Amy made it home from the clinic before Jack and Claire returned from London. She sat at the kitchen table, a mug of tea at hand, and read back through each of the text messages she’d received – on the hour, every hour – through the day.
They started out so full of hope, so optimistic that any moment now they were going to catch a break or find a lead. But as the day had worn on, they’d grown less certain, less hopeful. Now it was fully dark outside, and the last one read:
Still nothing. Heading to station now. Home soon.
Still nothing. That was how this whole season had felt, for Amy. Like she was still getting nowhere, no matter how hard she tried. Like trudging through a snowdrift, and getting blown backwards by the wind. Like when she finally got a night out, and the chance to feel like Amy again, singing karaoke with Luke Fitzgerald, only to be dragged back to the real world by Jim’s phone call.
The future felt an awfully lonely place, right now.
She shook her head. She couldn’t let the kids see her moping around like this, and they’d be home any second.
Instead, she got to her feet and turned the radio on, tuning it in to whoever was playing Christmas music right now. Then she pulled a couple of packs of chocolate Christmas decorations out from the cupboard. The kids had always loved hanging them on the tree – and insisting they had to eat whichever ones didn’t have threads attached to hang them with. It was always amazing how many defective ones they found – and how many extra threads she found hidden around the place afterwards.
Amy had just hunted down the scissors to open the packet, when the front door crashed into the telephone table, indicating that the kids were home at last.
‘Hey, how did it go?’ She met them in the hallway with a smile on her face, but neither Jack nor Claire returned it.
‘Waste of time.’ Jack brushed past her to throw his coat over the end of the bannister, and add his shoes to the pile that never quite seemed to make it onto the shoe rack. Amy smiled sadly at the shoes – all unchewed, without Henry there. Just another sign of their loss – like the small pile of food scraps she kept finding under the kitchen table after dinner, which she knew were there because Claire had forgotten, again, that there was no Henry around to eat up the bits she didn’t like.
‘We looked everywhere,’ Claire said, quietly. ‘No one had seen Henry. Not even at the Dogs and Cats home.’
Amy wrapped an arm around her shoulders and held her close. ‘At least you tried.’
‘Don’t know why we bothered,’ Jack muttered. ‘Henry’s never coming home. Just like Dad.’
Ouch. Amy’s heart contracted at the pain in her son’s voice. She had a feeling that chocolate tree decorations weren’t going to come close to fixing this, but they were all she had to offer right now.
‘Come on,’ she said. ‘I’ve got chocolates to put on the tree. We can put a Christmas movie on and I’ll make hot chocolate too, if you like. What do you say?’
It took some cajoling, but no one could turn down her hot chocolate. Amy hummed ‘Baby, It’s Cold Outside’ under her breath as she added the whipped cream and chocolate sprinkles, and carried the mugs through to the lounge. She smiled as she noticed that a few chocolates were already missing, and that The Muppet Christmas Carol was playing on the TV.
‘I love that you both still love the Muppets,’ she said, handing out the mugs.
Claire rolled her eyes. ‘Mum, we put it on because it’s your favourite. Not ours.’
Amy’s throat felt tight. ‘Then, thank you, sweetheart.’
‘This chocolate has no string,’ Jack declared, tearing the thread from the wrapper without even trying to be stealthy about it. Then he handed it to Amy. ‘You better eat it.’
She did.
For a moment, while the Muppets sang, the Christmas tree lights twinkled, and the world tasted of chocolate, Amy started to think that maybe, just maybe, things were getting better.
And then the phone rang. Again.
She was starting to hate phones.
‘Hi, Jim.’ Amy tried not to sigh at the sound of his voice, but it was hard. She signalled to the kids that she was taking the phone through to the kitchen, and saw them exchange a look. Had they been talking about Jim and her on their day trip to London? Probably. She’d give up hot chocolate for a year to know what they’d each said.
