We Are Family

by Nicola Gill

  Jess sighed. ‘A parcel arrived for me and I didn’t think anything of it. I get sent loads of freebies because of work. But, as soon as I saw the Creme Eggs, I had a sickening memory of Aaron once offering me some expensive-looking truffles and me saying that I hated posh chocolate and to give me a Creme Egg any day. I didn’t even need to look at the card, I just knew they were from him. I was shaking. Ben asked me who they were from and I said a photographer had sent them. And he said, “He must know you very well.” And I tried to pass it off, said something like, “Oh, you know me. I’m always banging on about Creme Eggs.”’ Tears had started rolling down Jess’ cheeks. ‘But Ben does know me. Really, really well. He just stared at me, a muscle pulsing under his eye, and it was as if the whole world had gone quiet and even the traffic outside had stopped. And then he just said, “What’s the deal, Jess?” It was awful—’ She broke off into a sob.

  Hannah, Lola and Billy whizzed down the helter-skelter, one after the other on their coir mats, and Jess looked at the ground so that they wouldn’t see she was crying.

  Laura waited until the kids were out of earshot before speaking. ‘And what happened after you told him?’

  ‘He didn’t shout or rage, he just sat there very quietly at the island unit, his eyes filled with hurt and disappointment. And I kept thinking about a row I once had with Mum when she referred to Ben as “boring Ben” and I went wild and said that being calm was a good thing. Mum didn’t apologize, of course. She said it was just a joke and not to be so over sensitive.’

  Billy whizzed down the slide on his coir mat a second time, all smiles. Lola appeared seconds later, closely followed by Hannah who smacked into the back of her.

  ‘Oww!’ Lola said, scowling. ‘You’re supposed to wait.’

  ‘No,’ Hannah said. ‘You’re supposed to get off quicker.’

  The kids started to climb the stairs again, trailing their mats behind them.

  Laura reached out and squeezed her sister’s shoulder.

  ‘Since then, he won’t talk about it,’ Jess said. ‘He hasn’t walked out on me but it’s like he may as well have done. He’s there but not there, if you know what I mean. And he just looks so sad all the time. I look at him and look away because I hate myself so much when I realize that I did this to him.’

  Laura stroked her arm.

  ‘I just keep telling him I’m sorry all the time,’ Jess said. ‘But the words seem so flimsy and inadequate. You say sorry to people when you accidentally step on their foot on the tube or are ten minutes late to meet them, not when you take a blowtorch to your marriage vows and casually destroy nineteen years of trust.’

  The kids whizzed down the helter-skelter again. Billy said he wanted to go to the shooting range so he could try to win one of those giant green ducks. Laura said they would in a bit, to have another go on the slide first.

  ‘I can’t believe I’ve been so stupid,’ Jess said. ‘I, of all people, should know that infidelity destroys lives.’

  ‘What do you mean you “of all people”?’ Laura said.

  Jess looked at the ground. ‘Nothing, nothing.’

  Laura puffed out her cheeks. ‘You’ve made a mistake, Jess. People do make mistakes. But there must be a way back from this. You and Ben have been together forever. Also, you’re good together.’ As she said this she realized how true it was and how the same couldn’t be said for her and Jon; that even if she still loved him, they definitely weren’t ‘right’.

  ‘He’s so distant, Laura. When I told him I want us to go back to how we were before he said that’s never going to happen. Never. I feel like there’s no hope.’

  Jess was not a ‘no hope’ kind of girl; she did not give up. She’d once crawled the last two hundred yards of a marathon. ‘What about counselling?’

  ‘I’ve suggested it,’ Jess said.

  ‘There will be a way through this,’ Laura said. Because surely that had to be true?

  Chapter Eighty-Eight

  Laura was hoping to channel her mother in a ‘take no prisoners’ sense but she feared she might actually be channelling unhinged lunatic.

  She was sitting in a pub with her brother-in-law, having ambushed him as he emerged from the office. ‘Laura,’ he’d said, looking taken aback. ‘What are you doing here?’ Laura told him they needed to talk and steered him across the road to the nearest pub before he could argue.

