23. Katie
Katie stood shivering in the cold playground.
She couldn’t stop thinking about the fact that Melanie and Frank hadn’t had sex in more than two years.
She’d always had a huge soft spot for Frank and she had grown very fond of Melanie – in as much as Melanie would allow you to get close.
When she’d first met Melanie, she’d found her a bit intimidating.
Melanie was a bookish intellectual and Katie worried she’d suss that Katie was as thick as a plank and couldn’t spell properly.
But Melanie had only ever been nice to her – distracted and work-obsessed but nice.
Katie wanted Melanie and Frank to get back on track.
What if they broke up? God only knew who Frank would end up with.
The agency needed Melanie. Jamie needed Melanie.
The whole family needed Melanie – she was the one keeping the agency afloat, these days.
Nancy’s writers were getting old and not so successful any more.
Jamie said Melanie was the backbone of the agency now.
Katie had royally messed up with Nancy, but here was a chance to do some good for everyone by fixing Melanie and Frank.
She was due to go to a gig with Frank that evening.
She’d talk to him then. How was she going to bring the conversation around to sex, though?
She’d figure something out. She couldn’t imagine not having sex with Jamie.
She was still mad about him and the sex was great.
She’d noticed that Amanda had fudged her answer to the question: granted she was living with her mother-in-law, but was she having sex with Ross?
They were hard to read. They’d always been so striking – both tall and fit and good-looking.
When they entered a room, they did so very confidently, the way good-looking couples do, as if to say, ‘Okay, everybody, we’re here now.
’ But that cool self-assuredness had dimmed lately.
‘ Muuuuuummy! ’ Toby pulled at her skirt.
Who the hell had invented swings? The playground was supposed to be a place where kids could entertain themselves with slides and roundabouts, but then some bright spark had decided to invent something that parents had to get involved in.
Katie had been smacked in the face twice by a swing and it was bloody sore.
‘Mum, Toby needs you,’ Lucy said, from behind her book.
She was wearing her mother’s coat because she wanted to finish the new book ‘Granny gave me’ and had refused to run around to keep warm.
Katie felt she couldn’t deny Lucy anything after the poisonous-bitch fiasco, so she was now coatless, freezing and mind-numbingly bored.
They should put bar-carts in playgrounds, she thought grumpily.
A little glass of mulled wine would take the edge off this torture.
She pushed Toby on the swing until he told her he felt sick. Katie pulled the swing to a stop and went to help him down. That was when he projectile-vomited the ice cream he had insisted on getting earlier.
For goodness’ sake, it was all over her new trainers.
‘Oh, Toby! Are you okay?’ she asked.
‘He obviously is not. He just vomited all over your shoes.’
Katie took a deep breath. ‘Thank you, Lucy, I can see that. Toby, stay here with your sister and do not move. I’ll go and get some water and napkins from the coffee shop.’
Katie cut across the park and as she passed a bicycle shed she heard a familiar voice.
‘About time. I’m freezing my balls off here. Have you got it?’
It was Theo’s unmistakable posh accent. Katie stuck her head into the shed. What the …
Theo was handing money to a kid on an electric scooter and receiving what looked suspiciously like a small bag of cocaine in return.
A lot of the young stylists in the salon did coke on the weekends.
Katie was used to seeing teenagers on scooters delivering bags to the salon on Friday evenings.
She did not approve. Alcohol was fine, but drugs – no way.
‘Theo!’ She marched towards him. Her nephew almost jumped out of his skin. The teenager selling the drugs hopped onto his scooter and fled.
In his shock, Theo dropped the bag. Katie reached down and picked it up. Waving it in front of his face, she asked, ‘Theo, what are you doing?’
He regained his usual don’t-care attitude and shrugged. ‘It’s no big deal, just a bit of fun – helps take the edge off.’
Katie knew all about taking the edge off, but not this.
‘Have a beer to take the edge off. Don’t snort this crap up your nose.
Come on, you’re too smart for this. A lovely young man like you doesn’t want to get caught up in it.
What if I’d been the police? Imagine what your dad would say. Or Nancy.’
Theo looked up. ‘I don’t give a shit what my dad or Nancy thinks.’
A man after my own heart, Katie thought. ‘Okay, your mum, then. She’d be devastated.’
Theo looked a bit sheepish. ‘Don’t tell Mum, please. I got kicked out of my last school because of coke and I swore I’d stopped. I don’t want to upset her any more than she already is. Please.’
