by TL Dyer
‘You seriously think that?’ I say, and this time he’s the one whose gaze falters. He attempts to hide his discomfort with a flick of the chin, as though it’s a perfectly reasonable question to ask. But I’m certain he knows by now, even if he didn’t know back then, that Craig didn’t want me in that way. He didn’t want any woman in that way.
Darren gets up from the table, the scrape of the chair legs over the tiles screeching through the tension in the room and making me jump. He turns, walking over to the patio doors and staring through them into the garden. Or looking at the reflection of himself I can see from here.
‘You were married,’ I say, giving him the reasons I lied back then. His beautiful wife, who I was so enchanted by when I was growing up, was one reason. An excellent reason. They were still together then.
‘And Lauren and Craig were my friends.’ Reasons number two and three. There were many more – Mam, Dad; Shaun only months out of prison and on probation – but he doesn’t need to know all those. They won’t matter to him or make the difference.
‘Is this about money?’ he says, turning abruptly. ‘I hear coppers don’t earn a lot, but I’m sorry, Sacha, I’ve got nothing. I’ve got this place and a car, and a job that pays for them, that’s it. The house Eliza wanted, the extension she nagged for, the conservatory I built, the bloody—’ He looks around the kitchen and to the ceiling before bringing himself under control. ‘I’m the one left paying for it, believe me. So if that’s what you’re thinking…’
‘No, Darren. This is not about money.’
‘Then what?’ he says, taking a step towards the table, his earlier concern about getting to work seemingly forgotten, but not his suspicions. ‘What is it you want from me you think I can give?’
The question floors me. What do I want from him? I don’t want anything. I don’t want any of this, I never did, or I’d have included him right from the start. What I want is for Jake to have everything he needs. For him to have a chance in life and not be handed a reason to become anything other than what he’s capable of. I want him to be happy, fulfilled. And I want him to not hate me for the decisions I’ve made on his behalf.
I look away from Darren’s stare to where my hands lie in my lap, my neck hot beneath my coat collar as I realise coming here was a mistake. I was only thinking about Jake. I wasn’t thinking about Darren at all – how he might react, this grieving middle-aged man who’s lost his son, his wife, and his daughter, and all in different ways. Ways that I don’t understand. All the colour and warmth that was once here in this house, the noise and the light, everything appealing that I remember about it, none of that’s here now. It’s as if the very life – and even the air, stale as it is in this kitchen – has been sucked dry so all that’s left is an empty shell. One that maybe he’s just existing in rather than living. And then I show up. Expecting what? That Darren would simply accept my change of heart, slip into fatherhood for a second time at fifty plus, and resurrect that role for a six-year-old he’s never known and only laid eyes on once?
Pushing away the shame of my actions, I draw my gaze back up to where he’s still waiting, patiently impatient, for my answer. And I respond with the one thing at least that will ensure all this hasn’t been for nothing.
‘I need to know if there are any medical disorders in the family. Genetic. That sort of thing,’ I say, eager now to be gone from the atmosphere in the room, this house, which is oppressive in its vastness.
Darren paces across the kitchen, his elbow propped at his hip, and thumb knuckle to his mouth. When he pauses, it’s to look at me sideways. ‘You’re really not lying, are you?’
I get up from the chair and pull the lapels of my coat together to ward off an icy draught that’s seeping into my bones from somewhere. ‘Blood disorders, digestive issues… Anything. Anything you can think of I should know.’
He pulls himself upright and folds his arms across his chest, his evaluation of me just as cautious as it was moments before. But the hard line of his jaw is gone. The colour of his eyes are less vivid.
‘No. Nothing comes to mind. Why, is he ill?’
Dropping my hands into my coat pockets, I wrap my fingers around the car keys, shake my head. ‘Just needed to be sure.’
I hesitate to thank him, hesitate to apologise for disturbing him, hesitate over how to finish this conversation at all. In the end, I do as he would and say nothing. When I leave down the hallway, it’s with my gaze pinned on the front door so I won’t look at the photographs in their flimsy frames on the bare, grey-painted wall.
