Here We Lie (2 page)

Martin made a face at her, then bent down and whispered something in Emily’s ear that definitely included the words ‘bossy Rose’. Emily grinned adoringly up at her brother.
Rose frowned. How could Martin be so thick? At least there was no sound coming from the kitchen at the moment. Did that mean Mum had stopped crying? Or was she just sobbing too quietly for Rose to
hear?

‘We came down for chocolate,’ Martin said.

Rose shook her head, barring the way to the kitchen with her arm.

A second later, Emily had ducked underneath and was opening the kitchen door. Rose watched her little sister as she scampered across the room to the store cupboard. As she hurried past Mum, Mum
wiped her eyes and stood up, sniffing back her tears.

‘Okay, Emily Sarah?’ she asked.

Dad didn’t turn around. He was gazing out through the kitchen window into the back garden.

Emily retrieved a bar of Galaxy from the cupboard. ‘For me and Mart, bedtime snack.’ Her dark eyes shone, all innocence and excitement. She strolled past Mum, clearly completely
oblivious to Mum’s distress.

Mum caught her arm and pulled her into a hug, stroking Emily’s hair as she did so. ‘Bedtime, yeah?’

‘Okay.’ Emily gave Mum a swift hug back. ‘Night, Mum. Night, Daddy.’ She hurried out of the room, leaving the door open.

Rose could hear her brother and sister going back up the stairs, but her eyes were focused on Mum’s agonized face. She felt a surge of anger that Dad was denying his affair. It
wasn’t fair on Mum, on any of them.

Dad turned. Without looking at either of them, he swept past like a thunderstorm, grabbed his coat and slammed the front door shut behind him.

Mum sank into a chair, her face in her hands, her shoulders shaking with sobs. Rose fidgeted by the door. Should she say something to Mum about what she’d seen yesterday? At least then Mum
would know the truth.

Except it wasn’t Rose’s job to sort out her parents’ marriage. Resentment snaked through her. Some of this was Mum’s fault too – she never made any effort with how
she looked now and she was always nagging Dad about how little he did around the house.

Anyway, maybe if she said nothing, the whole situation would just go away. Casting a final look at her mother, still slumped over the kitchen table, Rose turned and went upstairs.

It was the last time she saw either of her parents.

It’s a near perfect day. Not that I appreciate it being near perfect at the time. In fact, after lunch I get a headache. It comes on suddenly, as we’re walking up
the endless series of steps and pathways of the citadel at Calvi. Jed, bless him, notices straight away. He pulls me back as the others dart past an oncoming Audi and through a dark tunnel.

‘Are you okay?’

‘I’m fine,’ I say, though in fact the Corsican summer heat and the steep climb are making the tight band across the back of my head worse. I don’t want to spoil the
afternoon. Everything has been so blissful up to now – being here with all the people I love best in the world, secure in Jed’s adoration, both of us looking forward to the rest of our
lives together. ‘It’s just a bit of a headache.’

‘Well, let me know if it gets worse.’ Jed puts his arm around me as we head into the tunnel. We emerge into the bright light of the fierce August sun and Dee Dee hurls herself at
me.

‘Emily, Emily, come and look!’ she says, grabbing my hand and tugging me away from her father.

‘Gently,’ Jed cautions.

But Dee Dee is so intent on showing me the view before anyone else gets a chance that I’m already halfway across the cobbles, Jed left several metres behind. This is typical Dee Dee.
Caught almost exactly between child and adolescent, she was thirteen back in early June and is plumper than either she or her father would like. I’ve told Jed she isn’t properly fat,
just hormonal, a little lumpy and uncomfortable inside her own changing body, and he murmurs that I’m probably right, but I know he worries that she should be more in control of her eating
– and of her behaviour. Dee Dee herself is certainly hard for any of us to get a handle on: one minute she’s all excitable puppy, the next moody and withdrawn. At least she has seemed
happy most of this holiday so far, enjoying the relative harmony of our extended family group – and away from her mother’s histrionics. Right now she is pointing at the yachts moored in
the bay, her thick dark hair – so like Jed’s – shining in the sunshine.

‘Is that Martin’s boat?’ she asks, indicating one of the larger motor launches that, like its neighbours, resembles a floating photocopier.

I shake my head, amused. My brother would be horrified if he could hear Dee Dee’s question, but he’s already around the next corner with Cameron. Their yacht – the
Maggie
May
– is a far more elegant affair than the boats in the bay below. ‘No, sweetheart, that’s on the other side, near all the restaurants.’

