What Goes Around... (25 page)

I remember things I can never share with another.

Not even Paul.

Especially, not Paul.

I want something to eat; I’ll make a big mug of coffee and some toast. I’ve got some peanut butter. I try not to have it in the house because if it’s there I get tempted, but Daniel likes peanut butter and I know that I bought some last week. I hear a wail from Daisy upstairs and I grit my teeth as I run up the stairs. I don't want her to wake Charlotte. Daisy’s sleeping through now but she must be unsettled from being dragged out in the night.

She's not crying though. She’s turned herself over and put herself back to sleep and Charlotte is out for the count.

This time, when I leave them, I don't go back downstairs. I don’t care if I left the kitchen light on, I just don't want to go near the kitchen because, if I do, I won't stop till the whole loaf is gone. Instead I go to my bedroom, the one I once shared with him. I sit on the bed where we once slept and I think of all the chaos he left behind.

I’d like five minutes with his body again, just so that I can kill him.

I wouldn’t be begging for him to look after his girls.

I’d be pleading with him to stay the hell away.

He can never make up for the damage he did.

‘How’s Charlotte now?’ Eleanor looks up, from where she's changing Daisy’s nappy.

‘She seems okay.’ Charlotte is on Facebook, I asked her to go on it so that Eleanor could have some time with Daisy.

Eleanor is looking better.

This morning we’ve had a long chat and she’s told me she’s sleeping with Noel. That he’s round quite a bit and sometimes he stays and she thinks there is hope for them.

I don’t know how I feel about it. If Noel is going to get back with Eleanor, then he needs to understand that that means Daisy too. Still, I get that they might need some time. I’m worried too though, knowing what I know about Noel and Lucy. So I changed the subject.

I told about her about the carry on last night, well not the part about Paul and how it seemed her dad was up to his old tricks as he died, I told her that Lucy was in a right old state. I watch her now as she kisses her daughter's foot and I am warmed that the bond is starting, just worried that it is taking so long.

All I bloody do is worry.

‘Her mum will be here soon.’ I say to Eleanor when she asks after Charlotte.

‘That bitch.’ Eleanor says.

‘Don't speak like that in front of Daisy,’ I say, ‘and remember Charlotte
’s here.’ I’m surprised; Eleanor is not usually like that, it’s Alice and Bonny that call Lucy names. Eleanor’s managed to keep things civil with Lucy, Noel did too - he does Charlotte’s braces, those fancy ones that you can hardly see.

Or he did.

God, another thing to worry about.

‘Lucy is a bitch though,’ Eleanor says and she picks up Daisy and holds her high and blows kisses onto her tummy and speaks in a baby voice to her little girl. ‘Did your daddy to be, sleep with your
step nanny?’  She turns to me as Daisy happily squeals for more of her mother’s kisses and she misinterprets my stunned expression. ‘They did.’ Eleanor says. ‘After the funeral!’

I don’t understand how she knows. More than that, I can’t believe how calm Eleanor is – I mean, she’s standing there with Daisy on her hip now and I think she’s even grinning.

‘It’s true!’ She says to the gaping hole of my mouth that is taking up my face.

‘Who told you?’

‘Scaredy Cat, Noel,’ she smirks. ‘He sobbed it all out the other week.’

I
don't know my daughter – you think you know someone, you think that you know how they’ll react in certain situations but in truth, you don’t.

‘I’m
actually glad that it happened,’ Eleanor says. ‘Not that I’ll ever tell him that.’ She looks down at Daisy who’s wriggling in her arms and blowing raspberries and wanting more kisses on her tummy from her mum. ‘I am actually glad that it happened – if we’re ever going to work out our marriage, maybe I need something big to forgive too.’

I do recognize her – it is Eleanor, it’s just not the Eleanor I’ve always known, my eldest has finally grown up. ‘I am trying Mum,’ she says and she hands me back Daisy. ‘Noel is too – he will be her dad, I just don’t know when.’ She looks at her baby and I know she loves her, I know now that I’m not so scared anymore.

