Love That Lasts Forever

by Pat Barrow

  The only so-called evidence of problems was his insistence that they continued to have nightmares triggered after contact, but this was not backed up either by my observation of the children with Ceri or by discussion with them, or reports of their performance and progress at school. Without doubt, Hetty and Jonty were troubled children but that may well be generated by their confusion surrounding contact with Ceri and the mixed messages they received from Jeremy. The level of responsibility that he heaped upon them – their constant feeling that if they chose Ceri, they were disappointing or displeasing him and risked losing his love for them. Of course time with Ceri had to guarantee their safety and therefore if contact was to take place, it was better for Jeremy to at least initially retain control over those arrangements rather than risking him digging his heels in and a regime being imposed upon him by the judge. It was just possible that he would begin to see that part of the package would be that he would have to give the children genuine permission, support and encouragement to bond with Ceri and that if he didn’t, the court case would drag on until eventually the judge would run out of patience and impose his or her own solution. It was a long shot but the alternative would be to criticise and to demolish his faulty thought processes and damaging behaviour and in doing so to completely alienate myself from him. He would, as I had already surmised, dig his heels in and seek some other ‘expert’ who would – at least initially – support his blinkered view. He would assume that eventually Ceri would realise that she couldn’t win and back off. If standing up to him and challenging his views was a scary prospect for me to consider, how on earth could Hetty and Jonty be expected to do so? Of course they couldn’t, he was their dad, they loved him to bits however destructive he seemed to be.

  Chapter 12

  Carol must have met with Dad the following week. He came home on the Wednesday night and was all sweetness and light with me. He had told Carol that of course he didn’t mind me going to see Mum but he had to make sure that Carol completely understood how it had been with her. He went on ‘to know the history and how it actually was’. Carol, she assumes that Mum is genuine but ‘we all know she isn’t what she seems’. “If you’re really sure, Hetty, that you can handle this, then of course I’ll support you.” Then he added, “Carol may be taken in by Mum but we know she’s always so nice, so convincing to people when they first meet her. We have to be careful and watch out for signs of your mum beginning to lose it. If you’re not happy, you must tell me and I’m warning you, Hetty, Carol’s on Mum’s side so don’t tell Carol everything, be careful, Carol twists things so everything sounds good. She wants Mum to win this battle and she’s using you, Hetty, so watch out or it will be me, your good old dad who gets pushed out.” My head felt like it was bursting. How could all that be true – I trusted Carol, but Dad hated her just like he hated Mum. I had to be careful or he’d hate me too.

  In spite of my fears, Jonty and I had a really good time with Mum the following Saturday. Carol took us and then Mum dropped us off at the supermarket and we went home with Dad. We had sort of got used to him not really saying anything about how we had got on, just a casual ‘okay kids’ and then him telling us how he missed us and how quiet it had been. During the visit, Mum had mentioned February half term and said that she had wondered if we would like to stay over for a night and what did we think? We had been back to the house that day and that had been sort of funny, it felt like stepping back in time I suppose. Mum must have seen the look of panic that crossed my face and I guess she mistook it for me worrying about it being our old house, my old bedroom, but no it was about asking Dad. I could imagine just how he would rant and rave about us being with Mum overnight. Good old Mum, she didn’t pressurise us but instead she suggested that Jonty and I thought about it and then she would talk to Carol so that she could set it up. I worried all the way home. Then, I just took the plunge and said, “Dad, you know half term…”

  And quick as a flash Dad interrupted with, “Yes, and I’ve got a super surprise for you two. Guess what, we’re going down to the Cotswolds to stay with Uncle Paul and Aunty Zoe. We had such a great time at Christmas. I knew you’d be thrilled to bits to see your cousins again.” And that was that, a fait accompli, nothing more was said, how could I spoil Dad’s happiness?

