by Tracy Bloom
‘Actually, I think I’m just hungry,’ she said.
‘Fat Club does that to me, too. Fish and chips?’
‘I could murder a fish and chips.’
‘Let’s get going, then. There’ll be a queue by now behind all the other starving slimmers.’
Chapter Fourteen
Michelle stood outside Rob’s rented terraced house feeling like Little Red Riding Hood. She was wearing a bright red raincoat and had a basket tucked under her arm with a dish of Salted Chilli Chicken hiding under a red and white checked tablecloth. She hesitated before banging on the knocker. Her heart was beating at a hundred miles an hour and her head was swimming with the rehearsed words she had been contemplating all day, as she built herself up to telling Rob he had a fifteenyear-old daughter.
The night before she’d sat for hours trying to foresee Rob’s reaction to make sure she was prepared with answers that might help him adjust to the news. At one point she’d even reached for the photo album that she’d put together of Josie during her first year, thinking that maybe Rob would like to see pictures of his girl as a baby.
She flicked through the obligatory shots of Josie in hospital, all pink and screwed up, followed by her first cuddles with grandparents, first outfit that wasn’t a Babygro, first smile, first tooth, first holiday in Whitby, throwing chips at enormous seagulls, and lastly first birthday on Christmas Eve, complete with Santa hat on her grinning head as she stood on her own two feet to blow out a solitary candle.
Michelle felt an overwhelming sadness as it hit her how fast the time had gone and how she would never be able to relive those precious baby moments again. She put the album back on the shelf, knowing that Rob should see them when he was ready, once he had found a way of forgiving her for the time she had deprived him of with Josie.
Pulling down her red hood, she grasped the door knocker and bashed it against the door. When there was no answer she tried again. She could see the flickering of the television behind the curtains in the front room, so she knew he must be in.
No answer.
She stepped across the path to the front window and banged on the glass. Now she was here she wanted to get it over with. Almost immediately the curtain was drawn back and out peered Rob. Well, she thought it was Rob. He looked horrendous. His eyes were red with huge bags drooping underneath them. A dark fuzz cluttered his normally clean-cut face, the result of many days without shaving. He also appeared to be wearing blue towelling. Never a good look at six in the evening. He dropped the curtain and disappeared. Next minute she heard the latch being pulled back and the front door opening.
‘It’s not really a good time,’ he muttered at her.
‘What’s happened?’ asked Michelle, spotting tartan checked pyjama bottoms peeping from underneath the blue towelling.
Rob stared back at her and to her horror he began to cry.
‘What’s happened?’ she asked again.
He sniffed loudly. ‘You’d better come in.’
She followed him into the living room, picking her way through a collection of empty pizza boxes and bottles of lager. The room smelt of beer, congealed cheese and miserable man. Rob slumped down on the sofa and reached for the remote control, turning the very loud rugby game on the TV to mute. Moving an empty bottle off the sofa, Michelle sat down next to him and put her basket on the table.
‘I bought you some Salted Chilli Chicken,’ she said when Rob didn’t say anything. He looked up in utter amazement at the mention of food.
‘That is so kind,’ he gasped. ‘So kind.’ His face, which had lit up for a moment, crumpled again and he grimaced, clearly trying to hold back some more tears. He was barely recognisable as the smart, calm, confident man that had sat at her kitchen table the week before. She didn’t know what to say. Her carefully rehearsed words had been blindsided by the wreck that sat in front of her.
‘Amy called,’ he said, as if it was painful to let the words pass his lips.
‘Is that your wife?’ asked Michelle.
‘Ex-wife.’ He took a tomato-stained handkerchief out of his dressing gown pocket and blew his nose.
‘She rang to say that she and Larry have decided to postpone the wedding.’
‘Okay,’ said Michelle, desperately scrabbling for the appropriate questions to be asking. ‘Did you know they were getting married?’
‘Oh yeah. They got engaged eleven days after she walked out.’
‘Right,’ said Michelle. ‘So were you intending to go to the wedding, then?’
‘God, no!’
