“I’ll – I’ll try and be out of here as soon as I can,” she mumbled, afraid to look at him, aching to touch him.
Mike picked up his suitcase and headed downstairs.
“Take your time. I wouldn’t want her ending up in some dingy flat,” he said, his eyes hard as flints.
Jenny enquired as to where he’d go but he told her nothing other than she should notify him once she and the baby were settled elsewhere.
Then Mike walked out the front door without another word.
Jenny stood in the open doorway for a long time after, trying to pretend it wasn’t real, hoping that it wasn’t happening.
She hadn’t heard a word from him since. It was over, and both of them knew it.
But had she truly expected anything else?
The scent of burning milk brought Jenny sharply back to the present. She looked at the cooker and saw to her dismay that the pot of milk she’d been warming for Holly’s breakfast had boiled over and congealed all over the hob.
Feeling well and truly defeated, she slumped down at the kitchen table and put her head in her hands.
Mike was really gone. She had hoped initially that after he calmed down and had a chance to think, that they might talk everything through and figure out what to do next.
But now Jenny knew there was simply no hope to cling to.
She and Holly would be out of the house by the weekend. Despite her protests that her friend had enough to contend with, Karen had insisted they come live with her until Jenny found something else.
“Anyway,” Karen added wickedly, “the more of us living there, the harder it is for a judge to kick us out.”
Jenny had reluctantly agreed, if only to get away from Mike’s. She felt bad enough that he was the one who’d left. Now she’d need a find a place of her own and begin a new life, just her and Holly.
But despite the pain of losing him, there was also a palpable sense of relief at the proverbial weight lifting from her shoulders that she no longer had to live a lie. While uncertain about what life had in store for her andher daughter, at least now Jenny could finally live with herself, and that alone brought her some comfort.
Across the room, little Holly watched ill-at-ease at her mum’s melancholy demeanour and the tears streaming down her face.
“Da-Da?” she called out, banging her spoon, trying to cheer her up by reciting the only word her baby vocal chords had yet managed. “Da-Da. Da-Da. Da-Da.”
60
Karen looked around her beloved home and tried to view it through fresh eyes, prospective buyers’ eyes. Inviting and homely, the warm gold walls, terracotta curtains and three-piece suite of her living room perfectly complemented the wooden floor.
Shane had been so proud of the house, but Karen knew that this room in particular had been his favourite. She remembered him cursing wildly the day he tried laying the wooden floor. It had taken him much longer than the ‘couple of hours’ the sales assistant had advised, not to mention the additional time sanding and varnishing.
But to Shane, it had all been worth the satisfaction of being able to tell everyone that he had done it all himself.
She had been surprised that he’d so easily taken to DIY. He had tackled the kitchen units with gusto too, albeit with help from Aidan, whose dad was a carpenterby trade. Between them, they had ripped down the tired formica doors and chipboard and completely modernised the space by replacing the units with bright maple doors, chrome handles and a solid granite worktop.
Room by room, and with infectious enthusiasm, Shane had transformed the dull outdated décor of 22a Harolds Cross Crescent. Gone was the jaded floral wallpaper, seventies swirling carpets and the ancient doors and skirting boards. Instead, he and Karen had opted for wooden fixtures, warm colours and textures.
She knew that if this house went on the market, it would be snapped up within days, if not hours. But the property wouldnotbe going on the market anytime soon, not if she could help it. No way the Quinns were getting their grubby, selfish little hands on her home, not without a fight to the death.
Or to put it less dramatically, a court battle at least. Her solicitor had phoned that morning to tell her that a hearing date had been agreed. She and Jack Quinn were to come before a judge early next year.
People she didn’t even know very well; work colleagues, her boss, her next-door neighbour – a snobbish woman who had never deigned to speak to either Karen or Shane before his death – had been telling her that she was coping well, that she was doing the right thing by going back to work so soon after the funeral, that she was managing ‘admirably’. Even her mother had complimented her ability to ‘bounce back’, a few weeks after the funeral when she and her dad had finallybeen able to tear themselves away – the same weekend they had scheduled to come home for the wedding.
Karen had sent them back to Tenerife early, frustrated with her mother’s incessant jabbering about how living in a sunny climate had done untold damage to her skin, and didn’t she notice all her latest wrinkles?
Clara could never have been described as maternal, and Karen didn’t expect her to be any different, but she wondered how any mother could be so self-absorbed and seemingly oblivious to her child’s pain. After spending a couple of days with her mother, Karen had to stop herself from throwing her out, and would have had Aidan not been around to calm her.
He had been wonderful, especially in the time immediately after the funeral, when everyone else had left her alone and got on with their own lives. Aidan had been the one to cancel the wedding and honeymoon arrangements, ensuring Karen would not have to make the difficult calls to the registry office or the hotel.
