The Bad Mothers’ Book Club

by Keris Stainton

‘Oh my god. And you’ve waited ’til now to tell me?’

  ‘I was actually going to wait ’til they started pumping you with the stuff, but apparently that’s not happening anytime soon, so. Don’t judge me …’

  ‘Oh god,’ Jools said.

  The nurse chose that exact moment to return with the tea, which came on a tray with a jug of milk, a bowl of sugar lumps, and a plate of biscuits.

  ‘We’re not in Kansas any more,’ Eve said, screwing up her Twirl wrapper and throwing it in the bin.

  ‘I’ll be back in a minute,’ the nurse told Jools. ‘Just need to sort out your medications. It’s only just arrived.’

  ‘So …’ Jools said, once the nurse had gone.

  ‘He’s married,’ Eve said. ‘But not happily. I know. It’s bullshit. But it’s not a relationship, it’s just sex. Really good sex.’

  Eve hadn’t lowered her voice at all and it was loud at the best of times. Jools shushed her.

  ‘Oh god, don’t shush me!’ she said. ‘I’m not going to go into detail. Unless you want me to? Also who’s going to hear me?’

  ‘I really don’t,’ Jools said. ‘And I don’t know! You don’t know how thin the walls are.’

  Eve rolled her eyes. ‘I know you won’t approve. And that’s fine. But I wanted to tell you anyway because I love you. And also I need someone to talk to about him. Show off when he’s amazing, complain to when he’s a dick. You know.’

  ‘Where did you meet him?’ Jools reached for the tea, which was still too hot but just about manageable if she held the cup by the rim.

  ‘School,’ Eve said.

  ‘You’ve known him since school?’

  ‘Christ, no. Hillcrest.’

  Jools tried to shuffle up in her seat, but she couldn’t because of the tea. ‘Do I know him?’

  ‘You’ve probably seen him, yeah. He doesn’t do the school run often, but he was at the summer barbecue. He’s called Jim.’

  ‘Jim,’ Jools said. ‘Maggie’s Jim?’

  ‘Your Maggie? From book club? No. Her husband’s not Jim, he’s …’ She screwed up her face in concentration.

  ‘Jim. Her husband’s Jim.’

  ‘Really? It can’t be the same one then.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘I’ve seen Maggie’s husband, haven’t I? I would’ve noticed if … What’s Maggie’s daughter called?’

  ‘Amy.’

  Eve made a humming sound.

  ‘You know it’s him. Stop pretending you don’t.’

  ‘I didn’t before just now, I promise.’ She bit the skin around her thumbnail.

  ‘You have to stop seeing him,’ Jools said.

  ‘Oh come on! Why?’

  ‘Why?’ Jools leaned forward, bumping the table, tea sloshing over the side of the cup. ‘Because Maggie’s our friend! How are you going to face her at book club when you’ve been fucking her husband?’

  ‘Like this?’ Eve smiled beatifically.

  ‘Oh my god,’ Jools said. ‘You’re the worst.’

  ‘OK, I’ll tell him we’re done. For you. Cos you played the cancer card.’

  ‘I did not!’

  ‘No, but you were thinking about it. I could tell.’

  ‘I’ve got a different card, actually.’

  ‘Yeah?’ Eve poured herself a cup of tea.

  ‘He made a move on me once.’

  ‘No!’

  Jools nodded. You remember when I did that stall on the summer fair? He cornered me in the stock cupboard.

  ‘He Cornered Me in the Stock Cupboard,’ Eve recited dramatically. ‘I think I’ve read that book.’

  ‘Shut up!’ Jools swatted her friend’s arm. ‘He told me I was beautiful and sexy and he could, you know, show me a good time.’

  ‘Did he actually say that? Cos that’s killing my lady boner.’

  ‘I don’t remember what he said exactly, but that was the gist. I told him I was married and not interested and said I had to get back to the stall and that was it.’

  Eve was still stirring her tea, even though the tiny amount of sugar she’d added had to have dissolved already. ‘Oh! Is that when you started being weird with Maggie?’

  Jools winced. ‘Yeah. I was going to tell her. I thought I should tell her, you know?’

  ‘You’re too nice.’

  ‘And then I just couldn’t. I didn’t think she’d believe me, for one. So then I just felt really guilty about it. And whenever she mentioned him it made me feel weird, so I just stopped seeing her so much. Shitty, I know.’

