‘Holiday? Since when are you going away on holiday?’
‘Since my shitty husband walked out on me, and my son and I have had to tear myself into twenty-five gazillion pieces just to make ends meet – I think we have earned a little break away in the sun, don’t you?’ She glared at him, daring him to argue. ‘Exactly.’ She stood and cleared away the mugs, taking his before he had a chance to finish the last mouthful. ‘So, if you don’t mind, I have some packing to do.’ She indicated towards the front door with her head.
Pete stood up and marched towards the door. ‘Oh, and this time,’ Nancy began, and Pete turned around looking hopeful. ‘When I call you – answer the bloody phone!’
She watched him exhale in frustration as he exited their family home, the home he’d decided to abandon. Pushing the door shut behind him, she returned to the kitchen and began loading the dishwasher. It felt strange seeing Pete after all that time. Her reaction had not been what she’d expected – emotionally or physically. She’d spent the last year believing that when – if – he walked back through that door, she would be overjoyed to see him. She would wrap her arms around him and thank him for returning to them, for making their family complete again. Instead, she felt an overwhelming feeling of anger and betrayal. Instead of begging him to come back, she had been blunt, stern and regimented in her responses to him. All the memories of the struggles over the last year had catapulted into the forefront of her mind. She wasn’t falling apart emotionally without him and after seeing him today, she actually felt that little bit stronger knowing that she had coped. He hadn’t been there and she had managed. A small part of her felt sad for the loss of respect for her husband, but she needed to suppress that and focus on making the right changes, for Jack. If Pete wanted to be in their lives, that was fine. But there was no way she was letting him back into her head. The consequences of letting that happen were too difficult to think about.
Chapter 3
Harriet made her way upstairs to see how far Isla had got with her packing. This really went against the grain with her as she was quite the control freak when it came to packing bags and getting organised – it was the businesswoman in her. However, when she had told Isla they were going on holiday, her little girl had insisted on packing her own bag. How hard could it be, Harriet thought to herself.
As she walked into Isla’s bedroom she was faced with piles and piles of clothes strewn about the room with just a small pile on top of the suitcase she had placed on Isla’s bed. Yet her daughter was nowhere to be seen.
‘Isla?’ Harriet called out, scanning the room in a bit of a panic.
‘Yeah?’ came the reply.
‘Where are you?’ Harriet slowly edged further into the room.
‘I’m here!’ Isla shouted, suddenly appearing from a pile of clothes in the corner of the room.
Harriet jumped, unable to control the small shriek that spilt out of her mouth as she threw her hand up to her chest, feeling her heartbeat race. Now that Harriet looked closer, she could see that Isla had built some sort of house with her clothes and duvet.
‘What are you doing?’
‘I built a den! Look, here’s the door, here’s the window and here are the flowers in the garden.’ She jumped around the mound of materials as she gave Harriet the grand tour. ‘Come inside!’ she squeaked.
Harriet was already shaking her head. ‘No, not right now. Mummy’s busy. I thought you were packing?’ Her phone beeped and Harriet took it out of her pocket, reading the email from work as Isla began to whine about wanting her to come inside the den. She exhaled in frustration as she read the email, asking her to a meeting in Ireland next month. Another hassle to organise childcare and have her mum tell her what a failure she was as a mother because she worked instead of staying at home with her two children. She flagged the email so that she could reply once Isla was in bed and she could concentrate better. She looked back at her five-year-old who was expectantly waiting for an answer to whatever question she had just asked her mum.
‘Sorry Isla, what were you saying?’
‘Urgh! Always have to say it again,’ she said, each word spoken with each step she took towards the den. ‘I said, can we have five minutes in the den and then you can work?’
Harriet looked at her watch. She should really be getting the packing finished so that she could reply to her emails tonight before they set off tomorrow first thing. And as much as she wanted to spend time with Isla, these things were not going to get done by themselves. The joys of single parenting. She began to say no but then thought against it. All the parenting books and sites talked about making time for your children even if you were busy – although how practical these things were, Harriet didn’t know. She nodded and walked towards the den just as her phone began to ring. Isla groaned and threw her hands up into the air as Harriet took the phone back out of her pocket.
