“The thing is”—Walshy dangled a nacho over his mouth, positioning the ribbon of cheese—“Matt’s stitched you up good and proper. Because you’ve agreed to go now. And I bet he hasn’t told you it’s a five-day trip.”
“Five days?” Alex frowned. “It’s not five days.”
“It is.” Walshy scooped guacamole onto another of Alex’s chips. “I said, ‘Are you sure Alex knows it’s five days, because I’m sure she told me it was just a weekend?’ And he said—”
“That he thought he’d told me that already.”
Walshy jabbed an over-salsa-ed nacho at her. Bingo. Oil ran down Walshy’s chin. “It’s a lot to ask, I told him so.”
“Do you want me to get you a napkin?”
“On the plus side”—Walshy wiped his chin with the back of his hand—“Claire’s a great girl. If I was going to be in a weird situation with anyone, I’d want it to be Claire.”
Alex fixed her mouth in a smile. “Uh-huh.” She gave a vigorous nod. “Claire’s great.”
“I was sorry when they split up. I liked having her around. She was great value on a night out. You never quite knew where the night would end up. A diamond lass.”
Alex gave a tiny cough. “How thoughtful of you to say that. To me. Right now.”
Walshy shoveled another nacho into his mouth. “You’re a great girl too, Al.”
“Gee. Really? Little old me?”
6
“What do you mean they’re not here?”
Patrick stared at Lindsay from his position on the front step, the presents slippery in their Christmas paper and weighing down his arms. The boxes pulled on some side-back muscles that he didn’t know the name of.
“I mean, they’ve gone out.” In a voice thick with generosity, Lindsay added: “Amber’s at a roller disco and Jack’s at Leo’s.”
“But I told you I was coming this afternoon! You know I go away for Christmas tomorrow!”
“I thought you’d just be dropping the presents off.” Lindsay folded her arms. “You should have said if you actually wanted to see the kids. I’m not a clairvoyant.”
Patrick shifted the presents in his arms, determined not to put them down. Lindsay clearly wanted him to hand them over and be gone, and Patrick made it a point of principle to do what Lindsay wanted as infrequently as possible.
“What’s Jack doing at Leo’s?”
“Gaming.”
“Why isn’t he gaming at home?” Those kids who stay in all day without opening the curtains, talking into headphones, hunting in packs and mutilating creatures with virtual friends—why couldn’t his son be one of those?
“What can I say?” Lindsay shrugged with bored accommodation, her arms still folded. “Maybe they didn’t want to see you. I’m not their fucking jailer.”
“They’re kids, Lindsay. You’re meant to be their fucking jailer.”
She shrugged again, ignoring the force of his glare. “You parent them, then. If you can get them to see you.” She held her hands out. “Now, do you want me to take those, or what?”
Patrick narrowed his eyes. Lindsay’s expression didn’t change. She seemed to have become completely inured to his glare over the years, and had an air of irritated acceptance when she found him on “her” doorstep (a doorstep that was two-thirds his—not officially but objectively, if you looked at the direct debit arrangements and who put in the most equity at the start).
Worse, Lindsay looked irritated, with barely any hint of guilt—no more than if she’d opened the door to one of those ex-offenders selling household items. Patrick’s face on the doorstep was as welcome as a flash of an ID card and a request to guilt-buy an overpriced dishcloth.
“Here, then.” Patrick shoved the presents into Lindsay’s arms. “Tell them their dad wished them a happy fucking Christmas.” He glared at her. “But don’t say fucking. That’s just for you.”
Patrick strode down what had once been his path and beeped the car open. He drove away with a jerk. He held his hand up in a wave to the driver he’d accidentally pulled out in front of.
He’d wrapped those presents himself. Himself.
He’d anticipated a warm reunion with the kids: hugs and excited faces—maybe a trip to Starbucks for some gingerbread lattes. He’d pictured it, all laughter and unwrapped presents and, We’ll miss you this Christmas, Daddy! Though, even in this most idyllic of daydreams, the idea that his teenage kids would still call him “Daddy” jarred with his narrative.
Lindsay should at least look sorry.
As the one who left him, she should be leaping to accommodate his needs and asking how he was getting on—not acting bored of the whole thing, like he was disrupting their routine and creating unnecessary drama. She acted like his time with them had expired and he was trying to hop back on the team bus with an invalid ticket. A ticket that, don’t forget, Lindsay, he was still paying through the nose for.
