The Fire House on Honeysuckle Street

by Rachel Dove

  Here we go again, she thought to herself. She should be surprised, but if she was honest with herself, this had been going on for a long time. Xander’s autism was first dismissed, then denied, and then totally ignored by her husband. It had been a year since his diagnosis, and Iain had no intention of adapting.

  ‘I can’t do this any more. This holiday is supposed to be a chance to get back to us, to being a family. Can’t you try?’

  He finished his mouthful and started to butter his toast.

  ‘I didn’t realise I had to try. It sounds like you have it all mapped out, Luce. Why do you need me at all?’ He threw her his very best shit-eating grin, and she wanted to punch him. He never had any input into Xander because he chose not to. It was ridiculous to throw her parenting skills in her face, when he was the worst absent father you could have. One that lived with you, shared your life, but didn’t give a fig about how you were or what made you happy. He had dropped his son like a hot potato as soon as he was a problem.

  ‘Is this about the school?’ She raised her voice now despite herself, and they both looked at Xander in a panic. He was still tucking into his breakfast, looking out of the window next to their table at the pool area beyond. It was one of the major draws of the place, the fantastic facilities for children. Water chutes, lazy river, wave machines, huge pool areas of different depths. Everything that they needed to keep Xander happy and interacting socially. She had formed a vision in her head over the last few months, one where they all splashed together in the pool, teaching their son to master swimming, being happy together, sharing the memory, being present and enjoying their time together. The image popped in her head as Iain jabbed his fork in her direction, trying to get her attention.

  ‘You’re not even listening to me. Of course it’s about the bloody school!’ He jabbed another sausage and thrust it into his mouth, chewing hard and glaring at her. Looking at him, his face scrunched up in fury, his posture ready for the argument that was brewing, the food swilling around in his mouth, she felt sick. How did she ever love this man like she did when they first met? Right now, she was ashamed to be his wife. She was never less attracted to him as she was in this moment. No wonder they didn’t have sex any more. It wasn’t all down to her nights being taken up by Xander’s scary dreams and her exhaustion at the end of a long and tiring day.

  ‘I told you about this a long time ago, he’s not a happy kid there. We need to move him so we can help him to make friends. The kids at his school are awful, and the parents aren’t much better.’

  A snort came from her husband as he shovelled more food in, no doubt wanting to get his money’s worth from the all-inclusive holiday that she’d paid for. The man could peel an orange in his pocket without spilling a drop of juice.

  ‘So I should pay for some poncey school, for him to be mollycoddled even more?’

  Lucy sighed heavily. Iain was a good businessman. A shark, excellent at what he did, which was selling office stationery by bulk to large businesses. He was good at his job, an excellent provider, but his working world and hers were, and always would be, galaxies apart.

  ‘It’s a specialist school, fewer pupils, more one to one support. He’d be with other children with needs like his, not kids who mock his little quirks. He’s not a bad kid, Iain, but there, he lashes out and gets into trouble. He doesn’t understand what he did wrong!’

  It continued like this through the rest of the meal, them whispering and shouting occasionally, trying to sort out their differences whilst their son devoured half the buffet menu and listened to his favourite band of the moment, which was the Beatles at that time. He devoured whole back catalogues of bands, learned all there was to know about them, and then moved on to the next. Something that his mother was doubly grateful for lately, because it shielded him from witnessing his parents’ marriage implode. Once they had finished, they grabbed their pool bags and headed outside. A few hours later, it happened.

  Lucy had been reading, laid out on her sunlounger enjoying the feel of the sun on her skin. For once, she could relax, knowing that there was no work to do, no laundry to fold. Xander was slathered in cream and in the pool with his dad, and she was finally catching up on the stack of books she constantly had at the side of her bed. She bought them to read, but then never got the time, so they sat there, taunting her. Most nights she barely got through a chapter before her head started to nod. She had bought herself a Kindle, thinking she could read it one-handed by the soft screen light, cuddling her anxiety-ridden son, but after a few nights of dozing off and having it land hard on her face, she went back to the paperbacks, and watched her stack of unused treasures get larger. Now, she was enjoying her downtime, and was just getting to the juiciest part of the book when her husband’s voice boomed out across the pool. She jumped off her lounger, heading to the noise. In the queue to the water slides, right at the front, stood her son and husband. Xander was shaking his head from side to side rapidly, whilst Iain, an angry look on his face, was trying to drag him onto the ride.

