leon, but she hadn’t exactly picked the best moment. In truth, she hadn’t ever intended to let him know the story at all, but then he’d come with her to her initial midwife booking-in appointment and when asked, ‘Is this your first pregnancy?’ she’d had to apologetically correct him when he’d enthusiastically answered ‘Yes!’ on her behalf. Which was something of a giveaway.

  A moment passed and then Olivia switched on her phone and started scrolling through her photos. The boys in the bath, with flannels on their heads. A party tea, where they were wearing red and purple paper crowns, Stanley with both fists pumped excitedly in the air. Harry lying on his side on the living-room carpet, playing with his trains. She had never taken a picture of Leon, she thought in sorrow. Her dad had gently suggested it after the birth, but Olivia had said no because the thought was too weird and she’d naively hoped she would be able to forget all about him, although of course that had been impossible. On reflection, it had been the wrong decision. Yet another wrong decision!

  She pressed the heels of her hands into her eye sockets wearily and sighed, feeling her emotions catch up with her. Then she looked at her phone again. At least she had Stanley and Harry, she reminded herself. And she missed them, she realized, feeling an ache inside. For all her doubts and self-blame, she missed her children and husband. I’ve just got one thing left to do, she had promised Mack when she’d last texted him – but now that she’d divulged her secret to Lorna and Roy, she wasn’t sure what the next step might be. Where did she go from here?

  A lorry thundered alongside her and the car rocked from side to side. Momentum had brought her this far, but now it was as if her clockwork had wound right down and she found herself paralysed with indecision, motionless with uncertainty. Before she could possibly go home again, she needed to come clean with Mack: open the door a little wider on how she had been feeling and try to articulate her sense of worthlessness, her difficulty in coping. He must know by now that she was not the perfect mother she had tried so hard to be, but talking to Em and Maggie had made Olivia see that perhaps nobody was. Maggie had even been to the doctor to talk about how hard she was finding everything when her daughter was little. Maybe Olivia’s old habit of keeping her own anxieties disguised and pushed down wasn’t working any more. Maybe it was time that she too plucked up the courage and asked for help.

  And if she did . . . would Mack still be saying, Come home, just come home, once he knew the extent of her struggles? Or would there be judgement in his eyes? Disappointment at her shortcomings?

  Well, there was only one way to find out. She took a deep breath and dialled his number. ‘Hi,’ she said when he answered, then swallowed hard. ‘Have you got a minute? I need to say a few things.’

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Amelia lay on the hard, narrow camp bed and shut her eyes, feeling disgustingly homesick. Or Mum-sick, rather, if there was such a thing.

  All around her she could hear the rest of the household moving about, getting on with the day. Thistle and Rain had been up for hours already, it seemed, watching cartoons in the living room and shouting out catchphrases. Then she’d heard Celeste running a bath and det
ected the faint herbal pong of whatever she was stewing herself in that particular day. Will . . . Dad – she still didn’t quite know what to call him – had been in the kitchen, whistling cheerfully as he organized breakfast and then she’d heard him calling to Celeste that he was going for a run, and the front door banging.

  Meanwhile here she was, warm and a bit ripe in her sleeping bag, feeling as if she didn’t want to do anything at all any more. Thistle and Rain had pounded on her door at occasional intervals – ‘Melia? Melia!’ – but she’d ignored them, and Celeste had eventually gently chided them to leave her be. ‘Teenagers need their sleep,’ Amelia had heard her say and she’d rolled over unhappily. She didn’t need any more sleep. She’d been going to bed really early at night just because it was all so overwhelming. What she needed was to feel like someone gave a shit. Like she belonged somewhere. Because she sure as hell didn’t belong here.

  She stared at her phone and at the glossy images she’d put up on social media over the last few days. Having an amazing time with my famous dad!!! My gorgeous stepbrother and sis!!! First photography lesson with Dad – lucky me! There were a few new likes since the last time she’d looked. A few new comments. It all felt hollow, though, when her own dad hadn’t followed her back on Instagram yet. She’d dropped it into the conversation yesterday, trying not to sound too keen or desperate – ‘Hey! How come you’re not following me then?’ – and he’d laughed, but made no comment. Was he embarrassed by her? Or just not that interested? She wasn’t sure which was worse.

