Private Lives

Chapter 9

Rosie tries on a few different outfits, eventually settling on a fitted knee-length crêpe dress she remembers her own mum wearing in the nineties. Greer is sitting on the bed, attempting to untangle a large clump of beaded necklaces.

Rosie looks at herself in the mirror and she can admit, in the right light and from the right angle, she looks good.

She picks up her phone to see if Seb’s been in touch, opens Instagram and is immediately distracted by the computer-generated photos Maggie has posted, plans for the new gallery.

She shakes herself to bring her back from Sydney to Waverly again. ‘Where’s your dad?’ Seb went for a run over an hour ago and they’re due to leave for the restaurant in fifteen minutes. The phone rings, but instead of Seb, it’s Anna. Again. She’s tried to call twice already; clearly whatever she wants isn’t going away. Rosie squeezes her phone between her shoulder and ear.

‘Ro, hi, babe.’ Anna’s tense, her voice strained. ‘You OK …?’

Usually, she doesn’t wait for a response, but tonight she does.

‘I’m fine, thanks, Anna. Why?’

‘Just checking that you’re OK coming tonight …’

‘Why wouldn’t I be?’ Rosie frowns as she opens an old shoebox; it’s a pair of ancient leather brogues, not the silver boots she was hoping for.

‘I just have something I want to talk to you about – maybe we could walk to the restaurant together?’

‘Fine. I can ditch Seb, but I will have Sylvie with me. I’m dropping her at a sleepover on the way.’

‘Oh.’ Whatever it is Anna wants to talk about, she clearly doesn’t want Sylvie within earshot.

‘What is it, Anna?’ Rosie’s body tightens as Seb, sweaty and breathing hard, walks into the bedroom, already peeling off his damp running top.

‘Daddy!’ Greer squeals, jumping to stand on the bed. ‘Daddy’s home!’ On the other end of the line, Rosie knows Anna is listening.

Rosie moves past Seb and Greer, out into the hall.

Once she has more privacy, she whispers into the phone, ‘Anna, what’s this about? Has something happened?’

When Anna speaks again, she sounds small, far away. ‘Oh, no, no, nothing. I just wanted to talk to you about this silly falling out I’ve had.’

‘Well, you can tell me tonight, can’t you?’ Rosie suggests as Anna says at the same time, ‘I should finish getting ready, see you there.’

And suddenly, Anna’s gone.

Seb carries Sylvie’s rucksack and is silent on the short walk to her sleepover. Just as Sylvie disappears into her friend’s house, Seb pulls his eldest daughter in for a hug, whispering something in her ear, Sylvie replying, ‘Me too, Dad.’

As the lights from the restaurant come into view, Rosie knows Seb is miles away; she’s walking next to an empty body. It’s frightening. She doesn’t think as she reaches out for his hand. Her touch brings him back and he looks sad, incredibly sad. She’s about to ask him what’s wrong when he says, ‘I love you, Rosie.’

His intensity makes her laugh a little.

‘You do know that, don’t you?’

‘Yes, I know, Seb. I do.’

He nods, lets their hands drop, and whatever it is that’s going on with him, Rosie has a feeling that she’s about to find out.

‘Hi, Rosie. Hi, Seb.’ Abi’s gorgeous in minimal eye make-up and bright-red lips. Rosie had fantasized about her and Abi being close friends, but Abi has essentially ghosted her. Tonight, an iPad tucked under her arm, Abi hardly looks at Seb. Instead, she fixes her eyes on Rosie as she asks, ‘How’ve you been?’ She’s professional, exuding a quiet confidence.

‘Fine, thanks, fine.’ Rosie feels like she’s tripping up inside herself. Had she done something without realizing it, to make Abi act so cold suddenly? Or is Abi like this with other people, too?

But Abi’s all smiles as she says, ‘Here, let me take your coats.’

Once they’ve gone through the clumsy coat-removing motions, Abi says, ‘Eddy and Anna are already here, so just follow me.’