  ‘Come on, don’t be a bloody girl! You’ll love it, I’ll come down with you.’

  Lucy shuddered. Since when was being a girl a bad thing? Man up, stop crying, be a man. It had to stop. At eight, Xander didn’t care about what kind of man he was going to be, he was simply terrified of his dad throwing him down a water slide. Lucy fast-walked towards them, trying to get their attention by waving, not wanting to draw any more attention. People were already looking, which would make Iain angrier and Xander more anxious. When he felt cornered, he dug his heels in. He was like his father in that respect if nothing else.

  Reaching them, apologising to everyone in the queue as she pushed past, she smiled at them both and looked at Iain.

  ‘He doesn’t want to go, it’s fine. I’ll take him to the pool, you go on the slide. We’ll watch from the bottom, won’t we?’

  Xander, tear-soaked cheeks and full bottom lip pout, shook his head vehemently.

  ‘No! I want to go to the room!’

  ‘You’re not going anywhere.’ Iain tugged his arm again, pushing his wife aside none too gently as he headed to the mouth of the slide. ‘We’re holding people up. Two minutes and we’re done, okay? Let’s go!’

  Xander reached for his mother with his free hand. ‘Mummy!’

  Lucy took it, giving it a reassuring squeeze but taking care not to pull him her way. The last thing he needed was a parent tug-of-war.

  ‘Iain, please,’ she tried, but he glared at her, before pulling his arm again.

  ‘I am his father, I know what’s best. Come on, Xander!’

  ‘No!’ Xander screamed, pulling back against his dad, jerking his arm back in quick bursts to try to get free. ‘No, Daddiiiee, I don’t want to!’

  ‘You’re doing it!’

  ‘Stop, Iain, you’re scaring him!’

  ‘Shut up, Lucy, mind your own business!’

  ‘Nooooo! Daddiiieeee!’

  ‘He is my bloody business! Let him go!’

  ‘Dadd-dy, let me go!’ Xander, now realising that he wasn’t going to get free, screamed in frustration and then charged forward, head-butting his dad in the torso.

  ‘Oofff!’

  ‘Xander, stop that. Iain, let him go!’

  ‘For God’s sake, why can’t you just be fucking normal, for once!’

  Xander went to charge again, and that was it. Iain brought his open palm up towards his chest, and then backhanded him. Suddenly free, Xander careened into his mother, who wrapped him in her arms, tucking him into her side, away from Iain, as she lunged forward and pushed him in the chest with her free hand. She used all her might, feeling every inch the mummy bear.

  ‘Don’t you dare do that again! You hear me? You will never hit him like that again!’

  She could feel the strain on her throat as she growled the words at him, the anger, shock and frustration zapping around every inch of her body, firing up every cell of her being.

  ‘Xander, let’s go to th
e room.’ He gave a relieved squeak, his face hidden into her side. She turned back to Iain, jabbing her finger in the air in front of her. ‘You even try to come into our room, and I’ll have you arrested.’ He looked for a moment like he was going to challenge her. She saw that familiar glint of annoyance cross his features, but he sighed deeply and nodded. She headed to the loungers, scooping up her bag and hers and Xander’s things on the way. The romance novel, lying open on the towel, was flung off and ended up landing in a puddle of water on the tiled floor. She left it there. She didn’t want to know how the story ended. Happy ever after was a concept that she had no hope or use for now.

  ‘You’ll never let me forget that, will you? I am the devil in your story, and that’s it.’ Iain was slumped at his seat at the table now, and for the first time Lucy saw real pain in his demeanour. ‘I will regret that forever, you know that. That’s not me, I was just frustrated. I love our son, I do. I just …’

  ‘He’s not the son you wanted, is he?’

