by Louise Hall
Cate nodded, “I’m so sorry. I know it must have brought things back.”
Tears pricked the corners of Jean’s beautiful blue eyes. She wrapped her fingers around the necklace she always wore, which held Eamon’s wedding ring. “I think about him every single day, sweetheart, there’s nothing new there. You have nothing to apologise for, absolutely nothing.”
“But they said I…”
“I’ve known you since you were a tiny baby, Cate. I’ve watched you grow up into a beautiful young woman. You’re everything I could want in a daughter-in-law; I’ve never once doubted the trueness of your love for my son.”
Cate felt tears pricking at the corners of her eyes, “I’m sorry.”
“Mummy,” Lola came charging in, carrying a bundle of towels. “Can I do it?” Cate lifted Lola up on to her knee and she set to work drying Cate’s hair.
They had just got back home when the doorbell rang. “I want to answer it,” Lola yelled. She dropped her stuff on the floor and ran towards the front door.
“No,” Cate said, “we don’t know who it is.”
“Yes,” Lola reached for the door handle.
“I said no,” Cate stepped between Lola and the door. “Pick your stuff up off the floor.”
As Cate turned around to unlock the door, she felt Lola’s hands grab on to her ankles. “Mummy, I want to answer it.”
The doorbell rang again.
“Lola, I said no. Get up off the floor.”
Lola didn’t listen. She wriggled closer so that her arms were wrapped tightly around Cate’s ankles, which meant that Cate had to manoeuvre very carefully to be able to open the front door.
“Fine,” Cate said, losing her temper a little. “But if I stand on you, it’s your own fault.”
She opened the front door and it was a delivery man. “Hi,” Cate said brightly, trying hard not to look flustered.
“I’ve got a delivery for Cate Warner.”
“That’s me.”
“Sign here,” he said, thrusting a clipboard and pen in front of her. After she handed them back, he went to his truck and came back with a huge bouquet of flowers.
Cate took them from him and brought them close to her face. They were gorgeous and so sweet-smelling. She could see freesias, which were her favourite flower. Her heart lifted a little as she thought maybe Kian had sent them. He’d never sent her flowers before.
As she closed the front door, she noticed that there was a card attached to the stalks. She opened it and the disappointment took her breath away. The flowers weren’t from Kian. They were from Lauren. She must have seen The Story and wanted Cate to know that she was thinking of her and Lola.
She struggled down the hallway from the front door to the kitchen with Lola still holding on to her ankles.
“Lola, you need to get up,” Cate said, trying not to shout. “I mean it, get up right this second.”
Lola looked up at her Mum and stuck her tongue out.
Cate laid the flowers down carefully on the kitchen table and bent down to where Lola was lying on the kitchen floor.
“Enough,” she said, prising her little hands from around her ankles. “Go and pick up your stuff from the hallway before someone trips over it.”
“Now,” Cate said sharply. Lola quickly got up off the floor and ran down the hall.
Cate looked in the kitchen cupboards for a vase for the flowers. She couldn’t find one. Then she looked in the cupboard above the oven. She opened the door and there on the top shelf was a vase. It was a stretch to reach the top shelf but she was impatient and didn’t want to go and get the small ladders so she reached up as high as she could standing on her tiptoes and was able to reach the base of the vase with her fingertips. She gradually nudged it forward until it was just a fingertip away from where she would be able to pick it up.
She was almost there when Lola suddenly came running into the kitchen, “Mummy, look.”
Cate turned for a second to look at Lola and suddenly the vase was off the shelf and heading for the kitchen floor.
“Lola, get back,” Cate screamed, which made Lola start crying.
As the vase hit the kitchen floor, Cate threw herself on top of it, to stop the glass flying up and hitting Lola. She put her hands out to save herself but they slipped and the whole of her upper body fell on top of the smashed vase.
She didn’t feel any pain at first. She turned her head to check on her daughter, “Lola honey, are you okay?”
Lola was stood on the threshold of the kitchen, she was still crying but she didn’t look hurt, which was a relief.
