The Marriage Mender

by Linda Green

  ‘What, about whether his intentions were honourable?’

  ‘Something like that. He basically wanted to know if he was going to knock up his daughter.’

  ‘I take it he said he wasn’t.’

  ‘Yeah, cos he wanted to get out of there alive.’

  I nodded, aware we hadn’t had a similar conversation with Josh yet.

  ‘But was that the honest answer too?’

  ‘Course it was. He’s not an idiot, you know.’

  I wasn’t sure if that meant Tom wasn’t having sex with her. Or simply wasn’t stupid enough to do it without condoms.

  ‘And I take it Caitlin’s dad didn’t ask you anything like that?’

  ‘No, just wanted to know what “A” levels I was planning to do.’

  ‘Should he have asked, though?’

  Josh looked down at the floor. ‘No. She wants to wait.’

  ‘Good for her. I know girls get a lot of pressure these days.’

  ‘Not from me, she doesn’t.’

  ‘No, I know. But from society, the media, all that stuff. It’s really important that you support her.’

  ‘Is this the bit where you turn into the embarrassing agony aunt type?’

  ‘Possibly,’ I said.

  ‘I think I’d better go, then,’ smiled Josh.

  ‘Your sister will be wanting you to help with the pancakes.’

  ‘I know. I’m on my way,’ he said, getting up off the bed.

  ‘Josh.’

  He turned back to me.

  ‘I think Caitlin’s a very lucky girl.’

  The colour rose in his cheeks a little. ‘Let’s hope you lot don’t scare her off, then,’ he said.

  * * *

  So the family was gathering in our house for a special occasion and we were preparing to welcome Josh’s special guest into our midst. The parallels with Christmas were obvious, and yet no one mentioned them, which only served to make it even worse.

  It was Matilda who cracked in the end. She wandered into the kitchen, unusually quiet, and came and stood next to me.

  ‘People won’t end up shouting again, will they?’ she asked.

  I crouched down and pulled her to me. ‘No, love,’ I said. ‘This is going to be a lovely Mother’s Day tea.’

  ‘What if Lydia comes?’

  ‘She won’t.’

  ‘Why not? She’s Josh’s mother.’

  I could see her logic, and I also shared a tiny bit of her concern. I wasn’t going to show that, though.

  ‘She won’t come because she’s not invited.’

  ‘Because of what happened at Christmas?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Why is Caitlin coming?’

  ‘Because she’s been invited.’

  ‘But you’re not her mother.’

  ‘No. But we thought it would be nice to invite her because she’s very special to Josh, and we want her to know that she’s therefore special to us too.’

  Matilda weighed this up for a moment and obviously decided it was an acceptable answer. ‘OK,’ she said, and skipped back out of the kitchen.

  Chris arrived back with Barbara first.

  ‘Thank you for the flowers, love,’ she said as I stooped to kiss her. ‘They’re beautiful.’

  ‘You’re very welcome.’

  Chris always got them, actually. I was fortunate enough to have got one of those rare men who didn’t stop buying their own Mother’s Day presents as soon as they had a wife to do it for them.

  Matilda ran out and threw herself at Barbara. ‘Grandma, you’re just in time to do the Grandma puppet in Little Red Riding Hood.’

  ‘Give your grandma a chance to get in the door,’ I said.

  ‘It’s OK,’ said Barbara. ‘I’m ready for action, just so long as wolf’s not too scary.’

  ‘He’s really scary,’ said Matilda. ‘But it’s OK because, after he eats you, we’ll cut him open and get you out again.’

  Barbara laughed and allowed herself to be dragged off into the lounge by Matilda.

  ‘It could be worse,’ said Chris. ‘She could be doing Hansel and Gretel, in which case Mum would be about to be burnt to death in an oven.’

  I smiled at him. ‘You OK?’ I asked.

  ‘Yeah,’ he said, putting his arms around me. ‘I’m good, thanks.’

  * * *

  We’d offered to pick Caitlin up but Josh had insisted he was going to walk her up from the bus stop. I suspected it was cover for some kind of briefing which would be going on, warning her of all our various foibles.

