by Janey Fraser
‘Are we staying with other people?’ Nancy asked, and the guide laughed. ‘No, this is just for you. When you are ready, we eat.’
They dined on a sort of wooden deck, overlooking the river.
‘Look,’ instructed the guide excitedly, and suddenly the tree outside lit up like a Christmas tree. ‘Fireflies,’ he explained and sure enough, Nancy could see lots of little lights hovering and moving around.
Dinner was a stuffed fish standing upright, with carrots coming out of its mouth. Nancy didn’t feel keen, but took a mouthful so as not to offend their hosts. Delicious! Afterwards, they swayed in hammocks on the verandah. So strange, thought Nancy, before dropping off into a postprandial stupor. She missed Danny, yet because there wasn’t any mobile-phone reception she had stopped worrying so much about him, because there was nothing she could do if something had gone wrong.
Besides, she had a feeling that nothing would. The girls had been right when they’d said she needed to get away for a break. It put everything in perspective, somehow. And hadn’t they both promised to call in on her mother-in-law to check everything was all right?
That night, after using the outdoor loo and ‘shower’, which was no more than a hose coming out of the wall and a bucket, Nancy was astonished to find that her body did things with her husband that it hadn’t done since they had first met. She knew it sounded crazy, but her new hairdo had given her a confidence that she hadn’t had for years, if ever. Maybe, like her parenting psychology magazine said on its Relationships page, if you feel attractive, your partner will think so too.
‘That was amazing,’ gasped Sam. ‘I’ve missed you so much.’
She waited for her heart to stop its post-coital thudding before replying. ‘And have you missed Danny too?’
There. She had said it.
‘Of course I have.’
His tone was hurt, reproachful. Suddenly all the warmth from their lovemaking drained away. But the new Nancy, with the hairstyle that made men turn their heads in the street – Sam had noticed that too – felt stronger and more certain of herself. She could hold her own in this conversation.
‘Then why don’t you talk about him?’
‘Why don’t you?’
Their words were like bullets of anger under the blue mosquito net.
‘Because I was waiting for you to start, Sam.’
‘I didn’t mention him in case it upset you. I knew it took a lot to leave him.’
She was silent for a minute. ‘We’ve changed since we had Danny.’
In the half-light streaming through the shutters from the moon outside, she could see him nodding. ‘I know.’
‘You didn’t want a child. You said that at the beginning.’
He turned away from her. ‘What are you trying to say, Nancy?’
‘I feel that you put up with me and Danny and that you don’t love us any more, if indeed you ever really did. It’s not as though we had much time together before I got pregnant. My mother was right. It was too much, too soon.’
‘That’s not true,’ he said quietly, ‘but I did tell you right at the beginning that I didn’t want children. My parents split up, as you know.’ His voice faltered. ‘My mother once told me that if it hadn’t been for me, they might have been all right.’
She hadn’t known that before. ‘But that’s awful.’
‘Awful perhaps, but maybe also true.’
‘Danny and I need you.’ She was crying now. ‘Have you thought about the family who live here? They lead a simple life, but they’re happy. Everywhere, on the walls, are pictures of their children. The mother looks after her niece’s baby. They make the family work. They aren’t selfish.’
‘Selfish? Who’s being selfish?’
‘You are,’ she cried. ‘You just think about yourself all the time. You don’t get up in the night when our son wakes, although now he’s at pre-school he doesn’t do that any more. And you don’t understand that parenthood frightens me.’ She tried to control her sobs. ‘It scares me because, unlike my work, I don’t know what I’m doing. I’m worried that if I do something wrong, Danny will get hurt. In fact one of the reasons I came out here is that I didn’t feel I was doing him any good by being there for him because I’m so neurotic.’
‘Ssh.’ Sam was soothing her. ‘You’re not neurotic. You just worry, that’s all. But neither of us is perfect.’ He hesitated fractionally. ‘Maybe I’ve been selfish, both as a father and a husband. But being out here has made me realise how much I love and miss you, Nancy. And Danny too, of course. Do you know why I asked you to come here?’