‘So why did she call to let you know they’re postponing it?’
‘Because,’ he sniffed. ‘Because she’s pregnant, that’s why, and she doesn’t want to be a fat bride.’ He leant forward, letting his head drop onto his knees. Michelle didn’t know what to do other than lay her hand on his back. Suddenly he reared up.
‘How could she?’ he gasped. ‘She didn’t think to ring and tell me she was pregnant. Oh no. She rang to tell me that the wedding is postponed, like that could ever be more important.’ He slammed his fist on the table, making Michelle jump. She had never seen Rob angry.
‘She kept telling me she wasn’t ready for kids,’ he said, pushing his screwed-up fists into his eye sockets. ‘What bollocks. She just didn’t want my kids.’
‘Well,’ said Michelle, panicking now that the conversation was off the scale in terms of what she had expected. ‘Perhaps it wasn’t planned, perhaps it was a mistake?’
Rob’s eyes appeared from behind his fists, a glimmer of hope glinting somewhere deep inside before he slumped back down again.
‘I very much doubt it,’ he said. ‘She plans everything. She left me on a Friday, you know? Friday is food shop day. She didn’t want to waste her time buying food for two.’
‘Are you sure that’s why it was a Friday?’
‘Her last words to me as she walked out the door were that I needed milk and I should start buying single-pint cartons rather than two-pint cartons. When I walked into that supermarket and bought one pint of milk . . . well, I’ve never felt so alone.’ Rob reached for a bottle of beer on the coffee table and took a swig. ‘This baby definitely wasn’t a mistake. She lied to me, Michelle. Why didn’t she just tell me she didn’t want to have kids with me?’
‘I don’t know,’ she mumbled. But she did know. She knew only too well how hard it was sometimes to tell the truth. A voice in her head shouted, ‘Tell him the truth now!’ She took a breath, searching for the right words to begin.
‘Why me, Michelle?’ he said just as the first sentence was formulating in her brain.
‘I’m sorry?’ she said.
‘Why me?’ he repeated, his face creased up in pain. ‘Why does this keep happening to me? When Jane died I remember thinking there was no way I could lose someone like that again. It’s why I had to go to America. To escape, to start again. Focus on my career, forget about relationships.’
‘I know.’ She nodded. She knew only too well. How she’d wished she were Rob, wished she could run away from the grief, the sadness, the awful mess she was in.
‘Then eventually I met Amy, just as I was starting to forget how terrible it was to lose someone. I thought I could do it. I could try again. I couldn’t be unlucky enough to have two women die on me. I never thought I’d lose her this way.’ He dropped his head into his hands. ‘Why does this keep happening to me?’ He gave a deep sigh, then began to weep again.
Michelle had no choice but to put her arms around him and pull him in close, rocking him gently backwards and forwards until his sobs subsided. It was heartbreaking to see him like this. It reminded her too much of when Jane had died and they’d sat together on the front row in church during her funeral and she’d felt every heave of his shoulders as he desperately tried to hold it together. She’d wanted to put her arms around him then but she couldn’t. Not in church and not with his baby growing inside her. She felt a tear escape down her cheek as Rob’s despair sparked her ow
n. She brushed it away hurriedly with her finger as Rob lifted his head from her shoulder, blowing loudly on his handkerchief.
‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘ I didn’t mean to load all this onto you.’
‘It’s fine,’ she shrugged, praying that he wouldn’t notice her watery eyes.
They smiled at each other awkwardly and Michelle knew she couldn’t bring herself to tell him now. She would have to bide her time before she piled any more heartache onto his overburdened shoulders. He was in no fit state to handle any further life-changing revelations. She started gathering up empty bottles in an effort to create a diversion and an escape route.
‘Look, why don’t I tidy this place up a bit whilst you go and have a shower? You’ll feel better.’
‘You’re right,’ he nodded, his eyes dragged back to the TV. He went quiet for a moment, watching men silently run in random directions across the screen.
‘You’re right,’ he said again, picking up the remote and turning the screen off. ‘Your mother’s coming round.’