Only once I’m outside, hurrying down the steps and half-jogging to the car, do I allow myself to take a breath. And only after I’ve fumbled the key in the ignition, pulled away from the kerb and am returning down the hill from Ty Bryn for the last time, do I let the tears that blur my vision finally fall.
Chapter 8
The party had finished early. It was one of those that had promised a lot but hadn’t delivered. Not all who said they’d be there showed up, and those who did obliterated the booze supplies by ten thirty. After that there didn’t seem any point in staying. Maybe it was because it was mid week, or maybe it was just everything going on at the time, but the two Strongbows and three Budweisers I’d drunk had done little to lift my mood. I couldn’t get out of there quick enough. I hadn’t wanted to go to some kid’s parents’ bungalow in Blackwood in the first place, but Lauren, persistent as always, had convinced me it would make me feel better. She was wrong. I spent the whole time we were there wishing I’d stayed in my bedroom, then the half hour wait for her dad to pick us up wanting to be anywhere else but back home.
‘Forget about him,’ Lauren kept saying, fed up with looking at my dour face. ‘He’s a twat. Everyone knows that.’ She snorted. ‘Not even a good-looking one at that.’
By the time Darren Isaacs pulled up in his BMW, streetlights flashing off the polished chrome bonnet, I was just about ready to punch his daughter between the eyes. Instead, sitting on the rear seat of the car, staring out of the side window, I clenched my fists in my lap as Lauren whined in the front passenger seat about how bad the party was and what a miserable sod I’d been. She feigned a full bladder so her dad would drop her home first and she wouldn’t have to go all the way to Cwmcarn and back again. Two and a half miles, that’s all it was between our houses. What she was really doing was making a point. It pissed her off to be with me, and she wanted me to know it. The twenty-year-old acting like a ten-year-old. She was starting to do that a lot and I was tired of it.
She’d got out of the car without saying a word and slammed the door. Her father winced and swore under his breath. With Lauren gone, the tears I’d been fighting to keep at bay grew harder for me to choke back. I ducked out of sight of the rear-view mirror and swiped at my damp cheeks. But the nearer we got to home, the more I couldn’t stop the sobs that wracked my body, and in the end I gave up trying and buried my head in my hands.
I can’t remember if he spoke. If he asked if I was alright or what I answered. But perhaps I told him I didn’t want to go home, because the car kept on driving, and I kept on crying, and when we eventually stopped, we were somewhere on top of the mountains, pulled into a layby with the forest on one side of us and an open view down to the twinkling lights of a village on the other. Abercarn maybe, Crosskeys, or my own, I didn’t know. I hadn’t been paying attention, and it was dark. I was just glad I wasn’t at the house yet with everything there that I wasn’t ready to face.
I was glad too when a rush of cool air from outside was replaced by the warmth of Lauren’s dad on the back seat beside me. His presence had always been reassuring, certain and capable. Always made me feel he could take care of everything. No matter how awful it might be, he could fix it. He could make a problem go away. All those things I imagined him to be, I felt from him then as his arms went around my shoulders and he comforted me. His body was warm through his shirt. The scent clinging to it was soothing and musky. And the tenderness
he showed only added to my growing dislike of Lauren and all the times she’d complained about what a loser he was, in that spoilt way she had. He was anything but a loser. He was strong and mature, and would know how to put this right.
So when he asked me what was wrong, I didn’t hesitate to tell him. Not about Jamie, my boyfriend of three months who’d dumped me by text earlier in the week, the reason Lauren thought I was sulking. But about Mam. The scan results that explained why she’d not been herself for a while. The diagnosis that meant she was living on borrowed time. When the tears returned, he held me again and told me it would be alright, and I remember, aided by the alcohol and exhaustion, closing my eyes and gripping him tighter to absorb some of his strength so that I could deal with this in the same way he would. I remember too – though not precisely how – that I was the one who kissed first. He backed off at first, as if I’d stung him, surprise flashing across his features. But then stone-blue eyes, clear even in the car’s darkness, captured the moment his shock turned to something else and he looked at me like he hadn’t before. As if he’d only just noticed me. When I reached for him a second time, he didn’t back away.
