Chapter 36
ANOTHER brILLIANT PERFORMANCE
This was not going brilliantly.
It had started well enough. Maureen had warmed up Zane’s plate of food and had fixed Skylar one of her own, then had sat down at the table again, presumably curious to learn what this was all about.
Which was fine, Skylar thought, as Maureen would need to know about Georgia’s classroom change.
Meanwhile, Zane had gone to fetch Georgia, who’d come skipping out happily and sat right beside him, as snuggled up as it was possible to get in two dining-room chairs.
It was also pretty bloody wonderful to eat food somebody else had cooked. Her granddad wasn’t doing much cooking at her house now, for obvious reasons, and Skylar missed it. She’d already taken her first bite of lamb and potato when Zane plunged in.
“You’ll be moving into a different class at school tomorrow, Georgia,” he said, and Skylar nearly choked. “Ms., uh … Ms. Thompkins’ class.”
Oh, this was going to go well. Did the man have no tact?
Georgia stared at him, stricken. Her lower lip had begun to tremble, too. “But …” she began. “But I …”
“It’ll be good,” Zane said. “Same class as George. Same school, too, of course.” And began to eat his lamb.
Georgia said, her eyes welling, “But I love Ms. Fairburn! And it’s my week to feed the rats! And I got a sticker today and got in the Tui reading group! I can’t change teachers, Daddy. I can’t!” She was crying now, great gulping sobs. “And I won’t have m-my desk,” she got out. “Or anything!”
“No,” Zane said, somewhat desperately. “It’ll be good. You’ll see.”
“It won’t be!” Georgia cried. “It won’t!”
Duncan and Scarlett appeared, drawn by the emotional eruption. “What’s happening?” Scarlett asked. “What’s wrong with Georgia? Is it the earthquake? You should probably get us therapy, Dad. Well, not me, because I’m fine, but the little kids probably need it.”
“I don’t,” Duncan said. “Whatever that is. I’m fine, too, and I’m not a little kid.”
“You are,” Scarlett said, “because you don’t even know what it is. It’s therapy. Where you talk to a counselor about traumatic events in your life, and they help you move past them so you don’t have nightmares or wet the bed or anything.”
“I don’t wet the bed,” Duncan said. “I’ve never wet the bed. I don’t have nightmares, either.”
“You probably just don’t realize you have trauma,” Scarlett said loftily.
“Little kids usually don’t realize. We were talking about it in school today, and my Social Sciences teacher said it’s normal to feel disoriented after an experience like that.
She was really interested that we were in the earthquake, and that Skylar rescued people.
She said that Skylar’s kids might need help with their mental health, because their parental structure had been threatened, especially since they don’t have a dad.
And that it was hard for kids to make sense of events like that in general.
I said that my dad had rescued people, too, and she said that maybe we’d need help as well, except that I said I didn’t. Obviously.”
Georgia didn’t say anything during all of that. She was still sobbing, a picture of misery, her tears dripping onto the tablecloth.
“I don’t have trauma!” Duncan’s voice was rising now. “And I’m not a little kid! I’m eight. I—”
“Stop.” Zane’s voice cut through the tumult. “If anybody needs therapy, I’ll know it, and I’ll get it for them.”
“You probably won’t, though,” Scarlett said. “You aren’t very good at tuning into our emotional needs. Especially mine, as I’m becoming a young woman. You don’t know much about girls.”
Part of Skylar longed to jump in, but they weren’t her kids, were they?
And, what? She was going to begin this whatever-it-was—Romance?
Relationship?—by shoehorning herself into the middle of Zane’s relationship with his children, as if only she knew best?
She knew teachers like that, but she wasn’t one of them. She’d taken care not to be.
On the other hand, Zane really was stuffing this up.
He said, “Never mind. Not what we’re discussing. Georgia’s going to move classes at school tomorrow, and she’s not happy about it. That’s what we’re discussing, not anybody’s trauma. Though if you have trauma, of course, tell me,” he added belatedly.
“But I can’t!” Georgia wailed. She was a mess now, weeping all over the shop, looking so small and forlorn all the way down there in her chair. Skylar stared at Zane. He must have felt her laser focus, because he looked at her and said, “What?”
She gestured to Georgia. “What?” he asked again. “I’m talking to her about it. D’you have something to say? Say it, then.” Looking beleaguered and confused, the way he never did, and half of her wanted to laugh.
“Your lap,” she hissed. “Hold her in your lap.”
