by Kim Nash
‘OK, Mum, but I’m not sure I even want you to have a boyfriend.’
‘How come it’s OK for Dad to have a girlfriend but not for me to have a boyfriend, out of interest?’ she said gently to Archie, realising that she would have to tread very carefully.
‘Well, that’s clearly very different, isn’t it?’
Grace raised her eyebrows at her son’s statement.
‘I just wish that you and Daddy were still together and we all lived in the same house. Then I could be like some of the other people at school. But I suppose if that’s not going to happen right now, then I think I’d like to meet this friend of yours as soon as possible as I have a lot of questions that I’d like to ask him. I wrote them down at lunchtime at school today.’
‘Oh OK, honey, that’s… er, really great.’ She squirmed inside. Who knew what Vinnie would think about being interrogated by someone else’s child? He’d probably run a mile.
‘Now I know that you’re upset about this, but you can’t go round punching people for taunting you. That’s just not on.’
‘This big rage came over me, Mum, and I didn’t know what to do. Before I knew it, I’d hit him. I am sorry, Mum, really I am.’ He was still crying but getting the words out through his tears.
‘Well tomorrow we’re going to have a day at home. Mrs Kelly has said that you are not allowed to go back to school until you apologise to George so you must do that the day after. We’ll tell Daddy that you have tummy ache tomorrow. But you have to promise me that you’ll talk to me about anything like this in future. Violence is not acceptable in any way whatsoever. Understand?’
‘OK, Mum.’ He hung his head in shame.
‘Now give me a great big hug and eat your milk and biscuits.’
‘OK, Mummy. Can it be a big heart hug?’
They’d had lots of rituals over the years, one of them being their heart hugs, but Archie had grown out of them years ago. Grace had to kneel down so that she was Archie’s height and then they could hug tightly with their hearts right next to each other. They had to hold the hug for at least the count of twenty. Apparently it was a proven fact that a hug lasting for twenty seconds or more releases happy endorphins into your body and lowers stress, blood pressure and heart rate. It was something they’d done since he was old enough to hug her.
He clung on to her like he was never going to see her again, but when they separated, he smiled and said, ‘I don’t ever want you to not love me. That’s why I was so annoyed at the thought that you’d replace me.’
‘Impossible. That, my darling, would never ever happen.’
‘Are you sure?’ he asked. ‘Not even if David Beckham asked you to marry him?’
‘Mmm, now that is a toughie! Let me just take a minute to think about that.’ She rubbed her chin, pretending to think it over.
‘Mummy!’ He warned. ‘Make sure you get the right answer.’
‘OK! Not even if David Beckham asked me to marry him!’ she replied.
Yes!’ shouted Archie as he fist-pumped the air. ‘The right answer!’
* * *
Grace stood at the kitchen sink, swilling some crockery around and pondering what had happened. She’d only been on one date with Vinnie and it had already caused a massive issue for Archie and when all was said and done, Archie was more important to her than anyone. She really liked Vinnie but was getting involved with someone new worth upsetting Archie for? And what was going on with Mark? He had actually been quite nice to her last night, even complimenting her. Was he jealous, or was it just a case of him not wanting her but not wanting anyone else to have her either? Grace was so mixed up. She knew that in an ideal world, Archie’s family would be complete and they’d all be together. And in fairness, that’s all she had ever wanted, but having that shouldn’t mean putting up with someone who had disrespected their family unit and cheated on her. God! It was so hard being a single mum. All this was making life so complicated.
‘Oh, Mum. I can’t tell you how much I wish you were here to chat through stuff with. I can’t believe it’s been so long, and that I still miss you so much.’ A tear rolled down her cheek as she contemplated her life while she finished the washing up.
