by Laura Carter
“I love you, darling. You know that, don’t you?” She presses her lips to my hair and squeezes me tighter to her.
“I’m sorry,” I whisper.
“Are you going to tell me what’s got you like this?”
I will, but I take a few more seconds in the embrace I’ve rarely given myself up to. I reluctantly pull away and sit up, folding my legs beneath me. I take another sip of wine and put the glass down on the coffee table. Then I look at my mother’s face, a reflection of my own. Her brown eyes, her dark hair, her soft skin. “I’m sorry that I’ve been awful all these years.” Her brow creases questioningly. “Why didn’t you tell me he had an affair?”
Her lips part and she inhales sharply, her pupils dilating. “How do you know?”
“It doesn’t matter. All that matters is I do know, and I’d like to know why you didn’t tell me. I always thought you just left. I thought you didn’t want me. Then you had Richard and Anna and this perfect life, and I just didn’t fit.”
“Only through your choice, Dayna. You’ve always been welcome here.”
I shake my head and wipe my sore nose again. “You let me think you left us both, but he pushed you away, and you didn’t tell me. I thought you had an affair.”
She sighs and pulls one knee up to the sofa, twisting to face me. “He loved you, and you adored him. Your father and I ended, and you cried for him. You wanted to stay with him, and whenever you visited me, you seemed unhappy. I couldn’t hurt you more by shattering your illusion of your father. That would have been crueller than what he did. You were a child; you wouldn’t have understood.”
“But why not now? Why not when I got older?”
“Oh, honey, there’ve been times I’ve come close to telling you.”
“When I’ve been an arsehole.”
She laughs, a soft “pfft” of humour. “Watch that mouth. Sometimes, yes. But you worked together. Your father couldn’t do wrong in your eyes. Why would I break that? What you had with your father, that bond, it was special.”
“It was built on lies.”
“No. Not everything. He loved you, and he made a mistake.”
“How can you say it like that, like it’s nothing?”
“I couldn’t for a long time. I was bitter. But I’m happy with Richard, and we have Anna. We’re a family, and you’re part of this family.” She puts down her glass then takes me by surprise when she holds my face in her warm palms. It’s unfamiliar but welcome. I lean into her hand. “Look at you. We made you, so something good came of us.”
“I’m sorry for what he did. And I’m sorry for who I’ve been to you.”
“It was my decision not to tell you.”
“He should have told me. I just can’t put everything together, you know? I’ve had him on this pedestal. Then I find out he did that to you, and he could have told me. He knew how I…” I look up sheepishly. “How I felt about you leaving. He could have stopped it with the truth.”
“He was just afraid of losing you.”
I close my eyes and my mother pulls me into her chest, holding me to her. “I’ll make it up to you, Mum. I swear I will.”
“Letting me hold you when you need someone is enough, my gorgeous girl. You are enough.”
I am enough. Am I? My mind drifts to Clark and I sit back. “Can I ask you something? Do you wish you’d never met him? I don’t mean whether you should have had me or not, I just mean the two of you. Do you wish you’d never met him so he’d never hurt you?”
“No. He made me happy once, and if I’d never married him, I’d always have wondered about what could have been. We were good together once, believe that.”
“I love you.”
She tilts her head to one side and smiles. “I love you too, darling.”
IT TAKES ME a couple of turns of my head and a few blinks to realise I’m lying in my bedroom at my mum’s house. I don’t know what time we came up to bed, but I remember being so exhausted I just crawled under the duvet. Now, as the sun streaks through the open blinds and across my face, I regret it.
With a groan, I lean down to the floor where I dumped my mobile and see it’s after nine already. My iPhone screen is full. Missed calls from Teddy. Missed calls from Rachel.
It really wasn’t a bad dream.
I type in my passcode and open my messages. I skim Teddy’s and Rachel’s names and land on Clark’s.
JUST LET ME KNOW YOU’RE OKAY. PLEASE.
