Over You (13 page)

‘Too hot,’ Toby muttered, squirming beside her.

‘Sorry,’ she whispered, releasing her grip on him, smoothing back his hair. ‘Sorry, baby.’

She was so, so sorry. A tear trickled from the corner of her eye down into the pillowcase and she scrubbed it away as Sam came into the room, his hair tufting sideways, pyjama top twisted, sleep still in his eyes. His ears were slightly more sticking-out than his brother’s, and he was half an inch shorter, but otherwise his mirror image. Peas from a pod.

‘Where’s Dad?’ he asked. Straight in with the big question. Ka-boom! No mercy!

Josie took a deep breath. Anything she said would be loaded with deceit. But she couldn’t break the news to them yet – Pete might be home before bedtime, wringing his hands and apologizing. It might still be OK.

For now, she would bluff. She would get through this day as best as she could. ‘Work,’ she said briskly, avoiding his gaze. She shuffled up to a sitting position, pulling Toby on to her knee and making room for Sam to scramble in beside her.

The room swung around horribly, as if she were on the waltzers at a fairground. Oh God, she’d drunk so much the night before. Again.

She licked her lips, suddenly starving. ‘Now – who wants a cooked breakfast this morning?’

The whoops of joy that followed were almost enough to bring a smile to her face. But not quite.

Ten minutes later she was dishing up bacon, eggs and toast. Exactly the kind of breakfast that would have had Pete muttering about childhood obesity and cholesterol levels as he devoured his morning muesli and blueberries, no doubt But he wasn’t here, was he? So sod it. And sod him.

A slice of sunlight fell on to the kitchen wall, and Josie felt herself staring at it. Cheesecake, the paint shade was called, she remembered. When they’d moved in, the house had been brilliant white throughout – shiny white, dazzling and harsh, the sort of thing you’d get in a student gaff Repainting had been the first step to making it their place, differentiating it from every other brilliant-white house on the street. She and Pete had decorated together, newspapers on the floor, heaving the stepladder round from wall to wall, jars of murky turps on the windowsill overnight. Yellow seemed right for a kitchen somehow, they’d agreed. Cheerful and warm. Yellow for the kitchen, Summer Blue for the bedroom, rocket wallpaper for the boys, Soft Caramel for the living room and Sweet Violet for the spare room. Not that any of that mattered any more.

The letterbox rattled, and Josie went out to the hall. She wasn’t sure what she was expecting – a forgive-me letter? Some kind of token? – but her heart raced as she approached the pile of post.

There were a couple of brown window envelopes she guessed were bills, and a computer-labelled
mr and mrs winter
white envelope with a local postmark. She stuffed them in her dressing-gown pocket and trudged back to the kitchen.

‘Stop pushing.’

‘
You
stop pushing!’

‘You pushed me first.’

‘No,
you
!’

Josie raked her fingers through her hair wearily. ‘Don’t fight today,’ she said. ‘Please.’

There must have been something in her tone, something unusually desperate-sounding, for the boys stopped their argument mid-sentence and went back to their food. Miracle of the year, Josie thought, dragging her finger under the white envelope’s seal. Then she felt bad for crushing their high spirits. The last thing she wanted was for them to pick up on her grief. Weren’t the TV psychologists always saying that miserable parents produced damaged children? What if this was the start of her ruining their lives, screwing them up completely? They would be repressed, depressed, on Prozac before they were out of short trousers . . .

She pulled the letter from the envelope and registered the council logo at the top of the sheet then read:

She read it through again. Redwood! They’d got into Redwood! Only the best primary school in the area, the one that all the middle-class parents fought over! If your child got into Redwood, it meant the best teachers, the best facilities, an ASBO-free childhood practically guaranteed!

A few days ago, Josie would have been overjoyed, bounding around the room, cheering and phoning up the other mums she knew to see if they’d been so lucky. Now she just felt . . . sick.

