‘You never told me that before,’ said Pete. ‘Not sure I want to think about you and Auntie Sue.’ Auntie Sue was only slightly less hairy than Griff.
‘I know you’ve gone back to work and are craving normality, but be warned, son, it takes your brain a bit of time to catch up with everything that’s happened. You get so good at saying you’re fine, trying to make people not feel awkward when they ask if you’re coping that no one realises if you’re struggling. You end up believing your own lies. Everything gets distorted. It’s only been six months for you. It helped me to finally admit that I wasn’t as all right as I was telling everyone I was. Even to you and Griff.’
Words of wisdom indeed. Maybe he was seeing Ria in a light that she didn’t deserve to be lit with. His thinking processes outside work were off-kilter, he knew that. He just hoped they weren’t so skew-whiff that he ended up feeling lonely enough to settle for the companionship of a cold fish like Cora Caldwell. Griff and Lucy referred to her mostly as Elsa, after the Frozen character, and not because she was beautiful and misunderstood.
‘Hurry up and miss a ball, I’m getting bored,’ said Pete as Nigel potted another red and a blue.
‘Work gone all right this week?’
‘Yeah.’
‘I’m glad. There, I’ve missed. I did it deliberately for you, because that’s the sort of dad I am.’
‘ ’Course you did,’ said Pete, getting in position to pot the red his father had just missed, which was tantalisingly near the top pocket.
‘Rescued any cats from trees this week?’
‘I wish I had a pound for every time you’ve asked me that, Dad. No. I’ve fitted ten smoke alarms and rescued a lad’s arm from a chocolate vending machine in the gym. A boy called – I kid you not – Tommy Cruise.’
Nigel clicked his fingers. ‘Oh, I knew there was something I meant to tell you and you’ve just reminded me. I’ve booked a holiday. It’s not until next year though. I’m going on a cruise.’
‘Well, you’re getting to the age when cruises are starting to look attractive, Dad.’ Pete nudged the red into the pocket and fist-pumped.
‘Cheeky,’ said Nigel.
‘Where are you going and when?’
‘Norway. Next Feb.’
Pete gave his father a look. ‘Are you daft? It’ll be freezing.’
‘That’s the idea,’ replied Nigel. ‘Your mother always wanted to go and see the Northern Lights, so I’m going for her.’
‘But taking Cora.’ It came out harder than he’d meant it to.
‘Yes, well . . . I can’t take your mum, can I?’
Pete aimed for the brown but his concentration had gone. He sank the white instead. The mood had darkened slightly. The mere mention of Cora had a tendency to do that.
‘Are you happy with Cora, Dad?’ The question was out before he had a chance to think about asking it.
‘We get on well, if that’s what you mean,’ said Nigel. ‘I know she isn’t everyone’s cup of tea. She’s very different to your mother.’
Pete wrestled against making any further comment. It wasn’t his business and he shouldn’t have raised the matter. Who knew what happened behind closed doors? Maybe Cora revealed a warm and friendly alter ego to his dad.
‘Well, I hope you have a nice time,’ he said.
‘Cora’s not keen if I’m honest. I booked it as a surprise and I was a bit disappointed by her response. She wanted the Bahamas.’
‘Oh? I thought she’d be—’ at home with all that ice ‘—thrilled.’
‘She’ll come round. And if she doesn’t, I’ll change it for warmer climes.’ Nigel sighed. ‘No, it won’t be the same as going with your mother, I’ll give you that. She’d have started packing for it already.’ He smiled, then as quickly as the smile spread, it contracted, fell from his lips. ‘I miss her like hell, Pete. We both made a pact that if either of us was to go, the other should find someone else to love but it’s not the same. It could never be the same.’
Nigel’s blue eyes clouded. Julie-Anne used to say he had eyes like a doll – beautiful, bright, fringed with thick black eyelashes, which he still had. It had been his eyes that she had fallen in love with first, she’d always told everyone.
‘Does Cora love you back though, Dad?’
‘In her own way,’ said Nigel with a sniff as he leaned over the table and took aim. ‘I’m sure she does.’
*
Pete dropped his dad off at his home afterwards so he could spend the evening with Francis and Lesley which, said Nigel, was sitting on the list of ‘things to look forward to’ alongside an enlarged prostate examination. Nigel turned and waved to him before going inside and Pete imagined his mother rushing out, ordering him to park up and have a cup of tea with her. He’d end up staying for a meal because she’d insist. She was a wonderful cook, not a fancy one but everything she made was always so tasty and colourful. Greens with everything. Pete coughed away a ball of emotion that rose to his throat. He’d always wanted with Tara what his dad had with his mum and they would have had it, given the time. A house so full of love it rushed out at you when you opened the front door. He’d have made it happen. He would have found the love she lost for him and put it back in her heart where it belonged.
Chapter 13
Laurie had decided to bite the bullet and clear out Alex’s things that weekend instead of procrastinating any longer. Common sense told her that it might make her move on more than she had done because, in her weak moments – and there had been many of those – the sight of his gorgeous suits, his ties, even his balled socks brought tears tumbling from a never-ending well within her. His jumpers sat patiently on the shelves like faithful dogs, waiting for their master to return, choose, wear. She would press her face into the wool, breathing in the faded scent, wishing him back there beside her with every ounce of her will, begging to feel the slightest touch of him through the membrane that separated the living from the dead. He would have tried to give her something, anything – however small – to convince her that she meant something to him, she knew, if there was an afterlife. Whether with love – or guilt.
Residing in this nebulous present full of undealt-with duties was a false sanctuary and practical everyday life was knocking at the door. Alex’s possessions were now doing more harm than good to her. Letting them go would not mean she was expunging him from her heart, but she had to start getting through whole days without crying. And she also needed to make sure that Alex’s financial situation was in order, that there were no outstanding debts or liabilities. She had to find out where the money in Alex’s account had gone, even if she didn’t want to. She needed to know that there were simple explanations for the things which were worrying her brain – awake and asleep. She needed to know that what was wrong between her and Alex could have healed with work and time. That she could have healed them.
She had taken some empty storage boxes from work. Not bin-liners; putting Alex’s things in those wouldn’t have felt right. She started with his wardrobe and took a deep fortifying breath as she reached for the first hanger. Alex spent a lot of money on clothes. Each piece had a memory woven into the threads for Laurie. This black suit, for instance, was one he had worn at his uncle’s funeral. He’d said, under his breath, to her in church that as long as he was going to other people’s funerals and they weren’t coming to his, it was okay. In other people’s wardrobes were now outfits that they had worn to Alex’s funeral and they’d have that memory attached to them, and so it went on – a chain of sadness. She blinked rising tears away, knowing that she had a lot of work ahead of her and needed to be stronger than this. Maybe she should have asked Bella to help because she didn’t cry in front of other people, she had control over herself then – mostly – but alone, with licence to let go, she liquefied.