  ‘I mean, it’s fair enough. Her husband did try to scuttle you in a cupboard.’

  ‘He did not. God, Eve.’

  They sat in silence for a few seconds before Jools said, ‘That’s made you want him more, hasn’t it?’

  ‘It really has,’ Eve said. ‘I don’t know what’s wrong with me. It’s a sickness.’

  And right on cue, the nurse arrived with Jools’s chemo.

  ‘Who is that?’ Emma asked Beth as a man appeared in the playground. He didn’t seem to have a child with him, but he did have swept back dark hair, square black-rimmed glasses and long legs in tight black jeans.

  ‘Oh my god,’ Beth said. ‘I’ve never seen him before. Maybe he’s a new teacher?’

  The man had stopped just inside the gate and turned back to look down the road. A small girl ran under the arm he was holding the gate open with and grinned up at him.

  ‘Can I go and play?’ she asked, holding a large floppy dog.

  The man’s face cracked into an enormous smile and he said, ‘Course.’

  ‘Is that Amy?’ Beth said, squinting over and making no attempt to hide her interest.

  ‘I think so,’ Emma said. ‘The dog’s a bit of a giveaway.’ She watched as Amy ran across the yard towards Ruby, who had been standing alone under a tree. Amy threw her toy dog up towards the branches and Emma could hear Ruby’s laugh as clearly as if she was standing next to her. She saw one of Jools’s daughters – Violet she thought her name was – standing watching and made a mental note to mention it to Ruby later so that Ruby could perhaps include her in future.

  Beth made a growling sound and Emma tore her eyes away from her daughter and looked back over at the new guy.

  ‘You think he’s hot?’ she asked Beth.

  ‘You don’t?’ Beth tipped her head to one side, considering.

  Emma tried to look at him without making it obvious she was looking at him. There was definitely something about him, but he wasn’t exactly good-looking. All his features seemed a little too big for his face. In fact, not just his features: his arms were too long, his hands too big. He looked a bit like a puppet. But it sort of looked good on him.

  Emma could tell the other mums were all checking him out too. The atmosphere had changed as soon as he’d appeared. He was still standing just inside the gate. But there were so few dads – or men at all – on the school run, maybe they were just startled.

  ‘Maybe Maggie’s hired a manny,’ Beth said. ‘Maybe he’s a lonely widower looking for a soulmate.’

  ‘Or, you know, just a man doing a job.’

  ‘You should go and introduce yourself,’ Beth said, bumping Emma with her shoulder. ‘Since you’re new too.’

  ‘Oh my god,’ Emma said. ‘Imagine.’

  ‘I wasn’t joking. Go on.’ She gave Emma a little push in the small of her back.

  ‘No way. I’m not humiliating myself in front of all these people. Women.’

  ‘Women are people too,’ Hanan said. Emma hadn’t even noticed her approaching. ‘What are we doing?’

  ‘We’re looking at the new hot new guy,’ Beth said.

  ‘Is he hot though?’ Hanan asked.

  ‘That’s what I said!’ Emma turned and smiled at her.

  ‘I think Emma should go and introduce herself, but she’s. Emma’s too chicken.’

  ‘I’m not chick—’

  Hanan interrupted her with a chicken noise.

  ‘You’ve got to
be joking,’ Emma said.

  Hanan grinned at her and made the noise again.

  ‘You’re a grown woman! A mother!’

  ‘Bwak,’ Hanan said.

  ‘Oh my god.’

  Emma set off across the playground without looking back. Or, in fact, in any direction. She could tell everyone was watching, could almost hear them talking about her; where she was going, what she was planning to do. Although that might have been her overactive imagination.

  ‘Hi!’ she said when she reached the guy, who was, it turned out, objectively hot. Beautiful brown eyes. Wide, soft-looking lips. And a jawline she wanted to run her fingers over. It had clearly been too long since she’d had sex.

  On the way over, Emma had planned to say ‘Are you new here?’ and then, at some point, ‘Me too.’ What actually came out of her mouth was ‘Are you me here?’

  ‘Sorry?’ He looked a little confused and a little amused.

  Emma blinked and shook her head. ‘Sorry. I meant new. Are you new here? Because I am too. And we were wondering …’ She turned and looked back at Hanan and Beth. Beth gave her a thumbs up and she felt her face heat up.

