The Rumor, page 13
“Oh, darling. I put my hat on when my ears got cold.” I look up at Karen. “It’s new. He’s probably never seen me wearing it before. I didn’t think.”
Now that Alfie is safe in my arms and my breathing’s returned to normal, I start to cry. How could I have let this happen? I was so engrossed in what Maddie was telling me about Anne Wilson, I must have forgotten to keep checking on Alfie and Sol. In fact, where the hell is Sol? He’ll be going berserk by now. Mom’ll never forgive me if I’ve lost him. She dotes on that dog almost as much as she dotes on Alfie. I run to the seawall and scan the beach from left to right.
Then I see him, plodding along next to Maddie—they’re some way in the distance still, but I recognize Sol’s lumbering gait and Maddie’s lithe, Lycra-clad figure. I didn’t realize how far I’d run. Now Maddie’s waving at me. She’s bringing Sol up to meet us. My eyes fill with tears and Karen touches me gently on the arm.
“I lost Hayley once. In Target. I only took my eye off her for a second, and when I turned around she was gone. A sales assistant found her by one of the checkouts, looking for candy.” She sighs. “Joanna, I’m so sorry I didn’t see you, but I’ve broken my glasses. They’re being repaired and I don’t have a spare pair.”
That’s why she looks different. She’s almost crying now. “We tramped up and down for ages. I should have waited for longer, but I’m supposed to be taking my mother to a doctor’s appointment in ten minutes. I didn’t know what else to do. If it was summer, there’d have been a lifeguard, but…”
“It’s all right, Karen. Honestly. I’m just grateful you looked after him.”
She squeezes my hands, and for a couple of seconds we look into each other’s eyes. Two women united by the common bond of motherhood and the terror of losing the only thing in the world that really matters. Our children.
26
MRS. HAYNES IS ALL SWEETNESS and light when I take Alfie back to school. She must be worried I’m going to make a complaint about that photo. To be honest, I haven’t entirely ruled it out. Just thinking about it makes me nauseous. Who would have done such a thing?
But Mr. Matthews has already apologized and it’s been removed from the board. Besides, I’m not sure what good it would do to lodge a complaint now. I might just end up with a reputation as a troublesome parent. One who needs to be handled with kid gloves.
Or maybe it’s the presence of Sol that’s softened her up. Dogs have that effect on people, and Flinstead is a dog lovers’ paradise. When Alfie went to school in the city, dogs weren’t allowed anywhere on school premises.
“I’ve seen this lovely fella before,” she says, fondling Sol’s ears. “He’s a big old sweetie, aren’t you, you gorgeous boy?”
Ugh. Now she’s letting him lick her face. I’ve never understood how people can do that. Don’t they know where those noses and tongues have been? Once, when I took Sol out for a walk, I had to stop him eating another dog’s shit.
Mom just laughed when I told her and proceeded to give me a mini lecture on the different types of coprophagia, as it’s called. Autocoprophagia is when they eat their own poop; intraspecific coprophagia is when they eat another dog’s poop; and interspecific coprophagia is when they eat poop from another species of animal altogether. Funny the things that stick in your mind. I bet Sol would indulge in all three if he had his way.
“Okay, Alfie. Shall we say goodbye to Mommy now?” Mrs. Haynes says.
I give him a hug and kiss the top of his head. “See you this afternoon, darling.”
“Mommy, remember it’s Liam’s birthday party!” he calls over his shoulder as Mrs. Haynes leads him away.
I give him a wave. “Of course.” The incident at the beach earlier had wiped it clean out of my mind. Still, at least he’s not upset anymore.
I watch until he and Mrs. Haynes disappear through the door that leads from the hall to his classroom. I don’t like leaving him after what’s just happened, but this is a good school. A safe school.
* * *
—
MOM’S STILL FEELING awful when I take Sol back. She looks as white as her sheets, and the tip of her nose is all red from where she’s been blowing it.
“Keep away from me,” she warns in a croaky voice. “I don’t want you and Alfie coming down with this, too. It’s horrible. I was feeling fine yesterday.”
