6. Seph
CHAPTER 6
SEPH
I couldn’t remember the last time so many of the grandkids had been in my parents’ house at the same time; neither could my mother, who was watching some of the chaos via a video call, which also involved lots of instructions to Max who was standing behind Claire as she showed Mum what was going on.
“The dining table’s staying so don’t let Will anywhere near it, Max. In fact, keep him out of the dining room. Can you pass on to the packers that the bed in the spare room is staying, and then whichever beds you lot scavengers aren’t taking, can go to that charity.”
I’d already had a call with her this afternoon, asking for more details about Rose and what and when things were happening. They were in Portugal in a service villa and should be there for two weeks, however I suspected they’d only stay a week. Mum was clearly itching to be here and organising everything, which surprised no one.
“Have you managed to relax today?” Claire asked, directing the camera at Niamh and Orla who were actually sat down, reading a book that I vaguely remembered from when me and Payton were little – fuck knew where they’d uncovered it.
“It’s been very relaxing. We spoke to the estate agent and we have an extra couple of days to get everything cleared.” Her voice carried over to where I was sitting, going through the drawers of a dresser in the dining room that I didn’t think I’d every been in before.
“That wasn’t the question,” Claire said, sounding a real adult which always surprised me. “Are you relaxing, because if you’re spending all your time planning this sale, then you’re rushing it.”
“Darling girl, whenever we’ve made big decisions, we’ve always made them quickly. If I’d thought for an extra day about marrying your father and taking on four feral children, I wouldn’t have done it. My life would’ve been completely different.” She sounded far too serene.
I closed the drawer, impressed at how much silverware my parents possessed and unsure of why the fuck they’d need so much of it.
“Mum, why’s there so much cutlery?” I stuck my head in view of the camera.
Claire handed me her phone and I flipped the camera round so we could see each other.
“Wedding presents. I think we had about six people send us huge sets. We should probably take it with us to Oxford.” She looked unimpressed. “Or you could all have a set – most of you. Someone would have to miss out.”
“I’m happy to miss out.” Max chirped in. “We were sent two sets for our wedding and we’ve never opened either.”
“Only two? That’s pathetic.” Mum grinned. “Anyway, I’m going to leave you all to ransacking our house while I go and have a double gin and tonic by the beach. Love you all.” She didn’t quite manage to turn the video off before the next comment. “Little eejits. I bet they’ve been waiting for this to get their paws on it – gree - ”
I looked at Claire, who was grinning, shaking her head.
“Sometimes she’s complicated.” It was an understatement. Once I’d wondered how my dad did it, managing to keep Mum happy even though she changed her mind at least three times before fixing on something. Then I met Georgia and knew why I did it.
“Aren’t most women?” Killian chose a possibly suicidal moment to come into the room, carrying Quinn, which could well be the best line of defence.
Claire sent him a look that should’ve toppled him to the floor. “I’m not complicated. You couldn’t have married someone less complicated that me.”
“Really?” He leaned against the wall. “Explain how? Because I’m not sure you’d have let me marry someone else. You worshipped me from day one.”
“In your dreams.” She took a few steps closer.
“In your dreams.” He grinned at her, looking at her in a way that made me question whether I should take my niece and leave them to it. “You followed me round like a puppy.”
“I did not.”
Killian was a braver man than I was.
“You were an egotistical, big-headed goon who thought he was God’s gift to women.” She kissed her daughter. “Who saw things that weren’t there.”
He laughed, leaning closer still to steal a kiss from my sister. She couldn’t help but smile and her expression softened, leaning in closer for a hug from him with the arm that wasn’t carrying Quinn.
“If you two want to go home early, or make more memories in your old room, we can watch the kids.” I really hoped they’d take the hint and quit the PDA’s.
“Killian’s too old for that.” Claire beamed at me and then him. “All that stopped working.”
“Carry on, woman and we’ll be having words later.” Killian kissed his daughter’s dark curls.
“See, you can only manage words.” Claire shifted out of the way, attention now on the door which swung open, Rose and Lucy appearing through it.
“We’ve found the secret room!” Rose said, sounding a little breathless, or maybe I was imagining it. I was trying not to notice things that weren’t there, rationalising that fear wasn’t having a healthy effect on me, but I was still over-analysing. Every time she moved quickly, I was fearful she wouldn’t be able to catch enough breath; every time she looked paler than normal I’d be thinking whether I needed to take her to the ward to be checked out. If I saw her with a friend from school I’d be spotting how small Rose was, how slender and worrying that it was because of her heart not working as well as it needed to. Should we have noticed something sooner? Should we’ve spotted how petite she was and taken her to a paediatrician? Georgia had told me we’d not made any mistakes and because the hole in her heart wasn’t that big, we shouldn’t be surprised it was only now it’d been discovered, but I hadn’t quite accepted that yet.
