by Fiona Gibson
‘Excuse me,’ I mutter, ‘but I really have to go.’ Rachel flings me a let’s-get-out-of-here look.
‘Mind you,’ Harriet retorts, ‘we had a proper editor then who knew what she was talking about. Not Millie Dawson, who brings in her friend to take over my page and hasn’t a clue about raising children.’
‘Do you have children, Harriet?’ I bark, startled by my assertiveness.
Her lips wither. ‘It’s not necessarily the mother who knows what’s best for a child.’
‘For goodness’ sake,’ Rachel snaps, ‘do you honestly think you know better than a parent does? I used to enjoy your page, Harriet, and read it every week, but I didn’t realise you had such an attitude—’
‘Why are you being like this?’ I cut in. ‘I didn’t sack you. I had no intention of taking on the page permanently.’
Harriet laughs scathingly. ‘With a job like this, one needs a break. I’d been doing it week in, week out, for ten years. Can you imagine what that’s like? Millie – your friend – encouraged me to take time off, said I needed a rest – planning, of course, to substitute me with you.’
‘I’m sorry you feel that way,’ I say firmly, ‘and I’m sure it didn’t happen like that. Now, if you’ll excuse me …’
Right on cue, my mobile trills. Grabbing my bag from Rachel, I fish it out and hurry to the corridor. It’s stopped ringing by the time I take the call. Not five but nine missed calls. All from Martin. What’s going on? Trembling, I call him, willing him to pick up.
It can only be one thing. Something has happened to Jake.
34
‘It’s OK, Cait, it’s OK. He’s going to be all right.’
‘What happened?’
‘It was just … an accident. I can’t believe I let it happen.’
‘Just tell me what happened!’
‘It’s his arm. He’s done something – fallen on his arm when the car hit him.’
‘He got hit by a car?’
‘Please don’t panic,’ Martin insists. ‘He’s been seen in A&E and they’re keeping him in, but they just want to check everything’s all right.’
‘Where? Which hospital?’
Someone touches my arm and I turn to see Amelia. Martin gives me the details and I try to store them in my head. My hands are shaking so much I stab the wrong button to finish the call.
‘Caitlin,’ Amelia says gently, ‘what’s going on?’
‘Jake’s in hospital. He’s been knocked over or something, I don’t know …’
‘I’ll drive you. My car’s over the road on a meter.’
‘I can get a cab,’ I protest, but she’s already marching me towards her beaten-up yellow Beetle with a gigantic sunflower emblazoned on its bonnet.
The car rattles and jerks, and it quickly becomes apparent that London driving and Amelia don’t mix. She curses constantly, gripping the steering wheel as if fearful that it might spring from her hands.
This shouldn’t be Jake. Not cautious Jake, who has never had an accident in his life. Travis is different; he’s been to A&E so many times that he greets the waiting-area toys like long-lost buddies. He broke his willy once, three weeks after Martin left. I’d bought him a toddler seat that fitted over the loo and he’d somehow tumbled forwards, trapping his penis at an unfortunate angle and bellowing for me. I’d run into the bathroom thinking, What now? What’s he broken or spilled? I was still smarting from finding him squirting the last glug of my L’Occitane shower gel (a gift from Millie) down the loo. All those bad thoughts I’d had; then I’d found him screaming, with blood dripping on to the floor.
Where was Martin when I needed him? I’d never hated him more than at that moment. Naturally, as soon as he learned of Travis’s accident, he was tearing through East London at something like 800 miles an hour to meet us at hospital, where we were told that the damaged appendage would miraculously self-heal.
Amelia is chatting – I wish she’d keep her mind on the road – but I’m not in a small-talk mood. ‘So I’ve definitely finished with my boyfriend,’ she says, ‘because whatever happens with me and Sam, I realised I wasn’t being honest, stringing him along and sneaking up to London whenever I could to spend the night with Sam.’
‘That’s probably the best thing,’ I murmur. Please don’t expect me to advise you. Not now.
She lurches to a halt at a red light. ‘I probably shouldn’t ask this, and it’s really none of my business—’
‘Amelia, I think you’re in the wrong lane.’
‘God, am I?’ She noses right, triggering a torrent of angry tooting behind us. ‘I was just wondering,’ she continues, now straddling two lanes, ‘if there’s ever been anything between you and Sam.’
