Chapter Twenty-One
There seemed no hope of Inger hopping back into her borrowed car and once again vanishing. For Astrid and Alvin’s sake, Mats knew he should be glad, as they were thrilled to have their mum around – although they were also focused on Christmas or screaming around the hall in breathless games with their cousins.
On Saturday, all the family but Grete, Erik, Jonas and Ebba were breakfasting together in the large, homely kitchen when Astrid turned to Inger. ‘Can you take us to see the ponies?’
‘And the donkey,’ Alvin added, always reluctant for Clive’s non-pony status to be overlooked.
Emil, the eldest of the cousins and so often the leader, tried to take charge. ‘I’d rather go to the copse where we made the mud slide.’ Emil, Filip, Astrid and Walter had been allowed a little way into the copse on their own yesterday and returned looking like piglets who’d found a muddy wallow. Mats had threatened to hose them down in the courtyard.
Inger answered cautiously, apparently attracted by neither a paddock nor a mud slide. ‘I’d rather do something indoors.’ Her hair was coiled behind her head and her smooth, glossy fingernails were painted the scarlet of her cashmere sweater. Mats contemplated her. She’d succeeded in avoiding being alone with him since the evening she arrived, when his anger had prevented him from paying close attention to her explanations.
‘Bah,’ baby Ronja contributed from her highchair between opening her mouth for spoons of porridge. Nils was feeding her while Maja supervised Liam and Walter munching crumpets, which all the older children had chosen this morning, and slathered with Nutella.
Astrid redirected her pony quest to Mats. ‘Can you and Ezz take us?’ Then, discontentedly: ‘Ezz hasn’t come out with us for ages.’
‘She’s busy,’ Mats said casually, knowing Ezz had been coming to work, albeit with a professional smile and a remote expression. He didn’t miss Inger’s lips tightening. ‘But I’ll be feeding the ponies and Clive, so any of you children who want to come, can. Just finish breakfast and get your outdoor things.’ In less than a minute, all the children but Ronja had run off, Walter still holding a crumpet in each hand. Ronja looked after them in surprise. ‘Gone,’ she observed.
Mats glanced at Inger. ‘What was it you and Andreas argued about?’ he asked abruptly.
Inger patted her mouth with a napkin, her eyes cutting to Maja and Nils, who were trying to free Ronja’s starfish-hands of excess porridge. ‘Not a subject for public discussion.’
Maja and Nils exchanged looks, lifted Ronja from the highchair and hurriedly exited the kitchen.
‘Bye,’ Ronja called, waving over Nils’ shoulder.
‘Bye.’ Mats returned the wave. ‘You’ve avoided being alone with me,’ he reminded Inger, keeping his tone mild when he felt anything but.
She tilted her nose. ‘Because you were so angry.’
‘Still am,’ he returned frankly. ‘And I think that considering the amount of disruption you’ve caused me, I deserve a fuller understanding of your actions.’
Suddenly, an expression of desolation showed through her make-up. ‘OK,’ she sighed. ‘We argued about me missing the children. I said Andreas didn’t understand because he isn’t a parent, which he didn’t like. He accused me of being more interested in you than the children. He knew Josefin had told me about what you were up to with your precious Ezz—’
Words leapt from him in a low, furious growl. ‘If Andreas is genuinely stupid enough to think there’s anything left between you and me, I’d be happy to tell him that we’re completely over. As you and Andreas cheated on me, “what you were up to with your precious Ezz” is insulting. And I’ll “get up to” anything I want.’ If only Ezz wasn’t holding him at a distance. He’d called her last night to invite her to the final advent Sunday tomorrow, when the children would get satsumas and nuts on ribbons to hang on the tree. She’d refused, regretful but firm, saying it felt wrong. There had been no shifting her.
Inger paled at his brutal honesty. ‘Well, he was angry,’ she continued stiffly. ‘As was I. I said maybe he wasn’t ready to be a stepdad and then I walked out and left him ranting. The wife of his friend said I could borrow her car, and I left.’
Mats pictured the scene. Even allowing for Inger pausing long enough to pack a heap of suitcases, it didn’t sound like a structured leave-taking. ‘Have you told him where you are so he’s not picturing you dead in a ditch?’
Sulkily, Inger snapped, ‘I’ve messaged him. He knows I’m here and OK.’
Mats wanted to say, Were you always such a brat? I can’t believe I ever loved you. But he resisted. ‘Then all we can do is put on a front for the kids until you can leave.’ He meant to ask her to make her exit between Christmas and New Year to give him a few days with Ezz before returning to Sweden in early January, but the slap of shoes on the hall tiles advertised the return of a herd of children. ‘Ready! Can we see the ponies now?’ Astrid panted.
Mats rose. ‘OK, kids. I’ll get my coat on our way out. Who’s going to push the cart?’
‘Me, me, me!’ Every child claimed to want the pleasure. They flowed up the hall like a river and out through the door to reception. By the time Mats gained the lobby, only half into his coat, they were bobbing about in Ezz’s office. ‘Want to come and see the ponies?’ Astrid demanded, in her what a treat voice.
‘And the donkey,’ Alvin added.
Ezz’s hair swung and glistened as she swivelled her chair so she could smile regretfully at the hopeful faces lined up before her. ‘I can’t today. Have a lovely time, though, and give my best pats to Haggis, Scotch, Mary and Clive.’ Over their heads, she gave Mats a polite and perfunctory smile.
He tried to tell her with his eyes that he wished they were back to where they’d been before Inger had turned up to spoil everything but her attention was on Astrid skipping around the desk to give Ezz a hug. ‘I don’t like it when you stay in your office. Will you be with us on Christmas Eve?’
Mats jumped in to support Astrid’s invitation. ‘Mum and I were outvoted about having a Scottish Christmas, so the gifts are to be given out on Christmas Eve, as we do in Sweden, and the food will be a mixture of Scandinavian and Scottish. Gwen and Caitriona are kindly preparing most of it and then going home for their own Christmas, and we’ll look after ourselves until after Boxing Day. But you’d be very—’ he paused for emphasis ‘— very welcome to join us. Or to meet any of us in the village,’ he tacked on hopefully.
‘Thank you very much, but I can’t make it.’ Ezz hugged Astrid again and buried her face in the blonde curls for an instant. Her voice emerged muffled. ‘Sorry, my lovely.’
Mats couldn’t force her, so he said, ‘I understand,’ in a voice that turned to a growl in his throat. ‘We’d better get the hay and feed, kids.’
When he cast a last look back as the children raced for the front door, he caught her dashing a tear from her cheek, and his heart ached. When they returned an hour later, her office was empty.
He hadn’t been back in the apartment for more than ten minutes when he discovered why. Grete took him aside, her eyes shining with compassion. ‘Ezz asked if she could take time off. I thought it best to agree.’
Mats felt winded. ‘From now? Till when?’
She made a rocking motion with her hand. ‘Maybe the twenty-eighth. She tells me almost all the work that can be done before the year-end is complete, and she’ll catch up … later.’
‘Shit,’ Mats muttered. He knew most of the preparation for year-end was done, because he’d helped her do it.
‘Shit,’ Walter shouted happily. ‘Uncle Mats said shit.’
His mother demonstrated her sympathy for his unhappiness by refraining from telling him off for swearing in front of the children, but giving him a hug instead.