We Are Family

by Nicola Gill

  ‘Yay!’ Billy said. ‘And can I go on the PlayStation before breakfast? Just for half an hour?’

  Laura smiled at his opportunism. He had been allowed to do this on his birthday and had obviously registered it as a perk to be enjoyed on all high days and holidays. ‘Okay, but only half an hour.’

  Laura got up and made herself a cup of tea, guiltily registering as she stood in the kitchen that the flat looked messier than ever. Still, she could hardly be expected to spend Mother’s Day clearing up. She may not need a spa day (especially after the last one) or a ritzy afternoon tea, but she wasn’t going to spend the day in her Marigolds.

  She got back into bed with her tea, wondering if she should message Jess to see if she was okay, but then she couldn’t really think of a way to word the message that didn’t seem trite. It was such a pity Jess hadn’t been there when Laura had gone round yesterday. Laura had felt really disappointed when she got back to her own house, and when she noticed all the weeds from the front garden had miraculously disappeared, she’d briefly entertained the idea that Jess had been waiting at her house at the very same time (because it would have been just like Jess to busy herself with weeding while she waited). But then Laura had shaken her head and told herself she’d just watched too many movies. One of the neighbours must have done the weeding.

  She took a sip of her tea. It really was a shame Jess had been out yesterday. It would have been so much easier to make up face to face. Laura had even planned to come clean about Dani mentioning her in a work context; make a joke of the whole thing by saying that she’d thought the last thing Jess would want was a commission from Natter.

  Laura would have to pop over to Jess’ sometime in the week, although if the last week at work was anything to go by, it was hard to see when she’d get a chance.

  It was weird to think that her mother hadn’t even been sick last Mother’s Day. In fact, Laura remembered her being particularly hale and vital that day, flirting with the young waiter in the pub they’d taken her to for lunch, remonstrating Billy for failing to sit still like his cousins and asking Laura if she really thought yellow was her colour (no, Mum, that’s why I’m wearing it).

  Laura felt a sharp pang of guilt as she recalled the difficulty she’d had finding a Mother’s Day card. She’d stood in the shop for ages browsing the racks but each and every saccharine offering seemed to be for different sorts of mothers. Mothers who were always there, mothers who made their children feel loved and cherished, mothers who always put their children first. Laura had felt a desperate, empty longing (well, just wait until next year).

  Billy came bursting into the room and told her he’d completed level two.

  ‘Excellent,’ Laura said, sipping her tea. In the back of her mind, there had always been the possibility on the horizon of her and her mother having a big moment of emotional connection. Laura had never been sure exactly what this looked like or where and when it would take place, she just knew there would be lots of weeping and hugging. ‘My poor, darling girl,’ her mother would say. And just like that all the years of hurt, anger and disappointment would have been wiped out.

  But now, of course, she knew that moment would never happen.

  Greta had taken Laura aside at work on Friday and said that she knew that Sunday was going to be very hard for her and that she’d bought Laura a rose quartz crystal (very healing) and some of her special home-brewed kombucha. And, even though the Kombucha looked and smelled like stagnant pond water, Laura had been very touched because most people just avoided the subject of Mother’s Day around her as if somehow she might not see the 5482 schmaltzy advertisements telling her to ‘Make her mother’s day’ or the endless tributes on social media.

  In reality, of course she absolutely knew it was Mother’s Day. But she was okay. Even if she didn’t feel entirely okay about that.

  Chapter Fifty-Eight

  There was something about waiting to see the headmistress that made Laura feel as if she was five years old and had been very, very naughty.

  She sat on the hard, plastic chair trying to stop herself shaking. The school secretary had refused to say much on the phone. ‘If you could just come in Mrs— Miss Fraser. Perhaps with your partner.’

  Jon was late. Of course he was.

  Laura had a discreet swig of Gaviscon. She’d already had some on the way here but it didn’t seem to have done much good. She was feeling as if she might be sick, actually.