I swallow hard. ‘Of course not,’ I say tersely. ‘What made you think there was?’
She shoots me a glance. Her sunniness has faded, and her eyes are flinty. I realise now that being chummy towards me has required a monumental effort on her part. She’s the one who deserves the Most Controlled Being Award.
‘It’s just … I hear from Harvey that you’re around a lot,’ she continues lightly, seemingly having forgotten my injured son in hospital, ‘and your name’s always cropping up.’ She barges in front of a rusting Transit van, her knuckles taut as she grips the steering wheel. ‘I just wanted to know,’ she adds with a dry snigger, ‘what kind of competition I’m up against.’
I stare pointedly out of the side window so she can’t see my blazing cheeks.
‘There’s no competition, Amelia,’ I say coolly.
‘Right. I’m sorry.’
‘I haven’t been involved with anyone since Martin left,’ I add, conveniently erasing Pac-a-Mac night from my mind.
‘Well, I can’t understand why not,’ she says, her voice brightening. ‘You’re a lovely-looking woman, Caitlin. Ever think of joining one of those dating websites?’
‘No,’ I growl. Oh, please. She’s warned me off Sam; now she’s turned into my mother. Isn’t it time you found yourself a nice man?
Mercifully, the hospital’s in view. Amelia pulls up in front of a huddle of smokers, their faces misted in a pale-grey haze. ‘Shall I come in with you? I can let Sam know I’ll be late.’
‘No, I’ll be fine. Thanks for the lift.’
‘He’ll be fine, Caitlin. Kids break bones all the time.’ She squeezes my hand, but any trace of warmth is long gone.
Jake doesn’t break bones all the time, I think, tumbling out of the car and striding towards the entrance.
But she’s right. The receptionist directs me along a corridor and up two floors to the fracture ward, and he is fine. His face is pale and drawn, and his right arm is encased in plaster, but my son still breaks into a grin when he sees me.
‘Hi, Mum.’
‘Oh, honey.’ I put my arms round him and kiss his forehead. He still smells of Jake: sweet as honey. I barely register Martin saying hi from the chair beside the bed and asking where Lola and Travis are, as if I might have left them bundled in the cupboard under the stairs while I snatched my five minutes of fame. He stands up and tugs the faded burgundy curtain around the bed.
‘They’re at Sam’s,’ I say quickly, ‘sleeping over. Oh, Jake, how did it happen?’
Jake shifts in bed, wincing. ‘Me and Dad were playing football—’
‘On the grassy area by the flats,’ Martin cuts in. ‘I passed to him and the ball went into the road. Jake chased it and the car came round the corner … It just clipped him, sent him flying, and he landed on his arm. It was my fault really, wasn’t it, son?’
Jake shakes his head fiercely. ‘No, Dad. It wasn’t anyone’s fault.’
He looks like a little boy, propped up against white pillows with his brave face on.
‘He’s fractured his elbow,’ Martin adds. ‘It was some mess, wasn’t it, Jake? All twisted-looking.’
‘It was freaky.’ Jake grins.
‘How long will he be in here?’ I ask as Martin drags over a chair for me.
>
‘A couple of days. We’re waiting for X-ray results. They want to check that it’s setting properly and make sure there’s no nerve damage to the hand.’
‘D’you think—’
‘He’ll be fine,’ Martin insists. I glance at him. Being here together reminds me of the countless school parents’ evenings we’ve attended together. These days I go alone, dispatching potted reports to Martin.
‘One of us should stay here tonight,’ I add.
‘I will. You should get home for Travis and Lola.’
‘I told you, they’re sleeping over at Sam’s.’
Martin frowns and there’s a glimmer of the old shark-eye look. ‘That’s OK, is it? What about school in the morning?’
‘I’d planned to go round first thing to pick them up. I’ll be there in plenty of time. You don’t have a problem with that, do you?’ I keep my voice light, for Jake’s sake. His dark eyes bore into me.
‘It’s just …’ Martin tails off, raking his hair distractedly. Clearly he does have a problem; he’s just not willing to share it.
‘Sam’s been a big support to me,’ I murmur.
Martin darts me an I-bet-he-has look.
‘Let’s not get into this now.’