She reaches for her glass of water and empties it.
“Here, let me get you some more,” I say. “Are you sure you don’t want anything to eat?”
She grimaces.
“I could come by again this evening if you like, after the party.”
“What party?”
“Didn’t I tell you about it? I’m sure I did. It’s one of Alfie’s classmates. He’s having a birthday party after school. A costume party.”
Mom groans. “Don’t tell me—Halloween?”
“ ’Fraid so. I did what you said and made friends with some of the other moms.”
She nods. “I hope you’ve gotten him a good costume. You don’t want him to be the odd one out.”
I stare at her in disbelief. This is the woman who used to tell me that pretty dresses were a complete waste of money and fashionable shoes were bad for my growing feet. “If you need a certain pair of shoes to fit in with the right crowd, Joanna, it’s the wrong crowd,” she used to say.
“You should see your face!” she says now, and laughs. “I know what you’re thinking, but it’s different when you’re a grandmother. You’ll find that out one day. At least, I hope you will.”
I wonder whether this is a good time to tell her about Michael moving in. If I don’t tell her soon, Alfie’s only going to blurt something out, and then I’ll feel bad for keeping it from her. I sit down on the edge of the bed. I’ll probably end up with her cold now, but so be it. I need to be straight with her.
“Mom, there’s something I have to tell you. Michael’s asked if he can move in with me and I’ve said yes.”
I look at my reflection in her dressing-table mirror and then, obliquely, at hers. She’s folding her hankie into a small square, gathering her thoughts.
“Well,” she says at last. “If you feel in your heart that it’s the right thing to do, and if you’re absolutely sure it’s what you want.” She sniffs. “All I want is for you to be happy, Jo. You know that, don’t you?”
Her eyes are wet, and though this could be the effect of her cold, I don’t think it is.
“Of course I know that. And I also know you’ve always thought he had commitment issues.” I stare at my knees. “I’ve never told you this, Mom, but he asked me to marry him once.”
She gasps. “And you turned him down?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because I didn’t want it to be just about Alfie.” I sigh. “And I guess it had something to do with Dad, too. I couldn’t bear the thought of Michael turning out just like him and letting us down.”
Mom unfolds her hankie and blows her nose.
“I know how much it damaged your self-esteem, Mom, and I didn’t want to—”
“End up an embittered old woman like me?”
“That’s not what I was going to say.”
She laughs. “You’re right, though. It did damage my self-esteem, and I’m sorry if I passed on my own insecurities about men to you. That wasn’t fair.”
“I just wish he hadn’t been such a shit.”
“You and me both, darling.”
I squeeze her wrist. “But I’ll promise you: If Michael doesn’t step up and commit to us, like he’s said he will, I’ll end it for good.”
Mom nods in approval. She could never move on, but I’m stronger than her. I can.
I just hope I don’t have to.
27
SARTRE, OR RATHER A CHARACTER in one of his plays, famously said that “Hell is other people.” I know that statement’s not quite as simple as it sounds, and I don’t have the necessary philosophical knowledge to unpick it. But at this precise moment, I’m taking it at face value. Hell is indeed other people, especially the people sitting in Debbie Barton’s sunroom drinking Prosecco, and even more especially their children, who right now are being entertained by a balloon sculptor in the room next door and making so much noise my head feels ready to burst.
My eyes drift from the faces that surround me and into the dining room beyond the French doors. A vast diamanté-framed mirror reflects the lush green of the garden, and a glass chandelier twinkles from the ceiling. Debbie’s husband, Colin—a plumber, I think she said—is sitting at the table having a beer with Karen’s husband, Rob. The two of them look out of place in what is the most bling-filled, girlie-inspired décor I’ve ever seen. Lots of purple and pink. Furry pillows and sparkly accessories. “Amusing” wall plaques with quotes. I wonder how much input Colin had in all this. Not much, by the looks of things. I bring my attention back to the conversation going on around me. It’s becoming more and more like an episode from one of those reality-TV shows—The Real Housewives of Flinstead-on-Sea. Tash will have a field day when I tell her about it.
