FREYA WAKES TO THE shudder of the windowpane. Loosened by the wind, a clutch of ivy gropes at the glass. On the bedside table her phone is flashing red – a missed call, or a text message – and her first thought is of Jem – some emergency. Of course not. He’s here, just the other side of the wall. She tucked him in herself.
It’s a missed call and two texts. She recognises the number immediately.
Unless you want me to come to Granny’s door, pick up when I call.
She was immensely stupid to ever have contacted Jem’s father. Grandma hadn’t pressed her about who the father was or any of that. It was Cara who convinced her that it was the right thing to do, to tell him about Jem, tell him he could ‘be involved’. But Cara didn’t know what he was like. All he kept saying was ‘cunt’ and ‘bitch’, and ‘Why did you keep it?’ Why did she? Was it sentimentality, or something more? She could have got the morning-after pill. There was a number of things she could have done. Sometimes she thinks she got pregnant on purpose; that she knew Jem was there, waiting to be born. That she wanted him. His birth felt like a kind of reunion.
The second message was sent only ten minutes ago:
Cunt call me back or I will take legal action.
A drowning sensation in her chest – she realises she has been holding her breath. It takes effort to exhale. She reaches for the glass of water beside the bed and forces herself to take a little of it into her mouth. Sometimes he can go six months without contacting her, and then there are a few weeks of texts and calls. She can tolerate that, so long as he doesn’t go to the courts for access, or turn up here, or at Jem’s school…
Jem is chatting to Grandma. She can catch the inflections of his voice, but not the words. Quietly, she crosses the hyacinth-perfumed landing and leans in the doorway of Grandma’s bedroom. There they are – Jem sitting up in the bed beside Grandma, his legs sticking out straight and the blankets across his lap. Grandma is sucking her dentures into place as she bends to the nightstand for her glasses. She pushes them onto her nose, draws back a little and peers at the book.
‘Oh yes!’ she says. ‘The lovely book with the owl family. You know your Aunty Cara drew these? Isn’t she a clever aunty? And look what it says at the beginning, “For Jem”… you were just a tiny baby when she made those pictures.’
Jem smiles fondly at the idea of himself as a tiny baby – his smile and tilted brows imitating Grandma’s – but Freya can tell he is impatient for the story to start.
‘She was always an artist, you know, your Aunty Cara. Her granddad said she came from the Old Masters… but she has her own style. She always knew what she thought, never went in for nonsense. You know once, when your mammy was very little – not much older than you – we were all together in a lovely hotel called the Shelbourne Hotel, in the city centre…’
‘Mammy!’
Jem has spotted her. He stands on the bed, arms stretched up, as though about to leap into the air.
‘Good morning everybody,’ says Freya. She sits on the bed, letting Jem wrap his arms around her neck and climb into her lap.
Grandma pulls off her glasses. ‘Well, Freya. Did you have a good sleep, darling?’
‘A great sleep.’
‘Good. Nothing like a good sleep.’
Jem twists himself off Freya’s lap and clutches one of her arms, pulling her up towards the headboard.
‘Come in the bed Mammy. Mimi is doing a story.’
‘I’ll get the porridge on. You have your story and then come on down.’
Jem harrumphs, falling heavily on his bottom beside Grandma.
‘Okay, but eggy bread okay? Not porridge.’
‘No Jem, I’m working today.’
‘Please, Mammy! Please, eggy bread. I can help!’
‘No, baby, you had pancakes yesterday, and your Aunt Cara is collecting you at eleven…’
‘Poor darling,’ says Grandma, ‘isn’t your mammy a terrible meanie? Come on and we’ll make you some eggy bread, it won’t take long. We can have the story tonight… You put your wellies on for me, and your jacket, and we’ll go and see if there are any eggs in the henhouse.’
*
While Grandma and Jem are making breakfast, Freya gets ready for her party. Just one today; a fairy princess party. She does her makeup in the hallway mirror – pale, sparkly eyelids and lots of blusher. The idea is to be as cartoonish as possible without becoming monstrous. She can hear Jem and Grandma in the kitchen…
‘Sugar?’ asks Grandma.
‘Check!’ shouts Jem.
‘Eggs?’
‘Check!’
‘Four of them…?’
‘Check!’
‘Cinnamon?’
‘Is this it?’
‘That’s the cinnamon, yes.’
‘Check, check, check, check!’
Freya uses hairpins to fix a string of roses around her head. Then she hangs her fairy wings on the back of the front door so that she won’t forget them on the way out.
‘Well, Jem,’ says Grandma, ‘you are the best eggy-bread-maker I ever have known!’
Freya lifts the lid off her coffee – it hasn’t all filtered down yet. ‘Don’t let Cara see that you’re still buying these filters, Grandma. They aren’t very good for the environment you know.’
‘Well, it’s Fairtrade it says.’
‘But all the plastic, Grandma.’
‘I’m allowed my one sin, Freya. I like my filter coffee.’
‘I might buy a coffee press, you know, something like what Cara has? It’s not good, throwing away a plastic cup every time we have a cup of coffee…’
Grandma turns to Jem. ‘Isn’t your Mammy a terrible saintly one? If a cup of coffee is my only vice, Miss Freya, I’m doing very well thank you.’
Freya checks the clock – nearly half ten. ‘So, Cara will be here around eleven Grandma…’
‘Yes, marvellous. That’s perfect. You know, I told Aoife I might go over to her for Sunday lunch.’
‘Oh well that will be nice Grandma.’
‘My Fifi can be very cranky these days, you know.’
‘She can…’
‘Is it since the change, do you think? I could bring her some lady’s mantle, maybe, or some sage. But I was never funny for the change. My monthlies just stopped, that’s all, you know. But Mrs Brereton had a bad time. Oh, she suffered. Once she came to the door and her face red, you know – well, red! As red, Freya, as Jem’s pyjamas there… “Oh Molly,” she said, “get Gerry from school for me could you?” And then she nearly collapsed right there on the step…’
‘Oh. I liked Mrs Brereton.’
‘Yes. I didn’t like how the son turned out. You know him, don’t you? A big article. Big potato head on him?’
‘I can’t picture him.’
‘Oh, Freya, yes you do – big long jaw and a bony forehead like he was about to sprout horns…’
‘I really can’t remember meeting him.’
‘You did, Freya – you must have met him ten times at least. Isn’t your mammy a silly goose, Jem?’
Jem shakes his head, his mouth shrinking to a bewildered shape. Freya rubs his back.
‘I might not be up to it today, Freya. I might cancel, you know. Though that might make Aoife blow up. You know how she is… Freya, I want you to do something for me, will you?’
‘Yep. It’s only I do have to leave now in five minutes…’
‘You remember that letter I told you about?’
‘Which?’
‘That your grandad wrote.’
‘The letter to Aoife?’
‘Yes. It’s in Grandad’s office, just sitting in the top drawer. Go and get it for me, will you? It’s time I did something about it.’
‘Are you going to read it?’
‘I think, yes. Or you read it. We could read it together maybe.’
‘Okay, but maybe this evening is better Grandma, because I need to get to work…’
‘Well, go and get it for me anyway, darling, and then we’ll see.’
‘Yes, okay, Grandma but then I’ll have to go, okay? Cara will be here soon.’