Through high school and college, anytime Lauren was out of earshot, those who knew Darren Isaacs referred to him as a DILF. It was said with a joke and a laugh, until his BMW came into sight and then all heads would turn. He was, in all, an average-looking man. But it was the vivid colour of his eyes, how he carried himself, the flash car, impeccable dress sense, and the cool, standoffish demeanour, that caught the girls’ attention, made everyone want to be Lauren’s best friend. I’d be lying if I said I was immune to it. Darren Isaacs intrigued me too, but only as much as Eliza did, and in fact the entire family. Darren was Lauren and Craig’s dad. I’d spent a lot of time at their house, eating dinner at their kitchen table, camping out in their back garden, listening to music in Craig’s room and, in Lauren’s room, trying on make-up and clothes my own family couldn’t afford. They had invited me into their home, to be a part of who they were, and so I never joined in with the lewd comments. And didn’t once allow my mind to go where the other girls’ did.
Except, none of that was uppermost in my thoughts as we undressed each other on the back seat of his BMW under a cloudless night sky in late August 2012. Nor afterwards when he drove me home, stopping at the bottom of the street, telling me again that my mother would be fine and not to worry. It was what I needed to hear, and I thanked him before I got out of the car, already knowing something significant had changed and I was on the cusp of turning from one kind of life to another. At the time, I’d thought it was that my friendship with Lauren was all but done, and now that Craig had been gone from the house for the last few years, my visits to Ty Bryn were coming to an end. But it was six weeks later that exactly what that life change would be showed itself in two thin pink lines on a Clearblue plastic pregnancy test.
I had slept with only one man, one time, and just like that the freedom I’d been on the verge of reaching for was snatched from my grasp.
*
When I get back to Dad’s after leaving Ty Bryn, he meets me at the door, wondering what took me so long. I tell him the checkouts in the supermarket crashed and the queues were a nightmare. Then I seek out Jake who’s lying belly-down on the living-room floor, his hands propping his chin as he watches an old Bugs Bunny cartoon on the TV. Behind him, Shaun lies sideways across the armchair, legs dangling off one end, head against the cushion, as engrossed in the animated capers as his nephew.
Getting down on the rug, I stretch out on my stomach and fold my arms where I can rest my head on them like a pillow and watch my son. His mouth hangs open, eyes move about the screen, and I can almost hear his brain absorbing information, making connections, drawing conclusions. My insides ache with how much he means to me. In the beginning, when I found out I was pregnant, my world was over. Shaken and terrified, I had told Mam – finally, and only when I didn’t know what else to do. She said whatever I decided would be okay with her, she’d support me. But a mixture of emotions had crossed her face, and I knew I had no choice. I would have to keep it. For her. It would be her only chance to be a grandmother.
Twenty-one was a difficult age to watch my future unfold before my eyes. I was overwhelmed with love at the same time as swamped with the responsibility. Mam helped me come to terms with that in those first months and years, convincing me I could be many things, not just one. Police officer, for instance; something that had been at the back of my mind for years, but I’d thought was without question off the cards once Jake came along. Three years later, once Mam was gone, completing the training and adjusting to my new dual roles gave me focus, stopped me from drowning in grief. The overwhelm was still there sometimes, but it receded as my competence grew both as an officer and as a mother.
Except now, as I lie here beside my boy, that overwhelm threatens again. Because Darren’s comfort may have been warm and reassuring that night almost seven years ago when I was helplessly watching my life fall apart. But in harsh contrast, his rejection of me this time is brutally cold and empty. I can live with that. I don’t need him to accept me. But some day Jake’s going to feel that rejection too. And I’ll be the only one he can blame for it.
Chapter 9
‘Are you grounded too?’ my colleague PC Neil Smith asks, as I stop by the door to what we teasingly refer to as his office. The room is barely bigger than a store cupboard, but it’s enough to house half a dozen filing cabinets, one desk, a chair, computer and audio equipment. It’s purpose is to be a quiet environment away from the chaos of the main space for those who need it. Those like Smithy, who’s dyslexic. Not that he advertises the fact. If anything, the special treatment the cupboard-office hints at only makes him uncomfortable. Like now. He’s taken little persuasion to drop back in his chair and shift his focus from the screen to the Tupperware tub and fork he holds in his hands.
