LIZZIE
I notice that Mum has gone quiet and is letting the conversation flow around her. She’s a bit pale and there are bags under her eyes. ‘How are youreallyfeeling?’ I ask her quietly as the others chat around us. It’s one of our little habits, to add the ‘really’. We used to say it to each other in the dark days after Dad died. It meant, ‘Don’t tell me you’re fine like everyone else, tell me the truth.’
Her eyes meet mine and I can see the exhaustion in them. ‘My ankle throbs a bit but the painkillers help, and I’m tired, which Alison said is only natural. It’s only been just over a day since the fall.’
It should be me looking after her, not Alison who she hardly knows, I think with a pang of guilt.
‘I don’t know what I’d do without Alison,’ Mum continues. ‘It’s so lucky that she’s a nurse and can take the time off.’
‘I don’t mind at all,’ Alison pipes up, she obviously overheard. ‘I’m happy to look after you. I lost my mum when I was young and I feel the loss even to this day.’
A shiver courses through me as her eyes hold mine and a sad smile plays on her lips. ‘I know that Lizzie would be devastated if anything happened to you.’
My hand shakes so much tea spills from my cup. I break the gaze, turning my attention back to Mum, trying not to show how unnerved I am.
That sounded a really pointed remark, and the way she looked at me. Was she having a dig? Does she realise that it was my fault her mum died? But then why hasn’t she said something?
The answer hits me so hard I almost drop the cup from my hand.
She’s after revenge. That’s why she’s all over my mum, making herself indispensable, replacing me. It’s her way of getting payback.
By the time I get home I’ve calmed down and talked myself out of thinking Alison is out to get me. She can’t possibly know about my part in her mother’s death. How could she? She didn’t see what I did, no one saw. It’s my own guilt that’s tormenting me. The knowledge that I robbed her and Kenny of their mother. Fortunately, Kenny wouldn’t even remember me, he’d only been four years old, and he was with his mother all the time.
The mother I killed.
‘You have to forgive yourself for this, Lizzie, it was an accident and you were a child,’ Bridget, my therapist, told me many times. And I managed to, eventually. Until Alison came into our lives.
I think of Isaac. Would I blame him if the same thing happened when he was on a school trip? Of course I wouldn’t. No one would.
I have to put it out of my mind and get on with my work. I’ve got a new student to deal with. He hasn’t joined an online session yet but has sent over his first assignment already. I need to stop thinking about Alison and keep calm and focused.
I make myself a cup of calamine and honey tea then carry it over to the kitchen table where my laptop is placed, ready for me to start work. I start it up, taking a long sip of the tea, and open the first assignment.
I enjoy my job teaching English as a second language. Most – but not all – of my students are overseas and really eager to learn. I’m a conscientious tutor and Nick is always telling me that I put too much pressure on myself, but I get a lot of pleasure out of seeing them progress, it’s a good feeling to know that I’m helping someone. It’s an atonement of sorts for causing someone’s death, a little voice in my head says.
I take my time marking the assignments, making sure that I give constructive feedback, then grab a sandwich and a cold drink. I’ve just finished my sandwich when my phone rings. It’s Jodie. We’ve been friends since school and honestly Jodie has saved my sanity at times. We don’t get to see each other much now we both have a family, but we make time for a catchup chat every week or so.
‘Hi, do you have time to chat?’
The sound of her bright, friendly voice lifts my spirits. ‘Good timing,’ I tell her. ‘I’ve finished my work for the day and have half an hour before I pick the kids up from school.’ I take my phone into the living room, sit down in the comfy chair, tucking my legs underneath me. ‘How are things with you?’
‘Same old. Freddie is adorable but refuses to sleep, me and Rob are going around all bleary-eyed and shattered. Millie was a much easier baby,’ she says. Jodie and Millie’s dad, Kyle, are divorced, and she’s been with Rob a couple of years now, he’s Freddie’s father.
My mind goes back to those baby years when I was so drained I could barely function. Nick did his best but he was working very hard to keep the company afloat. Mum came to the rescue, though. She was such a support then, cooking meals forus, doing the washing and ironing, even though she was working part-time herself. I don’t know what I’d have done without her. She offered to take Isaac for a few hours so I could catch up on sleep, but I wouldn’t let her. I couldn’t bear him to be out of my sight, thinking I was the only one who could keep him safe. I woke up in the night to check on him constantly, sometimes sitting on the chair by his cot watching him sleep, making sure he was breathing. I was ill with anxiety and lack of sleep, barely eating.
‘Do you remember what a mess I was when Isaac was born? I don’t know how I’d have got through without Mum and Nick’s help,’ I remind her.
They had both been worried about me, exchanging anxious looks, whispering to each other in concerned voices, speaking to me softly, slowly, as if I was a child. They couldn’t understand why I was so tired and anxious when Isaac was such an easy, happy baby, a good sleeper, content to kick and gurgle in his playpen while I got a few jobs done, but I was scared to take my eyes off him, terrified that something would happen to him. That Karma would take him away from me. Like it had taken my dad. It was a really dark time for me.
‘Lucky you. I wish my mum was here,’ Jodie says with a sigh.
Jodie’s parents live in Portugal. They’ve been over for a few visits but it’s not the same as having a mum on hand to help. I’m lucky. I know that.
‘Anyway, how did the wedding go?’ she asks.
‘The wedding was lovely but Mum had a fall…’ I explain what happened and how Alison has stopped over to look after Mum.
‘That’s a bit of luck that she’s a nurse,’ Jodie says. ‘What’s she like?’
