Chapter 26
HAL
‘Please, please, please,’ I say to Betty as she chugs slightly.
We’re just nearing Vivian’s – the i-GPS reckons we’re five minutes away – but she’s sounding a bit reluctant as we climb the steep road.
I glance at the ocean to my right and it shimmers.
It’s hard to appreciate though with Betty struggling as much as she is.
I just need to make it to Vivian’s, then I’ll be able to tinker with her and get things right.
‘Come on, old girl,’ I say, patting the dashboard.
I think about Vivian’s words to me when she picked Sarah up and feel slightly sick.
I’ve always known the woman wasn’t my top fan, but hadn’t realised just how much resentment she was still carrying.
Or maybe she was just worried, I tell myself.
Maybe it was the worry talking. Sarah’s her daughter, and clearly ill.
And I was the only person there to shoulder any blame.
Finally, finally, I’m here. I bump down the little gravel driveway and see Vivian’s Audi shining in the sun, top down, sleek and expensive and perfect.
‘Don’t worry, Betty,’ I say softly, tapping the camper’s dashboard again as I turn off the engine.
‘Newer isn’t always better.’ Then realise what I’m doing and wonder if, after all, I might be getting too attached to the camper.
I hop down onto the gravel and look around. The house is gorgeous – its enormous windows spotlessly clean, perfectly pointed stonework, hanging baskets green and lush, somehow defying the beating sun’s attempt to dry them out.
So this is where Vivian’s been spending her widowhood, I think. And honestly, I can’t blame her. As I walk towards the front door carrying my rucksack, I can hear a splash from the pool out back and my whole body has to resist the urge to simply run there, strip off and dive into the cool water.
I’m just reminding myself that I already have ground to make up with Vivian, and appearing in her back garden in my underwear before even saying hello is probably not going to get me into her good graces, when there’s a flurry of activity.
A tiny thing moves at rocket speed and with a growl, fastens its teeth to my trouser leg.
I’m normally a dog person. And I’m always sure that dogs can sense that.
They usually come up to me for a pat or belly rub within moments of meeting me.
But this trip, something has shifted. First Princesse, and now this little rat-like thing.
I shake my leg, trying to loosen the dog’s pincer-like grip.
‘Peaches!’ comes a voice and there’s Vivian, looking on in horror as I appear to kick out at her dog.
The dog lets out a whimper and rushes to its owner’s ankles, peering from behind them like a shy toddler.
‘Oh. It’s you,’ Vivian says, rather coldly. ‘You got here then?’
‘Yes. Hello.’
‘Your van’s fixed?’
I open my mouth to explain the cooling system, the fact that I’ll need to find a local mechanic. But then decide against it. ‘Yes,’ I say. ‘All fixed.’
‘Well, good.’ She turns, leading me into the house. ‘I’ll show you your room.’
‘I don’t suppose I could get a drink of water first?’ I ask, sounding more like a prisoner than a guest.
She nods. ‘Kitchen, then,’ she says. ‘Come along, Peaches.’
Peaches trots at her heel, stealing the odd glance back at me. Soon we’re in a beautiful kitchen – all polished wood and tile, and Vivian is filling a large glass from a dispenser on her fridge. ‘Ice?’ she asks.
‘No, thanks.’
She passes me the tall glass and the moment the cool water reaches my lips I gulp greedily, feeling it move around my body’s own cooling system and realising just how dehydrated I’d become in the roadside heat.
Vivian’s watching me as I set the glass down on its coaster. She opens her mouth and I assume she’s about to direct me to my room. But something in me wants to clear the air. There’s a wedding tomorrow, and the last thing Louis and Summer need is an atmosphere of animosity.
‘Listen, Vivian, I really am sorry about… you know. Letting Sarah down.’
She studies my face for a moment, then gives a brief nod. ‘Good,’ she says.
The word makes a little anger flare inside of me, but I push it back down. Let her have the upper hand. Because this isn’t just about me. I’m not here to argue; I’m here for my son. For Sarah. And if we can get along it’s for the best.
‘I should have driven straight here,’ I add.
Her brow furrows. ‘Oh!’ she says.
‘What?’
‘Oh, nothing…’
‘No, what?’
She sighs, leans on the counter, her face closer to mine than I might have chosen. ‘I assumed you were apologising for letting Sarah down back in the day. Not in the past week,’ she says. ‘I must admit I was a bit surprised that you’d come to your senses after all this time.’
‘Back in the day?’
‘Well, yes. When you knocked up my daughter then disappeared to live your life. Leaving her to struggle,’ she says and it’s so matter-of-fact that I wonder for a moment whether that’s what I actually did.
But no. I stuck around. I supported Sarah.
Financially and emotionally, as much as I was capable.
Didn’t I? ‘I didn’t knock Sarah up,’ I say, and she shoots me a confused glance.
