by Lucy Diamond
Her eyes filled suddenly. ‘You idiot,’ she said gently. ‘You’re not a failure.’
‘That’s not how it felt.’ He fidgeted. ‘Mum sat me down and gave it to me straight anyway. I think she’s been watching too many soaps, because she actually told me I had to “man up” and start facing real life again.’
‘Really?’ She smirked, imagining the scene. To think that Lilian had taken her side for once!
‘Yep. So here I am. Manning up. Facing real life. Telling you I’m sorry for not being around. But I’m back now, and I’m going to sort everything out, I swear.’
His words sent an enormous weight rolling from her shoulders, she felt light-headed with its release. ‘I’m glad you’re back,’ she said. ‘I missed you so much. It’s been rubbish without you. I even started going a bit mad, I think.’
‘Talking to yourself in public again?’
She forced a smile. ‘Something like that.’ That was one can of worms she would definitely leave closed, she decided, pouring more wine for them both. ‘So, what’s going to happen with the house then, now that we’re out of the picture?’ She couldn’t help herself; she actually wriggled with joy saying the words. They were out of the running. They wouldn’t be taking over the B&B. David had finally made his choice and he’d come home, to her. YESSSSSS.
‘I don’t know,’ he admitted. ‘Mum and Dad definitely can’t carry on there, though. I don’t even know if they’ll last the summer. Dad’s … I think he’s losing his marbles, Em. It’s horrible. He’s forgetful and confused, and it’s all just too much for him.’ He ran a hand through his hair, and she noticed how tired he looked. ‘That’s another reason I stayed so long, because Mum was struggling. But she’s booked a doctor’s appointment for him now, to see what they think, so …’
Emma winced. David wasn’t the only one facing up to things then. Going to the doctor was official confirmation that something was wrong, and might be the first step in a whole flood of hospital appointments, tests and check-ups. You wouldn’t wish it on anyone. ‘Poor Eddie,’ she said when he didn’t finish the sentence. ‘And poor Lilian.’
‘Yeah,’ he said heavily. ‘But anyway. Let’s not talk about them. Let’s talk about us, and make some plans together. Me and you, what do you say?’
‘I’d like that,’ she said, as optimism and joy inflated inside her like balloons. She put her arms around him. ‘Oh, David, I’d really, really like that.’
It was strange, having her husband moving back in. Good-strange. They had only been apart a matter of weeks, but Emma had become quite set in her ways without him around the place. David being home made her realize how lonely she’d been, with her single mug and plate in the morning; how she’d left the radio on almost constantly just so that she could hear someone else’s voice; how she knew the weekly TV guide off by heart by the time it was Tuesday. Now that he was back, the small rooms filled instantly with his sounds again – the ringtone of his phone, his laugh, the low burble of sporting commentary from Radio 5. She slept so much more soundly with him in bed beside her too, somehow better able to block out the noises from the street below with the comfort of his warm body there.
It had crossed her mind that, for all his promises and optimistic words, he might well fall back into the slough of depression he’d been in, gradually becoming beaten down with negativity if a job didn’t fall into his lap straight away, but on the first morning he got out of bed as soon as her alarm shrilled and went into the kitchen, where she heard him filling the kettle.
‘You don’t have to get up,’ she said, when he presented her with a cup of tea and two slices of toast, with the perfect amount of butter and Marmite. ‘Stay in bed, I would.’
‘It’s cool,’ he said. ‘I’m used to getting up and helping Mum with the breakfasts, remember. Looking after you is a breeze in comparison.’
He was trying, she realized happily as she came home in the evening to find him making risotto for them and saw that he’d circled job ads in the local paper and even arranged a couple of interviews with recruitment agencies. He wanted to make this work – to make them work as a team once more. It hit her then just how badly she wanted the same, not to mention how close she’d come to blowing everything, messing about with Nicholas and Greg.
