She wasn’t expected to shag him in the back office and fall pregnant promptly afterwards. It probably wasn’t the sort of softening up her father had had in mind, anyway.
She clears her throat. ‘I will never call that a bad decision, it brought Georgia to me.’ Heather lowers her gaze to the table. ‘But it was the wrong choice, as it turned out. Dougie emigrated to Canada with his ex-wife when Georgia was just over three months old,’ Heather chews her lip, ‘I haven’t heard from him since.’
***
When Heather gets home from her date with Gerry, (dropped off in a taxi, with a peck on the cheek), she checks her phone and notices a text from Georgia that had slipped under her radar in the restaurant. Had Gerry’s company beenthatenthralling?
“Mum,” her daughter had typed, “can you get Brianna a mattress topper, please? Nowhere in St Andrews has one.”
Heather can’t help the little smile of victory that pulls at the corners of her mouth. Oh, to see the look on Scott’s face if she were to do that! She pictures the furrow, the hardened mouth, the slight curvature of the shoulders when he tries to establish if he’s being churlish in his response, because Heather knows this will just kill him. But if she’s needed again, then who is she to refuse simply because a stand-offish man 1,800 miles away chooses adventure sports over his daughter’s well-being?Besides, the temptation is more than she can bear. Ten seconds later, she replies, “sure”.
Heather orders the mattress topper for collection at the nearest mega market whilst her bath is filling, then finds herself immediately distracted. She can’t help it. She’s just been on a nice date with a perfectly respectable (boring?) man. So why does she find herself swiping through Scott’s online profile as soon as the e-mail confirmation of her order comes through? Scott is currently sharing two images: one of himself in a tight-fitting wet suit with a streak of fluorescent yellow on his lips and nose, which gives a pleasant contrast to the deepening tan on his cheeks; the second shows him riding a breaker just off the Agadir coast, his blonde curls plastered against his forehead and seemingly oblivious to any drama that might be playing out at home.
She is observing, by the way. Not stalking.
As Heather tries to pull her attention away from these images and think favourable thoughts about Gerry’s knitted sweater vest (she’s sure it has a certain style to it), a message comes in from Claire.
“So, how was it?”she asks, as if they’re fifteen again and Heather’s just been on a first date with the school hunk.
Heather lowers herself into the scented bubbles before replying.
“Fine,” she texts back once immersed, and her fingers dry of bathwater. “Nice. Better than sitting in the house on my own,” she qualifies. Because, in all honesty, that’s the benchmark she is going to measure dates against from now on. Better than Eastenders will be a positive, but not to be repeated experience; worth missing a re-run of Downton Abbey will be definite second date potential.
Claire replies with a wiggly mouthed emoji.
When Gerry messages moments later, asking her for a second date, Heather has to coach herself to reply positively. She isn’t expecting fireworks and high drama. She no longer believes in that and no longer subscribes to the allure of guys like Scott-Bloody-Reynolds.
Not at her age.
Heather replies to Gerry, then books her car into the garage for its almost overdue MOT.
SCOTT
Scott should know better than to check social media when he’s on an adventure holiday. Its absence, along with the sea air, the wholesome food, and the engaging company, combine to provide a feeling of altogether oneness with nature. He’d noticed it most acutely this morning when surfing the longest, deepest wave he’s seen on the Atlantic Coast. He’d caught it just right, having anticipated the swell, and paddled forward furiously at exactly the right moment. The feeling is still with him. The ultimate exhilaration: a combination of flying and walking on water. Like he was Jesus Fucking Christ. That’s how Scott feels today. Unstoppable. Unassailable. Until …
My daughter Georgia and her friend Brianna are going to Genealogy tonight. If you DM me, I can ask them to look out for him. They’re inclusive. I’m sure they’ll be happy to take him under their wing.
From Heather McVey.
And a second message, a DM from his sister-in-law, who has taken to stalking Brianna remotely through the St AndrewsUniversity online parents' forum, “Oh Bless her. What a lovely lady. Pretty too ;)”
He’s about to make a snarky (possibly anonymous) comment, when a message from Brianna comes in via WhatsApp:
“Hey Dad. Check out my mattress topper.”
It is the first message he’s had from Brianna since arriving in Agadir and their first interaction since her “given the circumstances”comment before he left St Andrews and, so, on some level Scott knows he wants their conversation to be about so much more than this. But still: a mattress topper? If those bloody helicopter parents in that online forum could see him now, they’d have a right old laugh at his expense.
“You’re joking, right?”
But she isn’t joking. And she sends an image to prove it.
“My bed’s lumpy.”
He’s scared to ask this next question, because he’s afraid of where it might lead. But, in for a penny …
“Did you order it online?” he asks, hoping to distract them both from the fact he made a point about those bloody mattress topper things.
“Heather bought it for me.”
