Take Mum Out (35 page)

I smile gratefully. ‘The lengths you go to to prolong a night out, Kirsty Greenwood.’

She squeezes my hand and turns to Logan. ‘You’ll be all right, sweetheart. The cut doesn’t look too bad. Lips tend to bleed a hell of a lot so it probably seems worse than it is.’

I’m relieved, actually, that she’s here; being a trained nurse, Kirsty is unfazed by the amount of blood gushing from his lip.

‘D’you feel sick or dizzy, love?’ I ask.

‘Yeah, a bit,’ Logan murmurs. I also want to ask what he and the others were up to tonight, but sense that now isn’t the time. All that matters is getting the cut cleaned up and possibly stitched, and to find out what’ll happen about his tooth.

‘I’ll have to get him to an emergency dentist,’ I say.

‘Why don’t you call Stephen for some advice?’ Kirsty suggests.

‘Good idea.’

‘Who?’ Logan asks, his voice muffled through the blood-stained tissue as we all climb out outside the hospital.

‘Kirsty’s dentist,’ I explain as I pay the driver. We make our way into the hospital and are booked in by an older lady who tips her head to one side and tuts sympathetically, like a kind granny.

‘You shouldn’t have to wait too long,’ she says as we take our seats in the waiting area.

Logan mutters something to the ground. ‘What’s that, hon?’ I ask.

He takes the tissue away, exposing a livid cut, blotched with semi-dried blood. ‘I said I’m sorry for what we did.’

I frown at him, still not wanting to get into a discussion about what was drunk or smoked tonight. There’s a woman holding a wailing baby a few seats away, and several liberally tattooed men sporting various facial wounds. A boy of around ten has clearly done something serious to his ankle, and is being comforted by a kind-looking biker dad in a full ensemble of black leathers.

‘It doesn’t matter now,’ I tell Logan. ‘We can talk about it later.’

‘But Mum—’ he starts.

‘I’m just going outside to phone the dentist,’ I tell him, jumping up from my seat and making my way outside. He answers immediately. ‘Stephen?’ I say. ‘It’s Alice, Kirsty’s friend.’

‘Of course I know who you are,’ he says warmly, his voice at once comforting and reassuring. ‘How are you?’

‘Not so great, actually. It’s not me – it’s Logan, my eldest son. I had a party this evening, and he – well, I don’t quite know what went on but he fell off a chair, smashed his face, and a tooth’s gone from the front.’

‘Oh, the poor boy …’

It’s a cool, damp evening and I shiver in my thin dress. ‘I … I just don’t know what to do next. We’re at A&E right now and I imagine they’ll stitch his lip, but his tooth …’

‘Bring him to my clinic first thing tomorrow. It’s in Dundas Street, number eighty-five—’

‘But it’s Sunday tomorrow,’ I remind him.

‘It’s fine. Bring him at nine and we’ll get him sorted, and please don’t worry, okay? They’ll make sure it’s all cleaned up and he’ll be fine overnight. Just make sure he gets a good night’s sleep.’

‘Thank you so much,’ I exclaim. ‘I feel terrible, calling you on a Saturday night—’

‘Alice, it’s not a problem, truly. Where are you now?’

‘Right outside the hospital.’

‘Get back in then,’ he says kindly, ‘and look after your boy. I’ll see you tomorrow.’ We finish the call and I pause for a moment, thinking, Now
that’s
what I call a proper grown-up man.

Back inside, Logan is called in quickly and attended to by a whippet-thin chap who carefully cleans the wound and secures it with sticky strips. ‘Not much left of this tooth,’ he observes sympathetically.

Logan nods, still deathly pale. ‘We’re seeing a dentist first thing tomorrow,’ I tell him.

‘You mean at the dental hospital?’ the doctor asks.

‘No, a private dentist near us.’

‘What, on a Sunday?’

‘He’s a friend,’ I reply, at which Logan throws me a confused look.

‘Well, you’re lucky,’ the doctor adds, pulling back to study Logan’s face. ‘So, now you’re all fixed and ready to go, want to tell me what you took tonight?’

A livid flush rouges his cheeks.

‘Logan?’ I say gently.

He looks down at the shiny rubberised floor. ‘It was, er … meringues.’

‘Meringues?’ the doctor repeats with a bemused smile. ‘What kind were they, then? Because I’ve never known them to have this kind of effect.’

‘Hash ones,’ Logan murmurs, twisting his fingers together and looking up at me, wide-eyed. ‘I’m really sorry, Mum. We made hash meringues at Blake’s.’

*

It turns out Logan and Blake cooked them up in the annexe. I’m not sure this is what Clemmie had in mind when she designed his very own mini kitchen.

