No Sister of Mine

by Vivien Brown

  As his career progressed, Josh worked harder and longer, often going away on business trips. Up north, Birmingham, Wales, the south coast … I lost track after a while. To be honest, I never really understood why an assistant bank manager, or loans adviser, or whatever it was he called himself, would need to go to quite so many courses and conferences, but I felt it best not to question him too much and, if I had, I knew he would just have told me it was too dull and boring to explain. In truth, although I still worried that he might be seeing other women, getting close to one – or maybe more – of his young glamorous colleagues behind my back, on the whole I enjoyed the times when he was away. Janey was turning into a real daddy’s girl, always sitting on his knee or clinging to his legs, always wanting Josh to take her up to bed or fetch her a drink or play with her in the bath. I knew it was wrong to be jealous. She was his child just as much as she was mine, but sometimes I just didn’t get a look in, and it was only when he was not there that I got the chance to have her all to myself.

  One Sunday afternoon, once Josh had put his case into the boot and driven off to some place in the Midlands that I had never heard of and couldn’t be bothered to look for on a map, I decided to take advantage of what was left of the sunshine and wheel Janey out in her pushchair. Not that she really needed it anymore, unless she was in a lazy mood or got tired on the way back, but it was always handy for carrying stuff. She looked so cute that day, in her little T-shirt and shorts, with a white sunhat falling over her eyes, clutching a cuddly toy rabbit. In the bag hanging on the handles I had packed a ball, a couple of books, a picnic blanket, and all her favourite snacks, with no intention of going home until dinner time.

  Halfway round the park we ran straight into a man. Quite literally ran into him or, more accurately, he ran into us, as he came tearing round a bend in the path, tinny music seeping out of headphones attached to a small player clipped to his T-shirt, and almost knocked me over.

  ‘Sorry. Wasn’t looking.’ He pulled the headphones down around his neck, quickly switched the loud music off and stopped to catch his breath. ‘Sarah? Sarah Peters. Well, I never. It is you!’

  It took me a few moments to recognise the once chubby, shy boy I remembered from that day I’d tripped over on the bus as this now rather slim and handsome man out jogging in the park. Colin Grant!

  ‘Oh, Colin. Fancy seeing you after all these years. How are you?’

  ‘Good, thanks. And I obviously don’t need to ask what’s been happening in your life!’ He bent down to take a closer look at Janey, who beamed up at him as if he was a long-lost and much-loved uncle and made a sneaky grab for his headphones. ‘So, who is this gorgeous little lady? And who’s the lucky man? Don’t tell me you ended up with that jerk, Jacobs?’

  ‘This is Janey. She’s nearly four. And, no, I did not!’

  ‘Glad to hear it. He was never good enough for you. And he’s a used-car salesman now, you know. I bumped into him when I was looking for my latest. Needless to say I didn’t buy it from his place! Anyway, enough about him. I don’t suppose you fancy a coffee or an ice cream or something? If you’re not in a hurry to be anywhere, that is. It’s thirsty work, this keeping fit lark. We’ll sit in the sun and you can tell all.’

  ‘Nothing much to tell. Marriage. Motherhood. Busy, but boring. And I’m a Cavendish now, by the way, not a Peters. I married a banker. Josh. Not much else to say really. But I’m dying to know what you’re up to these days. So, yes, please. I’d love a coffee, and Janey adores ice cream. Assuming she’s included in the invitation?’

  ‘Of course she is. Come on. The kiosk by the playground should be open. We might even be able to have a go on the swings, if nobody’s looking!’

  We walked side by side, Janey kicking her legs and singing to herself in her buggy all the way to the kiosk. Colin waved away my offer to pay, pulled out a ten-pound note that had been tucked inside his sock and bought us coffees in polystyrene cups and a couple of Penguins, with a small cornet for Janey that gradually dripped its way down her arm as we sat opposite each other on wooden benches in the sun.

  ‘So?’ he said, putting his cup down on the table in front of us. ‘You want to know what I’ve been up to? Everything since we last met? It could take a while.’

  ‘Okay, maybe just the edited highlights then.’ I laughed. ‘I would like to get home before dark!’

