Chapter Seven

‘Better?’ David asked when Andrea appeared in the kitchen ten minutes later, jog pants rolled up at the bottom and down at the top, shirt tied in a not very artistic knot in the middle.

Andrea nodded, offering him a grateful smile. ‘Yes. Thanks. You’re very organised,’ she said, having noted that, although there were various boxes parked in the hall and the lounge, the man seemed to have most things in place.

‘The house came furnished, so there wasn’t too much to do, thank goodness.’ He glanced at her. ‘But then, you’d probably know that.’

‘Yes.’ Andrea nodded and glanced down, reminded that she wouldn’t be spying on him from her bedroom window again. She didn’t have one.

‘Hope the plumbing didn’t keep you awake?’ he asked, obviously trying to make conversation. ‘Boiler’s a bit past it, I’m afraid.’

‘No, not really.’

David arched an incredulous eyebrow.

‘I was awake anyway.’ Andrea shrugged.

David nodded, understanding, and went back to grilling the bacon, stirring the beans, burning the toast. ‘Damn!’ he cursed, shaking his also burned fingers.

‘Can I help?’ Andrea asked, stepping forwards.

‘No,’ David said quickly and rather brusquely.

Startled by his tone, Andrea stepped back.

‘Sorry. Sorry.’ David looked immediately apologetic. ‘It’s just … I prefer my space, you know? Thanks, anyway.’

‘That’s okay,’ Andrea said, but she couldn’t help but be reminded again of his fast temper. ‘I’m the same in my own, um …’ she trailed off, studying her toes and trying hard not to think of what was burned in her kitchen. ‘We’ll be out of your hair just as soon as I can get something sorted out,’ she offered, aware that having her family descend on him uninvited must be as awkward for him as it was for her.

‘Right,’ David said, placing plates on the kitchen table, along with a handful of cutlery, coming back for juice, catching the unburned toast, dropping a slice. ‘Shit!’

He shoved that in the bin and tried again.

‘I’ll go over to my … the house later,’ Andrea went on as he carried a dish laden with bacon to the table. ‘Survey the damage and see what can be salvaged.’

‘Bad idea.’ David headed back again to the hall. ‘Jake. Breakfast!’ he shouted up the stairs. ‘Now, please.’ He gave Andrea a brief smile as he came back to the kitchen. ‘He’ll be late. School, you know.’

‘Yes. Yes, of course.’ Andrea managed a small smile back. It was business as usual for the rest of the world, she supposed, even if her world had ground to a disastrous halt. ‘I’d better ring in.’ She sighed wearily. ‘Tell them what’s happened, though I imagine the village drums will have conveyed the news by now.’

David smiled wryly. ‘I expect so, but feel free to use the phone anyway,’ he offered, finally managing to produce edible toast that stayed on the plate.

‘Thank you. I will, if you don’t mind. I don’t have my mobile charger. It’s … You know.’ Melted probably, Andrea thought miserably.

She glanced at the ceiling, almost wishing he wouldn’t be quite so hospitable. Her previous judgement of him may well have been hasty, the man was being terribly kind, but she didn’t want to be his houseguest any more than he wanted her family camped there, she imagined.

‘What’s a bad idea?’ she asked, since he hadn’t elaborated.

‘Going back into the house before it’s been checked out by the fire safety officer. Too risky. The insurance assessor will have to go in, too, presumably. Might be best not to disturb anything yet.’

He was right. Of course he was. So, what on earth did she do? Go shopping in his jog pants? Go to school in them?

‘Black or white?’ David asked after her preference to coffee as Andrea blinked back a useless tear.

‘White. Thanks. Ten thousand sugars … for energy,’ she said, drooping across to the table.

‘I have some stuff you might be able to use,’ David said, seating himself opposite, checking his watch, one eye on the door to the hall.

‘Sorry?’

‘Clothing.’ He shrugged, seemingly uncomfortable. ‘Things you could wear until you get yourself sorted out.’

Andrea looked at him curiously. ‘Well, I’d be glad of anything, obviously. I’m sure the jog pants look wonderful on you, but … um …’ she trailed off awkwardly as Ryan came into the kitchen, apparently his usual witty self.

‘Put him down, Mother. Children present,’ he commented drolly, stretched and yawned, and then scratched his armpit as he headed to the table.

‘So I see.’ Andrea arched an eyebrow at his Homer Simpson boxers.

‘What?’ Ryan followed her gaze. ‘Can I help it if someone has immature dress sense?’

‘Jake bought them. A Christmas present, a while back,’ David explained, glancing down, quite obviously embarrassed.

Oh, dear. So they were his, then. And Jake had bought them for him? The Jake she’d seen wouldn’t be excitedly buying Christmas presents for his dad, which might indicate the wide gulf between them was due to recent events.