‘Hello, is that Mrs Fisher, Tommy’s mum?’
‘Oh no!’ Harriet replied and instantly felt her heart sink. ‘I’m so sorry, I’m on my way.’
‘Thank you,’ the nursery assistant replied abruptly and ended the call.
‘Isla, we need to go and pick up your brother.’
Isla found this incredibly unfair and sat on the bed, crossing her arms and huffing.
‘What are you doing? Come on!’ Harriet turned to walk out of the bedroom, so angry at herself for forgetting to pick up Tommy again. She always had so much to do that she seemed to run out of time before she realised. She looked over her shoulder as she reached the top of the stairs only to see Isla sitting back on her floor, getting a puzzle out of its box. She turned on her feet and stormed back into the room. ‘Isla! It’s time to go, come on.’
‘No! I don’t want to – Tommy is stinky and he always cries.’
‘Oh for goodness’ sake, stop being silly and come on.’ She put her hands on her hips to show she meant business but Isla was very much her mini me and had every ounce of Harriet’s stubbornness. She stayed sitting on the carpet, staring back defiantly.
‘Isla…’ Harriet warned and did her best mum look.
‘I don’t want to though,’ Isla groaned, standing up slowly.
‘It won’t take long.’ She turned and walked back to the stairs and again, looked over her shoulder. Isla had stood up but was now just standing still in the middle of her room staring at Harriet. ‘What now?’ she said impatiently, feeling sorry for Tommy sitting and waiting at nursery for her.
‘Can I have a biscuit?’
That girl knew her far too well. ‘Fine! Get a biscuit on the way out – now come on, let’s go!’ Harriet rushed down the stairs and could hear Isla skipping behind her saying, biscuit biscuit biscuit…
As a single parent Harriet knew to pick her battles – and this wasn’t one of them.
Chapter 4
‘OK spill, what did he say?’ Harriet placed the coffees onto the table in front of Nancy and sat down opposite her, expectantly. Nancy shuffled in her seat, very aware that Jack didn’t look too comfortable at the airport. She had sent Harriet a text yesterday and said she would explain all about Pete’s visit today; she knew Harriet wouldn’t just be content with a condensed version.
‘He apologised and said that he wants to be a part of Jack’s life.’
Harriet guffawed and sipped her coffee. ‘You aren’t seriously falling for that tosh, are you?’
Nancy laughed. ‘Tosh? Did you actually say tosh? Who says that?’
‘Oh, be quiet, just tell me that you’re not falling for it?’
Nancy shrugged and sipped her coffee.
‘Nance!’ Harriet picked up her napkin and threw it at her. ‘Come on girl, sort it out.’
‘Hari, it’s not that simple. He’s Jack’s dad – I can hardly tell him to piss off, can I? What about Jack?’ She looked over to her blonde-haired boy and felt the weight of anxiety drop into the pit of her stomach. ‘It’s not his fault his dad is an idiot but if Pete is going to try and make things righ
t, surely Jack deserves to have his dad around?’
‘Babe I get that, honestly I do, but he’s hardly shown the best intentions over the last year, has he? It wasn’t like he was dad of the year even before he walked out.’
Nancy stayed quiet, not wanting to delve into the mess that was her marriage. But it seemed Harriet had other ideas.
‘What about the time that he left you waiting at that restaurant because he decided to go to the game with his mates and not tell you? Or the time he cancelled your weekend away because tickets came up for the F1? Or the time you slaved over a romantic dinner for him on your anniversary and he rolled in from the pub at 11 p.m. with a kebab?’
‘Alright, Hari, jeez!’ Nancy sipped her coffee again. ‘What is this, let’s highlight how shit Pete has been as a husband over the last few years? Don’t you think I know all this?’ It was a sore subject and Harriet knew that. But she was also the kind of friend who was completely honest with Nancy. However, hearing her list these things raised the question in Nancy’s mind of whether had been going wrong in her marriage even before Jack’s diagnosis.
‘Look, I’m sorry; I didn’t mean to bring the mood down. I just don’t want to see you and Jack get messed around and quite frankly, you have been so much happier over the last few months since things started getting back on track, I don’t want you to spiral back down into the person you were when he was making your life a misery.’
