Conditional Love

by Cathy Bramley

  ‘I would like to offer my resignation.’

  Donna narrowed her eyes and chewed the inside of her cheek. She looked at me for a long time. I couldn’t be sure, but I got the impression that she was thinking back to that moment in the ladies’ loos last night. I stared back at her, willing her to take pity on me.

  ‘Please, Donna. I’m planning on re-training. A resignation would look so much better on my CV than a dismissal. And last night, well, there was a lot going on, let’s say. Not that that’s an excuse. Well, it is –’

  Donna held up her hand. I clamped my mouth shut and she gave me a curt nod.

  ‘I accept your resignation. Out.’

  Wonders will never cease. I sighed with relief.

  She flicked her head at the door and I scarpered.

  forty-four

  Well, that didn’t quite go as planned.

  By eleven o’clock I was back in the flat, staring at myself in the hall mirror. It crossed my mind as I winced at the dark circles under my eyes that perhaps I hadn’t even been out of the flat. Maybe I’d simply overslept: the whole Facebook faux pas could have been a dream, my resignation could be still in an envelope on the kitchen table and I was just horribly late for work.

  The plastic handle on the carrier bag was cutting into my fingers and I dropped it to the floor with relief.

  A photograph of me with Tyrone from Coronation Street fell out on the carpet.

  Ah, proof: I really had cleared all the tat out from my desk.

  ‘I’m unemployed,’ I informed my reflection.

  The silence in the flat was oppressive. I put the radio on, the kettle on, the washing machine on and felt better.

  I set myself up on the kitchen table: milky tea, a Go-Ahead breakfast bar, notepad, pen and laptop, muttered ‘Right then’ several times and tried not to panic.

  A quick game of Solitaire led to the best of three and before I knew it the morning was gone. I nearly jumped out of my skin when my mobile rang.

  Please let it be Nick.

  No, no, don’t let it be Nick! I don’t want to talk to him. Yet. Maybe not ever.

  It was Emma, letting me know that Jess was out of hospital and on her way back to their parents’ house.

  It was good news and just the interruption I needed to gird my loins. I turned off Solitaire and Googled ‘Interior Design courses’.

  My plan was still sketchy, but last night I realised without a shadow of my usual doubt that life was too short to spend even one more day doing something that didn’t inspire me. What did inspire me was interior design.

  I had derived so much pleasure from working on the layout for my own house and doing that little job for the cowshed. I hadn’t felt so alive, so passionate about anything since I was a raw recruit at The Herald all those years ago, when I’d had my future all mapped out.

  It was scary, letting go of the security of a monthly salary, a steady career and the knowledge that I could do the job blindfolded. But I owed it to myself to walk on the wild side for once.

  Plus if I hadn’t gone, they would have pushed me anyway, but I decided not to dwell on that.

  I filled in a few forms online, requested several brochures and felt pleased with my progress.

  Next job was to make a few phone calls.

  ‘Hello Mr Whelan, this is Sophie Stone.’

  ‘Hello Miss Stone, not in any trouble I hope?’

  Was it just me, or did he actually sound hopeful?

  ‘I don’t think your granddad would be very pleased with me,’ I said. ‘I’ve been rather rash.’

  I brought him up to speed with recent events and my new employment status and warned him that I might need him to act as my solicitor if I decided to sell the bungalow. I also asked him to write a letter on my behalf to Marc and Strong Developments with copies to go to the planning office and my ex-architect. Mr Whelan ummed and ahhed and I heard his pen scratching as he made notes.

  ‘My granddad had another saying,’ he said.

  ‘Go on.’

  ‘What’s the worst that can happen?’

  Bankruptcy, homelessness and professional humiliation sprang to mind but I thanked him and rang off.

  The second name on my list was Max Fitzgerald, the financial advisor. I dialled her number and braced myself.

  ‘Oh yes,’ I heard her tapping on a keyboard in the background. ‘Got your file here. I called you “the rainy day ditherer”.’

