The Single Mums' Picnic Club

by Jennifer Joyce

  ‘Hello?’ She cringed at the wobble in her voice.

  ‘Katie? Is everything okay?’

  She cleared her throat and gave a pretty unconvincing laugh. ‘Everything’s fine. Why do you ask?’

  ‘I’ve been trying to phone you for the past hour.’

  He had? Interesting. Rob rarely phoned her, unless it was to arrange access with the kids, but they’d established a routine that suited them both as much as possible by now.

  ‘My phone ran out of battery while I was out. Is everything okay?’

  A million scenarios crossed her mind, the most pressing being the possibility that Rob had finally come to his senses. He’d realised what an absolutely selfish arse he’d been and wanted the opportunity to grovel on his knees for her forgiveness.

  She wouldn’t grant him anything close to absolution, obviously.

  Not straight away.

  ‘Anya phoned me. Told me you’d run out of the supermarket this afternoon.’ Katie flinched at the mention of The Other Woman. ‘She was worried she’d upset you.’

  Katie wanted to hoot.

  Worried she’d upset her? Anya had turned her world upside down, given it a vigorous shake until everything fell down into oblivion and tossed it aside. Of course she’d upset Katie. When had her husband morphed into this moron who made such understatements and expected to be taken seriously? Probably around the time he’d slept with another woman.

  ‘Anya said you looked distressed.’

  Katie laughed, but it sounded more like a snarl. ‘Well, isn’t Anya observant?’

  Rob sighed. ‘Come on, Katie. There’s no need to be like this. Anya was just trying to be nice. Looking out for you. She was worried when you ran out of the shop without paying.’

  ‘I left my shopping behind. I didn’t steal anything if that’s what she told you.’ Like that made her actions normal.

  There was another sigh from the other end. ‘There’s no need to be like this, Katie. I’m just looking out for you.’

  ‘Is that so?’ There was another snarly laugh. ‘Well, I’d have been much better off if you hadn’t had an affair.’

  ‘Katie…’ Rob sighed again.

  ‘What? Am I making you uncomfortable? Guilty? Or do you really not care about what you did to us?’

  ‘Of course I feel incredibly guilty about the way I behaved, but I can’t go back in time and change the way I went about it all. It was wrong of me to have an affair, I know, and I shouldn’t have left it until Anya was pregnant to tell you.’

  Katie sucked in her breath. ‘You’d have left me, wouldn’t you? You’d have left me anyway? For her.’

  ‘I love Anya.’ Rob’s voice was small, contrite. ‘I’m sorry, but I can’t change the way I feel.’

  Katie ended the call without another word. How was she supposed to react to that without bursting into noisy, snotty tears? He’d have left her anyway, even if he hadn’t impregnated his bit on the side. He’d have left Katie and married her instead.

  Well, screw them. They could get married and live happily ever after, but Katie wouldn’t make it easy for them. Why should she enable them to skip off into the sunset?

  Placing the phone down on the side, she returned to the acknowledgement of service, picked it up and folded it into a neat square before sliding it between the sofa cushions to be forgotten about for a little bit longer.

  Chapter Eight

  George

  George was singing along to Barry Manilow’s ‘Copacabana’ while spraying the tiles of her client’s en suite bathroom’s shower cubicle, squirting the cleaning solution in time to the beat. The secret, she’d found over the past few years, was to find some enjoyment to the job you were doing. This hadn’t been difficult back when she was utilising her baking talents in her jobs but cleaning toilets and scrubbing floors wasn’t quite so pleasant. Music, it seemed, was the answer. George had created a massive playlist of fun, upbeat songs to clean to, songs she loved to sing along to, songs that motivated her during the grubbiest of tasks.

  The bathrooms were sparkling by the time she’d sung and jiggled her way through dozens of joyful songs, and although she was exhausted after scrubbing the four bathrooms in the large property, she couldn’t help smiling as she packed up her cleaning gear.

