Soldier's Daughters

by Fiona Field

  ‘Why?’ Maddy had asked.

  ‘Surprise,’ had been the answer. Which meant she could hardly pry, although he’d promised to be back in good time for them to drive up to her parents’ house for lunch. She glanced at her watch again. They’d still be in plenty of time if they set off shortly, but they had to load the car and Nate was bound to need a last-minute nappy change… Oh, where was he? Surprise or no, the clock was ticking and if he wasn’t back soon they’d be late and her mother wouldn’t like that.

  Maddy sighed and tried to establish a feeling of calm and acceptance. She told herself that a couple of weeks ago she might have thought Seb was being deliberately selfish and thoughtless; that was a time when everything seemed to come a pretty poor second to his rowing and what he wanted. But since he’d announced he was sacking his involvement with army rowing he’d been the perfect family man, so much so that Maddy had even mentioned this transformation to Susie.

  She had guffawed and said, ‘Sounds like a nasty case of having a guilty conscience.’

  Maddy had been horrified. ‘Guilty conscience? About what?’

  ‘About abandoning you almost every weekend for months, sweetie. Maybe someone pointed out to him that you have been a complete saint, coping with being pregnant and a toddler and the move and the house while he swanned off and enjoyed himself.’

  ‘I think the rowing is pretty hard work,’ said Maddy staunchly, but Susie had raised her eyebrows in an if-that’s-what-you-want-to-believe sort of way.

  Maddy carried Nathan downstairs and plopped him in his playpen along with a selection of toys, and then went back up to the bedroom and loaded the presents into a carrier bag, which she carted back down the stairs and put by the front door. She was thinking of bringing the cases down as well to reduce the time needed to load the car to a minimum when she heard Seb’s key in the door.

  ‘At last,’ she muttered. ‘Hi, hon,’ she said as she greeted him.

  Seb saw the overflowing carrier bag.

  ‘Hey, I’d have brought that down.’

  Maddy shrugged. ‘I’ve done it now.’

  ‘I hope you weren’t considering bring down the cases?’

  ‘Of course not.’

  ‘Good. You’re far too precious to risk pulling a stupid stunt like that. So, if you and Nathan are ready, I’ll load up the car and we can go.’

  ‘Wonderful.’

  Maddy fetched Nathan and got him strapped into his car seat while Seb wrestled their luggage and all the presents into the boot, along with the travel cot and the pushchair and all of Nathan’s other paraphernalia.

  ‘Have we got everything?’ asked Maddy anxiously.

  ‘If we haven’t, we’ll have to cope without,’ said Seb, mopping his brow and slamming shut the boot.

  ‘You’re right,’ said Maddy. ‘Let’s go.’

  She was really looking forward to this break and Christmas with her parents. And it was going to be especially nice since Seb had turned over a new leaf and was suddenly so hands-on with Nathan. He’d even been changing the occasional nappy! Over and above all the lovely things that went with Christmas Maddy was looking forward to being spoilt rotten by her mum. Even if the sickness had finally and thankfully stopped, she still suffered from heartburn, swollen ankles, backache and everything else that nature had decided to throw at her. The plan was that she would stay up in Herefordshire after the holiday was over, while Seb returned to the barracks to fly out with the advance party to Kenya. He was going to stay till New Year’s Day and then go back to the quarter, collect his kit and report to Brize for his flight shortly after that.

  Sam turned her car off the M5 and headed towards Exeter St Davids. Michelle had decided to come to Devon by train and Sam had promised to meet her and then drive her to her grandparents’. She checked her ETA on the sat nav and was glad to see she was going to get in a good ten minutes ahead of Michelle. Perfect.

  No, it wasn’t perfect. It was going to be anything but because, at the risk of being disloyal to her best friend, what was there left to say about Seb? Five days of picking over the wreckage of the relationship. Sam wondered if she was going to be able to bite her tongue and not tell Michelle that she was being driven mad by her relentless, dreary analysis. And if she couldn’t and she said the wrong thing, Sam reckoned her friendship with Michelle would come to an abrupt and messy end.