‘I’m sorry,’ Martin mutters. ‘I just feel so … responsible for this.’
‘Dad,’ Jake says, ‘would you mind if …’ He reddens.
‘What is it, son?’
‘It’s … football. I, um, don’t really like it. I try, but I’m rubbish, everyone knows I am.’
Martin looks aghast. ‘Why didn’t you say?’
‘I thought you might be cross,’ comes the small voice.
‘You really thought that?’ Martin’s eyes moisten instantly.
‘Or disappointed or mad,’ Jake adds.
‘What kind of dad d’you think I am? I don’t care about football, Jake. I thought it was what you liked to do.’
Jake shrugs.
‘Hey.’ I touch his good arm. ‘I’ll go and see if the shop’s open, find you some comics and stuff, get a couple of coffees … Is there anything else you’d like?’
‘No thanks, Mummy.’
I can’t remember the last time he called me ‘Mummy’, or looked at me that way – as if he’s actually fond of me, and I’m not just some random, fun-wrecking adult.
I feel Martin’s eyes on me as I delve for my purse. My bag is crammed with wodges of paper – my survival notes for the Bambino event, none of which I referred to. There’s an oily napkin that the waitress gave me with the fishy blini.
‘I haven’t asked,’ Martin says, ‘how did the Bambino thing go?’
‘It was fine. Actually, I enjoyed it.’
He smiles. ‘Thought you would.’ A hint of sadness crosses his face. It’s still a handsome face, with top-quality cheekbones; he looks like a man who takes care of himself, even with the ward’s blue-white striplights draining him of colour. ‘Cait.’ He clears his throat and looks down. ‘I’m so sorry.’
I know then that he’s sorry for more than Jake’s arm and for trying to crowbar him into some First Division-footballer mould. He’s sorry about water-coolers, and shagging in the toilets of Bink & Smithson, and messing up everything we had.
It’s too late, of course, but something loosens in me, as if I’m slowly uncoiling. I turn away before he sees my eyes filling.
‘Cait?’ Martin calls after me. ‘Black no sugar, remember?’
My lips twitch into a smile. ‘Of course I remember,’ I say.
35
Travis and I spend Friday in hospital with Jake, having relieved Martin of bedside duties and seen him stagger off to work with hair askew. (Work, I ask you, after spending the night on a fold-out bed. Still, the design of a swanky gym complex in Canary Wharf waits for no man.) The ward and its various fittings thrill Travis. Who needs Thorpe Park when there’s a round-the-bed curtain to swing on and drape around oneself like a cape?
Jake, who is still being unnervingly – almost spookily – warm towards me, spends most of the day pretending he isn’t really watching little ones’ programmes (Tweenies, Teletubbies) that are showing on a loop in the TV room. His lunch arrives on a squeaking trolley. Fish, boiled potatoes, cauliflower florets – all a bleary off-white, apart from a small mound of sweetcorn. A brusque nurse hands him a bulbous red plastic knife and fork, as if he were three years old and incapable of manipulating proper cutlery, and he tucks in with one-handed gusto.
‘How are the sea monkeys?’ he asks through a full mouth.
‘They’re fine,’ I lie. (Frankly, they haven’t entered my radar for weeks.)
‘I miss them,’ he adds wistfully, and I wonder if this is my Jake talking, or if he’ll rip off a mask like a Scooby Doo baddie to reveal someone else’s child.
‘Do you?’ I ask. ‘I didn’t think you liked them. Remember when you unwrapped the box last Christmas and complained that they weren’t proper pets?’
He smirks. ‘I said they were rubbish, didn’t I? I was disappointed ’cause I couldn’t teach them tricks.’
I reach for his hand and squeeze it. As visitors aren’t catered for by meals-on-wheels, Travis is wolfing a canteen ham sandwich that looks as if it’s been compressed by straightening irons. ‘I suppose they were a bit babyish for you,’ I venture. ‘Sometimes I forget how grown-up you are.’
He shrugs. ‘That’s all right. I’d rather have a dog, though.’
‘Are you joking?’
‘No. Yeah.’ He pulls a mock scowl that morphs into an ear-to-ear grin as Harvey whips back the curtain.
‘Jake, you’ve got a cast!’
‘Yeah.’ He displays it proudly.
‘And you missed school today. You’re so lucky. Wish I could break my elbow.’