Cate lifted herself up a little and when she looked down at the floor, she noticed that there was a lot of red on the floor, mixed in with all the glass. She looked down at herself and her chest and arms were covered in blood. That was when she started to feel pain.
“Honey, can you go in the lounge for me?” Cate asked, trying to keep her voice soft. “Not through here, use the other door. Mummy needs to clean this up.”
As she put her hands down to push herself up off the floor, she felt sharp pains in both of her hands. She turned her palms over and looked at them. There were lots of little shards of glass digging into the palms of her hand but it was her wrists that really drew her attention. From what she could tell, they must have taken most of the impact. There were bigger pieces of glass in there and that was where most of the blood was coming from. Cate knew straight away that this was serious.
She tried to stand up but felt light-headed. She would have to start cleaning up from right here on the floor. She gritted her teeth and began pulling out the more obvious pieces of glass from her wrists. It hurt like a bitch and made her wrists bleed even more without the glass to cork the blood flow. She grabbed the dish towel from the side of the sink and pressed down, trying to stop the bleeding. The towel immediately turned red with blood and she was starting to feel dizzy.
She didn’t want Lola to panic but was just about to call her and ask if she could bring her phone when Irene came home. Cate had never been more relieved to see her Mum.
“Hello, anybody home?” Irene called, hanging her coat up on the hook.
“In here,” Cate said, her voice sounded weak.
“Hey,” Irene said, cheerfully. When she saw Cate sat on the floor covered in blood, surrounded by glass, the smile dropped from her face. “My God, what happened?”
Cate lifted up her wrists, “I can’t stop the bleeding.”
“Okay,” Irene gulped. “Okay, let me have a look.”
Irene knelt down on the floor and removed the towel from Cate’s wrists. “Wow, we need to take you to A&E.”
“No,” Cate shook her head. “People will think I did this on purpose.”
Irene stopped and looked at her for a second, “you didn’t, did you?”
“No,” Cate said. “No, I promise.”
She suddenly felt really sleepy. “I’m going to close my eyes for a second.”
“No,” Irene said, slapping her face. “Come on, let’s get you up off this floor.”
Irene lifted her up and sat her on one of the chairs at the kitchen table. She put on the kitchen light and her glasses and using tweezers, she removed all of the shards of glass that she could see embedded in Cate’s wrists. Then Irene went and got the medicine box and after wiping her wrists with TCP, she wrapped them up in thick, white bandages.
After she’d finished, she said, “are you hurt anywhere else?”
Cate looked down at her hands and chest, which were covered in lots of little cuts. “I’ll do the rest, thanks Mum.”
“I’m just glad my last meeting got cancelled. I dread to think what would have happened if I hadn’t come home.”
Cate got up slowly from the kitchen table.
“Where are you going?” Irene asked.
“To get the dustpan and brush and the mop, I need to clean this up.”
“No,” Irene said. “I’ll do it. You go and sit in the lounge with your daugh
ter.”
“I can’t see Lo like this, I’ll give her nightmares for weeks,” Cate looked down at herself covered in blood.
“Fine, take off your clothes and put these on,” Irene said, handing her a jumper and some pyjama bottoms from the laundry basket.
“I can’t get changed here,” Cate said wide-eyed.
“Cate, just do it, okay,” Irene said, looking tired. “It’s nothing I haven’t seen before, I gave birth to you remember?”
Cate got changed and went in to the lounge, where Lola was sitting quietly watching TV. “Are you okay, sweetie?” Cate asked, sitting down beside her.
“Mummy hurt?” Lola asked, looking really scared.
“Mummy’s fine,” Cate lied. “Come here, it’s okay.”
CHAPTER 17
On Monday morning, before she left for work, Irene put fresh bandages on Cate’s wrists. The cuts were deep and angry, stark red against her pale skin. “Tell me again you didn’t do this on purpose?”
“Geez Mum,” Cate hissed, “of course I didn’t. I’ve told you a thousand times, I fell.”
“I’m worried about you,” Irene said. “Denial is a nice place to visit but you can’t live there forever.”
