It's Only Temporary (19 page)

Sitting waiting I knew I had to say something before we got to her house, trying to say it during dinner would be very uncomfortable. I decided to prevent her from distracting me; or even starting Dolly before I had told her, that way if she reacted badly she could simply run me home. Or if it was really bad I could get out and walk.

I saw her coming back holding Max’s hand as he trotted next to her; she slid open the large side door in the rear and proceeded to strap him into a child seat that I had not noticed before. Her concentration was understandably fully on this important task so I waited until she was behind the wheel again. Once in she turned to Max and said ‘You ok buddy?’ He gave her a big smile and thumbs up signal. This was my chance.

‘Listen….’

‘Rock and Roll!’ Max shouted.

Oh good grief!

Stacy started laughing, ‘Sorry he loves to shout that when we drive away, what was it you wanted to say?’

The moment had thoroughly been lost but I had to push on, ‘I err, wanted to talk to you about the course you mentioned today.’

‘Yeah sure I know.’

She knew? Knew what?

‘Look I am sorry I dropped it on you like that please don’t let that put you off.’

‘Well ok, but it’s not the way you told me. Well it is a little bit. A lot actually, but that’s not what I wanted to talk about.’

‘I’m sorry, ok? She replied. I accept it was inconsiderate but if I offer you a heartfelt apology, which I do by the way, then can we move past it?’ She was not being defensive but genuinely seemed to be accepting her mistake; this was getting harder and harder.

She reached to turn the ignition key, ‘No wait!’ I almost shouted. She looked at me in surprise. Max added ‘Ohhh, Mummy!’ from the rear as he was obviously taken aback at my outburst as well.

‘You see, the thing is….’

There was a tapping on Stacy’s window; a woman was standing there grinning at her. Go away! I wanted to scream at her but Stacy was winding down her window, ‘Hi Ya Mel! What’s up?’

‘You left this,’ Mel said, holding a bag up. ‘All Max’s best toys!’ she added for his benefit, which made him shriek with excitement and reach for them.

‘Cheers Mel, sorry. Oh this is Marcus, Marcus this is Mel.’ Mel nodded to me and said, ‘Be nice to her mate, she is a bit special this one.’

‘Special case maybe!’ Stacy said as she laughed.

‘Ok, will do,’ I said.

Stacy started Dolly, ‘Well spotted,’ she said. ‘Leaving Max’s toys would have been a disaster. Hey Max?’ she said looking the rear view mirror at him.

‘Rock and Roll!’ he shouted.

‘What did you want to say?’

‘It can wait.’

Her house was a small terraced affair in a fairly quiet street; in fact Dolly’s arrival was probably the loudest thing that had happened all day I assumed.

‘This is nice,’ I said.

She gave me a long sideways glance, ‘Nice or different?’

‘How about pleasant?’ I tried.

She smiled at that then just sat behind the wheel and seemed to consider the house for a second, Max decided the pause had gone on too long an announced ‘This is my house,’ just in case I was unsure it seemed.

Stacy looked back and smiled at him, ‘Yes it is buddy and before that it was Granny and Granddad’s house,’ she said looking at me. ‘They left it to me; actually my Dad left it to my Mum and a whole heap of money. My Mum then left the lot to me hence buying the centre.’ There was another pause before she said, ’Right let’s do it!’ and jumped out of Dolly.

Once in the house Stacy left me alone with Max as she set about making lots of noise in the kitchen, Max elected to spend the time showing me his toys and explain in great depth what each one was. His favourite was a Dinosaur imaginatively named Lucy, an unusual choice for a T Rex I had to admit.

‘Do you like my Mummy?’ he suddenly asked.

Caught slightly off guard I managed to reply ‘Yeah, she is very nice.’

‘I love her; she’s the best Mummy in the world.’

‘Well that’s good news. Lucky you.’

He nodded sagely, then said ‘Where’s your Mummy? Is she dead?’

‘Err no, she’s not dead.’

‘He considered this then advised me with great authority that ‘Ricky at playgroup told me that most old peoples Mummies are dead.’

‘Not mine.’

‘Where is she?’

‘Max,
don’t be rude!’ Stacy called form the kitchen. I actually didn’t think he was being rude, his line of questioning was logical considering the information he was working with.

‘Ah well you can tell Ricky he is wrong in this case. My Mummy is in
Devon with, my Dad.’

Seemingly satisfied that this topic of conversation had run its course he proceeded to demonstrate how Lucy would eat me if I was “bad”.

Stacy eventually took him up to bed and as I sat alone in the living room I once again began to consider how to tell Stacy I would be leaving. Alfie’s opinion that she did not own me was at the forefront of my mind, as was the thought that I had never made any commitment to stay beyond the four weeks. If she had assumed things and was relying on her assumptions to come to fruition then more the fool her, this was not my fault I told myself.

So why did I feel so bad?

‘Ok, Marcus. You’re on!’ she called from the landing.

‘Sorry?’ I had no idea what she meant.

‘Story time remember? With the laugh proviso!’

I had forgotten that, ‘Ah, ok,’ I said far more confidently than I felt.

Sitting next to Max’s bed I felt a bit lost, well a lot lost actually. ‘Toby in Trouble!’ Max declared, Marcus in trouble was more like it. I looked at Stacy who advised me that ‘Max likes Thomas stories; his favourite is
Toby in Trouble.’

‘Thomas?’

‘The Tank Engine! Blimey were you never a kid?’

‘Not that I can remember.’

‘Max buddy, Marcus is going to tell you a story about ancient Egypt! A none scary story,’ the last part of the sentence was pointedly for me.

