22 Britannia Road - Amanda Hodgkinson [105]
What a fool he is. It’s probably been going on for months. He never once thought that Silvana could do something like this. How could he have been so blind?
He tries to pull up a dock weed, but its roots are stuck hard in the soil and he steps back onto a clump of his favourite irises, grinding them under his heel. One thing he is sure of: she won’t take his son away. Tony will not bring up his son.
‘You all right?’ Gilbert is looking over the fence. ‘Jan? You OK, mate?’
‘I’m very well,’ says Janusz.
‘Your missus home yet?’
‘No. But I’m expecting her. She’ll be back soon, thank you.’
He bows slightly and turns to go into the house, flattening a bed of lady’s mantle as he goes.
In the kitchen he searches out the bottle of wine Tony bought them. He’d like to throw it away but he needs a drink right now, and why not drink the man’s wine? He opens it, drinks a glassful and finds it tastes bitter. He pours the wine down the sink and stumbles outside again, down to his potting shed, where he sits on the floor and puts his head in his hands. The smell of pig iron from work clings to his skin.
He looks up to see Gilbert standing over him.
‘Are you really all right?’
‘No,’ says Janusz. ‘I’m a bloody fool.’
Silvana begs Tony to drive her home.
‘I have to find Aurek,’ she says. ‘I have to find him before he sees Janusz.’
Tony stops at the bottom of the hill so that nobody will see her get out of his car. She says goodbye to Peter, who is sitting on the back seat, looking scared, the weight of what has happened that afternoon pressing on his shoulders, making him slump. He looks fatter than ever with his fists balled on his lap and his face swollen with tears.
‘I want to go to Grandma’s,’ he moans.
‘Stop that crying, Peter,’ snaps Tony. ‘Silvana, will you be all right?’
‘Yes. Take Peter home. Please just let me go.’
‘Look, I can come with you, explain the boys made a mistake …’
‘No. I want to go home alone. I’ll be fine.’
‘I’ll be at the pet shop,’ he says as she gets out of the car. ‘Silvana, I’ll be there if you need me. Silvana?’
‘Yes,’ she says, walking away. ‘I’ll be fine.’
She is feeling anything but fine. Her legs tremble and her eye is weeping and she bows her head, hoping nobody will see her walking stiffly up the hill.
Earlier she was carrying a picnic basket and walking with Tony and the boys in the woods. Now her world has fallen in. She should have gone home with Aurek straight away. Going back to the flat above the pet shop had been a big mistake. Her knee starts to ache and she begins to limp.
She will tell Janusz the truth. She will do what she should have done that first day they arrived and he met her off the train. It’s as simple as that. No more lies. Oh, for somebody to give her advice!
Janusz will see what a gift Aurek is to them. He will see that the boy must be cherished and kept safe. They can move if he wants. Move away and start again somewhere. No more Tony. None of it. She stops outside the house and takes a deep breath.
There is a car parked outside, and she wonders who it belongs to. Her first thought is that they must have company, but she dismisses that quickly. They don’t know anybody. She pushes the door open. 22 Britannia Road. This is her home. Though what sort of a welcome will be waiting for her she has no idea. She nods at the bluebird in the door, as if it might offer her some kind of luck, and walks through to the kitchen, where she finds Janusz sitting at the table with Gilbert and Doris.
Silvana knows what she must look like. Her eye is swollen. She has a cut on her cheek. Her dress, the one Janusz bought her, is covered in green mossy stains and rips. She tries to tidy her hair a little and her fingers find a twig. She decides to leave it where it is. She knows she looks stupid enough, outnumbered in her own kitchen, without conjuring bird’s nests out of her hair.
Doris is the first to speak.
‘So you’ve come