38
THE GOOD, THE BAD AND THE HONEST-TO-GOD TRUTH
To my immense relief, Adam was only calling to ask if I could pick him up and bring him home. There have been no further crises. Please God there will continue to be no further crises.
I would’ve used picking him up as an opportunity to see Niamh in person and give her a big, reassuring hug but it seemed that she and Paul had gone out for lunch. That has to be a good thing, doesn’t it? That they are spending time, just the two of them, together.
I’m telling myself it absolutely has to mean that and not something sinister as we get home. On arrival, Adam becomes my favourite child simply by being here and taking a very muddy Daniel through to the bathroom to get washed.
While I listen to him tell Daniel to be a good boy and behave himself, and reassure the dog that he’s being very brave, I get a tiny little idea of what he might be like as a father. Firm yet gentle. Loving and intuitive. He might be so very young, and it might only seem like five minutes ago that he was a little boy himself, but he has shown me in these last weeks, and especially in the last twenty-four hours, just how mature and responsible he can be.
I let those fuzzy feelings warm my heart as I get ready for my second shower of the day. It is, after all, not only Daniel who has come home from the walk in the woods mucked to the eyeballs and shivering with cold.
I need to warm up, feel refreshed and be comfortable and then I absolutely will start to write. Or so I promise myself.
An hour later and I’m looking like a bag lady, but a comfortable and clean bag lady, dressed in some jogging bottoms and my favourite ‘Tired and Needy’ oversized hoodie (with thumb holes!). The thick woolly socks and Crocs round the look off nicely.
I come downstairs to find that Adam has lit the fire, and Daniel is now dozing peacefully in front of it. Adam has also made me a cup of tea and a sandwich and announces he is going to have a bath himself.
‘When I’m done, I think it’s about time I started looking at flights back to Manchester and sort things out there,’ he says. ‘I’m not really happy about leaving Jodie, but at the same time I have to make sure to get my qualifications, don’t I? If I’m going to be a dad. I need to have my shit together.’
He gives me a kiss on the cheek and I watch him as he leaves the room. So much is changing, so fast. I’ll miss him when he goes back to college, but I’ll also continue to be increasingly proud of him. There are many nineteen-year-old boys who would run for the hills faced with their girlfriend’s unexpected pregnancy. God knows there are many fully grown men who struggle to cope with not being the centre of attention any more in a relationship.
Once I can hear the bath running upstairs, I bring my tea and sandwich through to the living room and switch my computer on, only to be bombarded with a whole host of emails – which of course I’ve not seen because my phone has been enjoying a mud bath.
There are several from the agency that oversees my B2B freelance assignments, listing new opportunities and also updating me on some of my existing clients and their next publication. The requests are in for interviews with aCEO, several listicles. Two are serious: on career progression, and on ways to make business customers trust your brand. The other is light-hearted with a Valentine’s Day/office romance theme which is a car crash waiting to happen. NoHRmanager in any company is going to let that through. I flag that to the client and ask forHRapproval – which I know will be denied – and go back to reading my emails.
Then I spot an email from Grace which of course I immediately click into. Please God she won’t be getting in touch to tell me that Peggy thought I was awful, or that Peggy has been found out to be an actual cult leader and the whole article is no longer needed. And actually, while she’s at it, she made a huge mistake and she doesn’t actually need anyone else writing for her magazine and if she’s being honest she doesn’t really like me anyway – and never did. Not even at school. And she was only pretending to like me so she could wreak her revenge for something awful I did to her when we were teenagers which I can’t even remember anyway…
I may, of course, just be spiralling. Still, it’s with a degree of trepidation that I read what she has to say.
Hey Rebecca,
I hope you had a super weekend at the retreat. I’ve heard it was a great success – can’t wait to hear your take on it. Are you okay to get me the copy overASAP– those pesky deadlines are already becoming a headache.
Oh, and we need some photos. Did you take any with your friends that they’d be happy to share? I’ve one of our staffers down at the site getting snaps of the accommodation and the setting, and Peggy of course. So it’s just for a bit of extra colour.
But we will need an official byline shot from you, so can you let me know your availability for this week and I can send a snapper over to grab a pic, or you can call into the office if that’s easier.
This isn’t a paid promotion, so don’t be afraid to be completely honest and if you can inject some of that great humour of yours into it then even better.
About a thousand words?
Can’t wait to read it! We’ll have to get a good chat about it all too.
Talk soon,
G
Oh, God, she sounds very enthusiastic. I hope I don’t disappoint her. There’s nothing quite like being told to be funny to absolutely kick your ability to be funny directly up the hole.
But then I remember my walk in the woods, and my realisation that it doesn’t have to beperfect. I don’t have to be perfect. I don’t have to be anyone I’m not already. Grace has put me on this assignment based on material of mine she has already read. Based on my ability to be honest. Isn’t that more than enough? Isn’t that what all this is about in the first place – us being honest with each other? The good, the bad, the absolutely humiliating and the ugly?
I want sixteen-year-old girls to write letters to their older selves having a proper idea of what life can be like when you’re older. Even some of the tough times. I don’t want them to worry about ageing or needing to fall in love to be whole. I don’t want them thinking their worth should be measured by how skinny they are, or how much money they have in the bank. Life is about so much more. This past weekend, including hearing jellybean’s heartbeat, has taught me that in spades.
I think of my boy upstairs, my other son in England and how their lives will change. When Adam changes his course and comes home it will be the first time they’ve lived independently of each other. I think of my mum in the house she now lives in alone crocheting cardigans for a baby who I think will help heal the very depths of her grief over Dad. I think of Deirdre, who has been so lonely but who has hopefully found new friends. I think of my beautiful Niamh, who is in pain but who is finally, finally, putting herself first. Of Laura, who is finding comfort in the universe and the powers beyond our understanding to cope with her loss.
And I think of Conal. The man who arrived at my house at eleven last night because he sensed I needed a hug and who offered that hug without expectation. The man who made my morning easier by taking Daniel out for his early-morning wee, before going to fetch breakfast. How this man has made me feel physical sensations I have not felt in a very, very long time, and all without so much as laying a finger on me.
