3. Jack
Chapter 3
Jack
I fought the urge to stare out the window as Dad went through the plans with the client for the third time. I knew why he did it – I’d heard him complain enough times about a poorly scoped job or a bad choice of materials – but it didn’t stop it from being boring as hell.
I’d got in trouble for staring out the window all through school, but it wasn’t my fault that what was happening inside was infinitely less interesting than what I could see outside. Even now, I could make out from the corner of my eye the blue of what I thought was the first cornflower of the season. It was a damn shame they’d be getting rid of half their lawn for a stupid extension; the house was more than big enough, and they had a veritable meadow out there. But that wasn’t my job to say.
It actually wasn’t my job to be there at all – until recently, I’d been just carpentry and joinery – but Dad had been taking me along for more and more quotes lately, and even taking the first stab at pulling them together, at least for small jobs like the extensions. It wasn’t my favourite, but he seemed satisfied enough, which was good; Dad was always in a better mood if I did a good job. He took a lot of pride in his work.
Back at the site, the guys had all left for the day, so we were just rounding up tools and cleaning up after them before heading home. I took advantage of Dad being round the other side of the house to check some messages on my phone; he hated phones being out on the job site, but Chloe and Phil had been trading jabs in our group chat, and it was entertaining as hell to read.
The two of them had been my best friends for well over half my life; Chloe even longer. She had grown up on the next farm over, and we were always so close that Mum thought we’d end up together. But I was the only one who knew that, from the time we had crushes at all, hers had been on her own girl next door, who devastated Chloe by being straight. Then there was Phil, who had come barrelling into our lives in year seven and turned our duo into a trio, a swirl of seam tape and the smell of freshly baked cookies trailing after him, even then. If he hadn’t been such a lad, he might have been bullied for his homemaker tendencies, but instead he was just the coolest guy in every room he walked into.
I’d never lost touch with the two of them, even when I left on what was supposed to be a gap year, following what I thought was my future all around the globe for almost six years. And when that didn’t work out, and I came home broken and directionless, they didn’t let me pull away. Even as I was walking around like a zombie, doing nothing but working on my house and going to work, they were there, force-feeding me takeaway and a film at least once a week.
It wasn’t until I emerged from my post-breakup fog that I met the other two. Grey was a university pal of Phil’s, sliding into the friend group like they had always been there once I came up for post-breakup air. And Fatima came with Grey, especially when she realised Grey had a group of pals who were desperate to try their hands at Dungeons most of us had only ever played together, and none of us believed that Morgan would be as keen on bringing her work life into her personal time as Chloe insisted she would be. But Jared had suddenly had to move to Manchester for work, and we were getting ready to start a new campaign, so we decided to give it a try.
I’d be seeing all of them over the weekend – well, other than Morgan, of course, but that was a given at this point. I wasn’t sure why I felt so disappointed every time she turned us down for drinks after the game or an extra hang over the weekend; maybe it was what Chloe always said, about her not having many friends. It was why she’d wanted to invite her to play with us in the first place.
Or maybe, if I were being more honest, it was the feeling I got in my stomach whenever she smiled at me. But I didn’t examine that too closely.
* * *
“You’d better not let your mum see you in that,” Dad said a bit later as he heaved the last of the rubbish into the skip. He dusted his hands off on his filthy jeans and pointed at my t-shirt.
“She’ll be fine,” I said, but I crossed my arms as if to cover it up from him, despite the fact that we’d been working together all day. I had to promptly uncross them as Dad handed me a bucket with a trowel in it, both still caked in plaster, of course. I knew he would lay into someone about it tomorrow, but for now it was up to me to clean it off when we got back to the workshop.
“You’ll need a shower before dinner, anyway. I suspect the both of us do.”
I managed to get a whiff of my own odour as I gripped the grab handle and lifted myself into the van; Dad was right.
“Still,” I said as he put the van in gear, “it’s been years. I feel like she should just get over it at this point.”
The black t-shirt wasn’t inherently offensive; in fact, the crumpled takeaway coffee cup illustration with “LEAVE NO TRACE” written across the side was downright polite. It had been a part of a campaign my ex had started – or, well, one I’d started, but she’d promoted – to clean up outdoor spaces. All the proceeds had gone to wildlife charities, too. But despite how long it had been since the breakup, Mum and Dad still treated it like a sensitive subject, and the t-shirt was just another reminder apparently. Maybe it had something to do with just how deeply I’d spiralled after it happened, but that was beside the point.
“Your mum just feels protective. I’m not saying she’s right to be that sensitive. Just that you ought to change before dinner.”
“Will do, I promise.”
Satisfied, Dad turned up his heavy metal music, and I unzipped the backpack at my feet to get to my massive noise-cancelling headphones. Turning them on woke my phone, which was still paused on the podcast episode I’d started that morning; a deep dive into emerging materials in sustainable architecture.
