Michelle Vernal Box Set

by Michelle Vernal

  Jennifer’s eyes narrowed. “What on earth is that ruckus?”

  “I’m guessing Hannah is trying to get Melissa up. She was desperate for her morning milk fix. From my experience, though, the only thing that will move Melissa is to whisper in her ear that Brad Pitt is on his way over and that she hasn’t got her makeup on. That usually shifts her quick smart.”

  Jennifer snorted at the mental picture and then her face sobered. “Becs, why do you bother with her?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean she is a self-centred madam who treats you like her PA instead of her friend. She always has done.”

  “That’s not true.” The words tripped automatically off her tongue. “She does have some good qualities.” Rebecca was on the defence.

  “Oh yeah?”

  “Yeah, loads of them.”

  Jennifer raised an eyebrow expectantly. “Like?”

  “Um well, she’s, she’s—oh crap, I can’t think of any.”

  They collapsed into giggles. “You’re a good tonic, Becs,” Jennifer said, wiping her eyes that were still puffy from sleeping so heavily. She glanced over at the bedside clock. “Bloody hell! Look at the time—the kids will be late!” Throwing back the bedcovers, she announced, “I’m already in Jack’s bad books, and this is so not going to help. He hates being late for school.”

  Rebecca held her hand up. “Stop! Calm down, Jen.” She pushed her sister back on the bed. “Look, since I am so obviously full of sisterly love this morning, I will do the school run and let you have a lie in, okay?”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Of course I’m sure. I came home to help out, and that’s what I want to do. So please don’t go playing the martyr, okay?”

  “Yes, boss.” Jen gave her a mock salute and then frowned as she tucked her hair behind her ears. “You won’t get any argument from me because I couldn’t face anyone this morning. Especially not the mummy mafia at the school gates. I tell you what, Becs, there are some fabulous pluses about living in a small community, but there are some bloody great minuses too.”

  The disconcerted look on her normally self-assured sister’s face prompted Rebecca to ask, “Jen, are you okay? I mean really okay?”

  Her sister chewed her bottom lip for a moment, and her eyes grew suspiciously bright. “No, I’m not.”

  Rebecca squirmed. “That was a stupid question, sorry.” And it had been but there was just something about the look in Jennifer’s eyes that worried her. “Of course you’re not okay—how could you be with all this crap going on with Mark. Do you want to talk about it?”

  Her sister gave a funny little half smile and shrugged. “I don’t know.”

  “It might help.”

  “We’ll see. But you had better be getting a move on if you’re going to get that son of mine to school before the bell goes.” Jennifer laid her head back on the pillows and sighed as she heard Rebecca begin rounding up the troops. There was so much she wished she could say to Becs, but she just couldn’t bring herself to confide in her. Her little sister was far too naïve to ever understand. There was nobody she could tell, she thought, wishing that she were the type of woman who had close girlfriends. Then maybe she wouldn’t feel so alone now but she had never been a woman’s woman. She’d been too driven and too focused on her career to spend time nurturing friendships. Her closest confidante was Betty, but she couldn’t bring herself to open up to her either, even though she knew Betty would never sit in judgement of her. The problem was, though, she judged herself. A cloud of fatigue began to descend, and she closed her eyes, telling herself it was just for a moment.

  JACK SLAMMED THE CAR door shut and, as his auntie headed down the driveway, whined, “We’re late. I told you we would be late. It’s all Mum’s stupid fault.”

  Rebecca glanced up into the mirror and spied her nephew with his bottom lip protruding.

  His annoyance at his mother was palpable, and she frowned. Surely it wasn’t normal for a kid his age to be filled with this much angst? “Don’t talk about your mum like that, Jack,” she admonished, deciding the time had come to deploy a distraction technique. “I’ll bet you fifty cents that we’ll make it to school before the second bell goes.” She held up a silver coin that was sitting in the ashtray and waved it temptingly.

  It did the trick and the bottom lip receded to its rightful place. “Make it a dollar.”

