The Mum Who Got Her Life Back

by Fiona Gibson

  I’d never get over it; I knew that. What had happened was all my fault, and no one would persuade me otherwise. But I allowed myself to be dragged along by Fergus, Tam and Paul, and to reward my friends for being so understanding, I’d behaved like a real arsehole.

  When stuff was nicked from our tent, I blamed them. ‘You said you were going for a kip,’ I snapped at Paul.

  ‘He went for a walk instead,’ Tam reasoned. ‘We can’t expect anyone to stay here, guarding our stuff all the time.’ It escalated into a full-on argument, with me trying to lob a beer can at Tam’s head (fortunately my aim was poor), telling everyone to ‘just fucking leave me alone’ and storming off pissed. I woke up hours later, in a soggy patch of field, minus a shoe, with a mysterious gash on my shin, and this fragile, pretty, red-haired girl gazing over me like a kind spirit.

  Elaine sat with me and stroked my hair while I blabbered on about my friends’ perceived crimes, our stolen rucksacks and the fact that I had no money.

  And my little brother. I found myself telling her all about him, our Sandy – short for Alexander, although no one ever called him that. He was thirteen years younger than me, fifteen younger than Craig: ‘A surprise,’ as our mum always put it. ‘My last gasp,’ Dad often joked, to which Mum feigned shock. But they were delighted, apparently, when they’d discovered Mum was pregnant, and it was brilliant having this cheerful little kid around the place. Sandy was a giggler, so joyful and fun. Everyone adored him.

  As he grew a bit older, he became quite a handful, but he was so damn cheeky and adorable, he got away with stuff that Craig and I never would have. We’d been pretty easy, by all accounts, doing our share of the chores without too much grumbling, helping with milking and lambing and the tons of other jobs people rarely think of when you mention you grew up on a farm. We fixed fencing and dry-stone walls, and filled in the pits in the half-mile of unmade lane that led from the main road to our property.

  We didn’t love it, but we didn’t exactly hate it either; there were plenty of other farm kids at our school, and it was just what we all did. But Sandy was different. Although he loved animals he had no interest in working with them. In fact I suspected he disapproved of them being born and raised for a specific purpose – i.e. for their milk, in the case of our dairy herd, or to be sold, when it came to our lambs. I often reminded him that it was our family’s livelihood, but once Sandy had made up his mind about something, that was that.

  He befriended the hens, the calves and especially the dogs. They were pets to him, not workers. One year we found out he’d donated all his Christmas money to a small charity that funded animal sanctuaries (although it no longer exists, it was a sort of prototype for the charity I work for now). He was only eight years old. We were all amazed by that, as none of us kids ever had much money. Dad would sometimes despair of the way in which Sandy pampered Bramble and Kit, our collies – sneaking them kitchen scraps, encouraging them to sleep on his bed, very un-farmy things to do with your dogs. But Sandy got away with it.

  He got away with tons of other stuff too. The one kid who mooned out the coach window on the way back from Scouts’ camp? That was him. The one who nicked Dad’s brandy and straddled the horse statue in our nearest village, and fell off and ended up in A&E with what he laughingly referred to as a ‘riding injury’? Him again. He was a little sod really, full of backchat and cheek, and no one had ever made me laugh so much.

  That afternoon at the festival drifted into a warm, heady night, and Elaine listened as I told her everything. She didn’t interrupt, and nor did she argue that it hadn’t been my fault: she just sat there and held my hand, and somehow, she helped me to heal, a tiny bit.

  It was the first time I’d properly cried since it had happened. Elaine seemed so kind, so gentle and good.

  I spent that night in her tent. Filled with a quiet confidence, she’d come to the festival alone, although she kept bumping into people she knew. We didn’t have sex. We didn’t even kiss properly. It was the last thing on my mind back then. Instead, she just covered me in a multicoloured striped blanket, which smelt of dust and some kind of hippie perfume, and was oddly comforting. She held me until I fell asleep.

  The festival ended, and although there’d been a shaky kind of truce with my mates, I travelled back to Glasgow with Elaine, both of us knowing we were together now. And we stayed together: me, the quiet guy who worked for a small book publisher’s, and her, the free spirit who flitted from job to job, never seeming to worry about anything.

