Chapter 12 #2
She walked across the street and could see Xander and Etta were busy serving a customer so she let herself into the flat and went upstairs to start unpacking some of the things she had brought over from her flat earlier that day.
She heard a thunder of feet coming up the back stairs from the shop. Etta must have seen her go in.
‘In here, sweetheart,’ Immy called from Xander’s bedroom.
Etta appeared in the doorway. ‘What’re you doing?’
‘Since I was allowed to go back to my flat, I’ve picked up a few things. I’m just unpacking them.’
‘Are you not going back home?’ Etta said, climbing up on the bed and sitting next to Immy’s bags.
‘Not yet.’
‘Because you’re still trying to find out if you love each other?’
‘Sort of. That’s one of the reasons. Also, I can’t use my electricity until someone comes over and makes sure it’s safe, so it’s better to stay here for a little bit longer.’ She paused. ‘Is that OK?’
Etta nodded. ‘I like having you here.’
‘I like being here.’
Etta picked up Immy’s make-up bag and unzipped it, peering inside.
‘Is this your make-up?’ Etta asked, reverentially as if it was the most exciting thing about her day.
‘Yes, it is.’
Immy wasn’t really a big make-up person, she loved her freckles splattered across her cheeks and nose and she had been blessed with a relatively clear complexion so she didn’t feel like she had anything to cover up.
If she went out somewhere nice she might do her eyes but, apart from a bit of face cream, she didn’t really use make-up on a daily basis.
‘Can I put some on?’
‘Why don’t I put some on for you,’ Immy said.
Etta nodded eagerly.
Immy pulled out her tub of face cream and started rubbing it in gently on Etta’s face.
‘If you decide you love each other will you live here all the time?’ Etta asked.
‘Yes.’ Immy wondered where this was going.
‘Where will you sleep?’
‘In here with your daddy. What colour eyeshadow would you like?’ Immy tried to divert Etta’s attention by offering out a large colour palette. She tended to use browns or golds but she had bought a huge palette of multiple colours last year so she could use them for her Halloween make-up.
‘Blue,’ Etta said decisively. ‘And pink and purple and green.’
‘OK, we’ll do a little bit of everything. I normally just do my eyelid,’ Immy gestured to that part of her eye. ‘But if you want I can do all the way up to your eyebrow.’
‘Yes please.’
‘OK, close your eyes.’
Etta did as she was asked and Immy started off with a little bit of green.
‘Why?’ Etta asked.
‘Why do I want you to close your eyes? Because it’s easier to see the whole of the eyelid and cover it all if the eyes are closed. I have to close one eye but keep one eye open when I do mine.’
‘No. Why will you sleep with Daddy?’
‘Oh, because I like to cuddle with him,’ Immy said, wishing Xander was here to help with age-appropriate answers to questions like this.
‘I like to cuddle with him too but he says I’m a big girl now so I have to sleep in my own room. You’re a big girl too, so why would you sleep in Daddy’s room?’
‘Because that’s what you do when two people love each other. Or trying to find out if they love each other. We… cuddle a lot. Like your mummy and daddy used to do, they shared a room.’
Immy cringed because that was probably a bad example.
‘Mummy and Daddy used to sleep in different bedrooms,’ Etta said as Immy blended the green into the blue eyeshadow. ‘I don’t think they loved each other.’
Immy definitely didn’t want to comment on that. But it was clear Etta had no basis for comparison when it came to a normal loving relationship.
‘When two people love each other, they share a bed.’
‘Me and Daddy love each other, but we don’t share a bed.’
‘You’re right, but that’s a different kind of love, you love each other because you’re family. Me and your daddy love each other because we want to spend forever with each other.’
‘So you do love each other.’
Damn it, Immy had walked straight into that one.
‘I mean, if we did decide we loved each other, we would want to spend the rest of our lives together.’
‘But I love Daddy and want to stay with him forever too.’
‘When you’re older you’ll find your own person that you want to be with always. That you will love too. And you’ll still love your daddy and see him but you’ll be living with the person you love.’
Etta shook her head and eyeshadow smudged across the side of her head. ‘No, I’m going to live with Daddy forever.’
‘Well that’s OK too. Your daddy loves you very very much, I’m sure he’d be very happy if you lived with him forever.’
‘Would you be happy?’
‘Yes, of course. I love you too.’ She grabbed a baby wipe and cleaned off the offending eyeshadow before starting to blend the eyeshadow on the other eye.
