by Vivien Brown
I shook my head and swallowed the lump forcing its way up my throat, threatening to
escape in a sob. I didn’t know what to say. Would he really do it again? Cheat on me? Lie to
me?
‘And the woman? What did she look like? Did you hear what he called her? Could it
have been her? My sister? I called her that night and she was at home, but that was around nine.
I assume this was later? Was it her, do you think?’
‘I have no idea, Sarah. I didn’t get a close look at her, and I wasn’t looking at my watch
either, but does it matter? When it was, or who it was? He was taking a woman to bed, and it
wasn’t you.’ He took hold of my hand. ‘I’m sorry. That sounded much harsher than I intended.
But you needed to know. How can you decide what to do if you don’t have the facts?’
‘Do?’
‘Yes. You have to do something. This time you really have to. If you don’t, he’s going
to walk all over you forever. And you deserve so much better.’
And then he turned my face towards him, gazed at me for a few seconds, and kissed
me. Very gently, very slowly, he kissed me on the lips, and his mouth was warm and tasted of
everything that Josh’s didn’t. Of caring and comfort, and love.
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CHAPTER 25
EVE
The Christening went like a dream. Lucy and Rob had called the baby Nathaniel, although he
had very quickly become Nat to everyone but me as I somehow couldn’t quite shake off
thinking of him, as I had all through Lucy’s pregnancy, as Horace.
Despite my lack of knowledge of church etiquette, I managed to stand in the right place,
repeat the right words, and even hold the baby for a while without dropping him headfirst into
the font. The set of Beatrix Potter books I had chosen as his gift were already in pride of place in the brand-new white bookcase in his nursery as I helped Lucy change him out of his posh
and rather girly lacy gown and back into his more usual T-shirt and dungarees while Rob held
the fort downstairs, refilling glasses and passing round the sausage rolls.
‘So? What’s happening with you? We haven’t seen you since Boxing Day.’
‘Not a lot really. New school term, so I’m pretty busy at work. Did I tell you I saw
Arnie O’Connor? Gave me a bit of a fright but I may have to get used to it. I looked up the files in the admin office and it looks like he’s got two kids at the school, a girl called Rebecca in Janey’s year, and a boy, Samuel, three years older. And he lives just a few streets away from
my new place, which could be awkward. He’s the last person I want to bump into at the corner
shop.’
‘Would he recognise you, do you think?
‘Well I recognised him the moment I saw him, so yes, probably. I haven’t changed that
much since school, have I?’
‘Nope. He may still live locally, but what happened is all in the past now, isn’t it? Best
forgotten. Just keep out of his way. And if he’s got kids, and presumably a wife, we can assume he’s mended his ways.’
‘I’m not sure he has got a wife actually. She’s down at a different address. Separated,
or divorced, but definitely living apart. Shared custody, from what I can gather. And keeping
out of his way might not be possible. He’s a parent and I’m the deputy head. There’s bound to
come a time when our paths cross, officially I mean, and I won’t be able to avoid it.’
‘Meet him head-on then. Seek him out, talk to him, clear the air, then it won’t be
hanging over you, waiting to happen. Take control. Get this thing over with, on your terms, not his.’
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‘Do you think I should?’
‘Of course I do. You’re not some frightened teenager anymore, Eve. You’re a strong
independent woman, and he’s no match for you, believe me. Stand up to him, like you’d tell
any of the kids to if they were being bullied.’
‘Bullied? I’m not sure that’s—’
‘That’s exactly what it is. The man scared you half a bloody lifetime ago and he’s still
scaring you now. Don’t let him!’
‘You’re right.’
‘Of course I am. I’m always right. Just you ask my Rob! Who, by the way, we have left
alone down there for long enough.’ She wiggled Nathaniel’s feet into a pair of Thomas slippers
and hugged him to her. ‘Let’s get this young man back to his party, and get ourselves a slice of cake before it’s all gone. They’re like gannets, Rob’s family. Not to mention the champers. We
only bought three bottles and I’ve heard two corks go pop already.’
***
I was feeling all warm and fuzzy when I left. Not drunk. Far from it, as I was driving myself
home. But there was something about being with friends and becoming a fairy godmother, as
Lucy insisted on calling me, and being all fired up to tackle Arnie O’Connor, that had put me
in a happy, mellow mood. I had a good job, a nice home of my own, and for once, the future
was actually looking good. Hopeful. Full of promise.
It was quite mild for January, and I drove slowly, with the window half open and the
radio turned up high, singing along with the songs, even when I only knew a handful of the
words. I thought I might drop in to see Dad, see how he was, have a cuppa and tell him how
the christening went. It was a Sunday and I knew it was possible that Sarah and Josh might be
there, but we’d got through Christmas okay, so I felt the storm had passed now and being in
the same room was possible again. If there was going to be fallout it would have happened by
now. Besides, Janey might be there too, and I always loved seeing her.