  Gradually, our differences became more apparent. We moved into a tiny rented flat, where Elaine would arrange parties with two hours’ warning. She’d send me out for tons of booze and ‘just a few crisps, no one cares about food’. Once, after one of these errands, she laughed herself senseless when I returned home with the requested beverages and Kettle Chips, plus a large quiche.

  ‘Who provides quiche at a party?’ she hooted when the do was in full swing. Her friends gathered around it and laughed as if it were a full roast dinner. ‘Hey, who wants a slice of Jack’s quiche?’ I fixed on a big grin and drank too quickly, in an attempt to propel myself to the level of tipsiness that everyone else seemed to have reached already. ‘Jack, you’re drunk already!’ Elaine laughed. ‘How did you manage that?’

  ‘He can’t hold his booze,’ someone sniggered.

  Elaine beamed at her friends. ‘It’s all your fault, guys, for mocking his quiche!’

  This was pre-Lori, and I have to admit, life was never boring with Elaine. It was expensive, though, having the kitchen redone when she finally admitted that her gloomy green tiles gave the impression of ‘living in a swamp’. It was stressful when, a year or so after Lori’s arrival, Elaine accused me of ‘only seeing her as a mother’, to which I’d replied that of course I didn’t, that was only part of who she was. ‘Everything changed,’ she raged at me, ‘after you saw me giving birth!’

  What was I supposed to have done, sat out in the hospital corridor, like the dads of yesteryear, doing the crossword until they called me in to hand me a cleaned-up, swaddled baby?

  Meanwhile, we struggled on, pretending to the outside world that everything was okay between us. There were still laughs, of course, and we socialised as much as we could manage. You wouldn’t believe how much mirth could be wrung out of a single quiche, but the joke went on and on. One time, at her friend Ginny’s birthday party, someone actually brought one and plonked it on the top tier of a cake stand, still in its box for added comic effect.

  Still, Elaine was a devoted mum, delighting in Lori’s latest developments, and maybe I should have relaxed more and worried less. One night, I happened to mention that perhaps we shouldn’t have such full-on gatherings at the flat anymore.

  ‘Why not?’ she asked.

  ‘Because we have a small child,’ I reminded her, ‘and she keeps being woken up at night, and being all cranky in the mornings and falling asleep at nursery …’

  ‘She’s fine!’

  ‘She doesn’t seem fine.’

  Elaine regarded me across the kitchen table with what I could only interpret as deep disappointment. ‘You never used to be like this,’ she muttered. ‘You used to be fun …’

  ‘I am still fun,’ I countered, somewhat unfeasibly.

  ‘Really? Are you? Because sometimes I think you forget we’re still people …’

  ‘Of course we’re people! What else would we be?’

  ‘And you seem to think that becoming a parent means sacrificing everything, and losing the very essence of who we are. Can’t you understand that, Jack? Can’t you?’

  Charlie Gillespie understood. Charlie-bloody-Gillespie wouldn’t have protested about the tile paint, or tried to sober everyone up at a party with a quiche lorraine. No, Charlie understood Elaine; he really ‘got’ her, apparently. He was fun.

  And now, as I drive home from Nadia’s, I try to quell a niggle of worry that I blew it today, the first time I met Nadia’s son. Cathedrals and rainfa
ll! What was I thinking? Still, there’ll be plenty of chances to make a better impression, and to convince Alfie that his mother isn’t going out with a twerp.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Nadia

  I tried to wheedle out what was happening in his life, but Alfie wasn’t having any of it last night. Too traumatised by the sight of me and Jack in a state of undress, probably, and of course I understand his disgust that I might enjoy anything resembling a sex life. But curiously, neither he nor Molly is remotely judgemental where their father is concerned. Danny’s so cool and relaxed, so damned successful and in demand, he can do anything he likes.

  After he’d been seeing Kiki for a few months, Danny introduced her to our kids. She ‘seemed really nice’, both Molly and Alfie reported back, when I’d casually asked for a full and detailed description, hoping for reports of terrible personal habits or appalling dress sense. But no, she was ‘so nice’, allegedly: friendly and pretty (‘like a model,’ according to Molly), with ‘long, flowing, really lovely’ reddish hair.

  ‘Ginger?’ I asked.