“I’m not in denial,” Cate huffed. “I know exactly what Kian did, in graphic detail thanks to Her.”
Irene frowned, “do you though? Or do you only know her side of the story?”
“Since when are you on his side?” Cate fumed. “Thanks a lot, Mum.”
After Irene left, Cate looked down at her torso; her chest and arms were covered with purple bruises and small cuts and grazes. She covered them up with a black, polo neck jumper. It had extra-long sleeves which reached down to her knuckles and she hoped that nobody would be able to tell that there were bandages on both of her wrists.
Lola was fussy. She didn’t want to wear the purple dress that Cate had picked out but wouldn’t tell Cate what she wanted to wear instead. Cate was too tired to argue with her. She grabbed the dress, a pair of black and white striped tights and Lola’s black, patent Mary Janes and put them in a bag. If Lola didn’t want to get dressed, she could go to Jean’s in her pyjamas.
When they got to Jean’s, Lola clung to her fiercely as if she was never coming back. “Honey, I’ve got to go,” Cate tried to be patient but all the time she was aware of the clock ticking down. She tried to prise Lola’s little fingers from her leg.
“Come on,” Jean knelt down and tried to help. “Mummy’s got to go now but she’ll be back before you know it.”
Eventually, between them, they managed to loosen Lola’s grip on Cate’s leg and she was free to go.
But because she was later, the traffic was worse and it took her ages to find a parking space in the university car park. As she circled the car park for the 3rd time on the lookout for a space, she thought she’d found one but a motorbike was already parked there. Cate hit the steering wheel in frustration and then immediately regretted it as her hand throbbed with pain. She looked down at the palm of her hand. She’d managed to open up one of the bigger cuts and there was a line of blood trickling towards her thumb.
“Damn it,” she said, rooting in her bag for a plaster. Was nothing ever going to go right?
Eventually she found a space but when she looked down at her watch, her 1st class was just about to start. She was going to be late and Cate hated being late for anything. She grabbed her bag and as she ran across the car park to the main building, she licked the blood off her hand and stuck a plaster over the cut.
When she got to the lecture hall, she was sweaty in her polo neck and slightly out of breath. The lecture hadn’t started yet; she could see Mr Robbins a little further along the corridor, finishing up a conversation on his phone. The lecture hall was in the old building and when she pushed open the heavy, wooden door, it grated against the stone tiles. Everybody stopped talking and looked up, expecting to see Mr Robbins.
Vanessa and Thom were sat about halfway up but Cate took the seat nearest the door. She couldn’t face doing any more of the walk of shame.
After class, Vanessa bounded towards her, leaving Thom to collect all of her stuff. “Cate Klein, was that you I saw walking in late?”
“Yeah, yeah,” Cate said, accepting the teasing. Vanessa knew how much she hated being late.
“Seriously though,” Vanessa said, sitting down beside her, “is everything okay?”
“Yeah,” Cate said, shoving her stuff into her backpack. “Lola was being clingy this morning, that’s all.”
“I still can’t believe you have a child,” Vanessa said. “I can’t even look after myself.”
“That’s true,” Thom said, handing Vanessa her backpack. “What are we doing for lunch?”
“Ooh, I want meatballs,” Vanessa said, licking her lips. Cate and Thom raised their eyebrows. “Seriously, I’ve got this thing about meatballs at the moment; I even had a dream about them last night.”
“It’s because she hasn’t got laid recently,” Thom whispered to Cate, who laughed.
“Hey,” Vanessa said, smacking Thom on the arm, “pot calling kettle.”
“What about you Cate?” Thom said, “you got a secret boyfriend we don’t know about?”
“Nope,” Cate shook her head, “I’m completely and utterly, pathetically single.”
“That’s not pathetic,” Vanessa said, defending her. “You’ve got a kid whereas Thom here has no excuse.”
“Neither have you,” Thom shot back.
As they walked through the campus gates, Cate heard someone call her name. She turned around and saw Kian on the opposite side of the road. He was in his flashy Range Rover with the window rolled down. Seriously, this day just gets better and better. Cate tried to ignore him but he called again.
