by Shari Low
THIS IS ME
Also by Shari Low
The Story of Our Life
A Life Without You
The Other Wives Club
With or Without You
The Winter Day Series
One Day in Winter
Another Day in Winter
Non-Fiction
Because Mummy Said So!
This Is Me
Shari Low
AN IMPRINT OF HEAD OF ZEUS
www.ariafiction.com
First published in the United Kingdom in 2019 by Aria, an imprint of Head of Zeus Ltd
Copyright © Shari Low, 2019
The moral right of Shari Low to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act of 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.
This is a work of fiction. All characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
ISBN 9781788541435
Aria
c/o Head of Zeus
First Floor East
5–8 Hardwick Street
London EC1R 4RG
www.ariafiction.com
To my menfolk,
J, C and B
Who are everything and more…
…and This Is Them…
Claire Bradley (née Harrow), 39 – eldest child of Ray and Denise, mum to Max and Jordy.
Sam Bradley, 41 – dad to Max and Jordy, Claire’s ex-husband. Currently living with his new partner, Nicola.
Max Bradley, 19 – kicked off Claire’s empty nest syndrome when he left home at 17 to join the navy.
Jordy Bradley, 18 – just followed his brother out of the door, gone to take up a football scholarship at an American university.
Denise (McAlee) Harrow, 55 – Claire and Doug’s mother. Martyrdom a specialty.
Ray Harrow, 56 – Claire and Doug’s father. Obnoxious git.
Doug Harrow, 38 – Claire’s brother. The only maths teacher in Scotland who looks like Ricky Martin. Wife Fiona, a lawyer.
Jeanna McCallan, 39 – Claire’s best friend since childhood. Superpower is brutal honesty.
Agnes and Fred McAlee – Denise’s parents, Claire’s grandparents. Also mum and dad to twins, Rachel and Ronnie, and Donna.
Jenny and Pete Harrow – Ray’s parents.
Tom and Sandie Bradley – Sam’s parents, also have sons Des, Jason and John.
Josie and Val, 70-something and 60-something (they refuse to confirm the exact numbers) – Claire’s pals and support system, two towers of strength who have been through the wars but are still standing.
Contents
Also by Shari Low
Welcome Page
Copyright Page
Dedication
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty-One
Chapter Thirty-Two
Chapter Thirty-Three
Chapter Thirty-Four
Chapter Thirty-Five
Chapter Thirty-Six
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Chapter Forty
Chapter Forty-One
Epilogue
Acknowledgement
About Shari Low
Become an Aria Addict
Prologue
Denise and Claire – August 2019
The fog was dense and chilling, but it was on the inside of Denise’s skull. The sun shone through the window, reflecting against the mirror in front of her, but the heat couldn’t permeate her body or her mind. Her movements were slow, fumbling, frustrating. The buttons on the black jacket that she couldn’t make fasten. The hairbrush that she could barely raise to her head. The eyelids that she could hardly lift because she didn’t want to view a world without him.
Ray was gone.
A visceral reaction to that thought forced the air out of her chest, causing her to buckle forward.
He was gone.
Her whole life wiped out in the seconds it took for his brain to stop functioning, then his heart to fail and stop. No warning. No second chances. No hope. Fifty-six years old and he was just gone, leaving a soulless vacuum behind.
She’d given up everything for him, willingly and without question. Now waves of grief were dragging the shifting sands of her life back into the water, sucking her down with them.
But she had to do this last thing for him today.
The crematorium was only a few miles away, on the south side of Glasgow. He was there already. Waiting for her. She was wearing the gorgeous Gina Bacconi black dress and jacket he’d bought her from House of Fraser last year, she’d done her make-up just how he liked it, and she was going to walk into that crematorium with her head held high.
Today she would say a last goodbye to the man who had been her world and she knew, without hesitation, that, despite everything, she would love him until the end of time.
*
A few miles away, her daughter, Claire, sat on the end of her bed, back straight so as not to put creases in the black dress she’d just peeled from the dry-cleaning bag. A loose strand escaped from the chignon at the nape of her neck and she pushed it back behind her ear with shaking hands, her fingertips gliding over the jaw that was set in defiance of her emotions. She wouldn’t crumble. She wouldn’t falter.
Her father was gone.
She exhaled, trying desperately to banish the knot that was twisting her gut.
He was gone.
For thirty-nine years, he’d been an undeniable force in her life, his actions and her reactions determining so much of who she was and what she’d become.
A vision of her mother flashed before her. Losing the love of her life would have left her heartbroken, but Claire was sure to her core that Denise would hold it together, put on one last show for her husband. She had never let him down, never faltered in her adoration for a man who was so much more than flawed.
It went against the laws of nature, the ways of humanity, but all she felt for her parents was disgust.
