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“No, no, there’s more tomorrow,” Ava said, grinning. “But for now, it’s home time. Go on, off you go. Goodbye, class.”
“Goodbye, Ms. Stanford,” they chorused, before rushing off to get coats and bags.
Hope started picking up chairs and putting them on desks so that the floor could be cleaned as the children filtered out of the classroom.
“Bye, mum,” Alice called.
“I’ll be home in half an hour, be a good girl for gran.”
Only when the class was empty did she finally breathe a sigh of relief that the day was over. She was exhausted, she’d barely slept last night thinking of Noah and Alice.
“Not a bad day,” said Ava. “Not a bad day at all.”
Hope nodded. “Yeah.”
Ava frowned at her. “You alright?”
Hope turned away, attending to the chairs at the next table. “Of course.” But even as she spoke, her voice thickened and she could feel the tears starting again. She really thought she’d already cried them out.
“Slightly less than alright then,” said Ava, coming around so that she could see Hope’s face. “Obviously none of my business, but would you like to tell me what’s going on?”
Hope gulped, tried to control herself but couldn’t, then gave up. “It’s Noah, he wants half custody of Alice,” she said, getting the words out in a hurry in case she broke down. She felt a tear run down her cheek.
“Oh,” said Ava. She pushed her glasses up on top of her head. “Oh dear.”
Hope gave a hiccuping sob and sniffed, blinking furiously to try and stop herself losing control.
“Oh dear,” Ava said again, coming a little closer. Close enough that Hope felt warmth emanating from her, close enough that she could see each eyelash, that she could see soft peach down on Ava’s cheek. Close enough that suddenly her heart was beating awfully fast and her mouth was drying up.
Ava raised a hand, bringing it up so that it was close to Hope’s face but not quite touching, obviously intending to wipe a tear away and Hope held her breath, waiting for the inevitable touch.
But it didn’t come.
The moment lasted too long and then Ava was moving her hand away again.
“I’m so sorry,” Hope said. “I shouldn’t lose it at work like this.”
“No apology necessary,” Ava said, shuffling back a little. “I can imagine that this must be pretty distressing for you.”
Hope nodded. “It is.”
Ava started stacking more chairs. “Obviously, you have to be thinking about Alice though.”
“Obviously,” said Hope, moving around to the other side of the table to get the chairs there.
“Well, would it be so bad for her to spend half her time with her father? She obviously loves him.”
Hope stared at Ava through the chair legs and shook her head. Of course Ava didn’t understand. How could she? She didn’t have kids of her own, she just didn’t get it. “This isn’t a topic for discussion,” said Hope, anger biting into her words.
“Okay,” Ava said. She moved off toward her desk and Hope watched her.
Just how was it that every time she was starting to think that Ava Stanford was an actual decent human being the woman managed to make herself annoying enough that all Hope wanted to do was slap her soundly?
However she did it, it was clear that Ava Stanford was strongly in the running for the title of most irritating person in Whitebridge. Perhaps the country.
Chapter Sixteen
“Close the door please, Adesh, you weren’t brought up in a barn.”