  Rebecca lost the bet and, shoving the gold coin in his pocket, Jack ran in to join the handful of other late stragglers, one of whom happened to be Ben. She cast her eyes around the car park, hoping to spot David, but he’d already seen her and was making his way over.

  “Hi there.”

  His hair was still wet from his shower, and he smelt like a pine forest after it had rained, Rebecca thought, smiling up at him. “Hi, how is it going?”

  “You were cutting it fine too.” He inclined his head towards Jack and Ben, who having reached their classroom, were disappearing inside the door.

  “Ah yes, but I had a good excuse. Did you?”

  “Um, does forgetting to set the alarm count as a good excuse?”

  “Nope, sorry, that one doesn’t cut the mustard.”

  His eyes crinkled. “So come on, fess up—why were you late?”

  “Jennifer’s back, that’s why. We got chatting and lost track of the time. I don’t suppose that cuts the mustard either.”

  His eyebrows shot up. “I thought she wasn’t due home for at least another week or so?”

  “She wasn’t but apparently she was worried about Jack because he’s been acting a bit weird with her and Mark. So she came home early.”

  “Mark came home too, I take it?”

  “No, he stayed on. He didn’t see the point in them both missing out on the holiday since they’d already paid for it.”

  “Oh, right.” He looked thoughtful as he processed this information.

  He was probably wondering how the hell Mark could carry on sunning himself in Mooloolaba when his son was obviously having difficulties. She didn’t blame him if he was because she couldn’t believe what a selfish arse her brother-in-law was either.

  “So where does Jennifer being home leave you?” His expression was one of concern, and Rebecca hoped it was because he was worried it might mean she’d cut her trip short. Well, he needn’t worry.

  “I’m going to stay on because I have a feeling Jen’s going to need me around.” She didn’t know how much David knew about her sister’s marital situation but was saved from any awkward questions by the blaring of the horn.

  “Honestly, that child! I thought she’d be over the terrible twos at three and a half.”

  David laughed. “I think she’s telling you she’s ready to go and didn’t you know it’s the terrible twos, the diabolical threes, horrific fours...do you want me to go on?”

  “No thank you. I get the picture.” She jumped as the horn blared again. “Right, well, I have obviously got to go.” She hesitated, hoping for—well, she wasn’t sure what she was hoping for but whatever it was, it wasn’t forthcoming.

  “Hey, tell Jennifer I said hello, won’t you?” David said before turning to walk back to where his vehicle was parked.

  Rebecca was disappointed. “Sure. See you.”

  He waved, and she hotfooted it over to the car to berate Hannah, who having spotted the look on her aunt’s face, was frantically clambering back over the car seat and into her booster.

  MELISSA HAD TAKEN UP her usual pew in the sunroom when Rebecca arrived home and spying her friend, she inclined her head towards the kitchen. “The queen of cooking is up as of five minutes ago. I must say, she’s not looking her usual blonde and beautiful self, though. I thought it best I stay out of her way until she’s had a cup of coffee; otherwise, I would have done the dishes.”

  Yeah, right, Rebecca thought as Melissa bent her head back over her magazine, signalling the conversation was closed. She rolled her eyes and pushed on through to the kitchen.

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nbsp; “Hi.”

  “Hey.” Jennifer looked up and in the light of day Rebecca could see there were dark rings under her eyes, and her face looked wan despite the hours spent in bed.

  “Jen, you don’t look too flash. You’re not coming down with something, are you?”

  “No. I’m just tired, that’s all.”

  Rebecca didn’t want to ask how she could still be tired after all that sleep, so she busied herself making a drink. “Have you been to see Betty yet?”

  “No, not yet.” Her sigh seemed to emanate from the depths of her soul. “Oh, Becs, everything just seems like such a monumental effort and I haven’t got the energy.”

  Rebecca turned around to where her sister was sitting, her laced fingers propping up her chin. Her hair was falling on either side of her face, forming a bedraggled frame. “What do you mean?” She was completely unprepared for the floodgates that suddenly opened as Jennifer broke into noisy sobs.