  Sam pulled her car into the short-stay car park and headed for the concourse. She heard Michelle’s yell over the sound of a departing train. She looked towards the shriek and there she was, still ten yards from the barrier, hurtling down the platform, her suitcase bouncing crazily on its wheels as she towed it along at breakneck speed. Except, although Michelle was obviously pleased to see her, even at this distance Sam could spot the dark shadows under her eyes and the obvious weight loss. God, and she’d only seen her a fortnight ago. Had she eaten anything during the intervening days?

  ‘Sam! Coo-ee!’

  Sam waved back and then Michelle was through the barrier and clasping her friend around the middle and trying to squeeze the life out of her.

  ‘Hello, sweetie. Thank you for coming to meet me. So kind of you.’

  Sam managed to disengage herself from the bear hug. ‘And if I hadn’t, how would you have got to Gran and Grandpa’s?’

  ‘I could have easily got a cab.’

  Which was true, but it would have cost squillions. ‘I wanted to.’ Even if she wasn’t looking forward to the inevitable and probably sole topic of conversation she was very fond of Michelle and it was nice to see her again. She grabbed the case. ‘Let’s go for a drink before we head for mine, and I inflict my grandparents on you.’

  ‘Your grandparents are lovely, and you know it,’ said Michelle as she followed Sam to her car. Sam shoved Michelle’s case into the boot and then drove to a pub on the outskirts of the city and swung the car into the car park.

  ‘You’ve lost weight,’ she commented as she pulled on the handbrake.

  Michelle turned in her seat. ‘Trust me, having a broken heart is the best diet in the world.’

  Sam kept schtum. She wanted to tell Michelle that Seb really wasn’t worth losing sleep over, that he was a lying, cheating bastard and Michelle was well out of it, but she knew that nothing she could say would help. Michelle had to work things out for herself and that would take time. She wished she understood why Michelle still obsessed about him but, then, she reasoned, no one knew what made one person fall in love with another. It was one of life’s great mysteries.

  They entered the bar and she ordered a large glass of red for Michelle and a J2O for herself before they headed for an empty table. Sam took a slurp of her drink. ‘Well, here’s to the holidays,’ she said, and raised her glass.

  ‘I suppose,’ said Michelle morosely. ‘I suppose he’s going to have one that’s all lovey-dovey and presents under the tree, and what have I got to look forward to?’

  ‘The same,’ said Sam, briskly. ‘Gran does a wonderful Christmas and you know it. It’ll be lovely, you’ll see.’

  ‘But it won’t, will it? The one thing I really, really want, I can’t have.’ She gazed at Sam over the rim of her glass, her eyes glistening suspiciously.

  ‘Oh, hon.’ Sam reached across the table and took Michelle’s hand.

  ‘And don’t tell me that I’ll get over it.’

  But one day you will, said Sam, in her head. ‘I wouldn’t dream of it,’ she said out loud.

  ‘I wake up every morning and he’s the first thing I think about. It’s like déjà vu all over again.’

  ‘I’m sure it is,’ said Sam, knowing exactly how Michelle felt. She felt the same way every time she saw Michelle’s caller ID on her mobile and guessed accurately how the ensuing call would go.

  ‘And if he knew how much I love him, how much I’m hurting, I’m sure things would be different.’

  Sam had to head Michelle off from thinking it would be a good idea to tell Seb this. The phrase restraining order kept poppi
ng into her head. ‘Are you sure, honey? He’s got an awful lot to lose.’

  Michelle’s eyes blazed. ‘Of course I’m sure.’

  Oops.

  ‘I have to see him and tell him.’

  Jesus, no! ‘Are you sure this is a good idea?’ And, God, how often had she said that to Michelle in the past?

  ‘I thought you were my friend.’

  ‘I am. And that is exactly why I am asking you to reconsider.’

  Michelle took a glug of her wine and stared at Sam defiantly.

  ‘Look,’ said Sam, ‘remember when we were at St Martin’s and I suggested that swapping salt for sugar on the staffroom tea trolley wasn’t going to go down well?’

  Michelle nodded.

  ‘And the whole year got detention as a result…?’

  Michelle nodded again. ‘But it was funny, though.’

  ‘It was funny till everyone got punished. I don’t think some of the girls thought it was so funny then when we missed a trip to the beach. And remember when you loosened the girth on Ella Somerfeld’s pony and she broke her collar bone?’

  ‘She should have checked it.’

