The Secret of Happy Ever After (14 page)

‘I’m really busy,’ she said, forcing the words out. ‘I’m sorry. I’m not going to be able to get away tomorrow.’ She knew she should have left it there, but the dutiful daughter in her couldn’t stop adding, ‘I’m paying the builders by the day, so, you know, the sooner I get the shop open, the sooner it can start earning money. I mean, maybe I can try to get away later in the month, when the sale’s quietened down . . .’

Even as she was saying it, Michelle knew she didn’t mean it. Her mother knew that too.

‘Oh, come on, I’ve got Owen dossing in my flat because everyone else has clearly had enough of his carrying on,’ she blurted out. ‘Don’t say I never do anything for the family.’

Carole let the pause stretch out as Michelle trailed off. The silence dripped with disdain. Then she sighed. ‘Well, that’s big of you, Michelle. Maybe he’ll encourage you to think of someone else other than yourself, for a change.’

‘What?
Owen
will? Owen’s the most selfish of . . .’ Michelle began, outraged, but Carole had already hung up.

I bet she’s been rehearsing that in her head for days, she thought, trying to make light of it in her head, but inside she felt scalded with an old shame that never went away. Whatever Michelle achieved in her adult life – the sales awards, the marriage to her dad’s golden boy, her business – it would never override the image she knew her mother kept in her mental gallery: the picture of a teenage Michelle arriving home in the back of her dad’s Jaguar, mid-term, in silent disgrace, her father’s face stony with confusion.

I don’t care, Michelle told herself, clenching her fists. I am who I am
now
.

But she still felt small. Small and alone, as if she was at the wrong end of a telescope all of a sudden.

Someone knocked at the door and she pulled herself together as quickly as she could, blinking hard to get her bright and confident sales face back on.

Kelsey put her head round the door. ‘Hiya.’

‘Yeah, I’m coming,’ said Michelle. ‘Is there a rush?’

‘What? Where? Oh, uh, yeah, it’s a bit busy. These came for you.’ She pulled her hand round and revealed another massive hand-tied bunch of flowers, multi-coloured roses this time. Kelsey’s eyes popped in a silent ‘Ta-da!’

‘Ta-da!’ she added, in case Michelle hadn’t got it. ‘Who are they from?’

Michelle’s breakfast coffee reappeared in her throat and she had to swallow hard to stop herself retching.

They’re only flowers. Just flowers.

‘Thanks.’ She reached out to take them, then said, ‘Can you separate these into individual colours and put them into the milk bottle vases on the far set of shelves, and . . .’

She stopped. She didn’t want Harvey’s flowers in her shop. Every time she saw them it would feel as if he was inching back into her life. First her house, now her shop. A little toehold here, an ‘Oh, you’re so lucky, Michelle!’ there. She could almost see him, his thick arms folded in that subtly aggressive way, the smile of triumph touching his face but not reaching his eyes. Eyes that never stopped assessing her, not for one second.

‘Kelsey, do you want them?’ she blurted out.

‘Me?’

‘Yes. Take them. Take them home. Thanks for all your hard work over the sales!’ She shoved them into her hands.

‘Wow, thanks!’ Kelsey’s eyes lit up and she nearly danced out of the back room.

It occurred to Michelle that now she’d have to find some present for Gillian, to avoid any staff fall-outs, but her brain was whirring round in circles.

Why now? Why was Harvey doing this now, after more than three years? She could imagine him starting his campaign with her mother, the sad expression over the drying-up he’d never done at home, the hints and whispers. She didn’t even want to think about how Harvey would set her dad’s concerns in motion, pulling the strings tighter until everyone was helping him haul her back. But why? Because he hated losing control of anything. Anyone.

Michelle grabbed her notebook, the one with her year’s ambitions and to-dos, and opened it to her long-term goals.

‘File for divorce’
.