The curtains were still open and, as I parked outside, I could see straight in. Dad, the
back of his head just showing above the top of his armchair, the TV flickering away on the
wall, Smoky the cat perched on the windowsill staring out at me, his big green eyes shining
like beady little emeralds in the semi-darkness. No sign of anyone else, which was probably
for the best when I really thought about it.
Dad took his time coming to the door. Although Sarah had no qualms about using her
key, I still preferred to knock.
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‘Come in, Eve, my love. Such a nice surprise. I was just watching one of those old films you used to love. Do you remember? Sunday afternoons there’d always be something on when
you were kids, and we’d all sit together and watch it with a bag of sweets or a nice cake to
munch on. John Wayne or James Bond, or something romantic that would get you girls sobbing
into your sleeves.’ He headed for the remote control on the arm of his chair and was about to
push the off button.
‘Well, don’t switch it off on my account. We can do that now, can’t we? Watch it
together with a cup of tea and something to eat. Look, I brought some christening cake back
from Lucy’s. I couldn’t eat any after all the sandwiches and sausage rolls, so I sneaked a big
chunk of it into a bit of tinfoil for later, but it’s too much just for me, so we might as well share.’
‘Sounds lovely. I’ll put the kettle on.’
‘No, no, you get back to your film. I’ll do it.’
He settled back into his chair and I closed the curtains around the cat, who didn’t look
like budging from the windowsill, and went out into the kitchen.
It was funny, but everything was still exactly where it had always been. Since we’d lost
&nb
sp; Mum he hadn’t changed anything. Even Mum’s favourite cup still hung alongside the others
on the old wooden mug tree and when I peered behind the door there was her apron, still
hanging there as if she was going to slip it on over her head and start baking at any minute. The room was clean, but it could do with a lick of paint, maybe some new blinds, but I got the
feeling Dad would be reluctant to change anything. This had been Mum’s domain, and he
wasn’t yet at the stage where he thought of it, or the rest of the house, as his to do what he liked with. They had always made decisions together and, now they couldn’t, it was easier to make
no decisions at all.
‘So, what’s the film about, Dad?’ I handed him his tea and pulled out the smallest of
the coffee tables from their nest of three so we had a place to put the cake plates down. ‘Tell me what’s happened so far.’
‘Well, this girl here – the one with the dark hair – she was engaged to this fella. Bill,
his name was. But now she’s met this other one – Anthony, he’s called – and she’s fallen for
him, but she doesn’t know how to tell Bill, or her parents, because they’ve already spent a
fortune on the wedding and it’s in three days’ time.’
‘Oh dear. Tricky!’
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‘Anthony hasn’t actually declared himself, or asked her to call the whole thing off, but you can see he’s mad about her, just trying to do the decent thing, not steal someone else’s girl, you know . . . but she can’t go through with it, the whole big white wedding thing, whatever
this Anthony says or doesn’t say, because she’s realised Bill’s not the man for her.’
I bit into my cake, my gaze fixed to the screen. It all sounded familiar. In fact, I had a
feeling I’d seen the film before but, even if I hadn’t, it was a sure bet that the girl would dump the boring fiancé she had never really loved enough and run off with the man of her dreams.
That’s what romances were all about, providing the happy ending you already knew was
coming before the film had hardly begun.
‘Since when have you been into rom-coms, Dad? Isn’t there a good Western on one of
the other channels you’d rather see?’
‘Nothing wrong with a bit of love from time to time, Eve. Beats people shooting each
other and chasing Indians about. And I can get soppy, I’ll have you know, when the occasion
demands. Besides, I’m particularly enjoying this one. It reminds me of something, a long time
ago, when your mother and I . . .’ He stopped and shook his head, then reached for his tea and
took a long slurp.
‘Go on. You can’t stop there. I’m intrigued now. What are you saying? That you stole
Mum from another man and ran off together into the sunset?’
I was about to laugh at my own joke when I saw him nod his head.
‘Yes, actually. Oh, I know you’d find it hard to imagine, but we did fall head over heels,
your mother and me, almost as soon as we met.’
‘In the queue for a bus, right? Isn’t that what you told us? A cold, wet night, and the
bus was running late, and you offered to share your umbrella.’
‘That’s right. But there was a part of the story we didn’t tell you about. Well, a person,
actually. Someone we hurt, quite badly, but when you feel the way we did . . .’
‘What are you saying, Dad?’ Somehow, neither of us was watching the film anymore.
‘That she was already with someone else?’
‘She was, yes. Not just with him, but engaged to be married to him. Sean Barker, his
name was. Nice enough bloke, but not right for her.’
‘And you were? Right for her, I mean.’
‘I thought so. And so did she, because she broke off the engagement just a week later.
