Chapter 7 #4
It seemed, she reflected with some irony as she tried to think of a suitable response to her mum’s observation, that her avoidance was about to backfire on her in a spectacular way because over the coming weeks and months they were probably going to be in her life a lot.
Whether that would be a good or bad thing remained to be seen, but Zoe wasn’t all that hopeful.
‘So when suits you? I have to warn you, I’m on call, so if anything happens with one of my mums, I might have to leave you to your own devices.
Actually…’ A thought occurred to her, a rather wonderful one, one that – though the notion made her even guiltier – would lessen the burden on her by sharing it with someone who knew her mum, even though they hadn’t seen one another for some years.
‘Georgia Capaldi lives in Thimblebury now!’
‘You said when I spoke to you last.’
‘Yes, so if you’re coming over, you’ll be able to see her new baby! We’ll go to visit, and if I did get called out, you’d be able to stay at her house for a few hours at least.’
‘So I won’t get to meet Alex?’
‘Oh, of course you’ll get to do that too. It was only an idea. I thought you’d like to see Georgia; after all, we were best friends when we were young, and she spent a lot of time at our house, didn’t she?’
‘I suppose it would be nice to see how things have turned out for her.’
‘And I’m sure she’d love to see you again!’
‘I’ll come on Saturday if it’s all the same to you. The trains aren’t so reliable on a Sunday.’
‘If you let me know what time, I’ll pick you up from the station.’
‘I will.’
‘Right, so I’ll let you go for now. See you on Saturday.’
Zoe ended the call and looked up to see Alex and Billie had dropped any pretence of not listening. ‘Sorry about that. It was my mum.’
‘No need to be sorry,’ Alex said. ‘Everything all right?’
‘Oh, you know, she’s a bit upset about Dad. Understandable, right?’
‘She’s coming to Thimblebury this weekend?’
‘She said she’d like to, and I suppose it’s about time you met her. Both my parents, in fact.’
‘And here we were, wondering if you were too embarrassed about us to introduce us to your parents,’ Alex said with a brisk wink at Billie.
‘God, it’s the other way around!’ Zoe said, perhaps with a bit too much fervour. ‘I mean, I love them, but… well, they can be hard work. But I’m sure it will be fine.’
Alex raised his eyebrows. ‘Are you?’
‘Yes.’
‘Because if you’d rather…’
‘No, I absolutely want you to meet her. I mean, I want her to meet you… Dad too, whenever that’s going to be. At this rate,’ she continued with a laugh that was far from relaxed, ‘it’ll be on the wedding day. The wedding day he might end up having here at St Cuthbert’s… oh God!’
‘It’ll be fine,’ Alex said gently. ‘You’ve got us, and we’ll do whatever we can to support you… right, Bill?’
‘Of course,’ Billie said as Alex folded Zoe into his arms and hugged her tightly. ‘You know we will. They can’t be that bad, can they?’
Zoe pulled from Alex’s embrace to offer his daughter a tight smile. ‘I realise it sounds ungrateful, doesn’t it, especially knowing you lost your mum. I know I’m lucky to have them, but…’
‘I get it,’ Billie said. Zoe sometimes forgot that Billie was far wiser than her twenty-three years, but moments like this reminded her. There was no bitterness, no accusation, no resentment, just a quiet understanding. ‘Just because you have them, doesn’t mean it’s always good.’
Zoe shook her head. ‘Now I know I sound ungrateful.’ She pushed a bigger smile across her face. ‘Mum is going to love you both. In fact, I’m looking forward to her coming now and finally getting to meet you.’
Alex and Billie shared a look that told Zoe she hadn’t quite convinced them. But that was hardly surprising, given she was still working hard to convince herself, despite her optimistic words.
Later, as Zoe got her coat on to go home, Alex took it from her shoulders again. ‘It’s blowing a gale out there. Surely you don’t want to go home in this. You’ve got plenty of stuff here – stay over.’
‘I would, but I’ve got a really early start tomorrow and I’d feel bad waking you up.’
‘I won’t care about that. It will do me a favour anyway; I’ve got loads to do.
I can chase up that archaeologist bloke for a start, see if I can finally get the all-clear on the camping field.
I’ve got to speak to someone at the bank, call that company about getting a supply of bottled gas, the guy who makes the specialist generators… a million other things too.’
Zoe paused. ‘It’s tempting,’ she said. ‘But I’ve got things to do at home as well. There’s washing all over the radiators; it’s been there days. I could do with cleaning round a bit before my—’
‘Boring. What’s the worst that will happen if you don’t take that washing off your radiators for another day?’
Zoe couldn’t help but smile.
‘Stay,’ he said, pulling her into his arms.
She wondered if he might bring up the subject of her moving in again and how she’d feel if he did. Part of her liked that he wasn’t willing to give up, because despite her convictions that it was too soon, she wondered why she was putting up such a fight.
‘Fine,’ she said, the battle lost as soon as she looked up into his dark eyes. ‘But don’t blame me if I wake you at the crack of dawn tomorrow.’