by Lucy Diamond
Her words simply rolled off him. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said once more. ‘It’s all happened really quickly, I’ve been trying to find the right time to tell you, but . . .’
‘But guess what, there isn’t a right time to tell your wife that you’ve been sacked, you’re having an affair with a student and you’re leaving her and your children while you hop over the border to set up a love-nest. Strange, that. You would have thought it would be so easy, too.’ Her sarcasm gave way to rage suddenly, sheer boiling rage that John could do this, wreck everything on such a stupid, selfish whim, and that she was a mere afterthought. ‘And your brothers know all about it, I’m guessing,’ she added, remembering his lying alibis of recent days. Her cheeks burned with the humiliation. ‘Does everyone else know, then? Been having a good old laugh behind my back? God, John!’ Her voice rose to a shout. ‘Come on! Do you really think this is a good idea? I mean, seriously? Genuinely?’
He sat in silence for a moment and she felt a brief flare of hope that he was about to come to his senses at last, see reason and apologize. But then he rose to his feet. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said again. ‘I can see you’re upset. But I know how I feel. And I’ve been given a chance at something amazing, with Naomi. I’d be mad to turn it down.’
Robyn’s mouth fell open, but nothing came out. She seemed to have run out of words, used up all her arguments.
‘So I’m just going to go, okay?’ he said, somewhat apprehensively. ‘And then we can talk in a week or so. Decide what we’re going to do about the kids, and everything.’
Oh, now he mentions the kids. Now that he’s about to walk out the door, he finally thinks about the kids, Robyn fumed. How dare he treat them – and her – like non-priorities? How dare he? ‘I can’t listen to this any longer,’ she said shakily. ‘You go and live out your deluded little fantasy in Edinburgh, if you must. But do me a favour and don’t bother crawling back here when it all ends in tears.’ She stared at him, hating him, but still desperately hoping that he would change his mind.
He didn’t, though. He merely gave her a sorrowful look, raised his hands in an All right – calm down! sort of gesture and walked out of the room. Then, as she sat there, dumbfounded, she heard the front door close and she knew that he’d walked out of the house, too.
He’d come back, Robyn said fiercely to herself as his car started up outside. Of course he would. This was his home, this was his family, this was where he belonged!
Her heart started banging as panic set in. But what if he didn’t? she thought fearfully. What if he didn’t come back, what if he genuinely meant all those crazy things he’d said and their marriage was over? Her breath rasped shallow and fast, her head began to ache with all the terrible questions that were swirling there. Was it really the end? How was she going to explain this to the children? How ever would she cope?
Mum, what would you do? Frankie thought that evening, washing up the dinner things as a quiet, anxious mood settled upon her. She and Craig had been to see their solicitor today, who had strongly advised mediation as a first step, but Craig seemed adamant that he wouldn’t go along with anything Julia wanted, claiming that he’d rather go straight to court to settle the issue. Frankie, who disagreed with him, had been left feeling helpless, as if her opinion counted for nothing.
Her mum had always been so brilliant at talking through a thorny problem, she remembered with a pang: listening carefully and weighing up the balance, before offering practical suggestions and advice. Sure, Frankie had friends she could talk to about the Julia situation, but they were Craig’s friends too, and it would have felt disloyal, confessing her private thoughts to them. She had her stepdad, Gareth, but he was living out his retirement in Spain and always seemed to be in some bar or other when she called, the sports channel blaring in the background. Plus, his advice tended to be ‘Chin up, love, it’ll be all right’, which, although cheering, wasn’t exactly specific.
This was the downside of having a small family, she mused, rinsing a saucepan: not enough people to turn to in a crisis. You always wanted a brother or a sister, didn’t you? her mum had written in that final letter, and Frankie thought guiltily again of her dad, Harry Mortimer, and those four mystery half-siblings, who might hate her now. She still hadn’t managed to write any kind of letter herself, what with all the drama of Julia’s arrival. Oh, hi there, Mortimer gang, I’m Frankie. Christ, it’s a nightmare when someone bursts into your happy family unannounced and stirs everything up, isn’t it? Sorry, guys. Any advice, by the way?