  She didn’t mean it in a harsh way. She’d had her struggles herself over the years. You develop a picture in your head of what your family will be. What your children will become. Will they have your chin? Your love of reading? Their dad’s business brain? When you have a child growing inside you, you envisage a big, beautiful, happy life for them. You will tear down any obstacle, you will stop any bullies, you will give your child the tools of life and then watch them build their own bright and shiny futures. You imagine Christmases with matching PJs, hot chocolate, leaving goodies out for Santa. Watching their excited faces as they come downstairs, their tiny feet padding down the carpeted stairs, bursting with energy and happiness because Santa has been. You imagine Easter egg hunts, family holidays, graduations. Standing in the aisle, best hat on, crying as your child ties themselves to their chosen person before God, or Elvis, or whatever deity they choose to wed under.

  When your child is born, and they have needs, that picture is taken away, and you can find yourselves feeling cheated. For them, for you. Life will never look like that, and it can be a bitter pill to swallow. She wouldn’t be without Xander, but she understood how people can struggle.

  ‘I love him,’ Iain said, for lack of any other explanation. ‘I just had a picture in my head, you know? Playing catch, riding bikes, going to the footie. Xander can’t do any of that. It doesn’t mean you get to take him from me.’

  She felt wretched then. The first thing she wanted to say was that Xander could do those things. It would be tricky sometimes, sure, but he was a person, with a life of his own. He didn’t try to do those things with his son, so how would he know? Xander didn’t even have a bike. Something else she needed to remedy. She made a mental note. He was autistic, not incapable. Lucy realised how little her husband actually knew about their son, and her heart ached for them both. For what they were missing out on from each other.

  ‘How did you find us, anyway? I know I told you we were coming to see my aunt, but how did you know where you were staying?’

  ‘I looked at your Amazon account. I saw the delivery order address. Bit much to spend on Lego, isn’t it? He has Lego at home.’

  ‘Wow, stalk much?’ she asked, surprised that he had gone to such depths to find her. Why didn’t he just ring Marlene? She knew the answer to that. Pride. Stubbornness. The same reasons she had decided to get away from him for.

  He didn’t laugh, just clenched his jaw.

  ‘I had to “stalk” you as you say—’ he used aggressive air quotes to punctuate his point ‘—because you ran off to the countryside and left me a note. You order a lot of expensive toys that he doesn’t need, and don’t have a thought for me, or what I have going on in my life.’

  It took a while for what he said to sink in; she had to dissect his barbs in her head. Money was always a sore point with them both, with Iain feeling like he did everything, but it wasn’t the case. Lucy was independent before she met him, and he had obviously forgotten that now.

  ‘First of all, he did need the Lego. He spent his birthday money on it, and he needs something to do when we are in the cottage. Do you really begrudge him that? You spend four times the money on your golfing weekends, and I don’t moan at you, do I?’

  ‘Right, fine,’ he snipped, standing up and looking around him at the surroundings of the neat and cosy cottage. ‘How much is this place costing?’

  Lucy felt her anger bubble up under her skin. Same old, same old.

  ‘I’ve got it covered, don’t worry.’

  He nodded, sneering a little as he looked about him. ‘Right, well I have the car around the corner, so we can get packed up and go when you’re ready. I’m sure we can return the parcels.’

  Lucy looked at him in stunned silence. Looking out of the doors, she checked that Xander was still okay and playing, and then stood and headed to the front door. She could hear Iain following her, and she steeled herself for what was coming. Opening the front door, she stood out on the porch. The light was still there, but fading a little as the heat from the sun died down. She needed to get tea on, and Xander in and bathed ready for bed. If his routine was messed up, he wouldn’t sleep well. Not that Iain would care about that.

  He followed her out and picked up one of the big boxes from the porch.

  ‘I’ll start taking these to the car. I’ll park out front.’

  Lucy crossed her arms. ‘Put the box down, Iain, we’re not coming with you. I booked the whole summer here, and we’re staying.’

  Iain’s face was a picture, and she couldn’t help but laugh. It escaped before she could stop it, and she covered her mouth with her hand. Luckily, the little lanes around them were empty.