  Sam stared at Michelle. ‘She did. You loosened it afterwards.’

  Michelle shrugged. ‘She had it coming, she was such a smug pain in the arse, always showing off how good a rider she was.’

  Michelle did have a point… ‘Yes, she was but she didn’t deserve a broken collar bone for being smug or a pain or showing off.’

  ‘Anyway, no one knew it was me… well, apart from you.’

  Sam sighed. This wasn’t going well. ‘And when we were at Sandhurst I told you not to sew those magnets into Captain Baker’s combat jacket so her compass gave the wrong reading and her map-reading lesson went to shit.’

  ‘Now, that was funny,’ said Michelle.

  ‘It was… right up to the point when the platoon was punished with stand-to-bed at five o’clock in the morning for a whole month.’

  ‘It was worth it.’

  Sam disagreed but loyalty meant she didn’t say so. ‘Look,’ she said, gently,‘sometimes you do things which end up causing trouble, trouble which you didn’t really mean to happen.’

  ‘I suppose,’ said Michelle. ‘But I can’t roll over and give up.’

  ‘Can’t you?’

  Michelle shook her head and eyed Sam sadly. ‘No, not with Seb. I know he should belong to me. Honestly, I’ll be doing Maddy a favour.’

  Sam had a sinking feeling that this was going to wind up even worse than she’d imagined.

  They got back to Sam’s grandparents’ picture-postcard thatched cottage in the heart of a picture-postcard village at around tea-time. Gran welcomed Michelle as if she were a returning prodigal daughter and swept her across the tiny hall and up the ancient, uneven polished wooden stairs to the guest room, pointing out, en route, the bathroom and Sam’s room.

  ‘But you remember this from your last visit,’ she said.

  ‘It was years ago,’ said Michelle. ‘It’s a bit hazy, if I’m honest.’

  Gran opened the door to a whitewashed bedroom, with exposed beams and a tiny window in the eaves which peeped out through the thatch, over the garden.

  ‘Now I remember,’ said Michelle as she plonked her case onto a chair by the bed. ‘This is lovely. Thank you.’

  ‘There’s scones and clotted cream downstairs. Come down as soon as you’re ready. And I can’t believe,’ continued Gran, ‘how long it is since you were last here.’

  ‘Well, after Sam and I changed schools we kind of lost touch.’ Michelle saw Sam emerging from her room across the landing. ‘We did, didn’t we?’

  ‘What?’ said Sam, leaning against the doorjamb.

  ‘Lost touch.’

  ‘Mmm,’ said Sam noncommittally. She knew she should have kept in contact with Michelle but she hadn’t. And deep down she knew it was because of the scrapes Michelle had got her into at their prep school, and as soon as she’d been freed from Michelle’s friendship, Sam had turned over a clean sheet and didn’t want this new page of her life covered in horrible blots. Maybe she’d been unfair but she’d sailed through her public school without a single black mark or detention – unlike the previous years she’d spent in Michelle’s company. QED, she thought.

  ‘Well, that’s all right. Now leave your unpacking and come and tell Arthur and I all about what you’re up to these days. I’ll get the kettle on.’

  A while later the two girls clattered down the stairs to the cosy sitting room, with its chintz soft furnishings, a fat Christmas tree in one corner, laden with baubles, Grandpa reading his paper in another, the woodburner in the huge fireplace belting out the heat and a trolley in the middle of the room groaning with tea – scones, jam, cream and a lemon drizzle cake.

  ‘And I expect you girls to tuck in.’ Gran looked at Michelle. ‘You especially. You look as if you haven’t had a square meal in a month of Sundays.’ She tutted, then bustled out into the kitchen from whence came the sound of a kettle being filled.

  From his corner Sam’s grandpa gazed at them over his copy of the Western Morning News.

  ‘Good afternoon, Michelle,’ he said. ‘You’ve grown.’

  ‘Hello,’ said Michelle. ‘You’re looking well.’ She went over to his corner and gave him a peck on his cheek.

  ‘Huh,’ he said, and returned to his paper. Sam winked at Michelle. Grandpa had never been garrulous.

  Gran bustled in with the teapot. ‘There,’ she said as she put it on the trolley and then sat in her customary chair, ‘isn’t this nice?’

