Over You (9 page)

Nell hesitated. ‘I’m not sure,’ she replied. ‘I could hardly think straight, my hangover was such a shocker, so the whole thing rather passed me by. But it did feel as if there was a bit of a strange atmosphere. Tense.’ She shrugged, then nudged Josie. ‘What, do you think she’s got a bit of a crush on your Pete or something? D’you reckon there was a stash of love poems under her bed as well?’

Josie wrinkled her nose. ‘No, I . . .’ She felt stupid for having asked the question now. ‘It was probably nothing. I’d only just woken up, maybe I was reading too much into it. She seemed a bit . . . defensive, that’s all. Like I’d rattled her.’ She tried to remember the expression that had flitted across Lisa’s face, but it was hard to dredge it up in her mind now. Then a thought struck her. ‘Oh God! I wasn’t thinking. Maybe she was being cool with me after all the Nick stuff last night!’

Nell nodded sagely. ‘Could have been. It did go a bit heavy, didn’t it?’ She rolled her eyes in a comical way. ‘I bet Nick’s ears were well and truly on fire, with all that arguing over him.’

‘It wasn’t arguing over
him
, it was just a drunken lapse,’ Josie retaliated. ‘It wasn’t like either of us still carry a torch for him.’

‘Well, I dunno,’ Nell put in. ‘Lisa seemed very touchy on the subject.’

‘Mmm,’ Josie said. The more Josie thought about it, the more her hunch seemed plausible. ‘All the more reason why that must have been it – the tension this morning, I mean. She woke up, remembered the set-to with me and was feeling a bit humpy about it. Then I burst in, brandishing Pete’s photo in her face all accusingly, and . . .’ She giggled, relieved that she’d worked it out. ‘No wonder she wasn’t exactly chummy.’

Nell raised an eyebrow. ‘By Jove, I think she’s got it. Listen, I’d better fly, anyway. Back to my mum’s for the Spanish Inquisition on why I haven’t settled down with my two-point-two children and mortgage and sensible job yet . . . God, how am I going to cope?’

Josie laughed. ‘You don’t have to,’ she reminded her. ‘Spare room at ours whenever you need it.’

Nell gave her a last hug. ‘Mrs Winter, you are too kind,’ she said. ‘I’ll probably be on your doorstep before the week’s out.’

An hour or so later, Josie pushed open the front door and dropped her bags. ‘Hello! I’m back!’ she called. ‘Anybody home?’

There was silence. Not the breathless, we’re-hiding kind of silence she knew from the boys, but a proper, dense, nobody-in absence of sound. ‘Oh,’ Josie said aloud. She glanced back out of the front door, and realized that Pete’s car wasn’t on the driveway. She’d been so excited about surprising them with her appearance she hadn’t even noticed.

She closed the door, unable to keep her shoulders from slumping. It was something of an anti-climax, coming back to find nobody home. Her arms swung empty where she’d hoped they’d be full of her boys and man. Where were they?

Maybe they’d all gone out to pick up a Sunday paper and some milk. Or maybe, as it was sunny, Pete had taken them to the adventure playground, and any minute now they’d come belting back in for lunch. So in the meantime she should make the most of it, have a quiet coffee, sit in the garden on her own and enjoy the peace and quiet.

The answerphone was bleeping, she realized. Maybe Pete had left her a message telling her to come and meet them somewhere?

Beep!
‘Hi, it’s me, Lisa. I’ve been trying your mobile but couldn’t get through. Give me a ring when you get this, OK? Bye.’
Beep!

Josie pressed Delete. She was always doing that, leaving her mobile off. She’d call later – she’d probably just left a pair of dirty knickers under the bed or something equally classy. Now . . . coffee. A strong one was definitely in order. Her hangover was still thundering about in her head, stubbornly resisting the Nurofen she’d thrown at it back in London.

She walked into the kitchen – and groaned out loud. What a tip! The breakfast things were still all over the place, the washing machine had finished its run and needed emptying, and . . . Josie’s eyes locked on to it and she let out a moan of dismay. She could see a wet, beige mass through its door and knew straight away what it was. Her bloody Miss Hoolie coat, which she’d put in to wash yesterday morning!

