by Jess Ryder
Inside, the dining table was heaving with salads, sandwiches and bowls of crisps, which the kids were busy emptying. The kitchen was packed; wine bottles were being unscrewed and caps were snapping off beers. Someone was doing the rounds with a jug of Pimm’s. At last, there was Nick, pouring out a glass of Prosecco – my favourite drink. I rushed over and picked it up.
‘Thanks, babe,’ I said, bringing the glass straight to my lips.
‘Actually, that’s for me.’ I turned to see Hayley. Behind her, Jen was cradling Ethan, bouncing him gently and cooing into his little pink face.
‘Oh, sorry,’ I spluttered. ‘I didn’t realise …’
‘No worries,’ said Nick, instantly reaching for another glass. He waved the bottle. ‘Anyone else while I’m here?’
‘Me please, Nicky!’ nodded Jen.
‘Baby!’ shouted Emily, running over to Ethan. Jen lowered herself so that Emily could get a proper look.
‘Give your cousin a kiss,’ said Nick. Emily planted a wet splodge on Ethan’s forehead and everyone chorused aww.
‘We’ve got to get a photo,’ said Hayley, reaching for her phone.
‘Nicky – come and join us!’ cried Jen. ‘Hold her up so she can kiss Ethan again.’ Nick lifted Emily and she obligingly did it all over again to a round of applause.
‘Brilliant,’ said Hayley, taking several shots in quick succession. ‘Jen! Don’t forget your drink!’ She picked up her glass and they disappeared into the dining room, a trail of laughter floating behind them.
Nick put Emily back on the floor and she ran off, no doubt looking for the baby again. ‘Having a good time?’ he asked.
I stared glumly into my glass. ‘What do you think? It’s unbearable.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Everyone’s behaving like I don’t exist. Jen’s acting like she’s still your wife, Hayley’s ignoring me and your parents haven’t even said hello yet. They’re so rude!’
Nick gestured at me to lower my voice. ‘I’m sure it’s not deliberate. There are a lot of people here, people we haven’t seen for a long time.’
‘They probably all think I’m the nanny or something.’
‘Don’t be silly.’
‘I can’t bear it, Nick. It’s humiliating.’
‘For Jen maybe, not for you. You’re the winner, remember?’
‘I don’t feel like a winner,’ I muttered, swallowing the Prosecco so fast the bubbles burned in my nose. ‘I feel like Hayley’s done this deliberately to get at me.’
Nick rolled his eyes. ‘Now you’re being ridiculous. How much have you drunk?’
‘Not enough.’ I poured out another glass, emptying the bottle.
‘Tash, please – don’t embarrass yourself.’
‘Stop patronising me, Nick. I’m not a child.’
‘If you’re going to have a domestic, do it somewhere private, please.’ I swung round to see Hayley, back for a top-up, looking like the proverbial cat who’d got the cream.
‘We’re not having a domestic,’ said Nick, pushing past her and going into the dining room.
‘Oh dear, did I touch a nerve?’ Hayley arched her eyebrows at me.
I knew it was stupid to respond, but I could feel the alcohol taking over. ‘I just don’t think it works, inviting Jen to these kinds of events,’ I said.
She gave me a snarky smile. ‘Good job I did, otherwise you’d have been stuck for transport.’
‘I didn’t want a lift from her. I wanted to take the train.’
‘Either way, it doesn’t matter, sweetie. It’s my party.’
‘Yes, well, next time maybe it’ll be better if we don’t come.’
‘Yes, well, next time,’ she said, mimicking my voice, ‘maybe it’ll be better if you don’t.’
‘Fine. But Nick won’t come without me.’ I took a defiant sip of Prosecco.
‘Don’t be so sure. He’s very loyal to his family, and anyway, we won’t let you take him away from us.’
I looked at her, sharply. ‘What are you talking about?’
‘We all know what you’re up to,’ she smirked. ‘My brother likes us to think he’s a tough guy, but he’s always been gullible.’
I gave her a cold stare. ‘What do you mean?’
