‘Calm?’ She took a step closer. ‘I am doing what I always do, Loz – trying to keep things together to make whatever shitstorm we are riding through the best it possibly can be for my kids! The one who can’t lose it, who has to keep going.’ She poked him in the chest. ‘And we both know I’ve had some practice. We don’t know what’s happened tonight, and so yes, I’m calm. For now. And you need to follow my lead, but trust me, Loz, if that man has laid afinger on my daughter, you can do what you like to him, and I’ll hold your coat. But until we have the full picture—’
‘We don’t need the full picture!’ He pointed again to the room where his little girl lay.
‘Loz, listen to me.’ She took her time, and he didn’t like it, getting the feeling that she was more than a little in the know, that she’d kept something from him. ‘I am distraught, I am fuming, I am sick to my stomach’ – her voice shook – ‘but I also know that Dom might have a life that you and I know very little about.’
‘What’s that supposed to mean?’ He resented the suggestion. It scared him. ‘What kind of life?’
‘I just mean that she’s sixteen, she’s not a baby, and I know she’s been up to Shiskas in the past because Cass saw her there once. I thought it was a one-off, that she might be experimenting, dipping her toe in that grown-up world and I didn’t think it was a big deal, she was with her friends ...’
‘What was she doing up there? And why didn’t you tell me?’
Julie gave a small, exasperated laugh and looked skyward. ‘You’re never present. Even when you’re here you’re not present. When was I supposed to raise it? This is what I was talking about earlier, about you not knowing what is important! Being here for our kids, living the everyday, the small stuff, understanding what they are going through – this is what’s important!’
‘Oh, I might have known this would be my fault!’ He couldn’t believe she was using this as an excuse to give him another verbal kicking.
‘Jesus! Not everything is about you!’ She rubbed her fingers over her forehead, and he recognised the familiar pattern. How everything from the weekly shop, politics on TV, what route to drive and even the question, ‘Has someone fed the cat?’, descended into this exchange where voices were raised and teeth were bared. It was as if they couldn’t help it, pre-programmed, locked in thecycle ... He was mightily sick of it and judging from the slope of his wife’s shoulders, so was she.
‘Please don’t go and find Micky.’ Domino’s voice drew them. The sight of her silenced him, two dark streaks of mascara ran down her cheeks and her eyes were swollen and smudged. Her shirt was undone, her bra visible. He could smell the pungent scent of booze and cigarettes, which was nauseating enough, but doubly so when it came from his daughter. His sixteen-year-old daughter. A child. Only she didn’t look like a child, she looked like a teenager, a young woman and one who knew little of the world.
‘You don’t need to worry,’ he began. ‘Daddy will sort it out. Whatever has happened.’
‘There’s nothing to sort out!’ she shouted, her arms stiff by her side, her words offered without censor, her truth aided by the liberal application of alcohol that clearly still swirled in her body. ‘Micky hasn’t done anything wrong, not really. I came on to him. I’ve been after him for weeks. We were heading off to his place for sex, he has a pool with a pool house and champagne. Not the cheap stuff, the really good stuff.’ She gave a wry smile as her tears gathered. ‘But I threw up when he took a bend too fast. I threw up all over the leather interior of his car. He’s got a McLaren. Guess I fucked that up; he doesn’t want to see me again!’ She tucked her hair behind her ears, still a little unsteady on her legs.
‘You’re just ...’ He tried to speak, tried to shift the tangle of emotion that clogged his throat like fibres. ‘You’re just a kid,’ he managed, unable to recognise the person in front of him, a clone of Domino, but her words alien, unthinkable.
‘Am I, Dad?’ she asked, as Julie rushed forward and took her daughter into her arms, cooing like Domino were still a baby.
‘It’ll all be okay, Dom. I’ve got you. It’ll all be okay.’
It struck him, as he slammed the front door behind him, that he and Lisa had started when they were fifteen. That’s when they’dfallen in love. So deeply in love that she was all he could think about. Lisa – the girl who still sat like a splinter in his thoughts.
He stood in the cool night air and fired off a text to Micky before jumping into the Merc that might be taken from him any day now, if he didn’t sort out the deal with the estate agent’s friends. He’d run out of money for the repayments. His standing orders had bounced and just like the house, it was a matter of when, not if, he would be forced to hand over the keys. Pulling out of the cul-de-sac, MrMoneybags put his foot down and let the engine roar ...
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CLEORICHARDSON
It was a little after one a.m. Thankfully, the pain in Cleo Richardson’s abdomen seemed to have subsided, and she now soaked in a warm bubble bath, with a cup of tea Georgie had made her resting on the side, and a fragrant candle lit for good measure. She inhaled the warm scent of amber, finding it soothing. She wished her husband could find something similarly calming to distract him, as the sound of him pacing the living room below filtered up the stairs. His heavy tread on the laminate flooring, interspersed with the squeak of the loose board by the fireplace ... it made her smile. He’d become the caricature she’d seen in movies, one they had mocked together: the pacing expectant father, hands wringing, prayers and wishes floating up to whoever might be listening, a tense look across a worried brow. In another era he’d have no doubt toked on a fat cigar. The thought made her laugh.
Still, the idea lingered that maybe they should move away, pack up their little home and go ... anywhere. Start over, free from the clutches of her parents, the irritation of Lawrence, the inevitable comparison between her baby and its wealthy cousins ... God, how she loved the thought!
She took deep, slow breaths, doing her very best to slow her pulse, knowing that to keep calm was the most important thing, aware that she would need to pull on all her reserves soon enough. They had read a book together when first pregnant, a book all about what to expect as first-time parents. She had read aloud the chapter on the importance for the person giving birth to feel in control and that their wishes were, as far as possible, adhered to at a time when they were most vulnerable. Yes, she remembered this clearly, knowing it would be in her husband’s nature to want to take over, make plans, usher her this way and that, make suggestions, do what he thought best. She knew it would be killing him to hand over control.
‘Did you call, love?’ He poked his head around the door.
‘No.’ She shook her head and reached for her tea.
‘Oh.’ He bit his lip, as he did when he was nervous. ‘Thought I might have heard you shout out. I yawned and was worried I’d missed it.’
‘You didn’t miss it. I didn’t call. Come in, you dafty, come and sit with your wife.’
Lumbering in, he took up a seat on the loo and leaned forward with his large hands splayed on his knees.
‘How are you doing, Georgie?’ She spoke in the soothing voice that she used to greet him after a long day, knowing it helped ease his worries.
He considered his response. ‘I’ve got to admit ...’
She could see he was doing his best, choosing his words carefully, taking his time, as if he, too, might be thinking about that chapter in their book.
