Alphabet Weekends - Elizabeth Noble [12]
The last time they’d met had been the summer he’d left. He’d rung her mother and asked Lucy to meet him in the park near their home. He’d expressed surprise, as she approached the bench where he was, that she hadn’t brought baby Bella with her. She remembered telling him that he didn’t deserve to see her, and she remembered enjoying the pain and hurt that came across his face.
She’d felt strong. She’d had Patrick.
For a few years after the divorce, she’d lived in a kind of permanent fear that he would come back to try to claim Bella – fight for access or shared custody. She couldn’t have allowed that. She didn’t ask him for advice, money, or help. And he’d better not ask her for Bella.
People tried to tell her that Will had rights; legal entitlements. Bleeding hearts, and do-gooders, and even her mother. They said that Bella needed to know him. That Lucy was storing up trouble for herself and her daughter by not acknowledging him. They made her angry. She didn’t want to be reasonable and civilised. She didn’t ever want Will to have the chance to explain his actions to Bella. The mushroom cloud of rage inside her grew smaller and paler over the years, and it was displaced. But it never went away entirely. She didn’t want it to.
But he hadn’t fought for Bella, of course. He wasn’t interested enough to stay around for her, and he wasn’t interested enough to want to be a part of her life. If there was anything still unresolved in her head about Will, that was it. How could she have fallen in love with someone who could father a child, then walk away?
When Bella had been younger, Lucy had spent hours watching her asleep in her cot, or toddling drunkenly across the grass, or painstakingly feeding herself, and offered silent apologies to her baby: I’m sorry I chose someone like that to be your father. I’m sorry.
The divorce had been finalised long before Bella was sentient enough to remember the man who had deserted her when she was just a few months old. And there had been Patrick, who had wanted to care for them both. There had been no need to tell her, and she had always sensed that Patrick didn’t want her to. So they hadn’t. When Ed was born, it had felt like even less of a lie – they were a family, the four of them: father, mother, daughter, son. Why complicate it? Only very occasionally did she lie in bed and worry at it in her own mind.
One day Bella would have to know.
She shivered. Standing there now, gazing at this child who reminded her so much of Will, that time seemed suddenly closer.
‘You’re cold, Mum! Hurry up. I can’t wait to show Nina my new skates.’
Lucy held out her arms and Bella bounded happily into them. She laid her head against Lucy’s stomach and put her thumb into her mouth, and they stood there like that for just a minute until Lucy broke away and started to dress.
She should have been thinking about Patrick and his New Year bombshell. But she was thinking about Alec and about Will.
Natalie and Nicholas
‘Hello, Dad!’
‘Hello, darling! Happy New Year!’
‘Off somewhere?’
‘I was just going for a walk. Want to join me?’
‘What about Mum?’
‘She’s asleep.’
‘Is she okay?’
‘Bit tired. You know what she’s like… The last guests didn’t clear off until about two and then she always insists on doing all the clearing up before she’ll go to bed. By hand, since it’s the best stuff. It was nearly four by the time she came up. I’ve left her there. Took her a cup of tea just now, but she was out for the count.’
‘Then I’ll come!’
Her dad looked pleased. Natalie slipped her arm through his, and they started up the road.
‘How was your evening?’
‘Boozy. Feel a bit crap today, truthfully. Fresh air’ll do me good, no doubt!’
‘Where were you?’
‘I was with Tom at the pub. Went back and stayed the night at his mum and dad’s.’
‘I had no idea you were going to be so local. Where was Simon?’
Natalie took a deep breath. ‘Forty foot under the sea, I expect.’
Nicholas looked perplexed. He’d stopped walking, but Natalie pulled him along, and carried on