  And, yes, it is, thought Sam. And while we’re all here, together in this room, I’m spared talk of Seb. She wondered how long she could spin out tea for.

  ‘Honestly,’ Sam said quietly into her phone to James later that night when everyone had gone to bed, ‘if I hear any more about Michelle’s ex I may well hit her over the head with a blunt instrument.’ She’d pulled the duvet over her head in the hope it would prevent anyone from eavesdropping, although, given the solid nature of the little cottage, she reckoned it was unlikely.

  ‘And that would stop her?’ said James.

  ‘No, you’re probably right.’

  ‘So have you met this bloke?’

  ‘No,’ lied Sam.

  ‘Were they engaged? Did she get jilted at the altar? She seems to be really taking this guy’s departure to heart. I mean… why?’

  ‘No they weren’t engaged or anything like that. And I don’t know why she’s got such a thing about him.’ Suddenly a memory of something Michelle had said to her about Seb popped into her brain. ‘Although…’ She giggled.

  ‘Yes,’ said James.

  ‘Apparently he’s incredibly… well, according to Michelle he’s… you know… um… quite… um…’

  ‘Hung like a donkey?’

  Sam had to stuff her fist in her mouth to stop laughter exploding. ‘Yes,’ she finally squeaked through unreleased giggles. She took a deep breath and managed to get some sort of self-control. ‘I was trying to be polite, and decorous and lady-like,’ she said.

  ‘You? That’d be a first.’

  ‘Yeah, well… moving on. Anyway, I shall leave here on the thirtieth, and I should be at your parents’ around tea-time. But I shall need the postcode for the sat nav.’

  ‘That sounds perfect. I’ll see you then.’

  She put her phone on her bedside table and switched her light off and thanked goodness for friends like James. Nice predictable friends with no agendas or hang-ups. She sighed as she thought about the car crash that was Michelle’s current love life. She wished Michelle would be more rational about Seb. Surely she had to get over him soon, she thought as she drifted off to sleep.

  Michelle kicked around her room in the mess, bored out of her mind, fed up and disconsolate. Technically she oughtn’t to be there as the mess was officially closed, but she’d nowhere else to go. She’d been so sure that Seb would choose her over Maddy she had made no arrangements for the h
olidays apart from spending a few days over Christmas with Sam. Spending New Year with her father and step-mother wasn’t an option so now she had no choice but to camp in the deserted mess. With no staff around and the kitchens locked, she was reduced to making do with the toaster and the microwave in the stewards’ pantry, so, when she bothered to eat, she was living off baked beans and toast. Not that she cared because her mind was preoccupied in equal parts with jealousy of Maddy and longing for Seb. Why didn’t he leave the bitch? What had Maddy got that she hadn’t? What was he doing? Did he miss her? How had they spent Christmas?

  Her own Christmas had been, as Sam had predicted, perfectly nice. How could she not have enjoyed Sam’s gran’s cooking and the walks she and Sam had taken over Dartmoor? And it had been wonderful to unload her feelings onto someone who understood. Although, in retrospect, she’d felt a bit hurt a couple of times when Sam had tried to change the subject to her excitement about Kenya: really, why would anyone want to talk about some country they knew nothing about and a stupid exercise that hadn’t even taken place yet?

  But despite all the nice things about Christmas, ultimately it had been rubbish because the one thing she’d really, really wanted – a text from Seb – hadn’t materialised. Even though she’d sent several messages to him, there had been no reply. She recalled the conversation when she’d told Sam, as they were going to bed at the end of Christmas Day.

  ‘Of course there wasn’t. And there won’t be,’ Sam had said. ‘Listen, Michelle, it’s over. You have to accept that. And you have to stop texting Seb. You’re deluded if you think he’s going to text you back. He’s a married man with a wife and a kid – kids plural, soon – and he’s not going to jeopardise all that with a fling.’

  ‘It wasn’t a fling.’

  ‘Look, Michelle, before you fell for Seb you’d have never contemplated having an affair with a married man. You might have your faults, but you’re not a marriage wrecker. And if you’d known from the start that Seb was married you wouldn’t have got involved, full stop. Seb led you on, Seb is at fault, and you’ve got to accept that he’s a fully fledged, card-carrying git.’