Sighing, Rachel closed the fridge door. “How about fish and chips for tea?”
Meghan brightened. “Seriously? We never get takeaway.”
“Maybe it’s about time.”
“What about Mum?”
“You can stay with her while I go—” Rachel stopped. “Actually, how about you go? And I’ll stay.” Maybe things needed to change.
“Okay.” Meghan’s smile looked genuine, and almost strange because of it. No mockery, no taking the mick. “I’ll be back in fifteen minutes.”
While Meghan went out, Rachel settled Nathan in front of the telly and then went to check on her mother. Janice was lying propped up in bed, her face slack, her expression glazed and vacant. Just looking at her made Rachel’s insides twist with sympathy and more than a little horror. To be so helpless, so trapped... It made her realize what a brave face her mother had put on her back injury all these years, trying to downplay the pain, not to fall apart when her husband left her alone, an invalid with three kids to raise. Rachel had been so consumed with how much she’d lost, she’d never really considered how much her mother had. A husband, a partner, a life.
“Hey, Mum.” She took a step into the room, and her mother blinked at her, her face jerking in what Rachel had come torecognize as a smile. “You all right?” She sat on the edge of the bed, something she rarely did, and touched her mother’s hand. Her flesh was plump and puffy, cool and slightly damp.
Surprise flared in her mother’s eyes at the touch, and Rachel felt another twist inside, this time of guilt, because how often had she ever shown her mother affection? She’d stayed in the doorway; she’d busied herself as an excuse to keep from dealing with the difficult stuff. The stuff Meghan had had to deal with every single day.
“You have a rehab appointment on Monday,” she said, and her mother gave a jerky nod—at least Rachel thought that’s what it was. She and Meghan had taken their mother to rehab twice, both times requiring a monumental amount of effort simply to get her out of the house. A wheelchair had finally arrived courtesy of the NHS, but even heaving their mother from bed to chair was a Herculean task.
Even harder was the actual rehab; Rachel had noticed how much better Meghan was at it than her. She sat with their mother, listened to the nurses, offered encouragement. Smiled while Rachel shrank back. She must have been doing similar stuff for years, and Rachel had never known. Rachel had tasked Meghan with taking Janice to most of her doctor’s appointments, and then she’d breezed in once in a while to make sure everything was on track. Supervising without suffering.
Janice tried to speak, but Rachel couldn’t make out the garbled words. She shook her head. “Sorry, Mum. I can’t understand.”
Janice tried again, and then again, enunciating each word as best as she could. “Oo... ah ree... ?”
Finally Rachel realized what she was trying to say. You all right? Or areet, if they were going to be Cumbrian about it.
Gently Rachel squeezed her mother’s hand. “Yes, Mum,” she said. “I’m fine.”
Rachel didn’t see Claire for the rest of the weekend, and on Monday morning, when she drove by the post office, she didn’t glimpse her inside. Had she already left, without so much as a goodbye? Wouldn’t be the first time.
Monday afternoon Rachel canceled her last cleaning job so she could be back home when Lily returned from sitting her exam. She’d made a cake, a gooey chocolate mess that hopefully tasted better than it looked. Her heart was beating hard, although with excitement or nervousness she couldn’t tell.
Then the front door opened, and Rachel came into the hall to see Lily trying to slip upstairs.
“Well?” Rachel asked eagerly, even though Lily’s closed expression didn’t bode well Anticipation burst in her chest anyway. “How was it? Not too hard, I hope?”
Lily turned around, taking a deep breath. “I didn’t sit the exam, Rachel.”
For a few seconds the words didn’t penetrate. Rachel simply stared at her, her mouth opening and closing like a fish. Finally, stupidly, she said, “What?”
“I didn’t sit it,” Lily repeated, her voice clear and firm, and she walked past Rachel into the kitchen.
Rachel followed, anger and incredulity blooming inside her where once a wonderful anticipation had been. “You didn’t...” She could barely get the words out. “You didn’t sit the exam? You didn’t take it?”
Lily was at the sink, pouring herself a glass of water. She shook her head.
“Lily. Why on earth... ? Did something happen? Were you ill—”
“No. I just decided I wasn’t going to take the exam.”
“You just decided,” Rachel repeated.
Lily looked at her warily. “Yes.”
“You just decided, even though you’ve spent the last two years preparing for this exam.”
“Yes—”