‘Is that what this is, you’ve been a naughty boy?’ I say, thinking it’s early in the night to be exchanging the street for the paperwork.
‘Undoubtedly,’ he answers, poking the fork at the contents of the tub and releasing pockets of steam that rise and disperse around his face.
‘Just heading out. But I smelled something amazing come from this direction.’ I lean against the door frame, my hollow stomach growling at the agonizing tease of home-cooked food. It’ll be his mam who’s cooked it for him, no doubt. Another thing we rib Smithy about, but only because we’re jealous. Most of us over the age of twenty-five have to prepare our own packed lunch.
Smithy flashes a grin and releases his fork to run a hand down his polo shirt. ‘Paco Rabanne, actually.’
I silently kick myself for walking into that one. There are an abundance of big egos in this department, of all genders, but Smithy’s is the most shameless. ‘Really? I had no idea he did a tomato and bacon range.’
‘Now you do,’ he says, a wry smile teasing his lips as he picks up the fork with pasta on the end of it and holds it up. ‘Want some?’
My stomach growls again. I pull back my hair and tug the band from my wrist to tie it up from my face. ‘Good of you to ask, but I couldn’t bear to take the food from a growing boy’s mouth. Besides, if all goes to plan, I’ve got a pair of golden arches in my sights tonight.’
‘Classy,’ Smithy says over his pasta. ‘What are we talking? Chicken salad wrap?’
Looking to the ceiling, I reel off what I’ve been mentally preparing since shift started a couple of hours ago. ‘Two bacon quarter-pounders with cheese and all the trimmings, large fries, and a full-sugar Coke.’
‘All out self-annihilation.’ My colleague winces. ‘Everything alright?’
‘It will be,’ I say, and laugh to brush off his concern. He’s not convinced, but he leaves it there, returning his attention to his food. I’m reminded of a tough call-out he attended just a few nights ago, and wonder if that’s another reason he’s in here and not out there. Maybe the sarge thought he needed
some time-out of a different kind.
‘Smithy, I’m sorry about Right Guard.’
He shrugs theatrically but doesn’t look up, his focus on his pasta. Neil might be all smooth talk and swagger on the outside, but he’s a teddy bear underneath. He’d grown close to Right Guard, a homeless man well-known to those of us who patrol the city centre, and his death will hurt more than he’s letting on. Not just that his old friend is gone, but the cruel way in which he went, a victim of the alcohol he’d consumed and the lit cigarette that turned his sleeping bag into a fireball he couldn’t escape. That was how Smithy found him, when it was already all over. In just three years, I’ve seen some things in this job I wish I hadn’t. But not even I can imagine what that would have been like.
‘Must have been a tough night for you, mate. I’m really sorry.’
‘Shit happens,’ he mumbles over his food.
‘Yes it does,’ I agree, thinking of the look on Darren Isaacs’ face when he asked what it was I thought he could give me. The pit of my stomach sinks at the reminder.
‘Well, drive careful out there, partner,’ Smithy orders. ‘I’ll be out there myself as soon as I’m allowed off the naughty step.’
I raise my hand to salute a response and leave him to finish his food. But I haven’t gone far when he calls after me. I retreat a stride and tip my head around the door frame.
‘Take a nugget for me,’ he says, with a mock seriousness that makes me laugh.
‘I’ll take two,’ I tell him, before heading to the locker room to gear up for whatever’s coming my way in the shift ahead.
*
Town is busy. Wednesday, being the universal student night, ensures I spend a lot of time settling petty arguments and directing vomit-stained teenagers either to the taxi rank or the hospital. I’m not alone in my endeavours. A dedicated band of volunteers and community support officers make up the brunt of the evening’s student care team, but I’m here to add extra weight where it’s needed in between urgent calls.