  ‘Oh!’ he smiled. He had really nice teeth. ‘Yeah. Sorry. No. Not really. Or maybe a bit.’ He shook his head as if to clarify his thoughts. ‘The little girl with the dog—’

  ‘Amy,’ Emma said.

  ‘Oh you know her? Cool. She’s my niece. I’m Maggie’s brother.’

  ‘Ah!’ Emma said. ‘That makes sense. I’m Emma. Do you want to come and …? I know it can be weird standing on your own when you don’t, um, know anyone.’

  ‘Cool,’ he said, following Emma across the playground to where Hanan and Beth were waiting. Beth looked flustered already. Hanan was smiling in a way that suggested to Emma she might be planning to break out another chicken impersonation.

  Emma introduced him to the other two women and then all three of them stared at him.

  ‘Oh!’ he said. ‘Yeah. God. Sorry. I didn’t say, did I? Nick.’

  ‘Maggie’s brother,’ Emma said and watched both sets of her friends’ eyebrows shoot up.

  ‘Have you moved here?’ Beth asked. ‘Or are you visiting?’

  Before Nick had a chance to answer, Miss McCarry opened the door behind them and walked out into the yard, blowing her whistle on the way. All the kids stopped absolutely dead and silent.

  ‘Woah,’ Nick murmured.

  ‘I know, right?’ Emma whispered back. ‘It’s impressive, but also sort of chilling.’

  Miss McCarry blew her whistle again and the children immediately sorted themselves into lines for each class.

  ‘This is freaking me out,’ Nick said.

  ‘I always think I should get a whistle for home,’ Beth said. ‘Since they take no bloody notice of me.’

  ‘I’ve said “one two three, eyes on me” before now,’ Hanan said. ‘That works. Although I said it to my husband once, he wasn’t keen.’

  The children all started filtering to their various classrooms, Sam stopping to hug Emma’s legs. She bent to drop a kiss on the crown of his head before gently pushing him in the direction of the door.

  ‘He’s doing a lot better, isn’t he?’ Beth said.

  ‘Yeah. We still have tears at night sometimes. And sometimes in the mornings. But I’m not prising him off the door frames any more.’

  ‘Sounds like my ex,’ Nick said, before shaking his head. ‘Sorry. No brain to mouth filter.’

  ‘We’re going to go and get a coffee,’ Beth said. ‘Would you like to come?’

  ‘Thanks,’ Nick said. ‘But I said I’d wait for Maggie. She was running late so she told me to go on without her. You know, like in a war.’

  ‘Ah,’ Emma said. ‘Well. Hope she doesn’t leave you too long.’

  The three women started to drift away, Beth and Hanan pushing their buggies.

  ‘Good to meet you all,’ Nick said. ‘Have a good day.’

  ‘See you later,’ Emma said. ‘Soldier.’ When she’d said that in her head, she’d planned to salute. But she couldn’t bring herself to do it. And the ‘soldier’ had been mortifying too.

  ‘Jesus Christ,’ she muttered under her breath, as the three of them shuffled into single file to get through the gate.

  ‘Was that you flirting?’ Hanan asked, once they were walking side by side again. ‘Because if it was …’

  ‘God, no, not flirting,’ Emma said. ‘And shut up.’

  Chapter Fourteen

  Maggie tried not to notice how Jim was coming home later and later. He kept missing bedtime with Amy and she’d even allowed Maggie to take over a little bit of their routine – singing a song she’d learned in nursery. It made Maggie’s heart hurt. Maggie was also aware that she hadn’t seen Jim’s phone since the day the text message from Eve had popped up. He never left it lying around any more. He took it with him even if he went to the loo. She knew he was having an affair, she was almost sure of it. But a little voice in the back of her mind (her mother’s voice) told her there could be a perfectly innocent explanation. Maybe it was right?

  Nick had been spending a lot of time in Liverpool looking for a flat – he’d decided to stay up north, but said West Kirby was too small for him – and hanging out with his friends. Maggie hadn’t told him about Eve, but whenever he came over he asked Maggie questions about her marriage. Questions she’d asked herself over the years, but now she found herself thinking about them all the time. Why had she married Jim in the first place? Why had she stayed married to him? Did she really think this was it for her for the rest of her life?