  She flicked through to the last image, a photo of herself posed artfully in the back garden. There were some blurry blue cornflowers behind her and the sun was falling on her face as she smiled. Happy, she’d captioned the shot, but just seconds after it had been taken, a chicken had waddled up to her and she’d yelped in fright, and then Thistle had wandered out with a storybook, wanting Amelia to read to her, and then Rain had fallen over and started crying, and then Celeste had snapped at Amelia for not keeping an eye on the kids. Er . . . do I look like your nanny? Amelia had thought sarcastically, scowling and stomping back inside.

  Happy indeed. A picture might paint a thousand words, but her pictures only told lies. A more representative image of her stay here would be a photo taken right now, of her huddled in a sleeping bag, with no inclination whatsoever to get up. Willing the time to pass so that she could go back to Cornwall with her mum. Then a thought struck her.

  ‘Mum?’ she said when Maggie answered the call. ‘I don’t suppose you could pick me up a bit early, could you? Like . . . today?’

  Izzie had hardly slept all night, such were the depths of her turmoil and guilt. She had wrecked everything. To think that a few short weeks ago she’d written brave, carefree words in her diary about how this would be her rite-of-passage summer, how she was on the brink of becoming a woman . . . ha! Cue mocking laughter from the rest of the world, she thought, pulling the pillow over her head. Now George had left, apparently having dumped Mum, and it was all because of her: a stupid girl.

  As if that wasn’t bad enough, she had totally blown everything with Fraser too. Having been grounded the night before, she’d texted him saying that she couldn’t go out that evening after all and could they hang out today instead?

  He hadn’t replied. Not a single word. He must have thought she had gone cold on him and couldn’t be bothered to answer her. He was probably already chatting up some other girl in a swimming pool by now.

  A sob burst out of her at how rubbish everything had become. Then another sob, because it was all her fault. She imagined pressing the pillow harder and harder against her nose and mouth so that she could no longer breathe. Was it possible to kill yourself that way, she wondered, or did the body’s survival instinct kick in and somehow push the pillow away in its fight for air? She didn’t have the energy to try it, though. That was how pathetic she was. She couldn’t even be bothered to suffocate herself.

  It was ten o’clock in the morning and they were having a lazy day at the cottage. Earlier on, Mum had made an effort and rustled up bacon sandwiches for breakfast, but she’d looked tired and red-eyed. For a horrible moment, Izzie had thought her mum might go into misery meltdown all over again when she realized she’d accidentally made two coffees, one for George, somehow forgetting that he had already left. She had stared at that mug as if it were possessed by the devil, and her lower lip had actually begun to tremble as the fact of his departure clicked back into place. He’s gone. You idiot. You could see it on her face.

  ‘I’ll have it,’ Izzie had said quickly, snatching the mug away, even though she’d never liked coffee. Anything to stop that wobbling lip. Anything to prevent her mum’s face from sagging with renewed despair.

  ‘What are we doing today?’ Jack had asked just then, ambling into the room with his headphones on and completely misreading the mood. ‘Hey, when are we gonna go zorbing by the way? You did say we could.’

  ‘Let’s just have a quiet one today,’ Mum replied in this sad, dreary sort of voice, as if she had completely given up on the notion of holiday fun. Which in itself was so disturbingly un-Mum-ish that the words made Izzie want to throw herself on the floor and clutch at Em’s dressing gown, pleading forgiveness for the hundredth time.

  ‘Mum, I really am so sorry,’ she mumbled, knotted up with guilt and shame, while Jack went over to the fridge and began gulping orange juice straight from the carton. There – another sign that Mum was still flattened by yesterday’s events, because she didn’t even start bollocking him about hygiene and Just get a glass and pour it out, it’s not difficult, as she usually would have done. No, her gaze just slid right over him with supreme indifference. Bloody hell. This was bad.