He shouldn’t have got so angry.
It was his main parenting fault, he knew: that he got so angry.
Maybe they didn’t want to see you.
He almost felt like giving up and reinvesting all his parental love into Scarlett: a virtually clean daughter-sheet, the negative boxes still unticked. One of the points of having kids was creating a better version of yourself—and today it didn’t feel like his kids were better versions of him. Today they were one hundred percent Lindsay.
Yet Patrick remembered that pull in his chest when he held the kids when they were small. When Amber had looked up at him with those face-filling Disney princess eyes. When Jack had begged to be his ball boy and run on court at every cry of “let,” and who had said at the end of the game, “Daddy, I want to be as good at tennis as you.”
There was that mushy feeling Patrick still got in his stomach when he hadn’t seen them for a while, like this was what it was all about—all the calls with the solicitors, all the papers at midnight, all the trips to obscure tribunals in places like Bangor, the five A.M. starts to pay the mortgage on a house where his keys no longer fitted the lock.
But Lindsay just couldn’t let him enjoy any of it.
* * *
—
When Patrick got home, he found Claire and Scarlett baking Christmas biscuits.
Claire looked up. “I’ve packed our stuff and got your case down from the attic. Are you OK to set off for the forest about ten tomorrow?”
“That’s fine.”
“Did the kids like the presents?”
“They were out,” he said shortly. “Some mix-up.”
“Oh, no.” Claire stood up with a head-tilt. She brushed her floury hands down her apron and took Patrick’s hands in hers. “What happened?”
“Amber was at a roller disco and Jack was at a friend’s.”
Claire clucked her teeth. “That’s really unfair of Lindsay.”
“She says she’s not their jailer.”
“She’s selfish.” Claire gave his arm a gentle squeeze of sympathy. “It’s the kids who lose out.”
Patrick gave her a smile, cheering up already. He and Claire had been arguing a bit lately, but he never found her more lovely than when she was criticizing Lindsay.
He looked to Scarlett. She stood up next to the table, concentrating hard, icing a ribbon onto a pre-stenciled biscuit shaped like a Christmas present.
He was going to get it right with Scarlett. Third time lucky.
And maybe—if they made the decision quickly (because he didn’t mean to be ungallant but they didn’t have long to decide)—he and Claire could have another, a shared child of their own.
Either way, with Claire, he was going to be better at it—at marriage, fatherhood, the lot. He was going to get it right this time, whatever it took.
7
Hi, Alex,
Patrick was worried all the activitie
s might get booked up, so here’s a spreadsheet he put together of what he’s sorted in advance. We can always cancel later, but better to be safe than sorry.
He has left the first day free so we can investigate the complex and get reacquainted.
Please bring a book so we can have family reading time. Apparently you can borrow board games there, which is great. And I should warn you that Christmas karaoke was once a family tradition in our house…?
C x
Alex took a breath. She clicked the mouse to open the attachment.
ITINERARY
Date
Time
Prebooked activities
Who?
Thu 21st Dec
4 p.m.
Arrive
All
Fri 22nd Dec
2 p.m.
Pony Trekking
Scarlett
6 p.m.
Crazy Golf
All
Sat 23rd Dec
10 a.m.
Spa
Claire
11 a.m.
Fluffy the Squirrel’s Woodland Winter Wonderland
Scarlett
4 p.m.
Pool Table (at the Five Bells on-site pub)
All
8 p.m.
Santa’s Grotto
Scarlett
9 p.m.
Carol-Singing Elves (visiting lodge)
All
Sun 24th Dec
1 p.m.
Archery
All
8 p.m.
Tennis Lesson
Patrick
Mon 25th Dec
11 a.m.
Badminton
All
1 p.m.
Christmas Lunch at Chico’s Italian Restaurant
All
4 p.m.
Adventure with Owls
Scarlett
6 p.m.
Ten Pin Bowling
All
Tue 26th Dec
8 a.m.
Ice Cream Hut (breakfast)
All
10 a.m.
Depart
All
Alex gave her neck a forceful scratch.
She tipped her head back and pinched the bridge of her nose.
* * *
—
Alex deliberately didn’t buy any new clothes for the trip. There was no one to impress.
The only person to impress was herself—and she could impress herself only by actively not trying to impress anyone else.
She finished her last day of work in the lab (or breaking up for Christmas, as she still thought of it) gathering the armfuls of colleagues’ Christmas cards and generic Christmas presents.