‘Daisy!’ Charlotte skids in the room and comes to a halt when she sees that Eleanor is here. ‘Oh, hi Eleanor,’ she says and, well, it’s a bit embarrassing to tell you the next bit, but that's how it is around Eleanor and Noel - Charlotte duly walks over and flashes her teeth. It was the same for me – my teeth were shocking and Noel fixed them up a few months ago and while I was getting work done, every time Eleanor came over, I had to show her my teeth, like a horse…

Anyway, Eleanor is fond of Charlotte and she’s nice enough to know that it’s hardly her fault and she tells Charlotte how nice they look, but Charlotte says she hasn’t had them done in ages.

‘Mum says we can’t go to Noel anymore.’ Thank God for that I think. ‘She says it’s because he doesn’t do many evening appointments and with her job and everything… but I don’t think it’s for that reason.’ Eleanor and I share a quick yikes look, surely Charlotte doesn’t know what’s happened.

I mean
surely
.

‘I think it’s because of the new mortgage.’ I can see the shimmer of tears in Charlotte’s eyes and that poor kid has been put through so m
uch – not just last night. Her dad’s gone, her pony has too and it can’t be about money, because I know Noel was hardly charging her anything. Maybe Lucy does have a conscience after all.

‘Maybe,’ Ele
anor looks at me, ‘Maybe, I can--’ and then she closes her eyes, because, no, she really can’t face Lucy, so I step in.

‘Why don’t you tell your mum that if she’s struggling to get you there, I can take you,’ I offer and I look to Eleanor who nods.

After Eleanor has gone I leave Charlotte to get Daisy off to sleep because the phone rings and it’s a call I don’t want her to know about.

I take the call in my bedroom and then when I hang up it rings again and it’s Paul.

‘Shouldn’t you be asleep?’

‘I can’t sleep,’ he says. ‘Do you understand why I couldn’t tell you?’

‘Of course.’ I’m actually proud that he didn’t. ‘Was that your stress at work?’

‘Yep,’ he admits.

‘I thought…’ when I falter, he pushes me to go on. ‘I thought you just didn’t like me talking about him.’

‘Maybe a bit of that too.’

His honesty surprises me. I’m not used to it I guess. ‘I think it’s because he died, it just bought a lot of stuff up.’

‘I get that,’ he says. ‘It’s just…’

‘Just what?’

‘You just seem to miss him so much.’

‘Miss him?’ I frown. ‘No,’ I tell Paul. ‘It’s not like that. I think I’m still angry.’

‘We'll talk about it. Not on the phone though,’ Paul says. ‘We need to talk properly.’

‘Honestly?’ I check.

‘Honestly.’ He says.

Then my throat goes all tight, because here I am demanding honesty but there’s something I can never tell him.

Something that I’d die if it ever came out.

I honestly think I would.

Paul doesn’t notice my silence, he just carries on talking. ‘I’m not going to lose you to a dead guy, Gloria.
’

‘Call around on your way to work,’ I offer.

‘It’s going
to take more than a quick chat,’ Paul says.

‘Not about that.
’ I grin, because it sounds like we really are going to be able to talk about things, well not everything, I am allowed to keep some things to me. ‘I’ve got loads of other stuff to tell you. You’re not going to believe this…’ and quickly I tell him that I’m going to be taking Charlotte to the dentist and he starts to laugh and yes, because it’s me, he can believe it, he says.  ‘Oh, but there’s more…’ There’s so much more to tell him but I’m not going to on the phone. There isn’t time because there’s someone at the door and he can come over on his way to work tonight if he wants to hear that Eleanor knows about Lucy and Noel.

I know we’ll end up laughing then too.

It’s how he makes me – it’s like all my worries and fears lighten when I speak to him.

I go down the stairs and I’m still smiling, even when I open the door.

Lucy

‘I’m sorry.’

I can’t look at her.