‘Cool, cooked breakfast.’ Ryan stopped yawning in order to facilitate stuffing a rasher of bacon complete into his mouth.

Andrea was about to admonish him when Jake himself wandered bleary-eyed into the kitchen. ‘Not hungry,’ he mumbled, sloping to the fridge to extract a pint of milk.

‘Uh-uh,’ David issued a warning as Jake tilted the bottle towards his mouth. ‘Sit and eat, please. And I mean eat, Jake. No arguments.’

‘Not hungry,’ Jake repeated, eyeballing his father defiantly, whose jaw tensed somewhat, Andrea noticed.

‘Better do it, mate,’ Ryan interrupted the almost indiscernible standoff as father and son locked eyes. ‘Don’t want to invite the wrath of Dad, do we? Not if he’s coughing up dosh so we can hit the shops later? In any case, you’ll need your strength if I’m going to beat you at Superior Challenge.’

‘Yeah, right.’ Jake’s mouth twitched into a smile. ‘In your dreams, mate.’ He parked himself next to Ryan and reached for the juice, his eyes again flickering moodily over his father as he did.

Andrea glanced at David, wondering what his reaction would be, and then cringed as Dee marched in, still dressed in her winceyette nightie and her chest puffed up indignantly. ‘Who’s had them?’ she boomed, turning suspicious eyes on Ryan.

Ryan splayed his hands innocently. ‘What?’

‘Teeth, boy. Teeth.’ Dee pointed a finger at her mouth and all became clear, to Andrea anyway. Ryan had ‘borrowed’ his gran’s teeth last snowfall, to give Chloe’s snowman a smile.

‘Mum, they’re in your—’ Andrea was about to point out where she’d left them for safekeeping, when Dee interrupted.

‘They’re not!’ She took a step forward, tripped over her nightie, and then hoisted the hem up. ‘The glass is empty,’ she imparted, raising the glass of water Andrea had left on the bedside table as irrefutable evidence. ‘You’re chewing very well.’ Dee turned her slit-eyed gaze on David.

Actually, he was more choking than chewing, Andrea noticed, concerned, as David coughed heartily and reached for his juice.

‘Mum, stop it!’ Andrea hissed, getting to her feet. ‘He has his own teeth.’ She tried not to look at Ryan, who was doing a rather impressive Bugs Bunny impression. ‘Why would he want yours?’

‘Exactly.’ Dee nodded triumphantly, leaving the audience to draw their own conclusions, presumably.

David knocked back his juice, coughed some more, then looked at Andrea as if he’d been caught up in a world gone quite mad. Then diplomatically looked down, as Sophie wandered in, her spikes bolt upright and her legs on show up to her knickers under one of his shirts.

‘Sophie!’ Andrea glanced despairingly from her mother – who was looking at David menacingly now – to her daughter.

‘What?’ Sophie blinked panda eyes and looked the picture of innocence.

Andrea sighed. ‘Clothes, Sophie! Put some on.’

‘I haven’t got any clothes to put on,’ Sophie retorted, hands on hips, and her head going from side-to-side as she spelled out her point.

‘Go!’ Andrea gave Sophie a no-nonsense glare and pointed to the door, and then shot off her chair as Chloe wailed from the landing, ‘Mum-my, wanna wee-wee.’

‘What on earth are you doing, Sophie?’ Andrea snapped as she bolted towards the hall. ‘You don’t leave toddlers alone at the top of the stairs with no baby gate.’

‘D’oh.’ Sophie stuffed her tongue belligerently against the inside of her lower lip. ‘We don’t have a baby gate, though, do we?’

‘You are going to be in big trouble, young lady, if you don’t watch the attitude,’ Andrea warned her, disappearing through the door to take the stairs two at a time.

‘Well, that’s really different, innit?’ Sophie’s sulky reply drifted up after her. ‘Blame everything on me, why don’t you?’

‘Grow up, metal-mouth,’ Ryan retorted. ‘Give Mum a break and give it a rest.’

Andrea scooped Chloe up, torn between being grateful to Ryan and giving him hell for making fun of Sophie’s braces in front of people.

‘Shut it, muppet,’ Sophie growled from below.

‘Says she with the cartoon hairdo,’ Ryan replied smartly.

At which point Jake joined in. ‘Weirdo.’

‘Jake, enough!’ Andrea heard David warn him. ‘And you two …’ he paused, obviously trying to moderate his tone. ‘Why don’t you both give your mum a break, hey? She has a lot on her plate.’

Andrea wasn’t about to judge him badly this time. Glad for his intervention, she reached to pluck her little one up from the landing as silence prevailed. Almost.