“Hey, I think that guy’s calling you,” Vanessa said. “Do you know him?”
Cate turned around, pretending she hadn’t already noticed him. “Oh yeah, he’s a friend of my brother’s.”
“Nice car,” Vanessa whistled, “is he single?”
“I’d better go and see what he wants,” Cate said, “I’ll meet you at Subway.”
“I don’t mind waiting,” Vanessa said, licking her lips.
“Come on,” Thom said, taking hold of her arm. “We’ll get the usual, Cate?”
“Yeah, that’s great, thanks.”
She walked across the road to Kian. “What are you doing here?”
“You won’t answer my calls,” he said.
“Whose fault’s that?” Cate snapped.
She turned around to make sure Vanessa and Thom had gone. “Seriously, Kian, you need to go.”
“I want a date.”
“You want a what?” Cate spluttered. “You’re not serious?”
“It’s up to you,” Kian rubbed his stomach, “you know I’m quite hungry, did somebody say there was a Subway near here? I really fancy a sandwich.”
“I hate you,” Cate hissed.
“I’ll text you the details,” Kian smirked.
“Geez Cate, who peed in your cereal?” Liv teased when Cate got home that night.
“Who do you think?” Cate slammed her phone face down on the kitchen table.
“Careful, you’re going to break the screen,” Liv warned.
“Good,” Cate scowled. Kian had just sent her a text, asking her to meet him at Mill Lake tonight. “Ugh, I can’t believe he thinks he can just snap his fingers and I’ll come running?”
“What are we talking about?” Irene asked.
“Kian wants me to meet him at Mill Lake tonight,” Cate explained.
“I hope you told him to fuck off,” Liv said, her eyes wide. “You did, right?”
“Language,” Irene admonished Liv. She turned to Cate, “I think that’s a good idea.”
“If I don’t go, you know what he’s like? He’ll keep turning up every day outside uni.”
“How on Earth is that a good idea?” Liv cried. “He’s blackmailing you.”
&
nbsp; “They need to talk. It’s not doing Cate any good pretending that he doesn’t exist.”
Liv threw her hands up in the air, “fine then, if you think it’s such a fantastic idea, you can babysit. I’m going out.”
“I’m going upstairs,” Cate grumbled, leaving Irene alone in the kitchen. She grabbed a quick shower, hoping that the hot water would ease some of the tension which had built up in her muscles.
Damn it, Cate cursed. She’d successfully avoided him for months. He called every night to talk to Lola before she went to sleep. Cate always left the room so she didn’t have to listen but Lola would eventually come and find her, “Daddy wants to talk to you.”
“Okay, why don’t you go upstairs and start getting ready for bed. I’ll be up in a minute.”
Cate would wait until she heard Lola’s footsteps on the stairs before turning back to the phone. Every time, she would look at his name on the screen and then quickly push the button to end the call before she could change her mind. Her resolve was so brittle.
Once, she’d made the mistake of switching on the TV in the basement; it was still on Sky Sports News. She couldn’t find the remote fast enough and suddenly there he was on screen. His voice had coiled around her heart like a boa constrictor. She’d quickly pulled the plug at the back of the TV but the damage had been done. She’d begun to doubt herself; could she really go through the rest of her life without him?
Later that night, after Lola had been tucked up in bed, Cate had pulled out The Story. She’d got up early the morning it was published, when Irene, Liv and Lola were still asleep and drove to the local newsagents which had only just opened. She’d read The Story online but she’d needed to feel it in her hands, to remind herself that it was real. She’d got back home before any of them woke up and hidden the newspaper under her mattress. She’d forced herself to re-read it again and again until the doubts had shrunk from huge boulders to tiny grains of sand.
He doesn’t love you. The words were still a sucker-punch to the gut.
Cate wrapped herself up in her dressing gown and pulled The Story out one more time. Even just seeing him for a few minutes outside university today, she’d felt herself starting to unravel again.
