Love Redesigned (16 page)

‘Everything alright? Holly asked as she opened the door, all smiles and looking perfectly relaxed in a jeans and fitted white shirt combo. Of course, she’d had time to herself, rather than having to keep an eagle eye on the boy wonder.

‘Hi, Mum,’ Harry said, barging past her, his coat already half off on his way through to the kitchen.

‘Thank you for doing the shopping. That’s a great help,’ Holly said, taking the shopping bags off Daniel and following Harry in the direction of the kitchen. Feeling a little lost, and unsure whether he was supposed to follow her in or not, Daniel took a guess, stepped over the threshold, and closed the door behind him. When he reached the kitchen, he saw that every visible surface had been scoured, all the dishes were behind closed cupboard doors, and there wasn’t a crumb in sight. Holly had obviously been doing a bit more than just having a relax, as he’d initially assumed.

‘And thanks for taking him,’ Holly added, nodding in Harry’s direction. Harry was kneeling on the floor, concentrating hard as his little hands tried to get into the slippery plastic packaging of a packet of biscuits. ‘I love him to bits, but every so often I need a bit of a break and a chance to catch up on things,’ Holly explained further.

She studied Daniel a little more closely. ‘Are you okay?’ she asked, apparently noticing that he was yet to utter a single syllable.

‘Fine,’ Daniel replied curtly, making himself useful by unloading a shopping bag and dumping its contents onto the now spotless kitchen countertop.

‘By the way, you could have warned me that Harry has a propensity for wandering off for no particular reason. No, let me correct myself there:
running
off,’ Daniel fumed, as he got some of his frustration off his chest.

‘Ahhh,’ Holly sighed as she stopped what she was doing. ‘I see. Welcome to my world!’ she said indifferently, and then continued trying to stuff the teabags into an already-overflowing cupboard.

‘Well, you could have said,’ Daniel sulked. ‘And he’s fine, by the way.’

‘I can see he’s happy as Larry,’ Holly smiled, glancing over at Harry, who was still losing his battle with the cellophane. ‘Listen, what happens in the supermarket stays in the supermarket. It’s a hellish place at the best of times, and the abysmal chore is only made worse by errant little boys.’

Daniel merely huffed in response.

‘Anything else bothering you?’ Holly asked him kindly. Here was his opportunity. He’d been ready to take a piece out of her when he’d dashed out of the car earlier, but here she was being all gentle and sweet and clearly not wanting, nor expecting, an argument. Daniel knew he wasn’t exactly being mature about this revelation that Holly was sharing her bed, but the more he thought about it, the more he thoroughly disliked the idea.

‘No, everything’s fine,’ Daniel replied, deciding that now was not the time to start questioning Holly about her sex life. Not when their young son was in the room.

‘Right then, Mister,’ Holly said, crouching down to Harry’s level. ‘What shall we do first? Lunch or ducks?’

‘Can we do lunch first, Mum? I’m sooooooo hungry,’ Harry replied, finally giving up on the fiddly biscuit wrapping and handing the packet to his mum.

‘Of course,’ Holly replied. ‘Daniel, would you like to stay for lunch?’ she asked, looking up at him. God, she was being lovely today, Daniel thought to himself. She was an entirely different creature when she was relaxed in her home environment, compared to the argumentative and difficult woman she had been in the office, and the somewhat guarded version of herself she’d been the previous evening.

‘I have a better idea,’ Daniel said, smiling broadly, as he thought of a way to string out his visit a little longer.

Half an hour later they were sat outside in a pleasant pub beer garden, enjoying the unseasonably warm English sunshine and sipping real ale. Harry was more than happy with the playground, which had clearly been designed for far bigger children than he. Daniel found himself unable to desist from glancing sideways at his companion—under the cover of his sunglasses—in what was becoming a repetitive cycle. She was wearing her own sunglasses on top of her head, holding back the hair from her face. She still looked as young and beautiful as she had when he’d first fallen in love with her and asked her to marry him. But there was more of an innate confidence about her now. When they’d been together, she’d been more than happy to go along with whatever his plans were. Present-day Holly, it seemed, had her own direction, and absolutely knew what she wanted.

Daniel was unable to restrain himself any longer. ‘How’s the love life then?’ he asked cavalierly, launching headfirst into the topic without so much as a snifter of polite preamble or the barest hint of a warning shot.

