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“What?” I check my phone. Seven a.m.
“Mummy always takes me to the park after breakfast.”
“Maybe wait until your mum gets up?” I suggest.
“I’ll ask her.” Ella hops down from the stool and I picture her jumping on the hungover Cerys.
“No. Okay. It’s a long time since I went to the park. Let’s go.”
I had plans to visit the shops today—a week until Christmas and I want some of the gifts under the family tree to come from me. I guess half an hour at the park won’t hurt.
Within minutes, the little girl disappears and returns downstairs dressed in blue track pants, a pink T-shirt, and a pair of pink and silver trainers. Before I can say anything, she heads out of the front door. I grab my blue hoodie hanging in the hallway and follow her out.
* * *
The wind bitesmy cheeks as I huddle on the wooden bench, hood pulled over my face. The dark clouds threaten snow, which excites me: a white Christmas. Has Ella experienced a white Christmas before?
The little girl spends ten minutes repeatedly sliding down the huge metal slide at the edge of a wooden climbing frame. I’m pretty impressed with the playground—better than the one set of swings and graffitied slide here when I was a kid. Nobody else is at the park, so I pull my phone from a pocket to catch up on some texts.
There’re a fuckload from Honey but I don’t answer. I’ll continue to pretend she doesn’t exist until I’m in the right head space to deal with her. Once I told Honey the engagement was off, I knew she’d do everything she could to change my mind. If I can be strong enough to walk away, I can be strong enough to keep things as they are. Finished.
There’s one from Bryn, Blue Phoenix drummer and mother hen. That’s if mother hens can be built like the proverbial brick house, and who could scare small children. Bryn’s text asks me to call him with a ‘not urgent’ attached. Rubbing my cold nose, I hit the screen.
“Hey, Bryn.”
“Ah, Liam, man. Wanted to check if you’re coming to Dylan’s place for Christmas?”
“Dylan’s? Is he there?” Dylan, Blue Phoenix’s lead singer, became a moodier bastard than usual recently. I’m surprised he’s allowed anyone to set foot in his house.
“No, he’s in London.”
“With Jem?” I ask incredulously.No way. Recently, Dylan and lead guitarist Jem returned to the hate part of their love/hate relationship for reasons I don’t want to know. “Are they buddies again?”
Bryn snorts. “No, he’s sulking back at hispenthouse. I also think he’s looking for Sky.”
“Sky? She left the scene months ago.” In the summer, Dylan disappeared without telling anyone and when he reappeared, he’d had a secret affair with some chick who wasn’t interested in him once she found out who he was. As he’s lead singer, the press endlessly pursue him, and he’s fucked up by the whole fame business. I get that, but he makes some shit decisions without thinking about the rest of us. Last I saw him with Sky, she’d changed her mind and they were together. Then she disappeared and Dylan refuses to mention her name.
“Yeah. Weird. Anyway, you coming?” asks Bryn.
“No, staying in St Davids. Doing the family thing this year.”
“Uh huh.” There’s a pause followed by the real reason he asked me to call him. “Honey with you?”
“No.”
“Oh?”
“Oh.”
I wait for Bryn to determine whether to push the issue as Bryn would, or step down.
He gives me the male ‘get out clause’. “Want to talk about shit?”
“No.”
Ella approaches, stumbling across the wood chip covered ground towards the bench. Her cheeks are flushed red, hair sticking up from the static of the slide. “Will you push me on the swings?”
“Who’s that?” asks Bryn.