Dad and I enjoyed this sort of company – each of us doing our own thing, but together. We saw each other at work almost every day, except when the job he was on didn’t need me. To just sit together on the drive home, each of us listening to something we enjoyed, was an ideal way to transition from boss and employee to father and son.
Mum was different. Where Dad was measured, Mum was manic. She was always making mountains out of molehills. This could be a good thing depending on the context – birthday celebrations for my sister Amy and me, and even Chloe, had always been next-level – but on average days, it could be exhausting, even for me, who had inherited more of Mum’s anxiety than I cared to admit. I wasn’t sure how Dad managed it. And as we pulled up the long drive to the house, we could both see Mum out in the garden weeding – something she only ever did when she was worked up. She was very passionate about rewilding, so when she was on her hands and knees ripping native species from the earth, it was a pretty good sign she was worked up.
“You’d better go,” Dad said, turning the music down. “I’ll get that plaster bucket cleaned up.”
“Is the shirt really that big a deal?”
Dad sighed. “She’s taking Amy’s breakup hard. Don’t wanna set her off.”
I rolled my eyes – Amy was twenty-two; messy breakups were her prerogative. And we’d all known this guy wasn’t going to last; he was some fancy project manager in the city nearly ten years older than her. But Mum took it so personally when it didn’t work out, as if she could have protected Amy from it.
But still, why should I suffer now about a breakup of mine that happened years ago just because Mum took Amy’s love life way too seriously?
But I knew Dad was right; it was best for the equilibrium for me to just go home and get changed, so I got out of the van, grabbed my backpack and started the walk to mine. On the way, I fired off a text to my sister – “Mum’s really tweaked about your breakup. You ok?” – after reacting with an eye-roll emoji to the message she’d sent me earlier containing my horoscope. She only ever sent it to me when it was dramatic, and today it read, “a shake-up is on the way, and it’s up to you whether it will be welcome or not.”
Honestly, a shake-up sounded like the worst thing I could imagine. I’d been shaken up enough for a lifetime, thank you. I’d basically designed my life around preventing future shake-ups. And Amy knew this, which was why she loved taunting me with supposed pending dramatics. She didn’t immediately start texting me back, so I pocketed my phone again as I crested the hill and my house came into view.
Technically, I didn’t live with my parents. Sure, we were on the same land: over a hundred acres that had been in my dad’s family for generations. His brother – Uncle John, after whom I was named – still farmed most of it. But Dad had never been a farmer, nor had I. So whilst Mum and Dad lived in the old farmhouse, and Uncle John lived in a modern build over the hill, when I had moved home four years ago I had chosen a tiny spot down in a dip in the crop fields that was blocked from view from any of the other houses. I designed it in a fit of creativity fuelled by heartache and IPA, learning everything I needed to know about building code and utilities and all the rest. After years of bending to someone else’s vision at every turn, I’d needed it to come wholly from me and what I wanted.
After that, it had taken me almost six months of full-time work and trial-and-error, but I’d built every inch of my house with my own two hands while I’d grieved my failed relationship. Every nail I hammered in, every roof tile I lay, every swipe of plaster inside, all had the angst and hurt and despondence I’d felt, both whilst I was getting over the breakup and, if I was being honest, for months before it had finally happened. It was a long and arduous project to commemorate the end of a long and frankly arduous relationship. And by the time I was done, I’d worked through most of my hurt, built myself a paradise to live in, and finally felt light enough to enjoy it.
Inside, I stripped off my clothes and turned on the walk-in shower. The rainfall showerhead sent well water cascading over me, a bit cold, but a refreshing change from the heat outside. It took almost five minutes of rinsing myself off before the water ran clear.
In the kitchen, my bath towel wrapped around my waist, I made myself a cup of chamomile tea and headed to my back deck, which overlooked a small wildlife pond formed in the little crook of the hilly farmland. It was the reason this part of the land hand never been utilised, and the reason I chose it as the perfect spot for my home.
I moved aside a magazine I’d been looking at before work – the May edition of the monthly journal put out by the Royal Institute of British Architects – and sat in my rocking chair, sipping my tea and thinking about Chloe’s birthday. It was still a couple of months away, but since we were kids Phil and I had gone in together on a present for her. This year she’d requested an old-school slumber party, so we needed to figure out what that would look like.
My phone dinged with a response from Amy:
Yeah, fine. Coming home in like 3 weeks, so hopefully she’ll see I’m okay.
Three weeks was a long time to deal with Mum in this state, but maybe that was the promised shake-up. Maybe I’d need to keep Mum from losing it.
Three weeks was also plenty of time for me to fit in my first camping trip of the year. I’d been thinking about what I wanted to do this summer, and along with some time on the water – the levels had been way too high over the winter to get any paddling in safely – a trip to the Brecon Beacons was at the top of my list. I’d been every year since I’d come home, and it was becoming a bit of a tradition for me; a way to kick-start the summer. So as I finished my tea and got dressed for dinner, I made a mental packing list, hoping I could shave a bit of weight off last year’s load, and went through my sparse calendar in my mind. There was Adam’s stag do, Chloe’s birthday party, and … well, not a lot else. Which was just the way I liked it.