‘Excuse me?’ Holly spluttered, choking on her beer, a shocked look on her face. She clearly hadn’t been impressed with Daniel’s clumsy introduction of this new subject.

‘Oh, you heard me,’ Daniel said jovially, summoning up some of his usual self-assured cockiness. ‘How’s it going with… er… what was his name, now? James? Justin?’ From the way he was talking to her, it sounded more like he was down the pub, taking the piss out of one of his male drinking buddies. All he needed now was to slap her on the back to complete the picture.

‘Jake,’ Holly snapped at him, fixing him with a death stare. ‘I see Harry has been a little tattle-tale during your boys-only-bonding session.’

‘Oh, Jake, was it?’ Daniel said, unable to stop himself from teasing her. It seemed to be a defense mechanism, a way to hide how he truly felt about Holly seeing someone romantically—someone other than him, that is.

‘You bloody well know he’s called Jake,’ Holly hissed at him, clearly rattled that she’d been found out.

‘Okay, okay,’ Daniel said, leaning back and raising up his hands in a gesture signifying truce.

‘It’s actually none of your business, Daniel. So, if you don’t mind, just keep your nose out.’

‘Actually, that’s where you’re wrong,’ Daniel began seriously, dropping his voice to signify he meant business. ‘I have the right to know what kind of gigolos you’re bringing into my son’s presence.’

Holly just threw back her head and laughed.

‘You’re being serious, aren’t you?’ she asked, when Daniel didn’t join in her spontaneous outburst. Daniel said nothing. He just watched her closely. Monitoring her.

‘Jesus. You have a colosseum-sized double standard going on here. Have I once ever said anything about your choice of partner being in my son’s presence? No, I bloody well haven’t.’

‘But you already know Miranda,’ Daniel pointed out, trying to sound reasonable. He knew Holly had a point, but the fact remained, he knew nothing about this Jake character and she knew a darn sight more about Miranda.

‘Exactly. And I still don’t like her or trust her with Harry. But who you date, or get married to for that matter, is fundamentally your business, and I would never have the audacity to play the Harry card on you simply because I don’t happen to like the idea of Miranda as Harry’s stepmother,’ Holly said forcefully. ‘Thankfully,’ she continued, ‘Harry’s a pretty good judge of character—and so far, he hasn’t warmed too much to the future Mrs Madison.’

‘No doubt as a result of some active persuasion from his mother,’ Daniel retorted bitterly.

‘How dare you! I haven’t said a
thing
about her to him… other than when he asked me about why she had such “pointy boobies”,’ Holly added, lowering her voice. ‘I think that’s the only time she ever even came up in conversation.’

‘Ahh, yes. The “cold” comment,’ Daniel said, remembering his earlier conversation with Harry in the car.

‘Yes, cold. As in the opposite of hot,’ Holly said, speaking slowly, as though to an infant.

‘If you say so,’ Daniel said as their lunch arrived, bringing a welcome pause to the steadily increasing pressure of their discussion.

‘He’s a little boy, for Christ’s sake! He hasn’t got a clue what all the various meanings of
cold
as an adjective are,’ Holly hissed at him once the waitress had departed.

‘Like I said: if you say so,’ Daniel repeated. He knew he was behaving like a juvenile, but he seemed unable to rein it in. Holly seemed to bring out his latent teenager.

‘Harry!’ Holly shouted. ‘Lunch is here!’

‘In a minute!’ Harry shouted back with a huge grin on his face, and began scaling what he referred to as ‘the big boy slide’ for the umpteenth time.

‘No,
now
. Get your bottom over here this instant and do as you’re told,’ Holly rattled off sharply at him. Harry’s head whipped round and his little face looked like it had been slapped. He looked utterly lost as to what he’d done wrong to warrant such a severe response from his mum.

‘It’ll get cold,’ Holly added, and began cutting up Harry’s food haphazardly. Harry gingerly walked to the table and climbed onto his chair, looking backwards and forwards between his parents for a sign of reassurance. He wasn’t getting anything from his mother, so Daniel gave him a wink, which Holly thankfully didn’t notice. Although not totally reassured, that friendly wink seemed to get Harry to pick up his fork and start attacking his lunch with gusto. Daniel breathed a sigh of relief that the boy knew not to antagonise Holly any further in that moment.