  ‘Funny, is it?’ he jeered. ‘What makes you think you can do that?’

  Lucy looked at him, his face scrunched up in anger, the box in his hands, his knuckles turning white as he gripped it tight. She loved him once, but that seemed like a hell of a long time ago now.

  ‘Iain,’ she said softly, moving forward and taking the box out of his hands. He pulled it back at first, but then relented and let his fingers slip from the sides of the box. She put it back down next to the others, taking a step further forward. ‘I don’t want to fight, but you are never home, and Xander deserves a holiday. I wanted to get away, see my family. I got the time off work, and I’m staying here. We need this break, Iain, and I think you know that.’

  Iain pulled his keys from his pocket. ‘I’ll go get the car, we can talk about it when we get home. I’m home tomorrow so we can sort it out then.’

  Then, it clicked. The date popped into her head, she could see it. Right there, a snapshot in her mind of the calendar on her kitchen wall. That’s why he was here.

  ‘You can leave now, Iain, and don’t bother coming back. We’re having our summer, and we are not puppets for your amusement. You can’t just pick us up when you need us.’

  Iain threw his arms up in the air in frustration.

  ‘What the hell are you talking about? I came to take my family home!’

  ‘Really?’ She raised her voice to match his, one ear and eye focused on the doors behind her. ‘So it’s not the fact that the annual ball for work is tomorrow, no? Face it, Iain, you don’t give a shit about us! You’re here so I can come home, clean the house, iron your shirt and hang on your arm all night to make you look good and talk about your perfect family. The son that you are ashamed of and slapped for being scared. Well, I’m not coming. You can go and schmooze all your little golfing buddies all on your own.’

  ‘Really!’ Iain exploded, right then and there. ‘Really? That’s it?’ He squeezed the hand with his keys tight into a fist, and shook it at her. ‘You really are a bitch sometimes, you know that? I don’t think you know just how much I do for you!’ He started to walk backwards down the path, and kept shouting at her the whole time. How hard he worked for them all, how much she had an easy life, how awful she was to him, how screwed up things were. All because of her and Xander. Everything was down t
o them. His long work hours, his need to golf all weekend and drink all night with his ‘contacts’. She could almost hear the violins playing for him. The tiniest violins known to man, for this pitiful figure of one. Lucy was really starting to feel mad. She needed him to just go. The thought of even having to sit in a car with the man was enough to get her mouth moving. Enough was enough!

  ‘Iain,’ she said, as quietly and evenly as she could, ‘you need to leave. You’re not Tiger Woods, you don’t need to golf every weekend to provide for your family. I managed on my own before you, and I sure as hell will after. You left, not me. You left your family a long time ago, as soon as things got tough. You want us when it suits you, and that’s not a family.’

  ‘A family!’ He snorted with laughter, glaring at her from halfway down the path. ‘Sure, blame it all on me, that’s great. I’ll just rattle around all summer, paying for your strop!’

  ‘I don’t need your money!’ This came out as a scream, a vent of anger spewing forth from her. ‘I need you to leave, so just go!’

  ‘You know what, Lucy? I’m tired of your crap now. Go get Xander, and your shit, and let’s go.’

  He went to take a step closer, his eye on the boxes of Lego, and no doubt to the refund he wanted of his own son’s money. She pushed the boxes back with a sweep of her foot, and crossed her arms in defiance.

  ‘No, Iain. Leave. I’ll tell Xander you’ll call him later.’

  He went to take another step forward, his foot lifting to take a step, but then it didn’t connect, and it just hung there, half off the ground. His face turned from rage to confusion as he lunged forward again, but he just swayed from side to side instead.

  ‘I think,’ Sam’s deep voice said from behind him, ‘that the lady asked you to leave. I think you should do that. Now.’ Sam’s shoulder moved, and Iain almost fell flat on his face as he released him. He had been holding his clothing, making him immobile. ‘You okay, Lucy? Where’s Xander?’

  ‘He’s fine, he’s in the garden.’