  At that same moment, Melissa popped her head round the door, cup in hand. “Any chance of a coffee?” Spying Jennifer, she backed out of the kitchen. “Er, maybe I will leave you two to it and head into town for a proper frothy coffee.”

  “Good idea,” Rebecca stated firmly, going over to her sister and wrapping her arm around her quaking shoulders.

  “I feel like my life’s spiralling out of control.” Jennifer sniffed, taking a tissue from the box Rebecca was proffering.

  Rebecca sat opposite her, watching as she gave her nose a good blow. The last time she had seen her like this was after Jack was born.

  “You do like to be in control of things, Jen.” Seeing her sister’s shoulders stiffen, she hastily added, “I don’t mean that critically; it’s just part of what makes you who you are. What I am saying, though, is that it must make things hard for you sometimes because life does have a tendency to veer off course. Take it from someone who knows.”

  Jennifer managed a small smile at that, and Rebecca, emboldened, found herself asking something she had often pondered. “Was that the problem when Jack was born, and you had that bout of the baby blues? You felt like you had no control?” She cast her mind back to those early days when her sister had struggled to adjust to sharing her life with a baby.

  Jennifer shook her head forcefully. “No. You and everyone else only saw what you wanted to see. It was never just the baby blues. You know, a few tears a couple of days after he was born while my hormones settled down. I was diagnosed with postnatal depression.”

  This was news to Rebecca and her eyes widened. “Oh my gosh; do you mean like Brooke Shields?” She’d read an article about how she’d suffered after the birth of a daughter she’d been trying to conceive for years. It had made for sad reading.

  At that, Jennifer gave a little laugh. “Yeah, kind of; it manifests itself differently for different people, though. Promise me you won’t repeat this conversation to Tom Cruise, okay?”

  Rebecca reddened, vaguely remembering having also read or heard that the movie star had gotten in bother over his insensitive remarks where postnatal depression was concerned; her knowledge of this subject was somewhat limited. “I just assumed you found having Jack hard going at the start, like most new mums. All my friends who have had kids go on about what a major lifestyle adjustment it is.”

  This time her sister’s laugh held no mirth. “If you can call ‘hard going’ being unable to summon up any feelings at all for this tiny thing you’ve just given birth to and feeling like you no longer exist as a separate entity. Like you’re drowning on a daily basis in this never-ending quagmire of sleep deprivation, leaking from every orifice, nappies, and baby sick. And feeling that when you gave birth, you fell into this deep and dark hole. A hole so deep and dark that no matter how hard you tried, you couldn’t see any light filtering in at the top of it. Then, yeah, I got through it.”

  “I thought I was the one prone to dramatics.”

  Jennifer raised a rueful smile. “You are, and I am not dramatic. That’s what it was like.”

  Rebecca couldn’t get a handle on what she was hearing. “I knew things weren’t great, which was why I didn’t jump up and down with excitement when you bought this place, but I had no idea it was that bad!”

  “If it makes you feel better, I thought your lack of enthusiasm when we bought it was because you were jealous. It seems like we both misread each other. Perhaps we should have tried communicating a bit better.” The smile that played at the corner of her mouth was sad because you couldn’t go back. If you could, she would have handled things differently. “As for not knowing how I was feeling back then, well, nobody knew except Mark. I was good at keeping the fact I wasn’t coping hidden. I didn’t want anybody to know.” She shrugged. “I thought you and Mum and Dad would think I was going mad if I told you what was going on because to be honest, that’s what I thought was happening.”

  “Mark knew, though?”

  “Yeah. I tried to explain the things that were going through my mind in the early days after we brought Jack home.”

  “Why didn’t he do anything then?” Rebecca interrupted indignantly, grateful to be able to lay the blame at somebody else’s door.

  “His wife suffering from postnatal depression didn’t fit the picture Mark had painted of family life. He withdrew into work and just left me to get on with it. To be fair, he didn’t understand it. Perhaps if he’d been some support, I might have found the strength to get some help sooner instead of feeling like such a freak of nature.” Bitterness crept into her voice as she carried on. “I’d go along to these coffee mornings, Becs, where all the mums would sit around scoffing biscuits, talking about breastfeeding and how hard having a new baby was. I could tell that despite their moaning they were all besotted with their children. Then there was me, just going through the motions.”

