‘It's not awkward for me,’ Eleanor replies. ‘After all, I haven’t shagged most of the bridal party's husbands.’ She gives a smirk. ‘It might be a bit awkward for Lucy!’
‘You don't mind if she goes?’ I hadn’t been asking for that. I had been asking what I should say to Charlotte but Eleanor is so much more open now, we’re closer than we ever have been.
Ever.
‘Would it be awkward for you Mum?’ She asks.
‘A bit,’ I admit, ‘but I'm getting used to awkward.’
‘Well, I’ll leave it up to you.’
‘Go on then,’ I say. ‘I’ll have Daisy.’ I call out to the kitchen. ‘Is that all right with you Paul?
‘No problem,’ he calls back. Paul's nice like that. He’s really laid back, he gets my plans can change at any given moment and, of course, he adores Daisy –everybody does.
‘I don’t think Lucy should come to the after party though,’ Eleanor kisses Daisy good night. ‘I think that might be pushing it.’
‘God, yes.’ I agree.
You wouldn’t want to mix alcohol and Lucy with that lot!
CHAPTER SIXTY FOUR
Lucy
‘I’m going to be a bridesmaid!’
She’s beyond excited – she must have deafened Alice from the squeal that she let out.
‘Mum!’
‘That’s brilliant!’ Even if will kill not to see it, it’s worth it for this.
She’s just happier every day. Oh, she has her bad days, we all do I guess, but she’s happy and funny and she’s really coming back to me now.
We talk for a bit, or rather she rabbits on and on and then I go to clean up my stuff in the garden.
You’re not going to believe this.
I love gardening!
It relaxes me.
I kneel down and pull out a couple of weeds, it’s the beginning of spring and things are starting to flower and little shoots are popping up.
I feel the soil beneath my fingers and I dig them in and I can almost feel a pulse – like the garden’s coming to life. I can feel all the life that lies within it. I wish he could have seen her be a bridesmaid, I wish he could see how much better we are all getting on.
It will be his anniversary soon.
Then I do my Buffy thing and I pull out my hands, because sometimes I have these horrible thoughts, about soil and him and I don’t think it’s normal.
The grief counsellor says that it is.
I think she has to say that.
I walk inside and I wash my hands and have a drink of cool water and then I go and have a shower and put on my bathrobe. I can hear Charlotte chatting away on Skype as she often is. She’ll be on it forever tonight sharing her good news.
And then I glance over and it’s not Felicity’s cold blue eyes, nor is it any of her more regular friends.
There are dark green eyes right up at the screen and a mouth wide open that’s drooling and trying to kiss what’s on the other side. How can you not smile at that?
‘Hi Daisy!’ I blow her a kiss but then Daisy sits down and I find myself face to face with Gloria. Only then do I realise that she must have seen me, dressed in my dressing gown, with my hair all wet and blowing kisses to Daisy.
God I hate Skype, I really do.
‘Oh, hi Gloria!’
‘Hi, Lucy,’ she says. ‘I’m assuming you’ve heard the news.’
‘The whole of the street heard the news,’ I say. ‘It’s lovely, thank you.’ I look to Charlotte. ‘I hope you said thank you to Alice.’
Charlotte goes red, so I roll my eyes.
‘I was just talking to Alice,’ Gloria says. ‘And then afterwards I spoke to Eleanor.’ My heart goes very still. ‘We all agree that it would be lovely if you came to the church.’
‘I’d love to,’ I say as my heart flutters in panic, I can hardly tell her the problem with Noel. ‘But the thing is…’
‘Then that’s fine then.’ Gloria says and she snaps me out of my panic and I remember that she knows. ‘Lucy, it will be fine.’
And if Gloria says that it’s fine, then it must be.
CHAPTER SIXTY FIVE
‘I haven’t seen you for a while.’ Denise says.
‘I’ve been busy.’
‘You don’t need to explain. Just come and see me when you feel it might help.’
It’s good to know that she’s there.
‘How’s Charlotte?’ Denise asks.
‘Doing well,’ I smile as I say it. ‘She’s going to be a bridesmaid,’ I tell Denise. ‘And she’s got a new puppy. She has her moments.’