Lotte’s given them a prominent table in the middle of the small restaurant. As she follows Abi, Rosie immediately notices that their table is strangely silent. Their friends turn to look at them as they approach. Eddy and Anna, usually the first to speak, look away, grimacing at the sight of them. Eddy drinks his wine and Anna looks at her hands folded on her lap.

‘Hi, guys,’ Rosie says, frowning, and they both look up, nodding and mumbling polite hellos as Rosie and Seb take their seats. Once seated, they turn towards Abi standing under a soft spotlight, the only one seemingly at ease.

‘So delighted you’re all here,’ she says, looking them all in the eye. ‘Your menus are on the table.’ And while Abi tells them about the specials and the free opening-night cocktail, Rosie looks around the group.

Anna is scowling, like she’s trying to stop herself from spitting in Abi’s calm face. Eddy is scratching at something invisible on the tablecloth in front of him. And Seb, opposite her, looks like he’s about to puke.

No one is behaving normally and it’s in that moment that Rosie knows she is alone. Alone in her confusion, alone in her ignorance. She looks to Seb and he’s staring directly at her, directly into her, and he smiles but it doesn’t make her feel any better.

‘I hope you all have a wonderful evening!’ Abi concludes before walking away, shoulders back, head high, towards a newly arrived couple at the door.

Left alone, the friends size each other up as if they were strangers.

‘Isn’t it amazing what they’ve done to this place?’ Rosie says, looking at Anna who still has thunder in her eyes.

‘Yeah, it looks great,’ Anna replies flatly, glancing around briefly. No one is talking as their waiter arrives with their free cocktails. Eddy finishes his wine, immediately picking up the martini glass that’s placed in front of him.

‘What shop was it before? I can’t remember,’ Rosie asks out of desperation, before Anna picks up her hint and the two of them quietly start rowing about whether the unit used to be a craft shop or a newsagent’s. Seb looks around, almost as though he’s checking how and where to make an emergency exit.

Suddenly, Richard and Lotte appear by their table in a great puff of ego and cologne. Richard puts his hand on Rosie’s upper back; his palm burns through the fabric of her dress. They’re grinning from ear to ear and Rosie wonders if they’ve taken something as Richard exclaims, ‘Wonderful to see you lovely people here!’

Lotte makes a great show of going around the table, kissing each of them, chattering the whole time, not pausing for breath, until she gets to Seb and, making sure the whole table can hear, she says, ‘Mr Kent, headmaster, absolute legend!’

Then Richard slaps his forehead and says, ‘Mate! I’m so sorry, I’ve been meaning to message and say I’m so glad the sports pavilion is finally being sorted out. All my not-so-subtle hinting finally worked, I guess. I want to give you something to say thank you. Let’s have a bottle of champagne, shall we?’ He nods at Abi and says, ‘Champagne, please, Abi – a bottle and six glasses.’

Seb mumbles something about it not having much to do with him, that the staff and students were the ones who … but Lotte waves his modesty away with a manicured hand – ‘Oh, pfff’ – and Richard starts telling Seb how next he hopes he’ll get rid of grumpy old Mrs Greene. ‘Early retirement, maybe?’

They don’t notice as Eddy stands, a little unsteady, and starts to walk towards the toilets. Rosie watches as Anna leaps up after him and, just before he goes into the men’s, pulls his arm. They’re in the middle of an argument, that’s clear, but whether it’s about how pissed Eddy already is or something else, Rosie can’t tell.

Then Abi appears back at the table, obscuring Rosie’s view, condensation dripping from the bottle of champagne she’s holding. She opens it in one smooth motion.

‘So cool,’ Lotte says, like she’s flirting. ‘Wish I could open champagne like that! You’ll have to teach me one day, Abs.’

Abi smiles, a little taut, replies with a wink, ‘Lots of practice.’

She’s about to place the bottle on the table next to the champagne flutes but Lotte says, ‘Pour it out, would you, Abs?’