‘My mother’s coming round here?’
‘Yeah, she called earlier to ask me round for Sunday lunch and I got a bit upset on the phone, so she insisted on bringing a casserole round. She’s been so kind to me since I’ve been back. She really is a great woman, your mum.’
Michelle stared at Rob, incredulous.
‘So I guess I should clean myself up a bit, you’re right,’ he said, getting up. ‘Thanks, Michelle. I mean it. What would I do without the Hidderley family?’ He gave her a small smile, then turned and left the room.
Michelle stared after him, then looked around at the devastation caused by his misery. She got up and began collecting soggy pizza boxes off the floor, wondering how exactly she had ended up tidying Rob’s house to make him look good for her mother.
Chapter Fifteen
Sleep was all she could think about as she counted slowly to ten following a barrage of questions from her mother. It was nine o’clock and the night before Chickens For Charity had finally arrived. It was a Friday and so she’d worked a full shift in the factory before knocking off at five to begin the set-up for the main event the next day. She was currently six feet up a ladder, hanging bunting across the entrance to the warehouse that Mr Evans had agreed to let them use as an event space. She had escaped up there after four very long hours, when she had been asked every ridiculous question known to man by the army of kind helpers who had volunteered, but who in such an alien environment seemed to have lost all power to make any kind of decision. She hoped that her elevated status, balancing precariously on the top rung, would put her out of reach of anyone requiring her attention. Just a few more hours and it would all be over, she told herself, wondering whether she would be able to stay awake long enough to go home and cook an enormous batch of Salted Chilli Chicken. She was exhausted, since every waking hour outside of the factory, as well as some during normal working hours, had been taken up with the avalanche of tasks that required attention in order to make Chickens for Charity happen. She’d thought screwing up the courage to stand in front of people and get them involved in the event was going to be the hard part. She’d had no idea that that was just the start. Her brain had to drag itself out of sleep mode and put itself on permanent high-alert, problem-solving mode, to avoid the whole thing crashing down around her ears. Endless requests from the competitors had kept her busy with such things as finding rotisseries for the rugby club, temporary stoves for the WI, and locations of plug sockets for Daz’s disco. On top of that, she’d had to deal with the factory health and safety Gestapo otherwise known as Marianne, who seemed intent on force-feeding Michelle as many legal regulations as she possibly could, which had been a bloody nightmare from start to finish. Michelle felt she had spent the entire week dotting i’s and crossing t’s until she could no longer see straight, and quite frankly, if anyone else approached her with what looked like a problem she was quite likely to burst into tears. Her escape up a ladder seemed a safe bet to keep her out of harm’s way.
However, she hadn’t banked on her mother, who was undeterred by talking to Michelle’s backside and who was prepared to go to any lengths to make sure the WI had every advantage available to maximise their chances of winning the coveted prize of CHICKENS FOR CHARITY CHAMPION CHEFS.
‘Michelle!’ she screeched, causing her daughter to overbalance and nearly clatter to the floor in a tangle of recycled jubilee flags. ‘Pauline Dimmock has called. You know, the one who’s providing her prize marrows for a display in our area. She has two questions. Question one, could someone go down to her house on Arcadia Avenue and fetch the marrows, as her Eric has only just had a knee operation and can’t go anywhere? Whoever goes needs a wheelbarrow, because they are exceptionally large marrows. And they need to be strong, because she’s worried it might be hard to lift the marrow into the barrow.’
‘So let me get this straight, Mum.’ Michelle sighed wearily. ‘She wants a man and a barrow to fetch a marrow at nine o’clock at night?’
‘It’s very kind of her to donate them. They’re prizewinning marrows.’
‘I know, Mum, but I’m not sure anyone will want to go down there now. Can’t someone pick them up tomorrow?’
‘Apparently not. Marrows don’t like to be moved in the daylight. Best to do it at night, apparently.’
‘Why on earth . . .?’
‘Least disruptive, I assume.’
‘Who for?’
‘The marrow, of course.’