‘That’s good,’ Denise says. ‘That you recognise that she has her moments.’
I nod, because otherwise Charlotte would be having her moments without me.
We talk about how well I’m doing, that I’m off my medication now, and no, I’m not dancing naked in the street or having random sex with the postman.
‘I feel guilty though,’ I say and then I roll my eyes at myself, because every one who enters this room must say that. ‘I feel guilty that I’ve sat in this room and I trashed him so many times. He did an awful lot of bad things and there were some terrible times but I never told you how funny he was, how kind he could be.’ I’m starting to cry. ‘How good he was with Charlotte.’
‘And?’ Denise prompts but I just sit there. ‘And?’ She asks again.
‘How good he was with me at times.’ I sit there still for a very long time, I don’t cry, I just sit there and I remember some of the good times.
I really don’t understand. By all accounts we had a terrible marriage, he cheated all the time and my perfect life was actually a mess, I was falling apart at the seams.
I just don’t understand how I can suddenly decide now that I loved him, I tell Denise and I tell her a bit more of the truth.
‘I was thinking of having an affair.’
I remember driving around with no knickers on and a mug in my bag and I was so cross, so, so cross and I wanted someone who wanted me.
I frown as I try to remember how I felt. ‘I hadn’t really thought about it, I hadn’t properly thought about it, but I was holding back on him. I wasn’t telling him things and he knew it. He told a very close friend that he thought I was, but I wasn’t. I think I was…’ I don’t know the words.
‘Preparing to leave?’ Denise offers and I nod, but then I shake my head. ‘I don’t think it was as straightforward as that.’
‘The end of a marriage never is.’ Denise says gently. ‘People start to disengage, pull back, people grow up…’ I frown. ‘Sometimes people grow out of each other and, had he not died…’
Yes, I think I’d have left him.
I think I was starting to.
I just didn’t know it at the time.
We talk some more.
It turns out Dr Patel was right - I was grieving.
Maybe I still am.
Not just my husband, but also my marriage, my own childhood and the perfect world I had so badly wanted for Charlotte.
I feel so superficial, I tell Denise, that I stayed for a house. ‘How shallow is that?’
‘Lucy.’ Denise’s voice is practical. ‘You said that you stayed for the house, for the pony, for Charlotte.’
‘I did.’ I nod.
‘What was he like with Charlotte?’
‘Always on her side!’ I roll my eyes. ‘She could wrap him around her little finger.’
‘So could you.’
‘No.’ I shake my head. ‘I mean, she could always win him around, he was always telling her how stunning she was, how he could never say “no” to her…’ and then I stop talking and I look at my husband and the relationship we had.
I’m sitting on his knee and I’m looking into the only eyes, apart from Charlotte’s, that I can stand to look into. I’m teasing him and talking him around and I know that I’ll get my way.
Oh, he might have thought that he was getting his way with me too, but there was no way I would have got in that pool in Portugal.
I don’t think.
Or perhaps I might have and that would have been the end of us.
I don’t know.
But I do know how we were.
I got to play house.
I got to dress up.
I got all the nice things that I never had in my childhood.
I got to be one of his girls
I didn’t just stay for Charlotte.
I stayed for me.
But, as Denise explains to me, as every child changes, as every young adult yearns to stretch their wings, I was starting to grow up, I was getting ready to leave.
I grew up with him.
And I’m grown up now without.
CHAPTER SIXTY SIX
I’ve tried to make this phone call so many times.
I introduce myself and I am met with silence.
‘I was wondering if we could meet – for a coffee perhaps…’ Still there is silence. ‘I’ve got so many questions and I thought you might have some too.’ I hear a sharp intake of breath and I quickly squeeze some words in. ‘I know we can never be friends, I just really need to talk to you.’ I don’t know what to say now, I’m about to give in when finally, finally, she speaks.
‘Okay.’ There’s another long stretch of silence and then she suggests that we meet for a drink.
Today.
I’m relieved that it’s today, because I know if we postpone this, then one of us will change our minds, one of us will find an excuse not to go.