“You’re a good son to think of your mother’s feelings, but it isn’t right that you were put in that position.”
“He was worse to her. He made her cry so much, but now she just wears that fake smile all of the time.”
Hugh falls quiet, breaking my heart for him a little more. Tom isn’t the best father, but he loves his boys in his own way. An inadequate way, my mind whispers full of regret. I never thought when I married him, thought about having children, of course, but I was sure he wouldn’t be the same kind of father as my own, but in his own fucked up way, he is. Neglect and deceit are just as harmful as mind games. Lost to my own regrets and introspection, I almost miss Hugh’s reply.
“What is a stepdad supposed to do?”
“Not buy you Arsenal Football Club,” Niko answers without missing a beat.
“It was worth a try,” the cheeky monkey admits with a grin.
“The problem with buying the club is that later, you’d begin to worry why I bought it. Then you’d begin to wonder about my intentions and my trustworthiness, and I don’t want that. I want you to like me not for what I can do for you but because of the respect I hope we’ll have for each other one day.”
Before I’d hidden behind this palm, I could’ve been offered a hundred guesses as to what I might hear, and I still wouldn’t have come close. And it feels disconcerting. Who taught this man about feelings?
Hugh nods and offers a happy, “Okay.”
“You’re sure about that?” Niko sounds bemused.
“Yep. I mean, I’d be really happy if you bought Arsenal, but understand the reasons you won’t,” Hugh replies sounding years older than his age. “I’m okay about it as long as you’re kind to Mum. She should have someone to look her after for a change.”
“You’ve noticed that,” Niko says quietly. “How she puts everyone before herself.”
I find myself frowning. Archie as he calls from the pool and Niko turns to him with a wave. I’m not some martyr. I just look after the people I love.
“He lies,” Hugh suddenly says. “My dad lied to her, and he lies to us all of the time.”
“There are all kinds of lies,” Niko replies, seeming to tread carefully. “Sometimes we lie to those we love to protect them.”
“I know there are lots of kinds of lies, Uncle Van. I’m not a baby. There are white lies people tell not to hurt someone’s feelings, and then there are the lies you tell when you’re embarrassed, like the time I walked in on Mum waxing her—”
“There you all are!” I positively burst from the potted palm. “What are you two up to?” I ask, all exuberance and jolly hockey sticks.
“We were waiting for you,” Hugh protests. “What have you been doing?”
Niko’s smirk makes my cheeks pink. I wasn’t waxing anything, I think, hoping my withering glance says as much.
And it was a couple of stray hairs in my nose Hugh had walked in on me waxing. The area Niko is probably smirking about no longer requires a waxing regime as I’d gone down the laser route some time ago. Mainly because I’d once waxed my own nether regions with so much wax, I’d had to lie in a hot bath to remove my underwear. It was either that or commit to wearing the same pair of knickers for the rest of my life. But those aren’t the kinds of things you discuss with your fiancé. After the wedding, however…
He’s in for such a shock, I decide.
“Mummy, can we swim now?” Archie calls. “We’ve been waiting ages.”
“We were about to send out a search party.” Niko angles his gaze my way, the heat shining there deepening my degrees.
“Were you?” The way he’s looking at me makes my stomach flip. I turn to my son as he begins to pull of his T-shirt. “Did you put sunscreen on?”
“Yep. And I’ve got my rash vest,” he says, pulling an aqua blue top from the bench. He slips it over his head, then one arm, before grabbing his brother’s matching one and stepping in the direction of the pool. “Here you go, Arch!”
“It’s all wet now,” Archie complains.
“Don’t be an idiot,” he replies, shoving his other arm in. “You’re in the pool already.” He pivots and gives a little hop and a skip. As a mother of boys with ten years’ experience, I read what he’s about to do. I make to move, my mouth already open, but that’s as far as I get before he catapults himself into the water with a bellowed, “Cannonball!”
My heart jumps to my throat, further strangling my reply, but then Hugh’s head breaks the through water’s surface again.
“Come on Arch!” he yells. Meanwhile, I think I’ve just aged ten years.