  Now the pair of them were sitting opposite each other, gazing warily across a faux mahogany table and sipping G&Ts (Ben had tried to order a Diet Coke but Laura had told him he’d need something stronger).

  Laura fought off a wave of awkwardness as she was struck by the realization that, although she’d known her brother-in-law for nearly twenty years, she didn’t really know him at all. Oh, she knew he supported Arsenal and couldn’t bear cauliflower, and once, on a camping trip, had accidentally wiped his penis with a toilet wipe instead of a baby wipe (the latter disclosed by an uncharacteristically drunk Jess one night) but that wasn’t a huge help right now.

  Ben took a sip of his drink. ‘I guess you must be worrying about the trolling thing.’

  Laura was wrong-footed because, not only was that not the thing she had planned to talk to Ben about this evening, but also she suddenly realized, with a flash of pure embarrassment, that he must know what she’d done. Well, of course he knew – Jess would obviously have mentioned it, however tense things were between the two of them.

  Ben put his glass down. ‘This company we’ve got looking into it are fantastic. They’ll definitely track the bastard down.’

  So, Ben didn’t know about MsRealityCheck. Jess had spared her that. ‘Great,’ Laura said. ‘Actually, it was you and Jess I wanted to talk to you about. I know about everything that’s happened.’

  Ben stared at the table. ‘O-kay.’

  ‘Heartbreak Hotel’ started playing and Laura thought of Jon pretending to be Elvis. It was a strange way to earn a living but at least he was doing something, she supposed. She forced her mind back to the present and looked across the table at Ben. ‘Look, it’s awful for you, really it is, but you need to talk to her.’

  Ben didn’t look up. ‘It’s sweet of you to look out for your sister, Laura, but I’m not going to discuss my marriage with anyone but Jess.’

  ‘But that’s the thing,’ Laura said, almost knocking her drink over. ‘You’re not talking to Jess.’

  Ben looked at her. ‘Laura, firstly, please can you keep your voice down, because there are people from my work in this pub, and secondly, this really isn’t your business.’

  Channel Mum. She never gave a damn whether something was her business or not. ‘Did Jess tell you about what happened when you were in New York? About how she found the lump in her breast?’

  ‘Yes, of course she told me.’

  ‘You could have lost her, Ben. She could have had cancer like Mum. That’s how it works. One minute we’re all going about our business, worrying about petty nonsense, and the next minute, “poof” – a person we love is just gone. And I really thought it might be Jess. I could picture her going through chemo and losing her hair and wearing ridiculously stylish scarves. I could imagine her being told that nothing had worked and that she didn’t have long. And I knew that we’d all go to pieces, but Jess would be amazing. That she would start making us all lists and writing the girls’ birthday cards for the next ten years.’

  Ben put his head in his hands. ‘Stop talking like this – she’s okay. The lump is harmless.’

  ‘Yes, but it’s a wake-up call, isn’t it? Don’t lose her if you don’t have to.’

  Ben stood up. ‘Okay, Laura, that’s enough. As I said, I think it’s good of you to look out for your sister. But I absolutely don’t want to have this conversation with you.’

  He started to walk away but Laura jumped up to go after him. ‘Don’t you think that Rob at my grief group wishes his wife was still around? Don’t you think that he’d do anything – anything – to be able to have one mor
e conversation with her?’

  ‘Laura, please!’ Ben said, heading for the door.

  She ran after him. ‘She didn’t even have a bloody affair, Ben.’

  Ben turned round to face her, his face a mask of hurt. ‘I said I don’t want to have this conversation with you.’

  ‘Then have it with Jess.’

  He paused and then shook his head. ‘It’s not that simple.’

  Laura stared at him. He looked so sad and broken standing there in the street that she felt a wave of sympathy. But then she remembered she was adopting the role of her mother. ‘It is that simple. You cannot lose Jess over this.’

  Chapter Eighty-Nine

  There was a new person at grief group and he was unmistakably hot. For goodness’ sake! Laura told herself. You do not pick people up at grief group. You only just split up from Jon. This guy is way out of your league anyway.

  Misery bloodhound Jenni asked him if he’d like to introduce himself.

  ‘I’m Marcus,’ he said.