I walked back up to the main house for dinner, my black t-shirt long gone. I let myself in through the front door to find Mum setting the table. My stomach rumbled as I spotted the sausage and mash; it was my favourite that she made. I knew the gravy would be from last weekend’s roast, and the sausages from the farm up the road. Maybe besides Phil, Mum was the best cook I knew. He’d learned from her, after all.
“Looks great, Mum,” I said, giving her a kiss on the cheek.
“Thank you, darling.” I could hear the edge of anxiety in her voice, but I very much did not ask her about it. She’d end up talking all through dinner about Amy, and how worried she was, and how badly she wanted her back. I wondered if that was how she’d talked about me when I’d been away.
Dad came in a moment later, also freshly showered, and plonked down in his seat. Mum and I sat down with him, and we all tucked in. The food was just as delicious as it smelled, which was heavenly.
“How are Phil and Chloe?” Mum asked as she poured me a glass of red wine.
“Yeah, fine,” I answered, my mouth full of food. When she glared at me, I gulped it down before continuing. “Sounds like Ethel’s memory isn’t getting any better, but Phil seems to be in good spirits.”
“I’ll have to go sit with her one of these days,” she said. “I’m sure poor Phil could use a break.”
“Yeah, probably,” I admitted. Phil had been caring for his nan full-time for a couple of years now, since she’d turned eighty and promptly broken her hip, as if it had reached an expiration date or something. She’d raised Phil since his parents had died; Phil had only been eight. “Same as Batman,” he always joked. But I knew it was still hard for him, even now, two decades later.
“And Chloe’s okay? She’s not dating anyone, is she?”
I laughed; Mum had only ever met one of Chloe’s girlfriends, over a year ago now. “No, Mum, she’s not.”
“Oh well that’s lucky,” she said. “Cynthia at work has a daughter who’s a lesbian, and I thought maybe we could set them up.”
“I’m sure she’d love that,” I said, knowing full well Chloe would not love that. “You can let her know the next time you see her.”
We almost got through the entirety of dinner without bringing up Amy, but in the end it was Dad, who’d hardly said anything all night, that opened that particular can of worms. Mum was asking him to fix part of the pergola that had come loose, but apparently he’d left his toolbox in Manchester when he’d moved Amy out of her ex Chris’s place and into the flat share she was now in.
“Oh that’s okay,” I said, “you can borrow mine.”
Dad levelled a gaze at me so pointed it sent a shiver up my spine.
“Or, you know,” I said, “I could do it?”
He nodded.
“Oh thank you, darling,” Mum said, grabbing my hand across the table. “And Alan, I’m so glad you did leave it, because I’ve been thinking one of us ought to go up and check on her. This gives us an excuse.”
Dad sighed. “I’ll be fine without the toolbox, love. I’m a contractor. I’ve got tools coming out my eyeballs.”
“But still,” Mum insisted, “she’s so far away, and heartbroken up there all alone.”
“She’s coming home in three weeks for a visit, isn’t she?” I asked.
“Is she?” Mum looked surprised, and I wondered for a moment if I should have been keeping that to myself. But no, Amy would have to stay with Mum and Dad. “Oh, she doesn’t tell me anything,” Mum continued. “You’d think I’d be the first to know about that.”
“It’s only because I asked,” I lied. “I’m sure she’ll be texting you any moment to let you know.”
I pulled out my phone under the table and fired off a quick message to Amy letting her know she needed to do that.
“I just want the best for you two,” Mum said, in a complete non sequitur. “I really thought she and Chris might make it.”
“Well, maybe don’t go on about it to her,” I suggested, and Mum frowned.
“Well, one of my kids needs to give me grandchildren one day,” she muttered, and I sighed, loudly enough to make sure she heard it for the admonishment it was.
“Now, now,” Dad said, always reluctant to get involved, “let’s leave it. Jackie here is doing plenty for this family.”
“Thanks, Dad,” I said, raising a skewered piece of sausage to him in salute.
“He’ll barely have time for babies of his own once he takes over the family business,” he continued.
I lowered my fork. I’d been training up for the last few months to do some of Dad’s jobs; when I’d come home, the deal had been that he’d get me trained as a joiner if I took over for him one day. I’d always thought he was just trying to make sure I wouldn’t move away as quickly as I’d moved home, but when he’d announced last year that he’d set a target retirement date, I’d realised he’d been serious.
Mum and Dad had done so much for me, Dad especially. I’d built a house on their land, eaten their food, used Dad’s business as a backup plan when full-time travel hadn’t worked out. It would have been ungrateful not to go through with it.
But every time he mentioned me taking over, I felt it in my chest. Like I couldn’t breathe; like it was being cracked open. And the best I could do was try to make sure he couldn’t tell.