  Max confirmed my suspicions. Without a job, I wouldn’t get a mortgage and without a mortgage I couldn’t build a house. She gasped in horror when I told her I was thinking of selling the bungalow, started wittering on about sluggish markets, return on investments and maximising assets. By the time I got off the phone, my head was spinning with percentages and interest rates but I had a plan. She had convinced me to tart the bungalow up a bit and rent it out. This would give me a monthly income and I would still have the option to build my dream home as soon as I joined the ranks of the workers again.

  It was a nice thought.

  There was one name left on my list: Nick Cromwell.

  My insides turned to jelly just thinking about him and Frannie Cooper last night. And the business with his ex-girlfriend. What a shocker, what a let down! Even now, after I’d heard it with my own ears, I couldn’t believe it of him. Everything I knew about Nick seemed at odds with this new information and my poor brain was struggling to process it.

  Still, it didn’t matter, I couldn’t afford to build a house now anyway. No more house meant no more Nick. What he did, or had done, in his private life, was none of my business. Perhaps this was for the best.

  My thumb hovered over his number. I was poised to call him and confirm that yes, I did wish to withdraw the planning application. I felt sick at the thought that this was the end.

  The end? End of what? We hadn’t even started.

  I was being ridiculous. He hadn’t exactly bombarded me with calls this morning, had he? Interflora hadn’t rung my doorbell, straining under the weight of flowers and forgiveness notes.

  I pressed dial and waited for someone to pick up. I would be courteous but business-like. I would banish this lump that was forming in my throat before….

  ‘Cromwell Associates,’ panted Poppi. ‘Sorry. Out of breath. Playing Frisbee with Norman in the garden.’

  ‘It’s Sophie Stone.’

  ‘Oh, thank my granny’s guts for that! I thought it was that Cooper woman again. Nick’s refused to work for her and she’s been on the phone every five minutes.’

  The news gave me my first smile of the day.

  ‘Is Nick there, please?’

  ‘Oh my God, Sophie! What happened last night?’ she squealed.

  ‘Er, what do you mean?’

  ‘Nick appeared this morning looking like he’d spent the night on a park bench and now he’s buggered off – ’scuse my French – to Manchester.’

  I knew exactly what must have had happened. Phil Strong had touched a nerve. Nick’s past misdemeanours were threatening to affect his reputation, forcing him to face his responsibilities; he had gone to visit his ex-girlfriend and his child. Better late than never.

  I forced myself to harden my heart. It was absolutely nothing to do with me.

  ‘How did he seem – contrite, guilty, ashamed?’ I probed.

  ‘No,’ said Poppi, sounding confused. ‘More like really, really angry. Like when he found out about the other application you’ve made for Lilac Lane.’

  We were both silent. I was thinking that angry wasn’t the best frame of mind to be in for a meeting with a small child. I didn’t know what Poppi was thinking.

  ‘Can you tell him –’ Tell him what? I hesitated. I couldn’t say it over the phone. I needed to see him face to face, to draw a line under our relationship. ‘Tell him I’d like to meet him. Soon as he can.’

  ‘It’s true then?’ said Poppi in a hurt voice.

  ‘Yes, I’m afraid so.’

  I grimaced as I put the phon
e down. There was a slight chance of misunderstanding there.

  forty-five

  A week later and things in our little household had moved on apace. Jess had gone back to school this morning, clutching a peanut butter sandwich made by me and a fruit salad containing superfoods to boost her immune system made by Emma. Apart from one wobble when I flicked the telly on to Call the Midwife by accident, she was doing really well.

  Emma was this very minute winging her way to London to accept a runner-up prize for her silver jugs. When the Chairman had heard why she didn’t turn up to the awards ceremony, he had invited her down for a tour of the academy and lunch at his private club. She was so excited that she’d even worn a dress!

  I, on the other hand, had spent the week at the bungalow, dressed in my scruffiest clothes and warmest jumpers. I called it Operation Spruce Up. The letting agent and I had hatched a plan to get the place on the rental market in time for the Easter rush. The rent he had suggested was huge! Village appeal, apparently. The money would easily cover my share of the rent on the flat and help towards my other expenses. Student life was looking more and more like a reality.

