by Lucy Dawson
‘Mum, you are spending too much time online,’ Flo says.
‘No, I’m not! What possible evidence do you have for that?’ Mum waits for a nanosecond. ‘Exactly – you don’t have any. You can’t just accuse someone of something without any factual basis for it.’
‘Seriously. A little less time on Twitter, OK?’
‘Look, he was perfectly happy not knowing what had happened to his sausage before he popped it in his mouth.’
Ordinarily, Flo would make a quip about this, and I would laugh out loud. But not today. Harry looks up, as if to catch Flo’s eye, but she doesn’t look at him and he glances down again, disappointed. I feel bad for him. Meeting the parents has not gone with a bang.
It’s almost a relief to make it to the goodbyes in the hall, Tris looking at his watch, repeatedly chivvying us all with: ‘Come on! Come on! Time to go! We’ve got a long journey ahead!’ Mum ignores him, leaping around the children crooning: ‘Kiss Nona goodbye! Ciao, Bella!’ while Dad tickles Teddy, getting him helpfully all riled up.
‘OK. Let’s do this. Bye, Harry! Nice to meet you.’ Tris, standing in the doorway, holds up a hand in a farewell to Harry, who is absently leant against the wall on his phone, messaging away. He doesn’t look up. Tris turns to me and thumbs at him like, ‘Who is this guy?’ gesturing widely in disbelief when Harry continues to ignore him. Tris gives up, shooting Harry a quick look of disgust, before turning on the spot and walking off down the path. Flo glances at Harry – oblivious and still staring down at his screen – then quietly disappears into the sitting room.
Mum and Dad follow the kids down the path to the car, so when Harry finally looks up, it’s only me still there, fiddling with my shoes. He looks surprised and then embarrassed to see everyone has vanished.
‘I’m so sorry, my mum is ill at the moment. I was just saying I’ll call her when I get back to mine.’
I smile sympathetically. ‘It’s totally fine. Don’t worry at all. And I hope she feels better soon.’
‘Thanks. It’s not really that sort of gig. More of a long-standing thing, but thank you.’
‘I’m sorry to hear that. Bye, Harry. You take care.’
I very much doubt I’ll see him again. Which is a shame. He seemed nice.
I don’t normally write on Sunday evenings, but once the kids are in bed, Tris gets out his laptop and I decide I might as well. In any case, I’m so woefully behind, I don’t have much choice. Since finishing work on ‘Mia’s’ book, I’ve had to return to the one I owe my own editor under my own name. But despite having been completely in the zone on Friday – the words flying furiously from my fingers – tonight I’m completely stuck. It’s like pulling teeth with blunt pliers. I dick around on Facebook for a bit, check my Amazon reviews and wish I hadn’t – there’s a new two-star annihilation of my latest release which concludes: ‘I found myself wondering, what’s the point?’ – get up, eat a few cheese straws and a biscuit, go back and try another jump start, but by 9 p.m., I’ve only managed a paltry 286 words. I’ve been doing this long enough to know it’s just a blip and I’d be better off packing up shop for the night and attacking it again in the morning afresh, so I take the Sunday magazines upstairs and sneak off to bed.
I can’t even concentrate on them, however, and give up – turning instead to my phone. All I can think about is my offer to Mia and how Flo would be furious if she knew what I’ve done. I don’t want to have to think about it. Just for five minutes I want to step away from what I’ve started and have a few moments of mindless peace. I want to leap-frog from Facebook, to Twitter, to Instagram – blanking my brain, filling it up with pointless sponge information that won’t leave room for anything else. But instead, a text from Flo comes in.
Checking you’re OK. You seemed very on edge earlier. Anything you want to discuss?
Very much not, thank you.
Totally fine. You? Harry seems nice?
I wait a moment or two, but as expected, that elicits no response. I leap next to checking my email, but as they load up, one name immediately stands out – and I sit up in bed, swearing under my breath. I told her not to contact me. I was explicit about that – but nonetheless there is her name, right in front of me: Mia Justice… She has begun a paper trail. Something that can now be traced back to me, with little or no effort whatsoever. Idiot!
Out of nowhere, Tris walks in, carrying two glasses of water. As he sets one down on my bedside table, I scramble to hit the home screen and Mia’s message disappears.
