The Switch(60)

I lift my top to wipe my nose; as I drop it again, I see his eyes flick away from the bare skin of my stomach. I clear my throat. This is getting a bit silly; I turn back to the wall, sobering up.

‘So anyway,’ Jackson says, following my lead, ‘I wanted to ask how open you would be to merging themes.’

I turn back to him, staring. ‘Tropical Medieval? That is literally absurd. What are we going to do, falconry with parrots? Jousting with bananas?’

He looks thoughtful.

‘No!’ I say. ‘It’s ridiculous!’

‘All right,’ he says. ‘How about medieval themed, but with cocktails?’

I squirm. Gah. It’s so anachronistic! It’s so messy!

Jackson looks amused. ‘It’s just a village fete – who’s going to care if it’s not perfect? And it’s the only way you’ll get Basil on side. Turns out that man loves a mango daiquiri. Besides, we’ve already booked the cocktail-makers.’

‘Fine. But you have to get up in front of all of the committee and declare that you give my theme full support because it is much better,’ I say, brandishing a finger.

‘Apart from how it doesn’t have cocktail stands.’

I growl. Jackson grins, dimples showing.

‘It’s a deal,’ he says, stretching out his hand. I clasp it, feeling the wet paint between our fingers.

‘Just so you know,’ I say, ‘you’re going to have to be May King, and I will be ensuring that the outfit is totally ridiculous. Revenge for the bunny ears.’

He snorts at that. ‘Ah, come on, I did you a favour, giving you the Easter bunny job – it’s pretty much a Cotton family tradition,’ Jackson tells me as we get started on the next wall.

I wrinkle up my nose. ‘Don’t tell me Grandma wears that outfit.’

‘Not your grandma. Your mum’s done it, though – and Carla, once.’

‘Carla? Seriously? I never knew that.’

‘When she was … seventeen, maybe?’

‘Tell me,’ I say, painting forgotten, because suddenly I’m hungry for it, this news about my sister, like she’s still out there in the world, surprising me.

‘Your grandma roped her into it, I think. You must’ve been at uni. I was doing teacher training, back for the holidays, and I bumped into her when she was out hiding the eggs. She looked at me absolute daggers. “You breathe a word of this to anybody,” she said, “I’ll tell everyone you smoke behind the allotments.”’

I laugh, delighted. His impersonation of Carla is brilliant. He smiles back at me, blue eyes catching the sunlight again.

‘She launched into it then, how it’s all a Christian appropriation of a Pagan ritual or something, you know how Carla was about that sort of thing, and then around the corner comes Ursula – she must’ve been six or so, then – and suddenly off Carla skips, bunny tail flapping. She wanted the kid to think she was the Easter bunny. Preserving the magic. Kind of like you did, for Samantha.’

I breathe out slowly, my paintbrush suspended in mid-air. It’s easy to forget, when you’re missing someone, that they’re more than just the person you remember: they have sides to themselves they only show when other people are around.

In the last few weeks I’ve spoken about my sister more than I have in the last year put together. In Hamleigh, people mention Carla without blinking; at home my friends stutter over her name, watching me carefully, afraid to say the wrong thing. I’ve always appreciated how Ethan will steer people off the topic if we’re out for dinner – he says he knows talking about Carla will hurt me.

And yes, it does hurt, but not like I thought it would. The more I talk about her the more I want to, as if there’s a dam in my brain somewhere with cracks forming and the water’s getting through and the faster the flow, the more the dam wants to break.





20


Eileen


It’s a long night, as any night spent in a hospital waiting room will be. I am reminded of Marian’s birth, and Leena’s, and Carla’s. But most of all I’m reminded of the day when Carla was first admitted to hospital. The careful way the doctor cast his warning: I’m afraid it’s not good news. The gaping, terrible panic on Marian’s face, how her hands clutched at my arm as if she was falling. And Leena, doing what she always did, setting her jaw and asking all the questions. What are our options? Let’s talk about next steps. With all due respect, Doctor, I’d appreciate a second opinion on that scan.

At about one o’clock in the morning Fitz suddenly seems to remember I’m old and might need to go home to sleep, but it doesn’t feel right to leave Martha. So I sleep on the floor under a heap of Rupert and Fitz’s jumpers and jackets. I haven’t slept on a floor for a very long time; I ache everywhere. It’s as if somebody has taken my body apart and jammed all the pieces back together again. My head is throbbing.

Fitz comes to fetch me at around lunchtime; I’m still dozing, but I’ve moved from the floor to a chair. He looks rather haunted, but happy.

‘There’s a baby!’ he says. ‘A girl!’

I try to stand too fast and clutch a hand to my head.

‘Are you OK, Mrs C?’ Fitz asks as he helps me up.

‘I’m fine. Don’t mind me. Did you get hold of Yaz?’