* * *
My sweet boy. I love you, my darling beautiful Archie. I know I never met you in person, but I’ve watched you since the day you were born and even before that when I used to lay my hands on your mummy’s tummy when she was pregnant. You know that I am around you all the time. I know that you feel it. I see your smiles, and I get all the kisses you blow to me in heaven. And I know that you saw me that time when I stood in the lounge doorway and Mummy asked you who you were waving at. I will be your nanna for the rest of your life, even though I’m up here and not physically there with you. I will do everything I can to guide you in the right direction and will always be around. I will make sure that you and your beautiful Mummy will be very happy in your lives. I’ll make sure of that! Goodnight, my sweet little angel. I love you. Nanna xxx
Chapter Fourteen
Mark came round at four-thirty on Friday afternoon to see Archie before he went away on his weekend to Spain and before Grace and Archie headed off to Wales. He was suspiciously nice for a change and gave Grace a hug as he came in. She was thrown by that and offered him a cup of coffee, immediately kicking herself because she didn’t normally give him any reason to stay. He spent some time playing with Archie on the floor, something she hadn’t seen him do for a long time. A tickling competition ensued and soon, both were properly belly-laughing. Grace felt a pang of regret for all the good times they’d had.
Looking at Mark and their son smiling together made her heart flutter. It was times like this that all the bad things about her ex were flung out of the window and all the good things that they had shared came flooding back from her memory bank. Grace got up to walk out of the room, as the feeling was quite overwhelming.
‘I love it when our family is together. Come on guys, let’s have a family hug.’ Archie didn’t give either Mark or Grace the chance not to be involved as he grabbed a hand from each and pulled them in for a hug. Mark gave her a wink over the top of Archie’s head, making Grace blush. She felt a real pang and wondered whether she should have tried harder. If she began a relationship with Vinnie, would that mean that she was turning her back on the possibility of them ever being a family again?
She hadn’t mentioned anything about the incident at Archie’s school. She didn’t want to betray Archie’s confidence, and Mark didn’t mention her evening out. Archie seemed happy so she thought she’d leave things till the next time she saw Mark. She didn’t want to upset the apple cart while he was in a good mood, perhaps she’d speak with him about it when Archie wasn’t around, if she still felt it necessary. The last thing she wanted now was to get into another slanging match with her ex. She knew that she had to pick her battles and right now she couldn’t cope with this one.
* * *
Grace was so delighted she’d decided to look up Saffy on Facebook. They had agreed to get together and Grace had been thrilled to accept Saffy’s invitation to stay at Bendigeddig House, her home in Wales.
After a two and a half hour journey to the North Wales coast, Grace and Archie arrived at the imposing double-fronted house. It was located in a pretty little coastal village which boasted views of glorious mountains from one side of the house, and a stunning sea view from the other. Saffy greeted them with open arms. She and Grace hugged deeply and when they parted, there were tears in both of their eyes for their lost years. Grace couldn’t wait to catch up with her friend and find out every detail about her life since they’d last been in contact.
‘I’m so glad you got in touch, Grace. It’s something I’ve been meaning to do for so long, but when you are busy, life just passes you by and you don’t always get round to doing it at the time and then another year comes and goes. It makes me so happy to see you.’
‘I was on a date – that’s a story for another time – bu
t I was thinking of you and the memories were so lovely and precious that I knew I had to try to find you. And being with you now, even for just a short time, feels exactly the same as it did all those years ago. I’m so glad we’re back in touch. I didn’t realise just how much I’d missed you and all that blooming great advice you used to give me.’
After a cuppa and a piece of home-made cake, Grace and Archie chose a pair of wellies each from the boot room, which contained wellies of every possible size and colour, and headed for the beach. As Archie and Becks ran ahead, splashing in the waves, Grace and Saffy caught up on some of what had been happening in their lives and Grace felt so happy to have this fabulous friend back.
‘So when you talk about Vinnie, you light up, Grace, but when you talk about Mark, you frown. That says such a lot. So why are you even doubting a relationship between you and Vinnie?’
