Sara frowned, hurt stabbing at her heart, making her voice waver. ‘We live together, I’ve known you all your lives. I’m used to talking to kids your age too, aren’t I?’
The girls glanced at each other.
‘And what does go on?’
‘It’s nothing,’ Amelia said, sounding a bit annoyed. ‘Just some lad playing jokes, that’s all. Auntie Hailey knows him – he’s one of the lads she looks after in her job – so that’s why it was good to talk to her. You wouldn’t…’
Sara swallowed her frustration, her voice shaking. ‘I wouldn’t what?’
Amelia looked away, picked at her peeling nail varnish. ‘Nothing.’
‘But it is something, isn’t it?’
‘Don’t go on, Mum,’ Sophia said, glaring at her. She put an arm round her sister’s shoulders. ‘We’ve done nothing wrong. All we did was chat to Auntie Hailey. She was here, we talked to her. It would be bad manners to ignore her, wouldn’t it?’
Sara couldn’t argue with the logic and recognised that she wasn’t going to get any further. ‘Sorry.’ She smiled and backtracked – aware of how delicate a mother’s relationship with teenage daughters could be – and tiptoed back across the eggshells to firmer ground. ‘I’m not getting at anyone. Not at all. I just feel a bit left out these days.’
Sophia locked eyes with her before she spoke. ‘Well maybe if you were here, like you used to be, we’d be able to talk to you more.’
Sara closed her eyes for a moment, unable to meet the challenge of her daughter’s stare. Because it was true. ‘I have to work since Dad lost his job. I really don’t have a choice. And there’d be plenty of time to talk in the evenings if you weren’t stuck in here or over at Chelsea’s or…’ She was going to say ‘playing football’, but that was their passion, and she didn’t want them to feel bad about it. She forced a smile. In the past she would have suggested a shopping trip to Leeds, something they’d always enjoyed, but now money was tight, that was no longer an option. She’d have to have a think, see if she could come up with something that didn’t cost a lot but would feel like a treat and help them to bond again.
Maybe football’s the answer, she thought, as she stood up. The way we can reconnect. She’d left that side of things to Matt – it was his passion as well – and it was tricky keeping Ezra happy through a whole match so it was easier for her to go and do something different with him. She’d always thought it was nice for the girls and Matt to have a shared interest, but she realised now that she should have made more of an effort to be involved.
‘Well, I’ll definitely come to footie practice on Thursday,’ she said, with an enthusiastic grin. ‘I’m looking forward to it.’
Sophia snorted. ‘Bet you only do it once, Mum.’
Amelia wouldn’t look at her, and she could feel the weight of her daughters’ disappointment sitting on her shoulders. I’ve let them down, she thought as she said goodnight and left their room, closing the door behind her. She waited for a moment, but they were both silent, no doubt waiting to hear her footsteps walk down the hall before they said anything.
Still a mystery, then. But something’s bothering them.
She went back downstairs, made herself another cup of tea and rang Hailey. Best to do it while she was all fired up, otherwise it would get put off and she’d never get to the bottom of whatever was bothering the girls. It seemed to be Amelia’s problem, and Sophia was trying to help her sort it out. Or was she making assumptions? The two girls were so different, it was hard to know. Sophia had a hard exterior and a soft centre, and Amelia was more sensitive, wore her heart on her sleeve.
After a few rings, Hailey’s voicemail answered. Sara was about to leave a message, then decided that she probably wasn’t in the right frame of mind. It would come out all wrong. Like an accusation. Better to wait until Thursday. They’d have plenty of time to chat at football practice, and Hailey was less likely to get in a tizzy if there were other parents around. She nodded to herself. It was only two days away. Not long, and in the meantime, she’d keep a closer eye on the girls, see if she could find out what the problem really was.
She went into the lounge to watch TV while she waited for Matt to come in, but when the ten o’clock news began, her eyes started to close, tiredness engulfing her. She’d never imagined that working full-time would be so hard. In her mind it was a mental challenge, something she was desperate for, but she’d overlooked the sheer physical effort of getting three kids up and ready for school, feeding them, doing all the laundry and the shopping, keeping the house in some semblance of order and sorting out childcare when Matt couldn’t do it.
Thank goodness it’s only for a month, she thought as she turned off the TV and dragged herself up to bed. There was still no sign of Matt.
As she lay staring at the ceiling – the house still and quiet – she heard the murmur of conversation drift in through the open window. It sounded like it was coming from right underneath it, although it couldn’t be, because their house stood back from the road. A tinkling laugh. Just like the one she’d heard coming from the garage earlier.
Sound travels at night, she told herself, but she was wide awake now, ears straining to hear every sound. The click of heels, the clink of a gate opening and closing. That’s our gate. She was sure of it – the weird clang it made – and she clambered out of bed, rushed to the window and peeked out, but there was nobody to be seen in the darkness of the night.
The back door thumped shut. That couldn’t be a coincidence, Matt coming in just after someone had gone out of their gate.
Fired up, she hurried downstairs to the kitchen, where Matt was standing looking in the fridge, his hair sticking up all over the place. He turned when he saw her, gave a sheepish grin. ‘Just going to make some supper. I completely lost track of time out there.’
‘Who was that woman?’ She hadn’t meant to go on the attack, but she couldn’t help herself.
He frowned, looked confused. ‘What woman?’
‘The one who was in your office just now. I heard her leave.’ Sara’s voice was getting louder, higher, her finger jabbing the air.
He laughed, looked back in the fridge. ‘I think you must have been dreaming, love. Nobody in the office except me.’ He pulled out a packet of ham and the tub of margarine, opened the bread bin and slapped a couple of slices of bread onto the worktop. He turned. ‘Shall I make you one as well?’ The kettle came to the boil. ‘Cuppa?’
His nonchalance whipped her anger away. She shook her head and made her way back to bed, thoroughly puzzled. Was I dreaming?
Chapter Fourteen
Sara woke the next day to the sound of Matt singing in the shower. She felt groggy and unsettled as she fumbled her way out of sleep. Working full-time was exhausting, and poor Matt had been doing it without a murmur of complaint for all these years. She hadn’t appreciated his efforts, she realised; had focused instead on her own niggles of discontent, always wanting a bit of what he had. Now she wasn’t sure why she’d felt like that. She wanted things to go back to how they were. Was that possible?