Scrubbing at the burned-on cheesy sauce bits around the rim of the lasagne dish, she thought about Julia and Fergus and Craig, and the seemingly impossible tangle they were in. What would her mum have said about it, had she still been around to advise? Frankie had the strong feeling she’d have been more generous to Julia, for starters. Kathy had been a staunch supporter of women in general – when Frankie was growing up, there was always a steady stream of her female friends dropping by for tea and sympathy, and sometimes even a place to stay when the going got tough. If Kathy was alive now, Frankie was sure she wouldn’t have been so quick to cast Julia as the villain of the piece; she’d have responded with compassion rather than fear. ‘Poor woman,’ Frankie could imagine her saying. ‘Sounds like she’s had a rough time. Why does Craig think he has to punish her for it? Why can’t he give her a break?’
Why indeed? Frankie thought, putting the dish upside down on the draining board. In her position, her mum might even have gone behind Craig’s back, telephoned Julia, tried to sort it out, woman-to-woman. Knowing Kathy, she’d have talked her round as well; they’d have come up with a plan that suited everyone, before popping open a bottle of wine and drinking to the future. But Frankie was not so bold and brave as her mother had been. Was she?
She washed up the last saucepan and gave the salad bowl a rinse, still thinking. She could hear Fergus giggling hysterically from the bathroom where Craig was giving him a bath, and felt her heart soften for them both. She remembered one of the first columns Craig had ever written about Fergus, which had essentially been a love-letter, a promise: I will never let you down, son, he had written. I am on your side, fighting your corner, come what may.
She knew, at heart, that this was why he was puffing up like a cobra whenever Julia’s name was mentioned, because of his deep-rooted instinct to protect his child, to keep him safe. Craig was a good person, he believed he was doing the right thing here – but somehow his actions were coming across as aggressive rather than kind. Whatever happened next in this saga, however she and Craig negotiated with Julia, they had to keep remembering that this was about Fergus, the small, exuberant person they all adored. They had to act out of love, in other words, rather than from misguided vengeance or rivalry. But could she make Craig see this, before they found themselves trading insults in a courtroom and making everything a hundred times worse? Or was he too blinded by his own convictions to listen?
Chapter Twenty
When Work Means It’s Love-All
Craig Jacobs, 41, and Frankie Carlyle, 34, are the real-life couple behind the hugely successful ‘Dad About the House’ column – a genuine happy-ever-after tale that has captured the hearts of readers everywhere. The pair of them live in west London with Craig’s young son Fergus, the co-star of the columns. So how did the story begin?
FRANKIE: As a freelance artist, it’s rare that I get to meet the writers whose work I illustrate, but in Craig’s case I felt as if I knew him from the first few paragraphs. There’s something so honest about his work, and his writing is so witty and moving, that I very quickly gained a sense of the real person behind the page and found myself eagerly awaiting the latest instalment of his column. Like the rest of the country, I was willing him and Fergus on, cheering every achievement – as well as sympathizing through each setback. Then came the newspaper’s Christmas party, and I couldn’t help crossing the room to introduce myself. I think my opening gambit to him was something really cheesy like �
�I’m such a fan of your work’, which I now realize he gets a lot, but once I introduced myself and we began talking, it turned out that he was a fan of my work, too. And—
Harry was blinking as if he couldn’t take in any more of the words on Paula’s iPad screen. ‘And it’s really her?’ he said faintly, his eyes full of tears. ‘She’s . . . the same Frankie?’
‘Well, you tell me,’ Paula said. ‘I mean, I’ve only seen photos of her. You’re the one who actually met her.’
They were sitting in the airport car park, his suitcase in the back of Paula’s car, a printed boarding pass and his passport in a plastic wallet by his feet. At long last Harry Mortimer was ready to catch his flight to Madeira and, without wanting to sound unkind, it had not come a moment too soon for his long-suffering daughter. Much as Paula loved her dad, he was not the easiest of house-guests, she had discovered. It hadn’t once occurred to him, for instance, to fill the dishwasher or clean up after himself – well, until Paula blew her top the night before, that was. ‘No wonder Mum has extended her holiday several times over!’ she’d snapped, having come home after a long day’s work to find the house a tip and the clean, wet laundry still in the washing machine, where it had been all day, Harry not having thought to hang it out. ‘Dad, if you’re going to make things work with Mum, you could do worse than mucking in a bit around the house, you know.’
