Just What Kind of Mother Are You? Read Online Free PDF Page B

after too much wine. Or when there’s a beautiful woman in the pub and my face falls, and when I check to see if Joe’s looking at her, and he’s not, he’s looking at me, and he’s smiling at my insecurity. Always , he says, and I’m okay again. It fixes me.
    If I screw up, it doesn’t matter. Because, to Joe, nothing I do is ever really a screw-up anyway.
    Don’t get me wrong, he’s as bad-tempered and as hot-headed and irritating as the next man. And we’ve definitely had our moments. But they were just moments. No different to any other couple faced with kids, faced with having to be better, having to do better, than we ever thought possible. Day after day after day after day.
    Kate’s house suddenly comes into view and I see there is a ton of cars parked outside already. All at once I lose the breath from my lungs. ‘Oh, Christ, Joe, I don’t think I can go in there. Pull over, will you?’
    He does as I say and cuts the engine.
    We’re in a passing place about fifty yards from Kate’s. The house looks so imposing. More than it has ever done before. It’s a grand house, built entirely from lead-grey Lakeland stone.Today it’s bleak and exposed. There’s a Christmas tree in the front bay, but its lights are off.
    ‘What do you want to do?’ Joe asks me.
    ‘I know I’ve got to go in. But I just want to go home and crawl into bed. I want to bury my head and hide.’ I turn to him, and my voice cracks. ‘I don’t want to see what I’ve done to her, Joe.’
    He nods, understanding. ‘You have no choice, though. It would be worse if you didn’t show up. They’ll be expecting you.’
    ‘I know.’
    For a minute we sit in silence. Me working through what I need to say, and Joe letting me have some space. There’s a foul, putrid taste in my mouth. I keep swallowing to shift it, but it’s no use, my mouth is dry.
    When Joe senses I’m maybe starting to get a grip on things, he speaks. ‘What do you reckon Kate and Guy will be thinking right now? Will they be considering … you know, the worst?’
    ‘What, that she’s already dead?’
    Joe flinches.
    ‘Well, there is that possibility,’ he says, ‘but I was thinking more along the lines of the young girl who turned up in Bowness. Remember? The one who was raped?’
    I put my hands to my face. I’d forgotten all about that poor girl. Discarded on the street, no idea where she was.
    When I’d read about her I’d immediately thought of Sally. About how self-conscious Sally can be. So much so that she turns away from me when undressing. If we’re out shopping, she has this way of trying on shirts, a way of covering herself so I don’t see the front of her bra. When I’d read the story of the girl, an image of Sally had flashed into my mind: Sally naked from the waist up. Sally walking into that busy travel agent’s asking for help after her hellish ordeal, quietly dying inside.
    ‘Please, no,’ I whimper to Joe. ‘Please don’t let that be Lucinda. She’s so young.’
    Joe scratches the area of skin under his chin. He hasn’t shaved yet and the re-growth is starting to itch.
    ‘Is there any chance she could have meant to do this?’ he speculates.
    ‘How do you mean?’
    ‘You know the girl better than I do, Lise. I don’t take that much notice of Sally’s friends … I try to stay out of the way.’
    I look at him sharply, surprised by his words. ‘Yes, but you do know Lucinda, Joe. She’s not just one of Sally’s friends, is she? She’s been in and out of our house constantly for the past few years. How can you say you don’t know her, when—’
    ‘It would be weird for me to take an intense interest in her is what I’m trying to say,’ he cuts in. ‘You know Lucinda. You know what’s going on with her. You see Kate often enough – how much do you talk about the girls?’
    ‘The norm, I suppose. She’s not said she’s worried about her – not that I remember, anyway.’
    ‘And Sally’s not said if