  ‘Well, I suppose the biggest thing – the most important thing – is that I’m a doctor now. Well, almost!’

  ‘Wow! Really?’

  ‘Not quite consultant yet, mind. Very much a junior. Still in training, so to speak.’

  ‘But I’m impressed, even so. Beats my one and only part-time job, behind the counter at the dry cleaners’, that’s for sure.’

  ‘Ah, but look what you’ve done. Brought a little life into the world. That outranks any achievement of mine. Something I’ll never be able to do.’

  ‘Oh, come on, Colin. So men don’t have wombs. That’s just biology. That’s not to say you can’t have kids of your own one day. Assuming there’s a Mrs Grant in the picture, obviously.’

  ‘There isn’t. No wife, no girlfriend. Or boyfriend, before you ask! No, I’ve just been too busy, too focused on my studies, and too damn knackered to be honest.’ He picked up his cup and took a sip. ‘Was that Mrs Grant thing your way of finding out if I’m available, by the way?’ His eyes danced with merriment.

  ‘No! I am a respectable married woman, I’ll have you know.’

  ‘Shame. But you can’t blame a man for trying. I may be one-hundred-per-cent single, but for you I would definitely make an exception.’

  It was just banter, I knew that, but I could feel myself blushing just the same. ‘Come on, get that drink down you. You promised us swings, remember?’

  The next hour passed by in a flurry of fun, Colin chasing Janey up the slide steps and then running back round to catch her at the bottom, pushing her higher than I could ever have managed on the swings, and whizzing the roundabout, with all of us on board, so fast I thought I might be sick.

  Back in her buggy, Janey’s eyelids were drooping. Colin walked with us as far as the park gates and leant forward to kiss me on the cheek. ‘It’s been lovely seeing you again, Sarah. We must do it again. Soon.’ He took my hand in his, his fingers warm, his thumb pressing against my rings. ‘A walk, lunch, coffee, or maybe something a tad stronger … whatever suits. I’m sorry I don’t have a card or a pen or anything to give you my number, or to take yours. I don’t even have my phone with me. When you go out running, you don’t normally carry a lot of stuff. Well, I don’t. Just money, for emergencies.’

  ‘Like having to buy ice cream!’ I pulled my new mobile phone out from the bottom of my bag. ‘Here. Tap your number in for me. But call yourself … oh, I don’t know. let’s say Carol, shall we? I wouldn’t want Josh to see I’m collecting men friends in my contact list!’

  ‘Jealous type, is he?’

  ‘I wouldn’t say that. It’s just easier somehow. No questions asked.’

  Colin handed the phone back. ‘There! Now you have my number – or Carol’s anyway – but I don’t have yours. So whether we ever speak, or meet, again will be entirely up to you. Our future is in your hands.’

  I laughed. ‘Such power!’

  ‘You will though, won’t you?’ He was still holding my hand. ‘Call?’

  I nodded, slipping my hand out from his. ‘Yes. I can’t promise when, and I have no idea of your shifts, so you’ll probably be in the middle of an operation or something, but yes, I will call.’

  ‘Bye then. And bye to you, little Janey.’ He laid his fingers gently on the top of her sleeping head and stroked her hair. And then he was gone, jogging away from us along the path, pulling his headphones back over his ears. I stood at the gate and watched until he went around the corner and disappeared from view. He didn’t look back.

  ***

  Josh was very quiet. He sat sideways on our second-hand sofa with his feet up and star
ed at the TV. There was a quiz show on, but I could see he wasn’t watching it.

  I worked around him, picking up discarded newspapers, running a duster over the coffee table, steering the hoover around the room. Normally he would have complained that he couldn’t hear the questions, insisted that the room was clean enough already, and couldn’t I find a better time to do all this stuff? Today he just sat there and said nothing at all.

  It was a Friday evening in November, already dark outside, and we had eaten early, Janey perched between us at the dining table, smearing ketchup over everything, herself included. Now, face and fingers wiped, she was settled in an armchair, playing with her dolls, waiting for Josh to put her in the bath and tuck her up in bed.

  ‘Do you ever wonder where we would be now, if we hadn’t got married?’