Dumped him for me. And her parents were not pleased, I can tell you. They’d known Sean and
his family for years, the venue was booked and the invitations had gone out and everything.’
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‘Oh my God! So, what did you do?’
‘Bided my time. All I could do really. They were hardly going to give us their blessing,
were they? Change the name of the groom and go ahead with it all as if nothing had happened!
No, they made us promise to stay apart. Six months, which felt like a lifetime I can tell you,
but that would be long enough to bring us to our senses, or so they thought. And, if we still felt the same way after that . . .’
‘And did you?’
‘Well, obviously, or we wouldn’t be here now, would we? Or you and your sister
certainly wouldn’t! No, we survived it all right, missed each other, wrote to each other secretly.
I think, in a way, it made us stronger, made us more sure, you know. I wish sometimes I’d been
more forceful about our Sarah, when she was in such a rush to marry Josh. We all knew it was
too soon, but it was their choice, wasn’t it? Some time apart might have helped make things
clearer, but they had a baby on the way, which changed things. Not something your mother and
I had to bring into the equation. Not in those days!’
‘There have always been unplanned babies, Dad. They have a lot to answer for.’
‘They do indeed. Do you know, I’ve still got her letters somewhere. There’s something
special about a real handwritten letter, isn’t there? Not like all this emailing and texting people do today. Your mum would probably think I was daft for keeping them, but I told you I can be
a soppy old sod when the occasion demands.’ He lifted a hand and wiped it across his eyes.
‘Oh, I do miss her, Eve. You’ve no idea.’
‘The letters, Dad.’
‘What about them?
‘Would it surprise you to know that she kept yours too? I found them, at the back of her
wardrobe, when I was sorting through her stuff after the funeral. I should have said something
but I didn’t want to upset you, rake up old feelings so soon after . . .’
‘She kept them? All these years?’
‘She did.’
He gulped. ‘Where are they now? You didn’t throw them out, did you?’
‘No, Dad, of course I didn’t.’
He leaned over and turned off the TV. ‘Show me, Eve. I think I’d quite like to rake up
old feelings now. Good feelings. And thank you.’
‘What for?’
‘For not throwing them away.’
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***
I had to do it. Lucy was right. Sometimes the past does have to be dragged back up, confronted, put in its place. I had to talk to Arnie, in my own time, on my own terms. I needed to know
what he remembered, whether he felt any remorse at all for what he had done to me, and that I
could cope with knowing I might run across him at any moment.
It wasn’t really a conversation I wanted to have on school property, but I was far too
much of a coward to just go and knock on his door. As it turned out, I didn’t have to do either.
I was leaving work early one afternoon, with nothing but a check-up appointment with the
dentist – Sarah’s old friend Tilly – to look forward to, and was about to climb into my car in
the car park when I saw Janey walking out through the school gates with two other kids from
the school. A girl, and an older boy. They were ambling along slowly, the girls chatting and
giggling, the boy fiddling with a phone, the weight of too many books crammed into bags
pulling their shoulders down on one side, when a tatty black estate car pulled up alongside and they clambered in. As he turned his head towards me I saw immediat
ely that the driver was
Arnie O’Connor. And, from the shocked look that flashed across his face as his eyes locked
onto mine, I knew he had recognised me too.
The car drove away. I watched it, the two small heads through the back window, and
the less distinct outline of the two bigger male heads in the front. So, that must have been
Arnie’s children, and it looked as if Janey was going home with them. For tea? A homework
session? A sleepover? Something about that unnerved me. I decided, there and then, to seek
him out and have it out with him, before another member of my family got sucked into his
orbit.
I came out of Tilly’s surgery an hour later, with a clean bill of oral health for another
six months, a request to be remembered to my sister, and Arnie still on my mind. Usually, at
five o’clock in the afternoon, I would still be at work, sorting out lesson plans or running an after-school club or getting into rehearsals for a school play, but my early finish had thrown
my routine and I had a hankering for some sort of horribly unhealthy takeaway, a whole box
of Maltesers to myself (because my well-behaved teeth deserved a sugary reward) and a
marking-free evening in front of the TV.
The chip shop was already open and doing a good trade, mainly from kids still in school
uniform whose parents were probably not home from work yet and had left them a fiver to feed
themselves. A plate of ham salad and a bowl of fruit was no doubt the last thing on their minds, 201
but who was I to talk, considering my own less than healthy food choices? I joined the queue, checking the prices on the board behind the counter and rummaging in my bag for my purse.
‘Eve? Eve Peters? It is you, isn’t it?’
I froze, my hand halfway back out of my bag, as his hand touched my arm. The voice
was exactly the same as I remembered it and, when I turned around, so was the face. Arnie
O’Connor. Had he followed me here? Or was it just one of life’s horrible coincidences?
‘Yes.’ My voice came out so small I could hardy hear my own reply.