What? Katie stared at him in disbelief. He’d been kicked out of school for doing cocaine?
So that’s why they’d moved home so suddenly.
Now it all began to make sense. No wonder Amanda looked so stressed and Ross was so uptight, although he had always been uptight, to be fair.
She suddenly saw their lives, their move and their current living arrangement in a whole new light.
It was tough, and Katie felt sorry for all of them.
No one wanted their kid messing around with drugs. It was every mother’s bloody nightmare.
Theo was looking at her, his eyes wide at the thought of Amanda finding out. He suddenly looked young again, not so cocksure of himself. Katie wanted to hug him and slap him at the same time – but he definitely needed a bit of tough love.
‘Well, then, what the hell are you doing, Theo? If you promised Amanda you’d stop, then bloody well stop. You’ve got a mum and dad who love you and you’ve let them and yourself down already, mate. It’s time to start behaving.’
Theo snorted. ‘That’s rich coming from someone who called an old woman a poisonous bitch.’
Katie took a deep breath. ‘Okay, fair point, but believe me, I’ve paid for that blow-out. Look, Theo, drugs are a road to nowhere. I’ve seen really talented stylists in the salon lose everything to their habit.’
Theo pulled his backpack over his shoulder. ‘I’m not an addict, Katie. I just like a bit every now and then. It’s an absolute nightmare being here. I don’t fit in and I hate it. I just wish I could go back to London.’
‘Well, maybe you should have thought about the consequences when you brought drugs into your school and got expelled and had to leave London. You have to own your mistakes, Theo.’
Theo shook his head. ‘We’re not just back here because of me. We had to move back because of Dad’s a–’
‘MUM!’ Lucy shrieked.
Katie turned to see her two children standing at the bike-shed door. Lucy looked furious and she was holding her brother’s hand tightly. ‘You said you’d be back in a minute and it’s been nine minutes. We could have been snatched by strangers, or had an accident, or been eaten by wolves.’
Katie stuffed the cocaine into her pocket. ‘I’m so sorry, sweetie. I bumped into Theo, and we were chatting.’
‘About what? Theo never speaks.’
For a nine-year-old Lucy could really cut people dead. Katie hoped she hadn’t inherited all of Nancy’s genes.
‘Theo was telling me about school and that he’s finding it a bit hard being the new boy.’
Lucy studied her cousin. ‘Oh, that is hard, especially as you’re so old. Auggie in Wonder took a while to fit in, but he did make friends in the end.’
Theo baulked. ‘Are you joking? That kid had a deformed face. Of course he didn’t fit in.’
Katie winced. Theo had no idea what he had just walked into. Auggie was Lucy’s absolute, most favourite character in the world. Katie hadn’t read the book, but she might as well have because Lucy had told her the entire story in excruciating detail.
Lucy’s face turned red. ‘Auggie is not deformed. He’s just different and he has the biggest, kindest heart, which everyone sees and then they all want to be his friend.’
‘Chill out. He’s not real, he’s a made-up character.’
‘He’s real to me!’ Lucy shouted. ‘And maybe if you were kinder, the other boys would like you.’
‘Okay, no need to bite my head off. I get nagged enough at home, thanks.’
‘Play football. Everyone likes good footballers,’ Toby wisely told him.
Katie needed to get her children out of here and home. She nodded to Theo. ‘Okay, we’ll see you soon, Theo. You’re a good kid, make good decisions.’ She gave him a light hug.
‘Any chance I could get that back?’ he asked in her ear.
‘Hell will freeze over first,’ she whispered.
Katie headed off with two cold and grumpy children while her nephew took out his phone, probably to order more drugs. Poor Amanda. Now that Katie knew why they had left London, she felt even sorrier for her. She even felt a little sorry for Ross too.
Later that night, Katie was sitting at a table with Frank listening to an up-and-coming Welsh singer-songwriter, Tiny Poole, whom everyone was comparing to Amy Winehouse. Tiny was in Dublin, doing a gig and meeting the press, so Frank had asked Katie along to see her perform.
‘Well?’ Frank asked.
‘She’s good, I mean really good, but she feels more like a Joss Stone than an Amy Winehouse.’
Frank put his drink down. ‘That’s exactly what I was thinking.’
‘We should have got married, Frank. We have so much in common. I chose the wrong brother.’ Katie winked at him. ‘Mind you, I wouldn’t change my Jamie for anything. Thank God he’s forgiven me for losing it with Nancy.’