He paused, and Nancy’s heart beat so loudly she could almost hear it in her ears. Not an affair, she begged silently. Please, not an affair.
‘It was a test.’ He had turned back to face her now. ‘I’m not proud of myself but that’s how I saw it. I thought that if you really loved me, you would leave Danny just for a few days and spend some time with me instead.’
Her heart plummeted. Back home she had wondered if Sam had been using this trip as a test of her feelings for him, and now she knew it was true, she felt deeply disappointed.
‘How very childish of you,’ she said coolly.
‘I can see that now.’ Sam looked away. ‘But I can also see that you were much braver than I gave you credit for. Not every woman would come out here on her own and get down to basics, like this.’ He waved his hand round the room – it was still possible in the moonlight to see the small black insects crawling up the wooden walls. ‘It’s no five-star hotel, is it?’
That wasn’t the point. ‘It’s a family home, Sam. And that’s what makes it special. It’s full of love, with a husband and a wife working together instead of against each other, or setting silly tests. And have you seen how the father here spends so much time with his children?’
He had the grace to sound ashamed. ‘When we get back, I promise I’ll be more involved. It will be different.’ He stroked her arm.
‘Honestly?’ Should she now mention something else that had been on her mind? Not the thing about the girl in the photograph in his study, because, after all, the past was the past, and Sam had made it clear that he loved her. But the other thing. ‘Do you think . . . I mean . . . is there any chance of us having another child?’
She felt his stroking stop. ‘I’m not sure, Nancy. I wish I could say I’m ready, but I’m not. Can’t we just sort out this stage of our lives and enjoy the rest of this trip?’
It was a deal. The following few days were, thought Nancy, more like the honeymoon they’d never had. After going down the river, they ended up in a beautiful hotel bungalow overlooking the beach on an island with an unpronounceable name. The first thing Nancy did was to make a call home from the hotel room, but the lines were down, the reception told her, due to a storm last week.
A few weeks ago, this would have sent her into a panic attack, but she was amazed to find herself receiving the news quite calmly. If something had happened, surely someone would have found a way to have got hold of her?
By the time it came to flying back from the island to Ho Chi Minh on the tiny sixteen-seater plane, she felt totally and utterly relaxed. Just as important, she and Sam had never felt closer.
‘Do you think he’ll like this?’ asked Sam, holding out a small football which he’d bought at Duty Free.
Nancy nodded. ‘Definitely, although what he’d really like is you to play with him instead of putting up with me kicking a ball around the park.’
She gave him a tough look; a look which she wouldn’t have been strong enough to have given before. Sam smiled. ‘Point taken. I will spend more time with him, even if it means having extra time off work.’ He reached out for her hand. ‘I can’t wait to see him again and talk to him.’
She felt a tingle of anticipation. Soon they would be back in a city and communication would finally be possible. She couldn’t wait to hear her son’s voice, either.
Her mobile finally swung into action when they got of
f the plane at Ho Chi Minh, planning to get a taxi back to their apartment. Sam asked if he could speak first. It was a good sign.
Smiling, Nancy watched his face. ‘Mum, it’s me. Yes I know, our phones didn’t work but we’ve had a great time. How about . . . what?’
He turned to look at her with an expression that she’d never seen before. And as Nancy gazed at her husband’s stricken face, she realised that all her worst fears had finally come true.
Chapter 30
HE WAS MORE than ready for half-term, thought Joe as he sorted out his desk, placing a copy of his email reply to Gemma about the nativity play in his Finished file. In comparison with Di’s desk in the office next door, his own looked smugly neat and tidy.
Almost too neat and tidy, he thought suddenly. Di’s desk, with her own special mug bearing a flowery D initial and her tin of Highland shortbread biscuits, was certainly more inviting than his own, with its neatly stacked files and sharpened pencils in the brown plastic container.