  I bit my lip and fought back the tears. I’d really wanted to spend some time with Mum, and I guessed that Jonty did too, but at least I didn’t have to choose one or the other and I sort of breathed a sigh of relief that it was all sorted out for me. I pushed away any thoughts of it not really being fair. I knew we would have a fantastic time in the Cotswolds, we always did so much with Uncle Paul and Aunty Zoe and with our cousins there too, it would be great. I thought wistfully of the times in the past when both Mum and Dad had taken us to stay there and how super it had been. I’d only been little then and I thought that my life would never change – well how wrong I’d been. The fairy tale was over and I had no idea of what was going to happen in the future. My world was falling apart and the more I tried to patch it up, the worse it got. Carol was a real friend, but like she said she didn’t have a magic wand. Mum and Dad just couldn’t get on and I didn’t think they ever would so I’d always be like a ping pong ball in a fast game of table tennis – wham, wham, wham – just hurting and hurting.

  That night, Jonty crept into my room. “Hetty,” he said, “can I have a cuddle?” He didn’t often ask for one but looking at his earnest little face, I held back the bed covers and let him climb in. “I really think Dad’s cross ’cos we go to see Mum,” he said. He’d just started to think about how complicated our lives had become and was beginning to see what was going on with Mum and Dad. I pressed the light on and looked at that little worried frown. “Oh Hetty, I’m so scared,” he said, as his face crumbled and tears ran down his cheeks. I put my arms around him and held him tight. “It’s okay Jonty, I’ll always be here for you even when you’re a pesky little brother and you know I can’t stand you.” I stroked his hair just as Mum used to stroke mine, and his. “If we both tell Carol that we want to stay overnight at Mum’s, we’ll go there one weekend instead and we wouldn’t upset Dad by saying anything about half term.” That must have satisfied Jonty because by then, he had fallen asleep and rather than wake him up, I crept into his bed and slept there.

  Carol suggested that all three of us could talk to Dad about staying over for a weekend at Mum’s. She must have seen the look of panic cross my face. She would help us but Dad needed to hear from us that that was what we wanted to do. That was what was so special about Carol, being there with us when we needed to tell Dad something just gave us the confidence we needed. Sure enough telling Dad that Jonty and I would like to stay at Mum’s overnight for a weekend wasn’t half as difficult as I had feared. But I had not anticipated his reaction. He snorted and a look of complete surprise filled his face. “That Mum of yours, she’s just so clever, so bloody devious,” he blurted out. “She’s convinced the pair of you and you Carol, the supposed professional, that everything’s fine and that you’re quite safe, but you mark my words, she’ll get her claws into you kids, you’ll be hooked and then everything will change and she’ll be back to her old tricks again. Yes, you can stay overnight if you are prepared to risk it but I want safeguards in place. It’s up to you Carol, to convince me that those kids are going to be safe.” He stood up, his chair scraped across the kitchen tiles, he looked cross, really cross and with a shrug, he walked out of the kitchen.

  Jonty promptly burst into tears. “I want to stay with Mummy,” he bleated. I just felt scared. I didn’t know how to handle this. Carol put a reassuring hand on each of ours. She checked with us that there was nothing that we were worried about before assuring us that she would talk to Mum and to Dad and would work something out for us. She wasn’t going to leave us with that responsibility. A bit of me worried what Dad would say to me later when Carol had gone. In fact, he didn’t say anything, it was like it had never happened. That’s how Dad dealt wi
th tricky stuff; he just wiped it out. We saw Mum on alternate Saturdays and I guess that in that intervening time, Carol must have spent ages with both Mum and Dad. On the Wednesday before Mum’s weekend, she told Jonty and me that if we still wanted to, we could stay over on the Saturday night and go back home for ten o’clock the next day, but we had to phone Dad and he insisted it was dead on 7 pm and again just before we went to bed. We had to promise that if there were any problems at all that we would ring him and he would come and fetch us home. Well, that sounded simple except I knew from bitter experience that it wouldn’t be.

  Jonty and I packed an overnight bag between us and of course, Jonty wanted to take Zobo his dog, the one that he always slept with, but for some reason, Dad wouldn’t let him. “You might forget to bring him back and then what would we do on Sunday night?” he insisted.

  “I want him at Mum’s!” shouted Jonty but Dad was adamant that Zobo wasn’t going.