Frank grinned. ‘You’ve had quite a week, between the outburst and the very original apology.’
Katie chuckled into her wine glass. ‘Your mum’s face!’
They cracked up.
‘Poor Mum … Underneath her hard shell is a soft person.’
Katie patted Frank’s arm. ‘Nice try, Frank, but your mother is a weapon, always was, always will be.’
‘Not true. She is a woman who has had to deal with a huge amount and has had to be strong and, yes, at times hard-hearted to survive and provide for her family.’
‘I know lots of women who’ve had tough times and it makes them more empathetic, not less.
Besides, your mum has never had any time for me.
I’m the least favourite daughter-in-law.
She always felt Jamie married down, and most of the time I let it wash over me, but that day I just cracked.
Don’t worry, I won’t do it again. It hurt Lucy and that killed me. ’
Katie finished her wine and poured another glass.
‘Don’t be hard on yourself. You’re a great mother.’
‘I’m not sure I am, but I try.’
‘You’re with your kids a lot, and that really counts. I wish so much that Melanie would spend more time with the twins – they’re growing up so fast. She’s a wonderful role model, but I’d like them to know her better.’
‘I guess she parents more by example than by being present.’
Frank sighed. ‘She just works longer and longer hours. She’s hardly ever at home, and when she is, she’s on Zoom calls or reading manuscripts. They get hardly any of her attention.’
Katie saw an opening and decided to jump in. ‘That must be hard on your relationship, too. My weekly date night with Jamie is what saves us. We look forward to it so much. How are things with you and Melanie? Could you do a date night?’
Frank laughed loudly. ‘Katie, I haven’t gone out for dinner with Melanie alone in about five years. If she is, by some miracle, free, she’s exhausted and in bed by nine.’
No sex for more than two years and no date night for five! This was bad.
‘Okay, so date nights might be hard to organize, but what about having one night where you have dinner together? Maybe run her a bubble bath after and you can hop in with her too.’
Frank looked down at his hands. ‘I don’t think Melanie would want me in the bath with her.’
Katie didn’t want to overstep with Frank, but she did want him to shake things up in the bedroom or their marriage would disintegrate. There was precious little joy in the routine of family life so it was awful to miss out on the joy of sex.
‘Maybe Melanie would like a couple bath. Maybe you just need to set the scene and make it romantic and sexy.’
‘She hates sharing baths. Even in our early days when sex was … well … active, Melanie was never a bath-for-two person.’
Katie took a gulp of wine and went for it. ‘What about porn? Sometimes Jamie and I watch porn to get us in the mood.’
Frank clapped as Tiny Poole finished her song. ‘Melanie would never watch porn. It’s just not her. But if I’m being honest, we do need to revitalize things in the bedroom. It’s got a bit …’
‘Stale?’ Katie helped him out.
‘Yep.’
‘Well, you’re into meditation and yoga and all that stuff, so what about Tantric sex? Didn’t it do wonders for Sting and his wife? Could you get a lesson or a private class or something like Sting and Trudie did? Apparently they were riding each other day and night afterwards.’
Frank leant his head to the side. ‘I never thought about that, but it’s not a bad idea. I must look into it.’
Katie knew that if Frank said he’d look into something it could be months or years before he acted on it. His marriage was on life support.
‘Get out your phone and let’s google it. I bet there are private classes you can book.’
She leant over his shoulder as he scrolled through the options. Katie was surprised there were so many. Who knew how popular Tantric sex classes were?
They found one that looked and sounded very professional.
She nudged her brother-in-law playfully, but also to get him moving on it. ‘Email them now, go on, Frank. Do it, and before you know it you and Melanie will be having marathon sex sessions and Jamie and me will be looking for tips.’
Frank shrugged. ‘I suppose I’ve nothing to lose, but I’m pretty sure Melanie will say no.’
‘She may surprise you,’ Katie said, as she tried to figure out how to persuade Melanie to go to the classes.
Maybe she could get Amanda to help her. After all, she’d been there when Melanie admitted her sex life was dead, and she was good with words.
Thinking of Amanda made her think of Theo.
Somehow she had to work out how to talk to Amanda about what was going on with her son.
Katie hadn’t the first idea how she’d handle that conversation.
Tantric sex seemed like a walk in the park compared to snorting cocaine.