  It was gone four when I heard Josh’s key in the door. I had vowed not to go running out there, embarrassing the poor girl, but the fact that Matilda jumped up and dashed out gave me an excuse to go after her.

  Caitlin was standing in the hallway dressed in a dark red Puffa jacket, short black skirt, opaque tights and boots. Her long brown hair curled over her shoulders. It did look a bit like Kate Middleton’s, but her face was younger and refreshingly devoid of make-up. She didn’t need it, anyway. She was absolutely gorgeous.

  ‘Hi, Caitlin,’ I said. ‘I’m Alison, it’s lovely to meet you at last.’

  I went over and kissed her on the cheek. It felt the right thing to do. She didn’t appear too embarrassed.

  ‘You too,’ she said, revealing a couple of dimples as she smiled and handing me a bunch of gerberas.

  ‘Thank you,’ I said, ‘they’re lovely.’

  I smiled at her and Josh in turn, suspecting he had tipped her off in the favourite flowers department. Matilda was bouncing up and down next to me. Josh ruffled her hair.

  ‘And this is my sister, Tilda,’ he said.

  ‘Hi,’ said Caitlin, giving her a little wave.

  ‘Are you his girlfriend now?’ piped up Matilda. ‘Only you’re holding hands.’

  They looked at each other and laughed. Neither of them let go, though.

  ‘Thank you, missy,’ I said, guiding Matilda back towards the lounge before turning back to them. ‘Here, let me take your jacket.’

  Caitlin slipped it off and handed it to me. She started to take her boots off.

  ‘You don’t have to worry about those,’ I said.

  ‘It’s OK, I have to do it at home. My mum hates shoes in the house.’

  I smiled at her. Caitlin and Josh followed me into the lounge. Chris was sitting with Barbara on the sofa. He stood up as soon as we came in, walked over to Caitlin and offered his hand.

  ‘Hi, I’m Chris, Josh’s dad. Good to meet you.’

  I could see Josh cringing behind her, but Caitlin appeared undaunted and shook his hand.

  ‘And you,’ she replied.

  Barbara got up from the sofa, came up to Caitlin, patted her on the hand and said, ‘Hello, lovey, so you’re the one who’s put a sparkle in our Josh’s eyes.’

  Caitlin smiled and looked down at her feet.

  ‘And this is my grandma, who’s very good at embarrassing me,’ said Josh, giving her a hug.

  He was a good six inches taller than her now. Caitlin wasn’t far behind him, mind you.

  ‘What do they feed you girls nowadays?’ asked Barbara. ‘You’re all so long and stringy.’

  ‘My whole family are tall,’ said Caitlin. ‘My brother’s over six foot.’

  ‘How old is he?’ I asked.

  ‘If you say ten, we’re going to worry,’ added Chris.

  ‘No, he’s nineteen,’ she laughed. ‘He’s away at uni.’

  ‘Which one?’ I asked.

  ‘The London School of Economics. He’s doing a social policy degree.’

  Chris looked suitably impressed. Her family might be well off but they still had a social conscience.

  ‘Anyway,’ I said, seeing Josh’s stop-asking-her-questions face, ‘come and sit down. Can I get you something to drink?’

  ‘A cup of tea would be great, but only if you’re making one.’

  ‘Oh, she drinks tea,’ said Barbara. ‘She must be all right.’

  I s
miled at Caitlin. ‘We’re always making one in this house,’ I said.

  * * *

  They sat next to each other at the tea table. It was probably the first time they’d stopped holding hands. But there were still constant glances at each other, and I wouldn’t have been surprised if there was some foot contact going on under the table. They were plainly smitten, the pair of them, which thrilled me and scared me in equal measure.

  ‘So how long have you been playing the violin, Caitlin?’ I asked.

  ‘Since I was about six. My family had to put up with a lot of screeching in those days.’

  ‘It’s paid off from the sound of it, though,’ I said. ‘Josh says you’re very good.’

  She looked at Josh and smiled. ‘Thanks, I’m getting there,’ she said.

  ‘Can you teach me?’ asked Matilda. ‘Josh lets me play his guitar sometimes. Not the one his real mum got him, the other one.’

  Chris and Josh remained silent, both looking down at their plates. I felt the familiar twisting sensation inside.