To be fair, Debbie did say I could go home and come back later, but given the day I’ve had there’s no way I’m leaving Alfie on his own. After all, how well do I really know these people? They seem friendly enough, but after what Kay told me this morning…
Every now and then Karen and I catch each other’s eye. From the look on her face, she’s finding all this as tedious as I am.
I lean toward her. “How’s your mother?”
She frowns in surprise.
“You said earlier you were taking her to a doctor’s appointment. I hope you weren’t late.”
“Oh no, no,” she says. “Well, we were a little bit, but it didn’t matter. You always have to wait about twenty minutes past your appointment time, don’t you? She’s…she’s fine.”
Karen takes a sip of her Prosecco and stares into the middle distance. Her expression has changed. I remember her mother’s face as she looked back at me over her shoulder, that time they waved at me through the window of Pegton’s. She didn’t look fine to me. Oh dear, I wish I hadn’t said anything now.
Around us, the chatter has turned to what’s been happening at Stones and Crones. The brick through the window and what it all means. Whether there’s any truth to the allegations.
Karen closes her eyes and sighs. She opens them and catches me staring at her. “How are you doing with this month’s book-club read?” she says. “I’m finding it a bit heavy going, to be honest. All those stories within stories.”
“What book is it?” Debbie asks before I’ve even had a chance to answer.
“Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein,” Karen says.
Debbie pulls a face, as if to say, What a bore. “I’m surprised nobody’s come to Liam’s party dressed as Frankenstein.”
Karen and I exchange a glance. A fleeting moment of mild amusement. I’ve misjudged her. I see that now. She might have been a little intrusive that time at book club, but maybe she was just trying to be friendly. I’ve certainly got more in common with her than with this crowd and, after what happened at the beach this morning, we seem to have reached a new understanding.
“Frankenstein is the name of the scientist who creates the monster,” I tell Debbie, immediately wishing I hadn’t. No one likes a smart-ass. “Although everyone gets it mixed up.”
“You could argue that he’s the real monster for abandoning his creation,” Karen says.
I nod. “Or for creating him in the first place.”
Debbie makes a face. “Cut it out, you two. You’re not at your book club now.”
Laughter erupts from the room next door.
“He’s good value for the money, that balloon guy,” Debbie says. “Very good-looking, too.”
Murmurs of agreement ripple through the group. Someone makes a joke about him being good at manipulating latex and they all shriek with laughter.
“Speaking of good-looking men,” Cathy says, lowering her voice a little so that Colin and Rob don’t overhear, “I couldn’t help noticing that rather gorgeous man you were with just before the holiday weekend, Joanna.” She smiles. “Is he your baby daddy?”
I bristle at the phrase. I don’t mind the question behind it. I’ve no problem confirming that Michael is Alfie’s father. Why would I? But the term baby daddy has a nuance to it I don’t like, implying as it does that his only significance is biological. And the way she said it, too, as if it were in quotes. Would she have said that if Michael weren’t black?
I detect a slight lowering of voices around me, as if the others don’t want to be blatant enough to stop talking, but neither do they want to miss out on my answer.
“He’s Alfie’s dad, yes. He’s also my partner.” It feels odd saying this out loud. I usually say something like, He’s Alfie’s dad and my best friend, but if I say that now, it might invite further questions, and my instinct in situations like this is to shut down the line of inquiry as politely and efficiently as I can. Besides, things are different now. Michael is my partner.
“Oh, I didn’t realize,” Cathy says. “I thought you were single.”
I smile. There’s a slight pause in the conversations going on around me, like white space on a page, and then, when my silent smile continues, the voices resume. Pitter-pattering over the awkwardness until the moment is washed away. Borne aloft on a tide of trivia.
“Okay,” Debbie says. “I think it’s time to quiet things down a bit in there.” She gets up and goes over to a sideboard, from which she draws a large box wrapped in shiny silver paper. “Any volunteers for music control in Hot Potato?”