‘My life wasn’t a misery,’ Nancy replied defensively, but then took in the no-bullshit look on Harriet’s face. ‘OK, well I was unhappy towards the end but my whole life wasn’t a misery.’
‘Mummy? Can I get a magazine?’ Isla was pulling on Harriet’s cardigan.
‘In a minute darling, let Mummy just finish her coffee.’
‘And a chocolate bar?’
‘In a minute.’
‘And a teddy bear?’
Nancy laughed. ‘You can tell Isla’s in holiday mode already.’ She turned to Jack. ‘Would you like a magazine, Jack?’
He shook his head but didn’t look up from the iPad.
‘How about a chocolate treat?’
‘It’s not after dinner time,’ he mumbled, still not looking up.
‘That’s OK, we’re going on holiday mate; you can have a treat.’ Harriet stood up and fished for her purse in her bag. Jack didn’t answer.
‘Jack?’ Nancy pressed but he just frantically shook his head. ‘OK, it’s fine. You don’t have to.’ Nancy looked to Harriet and shook her head.
‘Shall I get him something else?’
‘No, its fine. He’s brought stuff with him; he probably just doesn’t want any change in what he prepared for. But thanks.’
Harriet smiled and walked off over to the shop to purchase the products for Isla who was skipping along behind her excitedly. Tommy was still asleep in his pram, so Nancy focused her attention back onto her son who was still glued to his iPad.
‘Are you excited about the holiday, Jack?’
He shrugged.
‘There’ll be a pool.’
‘I don’t like water.’
‘I know you don’t sweetheart, but it doesn’t have to go over your head, you can just paddle in it or do some swimming.’
‘I don’t want to.’
‘OK that’s fine; you don’t have to go in if you don’t want to. There’s a beach there too – we can build some sandcastles and you can go in the sea.’
‘I don’t like sea.’
Nancy started to wonder whether she had made the right choice in agreeing to this holiday. Jack hadn’t jumped up and down and squealed excitedly when she’d told him like most seven-year-olds would at the prospect of a week away in the sun. Instead, he had asked her a million questions and not slept much all night because of the anticipation of today. She’d spent two hours just going through all the different scenarios she could think of and how she would overcome them should she need to. Jack was obviously feeling anxious today because he was more quiet than usual and had closed off with his iPad and headphones all morning. He didn’t want any photos taken – she couldn’t feed her Instagram habit today – and he wasn’t interested in engaging in any conversations with anyone.
Nancy exhaled and picked up her coffee. It was going to be a long week.
Chapter 5
‘Oh my God, will you just look at this place!’ Harriet strolled into the foyer and stopped still in the centre of the room, glancing around 360 degrees. ‘It looks so much better than in the pictures, Nance!’ She looked at her friend who was standing open-mouthed, looking around like a kid who had just walked into Willy Wonka’s Chocolate Factory for the first time. The gentle cream softness of the décor made the room instantly inviting. A warm glow from the designer lightshades that hung above them lit the room just enough to feel cosy but was totally unnecessary as it was still daytime and the blistering heat was beaming beautifully outside. The foyer was spacious with huge marble pillars dotted around creating a sense of grandeur. As Harriet approached the reception desk she was greeted with cheery smiles and gentle voices.
‘Good afternoon, how may I help you?’
‘I have a booking under Harriet Fisher.’ She glanced over her shoulder to see Nancy still looking around in awe and the children looking bored and grumpy. Tommy was strapped into his chair and was moaning about the fact that he couldn’t get out, bucking his body as though he was in a bucking bronco tournament. Isla was wandering around one of the marble pillars, one hand placed onto the cold surface singing a song to herself and going round and round and round … and Jack was sitting cross-legged on the floor, his head stuck in his iPad still.
‘Yes, here we go. You have adjoining rooms 235 and 236, with 236 occupying a balcony. Here are your key cards and the lifts are to your right. Just sign here please.’ Harriet did as she was asked. ‘Is there anything I can get for you?’
Harriet took the envelopes and shook her head. ‘No thanks, I think we’re all good.’ She practically skipped back to Nancy and the children.