  Carol picked us up as usual on the Saturday morning. “I wonder if you’re both a wee bit nervous about staying over?” she said, as we drove along to the supermarket where we were meeting Mum. We were early so as we sat waiting for Mum to arrive, there was time for us to explore that with Carol.

  “I’m worried about not phoning Dad on time,” I blurted out. “Then he’ll get cross and maybe he won’t let us go again. Or he might come and force us to go home with him.” Carol explained that Mum knew the conditions that Dad had put in place and it would be up to her to be the timekeeper, not us. We didn’t have to talk to Dad for long, just simply to reassure him and tell him that we were okay. I’d had this niggling doubt that it would be tricky, it was this trying to get it right for Mum and for Dad that was just so, so difficult. It was only Carol who seemed to understand that. Mum just didn’t have a clue, and Dad, well he just assumed it would be a horrible experience for us.

  I knew that we’d have fun with Mum – we went swimming and then back home and it was Jonty’s turn to choose the evening meal. The chicken and jacket potatoes with lots of melted cheese was just what we both loved. Then we had great fun making pancakes and taking turns tossing them up to the ceiling. We had a really good time together. It was like old times – the memories I’d forgotten were coming back – happy, carefree times with Mum and Dad together except that it was now one or the other, never both of them, and I had to juggle my time and my feelings.

  Mum made sure that we had finished our evening meal well before seven o’clock so that we could ring Dad. That was easier said than done. Mum got him on her mobile and handed me the phone switched on to loudspeaker. He answered immediately. “Hi kids, how is it?” His voice sounded sort of anxious, I just clammed up and didn’t know what to say. Jonty said hello and then ran off and left me with the phone. Dad took my silence to mean that there was something wrong. He kept on repeating, “Do you want me to come and get you? Is it that bad? What’s she done? What’s she saying to you?” In the end, I just flung the phone back to Mum and ran upstairs. I could hear Mum repeatedly offering reassurance that we were all fine but clearly, Dad was taking a lot of convincing.

  Mum came up to Jonty and me afterwards. “Come on,” she said, “if you’re going to do that it makes it really difficult because your dad just doesn’t believe me when I tell him that you’re having a good time.”

  “I don’t want to talk to him when I’m here,” I said and Jonty nodded in agreement. “It’s just too difficult, can’t you see that?!” I screamed, really wound up.

  Mum said, “Yes, my love, I can see, but sadly your dad can’t and we need to help him to understand how it really is for you. Otherwise, he’s just going to go on imagining, it’s how he believes it will be, in other words, that it won’t work.” I couldn’t help it. I just started to cry. Of course that was the truth, but I just couldn’t change how Dad was. Mum put her arms around me and Jonty too and held us both tight. Although she seemed to understand how hard it was for us, it didn’t really make it any easier. I was still meant to ring Dad later that evening before we went to bed. I put a brave face on for Mum and said I’d try.

  At nine o’clock, Mum rang Dad again, she pressed loudspeaker and I immediately said, “Night, Dad.”

  Jonty shouted, “Night, Dad!” and pressed the end of call button. Mum snuggled us down into bed and switched the light out and kissed us both good night.

  It was sometime later when I heard voices from downstairs. I got out of bed and opened the door, crept on to the landing to listen. It was Mum in the lounge, talking quite loudly. She sounded agitated and I heard her emphatic ‘they’re my kids too, they’re not just yours’. I instantly knew that she was talking to my dad. I crept back into bed, buried my head in the pillow and sobbed.

  Chapter 13

  I felt deflated when I came downstairs the next day. Somehow hearing that conversation between Mum and Dad the night before had taken the joy out of the weekend with Mum. I didn’t know what I wanted any more, but why did I take it out on her? I just didn’t know but I heard myself snapping at her when she asked me what I wanted for breakfast. “Come on, Hetty, that’s not like you,” she said.

  “I don’t care, I don’t know,” I retorted. Jonty was playing on the floor with a Lego model he’d constructed and looked at me in surprise. “What are you staring at? You don’t know anything.” I snapped at him. “That toy is rubbish.” Mum tried her best to placate me but I was having none of it. I chased my cereal around in the bowl before pushing it away and saying I didn’t want it. We were due to meet Dad at twelve o’clock and it was only nine, three more hours. The day before we had talked about going swimming in the morning, but now I just seemed to drag my heels, I wanted the time to be over – to go home. The worst of it was I just didn’t know why.