Rosie wants to tell Lotte to be more respectful because now, being back in the same room as Abi, Rosie is still drawn to her. She watches her pour, froth billowing up the glasses, and Rosie feels again with certainty that tonight, something’s going to change.

The evening inches along. Eddy, Anna and Seb stare at each other blankly, like they’re engaged in some intense poker game. The food arrives, and it is – as promised – magnificent, which is a relief as it gives them something to talk about. Towards the end of the meal, Rosie decides she’s had just the right amount of wine, she’s feeling bold enough to go and talk to Abi. Either she’ll clear the air and find out she was being paranoid all along or Abi can tell her to her face why she’s suddenly stopped messaging her, why she didn’t say anything about the emails she’d exchanged with Seb.

‘Just going to the loo,’ she tells the table as she stands, already looking around for Abi, but she can’t see her. Suddenly, there’s a hand pulling her arm and Rosie turns, hoping it’s Abi but finding Anna.

Anna’s flushed face is staring up at Rosie. ‘Ro, babe,’ she says, her eyes filling with tears, ‘we have to talk.’

Rosie backs away from her, shaking her head because Anna’s unsmiling, so serious, and whatever it is, Rosie doesn’t want it. She feels her heart pulse in her temples as she walks quickly back to the table. Anna is still at her side and Seb’s also staring at her, his face full of sorrow. She realizes it then: whatever it is, this thing, Seb knows it too.

‘You guys ready to order pudding?’ Eddy’s voice is thick with wine, but everyone ignores him. Seb gently pulls Rosie away from Anna, towards the door, grabbing their coats from their hooks. Everything and everyone passes Rosie by in a blur on their way out.

Then they’re outside and it’s just the two of them and Seb is trying to pull her away, further away from the restaurant, but this isn’t what Rosie wants. She doesn’t want to be dragged or pulled any more. She twists her arm, yanking it away from Seb. ‘What the hell is going on, Seb? Why is everyone so strange tonight?’

‘I’m going to tell you, Rosie. I want to tell you everything,’ he says, glancing back to the restaurant like he’s worried they’re about to be set upon by their friends, ‘but not here. Please, we have to go home.’

‘No, Seb. Whatever it is, judging by tonight, it seems Eddy and Anna already know.’

Seb looks to the sky and then to the ground, as though asking the great mystery above and below for answers. He swallows, looks at Rosie. ‘That night, when Abi was at ours …’

Rosie doesn’t say anything, she just stares at him, watches him collapse a little more with every word.

‘We’d met before. Abi and I.’

‘At school?’ Rosie hears herself, a little desperate now.

‘No. We met a few months ago. Twice. In London.’

He can’t look at her and she can feel his shame and suddenly Rosie sees it. She sees it all.

‘You had sex with her,’ she states, her mouth dry and hard.

Seb nods his head, his eyes fixed on the ground.

‘You love her,’ she says, a statement, because she’s done with questions, done with others having control.

At last, he meets her eye. ‘No, Rosie. I promise you. It wasn’t an affair.’

‘I don’t believe you.’

‘It wasn’t an affair, Rosie. Because …’ He whispers, ‘I paid her.’

Rosie feels the earth beneath her tilt at a new angle and everything goes quiet. For a moment it’s a wonderful relief but then she stumbles, and Seb leans forward to steady her as Rosie hears herself scream, ‘You paid her? You fucking paid her?’

Somehow Eddy and Anna are there already, disgust twisting their mouths and Anna asking again and again, ‘What? What did you say, Ro? Ro! What did you just say?!’

Seb’s reaching for her now and she pulls her arm away hard, shouting, ‘Don’t you touch me! Don’t you fucking touch me,’ and Anna’s by her side again and she’s crying and screaming at Seb to get the fuck off Rosie and Seb’s saying, ‘Calm down, Anna, you need to calm down.’

