December EIGHT YEARS BEFORE

December

E IGHT YEARS BEFORE

7.40 A . M .

‘Morning, Mum.’

It was an odd thing; no matter how old Madeleine got or what was going on in her life, if anything went wrong or – as was the case this morning when she had woken feeling under the weather – her instinct was to call Marnie. The pull of the umbilical cord was strong!

‘You okay, love? You don’t usually call this early. Not that it isn’t smashing to hear from you, it is – any time!’

She heard the message loud and clear, the one lurking between the spoken words: call more, your mother worries! It bothered her that Marnie just didn’t get that her job was not the same as her mum’s. Marnie worked at the local community college doing something she loved – doling out food to the students, listening to their chatter, the snippets they dropped as they queued with their plastic trays to collect portions of chicken curry or generously filled sandwiches or bags of crisps and pieces of fruit. She had told Madeleine in the past that this daily contact felt like they shared their lives with her, and she loved to be among it, considered it a privilege to listen to their conversations, to see their eager faces, to receive their thanks, confirming her view that each generation had something wonderful to offer the world. It was an optimism Madeleine didn’t necessarily share and a set routine she could only imagine. Marnie started at ten in the morning and finished at three in the afternoon come rain or shine. Madeleine’s life was busy! Too busy! Early starts, late finishes and pressure coming at her from all angles. Admittedly it was an internal pressure, determined as she was to save money while rising up the corporate ladder, to have one of the fancy offices with a view and not to have to take Captain for a dump whenever he whimpered and pawed at her leg ... She could but dream.

Not that she didn’t love her parents – she did, very much, and called or visited home whenever she was able. Distance wasn’t the problem. It was a short tube ride from her shared flat on the Old Kent Road to her family home in East London – a little over half an hour on a good day with only one change. It was more a case of trying to fit it in. She worked all week with early starts, rising early to ensure her hair, make-up and clothes were on point. Evenings were spent at the diner, and on the weekends she worked hard to build a life away from the Brenton Park estate – a different life, a fun life! Heading out to clubs with Meredith, Luciano and Liesl, who were attractive to her based on no more than their different life experiences. Meredith came from money, Luciano had travelled the world, and Liesl pulled off a droll indifference to life that made Madeleine laugh out loud. On Sundays she slept off her hangover and slept off her fatigue and slept off worry over how she was going to get out of the blocks and get noticed at work.

It was exhausting.

There was the odd Saturday when she fell into bed with the intention of heading out to see her parents the very next day, planned to invite Trina – her best friend since school – over so they could catch up, but when her eyes opened and her head pounded and her bed was warm and soft, it was an easy decision to put it off until the following weekend. Plus – not that it was an easy thing to admit – but she had been kind of avoiding Trina, wary of letting it slip that her last relationship – or rather fling – had been with Jimmy. Jimmy who her best friend had held a candle for a while back. Madeleine wasn’t entirely sure that flame was extinguished and couldn’t risk the fallout of such an admission. Especially not now when it was done and dusted, never to be mentioned again.

Craig Fallon – Jimmy to everyone – had been in her school year. A nice boy about whom she’d known very little, other than his mother was Malaysian, his dad wasn’t on the scene, and that he was an incredible artist. A boy who ran his own race and danced to his own tune, which had never been appealing when she was a kid. Yet when she bumped into him on Oxford Street of all places, a year or so ago, with the residue of a handful of rum and Cokes sloshing in her system, she had felt an odd stirring – a potent mixture of lust and nostalgia that had carried them along on a wave of hook-ups and laughter for six months. Theirs had been a physical attraction, or at least that was how she saw it. Until that fateful night when, under a full moon and with stars twinkling overhead, he had presented her with a drawing of a cottage in a garden with a pond where ducks swam, all set beneath a blue, blue sky, headed with the words ‘Our Forever Home’ written in biro. It had put the fear of God into her – the artistic equivalent of taking a knife to the stays that bound them and cutting himself loose.

She shivered to recall it. Jimmy was handsome, attractive, calm, and sweet, but a bloody cottage with a duck pond? Good Lord, she was planning world domination in a pair of snakeskin Jimmy Choos, not trundling around a garden in a pair of wellington boots! She didn’t even own any wellington boots!

It hadn’t ended well, and she hadn’t seen him since – about six months ago now.

‘I don’t feel too good,’ she whispered.

‘That’s not like you. How do you feel exactly?’ Marnie’s tone was one of concern.

‘I’ve got a tummy ache, bit sicky, slight fever. I don’t know really how else to describe it. I’ve showered, thought that might help, but I still feel grim. Not sure what to do.’

‘Do you want me to come over, love? I can call in and they’ll get Dara to cover my shift. I can pick you up some tonic water or—’

‘No, no, Mum, you don’t need to do that.’ It warmed her heart that her lovely mum was only ever a phone call away. This thought bookended by guilt that she hadn’t made it home for a while now. ‘I might go to the doctor’s.’

‘Do you have a doctor?’ Marnie was familiar with her stance on illness.

‘There’s, erm, a drop-in centre not far from the flat.’ She had passed it hundreds of times on her walk to and from the station. ‘You don’t need an appointment. I might go there. I just want them to give me something so I can get back to work.’

‘What you need to do is listen to your body, Edith-Madeleine! You need to rest and drink water and sleep and let it pass. Please don’t rush back to work. They can do without you for a day or so, I’m sure. The place won’t fall down. And if they can’t manage without you, then they need to change their ways!’

Her mother just didn’t get it.

‘Yep, well, I’ll see what the doctor says.’

‘Promise me you’ll rest, my love.’

‘I promise,’ she replied, with her index and middle finger crossed.

‘And let me know how you get on at the doctor’s!’

‘I will.’

Again she crossed her fingers and threw in an eye roll for good measure.