Second Chance - Jane Green [111]
Holly rolls her eyes and leans towards him. ‘Ask your father,’ she says with a sigh, reaching over to pour herself more coffee.
‘How are you?’ Paul crunches over the field to an old tree stump where Anna is sitting, gazing out at the view, a crumpled damp tissue clenched in her hand. Her eyes are red-rimmed, and at the sight of Paul a few more tears squeeze their way out.
‘It just does not seem so fair,’ Anna starts to talk; it comes out as a sob. ‘We have tried so hard and for so long, and then someone like Olivia just falls pregnant at the drop of a hat, and she is going to have an abortion. How does this happen? How could she do that?’
‘I never realized you were anti-abortion,’ Paul says gently, surprised.
‘I’m not. I mean, I was not. I never had any feeling about it at all, but now, I… just do not understand how someone could do that when there are so many people in the world who are desperate to have children and who cannot have them.’
Paul puts his arm around Anna and hugs her as she settles in, leaning her head on his chest. Safe. Loved. Exhausted. No more sobs for now, too tired, just a blankness as she whispers over and over again, ‘It’s just not fair. It’s just not fair.’
They keep to their separate corners of the house for the morning, waiting for the emotions to die down.
Anna and Saffron in the bathroom, Paul sanding the floors of the living room, Olivia painting the window frames. Holly and the children are sanding down the kitchen cupboards, the children delighted to be taking part in grown-up work, each clutching sandpaper and working on their own cupboard doors.
Saffron doesn’t ask Anna about the IVF, or how she feels, or if she’s okay, for which Anna is grateful. There are times when talking about things is exactly what you need, and there are other times, times like today, when no amount of talking will make you feel better. When all you can do is breathe, put one foot in front of the other, get through the day until you can sink into unconsciousness, hoping that tomorrow things will be easier. Tomorrow you will be fine.
‘Paul!’ Holly walks into the living room, yelling over the noise of the industrial sander, coughing as a cloud of dust settles over her.
‘Hang on.’ He switches the machine off and pulls the mask off his face. ‘Yup?’
‘You need to come and look at the kitchen cupboards. I think all the wood might be rotten.’
‘Oh God,’ he groans. ‘Let’s get Anna down here; she’ll know more than me.’
Anna crouches down, stroking a finger down the wood, then looks up at Paul with a frown. ‘Yes. They are rotten all right. If one is, then they probably all are. We need new kitchen-cupboard doors.’
Paul sighs. ‘That’s the problem with these bloody renovations. You think you know exactly what you’re going to be doing, but the more work you do, the more you uncover that needs doing. Great. I don’t suppose any of us knows anything about building kitchen cupboard doors…’ They all look blankly at him and shrug. ‘So now it will probably cost a small fortune to get this done. Just what we need.’ His irritation is obvious, and Anna shifts uncomfortably, guilty at having initiated this project at a time when clearly they couldn’t really afford it.
Holly’s face lights up. ‘We could ask Will!’ she says, and Olivia suppresses a smile, raising an eyebrow instead as she turns to look at Holly. ‘No, seriously.’ The others look blank. ‘Will. Tom’s brother. He’s a cabinet-maker. He’d come in a heartbeat.’
‘Oh my God!’ Anna starts leaping in delight. ‘What an excellent idea! I did not know Tom’s brother is a carpenter. Does anyone have his number?’
This time, Holly avoids catching Olivia’s knowing eye. ‘I think I do,’ she says, happiness lifting her up and floating her towards the door. ‘I’ll go outside to get a signal and call him.’
A beaming Holly comes back twenty minutes later.
‘What took you so long?’ a still-disgruntled Paul asks, convinced Will won’t come, convinced Holly won’t even have his number.
Holly blushes. ‘It took me a while to get through,