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‘I didn’t start it in the first place.’
Saturday morning. I’m in the car with John and Matt. Pippa is out for the day at a friend’s house, doubtless being drowned in pink. Pink-walled bedroom, pink ballet dresses, a selection of dolls all dressed in pink. Suffocation by candyfloss.
‘Where are we going, Mummy?’ Matt asks.
‘Snakes and Ladders.’
‘Why isn’t Daddy coming with us?’
‘His turn for a lie-in.’
‘What about Jenni and the other Gospels?’ John suggests hopefully.
Wincing at the use of the word Gospels, the cheesy nickname Jenni has coined for our children – Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, the conjoined products of our NCT friendship.
‘I thought we could enjoy some time on our own,’ I reply.
‘Please, Mummy. Phone Jenni. You can talk to her while we all play on the slides,’ Matt begs.
Jenni. Holding my hand and laughing. Jenni. Before she started making cow eyes at Rob. I push the memory away.
‘You’ll have to make do with Mummy,’ I snap.
I signal to pull off the main road, and turn into the car park of the state-of-the-art climbing facility. Brightly coloured plastic slides and climbing nets, all hidden from parental sight by giant yellow plastic walls. It’s simple, and expensive. You pay for your children to go in. They take their shoes off, leave them with you and disappear. You sit and drink coffee. You read a book or a newspaper. They reappear several hours later, hot, sweaty and requiring drinks, but too tired to give you any more trouble for the rest of the day. A perfect way to keep children amused on a Saturday morning. Maximum expense. Minimum effort. My favourite treat for them.
After I have flashed my credit card, my sons disappear through the yellow and blue plastic doorway that leads to the gargantuan play frame. I buy a large cup of coffee and a shortbread biscuit from the café and set myself up at a table. I plug my earplugs in (small foam ones that I bought at Boots yesterday), spread my newspaper out on the table, and home in on the magazine supplement.
I must have fallen asleep because the next thing I know, I open my eyes to find John shaking my arm. He is red-faced, blond curls plastered to his head with sweat.
‘Can I get you a drink?’ I say dutifully.
‘When we’ve found Matt.’
‘Found him? I thought he was with you.’
‘He was, Mummy, but when I went down the wiggly slide, I thought he was behind me but he never arrived.’
‘He’s probably just in another part of the slide complex. Let’s go and ask the staff.’
Holding John’s hand, I venture through a yellow and blue doorway, into a world where toddlers tumble and twist through nets and tubes, thundering towards me at frightening velocities. But it’s only me that is intimidated, not the toddlers. They are laughing and smiling as their chubby bodies slide and bounce. At the bottom of every tube or net there is a substantial amount of blue matting and a Snakes and Ladders guard; a young adult wearing a canary yellow sweat shirt. I approach the nearest guard, clinging tightly to John’s hand to keep him with me.
‘Excuse me,’ I say to him, a boy of about sixteen. A boy with a pulpy face, a rash of spots on his right cheek. ‘I can’t find my other son.’
‘What’s he wearing? I’ll look out for him.’
I hesitate.
‘Black jeans and a T-shirt,’ John replies before I can remember.
‘And his name?’
‘Matthew Burton. Matt for short,’ I reply.
‘Tell me a bit more about what he looks like.’
‘He looks about five – but he’s only three and a half. And his hair is blond, like his brother’s.’
‘That’s me,’ John proudly informs the pimply youth.
‘Wait in the café, I’ll go looking for him and bring him to you as soon as possible,’ he replies, a little sharply. He is looking at me critically, but I ignore him.
By the time he has finished his sentence John has freed himself from my hand and is climbing up a purple net. Before I have returned through the plastic door to the café for another cup of coffee, John is already halfway up the giant play frame.
Half an hour later, a man wearing a suit and an earpiece is standing in front of me holding John’s hand. Attached to his shirt is a plastic badge telling me that he is the manager of Snakes and Ladders. Only his badge and his earpiece prevent him from looking like a funeral director, so low are his eyes, so dark his grimace.
‘I’m sorry to say we can’t find your son Matt on the main play frame,’ he announces.