Karen’s hand shoots up so fast she almost knocks Teri’s Prosecco to the floor.
Debbie points to her iPad on the coffee table. “I’ve got a playlist set up on Spotify. Just click on Spooky Tunes.”
We all troop into the adjoining room, where balloon animals are being brandished like weapons and bashed over a sea of heads. Karen’s and Teri’s daughters, Hayley and Ruby, are the only girls in the group, and it’s interesting to see how they’ve taken themselves off to a quiet corner and are playing an entirely different game that involves trotting their animals along the back of the sofa in a sort of dance routine.
Alfie’s hair is damp with sweat and his eyes have a manic gleam. I perch on the end of a sofa as far too many mothers try to organize the children into a seated circle. Colin and Rob have wisely stayed in the dining room. At last, the Ghostbusters theme tune starts up and the potato is on the move.
* * *
—
TWO HOURS LATER, after a dismal half hour traipsing along dark, wet streets while our hyperactive offspring knock on strangers’ doors and ask for treats, I’m desperate to get home. But when Karen and Rob ask me in for a cup of coffee—well, just Karen, really—and I realize they live in The Regal, I can’t resist. It used to be a fancy hotel in its day and I’m dying to see what it’s like.
One of the apartments on the upper floors with a terrace and a view came up for sale recently, but the owner withdrew it before I got a chance to take a look. Karen and Rob’s place, disappointingly, turns out to be in the more modern extension, but I can hardly change my mind now. And besides, she did let Alfie win the main prize in Hot Potato.
Karen ushers me into a warm, square-shaped living room. It might not be as big as I’d been expecting, but it has a homey feel to it. Hayley scrambles up onto the lap of an older woman curled up on one end of a large sofa with a laptop. The same woman I saw with Karen outside Pegton’s. She’s dwarfed by a white, fluffy bathrobe, and she’s wearing a pink beanie and slippers.
“Meet my mother,” Karen says. “This isn’t her usual attire, but then it is Halloween, right, Mom?”
I cross the room toward her, hand extended. She can’t get up, not with Hayley hogging her lap. She shakes my hand. Her wrists are tiny, her face gaunt.
“She’s charming, isn’t she, my daughter?” Her voice is surprisingly gruff. The pink hat and the fluffy slippers had me expecting something a little softer. More feminine.
“Learned it all from you, Mother dear,” Karen retorts. It’s just mother-daughter banter, but I sense a slight tension between them. It must be a strain for Karen and Rob, having her mother stay with them in this small apartment. I can’t help noticing that Rob’s disappeared into the bedroom and closed the door behind him.
Karen plucks a DVD from a basket on the floor, and before long Hayley and Alfie are sitting cross-legged in front of the TV, enthralled by the opening scenes of Frozen.
Karen beckons me into the kitchen. “Let’s go have some coffee. Mom’ll keep an eye on them. She loves Frozen.”
As I follow Karen out of the room, I glance back at the three of them: a somewhat disheveled Darth Vader and his ghostly bride, and the thin woman in the oversized bathrobe, tapping away at her keyboard.
* * *
—
LATER THAT NIGHT, when I’m stretched out on the sofa watching mindless TV, I reflect on the day. All that terror I felt this morning when I saw that awful photo, and my panic at losing Alfie—it’s all faded away. If I never hear the words Halloween and trick or treat again, I’ll be happy, but at least Alfie enjoyed himself, and I’m glad I went back to Karen’s apartment. I have a feeling we’re going to be friends after all.
I reach for my phone to check whether Michael’s been in touch and, sure enough, there’s a text.
How was the party? Bet Alfie stuffed himself with candy.
For the next couple of minutes we bat messages back and forth, neither one of us wanting to be the last to sign off. I know I should tell him about the photo, and the incident on the beach this morning, but it seems too much for a text and I’d rather tell him face-to-face. Eventually we say good night and I toss the phone onto the cushion beside me. Then I pick it up again and go onto Twitter. Just one last look at Sally Mac before I delete my Twitter account for good. Now that Michael’s moving in, I won’t be so bored in the evenings.
