Everyday life before the accident
Max was sitting on the train next to Emma and they were heading to St Albans.
This was a big deal, and they both knew it because Emma was going to meet his parents for the first time.
She had made a real effort with her outfit, spending hours in her bedroom before they left, switching out outfits, doing her hair and make-up because she wanted to look her best, but Max knew his parents wouldn't mind how she looked.
All they cared about was whether she made him happy.
Max reached down and held her hand as the train slowly pulled into St Albans Station on that bright but cold Sunday afternoon.
‘It’s going to be fine, you know. My parents are going to love you,’ said Max with a smile, but he could feel the warmth in her hand, see the tension in her face, and the mild panic in her eyes.
The problem was that Max had explained to her numerous times since they had started dating just how important his parents were to him and how much he respected their opinion, so Emma knew that if she blew it, it would put a serious dent in their relationship.
They stood up as the train came to a gradual stop, and then waited for the doors to open with a sharp ping.
‘But what if they don’t?’ said Emma, stepping off the train, and they walked along the platform. ‘What if they don’t think I’m good enough for you.’
‘Why would they think that?’ said Max, as they walked through the barriers, leaving the train station, before the ten-minute walk to his parents’ house.
‘Oh, I don’t know because no-one is good enough for their perfect little boy,’ said Emma. ‘And yes, I know I’m being facetious, but since we met, all you’ve told me about your parents is just how close you all are. It feels like I’m walking into a trap.’
‘We’re close because I’m an only child,’ replied Max, turning onto the main road that led into St Albans.
‘But don’t you see, Max. It’s a lot of pressure,’ said Emma, and Max stopped walking, took hold of Emma by the shoulders, and gently turned her towards him.
‘Em, my parents are going to love you because I love you. They’re going to think you’re perfect for me because I think you’re perfect for me. I know my parents, Em, and trust me when I say that you have nothing to worry about. OK?’
Emma looked at him, and then she smiled, letting out a deep breath she didn’t even realise she was holding in. ‘OK, and thank you.’
‘Right, let’s go and enjoy Mum’s Sunday roast because trust me, it’s one of the best you’re ever going to have. She does some sort of magic with the roast potatoes that doesn’t even make sense. They’re out of this world!’
Max held Emma’s hand as they walked to his parents’ house.
The same walk that Max had done hundreds of times before as a boy and then as a young man returning home from university and then London.
The walk along Victoria Street, past the church on the right-hand side, Iceland on the left, the Robin Hood pub, which he had been in many times over the years, and towards the town centre.
Then it was a right, a left, another right, and two more lefts until finally they were standing outside his parents' 1930s semi-detached house where Max had grown up.
Every time Max stood outside of that house, a million memories flooded through him, like he was all the versions of himself all at once.
‘Ready?’ he asked Emma.
‘What if I say no?’
‘I think it might already be too late for that,’ said Max as the front door opened and standing there with effervescent smiles on their faces, were Phillip and Susan Lawson, ready to greet the first girlfriend Max had brought home in years.
Emma was greeted like a returning Olympian to British shores with warm hugs, platitudes galore, and with the promise of refreshments and a slap-up roast with all the trimmings.
As they walked inside, Max couldn’t help notice that his mum had clearly had a real tidy-up for their arrival.
Not that the house wasn’t always spotless because it was, but there had been an extra level of care.
A new air freshener had been deployed that had top notes of something floral and base notes of something deeply woody.
All the clutter had been removed from the entranceway, and as they walked along the hallway, past the living room and then into the kitchen, it was clear that there had been a deep clean.
The kitchen, despite a roast being cooked, was spotless.
Max imagined his Mum whizzing around the house all morning making sure that everything was spick and span, while his father got out of her way.
He probably had a round of golf, and then was instructed to head to Waitrose to pick up something that Mum had forgotten.
‘Come in,’ said Susan. ‘Welcome to our home, Emma.’
‘You don’t need to be so formal, Mum. Really.’
‘Drink?’ asked Phillip. ‘We’ve got wine, beer, lemonade, or some gin. I think we have some gin. Do we have gin, Sue?’
‘In the cupboard with the rest of the spirits.’
‘Oh, right, yes. So wine, beer, lemonade, a G&T, if you fancy one?’ said Max’s dad, who headed off across the kitchen to the spirit cupboard.
The cupboard Max had raided with teenage friends in an attempt to impress girls.
Nothing like a two-thirds bottle of Southern Comfort to break the ice at a sixth form party.
‘Umm, yeah, a G&T sounds great,’ replied Emma.
‘Just a beer for me,’ said Max.
‘You can get your own, you know where they are,’ said his Mum. ‘Right, Emma, how are you, love?’
‘Yes, good, thanks. You have a beautiful home.’
‘Oh, thank you. We moved here in ninety-six—’
‘Ninety-seven,’ came a voice from across the kitchen.
‘Oh, yes, ninety-seven, and we've been here ever since.’