Having David there in the evenings meant she had less time to spend obsessing on the pregnancy forum too. For the last month she’d felt close to the other women all tapping away online in their lonely bubbles of desperation, as if they were in it together. She knew their ovulation cycles almost as well as her own, had been typing them supportive messages and words of encouragement every night. Funnily enough, as soon as she switched off, she discovered that she didn’t miss them one bit – if anything, she felt lighter, not having to worry about them. The website had been a good source of information, and a useful emotional crutch at first, but she could see now that it had long since stopped helping her. If anything, it had only made her feel more obsessed.
In its place she made more of an effort to reconnect with Sally and other friends, and began organizing nights out. She even agreed to go to baby Poppy’s naming ceremony in May. Baby or no baby, she and David still had a lot to be thankful for, after all.
Two weeks after his return to Bristol, David greeted her one evening with a bottle of champagne. ‘It’s not even cava, it’s the proper stuff,’ he said, popping it open with a flourish. ‘Cheers!’
She squealed as the champagne foamed over the fat green lip of the bottle. ‘What are we celebrating? What’s happened?’
His eyes sparkled. ‘I’ve got a job,’ he said. Four words, and he could not have said them with any more happiness or pride. ‘For an architect’s firm in Bath. Great company – the MD is Robert Fletcher, remember me telling you about him? Amazing bloke.’ He pulled a crumpled pile of paper from his laptop bag before she could say anything, and grinned. ‘Picked these up on the way home, too,’ he said tossing them onto the table. ‘Houses for sale. Thought we could look at a few this weekend.’
Emma couldn’t speak for a moment, she felt so delighted for him – for both of them. Finally, finally, the wheel had turned and they were moving once more, out from the dark place they’d been in and forward towards a bright new future together. ‘I’ll drink to that,’ she said, kissing him full on the lips. ‘Oh, David, well done. I’m so proud of you. Congratulations!’
The next few weeks passed very happily. David started work, throwing himself enthusiastically into his first new project – a modern extension to a Victorian villa, which seemed to consist of inordinately large pieces of toughened glass, so as to give incredible views down one of Bath’s hillsides. The job was a twelve-mile commute away, but he was able to do it by bike, along the cycle path, which he absolutely loved. Within the week he was bragging about how he’d already shaved two minutes off his journey time. ‘I feel a spreadsheet coming on,’ Emma groaned, rolling her eyes.
Being employed again seemed to flick a switch in David’s internal circuitry. The light in his eyes became brighter, he moved with more energy and purpose. He was David again, in short. Gone were the despair and moping – now he was back playing cricket with his mates every Thursday night, he was swimming his splashy butterfly at the Dean Lane baths, he was running around the park and getting sweaty in Lycra. (Mmm-mmm.)
Emma loved seeing this change in him. He hummed without realizing it. He laughed easily. He even sang in the shower some mornings. She looked forward to seeing him after work every evening and hearing what he’d been doing that day. If they met for dinner or a drink in town – which was quite often – she found herself feeling fluttery as she put on perfume and lipstick, just like in the early days when they’d started dating. It was as if she was falling in love with him all over again.
Even house-hunting was romantic. ‘What a chore,’ Alicia had said sympathetically when Emma told her over the phone that they were about to start looking, but it didn’t feel remotely chore-like to Emma. Walking han
d-in-hand up the front path of what might be their new home actually felt really exciting, full of hope. Even going through specifications seemed to bring them closer together. ‘We can’t have this one, the garden’s pathetic,’ he would say. ‘How are we meant to teach the kids football on one titchy patio?’
Such a line might sound throwaway and unimportant to another person, but to Emma it felt seismic, just as ruling out houses with fewer than three bedrooms did. Their checklist simply underlined what they both wanted to find, in a house and in life too.
Emma knew that house-hunting might well take them a long time. As an architect and an interior designer, they were tough customers and knew exactly what they wanted – she was fully prepared for it to be a long haul. ‘There’s no point settling for anything we don’t love,’ they had both agreed.
‘It’s got to be our happy-ever-after home,’ she had added.