She tutted in annoyance as she went to wrench the door open. Ugh! So the whole load of wet washing had been sat here all day yesterday, and overnight! It smelled damp and mouldy already, and would need rinsing all over again. Bloody hell! Couldn’t Pete have hung it out? Was he really that incapable of doing a bit of housework off his own bat? When she’d specifically phoned to remind him as well!

Sighing, she turned the dial to Rinse and switched it on. The machine hummed into life and water poured into its drum. Honestly! What a welcome home. No hugs, no ‘Missed you’s, just yesterday’s washing to redo. Great. Thanks for that, Pete. Missed you too, sweetie.

Josie filled the kettle and put it on to boil. Then she went to get her favourite mug out of the cupboard, the one the boys had decorated in red and khaki splodges at a pottery-painting shop last year. But it wasn’t there. She swivelled back towards the sink . . . to see it dumped on a toast plate, waiting to be washed.

Her eyes narrowed and she stormed over. The mug still had a lipstick print on one side, and a swirl of cold tea at the bottom. For goodness’ sake – it hadn’t been washed since she’d used it yesterday morning! What was Pete playing at? The breakfast things piled up at the sink were from
yesterday
– they’d obviously been left there all night!

Josie filled the washing-up bowl with hot water and squirted in some Fairy. Out of habit, she began sorting the glasses to go in first, then the plates . . .

Hold on. Something was wrong. The breakfast things were all here from yesterday, yes – but nothing else. No lunch plates with uneaten sandwich crusts, or empty yogurt pots. And no dinner plates either, smeared with sauce, or bedtime milk cups.

She ran to the fridge door and pulled it open. Three cartons of spaghetti bolognese stood exactly where she’d unpacked them, on the middle shelf. Josie stared at their cheerful packaging, taken aback. So . . . if Pete and the boys hadn’t eaten here since breakfast yesterday, where had they been? And where were they now?

Her mind in a whirl, she raced upstairs to the boys’ bedroom. Their beds hadn’t been slept in, and the bedtime teds were missing. Some of the drawers were pulled out at angles, as if clothes had been taken from them hastily.

What was going on? Where
was
everybody?

Horrible thoughts collided in Josie’s head, and she grabbed at the chest of drawers, feeling giddy. Oh Christ! The boys had been rushed into hospital after some horrible injury, and Pete hadn’t had time to leave her a note. He’d slept on the floor next to their hospital beds and—

No, stop. He’d sent her that text, hadn’t he?
All fine.

Maybe Pete had run away with them. He’d taken them off to live somewhere else with him, because . . . Well, why? Why would he do that?

Oh, no – what if they had been abducted at gunpoint? What if someone had broken into the house yesterday, just after she’d left, and . . .

‘Hello? Josie? Are you back?’

Josie thought she might pass out in relief at Pete’s voice calling up the stairs. ‘Yes – where have you
been
?’ she cried, stumbling out of the room. ‘I was starting to worry, I was . . .’

‘Mum!’

‘Mummy!’

And there they were, shock-headed and grinning, her sons, her darlings. She raced down the stairs as they scrambled up, meeting them in the middle in a tangle of hugs.

‘Oh, I’ve missed you!’ she cried, sitting on a step and kissing them in turn, her arms tight around them. Their hot breath on her neck, their pulses against her skin, their soft hair on her cheek . . . it was heaven. And to think that for a moment she’d been imagining . . .

‘So where
were
you?’ she asked, looking up at last.

‘We went to Nanny’s,’ Toby told her, bouncing on her leg. ‘And she gave us sweeties!’

‘To Nanny’s?’ Josie echoed in surprise. ‘Did you really?’

‘And we helped her make biscuits,’ Sam said, pressing himself into her side. ‘I made a specially nice one for you, Mum. Only I ate a little bit in the car because I was hungry. One teeny nibble.’

‘No, it wasn’t! It was two nibbles. It was seven nibbles,’ Toby said.

‘Well, thanks anyway, sweetheart,’ Josie replied automatically, but she was hardly listening. Since when had Pete been planning to take them to Barbara’s anyway? Why hadn’t he said anything?

She got to her feet, unwinding herself from the boys after a last squeeze, and stepped down towards Pete. ‘Hiya,’ she said, hugging him. ‘I thought you were going to do stuff here this weekend?’

