Chapter 12 #3
‘You don’t know him, not really.’ Meg called through the closed door. ‘Do you even know where he lives, or what he does?’
Meg was waiting for her when she emerged. Chrissie stood out of the way of one of the flatmates whose name she couldn’t actually remember. In a dressing gown and given the stale smell, she was pretty sure he’d been in bed all day.
In the kitchen she found a tumbler from Meg’s cupboard and filled it with water.
‘His name is Anthony.’ She shuddered. The water tasted funny, but Chrissie suspected it was the tumbler that was the problem.
She rewashed it using her fingers to swish the dishwashing liquid rather than the dishcloth, which looked like an environmental hazard. ‘He’s in the RAF.’
It turned out that sharing that little nugget of information was far worse than telling her sister it could be love at first sight.
Meg went off. ‘What the hell? They’re all shagging around, Chrissie. Don’t you think he’s got a girl in every town or city he goes to? And if you get serious, you’ll follow him, you’ll never have a life of your own!’
‘Dad didn’t shag around.’
‘That you know of,’ said Meg.
‘How could you say that?’
Meg backed off. ‘All right, that was mean of me. No, I don’t think Dad ever did.’ But the peace didn’t last. ‘At least you’re on holiday, that’s all I can say.’
‘What’s that supposed to mean?’
‘Well, it’s not like you’re marrying the guy. Thank God.’
And right from that moment Meg’s disapproval had been sown like a seed that continued to grow. No matter how ugly the plant became, it never wilted, never went away. Her condemnation was there, even at the wedding.
Chrissie couldn’t wait to leave Meg that weekend, but she was sorry to leave Anthony.
She told her parents all about him when she got home.
They were a lot more positive than her sister had been.
They wanted to meet this chap, that’s what her dad said, but when he suggested he and her mum go over to surprise Meg and meet Chrissie’s new beau, Chrissie had to tell the truth about her sister and the way she was living.
Her dad had been ready to fly to London that night and bring Meg home, but her mum had pointed out that Meg wouldn’t listen, that it might even stir things up all the more.
It turned out that Meg managed to do that all by herself when seven months later Chrissie and Anthony got married.
Anthony had always said the door was open to Meg if she came forward and apologised for what had happened at the wedding, but Chrissie was too angry for that to ever happen.
And when Sarah came along, she never wanted her sister involved with her daughter.
She wanted to protect Sarah from the hurt she’d felt herself.
Chrissie had only felt ready to give her sister a chance on the day of Anthony’s funeral.
It was the first time she’d seen Meg in years, and she’d felt a sudden desperate longing to reconnect and find the closeness they’d once had.
At the wake when she couldn’t see Meg inside the house, Chrissie had gone outside to find her sister.
She was going to suggest they put the past behind them and try to find a way forwards, and she found her, all right.
She was in a car with Heath, Anthony’s good friend and the best man at their wedding.
Meg was on his lap in the passenger seat, and Chrissie didn’t need to get any closer to know what they were doing.
When Meg eventually came inside the house she’d tried to talk to Chrissie.
On her breath was alcohol and cigarettes, and the hiccup gave away that she’d had more than a calming nip of whisky.
Chrissie was angry, upset, devastated. Hooking up outside the house where a wake was taking place was disrespectful, it was cruel, and so was staggering around inside the house because you’d had a skinful.
That had been it for Chrissie. From that moment, she’d accepted that Meg was never going to change.
Chrissie put a stop to any conversation about her sister if her parents tried to raise the subject, and she stumbled on as best she could as a single parent.
Everything became about what was best for Sarah.
Chrissie read whatever she could about single parenting, and parenting when your child had lost a parent.
She joined a group for single mothers with teenagers.
She took on the job of protecting Sarah from any more hurt as seriously as if she were studying for a diploma rather than for what it really was: being with like-minded people who understood what you were going through.
Chrissie tried to be perfect. She tried to never let Sarah want for anything.
She never wanted her daughter to suffer again.
At the house now she was officially on leave, Chrissie was curled up on the sofa, staring at the lights on the Christmas tree. The only sound that interrupted the eerie quiet of her home was Tessa’s gentle snores beside her.
And she’d never felt so alone.