“How is it?” I asked, following her out of the dining room and towards the kitchen. Claire followed, Max already peering through the door at the back of the larder. He was holding his phone and taking a photo.
Lucy and Rose squeezed past him, launching themselves back into the space, where five more of our kids had congregated. Eliza, Bear - Callum’s son, Teddy, Tomas – Payton’s eldest, and Nancy. All of our firstborns, although Bear was only half an hour older than his twin, Bea.
Twins. The family curse.
“Dad, is this your name here?” Rose pointed at the name I’d written yesterday, proving that I was taller than everyone now.
It was the small victories in big families. Or tall victories in this case.
“That’s me.”
She sent me a look that reminded me of her mother.
“When did you make that mark?”
“I’ve always made my mark, Rosie. It’s why I’m so amazing.”
Another look. “Serious, Dad, when?”
My heart grew a little more every time she called me dad.
“Yesterday.”
“But you’re a grown-up. Why do you need to put your height on the wall now?” She shook her head at me – Georgia all over.
“Because I wanted to record that I was taller than Max.” When I was five all I’d ever wanted to be was taller than Max, which I knew now was a ridiculous ambition, but hey, I’d achieved it.
“But Uncle Max hasn’t recorded his height so it’s not exactly proof.”
My daughter had a point. “Max, go and stand next to my height line.” I gestured to where I wanted him.
“Why?”
“I need to prove to Rose I’m taller than you.”
He would’ve sworn but there were too many kids there who would’ve told on him.
Begrudgingly he went over there, standing against the wall like he was about to be shot.
“Uncle Jackson and Uncle Callum should do this too.” My daughter was so smart.
“I agree. Then we have proof who’s the tallest.” I didn’t want to tell her to go and find my other brothers because I wanted to wrap her up in cotton wool until the surgeon told me she was well and always would be, but that wasn’t fair. “Can you and Lucy go and find them?”
She nodded, but didn’t tear off, walking off casually, chatting to Lucy about something or other.
“Just draw the line, Seph,” Max said, still standing with his back to the wall which for some reason was fascinating Bear and Tomas.
“I’m enjoying the view. It’s really obvious now how much taller I am than you.” My line was significantly higher.
Well, a centimetre.
Noise started, footsteps came through the larder and more adults and kids arrived, cramming into the room.
“What’s happening?” Payton looked puzzled. “Are we going to throw rotten veg at Max or something?”
“Good idea.” I was enjoying Max’s glare. “No, we’re doing heights. Let’s get everyone lined up.”
There was moaning and bickering, the adults and the kids lining up in height order, now on the opposite wall to where we’d had our growth chart, Georgia having appeared with Luke and helping the kids to work out who went in which order.
“I don’t think Seph’s actually much taller than Max.” Ava pointed at us both. “Sorry, Joseph.”
“That’s because he’s wearing trainers with thick soles and I’m in socks.” Which was absolutely true. “Shoes off, everyone.”
That took an extra five minutes of faffing and a lot of complaining from Max.
Then we were ready. Killian drew the lines, making sure backs were straight and hands were out of pockets, probably reminding him of when he’d been in the marines.
Each name was written neatly next to the line, as well as our age which was harder for some to admit than others. Then we stepped back and looked at our well-intentioned graffiti.
“We should do this again in Oxford. The kids won’t see this again.” Georgia whispered into my ear, her arms around me, watching where Rose was. Rose had been the fourth biggest, even though she was the oldest.
“We can do it in the room we used to use as a playroom.” I thought of the house at Oxford. We had many memories of it there because that’s where we’d been freer, at least for me, Payton and Ava. When we’d been there school had been a spot on the horizon behind us as we ran into the holidays or a long weekend. We’d had the fields to run around in and trees to climb, the endless summer days that became warm nights when we’d been left to live a little bit wild.
“What’s that?” Max hovered nearby.
“We should do this in Oxford.” I said, my arms wrapped around Georgia. “The heights. Then repeat it every year.”
“Good idea. Vic’s suggested ordering pizza. You in?”
Pizza was always a good idea.
