‘He said as much to me.’
‘Yeah?’ He took a tea cup from Carys, who had given one to Lucinda, one to dolly and now one to him. He pretended to sip from the cup.
Beau’s footfall had Lucinda and Hudson look at each other and when their eldest son came into the room, Hudson pulled out a chair for him.
‘How was the collection at the supermarket?’ Lucinda asked when it seemed their son had nothing to say.
‘All right.’ Eyes on the table, he slumped in the chair in typical teenage fashion with legs outstretched and face hidden somewhere beneath his fringe.
‘Raise much money?’ Hudson put in.
‘You already asked me that.’
‘I haven’t,’ said Lucinda.
‘I don’t know, the money goes into the slot, I don’t count it.’
‘Watch the tone,’ Lucinda warned and he looked up, surprised, but Hudson kept a blank expression because he was taken aback by her supportive remark too.
‘It seems your apology letter was received well,’ Lucinda began. ‘We are really proud of you for taking ownership of the hoax that you were a part of.’
Hudson opened his mouth to ask again who his comrades had been but then he closed it, kept the focus on the reason they were here.
‘I like being at the airbase,’ Beau confessed. ‘They’re all really nice, too nice, when they don’t need to be.’
‘It’s part of the job description a lot of the time.’ Hudson smiled. ‘But you’re right, they are.’
‘I’m proud of that too,’ said Lucinda, ‘that you’re helping out to make up for what you and the others did.’
Hudson had done most of the hard yards with parenting up until now – the parent evenings, minding the kids when they weren’t well, doing the school run every morning and pick-ups from childcare or after-school care. When Carys went through a stage of colouring on the wooden floorboards, it had been Hudson who cleaned it all up and told her off in a firm but gentle way when she was so young. When Beau got into a fight outside school a couple of days after Lucinda walked out, it had been up to Hudson to teach him that no matter what his frustrations, no matter how much someone wound him up, using his fists wasn’t the answer. Carys had gone through a biting phase a few months ago and it had been Hudson who went up to meet with the other parent at childcare and apologise. It wasn’t that Lucinda didn’t care, but Hudson’s job, his proximity to his kids made it easier for him to deal with these things. He didn’t begrudge her her successful career, but it wasn’t up to him to convince the kids of her love for them; it was up to Lucinda to show them both how she felt. And if she didn’t, he’d have to be here to catch them from every disappointment, every let-down she was responsible for. He just hoped it wouldn’t come to that.
‘I didn’t realise how much money it cost to send the helicopter on a mission.’ Beau started talking unexpectedly, although he still wasn’t looking up from beneath that fringe. ‘I feel bad about it.’
‘Not so bad that you’ll tell anyone who the other lads involved were?’ Lucinda asked.
‘No way, Mum. I told you, I don’t want to be a grass.’
‘Don’t be ridiculous, just tell us who they were,’ she went on. ‘I’ve a good mind to go up to that school and ask around – you hang out with Simon and Gareth still; was it them? Beau, tell us.’
‘No!’
‘Beau, you have to.’
This was spiralling out of control. It had been going so well, but when Lucinda kept asking him, Hudson knew what was going to happen even before Beau pushed out his chair and stomped off with calls from Lucinda of, ‘Don’t you dare walk away from me,’ and, ‘Come back here right now!’
She turned her venom towards Hudson. ‘That is not okay, you know, to walk away when we’re having a family discussion. Are you going to get him back down here? Or am I?’
‘Well, at least you’re playing bad cop for once,’ he said.
‘It’s what you wanted!’
She had no idea of the difference, did she? That you could be bad cop without blowing the situation up, resolving nothing.
‘Maybe we should try this again another time,’ he suggested.
‘Or maybe we just accept it is what it is, or rather what we are. Divorced. And Beau is going to have to adapt.’
He should’ve known this wouldn’t work and he was tired of arguing about it. He’d done his best.