Hayley grabbed my sleeve and pulled me to one side. ‘Nick and Jen tried for years to have a child – he was the one with the problem, not her. Slow sperm.’ She paused, taking in the shocked expression on my face. ‘Don’t pretend you didn’t know.’
A memory flashed across my brain. Sitting on the bench in the park, giving Nick the news. It’s a miracle. I’m going to be a father. So that was what he’d meant by those words. If what Hayley was saying was true, Nick had lied to me about why he and Jen didn’t have kids, but I instantly forgave him.
‘Nick can’t have been the problem,’ I said eventually. ‘Emily’s the proof of that.’
‘You can’t pull the wool over our eyes, Natasha,’ Hayley replied, keeping her hand on my arm. ‘Emily’s a lovely little girl, but she doesn’t look anything like him, does she?’
Her words ripped into me, flooding me with anger. ‘Nick is her father. I swear on her life.’
‘You wanted his money and you knew exactly how to get it.’
‘That’s not true! I love Nick, I would never, ever do that to him.’
But Hayley carried on as if I hadn’t spoken. ‘He believed you because he wanted to believe you. He’s very vulnerable when it comes to his virility. Jen understands that. That’s why she didn’t put up a fight when he left. She was devastated, but she wanted him to be happy. It’s like that song … how does it go? If you love somebody, set them free.’
‘Oh, fuck off.’
She lowered her voice to a menacing whisper. ‘How dare you swear at me in my own house, you little slut.’
‘Everything okay?’ It was Nick.
‘No, it’s not,’ I said, glaring at Hayley. ‘We’re going home. Now.’
‘What? That’s crazy … Hayley? What’s been going on?’
Hayley pursed her lips. ‘I think she’s a bit pissed.’
‘I’m not pissed! I’m furious!’ I marched into the sitting room, looking for Emily. She was sitting on her grandma’s lap, being fed chocolates. There was no way I could retrieve her without causing another scene. I went back to Nick. ‘Fetch Emily, please. I’ll call a taxi.’
‘Calm down, Tash. This is supposed to be a happy occasion and you’re spoiling things.’
‘Not me. Your sister. She insulted me.’ I started searching for the nearest taxi firm on my phone.
‘We can’t leave now,’ he pleaded. ‘I haven’t seen my family in ages. Emily’s having a lovely time; she hardly ever sees her grandparents. It’s not fair …’
I hesitated, my finger poised over the screen, ready to dial. If Nick wouldn’t come with me, what was I going to do? Leave on my own? I was desperate to get away from them, but wasn’t that exactly what they wanted? Hayley had set out deliberately to cause an argument, and like an idiot, I’d risen to the bait. What a bitch. She must have made up all that stuff about Nick’s infertility. If it were true, he would have told me. We shared all our secrets, all our hopes and fears. Nick had never expressed the slightest doubt that Emily was his, even though – it was true – she didn’t look at all like him.
‘Okay,’ I said, putting my phone away. ‘We’ll stay. But have a word with Jen, will you? That’s her second glass of fizz. We don’t want her driving us back over the limit. Not with Emily on board.’
‘No, you’re right.’ Nick bit his lip. ‘I’ll talk to her.’ He put his hands on my shoulders and kissed the top of my head. ‘Thanks, babe, this means a lot to me. Love you.’
‘Yeah, love you too,’ I said, grumpily. He went over to Jen and pulled her gently to one side. I watched the two of them talking – there was still a connection between them; it was obvious from the way they stood so close to each other. If it was true that Nick had been unable to gi
ve her a child, why hadn’t he told me before?
8
Then
Natasha
* * *
Sam started working as our driver the following week. Despite my misgivings, I liked him from the beginning. He was about my age, in his mid-twenties. Ordinary-looking, of average build and height, with short mousy hair and rather generic features. Months later, when I tried to describe him, I couldn’t remember the shape of his face or the length of his nose or even the colour of his eyes. He’d already blurred in my memory. But I will never forget his voice – warm, with a slight crack in it, and soft northern vowels.
‘Anything I can do, Mrs Warrington, just whack us a text, all right?’
