by Dani Atkins
Noah was halfway through his breakfast before I spotted the thin leather bracelet fixed around one small bony wrist. It appeared as he stretched across the table for a second slice of toast and I knew he’d seen my expression of surprise by the way he quickly tugged the white cuff of his school shirt back down to cover it. Twice in the space of less than half an hour, my son, who I’d always believed told me everything, had revealed a secret.
‘What’s that?’ My voice was just the right amount of curious.
‘It’s a bracelet,’ he mumbled, and I could have left it there, should have left it there, except his cheeks had suddenly gone bright red, the way they used to do when he was teething. As he now had a full complement of teeth, the heightened colour had to come from embarrassment.
‘Where did you get that?’ I asked, laying my hand down on the table, palm-side up, in invitation. Noah fidgeted on his wooden kitchen chair for a moment before laying his wrist on my hand. It was an unremarkable piece of jewellery, but something I couldn’t imagine his dad buying. Like a lot of mechanics, Pete didn’t even wear a wristwatch, and the only piece of jewellery he’d ever owned or worn was his wedding ring. It still sat on his finger, as did mine. I dreaded the hurt I knew would come the first time I saw his left hand without it.
So it was hard to imagine Pete buying this ethnic-looking bracelet for our son. A mother’s instincts are sharp; so too are a wife’s.
‘Maya bought it for me on Saturday. There was a stall selling them in the park.’
‘Uh huh,’ I said, very pleased with the way I sounded just the right amount of pleasantly interested. Maya was the receptionist at the garage where Pete worked. She was a few years younger than me, wore way too much mascara, and tops cut so low that hardly anyone bothered looking at her eyes anyway. She was pretty, and divorced, and fancied my husband; had done from the first moment she’d joined the staff of the garage three years earlier. Pete hadn’t seen it, not even when I’d jokingly pointed it out to him. Only now it didn’t seem so funny. ‘Does she?’ he’d asked, truly not sounding even the least bit interested. ‘Well, that’s a shame for her, because the only woman I happen to fancy is…’ There’d been a long pause as he’d come up behind me at the sink and wound his arms around my waist.‘…you,’ he had whispered in my ear, and then kissed my neck in the way he did that always made my knees forget how to hold me up.
‘Yuck. That’s so gross,’ Noah had declared, watching us with undisguised disgust from across the kitchen. Parental canoodling was possibly the very worst thing he could imagine back then. How could he possibly know how much worse it got when the canoodling stopped altogether?
‘So Maya came to the park with you, did she?’ I was pleased at how I’d managed to make my words sound like idle curiosity and less like bullets being fired from a gun.
‘No. We bumped into her after we’d played football,’ Noah exclaimed, opening his mouth and biting off a huge chunk of toast. It felt like an eternity before he was ready to speak again. ‘But then Dad invited her to join us and we all went for ice creams and then she bought me this cool bracelet with my name on it and everything. Do you like it, Mummy?’
Once, a very long time ago, I’d promised myself never to lie to my child. And yet it was surprisingly easy to do so now. ‘I love it. But I’m afraid you can’t wear it to school, honey, it’s not allowed.’ I reached for the press-stud fastening and removed the thin strap from his suntanned wrist. As I looked into his huge brown eyes I felt a familiar tug of love, laced with a feeling of panic I hadn’t been expecting. Would I have to share his love with another woman one day? Would Pete eventually find a new partner who’d become my son’s stepmum? Would another woman tuck him up in a bed I’d never see; read him stories I’d never hear; and kiss him goodnight on the weekends he spent with his dad?
I palmed the bracelet, squeezing it so tightly I could feel the sharp edges of the leather digging into the skin of my hand. ‘You can wear it when you get home this afternoon. Hurry up now, or you’re going to be late for school.’
*
There were a few lingering mums chatting in the morning sunshine when I pulled up outside the green wrought iron primary school gates, but most had already dispersed. The traffic had been particularly bad that morning.