  ‘You’re looking far too jolly for somebody who has spent the morning in a pair of marigolds.’ Cecily, the sixty-something ex-supermodel who lived in the gorgeous Georgian house, hopped up onto a stool at the high-gloss breakfast bar while George stored the mop and bucket away. ‘What’s your secret?’ Cecily wrinkled her nose. ‘You’re not one of those weirdos who actually enjoy cleaning, are you?’

  George wished she was. It would have made her job much easier. ‘I’m afraid not.’

  ‘Well, something has put a smile on your face.’ Cecily wrapped her hands around the mug of coffee in front of her and winked at George. ‘And it’s something more than Barry Manilow.’

  Grabbing her caddy of cleaning products, George called out a hasty goodbye before she practically threw herself out of the house. The cold air helped to control her burning cheeks as she scurried away. She was horrified at the knowledge Cecily had heard her warbling along to her playlist, but the truth was, she did have a spring in her step that morning as she would be meeting Frankie and Katie at the beach hut for their picnic lunch. George adored picnics; her granny used to make the best picnics when George was little and she’d inherited the knack of putting together delicious packages of food (even if the only judges of her talents were herself and Thomas of late). George loved creating dishes and treats in the kitchen, and the kitchen in her flat was surprisingly roomy considering how poky the other rooms were. She’d started the picnic preparations early that morning, rising before Thomas as she wanted it to be perfect. She’d already made honey and mustard seafood kebabs, spicy mustard chicken wings, and a potato salad with a lemon and herb dressing, which were all chilling in the fridge, and she’d defrosted a batch of homemade sausage rolls leftover from Christmas. She’d also baked her favourite lemon drizzle cupcakes, which had been cooling on the side while she worked and would now be ready to be topped with her lemon syrup and zest mixture. Once the cakes were completed, she’d make some simple sandwiches and prepare a salad.

  She may have gone slightly overboard for an afternoon meet up, but it wasn’t often she was given the opportunity to spread her foodie wings.

  George didn’t have a picnic basket like the one she remembered her grandmother using to transport their picnics down to the beach hut on Saturday afternoons, so she loaded the food into a large tote, remembering to add paper plates, plastic cups and packs of wet wipes and serviettes. She’d been chilling a bottle of sparkling apple- and blackberry-flavoured water in the fridge, and she wedged it down the side of the tubs of food in the bag now before rolling up the throw from the back of the sofa to use as a picnic blanket. It was still chilly out, but at least it hadn’t rained for a few days, so she hoped the sand would be relatively dry.

  George emitted a small yelp when she realised she was running late. Tucking the throw under her arm and slinging the tote bag over her shoulder (and listing to one side under its weight), she hurried out of the flat and down to the row of beach huts, raising her hand in greeting when she spotted the others already waiting outside her mint green hut.

  ‘Sorry I’m late.’ George was out of breath. She placed the tote bag and blanket down on the sand before thumping a hand down on her waist, sucking in air and puffing it back out again. Little clouds formed on the exhales, but George wasn’t cold after scurrying down to the beach so quickly.

  ‘Wow, is all that our picnic?’ Frankie peered at the overstuffed bag. ‘I was expecting a sandwich and a can of coke.’

  George, still panting, grinned. ‘The Pappas family are famous for their picnics.’ She gave a wheezy laugh. ‘At least among my granny and I. Granny Pappas’ picnics were legendary as far as I’m concerned.’ She grabbed the throw and tote now she wa
s starting to get her breath back. ‘I hope you’re hungry.’

  ‘I am.’ Katie pressed a hand to her stomach. ‘I’ve been so busy, I haven’t had the chance to sit down all morning. Breakfast wasn’t even an option.’

  George gave a tsk. ‘You know what they say – breakfast is the most important meal of the day.’

  Katie nodded as she helped to shake out the throw. It billowed for a moment before landing gracefully onto the sand. ‘I know, but I had an interview this morning, and obviously I couldn’t find a smart enough top that was clean. I don’t know how I used to manage going into the office full-time. My brain’s turned to mush.’

  ‘How did the interview go?’ Frankie asked, and Katie scrunched up her nose.

  ‘I know I should remain positive, but…’

  Frankie rubbed her arm. ‘I bet it went better than you thought it did. When do you find out?’