‘Harriet this place is incredible – when you said you were taking us on holiday, I didn’t envisage such a … well, such indulgence!’
‘Only the best for my girl.’ Harriet winked and blew a kiss and then picked up her bags. ‘Come on, let’s get unpacked so we can eat, I’m starving!’
***
As Nancy walked into her adjoining room leaving the others still exploring Harriet’s room, she couldn’t help but feel the emotion catch in her throat a little. This place was truly magical and definitely something that she needed in her life right now after the horrendous year she had had. But equally, she felt sad because being here as a single parent just reminded her where she was currently at in her life right now. After years of building up her family unit, it had all been taken away from her – against her will – and now she felt more confused than ever. This holiday was definitely going to be the break she needed to refocus and decide what she was going to do. Hopefully, being away from Pete and home would help to put everything into perspective.
Nancy walked over to the balcony and slid the door open, stepping out onto the concrete and taking in the view around her. It was truly stunning. The pool below them was heaving with families; children laughing and screaming as they played their imaginary games and splashed around in the pool – which was in the shape of a dolphin. There was the faint tune of local music playing within the complex and if you looked beyond the horizon, you could see the picturesque view of the sea, deep blue and glistening.
Before she came out here she kept telling herself that she needed to do it, needed to listen to her body – and her friend – and take some time out. But she just couldn’t shake off the anxiety of bringing Jack here. She and Pete hadn’t taken Jack away very much because of an early bad experience when Jack was a toddler. He was struggling with what they now knew was a fear of his ears being touched, and he’d had a huge meltdown which resulted in Nancy and Pete having a blazing row. The rest of the holiday wa
s tainted with the harsh comments both of them had made in the heat of the moment. Since then, they had shied away from holidaying anywhere where there were people or potential triggers. This had been a cause of pressure in their marriage because it had been Nancy’s choice to reduce the holidaying and subsequently, they spent their down time locked away in barns and cabins in the middle of nowhere. Pete missed the holidays they took before Jack was born and Nancy resented the fact that Pete didn’t understand that she was the one who always had to deescalate the meltdowns when Jack had them, so normal holidays were just a stress for her.
But being here was the right thing to do – she knew that. She just needed to ignore the impending feeling of dread that constantly sat somewhere between her stomach and her chest. Jack would be fine. She let a small smile play over her lips as she watched the children below bouncing around in the water and jumping on each other’s backs for piggyback races. But the smile wasn’t because she was happy; it dressed her face and pretended that she was fine but inside all she felt was deflation. Because she knew that Jack wouldn’t be laughing and joking with friends like these children were. He wouldn’t be playing race games and splashing other children as he dunked his head under the water. And as much as she hated herself for feeling disappointed about this, she couldn’t lie to herself. Other people, sure. But not to herself.
A holiday in the sun where she could try to hide from all the feelings of guilt and anxiety? Yes, this was exactly what Nancy needed right now.
Chapter 6
Nancy glanced around the restaurant as she waited for Harriet to return to the table. The one they had chosen to eat in tonight was the least plush of the three available options. The children had had a long day travelling and Nancy was tired too, so choosing the least fancy one suited her just fine. If Jack was to have an episode – which was always a possibility as they were in a new place – then she would feel more comfortable here, with fewer people to look down their noses at her. She wasn’t the type of person to judge others, especially when she knew how horrible it was when people judged her parenting and her son. But she had found that in places where a particular etiquette was expected – like highbrow restaurants – the consequences of a meltdown were not appreciated in the slightest. Children were expected to behave in a certain way and whilst that was understandable, it wasn’t always practical. She had been made to feel an outsider last year when out with Hari and the children at a posh restaurant in town. Hari had been given the table reservation as part of a contract and had chosen to take Nancy and Jack along with her as a treat. A waitress had dropped a tray of food, the noise was too loud for Jack and he became anxious and jittery. The waitress then came over to apologise and ruffled Jack’s hair but this was enough to tip him over the edge and it all fell apart from there. The looks on the faces of the other diners and the staff had been branded onto Nancy’s brain and regularly fuelled mild panic attacks. When she thought about that evening, she could still hear the voices saying things like ‘she should learn to control her child’ and ‘what’s wrong with him’.
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