And that’s why she too, was going to walk into that crematorium with her head held high.
Today she would say a last goodbye to the man who had treated her like she was nothing and she knew, without hesitation, that she would despise him until the end of time.
One
Claire – 2019 – One Week Earlier
‘I’ve laced it with arsenic to put you out of your misery,’ Jeanna sai
d, as she put a steaming cup of coffee down in front of Claire. She hadn’t bothered topping it up with cold water to cool it down and avoid scorching of the lips, because she figured Claire was so focused on staring at her phone it would take at least ten minutes for her to realise it was there.
‘Yeah, lovely, thanks,’ Claire replied distractedly, as predicted, the jokey threat of imminent poisoning failing to register.
Jeanna sat in her usual chair, directly across from her distracted friend, in the distracted friend’s kitchen. It was only a few miles away from her home in Glasgow’s city centre, so she dropped by at least a couple of times a week for dinner, and these Sunday cuppas were weekly events. They’d been best mates for over twenty-five years and stuck together through thick, thin, and opposing views on their favourite member of Take That (Jeanna – Robbie, Claire – Howard). Today, however, was more of an emergency visitation situation. Jeanna was here to provide emotional support and consolation in her friend’s time of need. Unfortunately, as always, that came out like brutal honesty and flippant disregard for the gravity of the situation. ‘Stop staring at the phone. He isn’t going to call. Caramel wafer?’
Claire still didn’t look up. ‘No. I haven’t been to Zumba for a fortnight. My arse is the size of a beanbag.’
Claire paused, her eyes finally leaving the phone to dart to the biscuit tin that was now silently shouting to her from the middle of the table. She tugged on the sleeve of her standard comfy jumper, then assessed the tightness of the waistband on her equally standard jeans. It wasn’t cutting off the blood supply to her extremities, so there was room for indulgence.
‘Sod it, I’ll have one. Big arses are in fashion these days.’
As always, Jeanna resisted temptation. A dedicated gym goer with buttocks like melons, she hadn’t willingly consumed a non-alcoholic carb since the nineties. Her daily dress code of trainers, Lycra running tights, a tiny vest and a clingy hoodie was a constant reminder that her body was a temple that could not be violated by Claire’s stash of high calorie snacks. She took a sip of her green tea and spotted that Claire’s eyes had strayed back to her phone. ‘Dear God, will you give it up? He isn’t going to call.’
Claire swallowed the heady combination of caramel, chocolate and wafer before replying with as much indignation as she could muster. ‘He is.’
‘No he isn’t. You’re wasting your life waiting around for him and he ISN’T GOING TO CALL. You realise this is an exact replica of a conversation we had when we were fifteen and you were madly in love with the bloke who played the bass guitar in that crap band that assaulted our ears down the youth club disco.’
Claire tried to be offended, but the twenty-four year old memory made her react with something between a laugh and a cringe. ‘Bobby Wright! I wrote my telephone number on the towel he used to wipe the sweat off his brow between sets. I was sure he was the next Jon Bon Jovi. He works in the butchers in the High Street now and I can’t buy pork chops with a straight face.’
Jeanna giggled. ‘Go vegetarian. It’ll save the embarrassment. But the point is… back then, Bobby Bon Jovi didn’t call and Jordy isn’t going to call either.’
Claire knew she was right, but she couldn’t bring herself to give up hope. Back in 1994, her eighteen year old heart could take the rejection, but this was different. It wasn’t some teenage crush she was waiting to hear from. All she wanted to see on the screen was an incoming call from her youngest child, Jordan Samuel Bradley. Age eighteen. Her son. The one who’d gone off to university last week without an ounce of hesitation. It wasn’t even as if it was somewhere in Scotland, and he’d be popping home every weekend with his washing. Nope, a soccer scholarship had taken him to a university in Tennessee, just outside Nashville. Getting there had been a long, arduous process, sacrificing normal teenage life to train, work, graft, make himself the best player he could be. She was beyond proud and thrilled that it had paid off and he’d achieved the goal he’d set himself when he first went to high school, yet every time she thought of him being away for four years she had an urge to break into full Whitney Houston mode and deliver a tearful yet dramatic rendition of ‘I Will Always Love You’.
His independence was nothing new. Hadn’t she taught both her children to be that way? But that didn’t make it any easier. When she took Jordy along to the school gates for his very first day at primary school, he might have been a little shy but only one of them had suffered acute separation anxiety and it wasn’t the short one with the Power Rangers backpack.
Twelve years later, when she’d waved him off in the car park of a Tennessee university, it was a different backpack, same story.