‘Where will the baby sleep if you live here?’ Etta asked
‘In here with me and your daddy.’
‘Why?’
‘Because babies need a lot of feeding in the beginning and so we will have to get up several times in the middle of the night to feed the baby and change their nappy. So it makes sense to have the baby in a cot next to the bed so we can do that.’
‘So you and Daddy and the baby will be sleeping together in here and I’ll be upstairs by myself.’
Immy’s heart broke that Etta was already worried that she would be pushed out.
‘Do you ever come into your dad’s bed for a cuddle?’ Immy asked.
‘Sometimes. But most days he is already up before I am. But sometimes I do. I like cuddling Daddy.’
‘Well, you can still do that when me and the baby are here. We can all cuddle together. But when the baby is older he or she will have their own room just like you have.’
Etta frowned. ‘Where will the baby’s room be?’
‘We will probably have to move out and get a bigger house.’ Immy bit her lip.
She obviously hadn’t discussed this with Xander and it was probably something they should have talked about before she blurted it out to Etta.
But it made sense. Xander’s tiny flat was hardly big enough to hold two children.
They would both have to sell their flats and pool their resources to buy a bigger place together.
Oh god, she was jumping way too far ahead.
It had only been a few days but Immy already had a whole future planned.
Etta opened her eyes and she looked distraught.
‘I don’t want to move house. We moved after Mummy died and I didn’t want to move then because my room had a little secret room at the back of it, where Daddy hung some fairy lights and put in some cushions and beanbags, and I would read in there and play with my toys.
My room here doesn’t have a secret room.
But now, I like my bedroom because it’s bigger and it has dinosaurs on the walls and I like the tree swing in the garden and we have hedgehogs and we feed them once a week.
There are baby hedgehogs called hoglets and they are so cute.
Who will feed the hedgehogs if we move?’
Immy cursed under her breath. She shouldn’t have said anything about moving. They should have broached the subject if and when the time came.
There was a noise behind them and she looked round to see Xander leaning against the doorframe.
He smiled at her sympathetically and then came into the room, kneeling down in front of Etta.
‘If we move, it will be a year or so down the line. It won’t happen yet.
And if we move, it will be to a house that has a secret room in your bedroom, and a big tree with room for a tree swing and a treehouse.
And if we lived a little bit nearer the countryside we might get foxes, badgers and deer in the garden as well as hedgehogs.
If we put food out the animals will come.
And we will make sure that whoever moves in here after us is left strict instructions on how to feed the hedgehogs. ’
‘No milk,’ Etta said, tearfully.
‘No milk as that makes them poorly and we’ll make sure the new owners know that.’
She sniffed. ‘I’ve always wanted a treehouse.’
‘We’ll make sure you have one,’ Xander said. ‘But it won’t be for another few years yet.’
Etta nodded. ‘OK.’
‘You’re looking very pretty,’ Xander said.
‘I am?’
‘Yes, I love what Immy has done to your eyes. Shall we put some lipstick on as well?’
‘Will you wear lipstick too?’
‘Of course, do you want to pick out a colour for me,’ Xander said, without missing a beat.
Immy smiled. He was so patient and kind to Etta, always knowing exactly the right thing to say to her. He was such a wonderful dad and as she watched Etta giggle at putting lipstick on him, Immy felt another little piece of her heart fill for him.
‘I’m so sorry about the whole house-move thing,’ Immy said as she helped Xander load the dishwasher after dinner. Etta was upstairs playing in her room.
‘Please don’t apologise. You were just being practical. If we stay together, we will have to move at some point and I like that you’re thinking about our future.’
‘But I shouldn’t have said anything to Etta, not yet.
I don’t want her to feel anxious about anything.
I think she’s already worried about the baby coming and feeling pushed out and all these changes, and then I make it worse with an announcement that we’re moving house too.
It’s so early in our relationship to be thinking of stuff like that. ’
‘Did she say she’s worried?’
‘She was asking me all these questions about where I would sleep and where the baby would sleep if we did decide to be together. When I told her that the baby would be sleeping in our room to start with she was a bit sad that me, you and the baby would be in our bedroom and she’d be upstairs alone. ’
‘She actually said that?’
Immy nodded. ‘I told her that she can always come in our bed for cuddles but it’s safe to say she’s feeling a little bit insecure about the whole thing.’
Xander swore. ‘I’ll talk to her.’
‘I’m so sorry about all of this.’
He frowned. ‘Why are you sorry?’