I hold my phone to my ear and dial my voicemail.
“Dayna, answer your goddamn phone. Clark told me. I need to see you.”
Fuck off, Teddy. Fuck off, world.
I drop my phone to the floor and lie back on the bed, staring at the ceiling until there’s a soft knock on the door, and my mother comes in with coffee.
“Good morning,” she says. I refrain from saying is it? “How are you feeling today?”
I push myself up to sit and pull the covers over the t-shirt she loaned me to sleep in. “I’d like to switch that coffee for something harder.”
“You’ll have to settle for Guatemala’s finest beans, I’m afraid.”
She sits on the bed, looking pretty in a cerulean sweater that matches the colour of her irises. I take the coffee from her.
“Dayna, I know this is hard for you. I know it might change how you feel about your father, but you being upset is what we tried to avoid.”
“I know. I wish I’d known though. Mostly I wish I hadn’t blamed you, but it’s not just that, Mum.”
“I figured as much, but I also figured if you wanted to tell me the rest of the story, you would have.”
I give her a half-smile. “I feel like I had this image of life, my life. Like I’d make you and Dad proud. I’d come home, and you’d swing me around because I’d made you both happy. And you’d be happy. I’d go to university, have a job I love. Find a husband, maybe have a child one day.”
“Are you really so far off course?”
“Oh gosh, I can’t even see the path, Mum. I don’t know if I want to head up the company anymore. I don’t know if I even want to be in the industry. And a husband?” I laugh but feel my face contort, as a pain I’m becoming increasingly familiar with strikes my chest. “The only man I ever thought I would want to spend the rest of my life with walked away.”
She rests a hand on my knee. “You’re loved. You’re intelligent and pretty. You have everything going for you, darling. You just can’t see the sky for the clouds right now.”
“How did you do it? How did you pick yourself up when everything you thought you had was taken?”
She smiles, a soft, thoughtful smile. “I remembered what was good in my life. And I found Richard. He loved me and wanted to protect me. He’d go to the ends of the earth to do what he thinks is right by me, even if he gets it wrong sometimes. You’ll be fine, Dayna. You’ll find your someone special, and you’ll think everything that happened in life is somehow okay because it brought you together and resulted in a life you want.”
“I’m not sure I’ll be as lucky as you.”
My mother strokes my hair and rubs a thumb across my cheek. Regret weighs heavily on me. “Anna and I are going to have our nails done and get lunch together. Why don’t you come with us?”
“Oh, that’s really not my… You know what, sure. That sounds nice.”
THE CHOICE WAS a pair of my mother’s trousers that aged me ten years or a pair of Anna’s “biggest” skinny jeans. I opted for the latter, and as long as I don’t breathe or bend all day, I’m just about getting away with them. Anna loaned me some black heels I’m sort of thinking might find their way to my car boot when I leave. Accidentally, of course. And Mum gave me a white shirt, which, tucked in and with the sleeves rolled up, doesn’t look too bad.
I feel slightly ridiculous walking behind Anna as she struts, in a dress, heels and fur coat, into the nail bar in Richmond as if she’s just stepped off 1950s Broadway. She makes a screeching sound that has me squinting and wishing
I could turn down the volume of my ears when she sees someone she knows and takes up a seat next to her at the bar.
My mother takes a stool next to Anna, and I sit on my mother’s other side. She signals to one of the beauticians. “Marybella, this is my daughter, Dayna. She’ll have the same as Anna and me.”
Marybella takes a seat on the opposite side of the bar and grabs hold of my hands, examining my cuticles and mismatched nail lengths. It’s not like I don’t keep myself in decent shape — I wax regularly, have my hair trimmed every six weeks — but nails aren’t top of my list, especially when I spend half my days on rigs and refineries talking about oil or biofuels made from fish guts.
Marybella gives me a giant keyring hung with false nails painted in various colours and asks me to choose one. Another member of staff brings out three glasses of prosecco and places them down on the bar in front of us.