Which makes Eddy lurch forward and, pointing a sloppy finger at his friend, say, ‘Back off, Seb. Anna’s just being a good friend.’

And suddenly Richard is standing at the top of the steps, outside the restaurant, and calling, ‘Oi, what’s going on? What about the bill?’

Everyone is shouting and no one notices as Rosie turns and starts to run.

She runs without knowing where she’s running to. Pedestrians step into the road to let her pass, shaking their heads at the unpleasantness, the shock of a middle-aged woman who has clearly lost control, a woman who should know better. Rosie doesn’t care. She runs until her heart screams and her body shakes. She realizes she’s close to the train station. She envisions herself getting on a train, escaping, leaving Waverly and everyone in it behind. It is the only thing she can think about, this need to leave.

It starts to rain, and she starts running again. The first ticket machine is broken. She kicks it and moves on to the next. Without looking at the time she buys a ticket to London and runs down the ramp to the platform. It’s only then that she notices that the platform and the one opposite are empty, that the whole station is deserted. The only movement is the text from the service announcements, scrolling along the station screens. She glances down at her ticket, realizes she’s just missed the last train.

She bows her head, the rain like tiny, cold kisses on her scalp, and she feels something break within her. She turns her face to the chilly night sky and makes a strange, high-pitched groan. Her rage is ancient and brand new, it’s hers alone and belongs to every woman who has ever lived, it is in every fibre of her being and it’s in every breath of air she breathes. It burns out of her in great fiery clouds, and she lets it, at last, at long last, rip through her. Her shouts and screams change shape, soften a little, and suddenly she’s crying, silent racking sobs that feel like they could crack the fragile basket of her ribs in two. She stumbles to a bench; it’s soaking, but she doesn’t care. She lies down, her cheek pressed against the sodden wooden slats, and she lets the rain and her tears fall together.

‘Excuse me, sorry, are you OK?’

From where she’s lying on the bench, she sees his sensible-looking black boots first and then his high-vis jacket. The security guard is young, still spotty, using a gloved hand to shield his face from the rain.

Rosie doesn’t want to scare him, so she sits up, her wet hair sticking to the side of her face. He bends down a little so he can see her. ‘Sorry, but you’re not allowed to sleep here,’ he says, loud and slow, like he assumes she can’t understand him.

‘I wasn’t sleeping,’ Rosie says, ‘I was crying.’

‘Oh.’ He takes a step back, rummaging in his pocket until he finds what he’s looking for. ‘Here,’ he says, thrusting a card towards her. It’s rain-splattered but Rosie can read the words, ‘Desperate? Suicidal? Alone? Whatever you’re going through, we’ll listen.’

‘The number is on the card,’ he says, still enunciating every word, ‘but you can’t cry here.’

It’s only when she’s standing outside the train station again that she realizes she’s soaking and numb with cold. The streets are empty now and for the second time that night she starts moving without knowing where she’s going. It’s a new loneliness, not knowing where to go so her heart can break.

She’s only been stumbling for a few minutes when a woman shouts from the other side of the road, ‘Rosie? Rosie, is that you?’

Anna discards her umbrella as she runs across the road towards her, Eddy a few paces behind.

Rosie’s too numb to push her away so she lets Anna hug her.

‘Shit, you’re freezing. Ed, take your jacket off. Quickly!’

Rosie can’t do anything as her own unbuttoned, wet coat is pulled from her shoulders and Anna wraps her in Eddy’s body-warm wool coat.

Anna’s hand rubs circles on her back; it’s supposed to be comforting but it just stirs up Rosie’s rage.

‘God, we’ve been so worried,’ Anna says. ‘Where’ve you been?’

Rosie shakes her head: it doesn’t matter.

‘Come on, I’m taking you back to ours.’

