Chapter 36
36
JOEL
I phoned in sick again on Sunday, feeling like such a fraud but equally not caring about it because, right now, I was where I needed and wanted to be.
While Poppy caught up on some work in her office, I sat in the lounge and FaceTimed my parents who’d flown back to Portugal with Chez on Friday. My brother was having a swim so I couldn’t speak to him but Mum and Dad both said he already seemed a lot more relaxed. They hadn’t booked him a return flight, the hope being that he’d ultimately find work locally and stay.
When we said goodbye, I was about to find Poppy to update her on the conversation, but my phone rang again, this time with a FaceTime request from Tilly. She never FaceTimed me and to do so while she was on holiday couldn’t be a good thing.
‘Everything okay?’ I asked when I answered.
‘Imogen wants to speak to you.’
‘Okay. That’s fine.’
‘No, it’s not fine. She’s been nagging me to FaceTime you since she woke up and she refused to get ready for our day out until I let her.’
‘So why didn’t you let her call me sooner and why are you being all angry with me?’
‘I’m not angry with you. I’m just frustrated. I said she could speak to you tonight, but she got herself into such a state about wanting to speak to you now that she threw up in the tent.’
‘Oh, my God! Is she all right?’
‘ She is. The tent isn’t. It stinks in there. I’ve never seen her like this before so I’ve said she can speak to you, but I wanted to give you a heads up that she’s upset before she comes on the phone. Are you okay to talk to her now?’
‘Of course. Put her on.’
‘Hey, sweetie,’ I said gently when Imogen’s face appeared on the screen a couple of minutes later. She was pale and tearful, clutching Cloud against her face and I longed to hug her. ‘I hear you’ve been sick.’
‘You have to come and get me, Daddy! I hate it here!’
‘You love camping.’
‘Not here! There isn’t a playground and Mummy and Greg say we might live here, and I don’t want to. It took forever to get here and Ezra and Delphine were both sick in the car and I don’t want to go to a new school without all my friends. I want to see Darcie and ride Munchie and see you all the time. I want to live with you. If they make me move here, I’ll run away.’
Her rant was punctuated by sobs.
‘Ssh,’ I soothed. ‘Look at me, sweetie. I’m right here.’
‘I want you, Daddy. Come and get me.’
‘I can’t do that. I’m not just down the road.’
‘But I hate it here.’ She shouted the word hate .
‘Take a deep breath with me. And another. You’re scaring Cloud.’
She sniffed and wiped her tears on her sleeve as she cuddled her sheep closer.
‘I wish I could come and get you, but I’m at Poppy’s house right now because her dad’s very poorly. You’ve got Mummy and Greg and your brother and sister to look after you, but Poppy doesn’t have anyone so I need to be here with her. Can you understand that?’
She nodded, wide-eyed.
‘I wish I could be with you, but this is your special time with your family and you usually love holidays. I bet you’d love this one if you let yourself. We’ll get together when you’re home and do something special then, okay?’
She nodded but the sadness in her eyes broke my heart.
‘I don’t want to move here, Daddy.’
‘I don’t want you to either and Mummy and I need to talk about that.’ I didn’t want to dwell on that with her and have her worrying about it. ‘So they don’t have a playground, eh? I reckon you could still have some great adventures with Cloud. There must be lots of grass if it’s a campsite. Is there?’
‘Yes.’
‘Show me.’
She turned the phone round and filmed round her. It was a bit fast and made my eyes boggle but, as far as I could tell, there was plenty of open space.
‘When I was younger, I used to love playing tig and hide and seek with my friends or just running around pretending we were superheroes. Can’t you do that with Ezra and Delphine? I’m sure they’d love their big sister to play with them.’
‘I could teach them tig.’
‘I think they’ll love that. Are you okay now? No more talk about running away?’
She nodded and smiled at me. ‘I’m okay. Thank you, Daddy.’
‘You’re welcome, sweetie. I love you.’
‘I love you too.’ She blew me a kiss before handing the phone back to Tilly who’d been hovering in the background.
‘I’ve been trying to calm her down for ages,’ she said, looking and sounding relieved. ‘Thanks for doing that for me.’
‘I didn’t do it for you,’ I said, a hard edge to my voice which I hated but which she needed to hear. ‘I did it for Imogen and if I didn’t think it would do more harm than good, I’d be jumping on a plane right now and bringing her back with me.’
‘You can’t do that!’
‘I just said I’m not going to! Did you hear everything I said to her?’
She nodded.
‘Then you heard me saying we need to talk. A heads up on that is I’m not standing for any more of this nonsense. I’ve seen my solicitor and you do not have sole custody of our daughter. Also, you can not move her to the other end of the country on a whim and you certainly can’t move her to Scotland without my permission.’
‘It’s not a whim. This is our dream. You know we love camping.’
‘Loving camping and running a campsite in Scotland are two completely different things. I think you need to seriously ask yourself whether you’re wearing rose-tinted glasses here. Being the owner rather than the camper will be exceptionally hard work. Do you really want to take that on with newborn twins and four more kids to look after? And what does Leighton’s mum think about it?’
Tilly shrugged. ‘She doesn’t know yet.’
‘Because you know she’ll say no. So what’s Greg going to do? Is he really prepared to lose his son for a dream that could turn out to be the hardest job he’s ever had?’
She bit her lip and looked down. The lack of arguing back filled me with hope that she might be having doubts herself, so I forged on.
‘Honestly, Tilly, can’t you see how crazy this is? Open a campsite if you must but do it in Yorkshire. You still get your dream, but you don’t rip three families apart in the process.’
‘We haven’t made any firm decisions yet,’ she said, but the hostility I was so used to was absent from her tone. She looked worn out. She looked like she wanted to run away too.
‘Imogen can call me any time she wants and I’m happy to talk her down if this happens again but, when you get back, you and I need to have a long talk. I’ve let you get away with too much and I’m not standing for it anymore. Imogen’s my daughter and I have rights. Okay?’
There was silence and I raised my eyebrows at her.
‘Okay,’ she said, with a sigh. ‘I’ll see you when we get back.’
She disconnected the call, and I ran my fingers through my hair with a sigh. That was the most compliant I’d ever seen her. Perhaps Imogen wasn’t the only one who hated the campsite. Perhaps it wasn’t Tilly’s dream either.