  ‘More of a really nice red,’ Alfie said. The four of them had gone out for a curry together, and it had all been very grown up and congenial, apparently.

  ‘That’s great!’ I said, perhaps a shade too brightly.

  ‘Dad said Kiki’s curries are better,’ Alfie remarked.

  ‘Yeah, she told us she makes her own paneer,’ Molly added. ‘You know, that Indian cheese …’

  ‘I know what paneer is, yes.’

  ‘And she says she’ll make some for us sometime.’

  Wonderful! But at least Danny was happy, I conceded – and a happy Danny meant a better dad.

  Of course, Alfie’s first meeting with Jack wasn’t such a success. I decided not to text or call Jack last night; no point in apologising again, or going over and over it. But later, just as I was getting ready for bed, he sent me a customary Night, darling xxx text.

  Night, darling, I texted back. See you v soon. Just need to spend a bit of time with Alfie, see what’s going on, ok?

  Ok xxx, he replied.

  When Alfie emerged from his room this morning, I tried again to find out the real reason he’d come home early – because there had to be one. I know something’s up, by the way he is avoiding talking about Camilla, or their travel plans. All he seems fit for is lazing about in the matted oatmeal onesie my sister bought him years ago and munching dry toast (admittedly, he has spoken to me a little, if only to inform me that ‘butter furs up your arteries’ and ask, ‘When can we get some non-dairy spread?’).

  I also apologised again for what happened yesterday, adding, ‘Well, I’m glad you’ve met him anyway. He means a lot to me, Alfie. He’s a lovely guy – really caring, and a great dad to his daughter. He’s a hard worker too. He looks after the volunteers at his shop, like a kind of father figure to some of them—’

  ‘Yeah, okay, Mum,’ Alfie cut in, turning his attentions to the raggedy paperback he’d brought with him. And now, seemingly exhausted, he has loped off back to his room for a nap – on this bright, sunny Sunday – taking his battered old rucksack with him without unpacking it. So I can’t even try to redress the good-mother balance by attending to his dirty laundry.

  Pathetic though it may seem, I want to perform menial tasks for him, to prove that I’m still his sock-washing, dinner-making mum. It’s terribly feeble of me, I know. However, even as I sit at the kitchen table and sketch out some ideas for a new stationery range, I keep picturing that seething mass of dirty clothing in his rucksack.

  I’ve been asked to come up with a forest theme, incorporating various animals, birds and a tangle of branches and foliage. But the ideas just aren’t coming today. It’s almost impossible to focus on owls and squirrels when I’m battling an urge to tackle Alfie’s mouldering laundry and hand it back to him, all fragrant and folded with a casual, ‘There you go.’

  I feel cheated, actually; cheated out of making his homecoming special. I’d planned to fill the fridge with delicious treats, and to scrub the flat from top to bottom (like they’d notice and compliment the absence of dust!). Instead, still feeling out of sorts, I grab my phone and message Jack: Hey, all ok? xxx.

  To which he replies: Good thanks, just been running, doing some house stuff. Think you need time alone with A today?

  Hmmm, I’d love to see Jack, especially as Alfie seems to have no interest in communicating with me, but then, it’d seem pretty churlish if I went out. What if my son decided he wanted to talk, and I was unavailable?

  Yes, I reply, but see you v soon. I love you x.

  I love you too x, he replies, which settles me a little. With time to myself, I try to switch my focus back to the forest wildlife theme, and by mid-afternoon, I have at least sketched out several possibilities for the notecard designs. I have also come up with a sort of plan regarding Alfie. Of course, no teenager wants to be quizzed outright by his mother, especially about 1. Feelings; 2. Relationships; and 3. Plans for the future, and I suspect that whatever is going on in his life involves all three.

  Over the years, I found that a far better way to communicate was to approach a topic more in the way of a casual chat, whilst something else was going on. When their dad and I were about to break up, I mentioned it when the kids and I were pottering about in the kitchen together. Molly was painting and Alfie was making cookie dough. I made sure I was beavering away, too – topping and tailing green beans – hoping that all of this industriousness would somehow dilute the enormity of what I was about to say.