  ‘Yeah, I’d love to,’ replied Caitlin. ‘As long as that’s OK.’ She looked across at me as she said it.

  ‘That would be lovely,’ I said. ‘Thank you.’

  ‘Just let me know in plenty of time when the first lesson is,’ said Chris. ‘I may have some work on that day.’

  ‘Yeah, and I think I’ll be busy revising at Tom’s,’ added Josh.

  They were both smiling. It was OK. We’d moved on. In every sense.

  * * *

  Chris took Caitlin home later that evening. Josh insisted on going with her – presumably to spare her any further embarrassing dad moments – and Barbara was in Matilda’s room, reading her a bedtime story.

  I remembered that Josh needed a shirt ironing for school the next day, so I quickly pressed one from the laundry basket and took it into his room. Lydia’s guitar was on his bed. I assumed it was where he’d left it after showing it to Caitlin earlier. He’d played a bit too. We’d heard him from downstairs, where the rest of us had been having a conversation about how nice she was.

  I hung the shirt up in his wardrobe. As I closed the door, his mobile beeped with a message. He’d left it on top of his chest of drawers. I glanced down as I walked past. I saw ‘Mum’ first, in bold type, as the sender. And then after it, the message: ‘Thanks, love. I’ll be in touch.’

  I caught her watching Mr Bloom’s Nursery on catch up one night, long after our little girl had gone to bed. I mean, the woman in Nina and the Neurons is quite cute. But you still wouldn’t catch me watching CBeebies after nine o’clock at night.

  17

  Lydia hadn’t said when. That was the trouble. This week, this month, this year. It was like being told you had cancer but the doctor neglecting to mention the prognosis.

  And because of that I didn’t tell anyone. The last thing on earth I wanted to do was get Chris in a state again for no good reason. It might never happen. All I knew for certain was that there’d been one text exchange between them. It could have been the first, it was quite possible. Mother’s Day would have been an understandable day for Josh to have contacted her. And she hadn’t said she was going to see him, only that she’d be in touch.

  So what if they texted each other? Was that really going to cause a problem? Only if I turned it into one.

  I could have talked to Josh, but that would have meant admitting I’d read his text message. I knew I hadn’t been snooping. But I was well aware that was how it would look from his point of view. And really, was it so bad that he’d sent a Mother’s Day greeting to his own mum? Would I have wanted to have brought up a boy who didn’t do that?

  The questions swirled around in my head. Sometimes things clouded over, I couldn’t see clearly at all. Other times I was convinced the only sensible course of action was the one I was taking. Everything was fine at home. Better than fine. The best it had been since last September. I’d had a lovely birthday, we’d been out for a meal together. Just the four of us. No unwanted guests. No nasty surprises. Everyone was happy. And I wasn’t going to jeopardise that for something which, at the moment, was nothing more than a solitary text message.

  I woke up with a start early on Friday morning. I lay there for a second, unsure whether it really had been the doorbell which had woken me or whether I had merely imagined it, in the way I used to wake up thinking I’d heard Matilda crying for a feed when she was a baby long after she’d stopped doing it.

  The doorbell rang again. I hadn’t imagined it. I jumped out of bed, leaving Chris (who used to sleep through Matilda crying as well) slumbering next to me, pulled on my dressing gown and hurried downstairs.

  It was in my head straight away, the idea that it could be Lydia. Probably it had been in my head that it was her even while I was asleep. I had no idea what I was going to do if it was her. All I knew was that I wanted to get to the door before anyone else. I pulled my dressing gown across my chest, fumbled with the lock and opened the door.

  It was the postman. Delivering some trainers I’d ordered for Josh on the internet.

  I thanked him and shut the door, sat down on the bottom step of the stairs, closed my eyes and let out a long, loud breath.

  * * *

  ‘What’s stopping you going home, Luke?’

  I’d hoped that Christmas would have been the turning point for Kelly and Luke. That not seeing his three young children excitedly discovering what Santa had brought them would have been enough of a jolt for him to want to move back home. It hadn’t been. And three months on, he was still living at his mum’s. Still going to the house every afternoon to look after the kids while Kelly went to work, and still returning to his mum’s at night. I was worried they’d reached a kind of impasse. They were both maintaining their positions but nobody seemed to want to make a move.