‘I suppose I’d forgotten just how charming Mark can be. And when I see him and Archie together having fun, it feels so wrong to keep them apart from each other. Plus, the fact that I’ve been on a date with Vinnie and really like him has already made Archie wobble. Do I really risk what I have with Archie over someone I don’t even know very well?’
‘I learnt when my parents split up when I was Archie’s age, that it’s better to have two parents who are happy apart than two parents who are constantly trying so hard to be nice to each other around their children, then sniping at each other when the kids are out of the way. My mum was so much happier when my dad left. It was like a physical weight had lifted from her shoulders. It taught me that everyone has a right to be happy. And that’s what you deserve too, Grace.’
Grace nodded, but she still felt selfish, thinking of her own happiness instead of her son’s.
Lots of long leisurely walks on the beach collecting shells, tons of fresh air, and time spent chatting with a good friend over a glass of wine, really felt good for Grace’s soul. Both she and Archie felt sad to say goodbye to Saffy on Sunday, but they promised to get together again when they both had the chance. The break had really recharged Grace and Archie’s batteries, and they both felt great when they returned to school and work on Monday morning.
* * *
Mark knocked on the door at four-thirty on the Monday evening, with two gift bags in his hand. He was having Archie that night, to make up for not having him over the weekend.
‘Hello, you two,’ he said cheerily. ‘I’ve brought you both presents.’
He gave Archie a huge bag of sweets and Archie ran off to the kitchen to put them in his sweety drawer.
‘And this is for you!’ he said and he leant forward and kissed Grace on the cheek as he handed her a silver gift bag. She peered inside to see a bottle of Daisy by Marc Jacobs. Only last week when he’d been picking up Archie, there was an ad on the TV for it, and Archie had commented to his mum that it was the one that she’d tried on recently when they’d been shopping. Mark had obviously taken note, and Grace was shocked at his thoughtfulness.
‘It’s to say thank you for dropping everything at the last minute again, so that I could go off and do what I needed to do. I do appreciate you being so amenable; I know I don’t often show it. And I certainly haven’t shown it in the past. You really are an angel, Grace, I don’t know what I’d do without you in my life.’
Ha, she thought. If only he had paid her half this attention when they’d been together, they might actually have made it work, despite their differences. But he’d torn them apart when he went off with Lorraine, the floozy of a school secretary. What a cliché! Grace had walked in on them on a Wednesday evening in June two years ago when she had gone to surprise him and take him out for their anniversary dinner after work. Only Grace was the one that had got the surprise when she’d found him embracing Lorraine behind his desk. They’d jumped apart instantly, and he’d tried to bluster through it and brush it off as nothing important. But it was quite obvious that there was a lot more to it than he’d admitted, especially when she saw how upset Lorraine looked when Mark told Grace she meant nothing to him. Grace even felt a little sorry for her, looking at her crestfallen face; she’d obviously fallen for Mark’s charming demeanour and lies, and of all people, Grace understood how that felt.
Agreeing to put the incident behind them, Mark had tried hard to win Grace and Archie back, with days out, home-cooked meals and a willingness to really throw himself into family life. For the first time in a long time Grace had felt that she had the happy family life she’d always craved. Then all of sudden Lorraine had started appearing everywhere they went – in the supermarket, in the coffee shop, in the bank; Grace became accustomed to spotting her when they were out and about. It eventually came to a head when Lorraine rang her up and gleefully told her that she and Mark had been having an affair for six months.
Grace had struggled with what she should do, wondering whether it was something that they could get through, or whether this was the end of their family as they knew it forever. She’d felt lower than she’d ever felt before. While she’d been busy trying to build a family, he’d been tearing it down. He had betrayed everything they had, the vows they’d taken to be faithful to each other had been destroyed. Her self-esteem had hit rock bottom. What could Lorraine offer him that she couldn’t? He was enough for her, she loved him, even with his moods, and she wouldn’t ever dream of looking outside of their marriage for someone else.