‘Shall I come in and explain why you’re late?’
‘No!’ Noah exclaimed, with the kind of horror only an eight-year-old can effectively pull off. ‘That would be soooo uncool.’
I reached over and smoothed back a thick strand of dark hair that had fallen across his forehead. It gleamed like sealskin in the rays of sunlight filtering through the windscreen. He was several shades darker than Pete and a whole colour chart away from my own tawny locks.
‘Would Danny Zuko’s mum come into school and speak to his teacher?’ Noah challenged, his small pointed chin nodding emphatically as though he’d scored an irrefutable winning argument.
‘You feel okay, don’t you?’ I asked, my fingers itching to rest against his forehead to perform a quick temperature check. There was a time when I did that almost automatically, but I was better now. Mostly I kept the urge under control.
‘I feel fine,’ Noah assured.
‘Got your EpiPen?’ One day I would let him go without asking. But not today.
He held his book bag up and waggled it by way of an answer.
‘Okay then, my little T-Bird. Scoot. Get the heck out of my car.’
Noah grinned, leapt out, but before running into the building he turned and glanced back over his shoulder. There it was, the grin I loved, all teeth, crinkled eyes, and freckles. ‘That was cool,’ he said approvingly, and then was gone.
*
The car park of the veterinary practice was already full, and I had to circle it twice before finally finding a space. I followed a woman cradling a sick-looking dog in her arms up the path to the surgery. Her red-rimmed eyes were as sad as a basset hound’s as she lifted them to mine in thanks when I held open the door. I’d worked at the practice for three years and still found it hard not to get caught up in the heartbreak of the job. It was a hard equation to balance: the joy of loving a pet versus the pain of losing them. The same could possibly be said of a husband.
It was nine months, two weeks and four days since Pete had walked away in tears from our family home, carrying a motley collection of mismatched suitcases in his arms and the memory of that last dreadful argument in his heart – the one when I’d told him to leave. And I still couldn’t decide whether the joy of loving him for fourteen years outweighed the pain of living without him for almost a year.
I made my way to my desk, evicting the practice’s moggy, Buzz, from my chair, as I did each morning. ‘Really, Buzz? Every single day?’ I asked, gently nudging the reluctant feline until he sauntered lazily away with a vengeful look in his baleful green eyes. A low rumble of laughter came from the direction of the reception desk, where a tall, well-dressed man waiting to be served had witnessed my confrontation with the cat. He smiled briefly before his attention was claimed by whoever was pulling sharply on the lead curled around his hand.
My job didn’t require me to help out at Reception, but the man was clearly dressed for somewhere other than a visit to the vet’s; he stood out like a thoroughbred in a string of ponies. More than that, he had a nice air about him. I hadn’t reached the point of ‘noticing’ other men yet, but if I ever did get there, he was the kind of man I’d like to meet.
‘Can I help you?’ I asked, approaching the reception desk with a smile. Whatever animal the man had on the end of the lead was clearly growing increasingly agitated. I could hear a plaintive whining and the scratch of claws on linoleum as it tried to make for the exit. I peered over the desk and his small Jack Russell terrier barked vociferously up at me. Its owner was considerably more courteous.
‘Thank you,’ he said, sliding a printed bill across the counter towards me. ‘I’d like to settle this now, if that’s possible.’
‘Of c
ourse,’ I said politely, swivelling the invoice around and trying to keep my features neutral. The amount would have secured storage for our frozen embryos for the next two years.
‘Could I have the name, please?’
‘Sally,’ he said, flipping open his wallet.
‘Erm, yours, not hers.’
His laughter set the excitable little dog off again. ‘I’m sorry. You’d think with the amount of time I spend here, I’d know the drill by now.’ His face sobered, and the fine traces of lines, which the amusement had smoothed away, settled back into place.
‘Thomas,’ he said, reciting his address to help me find his account on the computer system. An impressive list of invoices popped up on the screen, many of them equal in size to the one he was paying today.