  Jenni nodded enthusiastically. ‘And what brings you here today, Marcus?’

  He’ll be a widower. One who has only recently lost his equally hot wife and is never ever really going to get over her.

  ‘My dad died. Six weeks ago.’

  Not a widower. So almost certainly married.

  Jenni nodded. ‘Welcome to the group, Marcus.’

  Like she was the greeting him at the door of some swanky members club rather than a dingy den of misery and sorrow.

  ‘Right,’ Jenni said. ‘Who would like to start today?’

  Emma raised her hand. ‘I wanted to ask what to do about people who say stupid things.’ She bit furiously at her cuticle. ‘There’s this teacher at my school who said my mum is probably in a better place now. And I should never forget to cherish the time we had together. She talks like a fucking Hallmark card.’

  Mary gasped.

  ‘I think it’s best if we try to avoid bad language,’ Jenni said.

  ‘Fuck, fuck, fuckety-fuck,’ Emma said.

  Laura noticed Marcus trying to suppress a smile. He had very nice eyes. Christ, she was like a dog in heat! And, anyway, he was definitely married, even if he wasn’t wearing a wedding ring. And definitely out of her league. Also none of that mattered because she was not interested.

  ‘It can be difficult for people to know what to say,’ Jenni said to Emma.

  ‘Yeah,’ Rob chimed in, ‘people keep telling me I should be thinking about dating.’

  As Laura looked at him, a memory rose up of her confrontation with Ben: Don’t you think that Rob at my grief group wishes his wife was still around?

  ‘It’s like time’s up on feeling miserable,’ Rob said.

  Jenni nodded. ‘In today’s world, we’re used to things happening fast. We send an email and expect an answer almost instantly. We pop food in a microwave because we want to eat in minutes. But grief isn’t something that can be hurried.’

  Preena nodded. ‘I get people telling me my sister would want me to be happy. Like it’s that simple.’

  Marcus gave Preena an encouraging smile. He had a nice mouth too. Oh, for goodness’ sake!

  ‘People tell me I’ll find a way of making sense of Rosie’s death,’ Ann said quietly, her eyes shining with unspilt tears. ‘But it makes no sense for a beautiful, bright girl with everything to live for to die of a horrible disease. Especially when there are so many vile people left walking around.’

  Laura suddenly remembered a phase she’d gone though after her dad had died, where she kept looking at people around his age that were still alive and judging them inferior to him. Like a long life was something you got on merit.

  ‘My dad wasn’t that nice,’ Marcus said. ‘I mean, I loved him because he was my dad, but if you look at it objectively he was a bit of a—’ He glanced across at Mary. ‘He wasn’t the nicest. He was a womaniser, a gambler and a drunk. When me and my ex-wife told him we were having a little girl, he said you couldn’t win them all. So you’d think my grief would be easy-peasy, right? But actually it has knocked me for six.’

  Laura stared, open-mouthed, at Marcus. Every minute that she’d sat in these groups, she’d wished she had the courage to come out as an imposter. To own up to the fact that her grief was simply not good enough.

  And now there was someone who seemed as if they were on exactly the same page.

  Chapter Ninety

  Jess handed Laura a gift-wrapped parcel. ‘It’s a little thank-you present for ambushing my husband the other day. I wouldn’t say things are suddenly all okay between us but we’re talking.’

  Laura pulled on the ribbon. ‘You didn’t need to do this.’

  ‘Least I could do. Ben said he’d do almost anything if I kept you away from him from now on!’ She winked.

  Laura tore open the wrapping paper to reveal a white porcelain dish that was crisscrossed with gold lines. Laura turned it over in her hands. ‘Oh, it’s so pretty. Wait, is this is the dish I broke at Mum’s?’

  Jess nodded.

  ‘What?’

  ‘It’s a Japanese thing called Kintsugi. There’s a leaflet in the box that explains it.’

  Laura took out the leaflet and read aloud. ‘Kintsugi is the ancient art of repairing what has been broken. Fragments of dropped ceramics are put back together; mended using lacquer dusted with powdered gold that leaves the repair visible. The revitalized ceramic becomes a symbol of fragility, strength and beauty.’ She kissed Jess on the cheek. ‘Wow, that’s so beautiful. Thank you.’