  ‘Nothing’s changed, has it?’ he said. ‘It would still be exactly the same, if I moved back in.’

  ‘You could give it a try and find out if that’s the case.’

  ‘There’s no point. I don’t want to muck the kids around, move back in and move out again a few days later. At least this way everyone knows where they stand.’

  I thought for a minute about what he’d said. Wondered if Lydia would stay away from Josh because of a similar rationale.

  ‘And what about you, Kelly?’ I asked. ‘Where do you think you stand?’

  She hesitated before replying. ‘I think he’s left us,’ she said, looking down at her hands. ‘I don’t think he’s ever coming back, he’s just doing it gradually because he feels bad about it and at some point it will become permanent.’

  Luke shook his head. ‘No. It’s not like that.’

  ‘I think it is,’ said Kelly. ‘You’ve got it too easy, having your mam fussing over you. It must be like living in a bloody hotel.’

  ‘Yeah, but I’m not with my family, am I? Not where I want to be.’

  Luke looked down at his feet. Kelly bit her bottom lip hard. There were occasions in my job when the desire to bang people’s heads together was almost too much to bear.

  ‘So what would you like to happen now?’ I asked, looking at Kelly.

  She fiddled with her nails before answering. ‘I want him to come home,’ she said. ‘The kids think he’s left them for good.’

  ‘Why? What have you told them?’ asked Luke.

  ‘I haven’t told them anything,’ said Kelly. ‘It’s because you haven’t lived with us since before Christmas. That’s for ever, as far as they’re concerned. Callum talks about Daddy’s new home at Grandma’s. What am I supposed to say?’

  ‘You can tell them it’s only temporary.’

  ‘Well, it doesn’t feel temporary to them or to me,’ said Kelly, her voice on the edge of cracking.

  ‘What about you, Luke?’ I asked. ‘What do you want to happen now?’

  ‘I want to move back home. But I don’t want it to be like it was before.’

  ‘OK,’ I said, sensing it was time to interve
ne. ‘How about we put together a plan for moving back in? A proper timeline, setting out what needs to be achieved before that happens, but agreeing an actual date for it, if everything goes to plan. I’ll see you both individually, we’ll work on what changes you’re both willing and able to make, and then we’ll get back together and go through them all, see if we can come to some kind of agreement. What do you say to that?’

  Kelly looked up at me and nodded, her ponytail bobbing up and down as she did so. Luke shrugged. But I thought I saw a glimmer of hope in his eyes.

  It was enough to go on. At least for now.

  * * *

  It was the flash of red which caught my eye. I’d left Chris and Matilda in the park and was hurrying to the Co-op to pick up some bits and pieces for tea, when my attention was drawn to the other side of the road. It was the Puffa jacket I recognised, rather than its occupant, at first. But as my gaze lifted to the face of the person wearing it, I remembered where I knew it from. It was Caitlin. She was with a friend, a friend I recognised as Alicia.

  I stopped in the street, pretending to browse in the bookshop window while discreetly looking across the road. It wasn’t that I wanted to spy on Caitlin, that I didn’t trust her. Not in the slightest. It was because Josh had told me he was spending the afternoon with her.

  Caitlin and Alicia appeared to be deep in conversation. Their faces were serious, none of the giggling and overly animated expressions often favoured by teenage girls. My eyes scanned up and down the road. Maybe Josh had got waylaid in the music shop, or was loitering by the cafe somewhere with Tom, waiting for them to arrive. There was no sign, though.

  The twisting and contorting inside me started again. There was only one reason why Josh would have lied to me. Her name was Lydia.

  Caitlin and Alicia disappeared round the corner. And with them went any hopes I had of being able to kid myself that the text had been nothing to worry about. Lydia was back. Josh was with her right now. And I had no idea what I was going to do about it.

  I negotiated the aisles in the Co-op on automatic pilot and somehow found myself at the checkout with a basketful of items from which I could manage to throw a meal together.

  I walked back to the park, trying to compose myself, to morph back into the bright and breezy person who had left there half an hour ago. It was difficult, though. The best-case scenario was that this was their first meeting. But even if it was, I suspected it wouldn’t be the last.