It came as a surprise, then, that the third house they looked around, a Victorian semi in Southville, spoke to both of them with the most persuasive of voices. It had a beautiful stained-glass inner-porch door, which Emma swooned over. It had the original Victorian doorbell that David loved (‘It’s an actual bell, rigged up on a cable, look!’ he beamed, pointing it out) and the ceilings were high, with all the original coving and plasterwork still in place. Emma knew quite well that she shouldn’t be swayed by something as temporary as a shade of paint, but when she went into the back living room and saw the deep Brunswick green on the wall, she was smitten.
‘This is it,’ she whispered, as they walked into the kitchen. It was dated, with tired old units, a peeling lino floor and what might even be damp in the corner. Whatever, she thought. There were large windows overlooking the garden, a separate utility room, and she knew a reclamation yard where she could get her hands on a good butler’s sink. With a spraygun of Flash and elbow grease, sandpaper, paint and a loving eye, she could turn this room into the very heart of their home.
‘Check out the garden,’ David murmured, gripping her hand, and she knew he was already planning where to put the football net. If I get pregnant, she reminded herself. If we have children to practise penalty shoot-outs with. But she was sure this house would be way more conducive to baby-making at the very least. They would be happy here.
With cash already in the pot from their previous sale, and no chain behind them, they were the best kind of buyers and were able to sneak in a low offer, which was duly accepted. They organized solicitors, contracts and a land search, and Emma began making moodboards for every room, gathering paint charts and fabric swatches like a woman possessed.
They moved in at the end of May, two days before her thirty-sixth birthday. They threw a double housewarming-birthday celebration, with friends bearing presents and Prosecco, and there was a huge cake filled with whipped cream and fruit that David had bought from Patisserie Valerie. They strung fairy lights around the grotty kitchen and everybody toasted their good fortune, and danced.
The occasion was tinged with a pang of anxiety, though. She was now thirty-six, and her conception chances were running out, trickling steadily away like sand through an egg-timer. Blowing out the candles on her cake only served to remind her that her fertile days were numbered – if she even had any left at all.
‘Let’s give ourselves one more year to get pregnant,’ she suggested to David one evening soon afterwards, ‘and then maybe we should look at other options. IVF, for instance, or adoption.’
He nodded. They were sitting out on their small patio on a rickety wooden bench, which had come with the house. Late golden sunshine fell warm on their faces, while a cool breeze ruffled through the too-long grass on the lawn. ‘I’ve been thinking the same,’ he said. ‘And in the meantime we should make a point of doing all those things that our friends with kids envy us for. Dirty weekends away when we feel like it, lazy Sundays in bed …’ He put a hand on her thigh. ‘Screaming full-blown sex on the patio …’
She arched an eyebrow. ‘David Jones, do all your ideas for things to do revolve around sex?’
He kissed her and slid his hand up her top. ‘But of course,’ he murmured throatily, while she gasped, and hoped very much that their nosey new neighbours weren’t watching. ‘Don’t yours?’
Chapter Thirty-One
Down in Dorset, Izzy and Charlie were also embracing life – and each other – wholeheartedly. This was the relationship she had always wanted: someone who made her laugh, who was fun to be with, who was on her side. Best friend as well as lover, Charlie was the sunshine to Gary’s darkness, the flipside of the coin. She’d always preferred the warmth of the sun to storm clouds.
Lilian surprised everyone – not least herself – by professing to being overjoyed about the blossoming relationship. She actually clapped her hands with joy when they broke the news to her. ‘Oh! I was hoping this might happen,’ she said, hugging Charlie, then Izzy, then Charlie again. ‘You two are perfect for each other. Perfect!’
Izzy felt dazed by such enthusiasm. To think she’d once thought this woman a dragon – and look at her now, dabbing her eyes on the corner of her apron, having shed real wet tears of happiness that Izzy had got it together with her son. She hadn’t seen that one coming, back at their first inauspicious meeting.
Later on, when Charlie was helping Eddie trim the front hedge, Lilian cornered Izzy for a woman-to-woman chat. ‘I’ve never seen Charlie like this before,’ she confided. ‘I mean, I always knew that the girls he hooked up with in the past wouldn’t last. They simply weren’t good enough for him, and he didn’t care two hoots. But the way he looks at you … well. He thinks you’re a cut above, take it from me. And Eddie and I think so too.’