I am beyond embarrassed.

I spoke to the consultant at 8am. He was actually very nice, and seemed to understand that it was the cream I was trying to get, and he believed that it hadn’t happened before.

Not in years.

But he wants me to see my GP and he is going to have to speak with social services.

I was discharged at 8.30am –
bundled into a taxi wearing two hospital gowns. I’ve been home and cleaned up the house and I’m not up to driving so, at lunchtime, I phoned for a taxi. It’s waiting in the street and I just want to grab Charlotte and run.

‘Thank you,’ I say and I still can’t look at her. ‘I’m really sorry….’

‘Why don’t you pay the taxi and come in,’ Gloria says. ‘Charlotte’s just upstairs with Daisy.’

I can’t really say no, can I?

I pay the taxi and I walk into the home I once destroyed.

‘Do you want a coffee?’ Gloria offers and I shake my head. It hurts to shake my head. ‘Could I have a glass of water?’

‘I might have one too,’ says Gloria. We share the briefest of looks as she hands me a glass, as I drink cool water and Gloria does the same.

‘How’s Charlotte?’

‘A bit confused,’ Gloria says. ‘She’s very worried about her mum,’ she adds. ‘Which she doesn’t need.’

I close my eyes, I don’t want a lecture, but I know I deserve one, except it doesn’t come. ‘You’ll get there, I’ve told her.’ I look up at
Gloria. ‘Charlotte adores Daisy.’

‘I know,’ I nod. ‘She talks about her all the time.’

‘A social worker called.’ I close my eyes in shame. ‘I told her that Charlotte was here with me and that she was fine. I said that, from everything I know, you’ve been a wonderful mother but that you’ve been struggling since your husband died.’ After all this time she hands him over to me and, the strange thing is, now I don’t want him. ‘I told her that I would do all I can to help with Charlotte. That’s if you want me to.’

I don’t know what she means.

‘Charlotte said that you weren’t able to take her to the dentist.’

My face is burning, I go to take a drink but my glass is empty, and Gloria takes it. She takes hers too and is gone a moment then she comes back with both of them filled and we both take a gulp
of our cool water. ‘I can take her to Noel for you – it’s no problem for me and it might give Charlotte a chance to see Daisy now and then.’

‘It’s every few weeks,’
I say.

‘I know that.’

‘Why?’ Why is she being nice?

‘I can’t help but care about Charlotte,’ Gloria says. ‘To tell the truth Lucy, I didn’t do the best by my girls sometimes, I was a bit missing in action for a while
.’ She smiles at my frown. ‘I don’t want the same for Charlotte. When’s her next appointment?’

‘I haven’t made one. I cancelled them.’

‘She needs her teeth sorted. Ring for an appointment and let me know when it is and I’ll take her.’

I’ve been so worried about her teeth.

They really do need sorting, they were just starting to look nice – I just didn’t know what to do.

‘Thank you,’ I say. ‘And thank you for last night.’

My head is pounding and I wince. I put my fingers to my temples, I just want it to subside and then I say it. ‘I’m sorry.’

There’s a very long silence.

‘I’m so sorry, Gloria.’

We both know, I think, that I’m not just referring to last night.

‘Why don’t you leave Charlotte here tonight,’ Gloria says. ‘I’ve got Daisy and in some ways it’s easier having the two of them.’

‘Her school uniform…’ I close my eyes and it hurts, my head hurts and I actually think I might be sick. I don’t know why she’s being nice, well I know it’s because she cares about Charlotte, or more that she just is…

…
nice
.

‘I could ask my friend Jess to bring it over this afternoon.’

Last night I remember it being so important that neither Jess nor Luke found out. I refused to give them anyone’s number. Now, with what’s happened, I really don't care who knows.

It’s embarrassing enough that Gloria saw me.

It kills that Charlotte did.

‘Can I use your loo?’

‘Of course,’ Gloria says. ‘Up the top of the stairs and to your left.’