‘Amy. Hi.’ Jim sounded stiff, constrained. Amy wondered if Bonnie was right there, listening in, making sure he said whatever they’d agreed on. Like she’d used to have to do when he called his mother to tell her when they’d be visiting.
‘What’s up?’ Amy sank onto one of the kitchen chairs and stared at the clock on the wall. It had stopped six months ago, so it wasn’t much help in actually telling the time, but it did emphasise how long the pause before Jim spoke felt.
‘Bonnie and I were thinking it would be nice to have the kids round on New Year’s Day. Once we’re back from France.’
‘Oh.’ Amy didn’t miss the way it was Bonnie’s idea too – or that it meant that they were living together, and he planned to introduce the kids to her. A new year, a new start – and a new family for her children. Just what they wanted, she was sure. Not.
But moving on – that was what she wanted. Wasn’t it?
‘We thought it would help you out, too,’ Jim went on, suddenly eager. ‘You know, give you a break from the kids.’
Amy blinked. ‘Wait. Are you honestly trying to tell me that you introducing our kids to your new girlfriend is doing me a favour?’
Jim sighed. ‘I don’t want this to be difficult. I just wanted to spend some time with Jack and Claire over the holidays.’
Which is why you’re going skiing for most of the two weeks they’re off school. Right.
She didn’t say it, because this was what she wanted, really. She wanted the kids to have a good relationship with their dad. She wanted Jim to make an effort to be an important part of their lives. And more than anything, she wanted to move on, to get to the next stage of whatever this was.
Jim wasn’t coming back, she knew that. And maybe Henry wasn’t too.
Which mean the only thing left was to suck it up and find her own future. Make a new life in a new situation. Maybe even go on a date, or two. Find things that she wanted to do, just for herself – not because anybody else needed her to.
Find out who Amy was, now.
The New Year was as good a time as any for that.
‘Fine,’ she said. ‘Let me know what time you want them, and where, and I’ll drop them off for you.’ She just hoped the kids would be alright with the new arrangement, too.
‘Great.’ She could hear the relief in Jim’s voice. Some small, mean part of her felt angry about giving him what he wanted, but she forced herself to focus on the bigger picture.
He had a new life. It was time for her to find one for herself, too.
Hanging up the phone, she headed back through to the lounge, where the Muppets had been swapped for something on YouTube, as far as she could tell.
‘What did he want?’ Jack didn’t look at her as he asked the question.
‘Your dad was calling to invite you both over to his new home on New Year’s Day.’ Amy braced herself for the response.
‘What? I’m not going.’ Jack shook his head so hard Amy was half afraid it might come loose.
‘I already told him that you would both be there,’ Amy replied. ‘He’s your father, Jack, and this is important to him. You’re important to him?’
‘Really? Then why did he leave?’ Jack didn’t wait for her answer. ‘And you had no right to tell him I’d be there. I’m not a kid any more, Mum. I get to make my own decisions, you know. And I’m never going to decide that I want to spend the day with him. Never again.’
‘For someone who claims to be an adult, you sound an awful lot like a whiny child,’ Amy snapped, and regretted it almost instantly. ‘I’m sorry. I just—’
But it was too late. Jack threw the TV remote down onto the floor and stalked out, muttering under his breath. She heard his bedroom door slam, and knew that she wouldn’t be seeing him again before morning. Perfect.
Claire looked at her, her gaze full of judgement.
‘I know, I know,’ Amy said, rubbing her forehead. She sighed. ‘Shall we watch more Muppets?’
‘No, thanks.’ Even Claire’s tone was clipped. ‘I’m going to go call Lucy.’
And just like that, Amy was all alone again.
Another perfect festive night in.
Well, at least she got control of the remote.
Amy flipped the Muppets back on, and went to fetch her bags of Christmas presents and wrapping paper. Unlike her children, she didn’t have time to sulk. There was far too much that still needed fixing around here, if she wanted to find that fabled future, where everything didn’t feel so difficult all the time.