My stomach tightens in annoyance.
‘He went in. He must be there,’ I reply.
‘We’ve checked every camera for twenty-five minutes.’ There is a pause. ‘Is it possible he ran past you and went outside?’
‘I wouldn’t have thought he would have done that.’
‘Is it possible?’
‘I fell asleep. So it’s possible. Unlikely, but possible.’
‘We have another play complex outside. Maybe he went there.’
‘Why would he do that without telling anyone? He’s never been there before.’
John starts to cry. ‘I want my baby brother.’
I lift him into my arms.
‘We’ll find him. He can’t have gone far,’ I tell him.
We follow the manager out of the Snakes and Ladders indoor arena, across the car park towards a large wooden climbing frame built in the shape of a fortress with boardwalk walls. The castle teems with children racing around the walls. I stand next to the manager, clinging on to John who is still crying, and a fist of panic suddenly squeezes me inside. Where is my son? Where has he gone? What’s happened to him? Then almost as soon as I start to panic, in the edge of my vision, like a speck of dust irritating me, something makes me turn to the corner of the climbing frame, and for a split second I think I see a boy of about Matt’s size, with blond curly hair.
‘What is it?’ the manager asks. ‘Did you see something?’
‘I thought I saw him.’ I shake my head. ‘But maybe I didn’t.’
And then I see him again. Matt. Matt’s hair. Matt’s red face. Matt’s black jeans and new flashing trainers running down the steps of the castle towards me. I manage to keep calm in front of the manager – who no longer looks funereal – the swarming children, and their over-vigilant parents who are hovering anxiously by the play frame. But as soon as I strap him into his car seat to drive him home I smack him, hard on his cheek. He cries. John starts to cry in sympathy. I drive home with two crying boys who are howling and bellowing, wishing I knew where I’d put my earplugs. As soon as I have pulled the car into the drive and switched off the engine, I lean into the back of the car and smack Matt again. Hard, on the opposite cheek.
~ Jenni ~ (#uee7c8ae9-dc6d-57d4-b06d-0fcd7a019a0e)
‘Why have you invited them midweek?’ Craig asks as he loads the dishwasher. ‘It’s my early shift. I’ll be exhausted.’
‘I’m worried about Carly. I need to talk to her.’
‘Because?’
‘She’s always been edgy – in a fun sort of way. But the balance has tipped. Now she’s just edgy.’
‘Well, it must be hard work being married to the local GP who works every hour that God sends, working herself, and bringing up three small children. So I do sympathise but’ – he shrugs his shoulders – ‘can’t you talk to her by yourself?’
‘I wanted to show her some hospitality. Hospitality at home. A deeper sort of friendship. You know how much she means to me. I can make dinner.’
I kiss him and he pulls me towards him, wrapping me in his arms and holding me against him.
‘Can’t you put it off until next week? Give us a bit of time on our own when the children are in bed?’
‘I told you, next week I’m going to see my mother.’
‘Not again,’ he complains gently.
I shrug my shoulders.
‘I don’t have a choice. You know that.’
Our dinner-party menu. Beetroot salad, followed by spinach and ricotta lasagne – which took too long to make as I had to cut all the stalks off the spinach. The kitchen looks as if it has exploded; there are pans and cutlery across every surface, as I didn’t have time to wash up before Carly and Rob arrived. I’m not sure why I’ve bothered to go to all this effort as so far I’ve had no meaningful conversation with Carly. She is behaving in a way I’ve never seen before, spending her time weighing up Craig, her eyes all over him when she hasn’t noticed me watching. Carly. Wearing a low-cut top and too much make-up. She has gone for the smoky-eyes look. Carly. Laughing too loud at Craig’s blokey jokes, and every time she does so Rob looks embarrassed. Rob, clean-cut and sensible in his stonewashed jeans and carefully ironed shirt. Even Craig looks surprised at the depth of Carly’s laughter.