‘Oh.’ Dee Dee rounds her eyes, making a little-girly face at me. ‘Stupid, Dee Dee.’ She gives her face a slap.

‘Hey, no.’ I’m shocked – and unsettled – by the gesture. As a primary school teacher I’m used to young kids showing off and acting out, but I’m finding
it hard to keep up with Dee Dee’s constantly changing attitudes. It’s like she’s whipping masks on and off her face so quickly that the real Dee Dee is a blur. Rose says such
behaviour is normal, that – at thirteen – I was the same. But it still troubles me. After all, my relationship with Dee Dee has always been one of the bonuses of my time with Jed. Even
when her older brother hated me and their mother stalked me to my school and shouted obscenities at me in the staff car park, Dee Dee and I have been close.

‘Stupid, stupid Dee,’ she says again, her voice even more little-girly than before though, thankfully, without the slap.

‘You’re not stupid.’ I squeeze her shoulder and she flings her arms around me in a breath-defying hug. I hug her back, more gently. There’s a desperation about Dee Dee
sometimes – as if she is eager to please but knows she is no longer a cute little girl and hasn’t worked out how to be appealing in a more adult way.

‘Stop mauling Emily,’ Jed orders, catching up with us. I know he doesn’t mean to sound so brusque, it’s just his manner, but his daughter lets go immediately, her head
bowed. I sigh, feeling for her.

‘I’m
fine
, Jed, seriously, Dee Dee’s just being affectionate.’ I hesitate. Everything I’ve been told about step-parenting stresses the importance of not
interfering in parental discipline, especially in front of the child. Rose has told me time and again: ‘never challenge them on their kids’. Trouble is, I worry Jed is getting it wrong.
The very qualities that make him such a successful criminal lawyer – his quick, incisive mind and ruthless ability to sift facts, casting away whatever isn’t needed – leave him
ill-prepared to deal with his daughter’s ever-changing emotions. Indeed, despite the fact that it means the world to him to have both his kids here on holiday, for most of the past week he
has seemed at a loss with Dee Dee, with little understanding of the awkward teen she has become. Whereas I have every sympathy, remembering clearly how awful it felt to be thirteen and out of sorts
with myself.

‘I’m just worried about you.’ Jed turns to his daughter. ‘Emily isn’t feeling well – be gentle, okay?’ Dee Dee nods.

‘I’m going to tell Cam and Martin we need to go back to the yacht. I’ll get the key to the main cabin off them,’ Jed says, looking at me with concern.

‘Can I come back with you, Daddy?’ Dee Dee wheedles.

I open my mouth to say that of course she can, but before I can speak Jed laughs.

‘Nice try, Dee Dee, but you’ll be bored back on the boat. Anyway, a bit of exercise will do you good.’ He grins, pats her arm, then strides off around the corner towards Martin
and the others.

A tear leaks out of poor Dee Dee’s eye. She keeps her head down.

‘Oh, sweetie.’ I give her shoulder another squeeze, unsure why the girl is so upset but Dee Dee is stiff with the desire to keep her pain to herself. ‘How about we take a
picture?’ I suggest, hoping this will cheer her up.

‘Okay.’ Dee Dee offers me a weak smile. ‘Just you though, not me.’

‘No way.’ I point to her phone. ‘Go on, both of us.’

Grinning now, her mood altering with mind-bending swiftness, Dee Dee positions her iPhone in front of us. I move in close beside her. Dee Dee adjusts the angle, so the sea is visible behind us,
then takes the photo. She peers at the screen and makes a face. ‘I look fat.’

‘I bet you don’t.’ I look over her shoulder. Unfortunately, the selfie has caught Dee Dee at a particularly unflattering angle. Plus, half my head is missing.

‘One more, then,’ I say. The band of tightness is starting to creep over one eye.

Dee Dee holds the phone out and positions it again. ‘I’ve got a secret,’ she says as she clicks.

‘Oh?’ I wonder what she means. Probably something about one of her friends, or a crush on some boy. I had millions when I was her age. ‘What’s that then?’

‘It’s something I saw.’ Dee Dee hugs me again. Her gold bracelet is cool against my skin. I have one just like it; they were engagement presents from my brother and his
boyfriend – a typically sweet and generous gesture to include Dee Dee in their gifts. She is still clinging to me. I feel horribly hot, but I don’t want to push her away. Jed will be
back any second and then it will only take ten minutes or so to get back to the cool of the boat.