  ‘They said they had a few more candidates to see, and that they’d let me know within a few days. I’m really not confident though.’

  ‘Well, come and sit down.’ George knelt down on the blanket and patted the space beside her to encourage Katie to do the same. ‘You’re to do nothing but eat, drink and relax for the next hour, okay? No worrying or fretting. What will be will be.’

  ‘You don’t need to tell me twice.’ Katie plonked herself down on the picnic blanket and helped George to pluck the containers of food from the tote bag.

  ‘There’s enough here to feed an army,’ Frankie said after container after container was removed from the bag and placed on the blanket.

  ‘Luckily, I’m as hungry as an entire army.’ Katie placed the final container on the blanket while George pulled out the bottle of sparkling flavoured water.

  ‘Dig in!’ George indicated the array of tubs before she started to pour the drinks. She could feel herself glowing from within as food was tasted and murmurs of appreciation filled their little space.

  ‘This is amazing.’ Katie held up a skewer, stripped of all but the final honey and mustard prawn. ‘Do you cook for a living?’

  George shook her head, her cheeks warming at the compliment. ‘I’m a cleaner. But I did used to be in charge of the kitchen of a teashop, years and years ago. And I’d been to catering college before that.’

  ‘What made you give it up?’ Katie pulled the prawn off the skewer and popped it into her mouth, closing her eyes to savour the flavours.

  ‘It was only supposed to be temporary. I loved my job but when my granny got ill and needed help in her haberdashery shop, I had to step in.’ George shrugged. ‘I knew nothing about haberdashery, but my granny’s shop meant the world to her. She left it to me when she died, but she never wanted me to run it myself. I was supposed to sell up and follow my own dreams. Which I did, just not the dream my granny was thinking of at the time.’

  Frankie helped herself to the potato salad, forking a generous helping onto her plate. ‘What was your dream?’

  George opened the zip of her coat slightly. They may have been enjoying a picnic on the beach, but a coat was still necessary. ‘I wanted to run my own catering business. I loved my job at the teashop, but I wanted something that was mine, that I could really put my heart and soul into.’ She smiled and gave a little sigh. ‘But then I suppose I achieved all of that anyway.’

  Katie popped a couple of the chicken wings onto her plate and started to attack one immediately. ‘What did you do instead?’

  George could feel the corners of her mouth tugging into a full-on beam and she didn’t fight it. ‘I had Thomas.’ She placed a plastic cup of sparkling water in front of Katie before filling another for Frankie. ‘I always meant to start up my own business after I’d sold the shop, but other things kept getting in the way, like buying my first house and planning a wedding. I was with my fiancé for nine years, and we’d always planned on having children – when the time was right. Except the time was never right for him. I reached the age of thirty, then thirty-five, and he still kept saying one day… Until one day, a few months before the wedding, he dropped the bombshell that he’d changed his mind. He liked the way his life was. Liked the freedom.’ She sighed. ‘He didn’t want children after all. It came between us in the end – there’s no compromise in that situation – and we split up. We sold our house and went our separate ways. I couldn’t waste any more time finding the perfect man again – and, if I’m honest, I couldn’t face looking – so I finally used my granny’s money to fund three rounds of IVF.’

  ‘Wow.’ Frankie accepted the cup of sparkling water from George. ‘That was a brave decision.’

  There was that glow again, warming George up from the inside.

  ‘So it really is just the two of you,’ Katie said. ‘That must be tough.’

  George poured herself a drink. ‘None of us have it easy.’ She looked from Katie, who was finding her feet as a single mum after all these years to Frankie, who had somehow pulled herself together after the death of her partner to raise twins all by herself.

  Katie nodded. ‘I guess we have that in common.’

  ‘It’s good that we can learn from each other,’ George said, but Katie sniggered.

  ‘I wouldn’t hold your breath on learning anything from me. I’m barely treading water here.’

  ‘I’m sure that isn’t true,’ Frankie said. ‘You’ve got further in this parenting thing than the two of us combined.’