She’d talked it through with Hannah, and through tears and anger and sadness, after arranging for Archie to have a sleepover at Hannah’s house, she had gone back to their home, where they’d lived since before they were married, and packed the majority of Mark’s clothes into black bin liners. She rang him and told him to come and collect his things and said that she was changing the locks. When he’d turned up at the house, he was in a rage that she’d never seen before. He’d told her she was being completely unreasonable and that she’d be hearing from his solicitor and that he’d take her to court for custody of Archie. This threat had done exactly what he intended it to do and terrified her more than anything else he could have said, but for once in her life Grace knew she had to stick by her morals and stand up for herself. He had totally disrespected her and their family unit. He was the one in the wrong, not her, and she knew she had to remember that, no matter how tough it got.
To hear Mark talk now, none of it was his fault and he clearly thought that he could just be nice to her and everything would be OK. He was still with Lorraine even now, even though every couple of months, he’d make a comment that he didn’t love her after all, and was just with her because Grace wouldn’t have him back and being with Lorraine was better than being on his own.
Grace jolted back to the present as Mark reached out and gently brushed her cheek with his fingers.
‘I think we should try again, Gracie. I know how much you hate being away from Archie. Just think. You could be with Arch all of the time. Just imagine how that would make you feel. Don’t you think you owe it to Archie to have our beautiful family back together again? What do you think?’
‘What about Lorraine?’ she asked, pulling away from him.
‘What about Lorraine?’ he asked.
‘You live with her!’ she said.
‘She’s never meant to me what you have, babe, you know that. I’d break up with her tomorrow if I thought you and I had a chance. You and Archie were the best thing to ever happen to me, you know that. I was an idiot to throw it all away. A total idiot.’
‘You are quite unbelievable, you know,’ she said, not intending it as a compliment.
‘Just think about it. You know I’m right. Just say the word and you know I’m yours – and we could be a happy family again, for Archie’s sake.’ He turned and walked towards the front door.
Archie came bounding down the stairs and flung himself into her arms. ‘I love you, Mummy, see you after school tomorrow.’
‘Bye darling. Mummy loves you to the moon and back.’ She kissed his head.
It wouldn’t be that much longer that he’d let her do this. He was growing up fast. And she was noticing things every day: like when she tried to hold his hand, he’d hold hers for a second and drop it; and when she told him she loved him on their walk to school, he just ran in without looking back. She wondered if she’d ever get over the feeling of missing him so much every time he went to his dad’s.
As she waved them off, Grace wondered, not for the first time, whether she should say yes to Mark and mend their broken family.
Chapter Fifteen
Vinnie was arriving at seven-thirty to take her to the pictures. She was really looking forward to seeing him again, even though this evening she had such a lot on her mind. He seemed to have such a calming and comfortable effect on her. She didn’t feel quite so nervous about seeing him this time. He knocked on the door at seven-thirty on the dot, and it made her smile; she loved the fact that, unlike Mark, he turned up at the time he said he would. She hoped that this wasn’t just the good behaviour that everyone displayed when they first started dating someone.
She glanced in the mirror wondering if her jeans and sparkly top looked OK, grabbed her linen jacket from the bottom of the banister and opened the door with a big grin on her face.
‘Hey, beautiful,’ he said as he kissed her cheek. They walked to the car where he held the door open. ‘Your carriage awaits.’ She went to get in the car but he stopped her. ‘Just one minute, lady, not so fast.’
He leaned forward, closed his eyes and kissed her, long and hard, on the lips. ‘Mmm. That’s better! I’ve been waiting for that all weekend.’
As he closed her door and walked round to the driver’s side, she touched her lips, which seemed to be on fire, and beamed from ear to ear. He climbed in beside her and she had to tell herself to stop grinning like the village idiot, but she really felt that the time that she spent with Vinnie was definitely better than that without him. She was determined that despite the conversation she’d had with Mark earlier, she was going to forget about everything else and relax into a lovely evening with Vinnie.