  “Come on hurry up and get ready,” said Mum, “or there won’t be time.”

  “I don’t want to go swimming!” I screamed at her, “I just want to go home, I want to go back to my dad. I want to go now. I don’t want you – it’s like Dad says – you’re horrible.” The words blurted out from nowhere. Mum looked horrified, really shocked. She came over to me and put her arms around me, but I pushed her away. “I told you!” I screamed, “I want to go to my dad, why do you have to shout at him like that, why do you have to be so horrible?! He’s my dad and I love him!”

  “I know you do my dear, I know. But when you’re here. I just want us to have a good time and then you can go back and see your dad and have good times with him.” I knew Mum was talking sense but I didn’t want to listen, I couldn’t stop the turmoil in my head.

  Jonty burst into tears. “But I want to go swimming, I want to have a go on the floats and they’ll have the great monster one out. It’s not fair; Hetty always spoils everything.” It was half past ten before I had managed to get ready so there wasn’t that much time. But yes, we did go swimming and once I was in the water, I had quite a good time, a good laugh as we splashed around and for a brief spell the demons in my head were quiet. Mum always had good fun in the water with us. She was a good swimmer and she liked to dive to the bottom and tickle our feet. But of course, my fears returned when we got out of the water. I kept glancing at my watch. I was so worried that we were going to be late and knew that would make Dad cross with us as well as with Mum. It was the thought of displeasing him that upset me. I couldn’t bear to see that look of disappointment on his face. I knew Mum could tell that I was anxious; she bought us both a drink at the machine rather than going to the café as we had planned. And then, it was five to twelve and it was time to go around the corner and meet Dad on the car park. It was only a few minutes’ walk from the swimming pool. Why did Mum walk so slowly? As we walked, I suddenly felt this terrible longing to stay with Mum. I held her hand tight until we turned the corner and I saw Dad’s car. I felt a wave of panic – I couldn’t let Dad see me holding Mum’s hand, I felt like a traitor. I let Mum give me a quick kiss but then I pushed her away and ran across to Dad. I don’t know what Jonty did, I expect he gave
her a hug as well but then he followed hot on my heels. I glanced back and saw Mum standing there. She gave a little wave, but I couldn’t acknowledge it. My dad’s big arms were wrapped around me. “Oh I’ve missed you so much,” he said. “It’s been so quiet. You know I didn’t think I could manage without you.” He just heaped on the guilt that I was already bursting with. “I was so worried that you weren’t having a good time and I know Mum made it difficult for you to chat on the phone. We need to get that sorted so we can talk properly whilst you are at Mum’s, especially if you’re planning some more overnight stays.”

  Jonty blurted out, “Hetty was crying.”

  “Oh Hetty, I knew it would all be too much for you,” said Dad, as he hugged me. I couldn’t argue with him, I just couldn’t, I wanted to but the words just wouldn’t come out, so of course he interpreted my silence as confirmation that Jonty was right and I had been unhappy away from him. In the past, Dad had hardly mentioned anything about our time with Mum; he just never showed any interest. But this time, it was different, he wanted to know everything. What we had talked about, where we had slept, what time we had gone to bed, what Mum had said. Yes, he was particularly interested in that. What had Mum asked us? Was she trying to find things out? Had she asked about him? He just went on and on – I wanted him to stop, but I guess he just wanted to be sure that we were safe; well, that’s what I wanted to believe.

  It was great being back with Dad. I felt so safe with him but I had to block out all those thoughts about what it had been like with Mum because otherwise I just got so muddled up. Yes, I did miss her, I missed her like crazy, but there were all these buts and I thought my head would explode. I talked to Suzie the next morning at school. She listened as I told her all about our visit to Mum’s and how it had all got spoiled because Mum had been shouting at Dad and how lovely it was to be back with Dad and how much he’d missed us. “You know, Hetty, you can see your mum and your dad. You don’t have to choose between them.” I shook my head.