‘I thought I’d come to bed early too for once,’ he says quietly and walks around to his side, carefully setting his glass down; but the second he does, Teddy starts to cough in his bedroom across the hall. Tris freezes. ‘That wasn’t me,’ he says, then swears as we both hear Teddy wail: ‘Mummy!’
I sigh heavily, and Tris’s shoulders sag. ‘I’ll go. It’s my fault.’
I hold up a hand. ‘Just give him a moment. He might sort himself out.’ We listen as we hear the familiar sound of Teddy reaching for his water bottle and gulping from it, before settling back down. Another second or two passes, and just as I’m starting to relax, he coughs again.
‘Great,’ says Tris, unbuttoning his shirt. ‘Your dad didn’t sound a hundred per cent today. They’ve probably caught this off him.’
‘Not in under three hours,’ I say, wearily. ‘It’s more likely to be a side effect of the flu vaccine they had on Friday. It can give them runny noses and coughs.’
‘I didn’t know you’d been to the doctors on Friday?’ Tris unzips his trousers and flings them in the direction of the dirty clothes bin. They miss and land next to it, in front of the door – perfect positioning for me to trip over them when I inevitably have to get up in the dark later to go and see to Teddy. I wait for him to walk over and pick them up. He doesn’t and I don’t want the row, so I get up and do it myself, before climbing back into bed.
‘Maybe they caught something in the waiting room?’ He peels off his socks and gets into bed in his boxers, shivering.
‘They didn’t go to the doctor. They had the nasal spray at school. I filled in the form at the start of term.’ I’m emotionless, just presenting the facts.
‘Oh. Right. Well, maybe it is that then. Oh come on… not her too?’ he groans, as Clara begins to cough, disturbed in her sleep by Teddy. ‘You spend all summer waiting for it to get cooler at night, then it does and instead you’re up for hours with two barking dogs. I’ve got such an early start in the morning. I so don’t need this.’ He stares up at the ceiling, hand on his head.
‘You’re in Sheffield tomorrow?’ I ask, and he nods. ‘I did tell you.’
‘No, you didn’t, but no worries.’ I turn away from him, pick up one of the magazines again and lie down myself. He listens to the kids coughing for a moment more. ‘Was your sister OK today?’ he says suddenly.
I carry on reading. ‘I think so? Why do you ask?’
He continues to stare up at the ceiling. ‘She seemed very quiet.’
‘She’s fine.’
‘I didn’t think much of that new bloke of hers.’
‘Yes, you made that quite clear. I liked him.’
Tris turns and gives me a look. ‘Based on what? He was barely three-D. It’s like saying “I like clingfilm”.’
Clara explosively coughs again. Tris groans. ‘Isn’t there anything they can have?’
‘I’ve already done Calpol. They don’t need Nurofen as well.’
‘Mummmmmmy! Where are you?’ Teddy is now wide awake.
I get up just as Tris does, gathering his pillows, water and his book. ‘I’m sorry, but I really need to get some sleep tonight. I’ve got such a long drive in the morning. Plus if I go in the spare room you can at least bring them in here with you if you need to.’
I look at him steadily. ‘OK. Sure. You do that. I don’t want you crashing on the motorway.’
I leave the room before he can answer and when I come back to the now-cold bed, some twenty minutes later,
after both kids seem to have mercifully settled down, he’s not there, but I can hear him snoring across the hall.
I climb back in, on my side, and return to inspecting Mia’s message… her confirmation that yes, she’ll do it. She’ll pretend to be me and make us both a lot of money.
I close my eyes. I promised Flo.
I swear and delete it quickly, both from my inbox and then Gmail itself before turning off the light. I lie there in the dark, listening to Tris snoring and coughing across the hall. It starts to rain outside. Blustery gusts thwack against the window, but my babies are safe in their beds – all is well in their world.
The rain doesn’t stop. I can hear it pouring through the hole in the gutter I told Tris about ages ago. In fairness I could have just had it fixed myself.
It’s a very long time before I finally get to sleep.
‘So I can’t call my shop John Lewis?’ Clara holds a felt tip over her notebook, snuggled in our bed, watching her daddy get ready for work.
