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“Make that a tandem skydive.”
“I’ll lock it in for our first anniversary.”He looked covertly from under his lashes, and she weaved her fingers into his.
“I’d like that,” she said.
They sat for a moment, well fed and contented, then Carts asked, “Do you want to do something after breakfast?”
She hesitated, and he immediately picked up on it.“You’ve got other plans?”
She sighed.“I have to try and get Mum and Pippa talking.”
A look of sudden comprehension dawned on his face.“Oh, christ, I’m sorry I forgot, with us and you know… Do you want to tell me what happened?”
With the whirlwind of events last night, there hadn’t been time to talk about Friday night.Nor, frankly, had she wanted to.She’d wanted to forget her family’s woes hanging over her.But now she explained the whole messy situation.Carts listened, his head inclined toward her, eyes intent, wincing when she explained how Pip had stormed off.“Oh jeesh,” he added a couple of times.It felt so good to talk about it that the leaden lump around her heart softened.She realised how much anxiety she’d always carried around with regard to Mum and Pippa.And as she talked, memories surfaced; of the times she’d listened to Pippa crying when Mum was too exhausted to go to her and Dad was working.How when she couldn’t bear it anymore, she’d go to the fridge, take out Pip’s bottle, drag a chair to the microwave and stand on it to warm it, then struggle to pick up Pip’s distressed little body from the cot.
“So why is it up to you to get them talking again?”Carts asked when she’d finished.
Her brow pleated as she sought for the words.“Because… because… I always have.It’s kind of ingrained in me…” She flicked a strand of hair over her shoulder, gave a nervous laugh.“Maybe I’m worried that if I stop caring as much, I’ll end up being one of those people who barge to the front of queues and walk past homeless people without blinking an eye.”
“That would never happen,” Carts said softly.“But sometimes caring too much means people lean on us when they should be fixing their own problems.”
She looked at his thoughtful expression, loving the wisdom that emerged when he relaxed into being truly himself.“You’re right, and I get that, logically.At work I know where to draw the line.But with Mum and Pip it all gets scrambled in my head.As though if I don’t sort it out something awful will happen.”
“Like when your mum disappeared when you were little and you didn’t know why?”
She gulped, nodded.When he spoke, Carts’ voice was full of compassion.“All the muddy shit from the past, eh?”
“Yes!”She let out a big breath, surprised and delighted that he got it.“That’s exactly how it feels, all the shit from the past messing up my head.”
“I know that shit,” Carts said.“It’s the reason I let my boss treat me like a turd on his shoe, even though I know I’m the best performer in the team.It’s why I never ask for a pay rise, or go for promotions.Even when the bullying stopped at school, even when I made friends, deep inside I still didn’t believe… that I deserved…” He hesitated, the fingers of his other hand curling around his napkin and turning it into a tightly scrunched ball.
“That you deserved…?”she prompted gently.
“To be happy.”His knuckles whitened and he glanced up at her, eyes clouded.“With Lucy, I knew in my heart it was over between us, but it was like I wanted to whack myself over the head with a two by four plank.Even as I went and chose that engagement ring, there was a great big sign flashing in my brain.Don’t do this.And then I did it anyway; like I was determined to prove to myself I was no good.That I deserved to be kicked in the teeth.And that’s exactly what happened.I let all that shitty stuff from when I was bullied affect my judgement over Lucy.”
She wound her fingers around his, brought his hand to her lips and kissed it.“And then with you—” His voice cracked a little.“If you hadn’t come running after me… because in my head it was like, of course, this is how it is, this is what you get in life Carts, mate, this is what you deserve.It felt weirdly right.”
“But you were so wrong.”
He nodded.“I was.And I’m so glad you didn’t let me leave.”They sat holding hands in the companionable silence of two people who totally got each other before Carts said, “So tell me, what’s the major issue with Pippa and your mum?”
“Where to begin?”She sighed heavily.“They’ve each got so much baggage.Mum feels guilty because she had post-natal depression, but then she also withdraws because she finds Pippa’s energy too intense.But to Pippa, that means Mum doesn’t care.So she tries to force Mum into a reaction.Every single time.And it always, alwaysbackfires.”He squeezed her hand in simple acknowledgement.“And then, guess who runs around to fix it all up?”She pointed her other hand at her chest.“Moi.”
“What do you do?”
“I call and I cajole and I organise everyone to come to tea and… I bake brownies.”She heard herself laugh, hollow and mirthless.“Until they start talking again, but they never sort it out, not really.It builds up like those rock formations in caves.Drip, drip, drip.And now…” She sighed.“This is the big one, the hardest for both of them.”
“But they do love each other?”
“Yes, yes, of course.Wealllove each other, but we’re one of those families who don’t know how to show it.”
“How many families really do?How many families really talk to each other about the hard stuff?I know mine don’t.Dad hides in his study, worrying himself sick about his work, Mum teaches her ring off to kids who don’t want to learn the piano.I didn’t tell them I was being bullied, not until years later.Now, Avery can’t talk to Mum anymore.They rub each other up the wrong way constantly.”
“Sounds like Mum and Pippa.”She took a big breath.She needed to tell him the rest.
“Mum had a terrible childhood.Her family belonged to a fundamental church.The kind where if you did anything the church didn’t approve of you’d roast in hell for eternity.Strictly no sex before marriage, no university education for women, as little contact with the outside world as possible.You had to marry someone from the church.They’d lined up a church elder in his forties for Mum to marry on her eighteenth birthday.”
“That’s terrible.”