Max showed his enthusiasm for this by drumming his legs on the mattress under the duvet. This was it, I was centre stage.

‘Ok, well Max. The Pharaohs lived five thousand years ago.’

‘He frowned, ‘What’s a ph, pha, saro?’ I looked to Stacy for help but none was forthcoming, she simply smiled and went down stairs.

‘Errm, like a king?’

‘A king, I like kings,’

‘Good, well these kings lived in a very hot place called the desert.’

‘Did they have space ships?’

‘Err, no. No space ships,’ he looked very disappointed. ‘Well maybe they did and we just don’t know it yet?’ I tried, that got a smile. ‘So anyway, they built these huge buildings called Pyramids,’ he was staring intently at me now but there was no sign of any laughter. ‘Inside these pyramids was where they put…’ Oh lord I was in danger of giving him nightmares.

‘Put what?’

‘Errrm, silly people?’ I was drowning already.

‘Would they put me there?’

‘Oh no! You are a good boy, anyway this was a very, very long time ago.’

‘Mummy said I was silly for drawing on the wall,’ he said pointing at the fresh paintwork above his bed. ‘I drew a space ship.’

‘Well funnily enough, inside the pyramids there were lots and lots on drawings and paintings on the walls.’

‘Ohhh, did they get told off?’

‘No,’ I had a flash of inspiration, ‘In fact the drawings were all done by the mummies of little boys.’ His eyes were wide in amazement, ‘You see, if a mummy told off her little boy for drawing on the wall she had to go and do a drawing herself inside the pyramid.’

He laughed at this, thank god. I just hoped Stacy had heard it.

‘What did they look like?’

‘The Mummies?’

‘No the place where they did drawings.’

I picked up his chalk board and drew a rough pyramid then I added a figure of a person to show the scale of them.

‘That’s where the space ships landed,’ he told me.

‘Really? On a pyramid?’

‘Yes!’ He was getting quite excited and took great pleasure in describing; complete with whooshing noises how the space ships would have landed on top of the pyramid. He had obviously thought this through as he went on to explain what the aliens looked like and the horrible things they did to the ancient Egyptians.

We were so engrossed in our story that we failed to notice Stacy standing in the doorway. ‘Ok, buddy, time for sleep,’ after a minimal amount of protest Max settled down and we returned to the living room.

‘So what were you two talking about?’ she asked seemingly amused. ‘I could hear him laughing so you are off the hook, washing up and walking home wise.’

‘Oh, er Max has just developed a whole new branch of Egyptology.’ She raised her eye brow as if to indicate I should elaborate further. ‘Yeah, it involves aliens, spaceships and mummies.’

She frowned, ‘You didn’t tell him about mummies? He’ll wet the bed!’

‘Well, only about the silly ones who tell their little boys off for being creative on their bedroom walls and then as a result have to do some artwork of their own inside the pyramid. Which by the way is where the spaceships land.’

‘Blimey, so I am going to be in trouble now?’

‘Oh yeah,
first class trip to Cairo. Pencil in hand,’ I said. I was gratified that she laughed at this.

‘Ok, that’s good to know. Foods ready by the way.’

We sat at her small dining table as we ate, ‘You were trying to tell me something earlier?’ she suddenly said.

Was I ready? No I was not, but here it was.
I could feel my heart pounding yet didn’t know why. What was causing me so much anxiety about this situation; I had done nothing wrong I told myself again.

‘Yeah, the thing is….. I need to be honest with you.’

‘Ok,’ she said staring intently at me.

‘Well, look…it’s not going to easy to say.’

‘Ok,’ she repeated.

‘I am probably, almost certainly going to get a job at a University soon.’

‘Oh, I see.’

Was she going to get angry at me now? Accuse me of letting her down? Become upset? I was not sure how to deal with any of those reactions.

‘Well, congratulations.’

What?

‘You’re not angry?’

‘Why would I be angry?’

‘Well, y’know. The new course and all that stuff.’

‘I am sure we can get someone else,’ she was smiling now. ‘Have you been really worried about this?’ I nodded. ‘You dipstick, why didn’t you just tell me?’

‘I don’ t know,’ I said telling the truth.

‘Well, that’s good for you! You can get somewhere decent to live. Is it still in
London?’

‘No.’

‘Where then?’

‘
Texas.’

‘Oh, that is a long way away.’

Chapter 17.

Once I had recovered from the surprise at Stacy’s reaction we were able to have a much more relaxed conversation. She told me that her ex-boyfriend had run for the hills as soon as she had discovered she was pregnant with Max and that she had no idea where he was now, nor did she want to know.

The conversation then moved onto Hank and the prospect of a job in
Texas, she seemed grateful that I had not simply dropped everything and left at the first opportunity but had decided to wait until the current course was completed. I was appreciative of her comments but had to admit to myself that I had no real idea why I had done that.

‘So I guess I will need to find someone new if we are to put the services course on then?’

‘Yeah, sorry.’

‘Why are you sorry, I would have done exactly the same thing.’

‘Would you?’

‘No, but you don’t love the centre. I do.’

For some reason that comment caused a slightly hostile reaction in me, I realised she wasn’t criticising me and in fact it was almost certainly true. It just didn’t seem fair somehow.

‘Well I will do all I can to help,’ I said fighting back my annoyance.

‘That’s good to know. So we have got two weeks left then you’re off?’

‘That’s right,’ I felt like a great weight had been lifted from me. Stacy knew what was happening and everything was going to be alright it seemed.

‘The kids will miss you, I will miss you,’ she said. I had not been expecting that, how did I respond when I was not even sure of my own feelings.

‘Well, I will miss you guys as well. I’m sure we can keep in touch.’

‘I hope so.’