“I think this one would be lovely on you,” my mother says, leaning across my shoulder to pick up one of the fake nails.
I smile inside, enjoying how it feels to have my mother tell me which colours might suit my nails and sitting next to me drinking godawful fizz. “Taupe it is.”
“How’s Constance?” Anna asks her friend. My ears prick up.
“A complete mess,” her friend says theatrically. “I mean, it was only three weeks ago. They should have been on their honeymoon, then those pictures of Clark and Camilla Normen of all people were on Facebook.”
“Urgh, she’s a whore.”
“Anna!” my mother interjects.
Anna turns to face her. “What? She is.” She turns back to her friend. “So, Clark and Camilla?”
Her friend shakes her head and takes a sip of her bubbles. “No. It was apparently an unfortunately timed photograph.”
“Like anyone believes that. Everyone knows his reputation.”
Anger stirs in me irrationally. I know Clark’s reputation, but I want to defend him. He wasn’t with Camilla Normen. But I just stare at my hands as Marybella starts to paint my newly shaped nails.
“Well, she believed it once he told her what really happened. Apparently, he was in Verbier with his ex-girlfriend and they slept together.”
I choke on my prosecco.
“No!”
“Yep. He met Constance yesterday and told her everything, told her he’s in love with his ex, always was.”
“I’m so sorry,” I tell Marybella, accepting a tissue.
“Who is she?” Anna asks.
Shit. Shitty fuck fuck fuck.
“Mmm, I can’t remember.”
I exhale subtly in relief and take another drink.
“Dayna. That’s it. Dayna Cross!”
Holy mother of fuck. I spray my entire mouthful across Marybella.
It feels like the entire nail bar drops silent and all eyes stare at me, the megabitch. In reality, I know other people look because I just spat prosecco all over the technician, not because they know I slept with Clark Layton two weeks after he called off his marriage. Not because Clark Layton told his ex-fiancée that he’s in love with me and always was.
Anna’s stare could sear my flesh, but she doesn’t concern me. It’s my mother’s look that steals my attention.
“You and Clark? Clark Layton? Layton?”
My mother has never known any of our story — not four years ago, not eighteen months ago, not that I’ve been in love with him for years.
“I didn’t know. It was before I found out about the affair.”
“He’s in love with you?”
“I’m not sure.”
“Tell me he’s not the man you were talking about earlier.”
I can’t speak. My mouth is suddenly dry. Yes. He’s the only person I’ve ever wanted to spend my life with.
“That’s why you’re so upset.”
Oh, Mum, you don’t even know the half of it.
She turns away from me and purses her lips as she watches the technician get back to work. I continue watching my mother, waiting, but we finish having our treatments in silence. Anna’s friend leaves as soon as her nails are finished; she looks like she can’t get away fast enough. I wonder whether that’s because the tension around us is palpable, or whether she’s desperate to get out of here and share her new gossip.
We leave the salon and if I had driven my own car, I would drive away from this mess. But my mother drove, so I’m walking behind her and Anna like the black sheep again.
The manager of the French restaurant my mother has already chosen holds open the door and welcomes her and Anna by name, kissing them on both cheeks.
“I’m afraid I had to move you over here,” he says, guiding us to a table set for three. “Your preferred table is only for two.”
Wow, even people I don’t know want to kick me in the gut today.
“That’s fine, thank you,” my mother says, still not acknowledging my presence but taking a seat at the table.
We look over the menus on the blackboards around the Parisian-feel bistro, still in silence. My mother orders a bottle of Burgundy without asking my preference.
“Are you going to ignore me for the rest of the day?” I snap, unable to keep a lid on my temper.
She raises her eyes to me but doesn’t speak.
“You’re the one who kept everything from me, Mum. How was I to know Laytons are forbidden?”
She puts down the piece of bread she’s picked out of the basket in the middle of the table. “This isn’t just about the Laytons. This is about my daughter sleeping with a practically married man.”