  She scrutinized the secretary’s face for clues. Would she give her that small half-smile if Billy had done something really bad? Could Billy even do something really bad? After all, it wasn’t likely they’d been called in because he was snorting coke or pulling a knife. How bad could a five-year-old be?

  She glanced down at her jeans and sweatshirt. Just her luck that she’d get the call today, when she was looking her scruffiest. Not that clothes made any real difference, of course, but she was bound to feel slightly more confident if she had to face the headmistress looking a bit more presentable. Her mother had always admonished her for not making ‘a bit of effort.’ ‘You can’t conquer the world if you don’t dress the part.’

  Not that conquering the world felt like much of an issue at the moment. Laura’s mind flashed back to the excruciating incident at that morning’s editorial meeting when Amy had accidentally dropped her in it. Chloe the fashion editor had been talking about a zebra-print midi skirt that everyone was after and said it had all started with StyleMaven putting it on her Instagram.

  Amy grinned as she turned to Laura. ‘You’ll have to tell your sister she’s a very influential influencer.’

  Dani’s head had shot up. ‘StyleMaven is your sister?’

  Laura tried to look as insouciant as possible for someone who had turned puce. ‘Yeah.’

  ‘But you didn’t think to mention that when I suggested her as someone who might be able to do the yes part of the “social media addict” piece?’ Dani said.

  ‘Didn’t seem relevant,’ Laura said feebly.

  She was brought abruptly back to the present when Jon burst through the swing doors looking sweaty and dishevelled. She could smell the hangover coming off him. Great! Whatever Billy had done, no doubt the headmistress would conclude it was hardly surprising, given his gene pool.

  ‘What’s this about?’ he said.

  A wave of nausea washed over Laura. She shook her head. ‘They wouldn’t say on the phone.’

  Jon nodded. ‘Don’t look so worried.’ He squeezed her hand and she felt pathetically grateful.

  The headmistress opened the door to her office. She was wearing a trouser suit and had a sharp bob. ‘Mr and Mrs— sorry, Miss Fraser and Mr Howell.’

  The office had a view over the playground. Laura looked at the empty play equipment, which looked sad and unloved in the rain. Never mind ‘April showers’, today had been more ‘April monsoons’.

  ‘I’ll get straight to the point,’ the headmistress said. ‘Billy has been hitting another boy in his class.’

  Laura heard a gasp escape from what must have been her own mouth.

  ‘Are you sure?’ Jon said, quietly.

  The headmistress said she was quite sure, that a member of staff had witnessed an incident.

  Laura hated it being referred to as an ‘incident’. It sounded so serious. Like there was going to be some kind of police report. ‘Who?’ she said.

  The headmistress tucked a stray piece of hair behind her ear. ‘I hardly think that matters.’

  ‘WHO?’ Laura said, more loudly than she’d intended.

  ‘Angus Murray.’

  ‘HE HITS EVERYONE!’ Laura said.

  The headmistress nodded and sighed. ‘We have had some difficulties with Angus in the past. Indeed, we have had to speak to his parents on a number of occasions. But they have worked with us.’ Laura heard the thinly veiled subtext. ‘Angus has modified his behaviour considerably.’

  ‘I bet it was just self-defence,’ Laura said. ‘That Angus hit
Billy first.’

  ‘Miss Fraser,’ the headmistress said. ‘I’m afraid that’s just not the case.’

  ‘Billy made me the sweetest Mother’s Day card,’ Laura said feebly. ‘He’s a very kind child.’

  Jon put his hand over Laura’s. ‘Mrs Jenkins,’ he said. Laura was somewhat surprised he’d even remembered the woman’s name. He’d never been the kind of dad to get very involved in school stuff. She was the one who went through Billy’s book bag, went to parents’ evenings and filled in Billy’s reading record. ‘I don’t know if you’re aware of the change in circumstances at home recently …’

  Laura looked at him. He was talking so calmly and rationally and she could see the headmistress’ face changing and softening.