Joe felt a sense of unease crawl through him. He hadn’t been himself since last month’s Parents’ Social, and the thought of Ed turning up out of the blue like that – not to mention his fainting fit – still brought him out in a cold sweat. He’d have liked to think that everyone had forgotten about it by now, but something told him that in a school where even the minutiae such as skimmed-milk sell-by dates were examined in detail, the arrival of a glamorous ex-wife would not be bypassed in a hurry.
‘Joe?’ Beryl put her head round the door. ‘May I have a word before you go?’
His initial reaction was to tell her that actually this wasn’t very convenient. After all, he’d brought his weekend bag in this morning, intending to take advantage of school ending at lunchtime so he could shoot straight off to Mike and Lynette’s immediately school finished. But then he remembered Brian’s advice. ‘Go with them, lad. They’ve been there longer than you and they don’t all talk rubbish. Some of them – yes. But not all.’
So, forcing himself to look as though a meeting after hours with the head was exactly what he wanted, he followed Beryl into her office.
‘Please.’ Beryl indicated the seat on the other side of her desk, which bore a cluster of photographs showing her with a small child of about three. Joe looked away, feeling the usual chill that ran down his spine whenever he saw pictures of kids who were that age.
Meanwhile, Beryl was taking off her spectacles, wiping them on her pale blue cardigan and then putting them on again. She seemed nervous. What was up?
‘This isn’t going to be easy, Joe,’ she said softly.
A spark of alarm went through him. That was exactly the phrase he used to start off with at the bank when he’d had to let someone go.
With difficulty, he flashed her one of the smiles that he’d been working on in front of the bathroom mirror ever since Brian had suggested that a grin or two might make him seem less severe in the classroom.
‘What’s the problem, Beryl?’
He used her first name intentionally, just as he’d been taught by Psychology Management on the fourteenth floor. It made the speaker seem more in control, because he had ownership of the other person’s name.
Beryl sighed. ‘You see this photograph?’
There was no getting out of it.
Clenching his fists by his sides, Joe made himself look at the blond boy cuddling up to Beryl in the frame. The kid had a challenging look on his face, as though teasing Joe for not owning something that everyone else seemed to possess.
‘That’s my grandson. He’s three.’
Don’t think about what might have been, he told himself. Don’t think about it.
‘Do you know what he loves at this time of the year?’ Beryl was eyeballing him now, without her glasses, and he had a sudden feeling that she wouldn’t have been out of place on the fourteenth floor herself.
‘He loves Halloween and nativity plays.’ Beryl paused, looking down at the papers in front of her. Joe was aware of a horrible heavy feeling filling the pit of his stomach.
‘Gemma sent me copies of your recent email correspondence on the subject of both the planned Halloween dressing-up day and the nativity play. I gather that you consider the first to be “outmoded and irrelevant to society today”, while the second is “politically incorrect in view of today’s varied religious beliefs”. Is that true?’
Joe felt an unfamiliar cold trickle of nervous sweat run down his chest. ‘When I was in my previous school, we banned both events for exactly those reasons.’
There was a nod, as though Beryl had thought he might say something like that. ‘That was in a tough inner London area, wasn’t it? I think you’ll find that things are different out here. We do, of course, include plenty of learning and play about other religions, in accordance with the Early Years curriculum. But the nativity play is a tradition, Joe. If we got rid of that, we would be destroying our heritage and would probably cause a riot amongst the parents as well.’
There was the glimmer of a smile, as though she was trying to soften the blow of what was coming next. Joe knew the signals all too well. He had followed a similar pattern at the bank except that then, he hadn’t been on the receiving end. ‘I’m afraid that’s not all, Joe. We have received various complaints about you from both members of staff and parents.’
‘Complaints?’ He stiffened in a mixture of anger and alarm. ‘What about?’
Beryl’s voice took on an authoritative edge he hadn’t heard before. ‘One parent who wrote in said she was deeply concerned about your emphasis on maths at the expense of, as she put it, “story riting”, spelt without the “w”.’