  ‘Erm, I have something to tell you,’ I started hesitantly. ‘I know it’s not going to be easy and I’m really sorry. But the thing is, me and your dad have decided we’re going to separate …’

  Of course they were shocked, the painting left unfinished, the cookies never baked – but it was still better, somehow, than ‘sitting them down’ and blurting out the terrible news to their faces.

  When Molly was seventeen, and it became apparent that her ‘friend’ Bryce was actually her boyfriend, I broached the subject of contraception when I’d picked her up in the car from a party across town. Of course, it wasn’t the first time I’d mentioned it, but now it felt as if some urgent revision of the subject was needed, and if she was having sex with this boy then surely she could handle a short chat about condoms? Although I can’t say she relished it, at least she couldn’t run away – not from a moving car – it was less painful than me eyeballing her across the kitchen table.

  And now I’m employing that tactic with Alfie too. Despite his reluctance, we are actually leaving the flat, stepping out into the bright May sunshine (he blinks on emerging, like a vole) and into my car, with the promise that we’re going ‘somewhere nice’.

  ‘Where to?’ Alfie asks, gazing out of the passenger window.

  ‘Just a little place I thought you’d like.’

  He exhales loudly. Of course, he’s too old for a mystery trip; I’m just trying to inject a bit of fun into the occasion. Also, going out has meant that he’s had to get dressed – in daytime clothes – rather than shuffling about in that onesie like someone convalescing. Although maybe he is, in a way. Naturally, I have already noted that his eyes are dull, his complexion sallow, his dark hair lank and outgrown. Twenty minutes later, having arrived at a part of town I never visit normally, we pull up at a kerbside parking space.

  Alfie turns to face me. ‘Arnold Clark? Are you buying a new car?’

  ‘No,’ I reply, ‘we’re going to Planet Earth.’

  He frowns. ‘But that’s what we’re on, Mum. We live on Earth.’

  ‘I mean that Planet Earth,’ I say with a smile, pointing across the road. ‘It’s a shop. Look. It’s just opened; it’s all organic and mostly vegan. Fancy a browse?’

  ‘Yeah!’ he says, perking up now as we cross the street.

  Having so far been denied the pleasure of laundering his skanky underpants, I took it upon myself to speed-learn about veganism this morning. My
son might have witnessed me and my boyfriend in the buff, all dignity vanished – but I can still prove that I am a proper mother, provider of nourishing fare.

  We step into the cheery, light-filled store. Its walls are the orangey-yellow of a pampered hen’s egg yolk.

  ‘Whoa, this looks good,’ Alfie observes approvingly.

  ‘Yes, isn’t it great?’ We gaze around at the spankingly fresh vegetables and gnarly loaves. Eager sales assistants with radiant complexions are busying about, wholesomeness radiating from their pores.

  ‘What are we getting?’ Alfie asks.

  ‘Whatever you like.’

  ‘Really?’ He grins. ‘You mean … anything I want?’

  ‘Yes,’ I say. ‘Just go ahead and choose.’ It had been a risk, hoping to delight a nineteen-year-old boy with what is essentially a trip to a food store, but so far, as we grab a basket each and he starts to browse the bottles and jars, it seems to be paying off.

  Admittedly, it’s pricey, but simply by being here, amongst all these glowing customers with their wicker baskets and brown paper bags, I start to feel purer inside. By the time Alfie and I browse the fresh juices, it has started to feel as if yesterday never happened. Perhaps my session with Jack on the sofa was just a figment of my fevered fifty-one-year-old mind?

  ‘Look at all these milks,’ I exclaim, gazing at various products derived from rice, soya, almond, hemp – it seems that anything can be made into a whitish liquid.

  ‘Mmm, yeah.’ Alfie drops a carton into his basket.

  ‘You don’t get this choice with normal milk,’ I add, hoping to convey the fact that I am wholly supportive of his dietary choices. ‘It’s just skimmed, semi or full fat. How boring is that? I mean, oat milk! How d’you think they milk an oat?’

  He smiles briefly and moves on to the maple syrup, which is so ruinously expensive I wonder if there’s been some kind of mistake. But who am I to quibble? Nope, I am embracing this stuff, even though a dinky bottle costs roughly the same as a small family car. Into his basket it goes, along with a slab of dark chocolate, crackers like roof tiles and a packet of sausages in an unsettling shade of grey.