Chapter Two
Our breaths were visible in front of us at each exhale.
Mum and I were halfway through the four-mile trek across the Chilterns.
We were wrapped up from head to toe, the cold February air making my nose cold.
The Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty had a handful of familiar walks we’d taken as a family.
With my dad as a kid and later with Graham when I was a surly teenager.
But as men came and went, Mum and I walked these routes on Saturday mornings.
It was a special place for us.
Or at least Mum’s favourite place. She loved the rolling green hills, the otters she’d manage to spot in the rivers, and bird-watching with Graham at the weekend.
I hated the outdoors but never had the heart to break it to her. I didn’t want to lose this rare connection. And I didn’t want to be lectured about my health and London’s pollution.
I chose the Chilterns, with their beautiful surroundings and uninterrupted countryside views, to break the news to my mother.
On the train over, I’d repeated the story to myself.
I was moving up north to renovate Dad’s house, whether I liked it or not.
After our chat last week, Willa had given me the rest of the week to get my shit in order.
Hand over to Clara and Kieran. By now, Willa would have revoked my access to the office.
I had no choice but to go forward with the plan.
She would have made it that way on purpose.
Her warning rang in my ears.
Don’t let your mum convince you out of it.
I knew I should tell Mum. Be bold. Brave. But I really wanted her blessing. And I didn’t want to have to beg for it.
I heaved a breath, a combination of my unfitness and my anxiety.
‘Mum –’
‘How is work?’ she asked, her tone swift and demonstrative. My confidence plummeted.
‘Good.’
‘You think you’ll stick this one out?’ she mused.
I took a sharp inhale of breath; the noise of our boots crunching on the hard ground grew loud.
‘I’ve been there four years, Mum,’ I said gently.
‘I know, but I know you can get… restless. You’ve always been restless, even as a baby.’
‘Well, I think Dr Harris explained that one.’
I’d gone for my diagnosis with Dr Harris at university after a lecturer had suggested I might have ADHD.
I came out of the examination room, Dr Harris having announced I was having twins!
She diagnosed me with dyslexia and ADHD.
I remembered looking at the psychology report like a flash of lightning had struck me.
It all made sense. It all slotted into place.
There was a reason for the struggles: the missed appointments, constantly running late, the feeling of being bored and unmotivated.
The euphoric highs when that strike of motivation hit.
The lows, when I couldn’t move, no matter how much I wanted to – my feet stuck in sinking sand.
It all made sense, and I had a community of people who felt the same way.
Despite that, inadequacy lingered.
Mum scoffed. ‘I’m still not sure she was a real doctor. They say that some of these places aren’t proper clinics. They sign whatever paper you want them to.’
I closed my eyes.
‘You know, they didn’t have these labels when I was a kid. Now everyone has some problem –’
‘Mum,’ I warned, ‘let’s not get into it.’
I’d had this argument with her a million times and I was so tired. Tired of justifying my diagnosis.
‘Katherine,’ she continued, ignoring my pleas, ‘you were a bright child. Sure, you had some… organisational challenges. But you were bright, clever. You just didn’t apply yourself.’
Anxiety rose like bile in my throat. My eyes and nose stung with tears.
‘Mum, can we please change the subject?’ I asked as calmly as I could.
She relented, and we walked in silence for a few moments. We passed a couple hiking back down the hill. Mum and I gave them a courteous nod. I looked up at the clear blue sky, trying to calm my nervous system, which had gone into overdrive.
‘Have you called the estate agent?’ Mum asked.
She probably thought it was a less controversial topic, which made me want to laugh.
Or cry. ‘We can do it remotely, I checked. We can send them some keys. Then, they can value it. I can’t imagine it would get more than what your father bought it for before –’ Mum gave a constipated look. ‘You know.’
Before he died was what she meant, but she couldn’t say it.
‘You know’ was the extent of the conversation we’d had about Dad’s death since the funeral.
While I empathised that some people felt icky about death, it wasn’t enough for me.
I wanted to talk about him. I needed to.
I craved to say how I was feeling. I wanted to claw at my skin and scream into the sky.
But Mum shut down every attempt I’d made to talk about him, and she was one of the few people who knew Dad.
Graham rarely met him. My friends had never met him.
Mum was the only person who could relate to how I felt, but she was content to shove it all under the carpet.
‘I haven’t yet, no –’
‘Oh, come on, Katherine. You need to move quicker than this. It could take forever to sell that house. Not all housing markets are like the one in London. I imagine it’s a lot slower in the Northwest.’