As the pen formed the F, Michelle’s hand faltered. Harvey’s face floated to the front of her mind. So handsome on the surface – bold cheekbones, wide mouth, blond hair – all apart from his eyes, which were small and cold, like little windows into his own smallness and coldness. But only she seemed to see that. Everyone else just saw the charming, sociable, easy-going salesman. He saved the smallness and coldness for her, his wife.

It was ironic that she’d decided to wait out the five years’ separation rather than cite unreasonable behaviour. She’d had a lifetime’s worth to choose from, but that was exactly why the thought of challenging him with it filled her with cold fear.

Harvey made out he was
so
reasonable – and was such a genius salesman – that he could convince anyone that she was the one with the problem. And he’d never stop.

I don’t have to write it down, she thought, recapping her pen. But I’m going to do it. This year. I am.

7

‘You’re very quiet,’ said Phil, as they passed the first sign for the airport. ‘Was it that second bottle of wine last night? Can’t you handle it any more?’

‘No!’ Anna swatted him on the knee. ‘Speak for yourself. I was just . . . enjoying the peace and tranquillity.’

‘Ah, the peace and tranquillity,’ said Phil wisely. Then he grinned. ‘And there I was thinking I’d finally worn you out. At least on honeymoon you insisted on spending four hours a day reading. I need another holiday to get over this one.’

‘Well, now you are speaking for yourself.’ Anna leaned back in her seat and smiled to herself. She wasn’t counting any chickens, but if the websites were anything to go by, they already had a good to middling chance of a September baby being under way already. Just as well, since once they collected Becca, Chloe and Lily from the airport, they wouldn’t have another private moment for weeks.

Phil took his eyes off the road for a moment to share a cheeky glance with her, and Anna held his gaze. He still made her stomach flutter. If that
was
her stomach fluttering.

‘I’m very lucky,’ he said.

‘I know. You are.’

‘I mean, yes, I’ve missed the girls, but I’m glad we got this time to ourselves. Just us. I’d forgotten how nice it is to read the papers without being interrupted. And being able to open that second bottle of wine without wondering if one of us is going to be summoned to Bethany’s house to collect Miss McQueen.’

‘I know,’ said Anna. ‘I don’t miss taxi duty. I don’t even mind getting a hangover. It’s nice to have one.’

‘On Sunday morning, I just thought, how happy am I?’ he went on. ‘Being with you, walking the dog, getting coffee . . . I don’t think getting old’s too bad, do you?’

That brought Anna up short. ‘What are you talking about?’ she demanded. ‘We’re
not
getting old!’

Phil pointed at the radio. ‘We’re listening to Radio 2.’

‘Young people love Radio 2. Becca listens to it sometimes.’

‘Becca listens to it because she thinks it makes her look sophisticated. You know what? I found myself looking at one of those luxury sheds the other day. And I found myself thinking, mmm, I’d
like
one of those. I’d like to relax in it, with Pongo at my feet, and read my Jeremy Clarkson books. That’s definitely old.’

Phil sounded a bit too pleased about this notion. It wasn’t the first time he’d talked about feeling old, either. Anna hoped it wasn’t a roundabout way of telling her something else – he had a habit of laughing her out of serious conversations, skimming witty little observations across the real matter in hand until the point of the conversation had passed.

‘You’re not even forty,’ she pointed out.

‘This year, though. And
slippers
. I wouldn’t mind a pair of really good quality velvet slippers next Christmas. I saw some in Michelle’s shop. Monogrammed. Or with something funky, like a skull and crossbones.’

‘There’s no way I’m giving you slippers for Christmas. Ever. Not even when you
are
old.’

‘What about homebrew? Can I start doing homebrew? I don’t have to grow the beard.’

Anna wanted to laugh, but she knew that if she did, she’d find herself agreeing with him. ‘Will you stop making out that we’re one step away from the Golden Moments Retirement Castle?’

‘But we have a daughter who’ll be able to vote this year. That’s old.’

‘You mean,
you
have a daughter,’ said Anna, without thinking, then realised what she’d said and mentally slapped herself. ‘I didn’t mean . . . I meant, we have a daughter, but
I’m
too young to have an eighteen- . . . I mean,
you’re
too young, really . . .’