I excuse myself and leave the room, walking back to our small galley kitchen to fetch dessert and put the kettle on for coffee. As I wait for it to boil, I look around at the culinary debris and sit on the low windowsill looking at the mess. Craig was right, entertaining like this is too much in the week. And he has to be up at five o’clock in the morning to start his shift at the fire station. He was recently promoted to leading fireman. I am so pleased for him. Craig, the only man I have ever loved. Unlike Carly, I haven’t had much experience with men. Craig is the only man I have slept with. I know that seems strange in this day and age of openness and overt sexuality, but it’s because of my religious convictions. My relationship with God. A relationship I am proud of. I don’t feel constrained or repressed because of it. God opens my life out.
Craig and I met late, and so the time we have had together was almost immediately shared with the children, which is why we have to guard our relationship so preciously. It can be such a struggle to try and find each other between sleepless nights and children’s tantrums. So far at least, I think we are managing.
But things are going to become more difficult.
My mother has been diagnosed with ovarian cancer. Too late. As is all too frequently the case. When the consultant told her last week, I was there, holding her hand, looking into my father’s eyes.
The kettle boils and I pour water on top of the freshly ground coffee beans waiting in the cafetière. I reach for the Eton mess I messed up earlier, and return to the party – followed by the fear of suffering and loneliness. Followed by my father’s eyes.
Carly’s cheeks are slightly red and the tip of her nose is glowing.
‘Craig tells me you have to go on hospital duty next week without the kids. Can I be of any help?’ she asks as I serve her a generous portion of dessert. Perhaps a bit more food will sober her up.
Rob stirs in his seat uncomfortably.
‘Have you run that by your mother, Carly?’ he says.
She turns to him, eyes glazed.
‘Whatever do you mean?’
‘Nothing. Let’s talk about it later.’
‘I have other things in mind for later,’ Carly says, giggling and stabbing her fork towards a strawberry. She misses and bangs her fork onto her plate. Metal scrapes against china.
Rob looks across at me, his eyes speaking to me – see what I have to put up with. I do not reply with mine, because after all, no one ever sees inside someone else’s relationship.
~ Rob ~ (#uee7c8ae9-dc6d-57d4-b06d-0fcd7a019a0e)
The children are in bed. It took me an age to settle them. Carly, you are sitting in the easy chair in the kitchen, watching me cook a stir-fry with your piercing eyes of china blue. With your Marilyn Monroe looks and your volatile personality. Carly. So colourful. So challenging. You have put on a little too much make-up, as you always do just before I come home. Tonight it has smudged around your eyes.
‘Have you been crying, Carly?’ I ask.
‘No,’ you reply, taking a large slug of wine and crossing your legs, forcing me to admire a pair of shiny high heels I haven’t seen before.
I stir the sweet and sour noodles.
‘Are you sure?’
A flicker of the lines around your mouth.
‘Why?’
I take the stir-fry off the heat.
‘Well, your make-up’s smudged.’
‘Are you criticising me again?’ you ask with a smile. An over-egged smile that doesn’t quite work. Carly, sometimes your smile frightens me.
I serve the food into large china bowls and we sit opposite each other at the table, a lighted candle and the cruet between us. Without tasting my endeavours you take the salt and pepper and lash it across your food. I want to reprimand you. But I cannot. You are like an awkward teenager and I need to address one issue at a time. And tonight I have a more important mission. I take a forkful of food.
‘Carly, why did you slap Matt on the way back from Snakes and Ladders?’
‘He deserved it,’ you say violently. A pause. ‘Are you going to call the police?’
‘Of course not.’
I lean across the table and put my hand on your arm. ‘I just want to talk about it.’
‘I’m not one of your patients, Rob. Leave me alone.’
I remove my arm. We sit and eat in silence for a while. I can’t resist saying more.
‘Are you still cross with me about Jenni?’ I ask softly.
‘It shocked me that you want to fuck her.’ You emphasise the word fuck almost jubilantly; its guttural ending spitting out of your mouth.
‘Fuck her? When did I say that?’
‘That’s what you meant, isn’t it?’
‘You twisted my words. You pushed me.’ I pause. ‘Please, Carly, stop this. I love you.’