It was after the kids went to bed that I finally got some alone time with Georgia. Our days were busy; we both worked full time, picked the kids up, had dinner, tried to keep them alive and then flaked out on the sofa after exchanging about a dozen words in total between us, usually something to do with the kids. Meals out could happen – we took turns in babysitting each other’s kids, having Friday or Saturday night sleepovers so someone could have a date night or a lie in, or in most cases, takeaway in front of the TV without someone shouting for their arse to be wiped, or that their sibling was hurting them, or why was the sky blue and why couldn’t it be neon pink and it wasn’t fair.
I had asked why I couldn’t watch fifteen minutes of a programme without being interrupted and that wasn’t fair, but my offspring weren’t concerned with that because their entertainment needs came first.
Always.
I’d once laughed at Killian for saying he was absolutely last in the pecking order in his house. We’d taken the piss out of him for being under the thumb of five women.
Now I understood.
So lying on the sofa, with Georgia’s head on my stomach, her hair everywhere and her eyes half closed, with no noise from anywhere because the rest of the house was asleep, was utter bliss.
Quiet.
It was underrated.
“Are you okay with your parents selling the house?” She fractured the silence. “I thought you’d have been more upset than you are.”
I thought for a moment. The whirlwind with Rose had been such that everything, including the house, was inconsequential and I hadn’t been absorbing it like I might’ve done.
“It’s been strange being back there the last few days.” It’d felt like a dream, a really odd dream.
“Good strange or bad strange?” She reached up to take my hand and threaded her fingers through mine
“ Strange strange. It isn’t good or bad. There’ve been so few times when we’ve all been there together in the last few years. When we’ve been together it’s been in Oxford and that’s been really good. I love the house and it was where me and Payts were born so it’s always going to be special. But it doesn’t feel like it used to.” I knew I was making hardly any sense and blamed it on my children.
“It doesn’t feel like home anymore?”
I squeezed her hand. “No. It feels like a place we made memories, and it’s been good revisiting those memories. But we don’t really make them there anymore.”
“It’s time to go forward?”
“Yes. I like how we go to Max’s house and Claire’s and everyone else’s. It feels like we’re not reliant on our parents to make us all like each other anymore.”
“You’ve always liked each other. From what I’ve seen.” She turned over onto her front and slid further up my body.
I rested my hands on her back, feeling her warmth surround me. “We did, but when we were in our twenties we didn’t hang out like we do now. Payts was in Manchester, Ava and Jackson were in New York a lot, Callum was travelling everywhere. Mum and Dad were the ones who co-ordinated getting us together whereas now, we’ve all landed nearby so we see each other all the time. Maybe too much.” I’d wound Max up this morning, supergluing a pen to his desk, right in the middle of where he usually had his notepad.
I’d found it the funniest thing ever. He’d spent most of the day plotting how to end my days and getting grumpier and grumpier, until he’d stropped off home to grab some stuff that would remove it that I’d had all the time.
“Maybe too much. You all interfere in each other’s lives maybe more than what’s healthy, but sometimes that’s good. Everyone’s been amazing about Rose.” Her hands pushed underneath my T-shirt.
I was hopeful about where this was going.
“They’ve actually managed to be subtle with her and not make a big deal.” Which hadn’t surprised me. My siblings were annoying rather than stupid.
Georgia shook her head at me. “They’ve managed not to say anything, but she’s being spoilt rotten. Owen’s booked that author who wrote that verse novel she’s obsessed with to do a talk and signing at Cases. Claire’s taking her and Eliza for afternoon tea somewhere. Payton’s promised to take her to see Hamilton – again. There’s more. I’m just too tired to remember it.”
“So she’s milking it.” I pushed my hands under Georgia’s top, her skin smooth and soft, toying with her bra strap.
“She’s milking it. I’m not going to stop it though. I can’t believe she’s been so calm about the whole thing.” Georgia pressed a kiss to my lips, a type of kiss I recognised as she wasn’t that tired.
“She’s rational.”
“Maybe one day she’ll meet someone who she’s not going to be rational over, like I was with you.” Georgia gave me a knowing smile. “I hope she does.”
I grumbled something unintelligible, unless you were my wife and you could interpret every sound.
“You don’t mean that. You want her to have a life she loves and enjoys and sometimes that comes with a healthy dose of people, and people aren’t always straightforward.” She moved, pulling up my T-shirt, forcing me to sit up so she could yank it over my head.
I decided to do the same with her.
“True. I wouldn’t miss out on this with you.” I would choose this life with her over any other. “Even if it isn’t always easy.”
“It isn’t always easy,” she said, undoing her bra. “But some things are.”