‘How’s the patient?’ Sam asks, appearing behind him as Lola dives towards Jake. Lifesaver Sam, offering to collect her from school and bring her to me.
‘They did X-rays,’ Jake enthuses. ‘We saw my bones.’
‘Cool,’ breathes Harvey, forcing his way to the bed’s head end and perching on its spongy edge.
Martin returns – he’s cut his working day short – laden with provisions. He spots Sam and his smile cements. ‘Hi,’ he manages, cradling a large brown paper bag awkwardly.
‘Here, have this seat.’ Sam leaps up. He, too, looks flustered. ‘We’re going anyway,’ he adds quickly. ‘Come on, Harv. You’ll see Jake as soon as he’s out of hospital.’
No he won’t, I think miserably. He’ll be back with Martin and Slapper, giving me the cold treatment again and having a marvellous time with his new friends in their block and at the afterschool club.
‘Oh, I nearly forgot,’ Sam murmurs, delving into a crumpled carrier bag that he’d dumped in the corner. ‘We brought you a few bits and pieces, Jake, to keep you occupied.’
He hands over the bag and Jake pulls out several well-thumbed books including The Far Side and Calvin and Hobbes.
‘Wow, thanks!’ he exclaims.
‘That’s far too much,’ I protest as Lola hops on to the bed, craning to glimpse the pages.
‘Charity shop.’ Sam flicks a look at Martin, as if he might disapprove of his son being given second-hand goods. My ex-husband is not a charity-shop man. And I see it then – Martin’s quick glance that says, ‘So, you know Jake’s favourite comic strips, do you? And you’ve had my kids to stay over? Oh, and I hear you’ve been a huge support to Caitlin.’ As if he has the right to prickle over anything.
‘Let’s get going,’ Sam says, grabbing Harvey’s hand. He looks as if he might kiss me or Jake, or both of us, then thinks better of it.
And he’s gone.
It seems so much quieter now, even though the ward is filling with early-evening visitors. Travis is whingeing to go to the vending machine – so many buttons to press – which he spotted in the entrance area. Jake sets down a comic book on the chipped bedside cabinet and closes his eyes.
‘Lola, Travis, why don’t you go
and watch TV?’ Martin suggests, and they scamper away.
Now it’s just us and Jake, who’s dozing off. We’re not talking much, but it doesn’t feel awkward. The old closeness has crept back in. An in-this-together feeling that I remember from when Jake was a baby and Martin and I were chronically sleep-deprived. Sometimes, after a small-hours feed, Jake wouldn’t settle and Martin would hold him in his arms, pointing out trees and street lamps through our bedroom window. Finally, we’d curl up in bed together, our body clocks so skewed that we couldn’t sleep. We’d talk then, barely noticing the creeping dawn.
‘Cait,’ Martin murmurs. ‘There’s … stuff I need to talk about.’
‘What?’
‘It’s about us. You and me.’
‘There you are!’ the voice chimes through the ward. Millie strides towards us. ‘God, Cait, I’ve only just found out what happened. Is he all right?’
I leap up to greet her. ‘He’s fine. Everything’s going to be OK.’
She hurries to Jake’s side, planting a noisy kiss on his forehead. He swipes a hand where she’s left a lipstick smear, as if a bird had deposited something there. ‘I couldn’t understand why you’d rushed off,’ she babbles, ‘when you’d gone down so well. Lots of people were dying to talk to you.’
I can’t help laughing. ‘Millie, it was an emergency.’
She plonks herself on the edge of Jake’s bed. ‘I know, and I’m really sorry … I’ve been trying to phone you, been so worried.’ She laughs. ‘I thought maybe you’d had delayed stage fright.’
‘Phone’s run out of juice,’ I tell her.
She sighs noisily. ‘None of those friends of yours were any help either. Especially that one in the hideous tight pink top … Bev, is it? Half pissed by the end of it, trying to chat up Henry, who’s only the MD. Don’t those friends of yours get out much?’
Martin clears his throat irritably.
‘Sorry, Martin,’ she catches herself, ‘listen to me babbling on, with poor Jake in his sick bed. Wasn’t it great, though, Cait? We’ll have to make these events a regular thing. Twice a year, maybe. Pre-Christmas would be perfect.’