They’d made up soon enough – Paula had a quick temper and had apologized for her outburst almost immediately, and then he’d apologized too, quite humbly, for his domestic failings. All the same, she’d been so exasperated that she’d quite forgotten to show him the Guardian article featuring Frankie that Fliss had sent her – until now, the next day. Having arrived at the airport with time to spare before Harry could check in, Paula had belatedly remembered, and looked up the feature on her iPad for him to see.
‘My goodness me,’ he said, biting his lip. He gave a shaky little laugh. ‘This is very strange. Reading about my own daughter on a website. Seeing her, almost for the first time, as a grown woman. A successful woman, too.’ He blinked several times more, seemingly overcome.
‘I know,’ said Paula. ‘I did some Googling, and she’s done all kinds of other work as well – greetings cards and stuff, it’s all really good. She’s talented.’ Hopefully not too talented that she wouldn’t want to know provincial estate agent Paula, she had found herself thinking the night before, as she pored over Frankie’s online portfolio. Was it awful that she had felt the tiniest stabbings of envy, the faintest prickles of inferiority? ‘Obviously gets it from her mum,’ she joked, nudging Harry in the hope of lightening the mood, and was rewarded by a small smile from him. Then she hesitated before adding, ‘I guess the big question now is: do you want me to try and get in touch with her while you’re away? I mean . . . I’d like to, but Mum was pretty clear about how she felt. I don’t want to tread on any toes, if you’d rather not go there.’
Harry was still staring at the picture of Frankie onscreen. She looked happy and pretty, as if life had been good to her over the years. As if she’d done just fine without the Mortimers, thank you very much. For all Paula knew, she already had a whole melange of siblings and cousins and other relatives anyway, possibly all high-fliers in London, like her.
‘I would like to see her again,’ Harry replied. ‘And don’t you worry about your mum. I’m going to sort everything out on that front.’ He glanced at his watch. ‘Talking of which, I’d better make tracks.’ He handed the iPad back to Paula after one last glance. ‘Thanks, lovey,’ he said. ‘Thanks for finding her. And for being so understanding.’ His eyes were still a bit moist as he smiled fondly at her. ‘A brand-new daughter is all very exciting, but my golly, I’m glad I’ve already got a daughter like you. Aren’t I the lucky one?’
That evening, at around the same time that Harry’s plane touched down, rather bumpily, in Funchal, Alison was making a similarly hopeful, if slightly apprehensive journey of her own, past the golf course and over the River Nidd into Knaresborough. Despite her previous dating disaster, she had decided to give Silver and Single one more chance, just to prove that she wasn’t a quitter; and so here she was now, singing along to Glen Campbell on the radio as she headed towards the car park. Moments later, she reversed into a space and took a last critical check of herself in the rear-view mirror. Was this the face of a woman about to be swept off her feet, about to capture a new man’s heart?
Well, her hair looked good, for starters: shiny and bouncy after a wash and blow-dry, plus some of her favourite finishing spray, which smelled almost as nice as perfume, in Alison’s opinion. Her make-up still appeared dewy and she had bothered to use lip-liner for once, so as to avoid her lipstick bleeding out into the lines around her mouth. Meanwhile her eyelids gleamed with a frosted caramel eyeshadow that really accentuated her hazel eyes. Not bad, in short, even if she said so herself.
And okay, so driving here instead of getting the bus over meant that she wouldn’t be able to drink more than one small glass of wine to keep the nerves at bay, but it also meant that she could escape quickly, if need be. So she was all set. Now she just needed to get out of the car and meet this hunk of burning love that Silver and Single had sent her way. Hopefully there would be cartoon hearts flashing in her eyes within minutes.
Tonight’s date was called Alastair Kirk. He was sixty-two (a younger man!), a retired veterinary surgeon and, with a bit of luck, would be so interesting and amusing and handsome that the evening would fly by. (Alastair and Alison – come on, they even sounded good as a couple. She’d already planned to make a joke of saying, ‘You can call me Al’, like the Paul Simon song, as an ice-breaker. Hopefully he would get the reference and find her witty rather than weird. Hmm. Maybe she wouldn’t mention it after all.)
