by Rona Halsall
‘You pathetic little shit!’ she’d yelled at Callum, who cowered against the wall, his arms protecting his head, wet pyjama bottoms clinging to his legs, a puddle on the laminate floor.
‘Mel, you mustn’t speak to him like that!’ Luke could feel the rage building inside, hot and fierce.
She turned on him. ‘How old is he? Nearly nine and he’s still pissing himself?’ She stood on tiptoes, her face inches away from Luke’s. ‘I call that pathetic.’
‘No, Mel.’ Luke grabbed her shoulders to keep her out of his face, blood pulsing in his ears. There was a moment’s silence while they stared at each other before she leapt at him, arms like windmills, slapping and scratching, tearing strips of flesh from his hands, arms and face.
‘Why do I never come first? It’s all about the fucking kids with you, isn’t it?’ Her eyes had a manic gleam, spittle flying out with her words. ‘What about me? You bastard. It’s never about me!’
Luke backed away from her, glad to see Callum dash into the bathroom, where he locked himself in. After a few minutes, Mel wore herself out, spat on him, then stomped back to their bedroom, slamming the door behind her. He waited a moment, to be sure, then spent half an hour coaxing his son out of the bathroom, while Tessa stood in her doorway, a cuddly unicorn clasped to her chest, eyes wide and fearful.
He didn’t go to work the following day.
The children didn’t go to school.
It was time to leave.
Once they’d had breakfast and long after Mel had left for a meeting, Luke got them organised, grabbing their most treasured belongings. He was waiting for Callum to bring his backpack downstairs when Mel came through the front door. She’s back early! Luke tensed, fear creeping up the back of his neck. She stopped, her eyes scanning the pile of suitcases in the hallway, a frown pulling at her face.
‘What’s going on?’
Luke took a deep breath. ‘We’re going back to the farm.’
‘What?’ She dropped her bags onto the floor and moved towards Luke, her keys still in her hands. ‘Why would you do that?’
Luke saw Callum start down the stairs, then stop and hurry back up again. He could see Tessa’s face peeping over the bannister. How could this be a home when the kids were scared of their stepmother’s temper?
Time to man up.
He turned and walked into the kitchen, Mel behind him, heels clicking on the floor, then he closed the door to give them an element of privacy. This was not a conversation he wanted to have in front of the children, especially when he knew that Mel would react badly. He could already see it in her face. That look. His heart started to race and he told himself to be prepared. He stepped back a pace, putting more space between them.
Mel had that mean glint in her eyes that he was coming to know so well. He was going to have to be careful here. In fact, maybe this wasn’t a good place for a showdown. Not with knives and other utensils on the worktop, pans hanging by the cooker. He walked towards the dining area and sat down, hoping she’d do the same. But she didn’t. She paced up and down, hands to her temples.
‘What the fuck are you playing at, Luke?’ She stopped and glared at him. ‘You’re like a little child, always running to mummy when things aren’t going your way.’ She leant towards him over the table, her mouth an angry line. ‘This is real life, Luke. People row. They make up. Rinse and repeat. I know Anna was a saint, but this is life for the rest of us.’
She stood back, threw up her hands. ‘I’ve apologised. Many, many times. I got cross. Sorry. I’m really sorry. It’s just… it’s just I need my sleep. I can’t function on a few hours and make sense when I’m in meetings with clients. And once I’m awake it takes me forever to get back to sleep.’
Luke swallowed, trying to dredge up some courage, but his heart was racing. ‘It’s not right, Mel. I can’t live like this. It’s not fair on the kids.’ Luke sounded defensive rather than masterful, weak rather than strong.
‘You’re not helping them, you know. Babying them like you do, always pandering to them, letting them get away with blue murder. That’s not the way to make them strong and independent. They need to learn to abide by rules.’ Her hands were waving in the air to emphasise her point. ‘None of this free-thinking bollocks you grew up with.’ She sneered at him. ‘That’s not going to get them anywhere. All that hippy shit. They’ve got to learn how to fit in. Have proper manners. Know how to be good little worker bees.’