He held her for a moment. ‘The car packed up,’ he said. She could feel his throat vibrate as he spoke into her hair. ‘And rather than have the boys hanging around with me in the garage while I waited for it to be fixed, I thought they’d have more fun at my mum’s, so I took them there, and . . .’

‘Oh, right,’ Josie said. ‘What’s wrong with the car?’

Pete launched into a long description of something technical that went straight over Josie’s head, as he steered her into the kitchen. ‘Anyway, enough about that boring stuff,’ he said. ‘Sorry it’s a mess in here, by the way, I wasn’t expecting you back yet.’ He flashed her a smile. ‘But how was your weekend? Did you do anything outrageous?’

Josie smiled faintly. ‘Not quite,’ she said. ‘It was great. It was just a bit weird, coming back to . . .’ She waved a hand over the dirty dishes, and the spinning washing machine. ‘Well, this lot. I was getting panicked, thinking you’d all run off together or something.’

He was still smiling at her, but she didn’t feel reassured. In fact, if she was honest, there was a small part of her that felt let down. She’d been really looking forward to Pete experiencing boy-care single-handedly for a day, just so that he’d realize it wasn’t quite as easy as he thought. She’d been half hoping to come back to him groaning and saying,
How
do
you do it, every day of the week? Looking after them for just twenty-four hours has brought me to my knees! You are a saint! A goddess among mothers!
, etc. Obviously not.

The boys galloped into the kitchen at that moment and insisted on unpacking their overnight bags to show her the biscuits they’d made and the drawings they’d done and . . .

Something was bothering Josie. Something was nagging away at the back of her mind, but she couldn’t quite reach it. And then, before she could even properly try, she was having to admire the drawings and biscuits and everything else, and lunch was demanded as they were starving, THIS hungry, and then the thought was gone, spun away from her in the whirlwind of everything else.

It wasn’t until that evening, when the boys were in bed cosy and kissed, both still clutching their new dinosaurs as they drifted into sleep, that Josie’s thoughts turned, with a shiver of excitement, to Rose. She’d already done the maths. If Rose were to be conceived sometime over the next few days, she’d be born in February next year. Lovely. Not too close to Christmas, not too near the boys’ birthday (April) either, not too late in the school year to be the youngest in the class . . .

And oh, she and Rose would be able to snuggle up and see the winter out together, warm at home for a while, before spring burst into bloom. Josie could imagine herself pushing along one of those Silver Cross Mary Poppins prams with a darling dimpled face peeping out at her from the pink blankets. And there she’d be, showing Rose the daffodils and spring lambs, lying her on a blanket in the back garden when it was warmer, watching her bend and kick those gorgeous chubby thighs under the apple tree . . .

But she was running ahead of herself as usual. Mustn’t get her hopes up. She had to get pregnant first, and that was taking long enough . . .

Josie undressed quickly, swapping her plain cotton knickers and bra for a pretty pink matching set, all lace and ribbons to undo – Pete could never resist those – before dressing again, with a little smile on her face. She squirted some perfume into her cleavage, and tried to muss up her hair into a sexy, tousled look.

She hummed to herself as she went downstairs. The weekend now felt like the best kind of catalyst for their new improved lives. She’d broached the subject of taking a trip abroad, all together, while the boys had been having tea, and they’d been wildly excited, even if Pete had seemed more reluctant.

‘Well . . . I’m not sure if, financially . . .’

‘We can borrow some money,’ Josie had interjected. ‘Let’s just go and have some fun, and pay it back later! Australia would be amazing, wouldn’t it? What do you reckon, boys, fancy seeing some kangaroos bouncing about?’

‘Yeah! Cool!’ the boys had shouted. ‘And polar bears!’

‘They don’t live in Australia,’ Josie had laughed. ‘Polar bears live in the Arctic.’

Pete was tight-mouthed. ‘Australia? That would cost a fortune! There’s no way we could afford that, Josie, absolutely no way!’

‘Well, somewhere nearer then. Thailand sounds exciting. Or South Africa.’

‘Disneyland!’ Toby put in at once.

‘Or India . . .’ Josie suggested, imagining the four of them riding a bejewelled elephant.

‘You know what my stomach’s like,’ Pete had moaned. ‘I’ll have the trots the whole time if we go to Asia. And what about all the gun crime in South Africa? It’s far too dangerous. What’s got into you, Josie?’