‘You know, it wasn’t supposed to be like this. I thought when I had my kids I’d signed up for thirty years of love and devotion, with them by my side. Because, you know, no one was going to prise my little darlings away. And what happens?’ Claire asked, then steamed on and answered herself. ‘First, Max joins the flipping navy – I get seasick on the Gourock to Dunoon ferry and yet someone who shares my genes has decided to live underwater. And now Jordy has moved to the other side of the world. I mean, it’s enough to give anyone a complex. I’m barely thirty-bloody-nine and I’m home alone already!’
‘Is this the point when I’m supposed to step in with pearls of wisdom and sympathy?’ Jeanna asked, slightly alarmed. Emotional consolations and expressions of comfort fell outwith her range of personality skills.
Claire sighed. ‘Nope, I know your limitations. Just pass me another biscuit. Make it a Wagon Wheel this time.’
‘No, I’m not doing it,’ Jeanna replied, with unwavering defiance. ‘Look, I’ll give you today to wallow, and then that’s it. You need to look at the positives. For the first time in nearly twenty years, you have your whole life back. You don’t need to do anything for anyone, be anywhere because someone needs a lift, or be organising your life around other people. You’re completely free.’
‘Are you trying to make me cry?’
‘No! I’m trying to say stop being pathetic and instead start thinking about all the brilliant things you can do now.’
Ignoring Jeanna was never an option, so Claire had no choice but to ask the question and brace herself for a slew of suggestions. ‘Like?’
‘Like read books. Find a hobby. Go to the gym. Get fit. Lose weight.’
‘I’d rather knock myself out trying to get a large box of Wagon Wheels off a high shelf,’ Claire replied, deadpan.
‘OK. But you could travel. Meet someone. Have sex.’
‘Make that two large boxes of Wagon Wheels.’
Jeanna wasn’t letting her off the hook. ‘You could just try putting yourself first.’
Claire tried to come up with a witty retort, but her heart wasn’t in it. It would be 9 a.m. in Nashville now. She’d sent a text asking Jordy to call her as soon as he was awake and he’d have been up for at least an hour by now. She couldn’t argue on the fact that she was being pathetic. She knew it was true. But this was day three without speaking to him and she just felt… lost. And slightly stressed. He could have been kidnapped. Had his drink spiked. Fallen down a mine shaft.
Note to self – check if there are many disused mines in a ten mile radius of Nashville.
She just wasn’t equipped to deal with this situation. She’d been a mother for two decades and she’d pretty much sussed out everything except where to find the off switch.
‘You’re right,’ she finally admitted. ‘I know you are. And I know this is a perfect opportunity to get my chunky arse in gear. But I just… just…’ She reached out for the Wagon Wheel, using the wrapper to stem the tears that were threatening to fall.
‘Oh Jesus…’ Jeanna sighed, rolling her eyes.
Claire took no notice of the lack of sympathy. ‘I just miss them,’ she wailed. ‘And I know it’s a total cliché, but I’ve been their mum for so long, I’ve no idea what to do without them.’ It was true. Before the boys deserted her, her days had followed a set pattern. Get up, ha
ve breakfast with them, tackle the school run, go to work, collect them afterwards, take them to the gym or to Max’s swimming practice or Jody’s football training, or one of their mate’s houses, or to a party, or – if they graced her with their presence – to a family night out at the cinema or the local Nandos.
Now? Nothing but bleak emptiness.
Jeanna’s voice was barely audible over the noise of a loud sniff from her pal. ‘You definitely need to have sex. Or get your jaws clamped.’
Claire fired the wrapper at her. ‘And get a new friend,’ she retorted, holding her own. They both knew she didn’t mean it. This heady combination of brutal honesty, intolerance and underlying care was a very familiar dynamic. They’d been inseparable since high school, when Jeanna had lured her into the netball team with the promise that the football squad came to all their games and they’d find her irresistible. All Claire got was a new best friend who made her laugh, chafed thighs and a knock-back from the footie team’s star striker.
Over two decades later, their dynamic hadn’t changed much. Claire was the warm ying to Jeanna’s incredibly dry, frequently bitchy yang. Through the years, they’d survived everything that the world had thrown at them. Jeanna’s two divorces, followed by her enthusiastic embrace of the online dating scene. Health issues. Make ups. Break ups. A difference of opinion on almost every subject they’d ever discussed. Several career changes for Jeanna, until she had found her calling as a life coach – someone who lit fires under the buttocks of people who weren’t reaching their personal and career goals. Then there was Claire’s one failed marriage. The traumatic split at a time when she was at her most vulnerable. And her life as a single mother to two teenagers.
They’d weathered every storm together, triumphed over every crisis, right up to the point where one of them was sporting a disappointed duck face (Jeanna had overdone the fillers again) and the other was comfort eating retro, circle shaped chocolate biscuits.
Jeanna was still dwelling on Claire’s comment about getting a new best friend. ‘Good luck finding one as irresistible as me,’ she retorted, her Botoxed eyebrows trying their best to form an indignant arch.