Where might they be living in September now? Some crappy little plasterboard-walled box with no central heating and an infestation of cockroaches probably, miles from Redwood sodding Primary School. She’d have to get them into a different school, but only a crap one would have places left now. All the decent ones were oversubscribed every year.

She gulped back the rest of her coffee, barely noticing the way it scalded her throat on the way down.
Shit.
In a matter of hours, their whole future had been wrecked, as well as hers.

‘Mum,’ Toby asked, mouth full of bacon, ‘when are we going to Australia?’

She couldn’t speak suddenly, couldn’t get a single word out.

‘Mum,’ Sam asked, swivelling around on his chair to peer at her, ‘why are you crying?’

Somehow or other she managed to eat a slice of toast without throwing it all up again. Somehow or other she tidied the kitchen, threw away the cold, congealed Thai food, washed the breakfast things, mopped the floor and put on a load of clothes to wash. She hoovered the living room and stairs, and made the boys’ beds. She persuaded them to get dressed, then put on a
Fireman Sam
video for them to watch while she finally peeled off her seduction undies (might as well throw them in the bin now), had a long hot shower and scrubbed her body until it was bright red and tingling.

She had squeaky-clean hair and sweet-smelling skin and minty-brushed teeth, she had fresh underwear and clothes on, but she still felt awful. And it was only ten-thirty in the morning. Pete would be at work now, probably humming smirkily and sending rude texts to Sabine.

Don’t think about it. Don’t think about it.

Meanwhile, what else was she going to do today? She had to keep busy, had to keep moving. The minute she sat down, she knew that the reality would crush her to pulp. It would blitz her, destroy her. She’d never be able to get up again. So what else could she do?

She stared out of the window. Last week, she’d vaguely planned to take the boys out today, to a new farm that had opened nearby with a big play area and lots of animals. If she could muster up enough energy to drive them over there, it might be just the thing. Fresh air, loads of distractions, and a bit of space for her to sit and watch them enjoying themselves.

She stared at herself in the mirror. She looked broken and old. She looked miserable and kicked-in. She looked exactly like the sort of wife that got left.

Don’t you ever worry he’ll go off with someone else?

Lisa’s
voice
was a taunt in her head. The snidey bitch.

She swung away abruptly before she could see herself cry again. She had to keep going for the boys’ sake. She couldn’t just shut down completely, much as she wanted to. ‘Boys!’ she called. ‘Get your shoes! We’re going out.’

Was it possible to use up your entire reserve of tears? Josie wondered, clumsily backing the car into a space. Surely she couldn’t keep up this rate of fluid loss for ever. She felt dehydrated already, not even twenty-four hours after Pete had walked out. Christ alone knew how she’d managed the drive to Fulton’s Family Farm, whose slogan boasted
Guaranteed fun for ALL the family!
She’d barely had the brainpower to reverse the car out of their drive, let alone stay focused through the entire journey.

She pulled on the handbrake and wiped her eyes with a soggy bit of tissue. ‘Here we are!’ she cried brightly. Here they were for a morning of guaranteed fun, for ALL the family. Fat chance.

Josie shivered as she opened the car door and swung her feet down on to the grassy field that served as the farm’s car park. It had been a mild May morning when they left the house, weather that promised new blossom opening, tulips unfolding in the sunshine, maybe even jackets off and lunch outside. Now a battalion of threatening clouds scudded dully across the sky, and a low wind flattened the grass, bouncing a faded crisp packet along the ground. Great. And there she was in Capri trousers, sandals and a T-shirt. She rubbed her arms, feeling the goosebumps that were already prickling along them.

‘Mum, the wheels are really wonky,’ was Toby’s critical assessment of her parking once he’d clambered down from his car seat. ‘Look!’ He kicked one of the tyres that was skewed out at an ungainly angle, and Josie flinched.