‘I mean, yes, we did get pregnant’ – she snorts at the ‘we’, but I carry on – ‘but it wasn’t… you know, thoughtless like that.’
‘Yes, well,’ she says, flapping a hand as if it’s not important, when it clearly is still very much to her. And to me, actually.
‘Vivian, I was a kid. We were kids. I did my best, I thought… I—’
‘You left her!’ she says, her voice sharper, the volume repressed so it comes out as more of a hiss.
‘I didn’t! I tried… I was there for the birth. I helped with Louis. It’s not as if I abandoned her.’
She shrugs as if again, this weren’t important. ‘Well, whatever you did or didn’t do, the impact was the same,’ she says. ‘Sarah’s life was ruined and yours carried on just as it would have otherwise.’
I open my mouth.
‘Oh yes, I know you paid,’ she tells me, as if giving money was incidental. ‘Took Louis to the park. But Sarah put her life on hold. Because of you. Her life was ruined because of you!’
‘Sarah’s life wasn’t ruined!’
Vivian huffs. ‘She had so much potential.’
‘Vivian, I’m not sure where this is coming from. And yes, maybe I could have done more. I… it was a long time ago. I was still a kid. And I realise that’s not an excuse. But it’s a reason. I was a kid. Sarah was a kid. And if the same situation happened now, things would be very different.’
‘I dare say,’ she sniffs with a dismissive flick of her hand.
‘I loved your daughter. Love her.’ I do, I realise. And wonder for a second whether I ever stopped. But now is not the time for introspection. ‘And I’m sure that having a baby made her life difficult back then. But how can you act as if she hasn’t achieved her full potential?’
‘It’s only a miracle she managed to drag herself back on track. And everything has been twice as hard for her as it would have been otherwise.’
I look at Vivian, at her perfect hair and make-up, her neat clothing. Her beautiful kitchen. None of it seems to match the resentful, creased expression on her face.
‘Maybe it wasn’t ideal—’
‘Not ideal?’ she barks. ‘How do you think it made me feel, made her father feel, to watch her struggle?’
‘What about Sarah? What about how she felt?’ I snap.
‘You should have married her,’ she says. ‘You should have stuck by her.’
‘Married her? We were teenagers! It didn’t occur to me. And come on, Vivian, do you really think you’d have supported that decision if we’d made it? Really? Because I probably would have, if I’d even thought it was possible. I’d have done anything for Sarah. Anything.’
She shrugs, unconvinced.
‘In all honesty, it was you who drove a wedge between us. All those times when I’d turn up and you wouldn’t let me in because Louis was sleeping, or Sarah was resting.
I was only a kid and I was… back then, I was terrified of you.
’ I don’t add that I am still pretty scared.
Vivian is a formidable woman, one who makes me shrink into myself.
‘I would have supported a wedding, because it would have been the right thing to do,’ she insists. ‘Children should be born into a loving family unit.’
And suddenly something inside me drops. ‘Is that what you said to Louis?’ I ask. ‘Did you tell him he had to get married because Summer is pregnant?’
She looks shifty. ‘I may have advised him—’
‘Vivian!’
‘That boy,’ she says, ‘is nothing like his father. He wants to marry Summer. He wants to be a present dad. He’s owned up to his mistake and he’s standing by her. Just as a man should. He’s not going to ruin his girlfriend’s life then swan off into the distance.’
I can feel sweat beading on my palms and clench my fists slightly at my sides. ‘Well, I’m sorry that you have such a low opinion of me. But I really don’t think I’m the monster you’re painting me as.’
‘Perhaps not.’ She looks at me; her brow softens slightly.
‘Fine. I know you were a nice boy. I dare say you’re a nice man now.
But it doesn’t change the fact that your actions sent Sarah’s life off the rails.
And when it came to picking up the pieces, stepping up, you were nowhere to be found.
You took your place at university even when Sarah had to defer hers.
You graduated with a first and Sarah was juggling her studies, getting average grades.
Like it or not, if Sarah hadn’t been a young mother, she would have been at a top university.
She would have got a first! She would have been snapped up by a top London law firm immediately.
It may not have been your intention that her life should become less than it could have been, but it was your fault. ’
‘Vivian, we were teenagers. Wouldn’t you like to go back and change some of the things you did and said at that age?’
She harrumphs but doesn’t reply.
‘And I don’t understand why you keep saying Sarah’s life was ruined.
Or acting as if Sarah is such a disappointment to you.
You don’t seem to see her for what she is!
Sarah’s not a child any more. And yes, perhaps her education was interrupted for a while.
But look at her now! Sarah is a lawyer. She runs her own firm.
She has a house! She’s brought Louis up beautifully. You should be so, so proud of her.’
And I set my glass down firmly, pick up my bag and leave the kitchen, hoping I’ll be able to work out which of the guest rooms is for me.
Turning the hallway corner, I see movement. It’s Sarah, hobbling quickly into her room. And I wonder how much of the argument she has heard.