  Rebecca’s heart broke for her sister. For the first time since they’d been kids, she saw a vulnerability in Jennifer that she thought she had long since grown out of. There had been no one she felt she could turn to; no one who would understand. Even their mum probably wouldn’t accept the idea that her daughter was incapable of loving her baby. There she thought that she was a total failure at motherhood and marriage, and she was blaming herself. After all, it had all been her choice. Like everything else in her life. It was all her own doing. She’d made the decision to get married and to have a baby, but her body somehow couldn’t accept it.

  “When I had the idea for Cuisine with Carlton’s,” Jennifer broke into Rebecca’s contemplations, “it was like somebody had switched a light on in my brain. If I hadn’t of set the business up, I would never have met Betty. And it was Betty who was my salvation in the end.”

  “Betty?”

  “Yes, Betty. She’d been through it herself with her first baby. She picked up that things weren’t what they should be between me and Jack and you’ve no idea how good it felt to talk to someone who understood. Someone who didn’t see me as this unnatural monster. She gave me absolution by telling me I was sick, and I’ll always love her for that. She frogmarched me off to the doctors.”

  The two sisters smiled at each other, Jennifer remembering Betty bossily taking her under her wing and Rebecca fully able to picture the scene. “It took awhile. But with the right medication and time, eventually things began to get better.”

  “And how do you feel about Jack now?” Rebecca ventured this with trepidation, unsure what the answer would be.

  Jennifer examined the transparent look of terror on her sister’s face. “It’s okay,” she answered reassuringly. “Like I said, things got better. Now I feel how any mother feels about her child. I love him so much I’d lay down my life for him. Jack and Hannah are my world.”

  “But not Mark?”

  “No, not Mark. Not anymore. We’ve tried our hardest, Becs, but the affair was only a symptom of a long illness because after Jack, we never really got things back on track.”

  “Is that why you had Hannah?”

  “If I say yes
, it sounds terrible—like Hannah was a Band-Aid baby or something.”

  “Was she?”

  “I’d be lying if I didn’t admit to a little bit of that in my reasoning, but mainly my motivation for getting pregnant again was purely selfish. I wanted to experience motherhood the way other women experience it.”

  “You must have been petrified of it happening again,” Rebecca whispered tenderly.

  “Yes and no. I knew that this time round I’d recognise the signs and get some help or at least I thought I would. With Jack, I had a blissful pregnancy, unaware of what I was in for, but with Hannah, I was uptight for the whole nine months. I needn’t have been, though; everything was fine.”

  “But it’s not fine now.”

  “No, it’s not. I feel like I am on this bullet train that is approaching the crossroads and can’t stop. I am so damned scared of what comes next, Becs.” Her breath was ragged, and Rebecca got up and wrapped her in a tight hug. For the first time in her life where their relationship was concerned, she was the one in charge.

  Chapter Sixteen

  LATER THAT NIGHT WITH the children tucked up in bed and Jennifer fast asleep, Rebecca explained to Betty what was going on with Jennifer while Melissa sat riveted to some inane reality TV show.

  “I think she just needs plenty of TLC while she gets her head around everything that has happened and is going to happen. Starting with lots of rest because she’s been running on empty for too long.”

  Betty nodded sagely. “Yes, she has. I knew things weren’t good between her and Mark, and I’ve been worried about her, but you know your sister. She’s always determined to soldier on by herself, and she wouldn’t let me in to help her.”

  Yes, Rebecca thought, that was the Jennifer she knew and loved but even she had her breaking point and she had reached it.

  “I’ll pop up and see how she’s getting on tomorrow. She’s not to worry about the cooking school. I have it all under control. I’ll tell her she needs to loosen the reins and let me get on with it while she gets herself sorted.” Betty looked thoughtful, adding, “You know, Rebecca, love, it’s a godsend you being here for her too.”