  George raised her hand. ‘I actually have a question for you, Katie.’ She dropped her gaze to the blanket and fiddled with the fringed edging. ‘Does it get easier dropping them off at school? Because it’s killing me at the moment. I want to cling onto Thomas and run all the way home with him.’

  Frankie bobbed her head up and down. ‘I’m the same with Finn. Skye’s fine – she’s Miss Independent and walks away without a backwards glance, but my poor boy… It breaks my heart having to leave him at nursery.’

  ‘Oh, don’t worry.’ Katie took a sip of her drink to mask a smile. ‘It gets easier, believe me.’

  ‘Really?’ George’s eyes were wide, pleading.

  ‘Believe me. Give it time and you’ll be counting down the hours until you drop them off again. And don’t get me started on the school holidays…’

  George wasn’t sure whether to take comfort from needing a time out from her son or not, but surely it was better than the anguish she felt every morning as Thomas disappeared into the school.

  ‘I’ve got one for you, George.’ Katie shifted into a more comfortable position. ‘You’ve been single for a while, right?’ George nodded while mentally preparing herself to impart wisdom onto her new friend. ‘Do you ever stop missing the sex?’

  Chapter Nine

  Frankie

  The three women learned a lot about each other as they chatted over the picnic. Katie was thirty-eight (so close to forty – how the hell did that happen and why didn’t anyone warn her that it crept up so quickly?), an unemployed (but not unemployable, George insisted when Katie suggested so) bookkeeper, and she’d lived in Clifton-on-Sea since her parents moved into their house close to the harbour when she was seven.

  ‘I rent the house out as a holiday let at the moment,’ Katie told her new friends. ‘But it looks like I’m going to have to sell it and give half the proceeds to Rob.’

  Frankie gasped. ‘Can he make you do that?’

  Katie nodded. ‘Apparently so, unless I can buy him out, which I can’t.’

  ‘That really sucks.’ Frankie frowned. ‘I’m so sorry.’

  George was the oldest of the trio at forty-three. She’d been single for the past seven years and was happy enough with the status quo. Her time for romance had passed (nonsense, the others had insisted, but George had simply shrugged and taken a bite out of a lemon drizzle cupcake. And yes, she’d broken the news to Katie, you did stop missing the sex, though George still sometimes craved the closeness of a partner). George had been born in Clifton-on-Sea (in the front bedroom of the flat above her paternal grandmother’
s haberdashery shop near the station, to be exact. She’d taken fifty-two hours and the use of forceps to be born and George’s father had said he hadn’t been able to look at a pair salad tongs in the same way since. George was ninety-nine percent sure he was kidding).

  Frankie, the youngest of the women at thirty-three, was a freelance brand designer. She loved her work, even if she was struggling to keep up with her projects after a sluggish couple of weeks modelling blobs of playdough, finger-painting and watching CBeebies with the twins. Frankie had moved to Clifton-on-Sea a year ago for a fresh start, away from the painful memories of Bradley’s death.

  ‘Bradley killed himself.’ It was still so hard to say the words out loud, but she wanted to get it out there, in the beginning, so she didn’t feel like she was keeping a shameful secret from her new friends. ‘The twins were just a few weeks old. I had no idea he was feeling suicidal or depressed. He was tired a lot of the time, but we were both being kept awake during the night with the twins, and he started snapping at tiny little things, but we were both stressed.’

  ‘Who wouldn’t be in your situation?’ George lay a comforting hand on Frankie’s arm.

  ‘It all got too much in the end, being back home. Living in the house we’d shared, being surrounded by our things. Seeing the place where it happened.’ Frankie cleared her throat. ‘So I decided to have a little break. My younger brother had just moved here for work and I ended up falling in love with the town.’

  She looked out to sea, where grey clouds were brewing, but it didn’t spoil the view. Clifton-on-Sea was the perfect place to raise her children, with the beach within walking distance of their home, and although she sometimes felt guilty about moving away from her childhood town and leaving her mum behind, she and the twins needed this quaint little town to heal.

  ‘I’ve tried to get Mum to move here, so she’ll be closer to me, Isaac and the twins, but she’s too stubborn for her own good.’