It took a week to get him to call me by my first name. He was always there by 7.30 a.m., in black jeans and a black padded bomber jacket, sipping a takeaway coffee while he waited for Nick to emerge. He’d drive him to the office in west London, then if he wasn’t needed until the end of the day, he’d come back to help me. He refused to come into the house, preferring to sit in the Range Rover on the driveway with the door wide open. It was a boring life, I thought. While he was waiting for jobs, he’d sit there for hours, listening to the sports news on Radio Five Live and playing with his phone. I’d bring him out a cup of tea and he’d tell me I was ‘a star’.
Often there was nothing I needed him for, which made me feel awkward. We had our groceries delivered, and if I ran out of milk or bread, there was a Little Waitrose round the corner. Emily’s nursery, where she went three mornings a week, was twenty minutes’ walk away, and I enjoyed taking her there in the buggy for the exercise and fresh air. I didn’t have a job, so there was no need for her to go to nursery, but Nick thought it was important for her to socialise with other children. The situation was almost comical. I spent most of the day indoors, twiddling my thumbs, and Sam spent most of it on the driveway, twiddling his. I started to feel like I was a prisoner and he was guarding me. Or maybe it was the other way round …
The weather had been fine for weeks, but today it was raining hard. Sam had shut the car door and all the windows were misted up. I was looking out of the sitting room window, wondering whether the downpour was going to subside in time for me to collect Emily from nursery. The skies were lead grey and the rain was falling in metal sheets. I picked up my phone and texted Sam, as per the system. Ridiculous, given that he was right there, but …
Please can you take me to Small Wonders? 5 mins. Thanks.
He replied immediately – No probs – and I heard him start up the engine.
I slapped on some lipstick and dragged a brush through my hair. The nursery mums were very competitive about their appearance – the required look was casual, yet perfect. They were competitive about their little darlings’ development, too. ‘Mabel reached her hundredth word this weekend’; ‘Arthur is virtually tying his own shoelaces now’. Most of them were in their thirties; I was the youngest by several years. They assumed I was the au pair and were amazed that I was English.
I set the alarm, dashed out of the house and jumped into the passenger seat, shutting out the rain. ‘Thank God you were here, Sam.’ I pulled my seat belt across and snapped it in place.
‘Do you live locally?’ I asked as we pulled away. It was a stupid thing to say and I instantly regretted it. As if someone on a driver’s wage could live around here.
Sam laughed. ‘Nah, I live out east, but I’m from the Midlands originally.’ He didn’t elaborate, and now I felt awkward about probing further. I sensed that he didn’t want to talk about himself and wondered if he was holding in some tragic secret. He smiled a lot, but he didn’t fool me. There was a deep sadness at the core of him, I could sense it. At least, I thought I could. Now I realise I was using him as a mirror – I thought I was looking at him, but I was gazing at my own reflection. That’s why I can’t remember his face.
We arrived at the nursery within a few minutes. Sam hoisted the Range Rover onto the pavement while I made a dash for it through the rain. Emily came running out to meet me, shouting, ‘Mama, Mama,’ and throwing herself around my legs. I untangled us, then scooped her into my arms.
‘Guess who’s waiting in the car?’ I said.
‘Dada!’
‘No, not Dada, not today. It’s Sam! Remember Sam?’
She gave me a puzzled look, then broke into a huge grin. ‘Sam! Nee-naw! Nee-naw!’
‘Ah, you’re thinking of Fireman Sam,’ I replied. It was one of her favourite television programmes. I glanced around, hoping none of the other mums had heard. Under-threes watching telly was generally frowned upon: something to do with impeding the development of the left brain – or was it the right?
When I told Sam that Emily thought he was a cartoon character, he chuckled loudly. She chanted nee-naw all the way home and he joined in, singing the theme song and shouting, ‘Oh no, there’s a cat stuck up a tree in Pontypandy!’ He seemed to know all about Fireman Sam and I wondered whether he had kids of his own. But I didn’t ask, and he didn’t offer any information.
‘Come inside and have some lunch with us,’ I said as we arrived home.
He hesitated, then shook his head. ‘Thanks, but I’m okay.’ He got out and put up an umbrella, holding it over me while I unbuckled Emily from her seat. ‘I go to the greasy spoon next to the Tube station; they do all-day breakfasts.’