Now that Alfie is safe in my arms and my breathing’s returned to normal, I start to cry. How could I have let this happen? I was so engrossed in what Maddie was telling me about Anne Wilson, I must have forgotten to keep checking on Alfie and Sol. In fact, where the hell is Sol? He’ll be going berserk by now. Mom’ll never forgive me if I’ve lost him. She dotes on that dog almost as much as she dotes on Alfie. I run to the seawall and scan the beach from left to right.
Then I see him, plodding along next to Maddie—they’re some way in the distance still, but I recognize Sol’s lumbering gait and Maddie’s lithe, Lycra-clad figure. I didn’t realize how far I’d run. Now Maddie’s waving at me. She’s bringing Sol up to meet us. My eyes fill with tears and Karen touches me gently on the arm.
“I lost Hayley once. In Target. I only took my eye off her for a second, and when I turned around she was gone. A sales assistant found her by one of the checkouts, looking for candy.” She sighs. “Joanna, I’m so sorry I didn’t see you, but I’ve broken my glasses. They’re being repaired and I don’t have a spare pair.”
That’s why she looks different. She’s almost crying now. “We tramped up and down for ages. I should have waited for longer, but I’m supposed to be taking my mother to a doctor’s appointment in ten minutes. I didn’t know what else to do. If it was summer, there’d have been a lifeguard, but…”
“It’s all right, Karen. Honestly. I’m just grateful you looked after him.”
She squeezes my hands, and for a couple of seconds we look into each other’s eyes. Two women united by the common bond of motherhood and the terror of losing the only thing in the world that really matters. Our children.
26
MRS. HAYNES IS ALL SWEETNESS and light when I take Alfie back to school. She must be worried I’m going to make a complaint about that photo. To be honest, I haven’t entirely ruled it out. Just thinking about it makes me nauseous. Who would have done such a thing?
But Mr. Matthews has already apologized and it’s been removed from the board. Besides, I’m not sure what good it would do to lodge a complaint now. I might just end up with a reputation as a troublesome parent. One who needs to be handled with kid gloves.
Or maybe it’s the presence of Sol that’s softened her up. Dogs have that effect on people, and Flinstead is a dog lovers’ paradise. When Alfie went to school in the city, dogs weren’t allowed anywhere on school premises.
“I’ve seen this lovely fella before,” she says, fondling Sol’s ears. “He’s a big old sweetie, aren’t you, you gorgeous boy?”
Ugh. Now she’s letting him lick her face. I’ve never understood how people can do that. Don’t they know where those noses and tongues have been? Once, when I took Sol out for a walk, I had to stop him eating another dog’s shit.
Mom just laughed when I told her and proceeded to give me a mini lecture on the different types of coprophagia, as it’s called. Autocoprophagia is when they eat their own poop; intraspecific coprophagia is when they eat another dog’s poop; and interspecific coprophagia is when they eat poop from another species of animal altogether. Funny the things that stick in your mind. I bet Sol would indulge in all three if he had his way.
“Okay, Alfie. Shall we say goodbye to Mommy now?” Mrs. Haynes says.
I give him a hug and kiss the top of his head. “See you this afternoon, darling.”
“Mommy, remember it’s Liam’s birthday party!” he calls over his shoulder as Mrs. Haynes leads him away.
I give him a wave. “Of course.” The incident at the beach earlier had wiped it clean out of my mind. Still, at least he’s not upset anymore.
I watch until he and Mrs. Haynes disappear through the door that leads from the hall to his classroom. I don’t like leaving him after what’s just happened, but this is a good school. A safe school.
* * *
—
MOM’S STILL FEELING awful when I take Sol back. She looks as white as her sheets, and the tip of her nose is all red from where she’s been blowing it.
“Keep away from me,” she warns in a croaky voice. “I don’t want you and Alfie coming down with this, too. It’s horrible. I was feeling fine yesterday.”
She reaches for her glass of water and empties it.