How had this happened? They’d been having a nice time. Daniel had been enjoying himself, until he’d brought up the seemingly touchy subject of love lives. Now it felt like the whole day had descended into an awkward misery as they sat in an uncomfortable silence, chomping away robotically on their food. Harry was clearly ill at ease, and the way Holly stabbed around angrily and skewered the pasta on her plate, it looked like she was imagining poking Daniel’s eyes out. Daniel wanted to take it all back. He wanted to take back his teasing about this Jake character, and revert back to having a nice time. If he thought about things rationally, he knew he’d picked a fight, and he knew Holly was right about him having double standards. But knowing this didn’t make it any easier to accept that Holly was seeing someone. Daniel couldn’t explain why this fact irked him so, but it did. He explained away his feelings to himself as perfectly natural, considering they were still technically married and that this was all still new to him. He just needed some time to adjust, and then he could get back on track with his life. In the meantime, he knew he was going to have to do something he rarely even contemplated, let alone actually performed: Apologise.

‘Holly, I’m sorry,’ Daniel began, uttering what were, to him, alien words. ‘I was out of order before. You’re right, it really is none of my business. I’ve known I was a dad for all of five minutes and I guess I got carried away with my paternal duties.’

‘I’ll say,’ Holly said, rolling her eyes, but at least she had finally spoken.

‘Truce?’ he offered, giving her his most charming smile.

‘Okay,’ she eventually sighed. Holly had never been one to hold a grudge for too long. Some things were still the same.

‘Can I ask you something?’ she asked quietly as they finished up their food. Harry was given permission to return to his playground, although now under strict instructions not to make himself sick.

‘Sure,’ Daniel replied, glad that the atmosphere had lifted.

‘How do you feel about your mother, now that you know that she kept our whereabouts from you?’ She looked at him carefully, clearly measuring his response to her personal question. And as far as Daniel was concerned, it was an
incredibly
personal question. He paused to reflect what his true feelings were for a moment. If truth be told, it wasn’t a subject he chose to dwell on all that frequently.

‘There’s not much point in hating her, is there?’ he asked rhetorically, half-laughing to himself. ‘What’s done is done. I suppose she had her reasons… and I presume she acted out of love for me and what she thought was the right thing to do, at the time. However misguided her actions were, she was still my mum. Even if I don’t agree with everything she did.’

‘You sound very reasonable about it,’ Holly said. ‘What about Harry? How do you feel about him?’ Holly asked tentatively.

‘All I can do, here on in, is make up for lost time,’ he replied earnestly, meeting her eye. ‘Meeting Harry and spending time with him has confirmed that I want to be in his life. I can’t stand the thought of him growing up thinking that I don’t care, or didn’t want to know him.’ A small smile escaped Holly’s lips. Maybe he was still partially in her bad books, but he could see that she was beginning to thaw.

‘More than anything,’ Daniel continued, ‘I feel guilty. I shouldn’t have listened to my mother in the first place. I shouldn’t have given up looking for you. I should have kept on searching. Who knows how things would have panned out if I’d found you sooner?’ He gave Holly a meaningful look. She seemed to colour under the heat of his gaze, and began rummaging around in her handbag. Daniel smiled to himself and felt secretly proud that he could still make her blush. Deciding to save her any further embarrassment, Daniel headed off for the big boy slide to give Harry a run for his money.

It was already mid-afternoon, and the day was evaporating into thin air as far as Daniel was concerned. They’d all survived the hiccup at lunchtime and were now back to having fun and enjoying being outside on a gorgeous sunny day. Holly had promised Harry a duck-feeding session, so rather than go back to the car and home, they’d gone for a walk down a country lane in search of a pond and, hopefully, some ducks. It was idyllic. A perfect Saturday afternoon with family, giving Daniel a glimpse at what might have been if he had continued his search for Holly and his baby five years earlier.

‘Ducks!’ Harry exclaimed, pointing frantically down from the bridge they were crossing, into a little stream.

‘At last,’ Daniel said, for Harry’s benefit. ‘It feels like we’ve been trekking for absolutely
hours
.’

‘We
have
, Daddy. It’s been nine hours since lunch, and I’m starving,’ Harry said, exaggerating just a little.

‘Let’s have a rest down on the bank, then,’ Holly suggested. ‘Maybe I have a snack in my bag somewhere, and I know there’s plenty of bread for the hungry ducks. Unless you have to be getting going?’ Holly asked, looking up at Daniel.