  Where had that come from all of a sudden? I was in the kitchen, putting the cleaning things away in the cupboard under the sink, but there was a small open hatch in the wall linking the two rooms and I could hear him through it, even though, at this angle, I couldn’t see him. Did he even realise I wasn’t there in the room with him anymore?

  I closed the cupboard door and went back into the living room. Josh was still staring sightlessly at the TV. The quiz had finished and there was a wildlife programme on in its place. A pack of wolves roamed across the screen, in search of prey.

  ‘Sorry. What did you say?’

  He turned towards me. ‘You heard. If we hadn’t got married, if you hadn’t been pregnant, what would have happened to us, do you think?’

  ‘Us? Us, as in us together, do you mean?’

  ‘Well, no. I don’t think we would have been together, would we?’

  I sat down at the other end of the sofa. ‘No, I guess not.’

  ‘I mean us, separately, Sarah. What would you be doing now? What would I be doing? With no pregnancy, no wedding, would you have gone back to school, do you think? Got a proper job? Or would you have latched on to some other bloke by now, got married anyway?’

  ‘Latched on?’

  ‘Okay, that was a bad choice of word. But, being married, staying at home, doing all this domestic stuff, it’s what you would probably have chosen, isn’t it? With or without me?’

  ‘Look, whatever this is all about, let’s not talk in front of Janey, okay?’ I picked her up and made for the stairs. ‘Time for bed, sweetheart.’

  ‘Want Daddy to take me.’ Janey squirmed in my grasp and stretched out her arms towards Josh, almost knocking me off balance.

  ‘You sit down. I’ll do it.’

  He was gone a long time, probably dreading the conversation to come, but he had started it and I knew it had to be finished. When he came downstairs, he sat back in the same place on the sofa and gazed straight ahead at the TV again, even though I had turned it off.

  ‘What’s this all about, Josh?’ I had made us both a cup of tea and put a couple of biscuits on the saucers. ‘Are you trying to tell me you regret our marriage? Our life? Because it’s a bit late now. We made a mistake, yes, but we made our choice, and, like it or not, we are married. And we have Janey … There’s no going back.’

  ‘I know that. It’s just that sometimes … sometimes it’s hard not to feel trapped, you know. Hemmed in. I’m going to be thirty next week. Thirty! Can you believe it? Where did the years go? Don’t you feel that we should be out there, doing other things, exciting things? Thirty’s still young, isn’t it? But it feels like we’ve been married forever. Short of money, sitting on someone else’s castoff furniture, tied down by a mortgage, eating bloody custard creams like a pair of pensioners. Never going anywhere …’

  ‘Going anywhere? Where do you want to go? Out for dinner? A day at the seaside? We can do those things. If we’re careful with our money we might be able to manage a week away next summer. Spain or—’

  ‘Spain? Crammed around some noisy, smelly pool, surrounded by other families with screaming kids, necking pints of cheap lager and eating the same crap we get at home?’

  ‘What then? What is it you want? Where is it you want to go? Tell me, and we’ll try to do it. Because don’t you think I need a break too? A change from all this? It’s not always easy for me either you know, stuck here every day, washing and shopping, with nobody to talk to, and dealing with Janey’s mess and her tantrums.’

  ‘Tantrums? Janey doesn’t have tantrums. She’s a good kid.’

  ‘She is for you, yes. Not always so good for me. Not when I’m trying to hurry her up so we’re not late for nursery, or trying to get her to eat her carrots, or to tidy up her toys. You come home in the evenings and you get the good bit, the fun stuff. And you only have to cope with any of it for … what? An hour at the most. And then there are your trips away, the late meetings. I feel like a single parent sometimes. Like you can do what you like, when you like, and I’m the one who doesn’t have any choice, any time, any life of my own.’

  ‘I came home early tonight, didn’t I?’

  ‘Yes, you did.’

  ‘And as for work, I do it for us, Sarah. For the family. To earn us the money we need to survive. Not for fun. God, when did we last have any bloody fun?’

  We sat in silence. Josh rested his elbows on his knees, his head in his hands. He looked like one of those old white thinking statues, as if he was pondering something hugely important, carrying the weight of the world. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said, eventually.

  ‘What for?’