“Here, let me get you some more,” I say. “Are you sure you don’t want anything to eat?”
She grimaces.
“I could come by again this evening if you like, after the party.”
“What party?”
“Didn’t I tell you about it? I’m sure I did. It’s one of Alfie’s classmates. He’s having a birthday party after school. A costume party.”
Mom groans. “Don’t tell me—Halloween?”
“ ’Fraid so. I did what you said and made friends with some of the other moms.”
She nods. “I hope you’ve gotten him a good costume. You don’t want him to be the odd one out.”
I stare at her in disbelief. This is the woman who used to tell me that pretty dresses were a complete waste of money and fashionable shoes were bad for my growing feet. “If you need a certain pair of shoes to fit in with the right crowd, Joanna, it’s the wrong crowd,” she used to say.
“You should see your face!” she says now, and laughs. “I know what you’re thinking, but it’s different when you’re a grandmother. You’ll find that out one day. At least, I hope you will.”
I wonder whether this is a good time to tell her about Michael moving in. If I don’t tell her soon, Alfie’s only going to blurt something out, and then I’ll feel bad for keeping it from her. I sit down on the edge of the bed. I’ll probably end up with her cold now, but so be it. I need to be straight with her.
“Mom, there’s something I have to tell you. Michael’s asked if he can move in with me and I’ve said yes.”
I look at my reflection in her dressing-table mirror and then, obliquely, at hers. She’s folding her hankie into a small square, gathering her thoughts.
“Well,” she says at last. “If you feel in your heart that it’s the right thing to do, and if you’re absolutely sure it’s what you want.” She sniffs. “All I want is for you to be happy, Jo. You know that, don’t you?”
Her eyes are wet, and though this could be the effect of her cold, I don’t think it is.
“Of course I know that. And I also know you’ve always thought he had commitment issues.” I stare at my knees. “I’ve never told you this, Mom, but he asked me to marry him once.”
She gasps. “And you turned him down?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because I didn’t want it to be just about Alfie.” I sigh. “And I guess it had something to do with Dad, too. I couldn’t bear the thought of Michael turning out just like him and letting us down.”
Mom unfolds her hankie and blows her nose.
“I know how much it damaged your self-esteem, Mom, and I didn’t want to—”
“End up an embittered old woman like me?”
“That’s not what I was going to say.”
She laughs. “You’re right, though. It did damage my self-esteem, and I’m sorry if I passed on my own insecurities about men to you. That wasn’t fair.”
“I just wish he hadn’t been such a shit.”
“You and me both, darling.”
I squeeze her wrist. “But I’ll promise you: If Michael doesn’t step up and commit to us, like he’s said he will, I’ll end it for good.”
Mom nods in approval. She could never move on, but I’m stronger than her. I can.
I just hope I don’t have to.
27
SARTRE, OR RATHER A CHARACTER in one of his plays, famously said that “Hell is other people.” I know that statement’s not quite as simple as it sounds, and I don’t have the necessary philosophical knowledge to unpick it. But at this precise moment, I’m taking it at face value. Hell is indeed other people, especially the people sitting in Debbie Barton’s sunroom drinking Prosecco, and even more especially their children, who right now are being entertained by a balloon sculptor in the room next door and making so much noise my head feels ready to burst.
My eyes drift from the faces that surround me and into the dining room beyond the French doors. A vast diamanté-framed mirror reflects the lush green of the garden, and a glass chandelier twinkles from the ceiling. Debbie’s husband, Colin—a plumber, I think she said—is sitting at the table having a beer with Karen’s husband, Rob. The two of them look out of place in what is the most bling-filled, girlie-inspired décor I’ve ever seen. Lots of purple and pink. Furry pillows and sparkly accessories. “Amusing” wall plaques with quotes. I wonder how much input Colin had in all this. Not much, by the looks of things. I bring my attention back to the conversation going on around me. It’s becoming more and more like an episode from one of those reality-TV shows—The Real Housewives of Flinstead-on-Sea. Tash will have a field day when I tell her about it.