And with Anna hugging her arm on one side and Eddy on the other, Rosie lets herself be led like a fugitive with two arresting officers. Anna, with strange joviality, chatters away, telling her the places they’ve been looking for her, that they were close to calling the police, while Eddy, with his arm around Rosie for warmth, makes a phone call. ‘Seb, hi, we’ve got her. Yep, wet and cold but think she’s OK. We’re taking her back to ours. Yup, OK, I’ll be in touch later, then.’

As Rosie listens, she realizes that this is what’s been happening for who knows how long. Have her friends been talking about her, privately laughing – ‘Poor Rosie!’ – while she blindly blundered on?

She stops walking. ‘You knew. You both knew what he’d done.’

For the first time, she looks at them, notices the panic crackle between them.

‘Let’s get you warm and dry first and then, if you want, we can talk, OK?’ They try to pull her along, but Rosie can’t move; she won’t be their prize.

‘No. I want to talk now.’ She looks directly at Anna, make-up melting down her face. ‘You knew, you both knew?’

Anna glances, briefly desperate, at Eddy, who gets the hint and says, ‘We didn’t know she was a prostitute, Ro.’

‘But you knew he’d had sex with her, and you didn’t tell me?’ Rosie would shake them if she wasn’t so cold, wasn’t shaking so much herself.

‘When we were in the sauna, Lotte called. She mentioned that Seb went to the restaurant to talk with Abi. She said it felt like a row. That’s when we figured it out but, Ro, I promise, I tried to tell you earlier tonight – when I called? But Greer was there and … Eddy wouldn’t let me tell you any sooner. He wanted to give Seb the chance to come clean first.’

Eddy, sober now, looks sharply at Anna. Rosie turns to him. ‘Was it you, Eddy? Did you tell him to pay for the shag he couldn’t get from his frigid wife?’

‘Ro, no, please don’t—’

‘Tell me!’

‘I had no idea, Rosie. I think what he’s done is disgusting, I do. There’s no excuse. I’m ashamed of him.’

Rosie looks at him, sees the way he squirms away from meeting her eye, the way Anna is frowning at Eddy, and she realizes there’s no love here, not between any of them. There can’t be with all this anger and mistrust.

‘What kind of friends are you?’ She pulls her arm from Anna’s, moving away from them both.

‘Rosie, we need to keep going, please, you’re freezing …’

‘I’m not going with you.’

‘What?’ Eddy glances nervously at Anna.

‘I don’t want to be near you. Either of you.’

‘Rosie, come on, that’s a bit dramatic …’

‘Don’t you fucking dare call me dramatic!’ Rosie’s voice is a shriek. ‘You came into my house, Eddy, you were with my kids, and all the while you knew what he’d done and you said nothing?’

Eddy looks at the ground.

‘Anna, you could have told me on my own. You could at least have let me have that.’

Anna starts crying, which makes Rosie want to scream in her face, but instead she says, ‘Tell Seb I’ll get a room at the Travelodge. Tell him I don’t want to see him. That I’ll come home tomorrow. When I’m ready.’ She takes out her phone and searches for the number for the hotel.

‘Rosie, it’s late, you don’t have any stuff … There might not be a room …’

But someone, thank God, answers and her voice only shakes a little as she asks, ‘Oh, hi there, please can you let me know if you have a room available for tonight?’

She lets Anna and Eddy walk her the short distance to the hotel, but she won’t talk, won’t answer any of their questions. Eddy reluctantly takes his coat back as Rosie goes to get her key. The receptionist smirks at her wild hair, her running make-up, and Rosie smirks back, emboldened by the drama of it all. As the door clicks shut behind her in her small, blank room Rosie’s heart fills with pain and suddenly she realizes it was always there. This feeling, the subtle vibration that she was being lied to, that she’d tried to ignore for so long. But now there’s no hiding because there’s no one she can call, no one who can help. She’s alone with it now and all she can do is climb into the tightly made bed, curl up into a ball and let herself go.

Her phone wakes her, rattling on the table next to her head. Seeing it’s Anna, she doesn’t answer, but then a few seconds later the phone in her room starts ringing. Her children flash into her heart and with a heavy arm she lifts the receiver.

