And as soon as I started thinking like that, it seemed obvious where they’d be. It’s where I’d have been at their age.
Liz: Typical Emma, hey? Couldn’t just tell anyone where she thought the girls were. Had to be the centre of attention.
Julius: Emma didn’t tell anyone where she was going. That would have been too simple, wouldn’t it?
Emma: If I’d told everyone what I thought, and then been wrong, it would have wasted more time. I wasn’t trying to be the centre of attention. I don’t want the attention.
Besides, if I’d not been the one to find them that day, then Julius’s little lie wouldn’t have been uncovered.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
THE HIPPO TOSS
Emma: The girls were sitting in the long grass, tossing an inflatable ring with a hippo head towards their own shoes. I wasn’t sure on the exact rules, but they had assigned each shoe a different amount of points – and were competing to see who could throw the ring over the shoes.
…
In fairness, I’ve seen worse game shows on prime-time ITV.
Chloe: It was called hippo toss. You get three points for a left foot; one point for a right. Double points if you get two shoes. Triple points if you get both rights, or both lefts.
Emma: I also think they’d stolen the ring from the hotel pool.
Amy: We borrowed the ring.
Emma: They were on the cliffs, near where Dad fell – although not too close to the edge. I’m never going to offer parenting advice, but, if it was me, and I was Julius, I’d have taken them to the cliffs before that afternoon. I’d have wanted to see it if I was their age. Kids are naturally curious.
I was about to tell them that they had to go back to the hotel – and that people were worried. I probably should have done, given that I was the adult… but they seemed so happy in the moment. It didn’t feel as if I could take that joy away from them.
Amy: Auntie Emma asked if she could play our game. We told her everyone had to pay ten euros to play and that it was winner-takes-all.
Emma: I swear, they must get that smartness from their mother.
Either way, I sat with them in the grass for a while. I watched at first and tried to remember what it was like to live so fearlessly. If there hadn’t been a search, I’d bet they could have spent hours in that grass making their own entertainment. You forget all that when you grow up. I can’t tell you how much I craved to be able to go back to that. I almost ached for it.
I’d probably been there for a couple of minutes when Amy asked if that was where Granddad fell. I told them it was, but I think they already knew. There was this moment where they both looked across towards the edge in unison. The crickets or grasshoppers were chirping nearby and there was the rush of the water. I could feel the sun prickling my skin and we felt frozen in the moment.
Then Amy turned around and asked if I still thought of Robbie.
Amy: I didn’t ask. Daddy told me not to.
Emma: He is… my son… was my son…
…
I don’t want to say his name any more. Is that OK?
…
It was a question that came so out of nothing that it felt as if she’d run into me. I was winded and the hot, sticky air was clogging my lungs. I have no idea what I told them, but it was probably that my son is always in my thoughts. There is never a time where I don’t think about what he might be doing, or how he might be growing.
Every time I looked at Amy and Chloe, I thought of how they were a few years older than him and that he would have been able to follow them around.
When I looked at that kiddie pool in the hotel, all I could think of was how he would have been a little over four years old and that he might have been learning to swim with his dad.
I thought that he’d love the slides, that I’d be mothering him with umbrellas and hats to keep him out of the heat. That he’d have loved the beach balls that people bounced around the main pool. That I could have got him some knock-off T-shirts from the market, and that he’d have liked the man on the corner who stood and blew bubbles all day long.
Every time I saw anything, I thought of how it would have looked through my son’s eyes…
…
I probably didn’t tell them any of that. I probably just said that I still thought of him.
Amy: Auntie Emma said it was time to go.
Emma: One of the girls asked why people divorced.
Amy: I didn’t ask that. Daddy wouldn’t have liked it.
Emma: I can’t remember whether Julius and Simone were divorced or just separated at that point. When I was young, hardly anyone at school had parents who were divorced. For the generation before me, it would have been basically nobody. I suppose it’s different now. I don’t know if it’s better or worse that people stay together for their kids – but I do know that kids notice and want to ask questions.
I told the girls that sometimes mums and dads don’t get on any longer and that, even though they both still love their children, they think it’s better to live apart.
What else are you supposed to say?
They knew it, anyway. Chloe gave me a sideways look as if to say: ‘Well, duh.’
She then said that Mum and Dad – Julius and Simone – had been arguing a lot and that neither she nor Amy liked it.
Chloe: I didn’t say that – and neither did Amy.
Emma: Amy started to say something. I think her exact words were: ‘The other night…’ but then a look passed between the twins and she went silent. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a single glance that said so much. There was something there and so I told them they can confide in me if they wanted. I wouldn’t tell their dad or mum, if that’s what they wanted.
Amy looked to Chloe and Chloe looked to Amy – and it was like they were having an entire conversation entirely through telepathy. I’ve never seen anything like it.
That’s when Amy told me that she’d overheard her mum saying that Julius had lost his job months ago.
Amy: I never said anything to her. I want to stop doing this now.
Emma: I didn’t get the significance at that moment. I didn’t know he was unemployed and I was certain he’d not told Mum or Dad. It might not have been a big deal – except, at the first dinner, Daniel had changed subjects by asking Julius how everything was going at the bank. Julius had said something about a big three months and building up lots of time owing for the holiday. I wish I’d have listened properly, but, at the time, I thought it was Julius being Julius – and bragging about a load of meaningless nonsense. I didn’t realise he was lying through his teeth.
Julius: I’ve already said this once. I don’t think anyone asked about the bank at that first dinner.
Daniel: I didn’t say a word to Julius about his bank on that first night.
Claire: I don’t remember. I think Daniel might have shouted down something, but I wasn’t paying attention.