  Jess smiled. ‘You’re welcome. I read about it ages ago and I’ve just been waiting to have the right thing to use it for. I love the spirt behind it. The idea that the broken can be beautiful and that we need to forgive ourselves and forgive others – embrace our “cracks”.’ She laughed. ‘She says, sounding unbearably pretentious!’

  Laura laughed. ‘Glass of wine?’

  ‘I shouldn’t really. I’m supposed to be writing a blog post tonight.’

  ‘Just a small one.’

  ‘Oh, go on then,’ Jess said. ‘To celebrate the fact Unmask have tracked down my online troll.’ She winked. ‘My other online troll.’

  ‘Don’t,’ Laura said, making a pained face. ‘Who is he?’

  ‘A chef from Tottenham.’

  ‘A chef?’

  Jess nodded. ‘The police went to have a word. Apparently, he looked as if he was going to burst into tears. I don’t think he’ll be messaging me again any time soon.’

  ‘Christ!’ Laura said, opening the wine.

  They were sitting in Laura’s kitchen. She had given up worrying about what Jess thought about the fact that she always seemed to have a pile of dirty dishes teetering near the sink, and that you were more likely to find a pile of (clean) knickers on the table than a scented candle. To be fair to Jess, she didn’t seem to care – although Laura had once caught her washing mugs she’d just taken out of the cupboard before using them.

  Jess picked up the dish and traced one of the gold lines with her fingertip. She grinned. ‘This line here symbolizes me forgiving you for being the world’s worst bridesmaid.’

  ‘I was not the world’s worst bridesmaid.’

  They were both laughing now.

  ‘You were so hungover, you had to stop to be sick in a plant pot just before we went into the church.’

  ‘At least I didn’t hurl as we walked up the aisle.’

  ‘You didn’t organize a hen night—’

  ‘You didn’t want one.’

  ‘I didn’t want a stripper.’ She took a sip of her wine. ‘You were late to every dress fitting and you shagged the best man in the toilets just before he had to make his speech. Which did, I have to admit, take the edge off his nerves!’

  Laura held up her hands. ‘Okay, okay. I wasn’t a great bridesmaid. But you did make me wear green.’

  ‘It matched your face.’

  Billy burst into the room, announced that Lola was cheating at Hungry Hippos, g
rabbed three biscuits without asking, and then ran out again.

  Laura picked up the dish and pointed to another gold wiggly line. ‘This line here symbolizes me forgiving you for being a smug cow about your A level results.’

  Jess gave her a mock punch on the shoulder. ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘You got two As and a B and you never stopped complaining about the B.’

  Jess laughed. ‘I was only a few marks off an A. But fair enough. Right, my turn again.’ She pointed to another gold line. ‘This one here is for you being so utterly rubbish when Lola was born, barely coming to see me at all in those first few weeks and then expecting me to make you tea when you did finally pitch up.’

  ‘Sorry. I had no idea what it was like. And, anyway, at least I didn’t keep telling you to put some make-up on like Mum did.’

  Jess laughed. ‘Your go.’

  ‘This line says I forgive you for stealing my platform sandals that time BEFORE I’D EVEN WORN THEM.’

  Jess winced. ‘Not sure you should forgive me for that one!’

  They carried on playing and they carried on drinking until they realized they’d finished the bottle. At that point Jess completely abandoned the idea of writing her blog post and they ordered takeaway pizza for everyone.

  As Laura burnt the roof of her mouth on a molten string of mozzarella, she looked across the table at Jess and thought about all the ‘I forgive yous’ they’d avoided.

  I forgive you for being Mum’s favourite.

  I forgive you for always sniping about me being an influencer.

  I forgive you for not liking my son’s father.

  I forgive you for not helping more when Mum was sick.

  I forgive you for always being better at everything.

  I forgive you for saying my ten-year-old would probably end up with an eating disorder.

  She thought about Preena at the grief support group. The raw pain in her voice when she talked about always waiting for her sister to call but realizing that she never would. It made Laura want to call Preena every day: I know I’m not her and I’ll never be as good as her but you can tell me when your husband is being a dick.