Luke cleared his throat, his back damp with sweat.
‘That’s not what I want for them, Mel.’
‘They’re spoilt. You know that, right?’
‘They’re not.’
‘They so are.’ She jabbed a finger at him. ‘And taking them up to that farm will make them worse.’
‘We’re going.’ Luke stood. Mel advanced towards him. A quiver of adrenaline radiated down his legs.
‘You’re not. You’re not going anywhere. You’ve got to stop this, Luke. Running away at the first sign of trouble. A bit of a disagreement and there you go, running off again.’ She reached for his hand and her face softened. ‘For better and for worse. That’s what you promised me in our marriage vows. Or didn’t you mean it?’
His mouth was so dry he couldn’t speak. That was such a loaded question, a palatable response too difficult to find.
She squeezed his hand, her eyes pleading. ‘Please, Luke, please don’t go. I love you so much. You and the children are everything to me. Everything.’
Luke snatched back his hand. ‘I can’t live like this.’ Not eloquent, but it was the only thing his mind could come up with. He tried to move to the door, but Mel blocked his path. His hands twitched by his sides, his heart galloping so fast he was struggling to breathe. ‘It’s… it’s not good for any of us.’
‘Luke. Don’t you realise that I know?’
She stared at him. He stared back, an icy chill running through him.
‘Know what? I’ve no idea what you’re talking about.’
‘I mean the pills that you keep in the garage. I know what they are. I know you’re selling drugs.’
Luke’s heart fluttered, his breath quickened. ‘No, I’m not. Don’t be ridiculous.’
She nodded at him, her mouth giving a dismissive twitch. ‘Okay, so what are they then? And why do you need to hide them?’
He sighed, looked at the floor then back at Mel, could feel the perspiration on his brow. ‘They’re… bodybuilding pills. I’m trying to beef up a bit.’
‘But you sell them to people. I have pictures.’
He rubbed his sweaty palms on his jeans, shaken by the turn in the conversation and what it might mean in terms of his plans to leave. ‘What? You followed me?’
‘No. I have better things to do. I paid an expert in surveillance to follow you. And he watched you make several drop-offs. Looked like a delivery route he said. Up to Deeside and back.’
Heat flooded Luke’s face, his voice defensive. ‘It’s not illegal. It’s just a bit of a sideline. Some extra money.’
She gave a tight-lipped smile and shook her head. ‘I’ve had them analysed. I have a lab report saying exactly what they are. And cannabis is definitely illegal.’
Luke’s heart was racing so fast he could hardly think straight. How could she have gone behind his back like that? Had him followed. This was bad. Really bad. Even though there was talk in political circles about making medicinal cannabis legal, it would be years before that came about and, in the meantime, she was right. He was breaking the law. A criminal.
She could bust their whole business open. Put loads of people in danger of being arrested. Including him. And what would happen to the kids then?
Fight your corner. Think about the kids now, not what ifs. She’s bluffing…
‘I don’t believe you. And anyway, it’s none of your business.’
‘Oh, but you should believe me. And I think it’s very much my business. I think the police would be very interested. In fact, I have a sample,
somewhere safe, just in case.’ Mel was staring at him, eyes narrowed. ‘So, if you decide to leave me, well, I might be compelled to tell the police. For the sake of the children, you understand. I would hate to think of them growing up in a drug den. And I’m pretty sure that if you’re convicted of dealing, I’ll have no problem getting custody.’
‘You wouldn’t do that. Anyway, it’s medicinal. You don’t get a high from it.’
Mel raised her eyebrows. ‘You think that matters? Because I don’t think the law is that precise. I think the law says that cannabis is illegal. Growing it, selling it and using it.’
Luke gasped, his mouth opening and closing as he tried to think of something that might put him on the front foot, give him some sort of lead in their verbal battle. But he couldn’t think of anything and her threat of taking the children from him sent shockwaves of panic through his body. Could she do that? Was it possible?