  ‘It doesn’t matter,’ Em replied dully – which was clearly a massive lie. Of course it mattered, Izzie thought, plunging slices of bread down in the toaster and silently fetching three plates. Mum had been nuts about George, and now Izzie had inadvertently destroyed the relationship and sent him packing. She had to find a way to haul her mother back up again, and fast.

  After breakfast, an uneasy silence settled upon the house. Mum trudged upstairs saying she thought she was getting a migraine and was going back to bed, and Jack was plugged glassy-eyed into some game or other and would almost certainly not move a muscle until lunchtime. Izzie didn’t know what else to do other than slope back into bed herself. One family: broken, she thought. One holiday: ruined.

  Over Christmas last year she’d worked in a gift shop in town, selling ornaments and vases and little wooden signs with cheesy slogans like The Sun Might Not Be Shining But We’ve Always Got Gin! to middle-class people who had nothing better to spend their money on. There had been notices up everywhere: You break it, you pay for it and clumsy Izzie had spent every shift dreading the moment when she was sure to elbow a cocktail glass off a shelf or trip over one of the tweedy Scottie-dog doorstops and go flying straight into the bone-china dinner-service display. The phrase kept coming back to her now as if it was a command: You broke this, Izzie Hughes, you’d better damn well pay for it. But how?

  Scrolling through her phone – and deliberately not looking at any of her group-chat notifications – she saw George’s name in her list of contacts from the time when he’d picked her up from babysitting, and her finger hesitated on the screen. Should she ring him? God, no, she thought with a shudder in the next moment. He probably wouldn’t even answer anyway. Still, she could send him a message, she supposed. Tell him the whole thing was her fault, not Mum’s, and ask him to give Mum another chance.

  She grimaced, imagining her mum’s face if she discovered Izzie had gone behind her back like that, trying to patch things up. And who was she, anyway, to go poking about in other people’s relationships, when she’d never even managed to get as far as a second date herself? It was the equivalent of a child with a junior doctor’s kit attempting to perform open-heart surgery. Broken-heart surgery, more like. Still, there was no harm in saying sorry, was t
here? Maybe that was a good place to start.

  She rolled onto her front, propped herself up on her elbows and began to type. Hello. Sorry things have gone wrong. If you want someone to blame, blame me, not Mum.

  Oh God, she was cringing already. Even she could see that this sounded so dramatically teenage, so pathetic. Would it be better if she sneaked Mum’s phone from her room and pretended to be Em? Hey, Em here. My daughter is insane, but don’t let that put you off!

  Even worse. Just imagine Mum’s livid expression when she rumbled what Izzie had done – the screeches that would rip through the house. You did WHAT? For crying out loud! Haven’t you caused enough trouble? What the hell were you THINKING?

  Maybe not, on second thoughts. She valued her life too much to risk it.

  Her eye fell upon her sketchbook just then and she remembered with a pang the conversations she’d enjoyed with George about drawing, about art. There would be no more of those now. No one in her corner saying yes, of course she should go for A-level Art, she should absolutely study the things that made her happy. She remembered how George had stood up to Mum on her behalf, arguing her case, and how validated he had made her feel, as if her view counted for something after all. Let’s face it, her own dad wouldn’t do the same. ‘Art? How’s that going to lead to a decent job?’ Dom would snort, without even listening to how she felt on the matter.

  Come on, Iz. She had to get George back onside, for Mum’s sake as well as for her own conscience. For all her earlier misgivings, she didn’t want him simply to vanish from the Hughes family’s life, gone forever in a puff of cologne-tinged smoke. She opened her tin of pencils, ran a finger along them thoughtfully. Maybe there was some kind of artistic gesture she could make. A funny cartoon of her saying sorry? She probably wasn’t a good enough artist to do the situation justice, though. In fact she could offend him by drawing him badly.