But her first words hung between them. Silence fell, except in Anna’s head, where all hell was being let loose.

The turn-off sign to the airport flashed past, like a warning.

‘What?’ he said, sensing her staring at him.

Had he noticed? Sometimes she was far more sensitive to these things than he was.

‘What I meant was, I’m still too young to have an eighteen-year-old, and really, so are you. But that’s the thing about being a bloke – it’s perfectly possible to have a daughter who can vote,’ she said carefully, ‘and have a newborn baby all in the same year.’

‘Now that does make me feel old,’ said Phil, but his voice had changed and he didn’t sound jokey any more.

‘Why?’

‘The thought of wet nappies, and broken nights, and sick, and feeling like a zombie for months, and did I mention nappies? If you think Pongo makes the house smell, you want to have a close encounter with twenty nappies a day.’

‘You’d have your shed,’ she tried, in a light tone.

‘Oh, I see.
Now
the shed’s acceptable.’ He indicated into the left lane to take the airport turning and glanced at her as he moved into a space. His eyes seemed wary, and his fingers weren’t tapping the steering wheel in time to the music any more.

Anna steeled herself. ‘Phil, you haven’t forgotten what we talked about when we got married, have you? About having a baby after we’d been married four years?’

‘I haven’t forgotten.’

That wasn’t the answer she’d been hoping for.

‘Well, it’s this month!’ Anna paused, trying to summon up some lightness so he wouldn’t feel nagged. ‘And I don’t mean that you’re getting past it, I mean I don’t want you to get entrenched in the Radio 2, shed mentality, you old goat.’

The traffic had bunched up as the cars queued to get into the terminal lanes. Phil turned to her and put his hand on her knee, a last caressing ember of the intimacy they’d shared over the past days. ‘Anna,’ he said, then sighed.

Anna’s chest contracted at the honesty in his face. He looked wary, but concerned, and his eyes searched hers as if he already knew his words weren’t going to be what she wanted to hear.

‘I’d love us to have a baby,’ he said. ‘But I’m not being flippant about how disruptive they are. It’s amazing, obviously, and so rewarding, but your whole life completely changes. It’s like being abducted by this tiny alien. Nothing is ever the same again.’

She flinched. ‘I am aware of that, yes.’

If one more parent said this stuff to her – how you never understood love until you held your baby in your arms, how only a parent truly grasped the world’s horrors, etc., etc. – she would throw Becca’s violin case, the gym pile and bloody Pongo’s basket at them. Her life had already changed completely, and if she ever breathed a word of how hard it had been, how stressful to have all the responsibility without the magic parent love drug, then she was branded a selfish, father-stealing homewrecker who should have known what she was getting into.

Phil didn’t seem to notice the sudden whiteness of her lips. ‘I know that. And you’re doing a great job. But things have changed, haven’t they? None of us were expecting Sarah to go off to the States. I don’t want to unsettle Becca when she’s stressing out about her A-levels, and Chloe . . .’ Phil pretended to squeeze his forehead in despair. ‘Every time she talks to me about this band I keep seeing the Pussycat Dolls in my head and I want to send her to a girls’ boarding school. And Lily . . .’

‘So what are you saying?’ Anna asked. Her stomach rollercoastered. But he’d agreed! ‘We can’t have a baby now?’

‘No.’ Phil ran a hand through his hair. ‘I’m not saying that. I’m saying that the playing field’s changed. If you hadn’t been here, there’s no way I could have coped with all this. I had no idea how stressful those three could be. I just . . .’ He took a deep breath. ‘I’m just more wary about adding in a newborn to the mix than I was when we only had the girls for alternate weekends.’

‘But Sarah’s coming back next year,’ Anna pointed out, trying to sound calm and rational even though inside she was howling with an unexpected, irrational fury. ‘It could take a few months, the baby might not arrive until after she does.’