‘What do you want from me, Mel?’ He sounded whiny, feeble. ‘Why can’t we just put this whole marriage down as a mistake. We rushed things. It’s not working.’ He took a step towards the door, but Mel wasn’t going to move. She stood her ground, blocking his way, put a hand on his chest and pushed him back.
‘You think it’s that simple? Really? I’ve built my life around you and your children. I have a business, a reputation, not only with work colleagues, but at the school. I have a network of mummy friends. I’m important to people. Don’t you understand that? If you leave, then I’m nothing again. Worse than nothing. I’m a reject. And that –’ she pushed him in the chest – ‘that is not going to happen. You are not going to humiliate me. You are not!’
There was a snarl on her lips, a hardness in her eyes.
Luke tried to swallow his fear and hoped that the children had locked themselves in the bathroom. He glanced around him, and knew that his only escape route was back into the hallway. He stepped to the left. She mirrored him. He stepped back, but she followed him, her eyes never moving off his face. He had to get to the door. Gradually he shuffled round until they had changed places, and he inched backwards until his hand was on the door handle. If he was quick, he could open it, turn and slam it in her face.
If he was quick.
But she was quicker.
Without warning, she lunged towards him, fists pounding him in the chest and face, her car keys still clasped in her hand. ‘You don’t love me, do you? Do you? You just wanted someone to look after you all, cook the meals, do the housework. I’m just a bloody slave for you all, that’s what I am. I thought we were going to be a proper family.’
The keys jabbed at him like a bunch of blunt daggers, scratching and bruising his skin.
‘Mel, stop it. Stop!’ he shouted, a hand over his right eye, where she’d scored a direct hit, pain searing through him. But still she carried on.
‘I hate you! I hate you! You just use me, you bastard!’
Luke grunted as the blows kept falling, his arms folded over his face. He tried opening his eye, but it stung too much, the pain intense. Tears streamed down his face. Then he noticed spots of blood dripping on to the floor and his brain froze on one thought.
What has she done to me?
He peered at her from under his arms. She looked shocked, her face blotchy and red, and she stared at her keys as if she’d never seen them before.
‘Christ, Luke. Look what’s happened now. You stupid man. You did that. You!’
Luke’s eye burned, the pain escalating outwards, almost unbearable. He still couldn’t open it, and could feel the tickle of blood oozing down his cheek.
‘Let me have a look.’ Mel tried to prise his arms away from his face, but he shrank back, holding them tighter while his heart jumped around and his breath came out in rasping gasps.
‘That’s going to need seeing to.’ Mel looked down at her hand, where the keys were dripping blood on to the floor.
Luke felt nauseous, his stomach swirling, his pulse pounding in his damaged eye. It was closed now, his lids stuck together with blood, and he was feeling a bit faint. He put a hand on the wall behind him to steady himself, but his knees gave way and he slumped to the floor, the room starting to spin.
Mel went over to the sink, washed her keys under the tap and turned to him, all businesslike and efficient, the rage gone as quickly as it had come. She gave him a tight-lipped smile.
‘Right, sweetheart, I think we need to get you to A & E, get them to have a look at that eye. It’s looking a bit nasty. Clumsy you. Fancy tripping and knocking into the keys like that.’
She called one of the mums from school, who was on the fundraising committee with her and only lived a couple of streets away, and she agreed to come and sit with the kids while they went to hospital. No problem, she’d said, only too happy to help, and she’d bring Rory with her. That would keep Callum busy.
Luke was in shock, the world going on around him, but he wasn’t part of it, all of his attention concentrated in the pain in his eye. He’d had a bit of an accident, Mel told everyone, and Luke couldn’t speak to contradict her.
The next day, Luke had to phone in sick to work. His eye was patched and he’d been told to rest in a dark room for a few days, minimal eye movements, to give it a chance to heal. Mel fluttered about, making sure he was comfortable, bringing him hot drinks and food. She cancelled her plans for the week and put all her efforts into nursing him better. It was hard to believe, when she was like this, that it had really happened, her version of the incident told so convincingly that he wondered if she was right and he was wrong.