  The disappointment of having to postpone building my own home was hard to swallow, but I still had the flat with the girls and what you’ve never had you can’t miss, right?

  The one thing that I hadn’t yet come to terms with was Nick.

  He hadn’t been in touch.

  I carried this round with me constantly, like a stone in my shoe that I just couldn’t shake out.

  Nick hadn’t called or texted or emailed or anything. I’d thought about contacting him, giving him the benefit of the doubt. What if Poppi had forgotten to pass on my message? I could have called his mobile and put the phone down again before he answered. Just to remind him that I exist. But I did nothing, pride got in the way. Because even if it was Poppi’s fault, if I meant anything to him, wouldn’t he have wanted to talk to me by now?

  Somehow, the ‘what you’ve never had, you can’t miss’ principle didn’t work where he was concerned; I thought about him all the time.

  Yesterday I was feeling mainly wistful; imagining how things could have been between us, thinking how much I would like to hold my soft body against his slender firm one and inhale his gorgeously masculine scent.

  The day before I was nostalgic, remembering the laughter in the park, Norman covering me in muddy paw prints, Nick mistakenly thinking I knew all about Mies van der Rohe (I did now, thanks to a quick shuftie on Google), and me barefoot on the grass. That was the good thing about nostalgia, you could just pick out the good bits, no need to drag up the blisters or the crack on the skull.

  Today, as I unpacked my new steam wallpaper stripper, I was erring on the bitter and twisted side. He hadn’t rung me because he was too busy. He was too busy to bother with little old me.

  Nick was probably throwing himself into fatherhood. He’d be bonding with his offspring over a McDonalds. No – scratch that – this was Nick we were talking about. He would be taking him or her on an architectural tour of the Midlands. By the time the poor little soul was ten, there would be nothing they didn’t know about Norman Foster.

  Or, I thought, as I positioned the stepladders in front of the fireplace, he could have changed his mind about working for Frannie Cooper and was busy bringing her luxury salon to life.

  I subjected the chimney breast to a vicious blast of steam and scraped the wallpaper off for all I was worth; it was very therapeutic.

  Anyway, I was very busy myself. I went back down the ladder, turned the radio to non-stop eighties and lost myself in the music.

  I had already stripped two of the living room walls when Nick phoned. The floor was covered in tiny scraps of paper, the room was steamier than a Turkish brothel and I was down to my t-shirt and knickers.

  I thumped the radio off, grabbed the phone and unplugged the wallpaper stripper in under a second. I was so elated to see his name flash up on my screen that for a moment I forgot whether I was still angry with him or not.

  My voice was croaky from not speaking to anyone for hours so that instead of ‘Hello’, all that came out was a sort of growl. I tried again, keeping it cool.

  ‘Nick.’

  ‘I’m sorry for the radio silence,’ he said.

  I quirked an eyebrow. Who says ‘radio silence’?

  ‘It’s been a bit, well, hectic,’ he explained.

  I bet.

  ‘Good hectic or bad?’ I asked politely.

  ‘I’ve had a rush project on and it’s finished and, well, I’m delighted with it.’ He sounded exhilarated.

  So he had taken that Frannie Cooper project! A wave of heat flooded through me and finished up as a red blotch on each cheek. Jealousy. I was glad he couldn’t see me.

  ‘Look, can we meet?’ his words came out in a rush. He made a noise in his throat which might have been a cough or an uncertain laugh.

  I took a deep breath.

  He wants to see me. He hasn’t forgotten me. He has things to say.

  Oh, stuff the Ice Queen act. I was no good at keeping it up; it was marvellous to hear his voice. I’d almost forgotten what he sounded like. A sensation filtered down to the pit of my stomach as gentle as warm honey.

  ‘OK,’ I said.

  We both spoke together: ‘In Lilac Lane.’

  I chuckled and the last piece of ice melted. He laughed and that made me smile.

  We fixed a date and he said, ‘Right then,’ like he was winding up the call. I didn’t want him to go.

  ‘Nick,’ I said suddenly, ‘can you bring Norman with you?’

  ‘I can,’ he replied straight away. ‘Why?’