‘That’s all very well, Mum, but it’s very disruptive for the rest of us. Everyone’s kind of busy at the moment.’
‘Michelle. Do I need to remind you that this is for charity?’
Michelle counted to ten again before she decided she’d better climb down and tackle the problem from the ground.
‘I know it’s for charity, Mum, I set it all up, remember?’
‘Precisely, which is why you should be grateful for the likes of Pauline, who is willing to hand over her prize marrows for George Clooney’s charity. I sincerely hope you’ll be mentioning her generosity when you hand over the money.’
‘Of course I will, Mum,’ sighed Michelle, too tired to argue. She rubbed her temples. ‘Is Dad busy? Could he pop down in the car?’
‘Good idea. Now question two was to ask if you have on-site security.’
‘What for?’
‘So nothing happens to her marrows.’
‘Nothing’s going to happen to her marrows.’
‘They’re prizewinners.’
Bloody hell, thought Michelle. Who knew that marrying George Clooney would lead to her discussing vegetable security measures?
‘Tell Pauline,’ she said slowly, ‘that there is twentyfour-hour security here three hundred and sixty-five days per year. I will personally tell Brian the security man to keep a special eye on Pauline’s marrows, okay? Her marrows couldn’t be better protected if they were in prison.’
‘Oh, Pauline will be relieved to hear that. Have you got Brian’s number and then Pauline can call him with instructions?’
Michelle escaped to find some form of sanity with Gina, who was busy setting up the raffle on a stack of pallets just inside the entrance to the warehouse. She wanted to ensure maximum exposure for the prizes she had harassed local businesses, as well as the factory’s customers, into donating. As Michelle approached, however, she was somewhat perturbed to see a tractor and trailer backed into the entrance and a large metal cage being lifted off.
‘What on earth is that?’ she asked, eyeing up what resembled some kind of torture chamber.
‘My God, Michelle, you’re such a townie. Surely you know what one of these is?’
‘I can assure you I have absolutely no idea.’
‘It’s a cattle crush, of course.’
‘And what would you do with a cattle crush?’
‘Crush cattle, stupid!’
‘For what purpose?’
‘No idea.’
One of th
e army of lads who were lifting the contraption off the back of the trailer turned to Michelle to explain.
‘It traps the cow inside so you can safely give them injections or check their feet or de-horn them. You can even castrate them.’
Michelle turned to look questioningly at Gina.
‘It’s our star prize,’ she exclaimed gleefully. ‘These things are worth a fortune, but it’s an old model and the agricultural suppliers needed the room, so they said I could have it if I could get someone to take it away.’
‘Who is going to want to buy a raffle ticket to win a cage that helps you castrate animals?’ enquired Michelle.
‘Well, I thought of that. We’re surrounded by farmers, right? So I’ve had all the agricultural businesses putting up posters for Chickens for Charity and making a big splash about the chance to win a free cattle crush. I reckon we’ll have half the farming community here tomorrow. Plus I have a back-up plan for the non-farmers.’
‘And what might that be?’
‘I got the bookshop in town to donate a load of copies of that book. Your very own Red Room of Pain. Ta-da!’ she said, parading around the cage like some bikini-clad babe at a fancy car show. ‘The guy who donated this thinks it’s genius. He’s thinking of setting up a bit of a sideline.’
‘Gina,’ said Michelle, struggling for words. ‘Your business acumen really makes me feel that your talents are wasted on the chicken factory floor.’
‘Too right,’ Gina agreed. ‘Every company I rang or visited donated something, Michelle. Every one. And in most cases I got an upgrade.’
‘Meaning what, exactly?’
‘It was my strategy, not to accept their first offer. You know Dominic, the sales manager here? He suggested it. He said if they offer a bottle of wine, suggest two bottles. The guy who gave us the cattle crush started off with a box of foot rot spray. Dominic says I’m a natural.’
‘Gina, you truly amaze me.’
‘In a good way?’
‘Totally in a good way. Now, have you heard from Cousin Jack’s colleague’s neighbour’s son’s girlfriend?’