‘Who gives a toss?’ she replied tightly, gripping her cold arms and wishing she’d brought a cardigan. While she was at it, she wished too that her eldest son didn’t have to be such a Nazi about her driving. Today of all days she just wanted the world to be nice to her, for people to treat her gently, like a fragile ornament. Any more criticisms and she’d shatter into hundreds of pieces, impossible to glue back into any sort of useful shape.

‘Come on,’ she said, wincing at the startled look on Toby’s face as she zipped up his jacket. It’s started already, she thought glumly, following their racing figures towards the farm entrance. They’re going to notice something’s up any minute.

Fulton’s Family Farm was a rural pocket of child heaven. There were miniature goats to pet, a stamping carthorse, three fat saddleback pigs (one with a litter of piglets), harrumphing ruminative cows munching hay and completely ignoring all the children, ducks, chickens, sheep, guinea pigs, rabbits and even a mangy-looking, rather smelly donkey that gave rides (and flea-bites, no doubt). There was also an enormous field full of climbing frames, swings, sandpits, trampolines and slides.

Josie bought herself a coffee and sat down thankfully at a picnic bench as the boys careered off towards a scary-looking twisty slide.

OK. We’re here. The boys are happy. So far, so good. No need to do anything but sit here and drink coffee and let the time go by.

For some reason she was counting hours, as if that proved anything. It had been fifteen hours since Pete had walked out. Fifteen hours and she was carrying it off, putting on the performance of her life. You’re doing OK, she told herself, sipping coffee. You are doing absolutely fine. Fifteen hours in, and you’re keeping going.

But her fingers were trembling traitorously on the Styrofoam cup. For how long, though? a voice wailed in her head. How long would she be able to keep it up before the façade cracked and she revealed all the messiness and fear underneath to the world? Sixteen hours? Twenty hours? A whole day?

She was exhausted. She could feel the caffeine skidding through her bloodstream, attempting to give her a buzz, but it just made her feel even more sluggish. She wished she still smoked so she could chain her way through a packet of twenty, just for the comfort, just for something to do. She’d spent the whole night lying in bed running through her last conversation with Pete and rewriting it so that she got to say things like:

This is ridiculous. I refuse to let this happen. Call Sabine right now and tell her that it’s over. I mean it!

Or, when she was feeling less feisty:
Let’s talk about where we went wrong, and try to fix things. We can make it work again, Pete. We owe it to each other. And to the boys.

Or sometimes, when the desolation and alcohol hit her in a particularly potent combination:

You scumbag liar! You are SO going to pay for what you’ve done to me!

She wished now that she’d slapped him. Hard, right across the face.
Whack!
Take
that
! How satisfying it would have been to have heard the crack of his nose, the ringing slap against his cheek! How gratifying it would have been to see the look of cold shock on his features! She had never hit him before – had never hit anybody in her whole life – but her palm smarted at the thought. If only she had sliced open his pink fleshy cheek with her wedding ring – the irony would have been supremely comforting.

She took another sip of coffee, vaguely registering the woman who was striding up towards her, face set, lips pinched in a tight line. A crying child was attached to one of her hands, snot running into her mouth, features crumpled.

‘Are those your boys over there?’ the woman said grimly as she swam up into Josie’s line of vision.

Josie blinked, then tried to focus on where the woman was pointing a chapped red finger. Toby was hanging upside-down from the climbing frame, arms dangling, face slack. Sam was astride one of the top bars, shouting something or other.

‘Yes,’ Josie replied. ‘Why?’

‘
Why?
’ the woman repeated. ‘They’ve just pushed my Shannon off that climbing frame, that’s why! Don’t you think you should be keeping an eye on them?’

Josie opened and shut her mouth a few times. Shannon scuffed a trainer along the ground, red lights flashing on the side panel of her shoe as her foot moved. The girl was smaller than the boys, long hair tangled by the wind, and her eyes were red from crying, but Josie could muster up no feeling towards her. She was numb inside.