She got out of the car, tugged her dress down where it had stuck to her legs and set off. Even if Alastair Kirk didn’t turn out to be Mr Wonderful, she hoped the evening would be worth missing her favourite TV quiz for, at least. Second time lucky?
He was waiting at a table in the pub for her with a glass of red wine and noticed her immediately, standing up with a little wave. First impressions: quite handsome, tall and slim with neat hair, well cut. He was clearly attentive, punctual and friendly, she thought, crossing the room towards him, a nervous smile plastered in place. All good things about a man. But then as they introduced each other and he went to buy her a drink, she noticed that he seemed to have brought several full carrier bags with him, clustered by the foot of the table. Had he been shopping prior to meeting her? she wondered, frowning and taking a surreptitious look. One bag appeared to be full of clothes, she saw. Another was stuffed with tins of food, and a third contained a variety of objects: a pair of knackered old trainers, a book, a folder of papers and . . . was that a toothbrush sticking out?
Not shopping, then, she thought, disconcerted and biting her lip. He appeared to have brought along a collection of belongings with him. She glanced over to the bar, where he was making the barmaid laugh about something. He seemed charming enough, but did he actually have anywhere to live? she wondered. He wasn’t hoping to cadge a bed at her place when the night came to a close, was he?
‘Excuse the bags!’ he cried in a jovial voice, as he returned with her glass of wine, presumably noticing her staring quizzically at them. He was well spoken and well presented too, clean-shaven, with a smart striped shirt and dark trousers, cufflinks glinting at his wrists. ‘I’m between houses at the moment, camping out with friends. I appreciate this makes me look rather like a vagrant, but it’s just a temporary setback. Not a down-and-out just yet, ha!’
‘Ahh,’ Alison said, smiling politely. ‘That must be frustrating. When will you be able to move into your new place?’
‘It’s rather a long story,’ he replied, sitting down opposite her, ‘and something of a tedious one, unfortunately. In a nutshell: blame the ex-wife!’ He gave a loud laugh that didn’t sound remotely genuine, and Alison heard a warning bel
l jangle in her head. Oh dear. No home, an ongoing feud with his ex . . . First impressions could be misleading, sure, but she had a strong feeling that here was another man who was not at all ready to be out in the dating world, when there was clearly so much baggage in his life. And no, she didn’t mean the three very full Morrisons bags slumped against his ankles. (Honestly, though, why were these men so desperate to get back out there? Why couldn’t they wait thirty or so years, like she had? At this rate, she would be waiting another thirty before she met anyone remotely suitable.)
At least the food was meant to be good here, she consoled herself, studying the menu. Now, what to choose – haddock or scampi? Steak? Ooh – someone on the next table had a burger, which looked nice and juicy, she noticed. Although burgers could be very messy to eat, couldn’t they? She didn’t want to be getting ketchup all over her fingers and embarrassing herself. Forget the burger.
‘Is that your phone ringing?’ Alastair asked after a moment.
‘Sorry, what?’ she asked, lost in her thoughts. ‘My phone! Yes. Thank you, it is.’ She reached down and took it from her bag – Robyn, she saw on the screen. With an apologetic grimace at her daughter’s name, she sent the call to voicemail, not wanting Robyn to know what she was doing. You’re on a date? Cool! she imagined the response, practically breathless with enthusiasm. How’s it going? Is he nice-looking? Text me a sneaky photo!
Alastair was watching her as she put the phone away. ‘I saw that look,’ he commented. ‘Don’t tell me – that’s your ex ringing up. Mine always picks the worst moment too.’
Ah, there she was – the ex, popping up at the table once again. Come on, love, pull up a chair if you’re going to be with us for the whole evening, Alison thought, trying not to show her irritation. ‘Actually my ex is dead,’ she said, turning back to the menu. ‘It was a long time ago,’ she added quickly, in case she’d made him feel awkward. People always felt they had to say sorry when you told them your other half had died, and then they’d give you that sad, worried face, and you could tell they were wondering if you were about to burst into tears.
