Chapter 13
Chapter thirteen
Sloan let herself in as quietly as she could, which was ridiculous considering it was her own house, and because the front door still stuck sometimes unless you gave it a proper shove with your hip.
“I forgot my charger,” she called, loud enough to announce herself without sounding as though she were checking up.
Immediately from the lounge, Sloan heard Gloria’s voice shout out, “Did you? How tragic.”
Sloan shut the door and stood still for a second, listening.
No raised voices. No crash. No brittle silence thick enough to feel from the hallway, just the murmur of daytime telly, Gloria’s dry tone, and the faint clink of crockery from the kitchen.
She followed the sound, first with her eyes, then her feet, glancing into the kitchen as she passed. Matty was at the counter, sleeves shoved up, sunflower T-shirt bright under an old cardigan, cutting sandwiches into triangles with Sloan’s bread knife as though she’d been doing it for years.
Matty looked up. “Oh. Hiya.”
Sloan frowned. “What are you doing?”
“Making lunch.” Matty nodded towards the plate. “One for your mum, one for me, and now, apparently one for you.”
“I only came for my charger,” Sloan answered, suddenly feeling like a burden.
“Mm.” Matty set the knife down. “And because you definitely weren’t worrying about leaving your mother with an untrained stranger.”
Sloan opened her mouth, then shut it again.
Matty smiled. “Don’t worry, I’d have done the same.”
Sloan left her there and went into the lounge.
Gloria was in her chair, blanket over her knees, cane within reach, expression pinched but composed. She looked up as Sloan entered, suspicious as ever.
“Well?” Gloria said. “Have you come to inspect the damage?”
Sloan ignored that. “Everything alright?”
Gloria gave a small, dismissive sniff. “I’m still alive.”
That comment was not exactly reassuring.
Before Sloan could ask anything else, Matty came in balancing two plates and a mug of tea.
“Correction,” she said, “you’re alive and about to have lunch.”
She set the mug down on Gloria’s side table and passed her a plate.
Gloria looked at it. “Triangles?”
Matty shrugged. “You strike me as someone with standards.”
Gloria made a noise in her throat. In a different person, it might have sounded like amusement.
Matty turned to Sloan and held out the other plate. “Ham and cheese?”
Sloan blinked. “What?”
“For your sandwich.”
“I’m not staying.”
“Then you can eat it standing up and pretend you’re in a rush.”
Sloan stared at her. “You made me lunch?”
“You looked like someone who’d forgotten more than a charger.”
Against her will, Sloan felt the corner of her mouth twitch.
Matty handed over the plate, their fingers brushing again, just for a nanosecond, but it was noticed. Sloan looked down at the neat triangles, the small pile of crisps on the side, and felt a strange little jolt of domesticity she had absolutely no use for.
“You didn’t have to do that,” she said.
“I know. I can make me another one.” Then, as if it were the most normal question in the world, Matty asked, “How’s your day going?”
Sloan let out a short laugh. “You don’t want the real answer.”
“Try me.”
“Meetings. Problems. More problems. A man in Boston who thinks forwarding an email counts as solving something.”
“Sounds grim,” Matty said.
“It is grim.”
“Then eat the sandwich. Might improve your outlook.”
***
From her chair, Gloria said nothing, but she watched.
She watched Sloan, who was plainly trying not to look as if she were checking for signs of disaster, then she watched Matty, who gave none. No little sighs. No meaningful glances. No attempt to draw Sloan aside and report on the morning like some martyr to the cause.
That was new.
Sloan took a bite, then looked at her mother. “And Mum’s been alright?”
Matty sat down on the edge of the other chair with her plate. “Yeah. We’ve been alright.”
We.
Gloria noticed her daughter notice it, too.
Sloan waited a moment longer, as if expecting more. A complaint? A warning? Some tactful version of ‘Your mother’s been impossible’, maybe? But Matty just ate her sandwich.
Gloria looked down at her own plate.
Interesting.
“Well,” Sloan said eventually, “I should get back.”
“There’s another one in the kitchen if you want to take it with you,” Matty said.
Sloan looked at her. “You’ve made me a packed lunch?”
Matty shrugged. “Look at me…thriving in my new career.”
That got a proper laugh out of Sloan, albeit brief and surprised.
She set the plate down, went upstairs for the charger she had in fact left behind that morning, then came back through the lounge with it in hand.
“You sure everything’s okay?” she asked, now looking between them both.
Gloria lifted her chin. “What exactly are you expecting? Blood on the carpet?”
Sloan exhaled through her nose.
Matty stood and took the empty plate from the table. “Go back to work. We’re fine.”
Again, no tale-telling. No kitchen-door de-briefing.
Sloan hesitated, still not fully convinced.
“I’ll be back around five then,” she said.
“Try not to sound so thrilled,” Gloria muttered.
Matty followed Sloan into the hall, more out of habit than anything else, and Gloria listened to the murmur of their voices by the front door.
“Seriously,” Sloan said, lower now, “if there’s a problem—”
“I know,” Matty said. “Go. Before your Boston man has a breakdown without you.”
A pause, then the front door opened and shut.
The house went quiet again, save for the television and the faint rattle of a spoon against Gloria’s mug.
After a moment, Gloria said, “Why didn’t you tell her?”
Matty turned back from the hallway. “Tell her what?”
Gloria fixed her with a look. “Don’t be clever.”
Matty leaned one shoulder against the doorframe. “And what would that achieve?”
Gloria said nothing.
“She’d spend the rest of the day worrying about you,” Matty said. “And you’d be humiliated.”
Colour crept slowly into Gloria’s cheeks.
Matty shrugged. “I don’t play that game, Mrs S. I’m here to help you, not embarrass you.”
Gloria stared at her.
Most of them couldn’t wait to report back. To prove they were coping. To make sure Sloan knew exactly what they’d had to deal with, as if Gloria were a problem to be logged and handed over.
But this one had kept her mouth shut.
Not out of pity, either—that much Gloria would have recognised and hated on sight.
Something else, then. Something steadier. Something that felt uncomfortably like respect.
Matty pushed off from the frame and nodded at Gloria’s plate. “You going to eat that, or just judge the geometry?”
Gloria looked down at the sandwich.
“Triangles,” she said.
Matty grinned. “Knew you were classy really.”