To be fair, Debbie did say I could go home and come back later, but given the day I’ve had there’s no way I’m leaving Alfie on his own. After all, how well do I really know these people? They seem friendly enough, but after what Kay told me this morning…
Every now and then Karen and I catch each other’s eye. From the look on her face, she’s finding all this as tedious as I am.
I lean toward her. “How’s your mother?”
She frowns in surprise.
“You said earlier you were taking her to a doctor’s appointment. I hope you weren’t late.”
“Oh no, no,” she says. “Well, we were a little bit, but it didn’t matter. You always have to wait about twenty minutes past your appointment time, don’t you? She’s…she’s fine.”
Karen takes a sip of her Prosecco and stares into the middle distance. Her expression has changed. I remember her mother’s face as she looked back at me over her shoulder, that time they waved at me through the window of Pegton’s. She didn’t look fine to me. Oh dear, I wish I hadn’t said anything now.
Around us, the chatter has turned to what’s been happening at Stones and Crones. The brick through the window and what it all means. Whether there’s any truth to the allegations.
Karen closes her eyes and sighs. She opens them and catches me staring at her. “How are you doing with this month’s book-club read?” she says. “I’m finding it a bit heavy going, to be honest. All those stories within stories.”
“What book is it?” Debbie asks before I’ve even had a chance to answer.
“Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein,” Karen says.
Debbie pulls a face, as if to say, What a bore. “I’m surprised nobody’s come to Liam’s party dressed as Frankenstein.”
Karen and I exchange a glance. A fleeting moment of mild amusement. I’ve misjudged her. I see that now. She might have been a little intrusive that time at book club, but maybe she was just trying to be friendly. I’ve certainly got more in common with her than with this crowd and, after what happened at the beach this morning, we seem to have reached a new understanding.
“Frankenstein is the name of the scientist who creates the monster,” I tell Debbie, immediately wishing I hadn’t. No one likes a smart-ass. “Although everyone gets it mixed up.”
“You could argue that he’s the real monster for abandoning his creation,” Karen says.
I nod. “Or for creating him in the first place.”
Debbie makes a face. “Cut it out, you two. You’re not at your book club now.”
Laughter erupts from the room next door.
“He’s good value for the money, that balloon guy,” Debbie says. “Very good-looking, too.”
Murmurs of agreement ripple through the group. Someone makes a joke about him being good at manipulating latex and they all shriek with laughter.
“Speaking of good-looking men,” Cathy says, lowering her voice a little so that Colin and Rob don’t overhear, “I couldn’t help noticing that rather gorgeous man you were with just before the holiday weekend, Joanna.” She smiles. “Is he your baby daddy?”
I bristle at the phrase. I don’t mind the question behind it. I’ve no problem confirming that Michael is Alfie’s father. Why would I? But the term baby daddy has a nuance to it I don’t like, implying as it does that his only significance is biological. And the way she said it, too, as if it were in quotes. Would she have said that if Michael weren’t black?
I detect a slight lowering of voices around me, as if the others don’t want to be blatant enough to stop talking, but neither do they want to miss out on my answer.
“He’s Alfie’s dad, yes. He’s also my partner.” It feels odd saying this out loud. I usually say something like, He’s Alfie’s dad and my best friend, but if I say that now, it might invite further questions, and my instinct in situations like this is to shut down the line of inquiry as politely and efficiently as I can. Besides, things are different now. Michael is my partner.
“Oh, I didn’t realize,” Cathy says. “I thought you were single.”
I smile. There’s a slight pause in the conversations going on around me, like white space on a page, and then, when my silent smile continues, the voices resume. Pitter-pattering over the awkwardness until the moment is washed away. Borne aloft on a tide of trivia.
“Okay,” Debbie says. “I think it’s time to quiet things down a bit in there.” She gets up and goes over to a sideboard, from which she draws a large box wrapped in shiny silver paper. “Any volunteers for music control in Hot Potato?”
Karen’s hand shoots up so fast she almost knocks Teri’s Prosecco to the floor.