‘Who got the hash?’ I ask, perching on the edge of Logan’s bed at two a.m. He’s tucked up in it, his lip swollen and livid pink, held together by neat adhesive strips. The rest of his face is chalk white, his eyes dull, with faint shadows underneath.

‘Blake got it,’ he mutters.

‘And who did Blake get it from?’

‘Mum,
everyone
has it,’ he growls; then, as if realising his attitude isn’t entirely justified, he adds, ‘He bought it off someone in sixth year.’

‘And those weren’t the meringues at the party, were they?’ I ask. ‘I mean, everyone was eating them …’

Logan shakes his head. ‘They were just normal. No one else had the, er, special ones. Just me and Blake and Kayla.’

‘Well, I’d better call Clemmie and Jacqui to let them know.’

He looks at me, aghast. ‘You mean Kayla’s mum?’

‘Yes, of course,’ I reply. ‘She needs to know, Logan. We can’t just pretend this hasn’t happened.’ He groans, as if I’ve just ruined his young life. ‘Are you
sure
no one else had any?’

‘Honestly, it was just us.’

‘Are there any left?’

He nods miserably and his eyes flick towards his wardrobe. ‘There’s a few in a tin in there. An old coffee tin.’ I open the wardrobe, hit by a fug of worn T-shirts and pants, and rummage among the scrunched-up tops and stray socks until I find a small cylindrical coffee tin stashed in a trainer. There are three meringue kisses inside, of a dingy grey hue, like concrete; I can’t imagine them exactly flying off the shelves in Pascal’s, unless word got out about their secret ingredient. I check Logan’s face again, then click off the light and take the tin to the kitchen.

It’s so tempting to cram the remaining three into my mouth and get off my face, frankly. It
is
my birthday after all. But instead I tip the meringues into the sink, then turn on the hot tap and watch them slowly dissolve, until there’s nothing left at all.

You can tell a lot about a dental practice by the magazines in the waiting room. Whereas our usual place has a few crumpled
Take a Break
s, here at Dundas Street Dental it’s all
Vogue
,
GQ
and
Harper’s Bazaar
. So while Logan is having his front tooth rebuilt, I try to read about some art collector woman who has seven houses dotted around the world. In truth, though, it’s impossible to focus on anything with the sound of drilling going on. It’s to be a filling for now, Stephen explained, which will be replaced by a crown when Logan is older, so I’m not expecting perfection. I’m still hugely grateful, though. Stephen even called in his dental nurse to help out today. He’s opened the place, on a Sunday, just for us. I don’t care what it costs. I have plenty of meringue orders to get through over the coming week; it’s almost funny that my confections, which are virtually one hundred per cent sugar, will be paying for Logan’s new tooth.

He emerges with Stephen at his side and smiles with his mouth shut. The cut on his lip still looks sore, but the swelling has subsided a little already.

‘All done,’ Stephen says. He looks at Logan. ‘Show your mum, then. See if she approves.’

Logan stretches his mouth wide. ‘It’s perfect,’ I exclaim. ‘It’s exactly like his original tooth. That’s amazing. Thank you, Stephen. I don’t know what we would have done without you.’

‘It’s no problem at all,’ he says, going to the reception desk while I fish my purse out of my bag.

‘So how much do we owe you?’

He shakes his head. ‘Nothing.’

‘No, I
must
pay you. You’ve done a brilliant job. Please—’

He laughs softly and hands me a card with contact details for the clinic. ‘Let me know if there are any problems. But it should be fine.’ He turns back to Logan. ‘No apples for at least a month, okay? Just to make sure it’s all settled.’

‘That’s all right,’ says Logan, who fears them anyway, with their impenetrable skins.

‘I can’t thank you enough,’ I say, studying Logan’s mouth again, which he opens obligingly.

‘Well,’ Stephen says, ‘I’m glad you’re happy.’ There’s a pause, and I’m overcome by an urge to ask if he’d like to meet up again, maybe with Molly, in one of the other museums some time. He has a lovely face, I decide, and those sparkly green eyes really are something else. The dental nurse, a fresh-faced girl with honeyed skin, emerges from surgery.

‘We’re really grateful to you for coming in today,’ I say. ‘I hope we haven’t ruined your Sunday.’

She smiles and casts Logan a fond glance, despite looking no more than five years older than him. ‘No problem. Just glad Logan’s okay.’ Then she turns to Stephen and adds, ‘Lucky it didn’t happen next Sunday, huh?’

‘Oh yeah,’ he says with a crooked grin.

‘Why, are you away then?’ I ask.

He shakes his head. ‘No, it’s Molly’s birthday party. The pressure’s on, you know, when you’re a lone dad.’