It was like receiving a blessing from the Pope. ‘Thank you,’ Izzy replied, trying to hide the stab of sympathy she felt for all the supposedly unsuitable girls who’d gone before. No wonder Charlie had never had long relationships in the past; she could well imagine Lilian terrifying each and every poor unknowing girlfriend with her gimlet eyes. ‘I think he’s pretty fantastic too. He’s great.’
‘Oh, he is. He’s had his moments in the past, mind you, but I feel he’s actually grown up a lot this year. And hasn’t he turned out lovely?’
Izzy smiled, her nose wrinkling. She was so going to tease Charlie for being Mummy’s Little Poppet. ‘He has,’ she agreed.
Term started and Willow and Hazel went back to school. Every morning Charlie appeared at twenty past eight to give them a lift in, and every afternoon he brought them home again. Within a few days the three of them had developed all sorts of in-jokes, and Charlie was party to umpteen items of gossip, about who was best friends with whom, and who had been sent to the head teacher for being naughty. Izzy might have felt left out, if she hadn’t been so pleased at the new bonds the three of them were forming.
Hazel would often burst into giggles for unfathomable reasons when they were having their post-school biscuits and apples in the garden. ‘Charlie was so funny in the car this morning,’ she would splutter, suddenly remembering. ‘Wasn’t he, Willow? When he—’
‘When he was doing all the voices!’ Now Willow was cracking up too.
‘What voices? What do you mean?’ Izzy would ask, but both girls would be helpless, shaking with laughter. ‘I guess you had to be there,’ she would say, when no answer was forthcoming.
In the wake of Gary’s death and the turbulent few weeks they’d had, Izzy had worried about Willow and Hazel coping at school, but being back in a busy routine seemed to distract them both, thankfully, and soon they were in the usual whirl of new playground crazes, school trips to look forward to, and spelling tests. If anything, they actually seemed happier and more settled than they had all year. Willow joined the drama club and was growing in confidence by the week, and Hazel had discovered (to Izzy’s horror) that there was a certain cachet to be had amongst her peers by dint of having ‘a dead dad’. ‘I’ve got an alive one as well now,’ Izzy heard her say to a group of girls one Saturday after
noon at a birthday party. ‘He’s called Charlie and he’s really cool.’
Izzy wasn’t quite sure what to make of this. Pleased as she was that the girls had taken Charlie to their hearts so readily, she didn’t know if they should yet be thinking of him as their new dad; it seemed clingy, even by Hazel’s standards. But they liked him at least. That was the main thing.
Three weeks into the new term Hazel’s long-suffering teacher, Mrs Anthony, called Izzy in for ‘a little chat’. ‘I know life has been difficult lately,’ she began tactfully, ‘but I’m slightly concerned that Hazel is being rather … er … well, ghoulish, frankly, about her late father. One parent has already come in saying that her child has had nightmares about, and I quote, “Hazel’s daddy being a zombie”.’
Izzy tried not to laugh, but it found its way out as a splutter. ‘Sorry,’ she said. ‘I know it’s not remotely funny.’
‘I’m glad she’s no longer quite so distraught about losing her father,’ Mrs Anthony replied, her own mouth twitching with suppressed amusement. ‘But perhaps you could have a word – ask her to tone it down a touch?’
‘Leave her to me,’ Izzy promised, then snorted again as she was leaving the classroom. A zombie, indeed. If Willow was showing a flair for amateur dramatics, then her younger sister seemed more inclined to no-holds-barred melodramatics. Still, she supposed she should be grateful that Hazel was talking about it at all. There was no chance of her ever bottling anything up.
Meanwhile, with the girls at school, Izzy had begun helping Lilian out more and more. The first morning that Charlie whisked them away, she sat twiddling her thumbs for all of ten seconds before deciding to hobble up to the house and see what needed doing.
She had never witnessed breakfast at the B&B before, and walked into the kitchen to find herself in a whirl of noise and action. Lilian was breathless and red-faced as she single-handedly flipped bacon, scrambled eggs, buttered toast and made pots of coffee, all apparently at the same time.