‘Right, here we go, gin. Now, let me get the tonic, and I think there’s lemons—’
‘Fruit bowl.’
‘Okey-dokey,’ said Phillip, and Max watched as his parents, seemingly without even realising it, spent the next thirty minutes putting on a show for Emma.
A constant barrage of conversation that they had spent years and years cultivating, finishing each other’s sentences, jumping in to correct information, and it all felt so natural, and watching it with Emma, Max felt like he was seeing it properly for the first time.
They had always been like that, and when Max had lived at home before he left for university, he had been a part of it too.
They were such a tight-knit unit, so closely interwoven with each other, that instead of two individual people they had almost become one.
Max watched in awe as his mum glided around the kitchen, slicing carrots with ease while asking Emma questions about her childhood, her career, what she planned on doing in the future, and then his dad would chip in too, while making sure all drinks were promptly topped up.
They were like a well-oiled machine, a football team that were so well drilled they knew what the other was going to do or say before they had even done it.
It was no wonder Max had always felt so close to his parents, if he had been just like that too.
They eventually sat at the dining room table, laid for a special guest with the finest table cloth and the best cutlery, and mum served her legendary roast. She had perfectly slow cooked roast beef with giant, crispy Yorkshire puddings, her duck fat roast potatoes, which were the star of the show, steamed cauliflower, broccoli, carrots, and her incredible gravy made from the resting juices of the beef.
There was nothing quite like his mum’s roast dinner.
It all felt so alien to Emma, whose parents had divorced when she was five, and then a series of step-dad figures emerged over years but none stuck, and her father remarried, and she had two step-siblings.
She was the result of a blended, mismatched family, and Max the poster-boy for perfect monogamy.
‘This is incredible,’ said Emma. ‘Max said you make the best roast, and he was right.’
‘I’m just glad you’re here, love,’ said Susan. ‘Maybe a toast?’
She looked across at Phillip, who raised his glass of beer in the air. ‘To old love, and new.’
They all repeated the toast, before they sank into comfortable conversation while they ate.
Emma, who had been so unsure of herself on the train, so anxious on the walk there, was suddenly so relaxed.
Max had always known his parents were good hosts, but they had made Emma feel like one of the family within an hour.
Perhaps the gin heavy G&Ts had helped grease the wheels a little bit too.
They finished eating, and Max and his father cleaned up, while his mum took Emma into the living room because she insisted on showing Emma the Lawson family photo albums. Susan had always taken photos over the years, and she had created extensive and organised photo albums. They had albums from every year of Max’s life from one to eighteen, when he had moved out and they had abruptly stopped.
They had albums of family holidays, each one beautifully laid out with perfectly curated photos, and small paragraphs of sometimes witty, informative text below: Max at Land’s End, Cornwall, 2008.
He ate a Cornish pasty bigger than his head just after this!
It was like Instagram before social media was even a thing.
Susan and Emma sat in the living room, devouring album after album of Max’s life from a baby all the way up to adulthood, with every holiday home and abroad. Max was in the kitchen with his dad, and he could hear them giggling like a couple of schoolgirls.
‘What do you think of her?’ Max asked his father, while drying up a plate with a tea towel.
‘She’s lovely, mate, really lovely.’
‘You think Mum likes her?’
‘Your mothers in love,’ said Max’s dad, and with that, Max knew his relationship with Emma had been rubber-stamped by his parents.
They went through into the living room, and with fresh drinks in hand, they ploughed through the photo albums together, long-lost stories were shared, funny anecdotes from holidays, and Max’s awkward teenage years were revealed in all their horrific glory to Emma, who couldn’t get enough.
Max’s entire childhood was spoken about with such warmth, love, and just hearing it for himself, Max knew how lucky he was to have been their son.
Eventually it was time to go, and head back to London, and at the front door they had stopped outside of just hours before with such apprehension, now it was hugs goodbye and promises to do it again soon.
As Max and Emma strolled back to the station, their stomachs full, both slightly tipsy, they barely spoke because all they could do was hold hands, and share in what had just happened to them.
It was like they had been enveloped in a hug, felt the generous warmth of the love that filled that house, and it gave both of them a glow as they got back to the station.
For Emma it was something new that she had never had growing up, and for Max a reminder of something he knew he was incredibly fortunate to have always known.
‘That went well,’ said Max as the train to London King’s Cross approached.
‘It all makes sense now.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Why you are the way you are. Your parents are perfect, Max. They’re like the parents everyone wished they had. It makes sense why you’re so bloody lovely.’
‘Stop it,’ said Max, reaching down, holding her hand and then pulling her into a hug, before he kissed her as the train pulled into the station. They boarded the train, and found two seats. Max took the aisle and Emma the window, and the train slowly pulled away, back into London.
‘Do you think we’ll be like your parents one day?’ Emma asked, a searching curiosity in her eyes.
‘I hope so,’ he replied, before he leaned across and kissed her again. ‘I really hope so.’