‘Sally’s quite a regular patient, isn’t she?’ I observed, wondering too late if my comment bordered on being rude. I was about to apologise, but Mr Thomas just shrugged good-naturedly and slid a credit cards towards me. ‘If I stop to think how much this little dog has cost my wife and me over the years…’
I processed the transaction and handed him the card reader. ‘I’m sure she’s worth it,’ I said, suddenly thankful that despite Noah’s persistent requests, we owned nothing more expensive to keep alive than a lowly goldfish.
‘Well, have a nice day,’ I said.
‘You too,’ Mr Thomas replied politely, already heading back to his life and out of mine. ‘I’m sure I’ll be back here and seeing you again before too long.’
But the next time I saw Mr Thomas it was in an entirely different location.
4
Izzy
The message came through on my phone. I stared at it for ages and delayed replying for so long Pete probably thought I hadn’t received it. When the screen went black, I kept pressing the home button to summon up his words again.
Was wondering if you’d like to grab a bite of lunch before Noah’s show? There’s something I’d like to ask you. We could meet at the pub near the garage? TB.
Only I didn’t want to text back until I’d forensically dissected his invitation. It was unprecedented. We didn’t do this kind of thing anymore, not since Pete and I had stopped sharing a bed, an address, or anything at all, except for Noah – obviously, he was something we’d always share. Since our separation, all contact was always in the presence of our son, who we passed between us like a relay baton.
The last full conversation Pete and I had held in private had been the one where we’d discussed how to break the news to our little boy that Mummy and Daddy weren’t going to be living together any more. We’d agreed that I should be the one to say the actual words, but when the moment came they’d burnt like bile in my throat, searing it closed. Pete had to take over, reaching for Noah’s small hand and gripping it tightly as our words tore his world apart. Pete’s other hand had held mine. I took comfort in that for all kinds of reasons. It made me think that perhaps this separation might only be temporary, a blip we’d be able to get past. But somehow we never did.
And now he was inviting me to lunch, away from the familiar surroundings of the home we still owned; away from our child. I ping-ponged backwards and forwards all afternoon, unable to decide if this request for a meeting was a good sign or an extremely bad one.
‘There’s no way of knowing unless you go,’ said Maggie, my work colleague and friend, looking up from a clipboard where she was busy ticking items off a delivery note. ‘You are going to go, Izzy, aren’t you?’
I sighed as I lifted a sack of dog kibble from the floor, my face half hidden behind it. ‘What if he wants to talk about going ahead with a divorce?’
‘What if he wants to talk about coming home?’ she countered straight back.
‘Maybe he wants to tell me he’s met someone else?’ Maya’s face, followed swiftly by her memorable cleavage, popped into my head and refused to leave it.
‘Or maybe he wants to tell you that he still loves you.’
I had to hand it to Maggie, she was playing her cards well, and I liked her hand much better than my own.
‘You have to go,’ Maggie said, ending the conversation on a decisive note, almost as if she didn’t know I would be spending the entire night tossing and turning, debating on whether or not I’d made the right decision.
‘I know I do.’
*
My reply was so breezy I could practically feel it gusting through the air from my phone to his.
Sure. I can do lunch before the show. One o’clock? See you then.
Never in the history of texts has anyone spent so long debating whether or not to end their message with an ‘x’. It went in and came out no less than five times before I finally lost patience with myself and pressed ‘Send’ without it.
*
The weather was hot, too warm for jeans, my preferred choice of outfit, or at least that’s what I told myself as I delved deep into my wardrobe and pulled out a floaty calf-length skirt and a short-sleeved top with a flattering V-neck. I stared at the woman in the mirror, who’d let her hair hang down in soft waves rather than clip it back in its usual sensible ponytail. I’d never been one for wearing much make-up, except for special occasions, but even I had to admit that a couple of strokes with a mascara wand and a smear of lip gloss made a big difference. Even Noah noticed when I wafted into the kitchen on a cloud of the perfume Pete had bought me two Christmases ago.