I lifted Emily out and he sheltered us until we reached the porch. ‘I can do eggs and bacon, if that’s what you’re after. Baked beans? A mug of strong tea?’ I realised I was starting to sound desperate. I wanted his company – any company, if I was honest. A long afternoon awaited me. After lunch, Emily would go down for her usual nap and I would have nothing to do.
‘It’s very kind of you, Mrs … I mean, Natasha,’ said Sam, ‘but I’m going to take my break now, if that’s okay. The boss wants me to pick him up at three.’
‘Of course. I’m sorry, I didn’t mean … No, no, you must take a break.’ Sam’s days weren’t arduous, but they were long; he often didn’t drop Nick back home until gone eight p.m. Then he had to make his way to his own place, wherever that was. Was someone waiting for him there? A wife or girlfriend, a boyfriend even? I didn’t know why I was so curious about him.
* * *
It had been months since I’d seen Mum, and although we nearly always fell out when we met, I was missing her. As so often with single parents and only children, our relationship had always been intense. She had a deep mistrust of the male species and seemed convinced that women were better off without them. For her, love was a dangerous business, to be conducted with extreme caution. When I told her that I was pregnant and marrying Nick as soon as his divorce came through, she reacted as if I was about to climb Kilimanjaro in high heels.
‘You stupid, stupid, fool,’ she said. ‘Throwing away your life …’
Mum declared that I no longer needed her now that I had a ‘rich sugar daddy’ to look after me. She refused to answer my calls and texts and wouldn’t come to my wedding. I was starting to think our rift was permanent, but when Emily was born I emailed her a photo, and within hours she was at my bedside, cooing over her granddaughter. But she wouldn’t have anything to do with Nick and never came to the house.
I decided it was time to pay her a visit. I didn’t want to roll up in the Range Rover with Sam at the wheel, but getting to her via public transport was awkward. It made perfect sense for Sam to take us, and as Nick was away on business, he had plenty of free time.
‘Is this where you grew up, then?’ Sam asked as we drove onto the council estate – rows of sixties terraced houses with small windows and white cladding that always seemed to need painting.
‘Yes,’ I said. ‘Surprised?’
He nodded. ‘It’s a bit of a contrast.’
‘You can say that again.’
I asked him to park around the corner, out of sight. Emily had fallen asleep on the journey, but she woke up as soon as I unbuckled the straps of her seat.
‘Um … about three? I’ll text you when I want to leave. Is that okay?’
* * *
‘I mean, honestly, Natasha, what did you expect?’ said Mum when I told her what had happened at the christening. ‘They see you as the home-wrecker. You chucked Jen out of her own house, for Christ’s sake. No wonder they all hate you. I bloody would.’
Thanks for the support, I thought, but I didn’t say anything, just dunked a biscuit into my tea, popping it in my mouth before it disintegrated.
‘But it’s worse than that, Mum. Hayley asked Jen to be godmother to get at me, I know it. And now she’s saying Nick can’t be Emily’s father because he’s got slow sperm. Nick told me he and Jen hadn’t wanted kids, but according to Hayley, they were trying to conceive for years. She could easily be lying, but then again …’ My voice wandered off into a no-man’s-land.
Mum screwed up her face. ‘Are you a hundred per cent sure Nick’s the father?’
‘Mum!’ I glanced across the room to Emily. Obviously she was too young to understand, but I still didn’t want her to hear those words. She’d been given some saucepans and was banging them with a wooden spoon. ‘Of course he is! How could you say such a thing?’
‘Well, I don’t know, do I?’ she muttered. ‘You didn’t mind having sex with a married man; who knows what else you were doing?’ I decided not to remind her that she was an unmarried mother herself. My father was never discussed; he was such an anonymous figure, he might as well have been a sperm donor, although I’d long suspected he’d been married to someone else.
I lowered my voice. ‘It wasn’t like that, it wasn’t about the sex. We couldn’t help ourselves. We fell in love.’
‘Love …’ she echoed, as if its existence was as likely as life on Mars.
‘Honestly, Mum, we’re very happy.’