‘Good morning, it’s reception.’

It’s immediately clear from the receptionist’s chirpy tone that none of her children are in hospital or in danger.

‘Hi.’ Rosie’s voice is gruff from her night of crying.

‘Just to let you know that your friend is here and she’s … oh, hold on …’

On the other end, Rosie can hear Anna saying, ‘Tell her I don’t need to come up, tell her I’m only here to drop off a bag of stuff for her …’

‘She says she has a—’

Rosie cuts her off. ‘Can you leave the bag outside my room, please?’

And then she hangs up.

She thinks of her children. Panics that they’ll be worrying and feels herself harden against her own sorrow. She looks for her phone on the bedside table, but as soon as she picks it up, the battery goes dead.

She urgently wants to know the time so she can place her children in their Sunday morning, know whether Greer has had a good breakfast and if Heath will be out playing football already; will Sylvie be back, exhausted from her sleepover? Or will they be collapsed, sobbing, trying to understand what’s going on, why Rosie isn’t home? She opens her room door and there is Anna’s favourite overnight bag. She pulls it inside and rifles through it, ignoring a handwritten note, clothes and toiletries until she finds a phone charger.

As soon as her phone is plugged in, it lights up with a call. Seb. She pauses but the pull towards her children is even greater than her rage. She answers, ‘Seb,’ just as her son in his high voice says, ‘Mummy?’

Rosie’s heart somersaults and before she’s even said anything, he starts crying. As he sobs, she can’t help but lie to him: ‘It’s OK, my love, it’s all going to be OK.’

When he calms a little, he asks, ‘What’s happening, Mum, where are you?’ But Heath’s never been good at waiting for anything, so before she can answer he says, ‘Dad was standing in the garden this morning – I watched him. He’d been crying, Mum. He couldn’t stop. He said you’d had a row, that you would be back soon.’ Now Heath’s started talking, his words avalanche. ‘He keeps crying, Mum, I don’t know why. He’s let us watch TV for ages, which never, ever happens. He said he’d talk to us later, when you’re home and things are a bit clearer, so can you come back? Please. We just need to know what’s going on.’

She pictures him, standing in the corner of the kitchen, the phone pressed close to his mouth, his beautiful brown eyes full of too much worry for someone so young, and she aches to be with him. She swallows hard so she doesn’t cry and says, ‘OK, darling, I’m coming home, I’m coming home now.’

She showers quickly and dresses in Anna’s softest clothes, tucking her crumpled dress into the bottom of the bag and ignoring the receptionist as she rushes out into the grey, expressionless morning.

Heath is waiting for her at the front door when she arrives, and they hurry to hold each other. His body is tense, full of shock, and she tries to soften her own to calm him. Heath has always feared anything he can’t control. Across the road, their neighbour Martin, his youngest daughter hanging off his arm, calls her name. She waves, briefly, and says to Heath, ‘Come on, let’s go in.’

Heath holds on to her, like he’s worried she’ll make a run for it if he doesn’t cling on. The house feels empty even though it’s not. Greer has fallen into a slack-faced, wide-eyed trance in front of the TV. Rosie kisses her and now it’s Greer’s turn to cling to her. Upstairs, Rosie can hear Sylvie singing to herself. They’re all here. They’re all fine.

‘Dad’s probably still in the kitchen,’ Heath says, still holding her hand.

Rosie kisses Greer’s forehead again and gently pulls her hand away from Heath. ‘Give us a couple of minutes to talk, OK, sweethearts?’ Heath looks worried, thinking they’ll argue, that Rosie will run again, so she explains. ‘We need to talk so we can figure out if we’re ready to say sorry,’ she says and he nods in agreement before he slumps down on the sofa next to his little sister.

Seb is still in his pyjamas, sitting on the sofa in the extension, his legs wide and his elbows balanced on his knees, his fingers in his hair. He looks up at the sound of her footsteps and in his weary face Rosie sees her own fear and confusion reflected back. He stands up. ‘You’re here.’