  ‘… obviously I’m not making excuses for Billy hurting another child, but I do think it helps to have the full picture …’

  Laura let Jon talk. She stared out into the playground, focussing on a red-and-white-spotted hairband that had been dropped on the ground and was lying sodden in the rain. No doubt some mother would be remonstrating her little girl about its absence this evening. I’ve only just bought you that. Honestly, you’d lose your head if it wasn’t screwed on.

  Billy wasn’t a violent child; he never had been. He could be cheeky or rude and he was a nightmare when it came to eating fruits and vegetables, but he didn’t hurt people. Except Lola the other week. Laura shouldn’t have ignored that. If she’d punished him properly, she could have nipped all this in the bud.

  ‘… he’s obviously wrestling with all kinds of different feelings at the moment …’

  Laura stared at the spotty headband again. She’d sounded like a loon bringing up the Mother’s Day card but Billy was a good kid and he certainly wasn’t violent. They’d done this to him: her and Jon. She was hit by a wave of nausea so strong that she thought she might actually vomit. Her heart was racing too. She willed herself not to have a panic attack; not now and not here. Breathe, Laura, breathe.

  Jon had finished talking and the headmistress was speaking now. Saying how much it helped to have the full picture and, of course, the school would do everything they could to support Billy at this difficult time. Her whole demeanour had changed; in fact, she seemed almost flirtatious towards Jon.

  You’ve seen the best of the man, Laura felt like shouting. Try stopping him from getting pissed night after night. Try stopping him from banging on about his stupid novel. Try getting him to earn money to put some food in his child’s mouth.

  She had to hand it to Jon though – he had been good in this meeting. Way better than her. She was still wondering if there was any way she could get Angus Murray on his own. Tell me the truth, you little shit! You started this, didn’t you?

  The headmistress got up and shook both their hands and Laura could swear she batted her stubby little eyelashes at Jon. She supposed he was still a good-looking man. Even if he did smell a bit unsavoury this morning.

  ‘Where are the toilets please?’ Laura said to the secretary on the way out.

  ‘At the end of that corridor on the right. Not the first toilets you see on your left – they’re just for the children.’

  The nausea was back with a vengeance and Laura had broken into a sweat. She hurtled down the corridor. Out of the corner of her eye, she could see the first toilets: the ones just for children. They would have to do.

  Laura threw herself through the door and into a cubicle just in time to hurl the contents of her stomach into the tiny, child-sized toilet.

  Chapter Fifty-Nine

  It’s the little things that unravel you. Laura had been so worried about how she was going to cope with Mother’s Day, but actually grief doesn’t check its calendar or care about ‘special days’. Laura had been fine on Mother’s Day, but on a random Tuesday morning a week or so before, she’d had to walk out of Starbucks because she’d suddenly remembered her mother making her snort with laughter when she expressed her utter derision for anyone whose coffee order was ‘more than four words long’.

  ‘Who are these people with their “half-caf, no sugar, extra shot, hold the whip and make it a venti” bullshit?’ she’d asked.

  What had poleaxed Laura today was the realization that her mum would have been great about the whole Angus Murray thing. Evie was not a woman who was afraid of authority. She would probably have laughed and said Angus was a little sod who had it coming to him. Not very PC, but very Evie.

  Laura looked at the crumpled leaflet that had been sitting in the bottom of her handbag for weeks. Lilypad Bereavement Support. Lilypad! It had been given to her by one of the nurses at the hospice. Laura had taken it out of politeness, convinced she’d never need it except, maybe, as an example of typefaces to be avoided at all costs.

  But now she was lying on her bed staring at the crack in the ceiling, unable to stop crying. She’d had to call work and say she thought she had a stomach bug (easier than saying: Do you know it turns out, eleven weeks in, I do miss my mother after all. And, yes, she could be a bloody nightmare but still).

  Lilypad Bereavement Groups are open to everyone.

  Hmm. Could she really go to a grief group? She hadn’t even finished reading Good Grief yet. That’s how rubbish she was at all this.

