“Dessert. Dinner first.” I had no idea what we were having for dinner. Max followed us out of the lounge and into the hall, up the stairs and towards the big family bathroom that really needed to be revamped.
They ran in Max’s room instead, something catching their imagination, leaving me just outside the door.
“I like my fringe.” My daughter’s voice sounded happily through the gap. “Are you a hairdresser?”
“No, I’m a solicitor like your dad, but I have three little sisters so I had to do their hair. My mammy used to cut our hair and I watched her so I could do it too. Stand up, let’s look at you.”
Movement echoed through. Footsteps, the knocking over of something.
“That’s better, Clairey. You look like a human now instead of a wild animal that’s been battling through a jungle. Get yourself out of the bath.”
I popped my head round. Claire was standing fully dressed in an empty bath, which I guess made it easier to get rid of the hair that’d been trimmed. “I like your fringe.” It was probably needed. I couldn’t remember the last time Claire’d had a haircut.
“Marie said she can plait it.” She climbed out of the bath and stepped over Callum, who was fast asleep in a towel, looking clean. “She said she’ll be here for ages too and she’ll help you look after us. Is that true?”
I nodded, looking at Marie who was nodding at me. “It’s true. Why don’t you go and see what Max and Jacks are doing and tell them to go downstairs? Get making a den.”
She scattered out of the room, yelling at her brothers. I stooped down and picked Callum up. “It’s too early to put him to bed.”
“Take him downstairs. He’ll wake up in a bit so just put him on the sofa.” She stretched. “They’re not that wild.”
“Really?”
She nodded. “I suppose it depends on your baseline, but they’re not feral like you were describing. They’re nice kids. There was some resistance from Jackson to having a shower, but when we explored the contents of soil and what he probably had crawling on him, which would crawl in his – or Max’s – bed, he decided a shower was a good idea. I don’t think he’s showered well, but we can work on that.”
“Are you sure about this? We’ve just had a big flight and you’ve walked into this.” If I was her I’d be heading straight back.
Her smile was genuine. “I’m not your nanny, Grant. You’re their dad and you need to step up for them, but I’ll help you do it.”
CHAPTER 11
GRANT
Iremembered the first time I’d seen Marie, in a lift in New York, making the assumption that she would be able to bring me coffee for me and my clients.
She’d made it a point, during the nearly four decades of being married, to never bring me coffee. The making of hot beverages was my job, duty and responsibility, which included a mug of coffee on her bedside table every morning, regardless whether I was having one or not.
It was never a problem and it always made me chuckle, the fact that she just expected her morning brew to appear like magic, and it gave me the added benefit of being her morning hero and also an excuse to invest in swanky coffee machines, which I’d developed an expertise in.
This morning, the coffee was made but she was already up and dressed before I made it upstairs for the final time in this house.
Last night had been the last night. We hadn’t told the kids that we were having one more night there, keeping this just for ourselves, a quiet goodbye. It did mean that there were a few more bits to pack today, another removal van booked to arrivein an hour and a half to take the coffee machine, mattress and a bureau that had come over from Ireland from Marie’s uncle when we got married which was something of a family heirloom. We had no idea where it was going to go – the suggestion at the moment was that Rose might like it or Victoria, who was a bit of an antique hunter, but for the time being it was being stuffed into one of the spare rooms in the apartment, where it really didn’t go.
Marie was dressed in sweats and hoodie, her hair scooped up on top of her head and she didn’t look that much different from the woman I’d met, the one I’d spent a weekend with in her New York loft and fallen in love with enough to make a decision that I didn’t spend my usual three months thinking about.
“Surely everything’s packed?”
She turned around and gave me a thoughtful look. “Almost. I nearly forgot about this.” She jiggled round at the back of the fitted cupboard. “The fecking family jewels.”
“Shit. They shouldn’t be there anyway. How the fuck have we forgotten those?”
“I’d blame senility, but I think we were too young for too long to claim that. These were my mother’s and I told Bernadette I’d look after them. She’d have my fecking arse if we leave them behind.” There was a slight hint of panic as Marie felt around the back of the cupboard, the bit of wood at the back displaced, I guessed.
“Want me to see if I can feel for it?”
The quick smile that occurred told me I’d walked into that one.
“Grant, you’re a man. You generally struggle with written directions and a diagram.”