Beryl gave another half-smile. ‘You can see that if a parent can’t spell correctly, it is even more essential that we help their children to do so.’
This wasn’t fair! ‘I follow the guidelines on writing but I have to say, Beryl, that some of the Puddleducks children have arrived woefully inadequate in terms of mathematical skills, and I am only doing my best to correct it.’
There was a sigh from the other side of the desk. ‘Ah, yes. Puddleducks. That’s another thing. I gather from Gemma that you have been rather critical of the joint assemblies.’ She gave him a reproachful look. ‘I have to say that she’s been rather hurt by your behaviour.’
Nonsense! Well, not nonsense about the hurt bit, obviously, because women’s emotions were a mystery unto themselves. But Gemma’s complaint about his attitude to their assemblies was nonsensical. ‘I simply feel that the appearance by a failed Britain’s Best Talent participant, who also happened to be a friend of Miss Merryfield, didn’t seem particularly pertinent.’
‘Really?’ Beryl’s glasses were eyeing him coldly. ‘You don’t think it’s an example of how someone can get to the finals – even if she didn’t win – and then go on to make a success out of her life?’
Joe shifted from side to side in his seat. When she put it that way, it did indeed seem reasonable.
‘Then there was the unfortunate matter of the Parents’ Social when you had a little too much to drink, which presumably triggered that rather unfortunate scene between you and your wife.
‘Ex-wife,’ he said weakly. ‘Ed’s my ex-wife. I keep telling people that but no one will believe me.’
Beryl’s face showed that she was one of the disbelievers too. ‘Your personal life is your own affair, Joe, provided you don’t let it interfere with your professional one, which sadly is exactly what happened. All in all, I’m afraid that so far, your first term hasn’t been what we’d all hoped. I need to write my staff reports this half-term and I am afraid, Joe, that I will be suggesting in yours that you might like to consider your position.’
Had he heard her correctly?
‘I can see from your face that this has come as a shock.’ Beryl’s voice was oozing with sympathy, which made him feel worse. ‘Maybe I have been a bit hard. Supposing you and I have another talk about your teaching skills at Christmas. Perhaps that will give you more time to
get used to our ways out here in Hazelwood.’
Consider his position? Joe was still seething as he leaped on to his bike. Thank God he’d been able to give up the crutches so he could ride again.
Another talk about his teaching skills?
Did Beryl know what she was on about?
He, Joe Balls, had more experience of the real world than any of them put together. And that was exactly what they needed! A good dollop of the real world to prepare children for what was out there. That was why he had got on so well at the inner-city primary, and that was why he had been asked to come here.
How dare they?
Joe’s anger propelled him down the motorway towards Lyme Regis in almost half the time it usually took. Not because he broke the speed limit, because he couldn’t have coped if he was responsible for killing someone. There had been enough of that already. No. He got there when it was just about light because he was too angry to have his usual halfway break.
‘Uncle Joe, Uncle Joe!’
Fraser and Charlie were sitting on the stone wall outside Mermaid’s Nook, waiting for him.
‘Are you coming to the beach with us?’
‘We’ve got a whole week off school!’
‘Fraser broke the kite you gave us in the summer.’
‘No I didn’t.’
‘Ouch. That hurt. Have you brought us a present?’
‘Boys!’ Lynette’s clear voice sang out of the front door as she came to greet him. ‘That’s so rude. Joe, I’m sorry.’
She brushed his cheek and he got a lovely whiff of her perfume, which reminded him of a scent his mother used to wear.
‘Come on in and take your gear off. Boys, give Uncle Joe a bit of time before we head down to the beach for an evening walk. He looks exhausted!’ She took Joe’s arm in the old familiar way. ‘Mike’s doing a bit of extra teaching.’ Dropping her voice, Lynette added, ‘We could do with some extra money, to be honest.’ Then she spoke more normally. ‘But Dad will be back by supper and then I thought we’d have a game of charades.’