The more he thought about it, the more blurred the actual sequence of events became. Had she tripped? Had he stumbled? Had it been an accident? Because he couldn’t believe that she would have deliberately hurt him this badly. Christ, he’d nearly lost his eye! And now… now she was looking after him so well, so lovingly. She was like a different person. The one he had fallen in love with.
He was sleeping in the spare room, where he could hear what was going on in the house if his door was open, so he still felt involved. He could hear Mel talking to the children, explaining maths to Tessa in a way that he never could have managed, talking football with Callum. Maybe they’d turned a corner, because she was trying really hard now, and even though she flared up with Luke, she had never touched the children, nor looked like she would. She might have given them the odd telling-off in the past, but it never escalated to anything physical and since his accident, there’d been no shouting at all. No, the problem wasn’t them and he was sure they were safe. The problem was him.
With Mel, they were a family. Without her, he was an incompetent single parent who regularly thought that the best thing for everyone would be for him to end his life. So, surely the children were better off if he could make his marriage work? The house ran smoothly, she could do things with them that he couldn’t, was there when he couldn’t be and everything was so much better than when he’d tried to parent them on his own.
Maybe she was right.
Maybe he wasn’t trying hard enough, running away too easily. Her comments had resonated with him and he couldn’t give Ted another stick to beat him with. It wasn’t that he actually wanted to go back to the farm, it was more that he had nowhere else to go. And anyway, the house was his. So why should he leave?
If it was his fault that the marriage wasn’t working, then it was in his power to put things right. He had to give it another go, especially with her threat to get custody of the children. He couldn’t even allow himself to contemplate that eventuality.
For the sake of all his family, and for the wellbeing of his children, he had to try harder.
Twenty-Five
Nine weeks ago
A pattern returned to their existence, Mel taking the kids to school and usually being there to pick them up as well. Luke’s shifts were still erratic, but she accommodated them without a murmur, organising her mummy friends to do pickups when she had work meetings.
The kids were behaving themse
lves; in fact, he hardly heard a peep from them. Mel was upbeat, having landed herself a contract with the company she’d been chasing for the last six months, and he was keeping up at work. She seemed a lot happier and he relaxed a bit, still unsure in his mind as to what had happened when he had injured his eye, time fading his memory until he was no longer certain whose version of events was correct.
He tried to forget about it and the threats that Mel had hurled at him during their argument, but his unease would not go away, gnawing at him in the night. Have I done the right thing by staying? But as he saw it, he had no option. If she knew about the drugs, he couldn’t leave or he and the rest of his family would be in danger of being arrested. But worse than that, he might lose the right to see his own children. And if he told the truth about Mel, if anyone believed him, the kids might end up in care. It was these thoughts that really scared him, these eventualities that kept him by Mel’s side, because, when he’d worked it all through, it was the safest option for his children.
He stayed in the spare bedroom, where Callum often came to share his bed when he had nightmares or wet his bed and this, in itself, became a source of friction.
‘I think we should take him to the doctor,’ Mel said one evening, when the kids were upstairs and they were on their own, sharing a bottle of wine. It was a routine that Mel enjoyed, although Luke hardly touched the stuff because it aggravated his acid stomach and made him feel even more melancholy. But it was Mel’s daily treat, so he went along with it, pretending to drink while he kept topping up her glass.
Luke shook his head, adamant that was not going to happen. ‘No, I think it’s just all the changes. You’ve got to remember that his mum died.’ He saw Mel tense and hurried the conversation on, a prickle of unease scratching at his skin. ‘Then I moved them away from their friends. They’re at a new school.’ He shrugged. ‘It’s a lot for a kid to deal with.’ Summarising it all for Mel gave his actions clarity in his mind, making him feel more protective of Callum. ‘They were just getting settled in at the farm when I bought this place. Then you came to live with us.’