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“Isaac, for goodness’ sake, come and get your breakfast!” My lungs are fit for bursting as I scream up the stairs at Isaac’s closed bedroom door.
It’s fair to say my mood is terrible. I haven’t slept a wink. How could I? Freddy turned up on my doorstep, snogged the hell out of me, made me feel all kinds of good, bad, and everything in between, and then left me there as he paced his way back down the driveway.
Who does that?
No explanations. No words other than, ‘I’ve been waiting for you to come home’.
It was as close to a heart attack as I hope I will ever come.
Now though, I’m feeling angry. I’ve spent a long time distancing myself from my memories of Freddy and the way he threw me away once he was all fixed up after his crash. But worse still, I’m angry at myself because there is something I should tell Freddy, but I just don’t know how. How do I tell him the reason why I never came back? Last night I sure as hell didn’t when he had me pressed up against the front door.
I want to pack my bags and run again. I wasn’t built with the fight or flight instinct. I just have the one that makes me run for the hills at the first sign of trouble, and Freddy Bale is trouble for me. I have a bad feeling he could bring me down with little effort at all. Or I could take him down, destroying us both forever with the secrets I’ve kept.
My head pounds with the weight of it all.
“What’s up with you?” Isaac slouches his way into the kitchen.
‘Don’t slouch,” I snap.
He doesn’t even bother trying to straighten up and it makes me feel hotter and madder. “Why are you so cross?”
“I’m not cross.” I feel like I could rip his head off.
“I wish I’d stayed with Dad for another day.”
He’s not your fucking dad.
Isaac eyes me defiantly and I try to take some calming breaths. “Go outside and play, Isaac.”
“I’m not six.” The retort is quick-fire.
“No, you’re nine and you should do what you’re told.” The moment I say the words, I know I sound ridiculous. I’ve never been like this with Isaac before—it’s not my style. The two of us stick together like a band of thieves, not me snapping and scowling. I let out a sigh, expelling my confusion, frustration and exhaustion with it. “Fancy ice-cream?”
“But. . . it’s breakfast!” Isaac looks shocked at my random suggestion.
“I know. Come on, let’s get dressed and get out of here.”
“What about Nan?”
This makes me stop. I’m not used to having two people to be responsible for. “Reckon she might like ice-cream?”
“Is she going to be embarrassing?”
I nod my head slowly. “Yes, probably. Come on, let’s do this.”
My decision made, I take the stairs two at a time and find Mum to get her dressed. Half an hour later I have us bundled in the car and heading for the Suffolk coast. I haven’t been to Lowestoft for ten years, and my memories of the place are muddled from my efforts to erase them, but it’s the only seaside place I can think of taking Isaac to. He starts school tomorrow. I don’t want to be snapping at him the whole day, his new start here deserves more than that.
The wind whips along the beach, brushing exfoliating stabs of sand against the back of my legs. Isaac is deep into a Magnum, dropping shards of chocolate in the sand which instantly gloss at the edges. With my toe I cover them up so no one gets sticky chocolate feet. Mum clutches her arm through mine and as strange as it seems I can feel she’s here right now in the moment with me. “You having fun?” I ask and pat her arm, strangely maternal, our roles officially reversed now with the roll of the tide.
“Me and your dad used to come here all the time.” She stops walking, pulling me back with her as she stares out at the sea. “It was so wonderful, so many days just laughing and talking.”
I stare at her, reading the features of her face. Isaac is ahead now but I don’t want to call out to him in case she stops talking.
“The sun used to bake our skin, do you know that feeling, Amber? As though you are warmed from the inside out, a glow that used to burn long after we got home.”