  Maggie had fancied Jim the first time she saw him. She was out with a group of friends from work, and he was with a group of his mates. They’d started off at opposite sides of the pub, but over the course of the evening had gravitated together to form one raucous, stumbling, laughing group. Maggie couldn’t remember much about it apart from Jim handing her a bottle of Smirnoff Ice and then, later, falling backwards off a chair and lying on the floor laughing. That’s how she’d pictured him when he’d texted her a couple of days later: on his back on the sticky pub carpet, looking up at everyone, his eyes bright, mouth wide open with laughter.

  For their first date he took her to a pub in Parkgate. They sat outside, looking out over the marsh, watching seagulls swooping down to steal people’s chips, before ordering fish and chips themselves, curling over to protect them from the birds. They’d bought ice creams and walked along the front. If Maggie closed her eyes, she could still smell the salty air, taste the mint choc chip ice cream, feel Jim taking her hand and squeezing. She’d felt safe. And happy.

  The first time he’d yelled at her, he’d been drunk. Had come staggering round to her tiny flat after post-work beers and picked an argument about something stupid. Something so stupid she couldn’t even remember. An advert maybe? Or something she was watching on TV that he didn’t rate. He’d called her a fucking moron, said he didn’t know what he was even doing with her, and then he’d fallen asleep on the sofa. In the morning he’d brought her a cup of tea in bed and didn’t remember anything about it. He’d been back to his usual self, funny and kind and loving. She thought it was just the drinking.

  They’d been together just over a year when he proposed. He’d planned to propose in Paris – at the top of the Eiffel Tower he said, even though he admitted it was a cliché – but he’d ended up proposing in bed one night, just after they’d had sex. She was resting her head on his chest, already seventy-five per cent of the way to sleep, when he’d said, ‘I want to marry you. What do you think?’

  The wedding was small and cheap, but the reception had been fun. All their friends in their local, laughing and dancing and toasting them. Maggie remembered it as a blur of happy and proud faces. Of too many drinks. Of Jim’s hands on her waist. Her dad hugging her and giving her an envelope that, it turned out, contained a cheque for £1000, of being the last to leave, sitting on a velvet covered sofa, her head on Jim’s shoulder, eyes drooping
as he laughed with the bar staff and then literally carried her up to bed.

  The first time she’d suspected he was seeing someone else was deeply unoriginal: there’d been a smudge of lipstick on his collar. But she told herself it could have happened easily – a colleague could have leaned in for an air kiss and misfired. Maggie had certainly fended off kisses and more from men she’d worked with over the years, it didn’t have to mean anything. She didn’t mention it to him because she knew even the question would infuriate him.

  The next time had been a comment from a friend – or someone she’d previously considered a friend. A group of them had spent the entire day in a beer garden. Lots of them had kids at the same time and they’d all been playing together – running around, hiding under tables, screeching with laughter and occasionally reappearing red-faced and sweaty for an ice lolly or a fruit shoot. Maggie had a few vodkas and then stopped. The sun made her sleepy and spaced out anyway and she knew she’d be the one getting Amy to bed when they got home. Jim was hammered, lying on the grass with his eyes closed. Their friend Claire had come to sit with Maggie, staggering in her heeled sandals, her eyes unfocused. She’d clambered up to sit on the table, her feet on the bench next to Maggie.

  ‘You know he’s fucking Selina, right?’ she’d said, holding up her bottle of beer like she was making a toast.

  Maggie had immediately looked over at Jim, expecting him to have heard and be heading over to them in a fury, but he was still on the grass, most likely asleep.

  ‘No,’ Maggie had said. She knew she should have said she knew he wasn’t. But no had been all she’d been able to manage. She felt the vodka from earlier burning the back of her throat. Ignoring Claire, she’d got up, found Amy and got a cab home, leaving Jim with his mates.

  The next day she told him what Claire had said and he laughed and said, ‘She was arseholed, why would you listen to her?’

  But he hadn’t denied it.

  Chapter Fifteen

  ‘Mummy?’

  ‘Hmmmph?’

  Emma had been deeply engrossed in a dream about Chris Hemsworth and a bottle of cocoa butter and she couldn’t believe she had to wake up.

  ‘Mummy?’ Ruby said again, adding a small hand to shake Emma’s shoulder.