‘Actually, from my research, they are having a bit of a boom at the moment.’
She raised an eyebrow. ‘You have time to research the housing market in Manchester but no time to call an estate agent?’
‘Well –’ I took a breath, wondering if she’d interrupt me again. But she didn’t. ‘The reason I did some research was because I did call the estate agent.’
My mum’s eyes lit up. ‘Oh, fabulous. Why didn’t you say that?’
‘Well, I had an interesting conversation with a chap called John. And he said that because of the market right now, that I could get a lot more for it, if I did it up a bit. You know, a lick of paint. A new bathroom and kitchen, perhaps.’ I added the last sentence with such airy grace that I was worried I would fly away.
Mum’s face contorted into confusion. Then repulsion.
‘How would you renovate a house two hundred miles away? It would be hell. It’s the kind of thing you need to be there for, making sure everything runs smoothly.’
‘Yes. Exactly. I was thinking that perhaps, maybe, I could move up temporarily to oversee the renovation.’ I winced, waiting for the onslaught.
Mum gave a peel of laughter, like it was the most ridiculous thing she’d ever heard. She glanced over at me, and her face dropped.
‘You can’t be serious.’ She sighed like she was tired, and not because of the gradual incline of the slope we were walking up. ‘Katherine, don’t be ridiculous. Renovate the house, for what? A few more thousand pounds? I can’t imagine you’d get much more back –’
‘Well, John said it could be up to seventy thousand pounds more.’ My words came fast now, desperate to escape. ‘And that would get me a flat in a more central location. A bit more central. Not somewhere on the outskirts of Reading –’
‘And what is wrong with Reading? There are plenty of houses you could buy here, I’m sure.’
My mum was oblivious. She seemed to think that houses were growing on trees.
We were living through a very real housing crisis.
And I’d looked at houses in Reading; they were as expensive and competitive to buy as in London.
Regardless of whether I picked a small flat in London or a little house in Reading, I needed as much cash as possible to buy.
‘It would take me two months –’
‘Two months?’ she squeaked. ‘And leave your job?’ She said it like my job was the be-all and end-all of my life.
Like it was my reason for living. And it really wasn’t.
I was grateful to have a job that allowed me to hang out with Willa every day and rent a room in London, but I’d always felt I was missing something.
Some greater calling.
‘Ah, I see,’ Mum said knowingly. ‘This is another one of your schemes. What was the last one? Calligraphy for weddings, wasn’t it?’
A lump in my throat formed. A shroud of shame hovered over me.
‘And the one before that – scented candle making. I think you sold a few of those.’
I’d sold ten before I lost interest and shut down my Etsy storefront.
‘And then, you were convinced childcare was your calling. And you wanted to become a nanny.’ Mum smiled like none of this was hurtful. Like she hadn’t pinpointed the biggest insecurity I had about myself – I had no follow-through. I was flighty. I’d never amount to anything.
‘But, Katherine,’ she continued, ‘this is a lot more than a hobby or what do young people call it – a side quest?’
‘A side hustle,’ I added quietly.
‘This would be spending thousands of pounds on a house. A house that might not make it back. It’s too big a gamble to take.
Would you pay for all the work or do it yourself?
Because if it’s the latter’ – she huffed – ‘well, I dread to think what could happen. You could hammer through a wall and fuse the whole house, for Christ’s sake, and then pay for a whole rewire. Would you have a job to return to?’
I didn’t mention that Willa had given me the time off. Unpaid. She would probably throw herself down the hill we were currently climbing. I stared at my boots with every stride, lost for words. Mum, however, was not lost for words.
‘You would hate Everly Heath. I doubt they have any of that Deliverloo you love so much. You would be bored, Katherine. Let me tell you, people are cliquey around there. They keep to themselves and look after their own. I wouldn’t count on your aunt and uncle helping out. You have to think, Katherine…’
The lecture continued for another two miles as my mum made her case against renovating Dad’s house. I didn’t mention any of my emotional attachment to the place. It was pointless. She wouldn’t understand. She would say the man had never played a significant role in my life.
Mum didn’t notice a few tears escaping down my cheeks as we finished the walk and climbed into her car to drive home.
I didn’t tell her I had already packed my suitcases. I didn’t tell her I was catching the train to Manchester in the morning. And I didn’t tell her that I was clinging to hold myself together long enough so I could be put back together again.