I wonder how to respond to this. He’s an adult now, I remind myself; I don’t have to gloss over things or pretend everything’s okay, like I did with his dad. ‘Okay, I’m absolutely furious,’ I blurt out, meaning it as a joke – but without warning tears fall out of my eyes.
‘Mum, don’t cry!’ Charlie exclaims, looking at me in alarm.
‘I’m okay.’ I try to blink them away and focus hard on the road ahead.
‘You’re obviously not, are you?’
‘I am,’ I say firmly, clearing my throat. ‘Honestly. And I do understand why he hasn’t come …’
‘Really?’ Charlie asks. It strikes me that it’s a long time since we’ve had a proper conversation like this. In fact, I can’t remember the last time. Maybe something good has come out of this after all. ‘Couldn’t Esther have stayed at her mum’s?’ he adds, studying me as I drive.
‘Hey, I thought you were pleased to be coming with me,’ I tease him.
‘I am. I’m really pleased.’ In fact, after his attitude in Corsica this summer I’d expected a curt ‘No thanks’ when I asked him. In preparation I’d considered asking Kim, but her girls are still home for the holidays and I didn’t want her to have to wrestle over whether to leave them for New Year’s Eve. I’d suspected that whichever decision she’d come to would have made her feel bad.
I’d also – briefly – considered coming on my own. I could work on a cookbook proposal, I’d figured. Give it some time and headspace at last. That way, I could turn my disappointment into something positive. But how would that have felt, being so isolated for three days? I was worried I’d brood and go over and over the whole James scenario, working myself into a stew about it.
The whole point had been to give me and James some space so we could just be together, like we were in Corsica. I wanted it to be like our blissful two weeks when we’d started to share our life stories, and I drove us around the winding mountain roads that had freaked him out so much. One time, when we’d parked up at a village square, he’d laughed and said, ‘I need a sedative.’
Now I’m picturing those meals at Camille’s beachsiderestaurant with the wine and the glorious sunsets. And our first night together, at his hotel, with the clanking cage lift, the disapproving front-desk lady and the breeze gently wafting the gauzy curtain at the balcony door.
I was wrong, I realise now. It could never be like that again and maybe I was mad to even try.
‘Yes, she could’ve gone to her mum’s,’ I say, glancing at Charlie, ‘but James felt he had to be there. And you know,’ I add, ‘if you were in the kind of situation Esther’s in, then maybe I’d have ducked out of a trip too.’
‘It’s not very likely though, is it?’ Charlie smiles wryly. ‘That I’d be papped eating food out of a bucket?’
I smile too. ‘D’you even like fried chicken?’
‘Yeah, sometimes. Me and Remy used to get it.’
‘What, a bucket of chicken?’ I ask in surprise.
‘Occasionally, yeah. If we were in London …’
‘I never knew that.’ I cast him a quick glance.
‘You don’t know everything about me, Mum,’ he says, and the playful glint in his eye tells me that perhaps things are changing again between Charlie and me. He’s growing up for sure. He’ll leave school in a few months’ time and his life will open up thrillingly. I remind myself how lucky I am to be spending three days off-grid with my boy. He’s planning to do lots of studying. We’ll coexist quite happily, I think.
As for James and me, I’ve had enough drama over the years, the way things were with Frank. And although I do care – and sympathise over the chicken thing – I don’t think it’s for me. As I once said to James, life is complicated. Too complicated, I realise now.
As the miles go by any last residues of annoyance ebb away. I don’t even blame him for what’s happened. None of it is his fault. But I do hope that Charlie doesn’t notice me blinking away more tears as I decide that it simply wasn’t meant to be.
CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN
CHARLIE
Of course Charlie was going to say yes to going away with his mum. It sounded amazing, being completely off-grid. He’d always liked camping with her and, better still, when he went with the Cubs, waking up with that feeling of being outside and hearing the birds. Sitting around campfires, cooking sausages on sticks and spotting the odd bat or even an owl. They hadn’t even gone very far from home but it had felt like a world away from their village.
However, this place reallyisa world away. ‘Will you be okay without Wi-Fi?’ his mum had asked apprehensively as they’d driven down, as if she’d said,Will you be okay without food?But Charlie isn’t constantly on his phone or online, and he can study perfectly well with his textbooks for a few days. He doesn’t really bother with social media, apart from keeping up with what Esther’s doing. Remy had badgered him into having an Instagram account, saying he could follow astronomers and all the famous observatories, the planetariums and all that. But he rarely bothers with that. What Charlie loves is his books.
As soon as they arrived yesterday they’d lit the wood-burning stove and had dinner, and then Charlie had gone off to study in the little cabin in the garden. That’s where he wanted to sleep, he’d decided. There was a comfy sofa bed and a skylight and it was magical. He didn’t mind that there was too much cloud cover for any star spotting. You can’t have everything, he’d told himself.
He’d said goodnight to his mum and hadn’t expected to see her until morning. She probably needed a bit of space, he’d decided, closing his books for the night. But he could see the light was still on in the living room so he’d headed back to the house. She was drinking wine and gave him a beer and somehow the hours went by with them chatting about this and that. He couldn’t remember the last time they’d hung out like this. She told him about a cookbook proposal she was putting together, with the plan to send it to an agent and try and get it published.
‘You should definitely do it,’ he’d said.
‘You think? I do wonder if anyone’d be interested. I mean, I’m not a celebrity chef or anything—’