‘People assume you can’t cope,’ I suggest.

‘That’s it exactly,’ he chuckles.

‘And this time she’s invited the whole class,’ the dental nurse adds, ‘so that’s – how many kids are coming, Stephen?’

He rakes back his hair. ‘Err … about twenty-six, I think. My fault really. She
says
she asked, and that I said yes …’ He laughs and tails off. ‘I probably wasn’t listening.’

‘I’m sure it’ll be okay,’ I say, remembering Kirsty enthusing about how brilliant he’d been at another child’s party, supervising the toasting of marshmallows and being Mr Wolf … Yet, despite his light, cheery manner, he looks more than a little worried.

‘Well,’ he says, ‘it’ll just have to be.’

‘Don’t other parents stay to help?’ I turn to Logan. ‘They used to, didn’t they, when we had parties?’

He frowns, as if he hasn’t the faintest idea of what I’m talking about. ‘These days they kind of drop and run,’ Stephen remarks.

‘I’ll help you then,’ I hear myself blurting out. ‘When is it again – next Sunday?’

‘Yes, but I’m sure you’ll have better things to do.’ He looks a little startled.

‘Honestly, I don’t. You’ve really put yourselves out for us today, when you could have been lying around reading the Sunday papers’ – Stephen emits a wry snort at this – ‘and it’s the least I can do. Honestly, I’d love to help. It’s been years since we had a proper children’s party and I quite miss them.’

‘Well … yes, okay,’ Stephen says, his eyes crinkling fetchingly. ‘I’d appreciate that. You’ll have done far more of these things than I have …’

‘Let’s speak during the week,’ I say as we make our way out, ‘and you can tell me if you need help with getting stuff ready.’

‘There is one thing,’ he adds hesitantly. ‘This might sound a bit weird, but remember how enthusiastic Molly was at the museum?’

I sense Logan glancing at me, clearly thinking,
You went to a museum together?

‘Yes, I do,’ I say.

‘Well, she’s had an idea for a theme. It’s a Medieval party so any ideas you have …’ He breaks off and laughs. ‘It’s not really my area of expertise, you see.’

Logan still seems baffled as we drive home. ‘What did you offer to do that for?’ he asks. ‘It was really
pushy
, Mum.’

‘No, it wasn’t. He seemed like he needs some help, didn’t you see?’

He shrugs and stares out of the passenger window. ‘He seemed nice,’ he adds grudgingly.

‘Yes, he is.’

‘So …’ I can sense him studying me, trying to figure things out. ‘You’ve met him before then?’

‘Yep, we had lunch once, and then I ran into him at the Surgeons’ Museum when I was out with Grandma …’

‘God, the Surgeons’ Museum,’ he groans, as if it’s as thrilling as a kitchen showroom, but at least his tone is warmer.

‘You used to love it actually. Remember that horrible book made of human skin?’

‘Oh yeah.’ He lapses into silence again, and I hope he’s reflecting upon the fact that I haven’t given him much grief over the hash meringues. Clearly, we have to talk about it, but it felt more important to have his lip and tooth sorted first. Maybe an incident like this is more effective than any amount of drugs talks he’s had at school. Or maybe not. ‘Did you really enjoy our birthday parties?’ he asks with a sly grin.

‘Yes, I really did. They were mad, of course, but at least there were always plenty of friends around to help.’ Mum, I recall, was surprisingly adept at keeping order, the more bookish of the children liking her teacherly demeanour, the way Molly did at the museum.

‘Were they easier when Dad was still here?’ Logan asks.

‘Er … sort of,’ I say diplomatically.

I’m startled by what he does next, actually reaching out and patting my leg while we’re sitting at a red light, as if I’m a pet.

‘You
are
great, Mum,’ he says, so quietly I can barely make out the words.

I laugh involuntarily. ‘That’s a nice thing to say.’

‘No, really, you are. I remember some of those parties. That time we had the insect-themed one and you made me this massive papier mâché costume with long hairy legs …’

‘And a spider cake,’ I add, ‘which freaked out some of the kids because that was hairy as well—’

‘How did you do that? How did you make a hairy cake?’

‘I can’t divulge that, Logan. That’s classified information.’

‘C’mon, Mum, what did you do?’

I smirk as we turn into our road. ‘It’s a special icing nozzle with lots of little holes so it comes out like fur …’

‘It was
amazing
.’

Pulling up outside our block, I turn to look at him, relieved that we are still capable of chatting like this. Reminiscing feels nice, reassuring me that my loveable boy is still there, despite the moods and the experimental baking. ‘Anyway,’ I add, ‘I meant to say, it looked like you and Kayla were getting along well last night.’