“Oh. Why didn’t you say so?” He picked Georgia up bodily, plopped her onto his lap, and said, “I’m talking to you, but I’m also eating my tea, because I have to leave soon.”
Which brought some fresh tears. “I don’t w-want you to leave, though, Daddy! You’re going to leave, and I have to go to a new class where they don’t have rats, or a chart for me to get a sticker, or—”
Zane looked at Skylar, and she read that look.
Help. Not that she could’ve held back much longer anyway, no matter how many reminders she gave herself.
“Ms. Thompkins does have a chart with stickers,” she said.
“I know, because George is in her class. You could ask whether you could sit next to him. He’d like that too. ”
“I want to stay in your class, though,” Georgia said pitifully. “Where I know people. Where there are rats.”
“Ms. Thompkins has guinea pigs,” Skylar said, “and they’re lovely. So soft and silky, and they’re very sweet. And you can come to my room after school as often as you like and talk to the rats.”
“I—can?” More sniffling, but she was listening, at least. “I don’t know about guinea pigs, though.”
“Oh, you’ll enjoy them so much,” Skylar said.
“They make a squeaking noise to tell you that they want a snack, and a grunting sort of sound to say that they’re happy, and all sorts of other noises, too.
They complain, and they purr, and they tell each other if they’re lost or lonely. They’re very comical, you’ll see.”
“But why do I have to change from your class?” Georgia said. “Don’t you like me anymore?”
More tears welling up at that, and Scarlett moved to sit beside her dad and put her arm around Georgia. She also glared at Skylar and said, “Yeh. Why does she have to change? Did you decide that, or Dad?”
Zane said, “I decided it. And watch your tone.”
“Well, I’m sorry,” Scarlett said. “I was just asking, because she’s my sister.”
Duncan said, “Dad probably didn’t decide. Schools do all sorts of mad things. Like when you’re in P.E. class and instead of playing cricket, they’re making you talk about weird stuff.”
“What weird stuff?” Zane asked. He was still eating his dinner. A focused man.
“You know,” Duncan said vaguely. “Weird stuff. Not as much in my year, but in Year Seven, they do. I know, because I heard.”
“What?” Zane said, totally blank.
Scarlett sighed. “Excuse me? Puberty? Alcohol? Consent? Hello? But you didn’t answer me. Why does Georgia have to switch classes? I don’t think it’s because Ms. Fairburn doesn’t like you, Georgia. She was just teaching you how to dive about five days ago!”
“Of course that’s not why,” Skylar said. “I like you very much, Georgia. But you see, I have a … a personal relationship with you now. With all three of you, but you’re the only one in my class.”
“Except Scarlett was,” Georgia said, still sniffling, but looking slightly less devastated.
“Yes, she was,” Skylar agreed. “But imagine how you’d feel if I had a pupil in my class who got to see me every day. Maybe somebody I even sometimes told bedtime stories to, and tucked in at night, and made breakfast for, and …”
“And kissed on the head,” Duncan said. “You like to kiss kids on the head, but you probably don’t do that in school. Teachers don’t kiss pupils on the head.”
“Exactly,” Skylar said. “Wouldn’t that make you feel sad, Georgia, to know that another pupil could get cuddles from me anytime, even after school, but you couldn’t?”
“I guess,” Georgia said. “Except that I want to be the one who does.”
“But that wouldn’t be fair,” Skylar said. “Not if you were in my class. This way, though, I can give you cuddles and sit next to you at your dad’s rugby match, because you won’t be in my class and it won’t be unfair to anybody else. And you and George can hold guinea pigs together.”
“And you could do my reading with me at night,” Georgia said.
“She could if she was here,” Scarlett said. “That was just in Wellington, though. She’s not going to be here.”
“She’s here now,” Duncan pointed out.
“Yes, because she wanted to talk to Dad. Obviously.”
“Well,” Duncan said, “that—”
“Yeh,” Zane said. “She’ll be here more, and you lot will probably be at her house more, too, because the two of us are going out. Dating. In a relationship.”
“Having sex, you mean,” Scarlett said.
“Pardon?” Zane’s tone was icy, and Skylar wouldn’t have wanted to be on the other side of that stare.
“Well, obviously,” Scarlett said, though she wasn’t sounding quite as confident. “Nan and Mr. Bulstrode sleep in the same bed. They probably don’t have sex, because they’re really old, but you told us you do have sex, so if you’re going out with Ms. Fairburn—”
“That’s none of your business,” Zane said.