‘No.’ Tris is staring down at his phone. ‘Because there’s already a shop called that and people would get confused. You need a new name that’s all your own to make as famous as John Lewis. That’s what we call a brand.’
Oh come on! Really? She’s seven.
‘I’m going to call MY shop “Edward loves fruit cake”,’ Teddy says confidently, tucked in on the other side of me. I can’t help smiling at that and Tris looks up too, catching my eye, equally amused.
‘Can you really not just tell work you have to be London-based today?’ I say suddenly.
Tris doesn’t answer, just slides his mobile into his pocket and pats the others, to make sure he’s got everything. I know he heard me.
‘Clara, Teddy – as you’re not going to school, you can go and get the iPad if you want,’ I say instead. ‘It’s in the kitchen. Take it into Clara’s room and watch it in her bed. I want you to stay warm. Just CBeebies,’ I call after them as they scramble out, and Tris says: ‘Mind my stuff please!’, grabbing onto the open case on the bed as Teddy almost knocks it flying in his haste.
‘I thought we weren’t letting them watch it during the week?’ Tris turns and glances at himself in the mirror, fiddling with the front of his hair then flaring his nostrils, peering up them briefly.
‘They’re ill. It’s fine just for this morning. Tris, surely you’re senior enough to pull rank now and say you can’t go to Sheffield today after all and someone else has to do it?’ I try again. ‘Just be honest. Say “my kids are ill again, they can’t go to school today, my wife is going crazy not being able to work and I need to be at home this evening to help her”.’
‘It’s because I’m senior that I have to go,’ he explains. ‘I know it’s not glamorous and you’re thinking “it’s only Sheffield, not Frankfurt”, but I’ve told you before, this client is huge. People make the mistake of writing firms off just because they’re regional. It’s elitist and unfair. Yes it sucks that the kids are ill again and yes I’m really, really sorry that I can’t stay and help today, but there is nothing I can do about it. I’m genuinely sorry – but there it is.’ He looks at his watch. ‘Shit. It’s already half past six. I’ve got to go. The M25 is going to be horrendous. I should have left at 5 a.m., really.’
‘I’m not asking you to take the day off, just to work in town instead. That way you can take over this evening when you get back, so I can write then. Please?’ I beg. ‘They’re going to be up and down all evening with blocked noses. I’ll get nothing done otherwise and I’m so in the zone at the moment.’
He looks up at me from double-checking the contents of his wheelie case and raises an eyebrow.
I cross my arms. ‘I know you think that sounds wanky, but it’s honestly like asking someone to hit pause when they’re just out of the blocks. This bit when the words are just pouring out happens for ten seconds of the race and that’s it. It’s like magic and I can’t even explain the frustration to you of having to just stop when all I want to do is write. Again. Like last time they were ill.’
‘I get it – honestly I do – but like you said last week, one of the few great things about your job is flexibility. You don’t have a boss to call who will go nuts at you for not coming in like I do. You’ll make the time up – like you always say, you write fast. I don’t feel good about the fact that I have to go again and leave you with this shit to deal with, of course I don’t.’ He zips up the case. ‘Funnily enough, I do also miss you and the kids when I’m away. Isn’t there anyone else who can come and help you tonight? What about your mum? Or your sister?’
I pull the duvet around me more tightly, defeated. ‘Forget it. I’ll sort something out.’
‘I can ask my mum and dad to come down if you like? They’d love to help out.’
‘Christ!’ I picture Moira framed in the front doorway, grimly rolling her sleeves up and snapping on the marigolds. ‘No, thanks.’
‘Fine. Well, I’ve offered solutions. I know it’s grossly unfair that just because I have a comparatively traditional job, I can’t ever be the one to take up the slack, and it always falls to you. I’m sorry, but I don’t know what else to say. It’s also my job that largely pays the bills, so…’ He shrugs, picks up the case and leaves the room, calling: ‘Guys? Daddy has to go to work now! Where are you? I need a kiss.’ I even hear him say to Teddy: ‘be good for Mummy while I’m away, OK?’
‘Tris!’ I call desperately and he reappears in the doorway. ‘I want you to call in sick if you genuinely can’t not go into the London office today rather than Sheffield. I never, ever ask you to do this, but I need you to today.’