  ‘I’ve missed him.’

  There was a pause down the line and although he was silent, if I had to guess I would have said he was smiling.

  ‘He’s missed you too.’

  Three days later and I’d decorated my first ever room. I’d cheated and bought easy to hang wallpaper. All I had had to do was slop wallpaper paste onto the walls, slap the paper on and snip it to the right length. A piece of cake.

  Picking up stray scraps of paper from the floor, I straightened up and cast a proud eye round the room. I had picked out something neutral to suit the rental market. It wasn’t the design statement I would make for my own home – when I eventually got one – but as the letting agent had advised, it was clean and fresh. And as I was letting the bungalow unfurnished, it needed to have broad appeal.

  Nothing broad about the tiny galley kitchen, though, I noted as I went through to check my refreshment supplies. Nick was due any second and I had pushed the boat out: new kettle and a tin of Millicano. Not a carton of Ribena in sight. I unpacked the mugs I had brought with me from the flat and re-boiled the kettle.

  Right on cue, there was a knock at the door.

  He’s here, he’s here, he’s here.

  I tripped over boxes and bags in my haste to let him in. I stopped just shy of the door and raked a fluttery hand through my hair.

  There he was, on the other side of the glass panel, sheltering out of the rain under the porch. He had his back to the door and his hood up, exactly where he was when we first met. It had been raining then too, he had watched as my umbrella got stuck in the branches. And then we had had some ludicrous conversation about dogs.

  I flung the door open. My heart was thudding so loudly I hardly heard my own hello.

  He turned, knocked his hood back and threw his arms out wide.

  ‘Sophie!’

  ‘Dad!’

  forty-six

  Excitement, shock, dismay, guilt at the dismay.

  ‘How lovely to see you!’ I cried.

  What was going on? Was this a set-up? Had Nick never intended to come at all?

  I peered over my dad’s shoulder as he hugged me. The lane was empty.

  ‘What a day!’ he was saying, removing his wet anorak and stepping into the hall.

  I checked for Nick once more, shut the front door and plastered
on a smile.

  ‘Come on through.’

  I busied myself making hot beverages to hide my disappointment.

  ‘Bet you wonder why I’m here?’ My dad slurped his tea and gave a sigh of satisfaction. His eyes twinkled at me like he knew something I didn’t.

  I wrapped my hands around my own mug and nodded. We were in the kitchen, side by side, leaning against the cupboards.

  ‘Nick got in touch. Your architect.’

  I looked up at him sharply. Dad chuckled.

  ‘Nice chap,’ he said slyly.

  ‘Yeah,’ I said, keeping my voice light, although I needn’t have bothered, my blush told him everything I didn’t want him to know. ‘He is coming, isn’t he?’

  Did that sound desperate?

  Dad nodded. ‘I asked him to give me ten minutes. He’s next door with Audrey and his dog. I haven’t seen her for thirty odd years. Still as scary.’

  I felt my body relax; he was coming. I felt much happier now, if confused.

  ‘What did Nick say?’

  ‘Oh,’ he waggled his head from side to side, as if to imply not much. ‘He told me about your job, about deciding not to demolish this place and build yourself a new one. He told me how much having a home of your own means to you.’

  Nick said that? Bit personal. Considering.

  Dad and I stared at each other until our eyes filled with tears and we both looked away, embarrassed.

  He put his tea down and took his wallet out of the back pocket of his trousers. He was wearing black jeans today and looked quite trim for his age.

  ‘I want to give you some money. A a a!’ He held up a finger to my lips as I began to protest. ‘To pay for the build. A lump sum so you don’t need a mortgage.’ He took a deep breath and held out a cheque. ‘I want my girl to have her dream home.’

  I lifted my gaze to his. My heart surged with love and gratitude. I’d come a long way since meeting him last August. We both had.

  Putting my tea down, I wrapped my arms round his neck and hugged him tight.

  ‘Thanks, Dad.’ I kissed his rough cheek and got a whiff of that cinnamon aftershave. ‘It’s a lovely offer and I don’t want to seem ungrateful, but I can’t accept it.’