I open my mouth to retort but her words resonate. She’s right. It was reckless to sleep with Clark. I was stupid to fall even deeper for him than I already had. I was an even bigger fool for believing he wanted me and that I wasn’t just a rebound.
“For what it’s worth, we’re not together, and I’ve hurt no one more than myself.”
She glances at me, her eyes fleetingly full of sympathy, then she looks away to taste the wine brought to the table.
I stay and eat the coq au vin I’ve ordered, but I don’t drink the wine. There’s only one place I’m going from here and that’s home, with another rip in my heart because I let myself believe I could have my mother back.
Four years ago.
I’M STILL LYING on the bed, propped up on my elbow, the white sheet wrapped around my waist, when Dayna walks out of my en-suite. I could have got ready five times, she’s been in the shower that long. Instead, I’ve been lying here with a goofy grin on my face that I just can’t shift, waiting for this moment.
She smiles as she comes back into the room, her hair wet, her skin clean, fresh, exquisite.
“Has anyone told you how gorgeous you are?”
She giggles, a sound that warms me to the core. “You need to get ready, Clark.”
“Just let me see. Just one quick look then I’ll get ready.”
Her lips curl into a lopsided smile as she slowly unhooks her towel, holding it closed with her hands. “What’s in it for me?”
“What would you like?”
She looks to the ceiling and hums, making me laugh. “A movie night. My choice. None of that boy crap. A chick flick.”
“Deal.”
“And popcorn. Copious amounts of popcorn. Made properly, in the pan, and you have to make it.”
“Okay.”
“Hmm, and ice cream, Belgian chocolate.”
“Is that everything?”
She bites her lip, and my cock hardens almost instantly. She opens her towel and lets it fall to the ground.
I dart from the bed and grab her waist, throwing her over my shoulder. “Sweet Jesus, this body.”
I place her down on the bed and hover over her, my nose almost touching hers. “You drive me crazy, Dayna Cross.”
She slips her hand between us and cups my erection. “Good crazy?”
I growl as she rubs my dick. “Fucking awesome crazy.” I grind against her and press my lips to hers, dipping my tongue
inside to taste her, fresh and minty.
“We’ll be late for lunch,” she says, as breathless as I am.
“Don’t care.” I worm down her body, kissing her neck, her collarbone, the soft plump flesh of her amazing tits.
I don’t want to be with anyone else. Since the night we met four weeks ago, all I’ve wanted to do is wrap her up and keep her all to myself. She unnerves me, messes with my head in a way I can’t control. But somehow, being with her puts me at ease. I don’t need to lash out or drink. I don’t want to score women and gamble. Being with her, this, is enough. She’s everything I need.
I try not to think about how much that worries me, and I work down past her navel. I push up her knees, lick my fingers and part the lips of her sweet cunt.
“Clark.” The way she says my name, a whispered, lustful plea, makes me desperate to be inside her. She’s the first woman I’ve ever gone bare with, and Christ, does she feel like magic, every muscle, every crease and fold.
“Why are you saying my name, baby?”
“I want you inside me.”
I crawl over her, holding my dick to position it at her entrance. I take her hands, interlacing my fingers in hers, and hold them to the mattress, looking into those deep brown eyes as I push into her. The feel of her takes over everything, every rational thought, my mind, my body. She is everything.
When we’ve taken every piece of pleasure from each other, I collapse onto her chest, and she wraps her arms around me, kissing my head, stroking my hair. My heart hammers under my ribcage, and I don’t know if it’s the workout or just being here, with her, that makes it hard to breathe.
“We’re really going to be late now,” she says.
THERE’S A FIRST time for everything. That doesn’t make me any less nervous about taking a girlfriend home to meet my family. I’m twenty-eight years old. It’s verging on ridiculous. I’ve bagged enough women, but I’ve never wanted to bring one home.
This one. She’s different. She’s not even in the same competition as those other women. Any other women.
“Would you relax? How bad can it be?”