  Laura knew the dangers of running away from grief; for years she had tried to stop herself from really feeling the weight of her Dad’s absence, lest it crush her completely. But she had learned that you can never outrun grief – that you might think you can for a while, but it will lurk in the shadows and wrap its icy tentacles around your heart when you least expect it. Once, when she was in her twenties, she had been on her way to a rave and, for no apparent reason, she’d just starting sobbing uncontrollably. The people she was with had tried to be nice but they didn’t really know what to do with her. Did she want to stop at a garage? Was she still upset about that scumbag Pete cheating on her? She’d feel better when she took an E. (No, yes, no.)

  Laura wanted to deal with her grief (‘deal with it’ – like it was a tax return) and felt guilty she hadn’t been ‘sad enough’ since her mother had died.

  She felt queasy when she remembered catching herself looking in the mirror the day of the funeral and smiling, actually smiling, because the skirt she was wearing seemed a bit loose on her. She harboured a fear that it was weird she had spent so much of the last couple of months focussed on how much she missed her dad (you’ve had twenty-five years to get used to that one, Laura). And she was troubled by how few tears she had shed.

  Now she was crying though. Real, ugly crying.

  Why, couldn’t she just be the right amount of sad?

  Our groups are of a drop-in nature, which means you can come regularly or just when you feel you need to.

  When Laura and Jess were little, their favourite game was dress up. They tottered around in their mum’s heels, weighed down by jewellery and silky scarves. Sometimes their mum would put a little make-up on them, curl their hair. Often the three of them would end up laughing so hard they could barely breathe. She had a good laugh, Evie, rich and infectious.

  Laura would never hear it again.

  Just like she wouldn’t hear her mum saying that she was crazy to get so upset over being called into the school, that all kids did stuff like this sometimes and there was absolutely no need to worry. She probably would have said that it sounded like Mrs Jenkins needed to get laid too. And Laura would have laughed despite herself.

  Our groups are facilitated by a trained psychologist but they’re not formal therapeutic sessions. Instead, they’re a chance for you to chat to other people about whatever you’d like to on the day. And there’s coffee and biscuits too – we’re big fans of biscuits!

  Evie wasn’t like other people’s mothers. She didn’t have a secret recipe for chocolate cake. Or endless patience. She wouldn’t clean your flat the moment your back was turned.

  But she was Laura’s mum.

  And Laura missed her.

  Chapter Sixty
r />   It was hard not to notice just how much Billy liked the three of them all being together. Even if he was being told off.

  ‘But I didn’t really hurt him, Daddy.’

  ‘Still best not to hit, kiddo.’

  ‘Angus is always hitting! He gave me the idea.’

  Laura could see Jon trying to suppress a smile. The three of them were in a café just down the road from the school. ‘I’m not sure we should have this conversation in a public place,’ she’d said when Jon suggested it.

  He’d laughed. ‘I don’t think there will be a scene.’

  She was too tired to argue. After throwing up in the world’s smallest toilet and then spending the afternoon sobbing, she wasn’t exactly at her best.

  ‘Can I have a doughnut now?’ Billy said.

  Laura thought you probably shouldn’t give your kid a doughnut when you were having A Talk, that it sent a bit of a mixed message, but she couldn’t face arguing.

  When he’d been led into the playground at the end of the school day and seen both his parents waiting there together, Billy’s face had broken into a grin so wide it looked as if it might split his face in two. Laura’s heart had lurched: We’re only together to tell you off. And don’t get too used to it. (Well, not to us being together.)

  When they had left the school that morning, Jon had been solicitous. Had she eaten something dodgy? She looked ever so pale. He insisted on driving her home. Did she want him to hang around until it was time to pick up Billy? Look after her? She’d shaken her head.

  It had been nice to know they were going to talk to Billy together though, especially since Jon seemed so much more sanguine about the whole thing than her.

  It was good to have Jon with her in the playground too. People she barely knew kept giving her strange looks and she wasn’t sure if she was getting pity stares (poor thing, she lost her mum recently) or judgy stares (that’s the mother of the hitter. No, not Angus Murray – there’s a new hitter in town).