Ruby’s present, when Alex opened it, was a panic alarm. “For the trip.”
Alex refused to say thank you.
Only that night before did Alex start to pack. Warm, sensible clothes. No heels, no dresses: nothing fancy.
She packed her hair straighteners and her makeup bag. Then took them both out again. After a beat, she put the makeup bag back in. But she definitely wasn’t going to take her straighteners.
And she definitely wasn’t going to put on makeup before the first coffee of the day. Or get dressed before breakfast. They could take her as she was, in her four-year-old, elastic-perishing Mr. Tickle pajamas or, holiday or not, they could go fuck themselves.
Shaking a little, Alex folded a pair of jeans and placed them in the case. She looked at her unsteady hand and took a deep breath.
Post-shooting interview. Jared Parker, 27.
Happy Forest archery host.
Face-to-face. Happy Forest adventure center staff room.
The man had already passed out by the time I got to the field with my first aid box. The ambulance was just arriving, so I only got a quick glimpse.
I saw the arrow sticking out. He also had cuts and bruises on his face.
Of course, I’ll tell you anything I can. It was Alfie who did the training, though, and we’ve sent him home. Poor kid, he was devastated.
It was hard to tell how badly hurt the man was. Arrows on human flesh make a mess—it’s never a neat puncture because the arrow flexes on the way in. We were taught that on our training course.
I’m happy to listen, if you think it will help?
(Listens to 999 call recording)
She sounds like a cool customer. And it just cuts off like that at the end?
Really, another five minutes like that? No background noise at all?
The first I knew of it was when the woman came to find me at the archery lodge—the same woman who made the call.
Alex? OK, Alex.
She was out of breath, she’d been rushing. When I got to the field, I saw the other three. There was the shot man on the floor, the other man kneeling beside him, and the blond woman watching on.
Yeah, they were calm when I found them. Just kind of…waiting. Shock, probably.
Poor Alfie. He’ll get sacked for this, but the only thing he did wrong was letting them sign the waiver and go off shooting before they’d all had the training. He’s just a kid, and Alfie said the blond woman was very convincing. She was hard to say no to.
I never met any of them before the shooting. But ask Sheila on reception, she knows everything and everyone.
Sheila Kapur. K-A-P-U-R.
I hear they had a kid with them, though. So where was the kid when they were shooting?
Dance class? On her own, when all the grown-ups were doing archery? That family gets odder and odder.
Mate, my parents are divorced. It was bad enough at my cousin’s wedding, and that was just for a day.
Because—a holiday with exes and new partners? What kind of people would do that?
THURSDAY 21 DECEMBER
Day 1
Extract from the Happy Forest brochure:
From the moment you enter our purpose-built village, you’ll feel like you’ve discovered a different world.
Freed from the habits of your daily routine, your senses will be stimulated by the outdoor life. You may find yourself stopping to smell the flowers, or interacting with the wildlife with childlike wonder.
Even grown-ups feel the magic of the Happy Forest. So why not come and join us, and become the person you want to be?
8
“Can you set up the satnav?” Alex asked.
In the passenger seat, Matt blew his hair out of his eyes. “We don’t need it yet, Al. I’ll tell you where to go.”
Alex gave him a quick smile and turned back to concentrate on the road. A freaky memory for roads and dire
ctions was one of Matt’s things.
They each had their own things. Alex’s were internal: she always remembered the names of people’s parents and children and where they’d been on holiday. She always knew the approximate time without looking at her phone. Whereas if Matt had been on a road, he never forgot it. It was impressive to Alex, whose brain didn’t work that way. She liked it when she discovered something Matt could do that she couldn’t.
Alex drove up the M1, watching the signs for Sheffield and Leeds turn into signs for Harrogate and Northallerton.
“You know,” she said, “practically every time I’ve met Claire, one of us has been standing in a doorway with a coat on, car keys in hand.”
Matt smiled. “Well, now’s a chance to work on that.”
Alex looked back to the road. Would she and Claire get on so well if they were actually in the same room? Without coats?
“What should I talk to Claire about?” Alex glanced at Matt. “If I get stuck?”
Matt looked up from his phone. “What do you normally talk to people about?”
“You know what I mean. What are her interests?”
Matt shrugged. “Work. Scarlett. Normal stuff.”
“What about telly? Books?”
“I don’t know. She didn’t really do that stuff when we were together.”
The Adults Page 4