  ‘For not being what you want. What you need. I’ve tried to make a family here. To be what you wanted me to be, but I’m not sure it’s really worked, has it? It’s just so hard.’

  ‘It doesn’t have to be.’

  ‘Really? You don’t think so? We’re ticking along, Sarah. And that’s not what either of us wanted, is it? Not what we deserve, just to tick along. I thought having Janey would fix things, but it hasn’t. It’s changed things, in lots of ways. Given us a purpose. And I love her. You know I do, but …’

  ‘But you don’t love me.’

  ‘Don’t put words into my mouth. Of course I love you. I love you like a sister, like a best friend, like the good, kind person you are, but let’s face it, Sarah, we’re not love’s young dream, are we? We don’t set the world alight. Truth is we’ve made a real mess of things, haven’t we? A lot of the time I know we’d be better off apart, and I’m sure you do too, but we can’t … Look, we’re stuck with it, aren’t we? This life. For better or worse, we’re stuck with it.’

  ‘So, you’re not leaving me?’ My hands were shaking now, the thing I had feared the most suddenly voiced out loud, out in the open. ‘That’s not what this whole conversation has been about? You asking for a divorce?’

  He lifted his head and looked into my eyes, took both my hands and held them tightly until the shaking stopped. ‘No. I don’t really know what this conversation is about. Some sort of mid-life crisis, I suppose, even if thirty’s not quite the middle. A “what-if” kind of a question. Life passing us by. Oh, I’m just trying to put what I feel into words that make some sort of sense, trying to be honest with you, so we know where we stand, so neither of us has to live with a lie. But, no, I’m not leaving. How can I? The thought of our little Janey growing up without me, or how my life would be without seeing her every day. No, that’s never going to happen. Unless you want me to leave …?’

  ‘No!’ I moved closer, felt his arms close around me. ‘And we can try, can’t we? To make things better? We’ll go somewhere nice next week, live it up a bit, for your special birthday. And then we’ll make more effort to do some of those other things you want to do – travel, go zip-wiring, learn to ski. Whatever. You’re right, we are still young, and we mustn’t waste that. No more ticking along. And no more custard creams, I promise.’

  And no Colin, I thought. I hadn’t called him, and I wouldn’t. Not now. It just wouldn’t be fair. Not if I meant it about trying. From now on, hanging on to my marriage had to come first. But I didn’t delete his number. He stayed right where
he was, hiding behind the fictional Carol in my contacts list. Just in case.

  Chapter 17

  EVE

  I think having a lover suited me. Not for me the washing of smelly socks or the humdrum day-to-day existence so many marriages seemed to slip into. We relished all the good bits and never had to deal with the bad. Josh and I didn’t see each other often enough, admittedly, but when we did it always felt new and exciting and electric.

  The miles that separated our life together, such as it was, and Josh’s other life with Sarah meant it was unlikely we would get spotted by a neighbour or one of Sarah’s school-gate mum friends when we ate in a restaurant or sat in a pub somewhere. There was something liberating, yet comfortingly safe, about the time we spent together, openly pretending to be a couple. Nobody knew, nobody cared, nobody disapproved. Except Simon.

  ‘Just don’t get pregnant,’ Josh had said, soon after we started out. As if the whole onus was on me. As if, like my sister, I might have some devious plan to trap him and lure him away from her, our whole lives led by what happened, or didn’t happen, inside my uterus.

  ‘I wasn’t planning to.’ I took my newly acquired packet of pills out of the bedside drawer and waved them at him in evidence.

  ‘Good. One child is enough. Believe me, if it wasn’t for Janey, I’d be here, with you. All the time. But bringing another baby into the mix … well, I have no idea what I’d do then. I can’t be in two places at once, don’t want to have to deal with all the broken-home stuff and how it would affect our Janey, having to split her time between us and see me playing dad to some other child. And then there’d be the finances to get to grips with. And as for the fallout in the family, can you imagine it? What our parents would say? I think I’d probably be excommunicated!’ He’d laughed, although it wasn’t remotely funny. Especially the bit about playing dad. As if he couldn’t possibly imagine feeling proper fatherly love for any accidental child we might produce together.