‘No,’ he says simply. No negotiation. That’s just it. ‘I can’t.’
I feel prickles of anger start to puncture the tears at the back of my eyes. ‘I have a job too, that is just as important as yours. The children are your responsibility as much as they are mine.’
He sighs and looks up at the ceiling. ‘Oh my god… No one is saying it isn’t important. I’m simply saying I have to go to Sheffield today. Can we please not make this into a nine-act drama where you start telling me we don’t live in the 1950s anymore? I know that. I just don’t have the job freedom and flexibility you do. That’s all.’
‘You’re a fucking selfish prick.’
His eyebrows flicker with surprise as I spit out the words, but he stays calm, looking at me meditatively. ‘And you’re toxic.’ My mouth falls open in shock as he turns and walks out of the room, shouting: ‘bye, kids! Love you!’
‘Bye, Daddy!’ I hear them call back.
I stay sitting on the bed as the tears start to leak down my face. I try really, really hard to make life as good as it can be for my family. I am not toxic. I hear Clara calling me and get up quickly to wash my face in the en suite – I don’t want her to see I’ve been crying – before going downstairs to make the breakfast. Keep calm and carry on. What’s the alternative?
Unfortunately, while both of the children have temperatures, they are not quite ill enough to sit quietly on the sofa and watch movies while I work alongside them. We limp through the morning somehow; a blur of colouring, stickers, junk modelling and Play-Doh, while I hear Tris call me toxic on repeat, in my head. I see myself walking confidently into his office – over ten years ago now – in heels and a pencil skirt, to interview him for the recruitment magazine I was working on at the time. I picture him jumping up politely and, rather flustered, shaking my hand. I was aware of the effect I was having on him and I liked it. Somewhere, I still have the tiny cassette of our very first conversation. He was funny – I laughed a lot. I looked online recently to see if I could buy one of the old-fashioned Dictaphones to play it back on, but they’re about a hundred quid. It seemed a waste of money.
I glance down at my yoga pants, black jumper and odd socks as I load the plates into the dishwasher after lunch. I look a state. How the hell did I get here? I pick up my phone as I put the kettle on, checking my emails. A new one from Johnnie Boden – 30% off
ends at midnight tonight! and then Sky – Charlotte, your latest Sky VIP rewards! Enter to win tickets for Disney on Ice Skate with the Stars. Nothing from my agent, or my editor.
‘Mummy!’ comes a shout from the sitting room. ‘Teddy just pinched me! OW! And now he’s hitting me!’
I stare up at the ceiling and take a deep breath. ‘Coming!’
After I’ve been called a poo, had a few tears (him, not me) but he’s said sorry and calmed down, we all make the train track, play Hungry Hippos, build Lego, sort out the dressing-up box and somehow, mercifully, it creeps round to 4 p.m.. The children finally settle down and select a DVD, and with huge relief, I immediately seize the opportunity to snatch a crumb of work time. Unfortunately they choose a compilation of Disney shorts, which means I have to stop every five minutes, yank my headphones out and select a different mini movie for them. I’m trying to kill someone, which is a hard enough scene to write at the best of times, requiring detailed concentration, unless I want my murderer to get caught immediately by a particular breed of Amazon reviewer who lives for errors in books:
★Not thrilling OR suspenseful.
I also noticed immediately that in chapter seven the killer was NOT EVEN WEARING GLOVES and would have left prints all over their glass. How does this rubbish get published?
‘Can I have a hug?’ Teddy appears at my elbow.
‘Of course you can.’ I put the laptop down – hug him, then settle him on the sofa next to me and pick up the laptop again.
‘Can I press some buttons?’ He leans over and gets in a ‘fwtdklae;87w4i6hla’ surprisingly quickly before I lift his hand away.
‘Not right now, darling.’ I manage to smile – but the hurt I’ve squashed down all day is shape-shifting back into rage again and starting to bubble ominously. I think about Tris wheeling his case out of the door, shutting it behind him and just walking away – simultaneously realising the chicken I put in the oven and forgot about will now be overdone and I haven’t started the rest of tea yet. I’ll bet Lee Child doesn’t have to stop mid-chapter to make a fucking cauliflower cheese.