‘So what’s this secret then?’ I ask gently.

Dee Dee’s body expands against mine as she takes a deep breath. ‘It’s—’

‘For goodness’ sake, let poor Emily be!’ Jed’s voice cracks like a whip through the air, making both of us jump. Dee Dee springs away from me, then sags down, her whole
body collapsing into itself.

‘I told you, Jed, she’s
fine
.’

‘Right, sorry.’ Jed frowns. He pats his daughter’s arm again. She shrinks back, like a cowed puppy. My heart goes out to her. Jed clears his throat. ‘I didn’t mean
to shout,’ he says. ‘I’m just really worried about Emily. She might have heat stroke or—’

‘It’s just a bit of a headache,’ I insist.

‘Right, okay.’ He turns to Dee Dee. ‘Sorry, Dee Dee, now run and catch up with the others. Go on.’

Dee Dee glances at me, smiles ruefully, then turns and runs off. At least she isn’t crying again. Yesterday she burst into tears because the strap broke on her new sandals.

‘Probably collapsed under her weight,’ Jed had joked in a side whisper to me. Dee Dee couldn’t have heard him and the way he said it was light – an attempt at being funny
– so I laughed to show him I knew he wasn’t serious, but the truth is that we’ve both worried Dee Dee isn’t coping well with her parents’ break-up. Later I must take
her to one side and remind her how much her dad loves her, how his bark – as the saying goes – is far worse than his bite. Jed’s ex doesn’t help matters, ranting whenever
she gets a chance that he has ruined all their lives. She informed him accusingly the other day that Dee Dee had recently retreated into her shell, hardly ever going out or seeing her friends. I
reminded Jed of what Dee Dee herself told me less than a month ago: that she’d had some problems with a few of the girls in her class, but her friends had rallied round and everything was
okay now.

‘Her mum is exaggerating,’ I told him, ‘making out Dee Dee’s moods are
your
fault. When I was thirteen my life was dominated by my parents’ deaths, but that
wasn’t why I was all over the place.
That
would have happened anyway. And Dee Dee would be hormonal right now whether you’d split up or not.’

Jed puts his arm around me as Dee Dee’s thick white legs thud along the cobbles away from us. She is wearing shorts and a shapeless T-shirt that only emphasizes her bulk. That bushy hairdo
doesn’t help either. I wonder why her designer-loving mother doesn’t give her some advice about how she looks.

‘You were a bit hard on her just then,’ I venture.

Jed sighs. ‘I didn’t mean to be,’ he says. ‘But she really needs to learn to think before she acts.’

‘She’s only thirteen, Jed.’ I purse my lips. ‘Do you think there’s something bothering her? She told me she had a “secret” to tell, something she
saw.’

Jed dismisses this with a weary wave. ‘I’m sure it’s just mood swings. She was fine this morning, bouncing about eating croissants. Anyway, what’s she got to be
“bothered” about?’ His voice tightens and hardens. ‘I pay her mother a fucking fortune so that
nothing
bothers
either
of them
.
’

‘I know,’ I say, wishing for the millionth time that Jed’s ex wasn’t still so angry about him leaving her. I understand, of course. But the fall-out on all of us,
especially Dee Dee, is hard.

Jed sighs again, then steers me back along the path and through the tunnel. I fall silent, letting him take charge. As we walk along, my headache gets worse and worse. I’m concerned for
Dee Dee still but also grateful – and not for the first time – that the full beam of Jed’s forceful personality is focused on looking after me. After spending my twenties with a
succession of irresponsible boy-men, I was single for nearly three years before meeting Jed last November. The experience has been like finding a port after years of storms. The fact that he is
seventeen years older than me has never been an issue. My friend Laura was initially adamant that I’d only fallen for someone so much older because of my parents dying when I was eleven, but
I think that’s a cliché and that our ages are irrelevant. I just love the fact that, unlike all the younger men I’ve known, Jed knows exactly what he wants. And it still thrills
me that what he wants is me. Jed asked me to marry him on my thirty-third birthday last month. We are planning a big wedding next year, probably in late spring.

‘Let’s do it properly: church service, a big party,’ he said. ‘It’s your first time and it should be special.’

Frankly I’d happily marry him on a towpath, but I love that he wants the best for us, that his view of marriage is still so positive even after the end of his relationship with his
children’s mother and – most of all – that despite having Dee Dee and Lish, he still wants kids with me.