‘You look pretty,’ he declared, which earned him a quick kiss dropped onto his thick dark hair. ‘But you smell kind of funny.’ There’s nothing like an eight-year-old for taking you down a peg or two.
Fortunately, excitement about his show that afternoon meant Noah was too lost in his own thoughts to spare any for what might be happening in my day. I tried to bury the idea that Pete was going to ask if he could come back home, but it kept clawing its way back to the surface.
*
The pub was busy; Pete had always called it a popular ‘watering hole’ for the nearby offices and building sites, and the phrase certainly rang true as I squeezed and excuse-me’d through the crowds. Laughter as shrill as hyenas’ from a cluster of smartly dressed women was answered by deeper, antelope-like snorts of amusement from their male colleagues. At the bar, a trio of dust-covered construction workers grunted like warthogs as I walked past. It felt a bit like being in a David Attenborough documentary.
Miraculously, I managed to score a suddenly vacant table and quickly slid onto a chair, in a manner Buzz the cat would clearly have applauded. The thought made me smile, and my lips were still gently curved when the chair opposite me was pulled out and Pete sat down.
‘Hey you,’ he said, and the use of his old greeting almost undid me. He moved in for a hug before stopping to question if he should, and ended up hovering so close I could smell the oil from the cars he’d been working on that morning and a lingering whiff of his shower gel. It was all achingly familiar.
‘It feels odd being out without Noah,’ Pete said, as we browsed the pub menu.
‘I did ask the school if he could join us for a swift pint, but they said he had double maths and then needed to get ready for the show.’
It felt good to hear Pete laugh – properly laugh – again. It was even better seeing the flicker of surprise in his hazel eyes, almost as if he’d forgotten that I could be funny. I couldn’t blame him for that, because I had too.
‘I’ll have the ploughman’s, please,’ I said, wondering how awkward it would be if I offered to pay for my own lunch. Luckily, Pete got to his feet to head to the bar before I had the chance to find out.
‘Won’t be a minute,’ he promised, and then muscle memory or a long-remembered habit reached out from the past to sabotage him. As he turned to go, his hand fell lightly onto my shoulder, giving it a gentle squeeze. Two sets of suddenly indrawn breath and the hand was whisked away. We both pretended that it hadn’t happened; it seemed safer that way.
By the time Pete returned with a pint for himself and a glass of wi
ne for me, I’d given myself a stern talking-to, and was trying to pretend that none of this felt weird or uncomfortable. Except that it did. And it wasn’t helped by the couple of glances I’d intercepted from him, which had suddenly made the smooth Chardonnay much harder to swallow.
Pete was scratching that spot beneath his ear again, a sure sign that he too was nervous, and suddenly the need to know what we were doing here made me bold.
‘You said there was something you wanted to ask me?’ I prompted, my hands fiddling with the stem of my wine glass as my entire future hung on a pivot.
Pete’s smile looked nervous. ‘Yes, there is.’
The pub faded away, and suddenly it was just the two of us staring at each other across a small table roughly the width of the Grand Canyon.
‘It’s about Noah.’
Keep smiling, I told myself, despite the fact I could already feel the grin sliding from my face like a melting waxwork. Don’t let him see that you were hoping this lunch was about us.
‘I’d like to take him away.’
You’d have thought that after so many years together, he’d have found a better way of phrasing it. Pete looked mystified as the colour drained from my face, before realising that I’d misinterpreted his words.
‘On holiday,’ he clarified rapidly. ‘I’d like to take Noah away on holiday. It’s been a really tough year for him, but he’s coped with it all so brilliantly. He’s such an amazing kid and he deserves a break.’
Part of me wanted to know if Pete meant a break from me. I was several glasses of Chardonnay shy of being brave enough to ask that one.