Debbie points to her iPad on the coffee table. “I’ve got a playlist set up on Spotify. Just click on Spooky Tunes.”
We all troop into the adjoining room, where balloon animals are being brandished like weapons and bashed over a sea of heads. Karen’s and Teri’s daughters, Hayley and Ruby, are the only girls in the group, and it’s interesting to see how they’ve taken themselves off to a quiet corner and are playing an entirely different game that involves trotting their animals along the back of the sofa in a sort of dance routine.
Alfie’s hair is damp with sweat and his eyes have a manic gleam. I perch on the end of a sofa as far too many mothers try to organize the children into a seated circle. Colin and Rob have wisely stayed in the dining room. At last, the Ghostbusters theme tune starts up and the potato is on the move.
* * *
—
TWO HOURS LATER, after a dismal half hour traipsing along dark, wet streets while our hyperactive offspring knock on strangers’ doors and ask for treats, I’m desperate to get home. But when Karen and Rob ask me in for a cup of coffee—well, just Karen, really—and I realize they live in The Regal, I can’t resist. It used to be a fancy hotel in its day and I’m dying to see what it’s like.
One of the apartments on the upper floors with a terrace and a view came up for sale recently, but the owner withdrew it before I got a chance to take a look. Karen and Rob’s place, disappointingly, turns out to be in the more modern extension, but I can hardly change my mind now. And besides, she did let Alfie win the main prize in Hot Potato.
Karen ushers me into a warm, square-shaped living room. It might not be as big as I’d been expecting, but it has a homey feel to it. Hayley scrambles up onto the lap of an older woman curled up on one end of a large sofa with a laptop. The same woman I saw with Karen outside Pegton’s. She’s dwarfed by a white, fluffy bathrobe, and she’s wearing a pink beanie and slippers.
“Meet my mother,” Karen says. “This isn’t her usual attire, but then it is Halloween, right, Mom?”
I cross the room toward her, hand extended. She can’t get up, not with Hayley hogging her lap. She shakes my hand. Her wrists are tiny, her face gaunt.
“She’s charming, isn’t she, my daughter?” Her voice is surprisingly gruff. The pink hat and the fluffy slippers had me expecting something a little softer. More feminine.
“Learned it all from you, Mother dear,” Karen retorts. It’s just mother-daughter banter, but I sense a slight tension between them. It must be a strain for Karen and Rob, having her mother stay with them in this small apartment. I can’t help noticing that Rob’s disappeared into the bedroom and closed the door behind him.
Karen plucks a DVD from a basket on the floor, and before long Hayley and Alfie are sitting cross-legged in front of the TV, enthralled by the opening scenes of Frozen.
Karen beckons me into the kitchen. “Let’s go have some coffee. Mom’ll keep an eye on them. She loves Frozen.”
As I follow Karen out of the room, I glance back at the three of them: a somewhat disheveled Darth Vader and his ghostly bride, and the thin woman in the oversized bathrobe, tapping away at her keyboard.
* * *
—
LATER THAT NIGHT, when I’m stretched out on the sofa watching mindless TV, I reflect on the day. All that terror I felt this morning when I saw that awful photo, and my panic at losing Alfie—it’s all faded away. If I never hear the words Halloween and trick or treat again, I’ll be happy, but at least Alfie enjoyed himself, and I’m glad I went back to Karen’s apartment. I have a feeling we’re going to be friends after all.
I reach for my phone to check whether Michael’s been in touch and, sure enough, there’s a text.
How was the party? Bet Alfie stuffed himself with candy.
For the next couple of minutes we bat messages back and forth, neither one of us wanting to be the last to sign off. I know I should tell him about the photo, and the incident on the beach this morning, but it seems too much for a text and I’d rather tell him face-to-face. Eventually we say good night and I toss the phone onto the cushion beside me. Then I pick it up again and go onto Twitter. Just one last look at Sally Mac before I delete my Twitter account for good. Now that Michael’s moving in, I won’t be so bored in the evenings.