“Excuse me,” she said. “We live here? You’re our dad?”
“It’s still—” he started, then didn’t seem to know how to go on.
“First,” Skylar said, “it’s probably better if you start calling me ‘Skylar,’ since I won’t be Georgia’s teacher anymore.
You see how much more comfortable that is?
And my kids will start calling your dad ‘Zane.’” You weren’t meant to introduce your kids to the new love interest, but they could hardly help it, could they?
“And second, people’s sex lives are private.
If they decide to have sex, it’s not something they talk about. ”
“It’s something boys talk about,” Duncan said.
“Yes, I don’t think that’s very realistic,” Scarlett said. “Because girls talk about sex too. And Dad wouldn’t say it was so extremely private if it was me doing it.”
“Too right I wouldn’t,” Zane said. “But it’s not you doing it. It’s not a subject adults discuss with kids, full stop. Except if you have questions, of course,” he must have decided he needed to add.
“You just said we couldn’t ask you questions, though,” Duncan said.
“I meant about your, uh, sexuality,” he said.
“Yeh,” Scarlett said. “Like that’s happening. I’m asking my dad questions about my sexuality? Puh-leeze.”
“Oh, I dunno,” Zane said. “You could do. If, for example, you wanted to know what boys think about something, or what they’re expecting when they ask a girl out.”
“Ick.” Scarlett put her hands over her ears. “Ick ick ick. No.”
The corner of his mouth twitched. “The offer’s there, anyway.”
“I don’t know what sex is, though,” Georgia said. “So I won’t know what to ask you, Daddy.”
Duncan sighed and put a hand to his forehead, and this time, Zane laughed.
“Never mind,” he told his younger daughter.
“Heaps of time for that.” He ate the last bite of lamb and pushed the plate away.
“Good tucker, Nan. And I’ve got to leave for the hotel in about ten minutes, so …
” He gave Georgia another kiss and cuddle.
“George is a good wee man, and I reckon his mum will tell him to look after you in class until you’re comfortable.
And I’ll see you Sunday, eh, and you can tell me all about guinea pigs and their noises and so forth. ”
“Yes,” she said. “I’m still sad about not being in Ms. Fairburn’s class, but I’m not as sad, not if I get cuddles and can come see her after school.”
“You’re supposed to call her ‘Skylar,’ Scarlett said.
“I forgot,” Georgia said.
“We’ll work our way into it,” Skylar said. “And now I need to get home to my kids, so they can practice calling your dad ‘Zane.’”
“Yeh,” Zane said, “you do that.” He stood up, kissed both his kids—Duncan allowed it tonight, which meant Zane probably had at least a few months left before he got, ‘Dad. I’m eight?”—kissed his grandmother, and told Skylar, “Walk me out, will you?”
Zane walked out the door, dropped his duffel, leaned against the wall of the house under the overhang as the rain dripped beyond it, and blew out a breath. “Another brilliant performance. Lucky I’m going to be playing a test match soon. I need to do something easier.”
Skylar, of course, was laughing. Laughing, leaning into him, pulling his head down, and kissing his mouth. While laughing. “I thought you were very masterful,” she said, so clearly lying, he had to laugh. And pull her in closer to kiss her better, of course.
“Well, no,” he said, “you didn’t. But you pulled my chestnuts out of the fire. Cheers for that. I was in dangerous waters there. Scarlett.” He shook his head, and Skylar laughed some more. “Who’d be a dad, eh,” he said, and grinned.
“You would.” She kissed him again, held his face, and smiled up at him.
“And you are a wonderful, blundering, perfectly adorable dad. Who I can’t wait to see play some rugby, now that I know I get to kiss you afterwards.
I’m sorry to say it, but if you lead the haka again, I might actually be down for some of that sexual novelty. Such is my unevolved nature.”
“Hotel,” he said.
“Never tell me you can bring girls to your hotel,” she said. “Oh, wait. What’s your pattern again? You meet them in a bar and go home with them. Alas, my house has three kids in it. And a cat. And the occasional granddad.”
“Yes,” he said. “Which is the reason for the hotel. The different hotel.”
“Is this what’s known as a booty call?” she asked. “I’ve never done a booty call.”
“Reckon it is,” he said. “It’s also a chance to sleep with you. And possibly even talk to you. Who knows?”
“Well,” she said, “how can a woman resist an invitation to an intellectual soiree like that?” And kissed him again.
So that was good.