‘Heath called.’

Seb pats his pockets, realizes he doesn’t have his phone. ‘I’m sorry, I didn’t know …’

‘Doesn’t matter.’ Rosie shakes her head; she doesn’t want to be distracted when they only have a few minutes to figure out how they’re going to break their children’s hearts. ‘They know something’s happened. We need to work out what to say.’

Seb nods. ‘I’ll go along with whatever you want to tell them.’

‘I want to tell the older two the truth,’ she says with a snap.

Rosie closes her eyes and hates Seb and what he’s done anew for putting her in this position. Because what, really, would her children do with the truth? She doesn’t even know if Heath knows what sex is yet. But they know what a liar is – how would it break them if they knew their daddy was one of the worst?

‘Wait,’ Rosie says, holding up her hand; she’s too angry to make such huge decisions. ‘I need more time.’

Seb nods.

They stand in silence before she asks, ‘What do you think would be best for them?’

Seb glances around the kitchen as though the answer might be hiding under the table or on top of the dresser. ‘I think we should buy time so you can figure out what you need.’

She wants to kick him, but instead her body sobs, ‘How?’

‘We confirm what they already know. That we’ve had an argument, but we’re trying to work it out.’

‘If we tell them that, they’ll panic, think we’re splitting up.’

Seb doesn’t say anything, and Rosie can’t bear to look at him, so she closes her eyes again as she says, ‘We’re going to do what we’ve always done.’

Seb widens his eyes, needs her to explain.

‘Pretend,’ she says, coldly.

Seb grimaces.

‘Don’t act like you don’t know how, Seb.’ He looks to his feet as she keeps instructing him. ‘We’ll pretend we’ve made up, that everything is normal, and we’ll put on a united front until we figure out how to tell them.’

‘How to tell them …’

‘That you’ve betrayed us all, that you’ve destroyed our marriage in the seediest way possible.’ She’s surprised the words come so easily. But isn’t this always the way? That the truest things are often astonishingly simple.

Seb lifts his hands to his temples to squeeze either side of his head. ‘It’s the worst feeling, knowing how much I’ve hurt all of you …’

‘Save it!’ she says, holding up her hand again. His mouth makes her feel physically sick. ‘You found her online, presumably?’

Seb looks at her, alarmed by this sudden change of topic. ‘Um, no, it was at that awards thing, with Eddy.’

Albie had been unwell, and Anna needed to stay with him so Seb had hired a tux and gone as Eddy’s plus-one.

‘One of Eddy’s bosses showed me her website,’ he mumbles, like this was all against his will, and Rosie wants to punch him right in his disgusting, lying, sucking mouth, imagines the crunch as his teeth loosen against her knuckles.

They both look up as Greer cries, ‘Mummmmmyyy,’ from the living room, already making her way down the hall towards the kitchen. ‘Heath just pinched me!’

‘I didn’t! She’s lying!’ He’s coming after his sister, because that’s what big brothers do, but also because he needs Rosie to deliver on her promise, to prove that everything is OK. They only have this moment, she knows, to convince them, so Rosie does the opposite of what she wants: she moves towards Seb and whispers quickly, before the kids arrive, ‘Stay at your mum’s. I don’t want you here.’

She keeps her hand on his back so when their children burst into the room, the first thing they see is their parents holding each other but they don’t hear as she whispers to him, ‘I’ll never forgive you for this.’

Greer claps her hands, delightedly shouts, ‘You’re friends again!’ She presses her little body against Rosie’s back to join in the hug and Heath does the same, and Rosie didn’t hear Sylvie come down the stairs but she’s there too, staring at them, unsure, before breaking into a grin and piling on. The kids start laughing and Rosie knows then that they believe everything is healed, and the five of them stay like that, clinging on to each other in the kitchen, until at last Heath, his voice muffled, asks, ‘What’s for lunch?’