The Two Lives of Lydia Bird(93)

Elle’s eyes fill with tears. ‘I can’t help the mess, Lydia. You try looking after another human on two hours’ sleep a night, broken sleep at that, and then see if you feel like cleaning up.’

‘Shall I make a cup of tea?’ I’m walking on eggshells, trying to work out whether to stay and help or go.

‘I don’t have any milk until David gets back from work,’ she says, and then laughs, wide-eyed and hollow. ‘Unless you count these.’ She gestures down at her boobs, the baby squirming on one shoulder. ‘Because this dairy is never allowed to run out, night and day, on bloody demand.’

‘I’ll nip and grab some,’ I say, glad of a job. ‘Is there anything else you need?’

She snorts. ‘A good night’s sleep? More than five minutes to myself? My sister not to piss off right when I needed her most?’

‘Elle, I’m sorry … I didn’t realize things were so …’ I’m stricken. ‘Tell me what to do, how to help …’

She cuts me off with an impatient wave of her hand.

‘Do you think I knew what to do when Freddie died? How to help you through the worst thing that had ever happened to you? I’ll tell you the answer – no. No, I had no bloody clue. But you know what I didn’t do? I didn’t catch a flight to fucking Croatia!’

I’m wounded. I want to argue, to say that you can hardly compare losing someone to gaining someone, but I don’t because my sister is in a state.

‘It’s bath time,’ she says, clipped, switching the baby from one shoulder to the other. ‘I better get it done before she’s hungry again or she’ll have a meltdown.’

I hear it; she’s telling me to leave. I swallow hard. ‘Can I help you bathe her?’

She sighs as if the fight has left her. ‘Not today, okay, Lyd? I’ll be faster on my own.’

Because I have no other option, I pick up my keys. ‘Shall I call you later?’

She tips her head to indicate the baby. ‘Text’s better in case she’s asleep.’

I expect she means it’s better because she won’t have to speak to me, either.

There’s a car in Mum’s drive I don’t recognize when I pull up there ten minutes later. But I don’t really register it in my eagerness to surprise her.

I let myself in, kicking off my Converse by the door as I head for the kitchen. And I walk in on my mum stripped down to her bra and jeans having a good old-fashioned snog with Stef, the now shirtless computer mender. My raised jazz hands freeze in the air at the sight of them, and they jump apart as if they’ve been electrified.

‘Bloody hell, Lydia!’ my mother half shouts, red-faced, covering herself nonsensically with a tea towel.

Stef literally crawls under the kitchen table and re-emerges from the other side with his jumper on inside out and my mum’s blouse in his hand. She whips it off him and drags it on without saying a word.

‘Nice to meet you again, Lydia, love,’ Stef mutters, and then shoots past me down the hall and scoots. I don’t blame him; Mum looks ready to blow a gasket.

‘Nine weeks,’ she shouts, still flustered. ‘Nine weeks you’ve been gone and then you swan in here without so much as a phone call to tell me you’re home again?’

I stare at her. I knew both Elle and Mum were put out, but I didn’t think they’d react to my homecoming this badly.

‘I wanted to surprise you,’ I say.

‘Well, you certainly did that.’

‘Sorry,’ I mumble.

She sighs, running her hands over her hair to tidy it. ‘When did you get back?’

‘Last night,’ I say. I don’t tell her that the house was colder than I’ve ever known it when I finally got back at around six yesterday evening, or that there was an officially worded letter from Phil telling me they’d had to take someone on to cover my job and to call him, or that my time away has changed something in me. ‘I’m sorry I’ve been gone so long.’

I can see that she’s struggling between anger and relief that I’m home.

‘You shouldn’t have stayed away that long.’

I nod, miserable.

‘Have you seen your sister?’

‘Just now.’

‘How was she today?’

The question implies that Elle’s health currently changes on a day-to-day basis. Organized, calm, reliable Elle.

‘She seemed stressed. The baby was crying, I didn’t stay long.’

Mum huffs. I don’t know if it’s at me for not staying long, or Elle for being stressed, or the baby for crying.

‘She isn’t just stressed. She’s struggling, Lydia. You’d know that if you’d been here.’

Ah. Me then, obviously. ‘I didn’t realize.’

‘No,’ Mum says. ‘Clearly.’

It’s as if my prolonged absence has soaked up any residues of sympathy they had for me and flushed them down the sink.

‘I’m sorry for interrupting you … you know.’

She glances down at her blouse, knowing she’s buttoned it up wrong.

‘Poor Stef,’ she says, shaking her head.

‘Sorry.’

‘Will you stop bloody apologizing? It’s not helping.’