‘Gran, geddoff! They’re in your mouth.’ Sophie’s peeved tones followed Andrea to the bathroom as she carried Chloe there.

Too late, unfortunately. Wonderful. Ah, well, little catastrophes Andrea could cope with. She gave Chloe a whoops-a-daisy smile, decided her first port of call would have to be the Tiny Tots shop, and then swilled out Chloe’s Fifi and the Flowertots trainer pants in the sink.

Though where would she hang them to dry? She glanced around the bathroom. Lots of man-stuff scattered about, but no handy hooks or indoor clothes line.

‘Mummy, upsies.’ Chloe jiggled, arms outstretched as Andrea squeezed as much water from the garment as she could.

‘One minute, sweetie,’ she promised, grabbing the opportunity for a quick call of nature herself, on the basis that time to pee was of a premium.

‘Mum-my.’ Chloe jiggled some more, desperate to be picked up as there was a knock at the bathroom door.

Typical! Andrea twanged up her own drawers and wondered whether to just drown herself in the bath and be done with it. She took a deep breath, breathed out, then picked Chloe up and hugged her tight.

‘Mummy loves you bigger than the whole world and all the stars, baby,’ she whispered, sure being even mildly irritated with her family was dreadful after what had happened. Shaking off the icy tremor that ran the length of her spine, Andrea grabbed Chloe’s pants from the sink and pulled open the door.

‘Everything okay?’ David stood on the landing, hands in his pockets, an expression of mild irritation tempered with concern on his face.

‘Perfect,’ Andrea assured him, dredging a smile from the soles of her feet.

‘Just a suggestion,’ he shrugged, taking in her attire and Chloe’s handheld wet pants, ‘but why don’t you do some shopping online? You could probably get next day delivery on most things, and the insurance should cough up, assuming you have household insurance?’ He glanced at her questioningly.

Andrea blinked at him as if he’d just sprouted a halo, and then nodded, dumbly. Why on earth hadn’t she thought of that?

‘There’s a desktop in Jake’s room, but you might prefer to rest up a bit and use my laptop in the lounge.’

Andrea found her voice. ‘Rest? Chance would be a fine thing.’ She smiled and hoisted Chloe higher in her arms.

He smiled back, properly this time, amazingly. Nothing too earth-shattering or face altering, but definitely a proper smile.

‘There’s a clothes airer in the utility, if you need it, and the clothes I talked about are in the spare room.’ He nodded towards a room at the end of the landing. ‘Sorry I couldn’t offer you the bed in there last night, but it’s pretty chock-a-block with stuff.’

Oh. So, if Ryan had bunked up with Jake and the rest of her family had taken over his bedroom, where had he slept, then?

‘Which is why I ended up on the sofa – and grouchier than usual. Sorry about that.’ David smiled again, a self-deprecating smile this time.

‘Oh, Lord, you shouldn’t have done that, Dav … Mr Adams. We could have camped in the lounge.’

‘No problem. The sofa converts to a bed. And it’s David, the name. Might as well dispense with formalities now we’re sleeping on top of one another. Er, I mean …’ he trailed off, looking a touch embarrassed.

Andrea laughed – she couldn’t help herself – and extended her hand around Chloe to re-introduce herself. ‘Nice to meet the nicer side of you, David. And thank you … for everything.’

She was grateful, truly, more than he could ever know, for his hospitality and his bravery. He might have burned his fingers on the toast, but his forearm looked to Andrea as if it had been licked by flames. She was still worried for his son – something was terribly wrong between them. She had no idea where the mother was or what the man’s circumstances were, but whatever had caused the dreadful rift between them, her own past experiences had coloured her judgement of David Adams, of that Andrea was sure.

‘Do you have something for that?’ she asked, concerned that he might have been too busy with everyone else to attend to himself.

‘Sorry?’ David followed her glance down. ‘Oh, yes, thanks. Be a poor show if I didn’t, wouldn’t it, my being a GP?’ David shrugged it off with a smile.

‘How did …?’ Andrea wondered how he’d come to be so close to the fire, though she wasn’t sure she wanted to know.

‘The, er, dog.’ He shrugged again, awkwardly. ‘I looked for him, but …’

Andrea nodded and swallowed back the tears that welled up inside her. ‘A very courageous GP, I think,’ she said softly.

David hesitated, his eyes searching hers for a second, before he dropped his gaze. ‘Depends on how you measure courage.’

‘And a very busy one, I imagine.’ Noting the flicker of guilt she’d seen there, the body language, Andrea sensed it wasn’t a subject he wanted to pursue. ‘I’ll book us into a hotel for tonight and leave you in peace,’ she said, sure he’d be desperate for his space.

He eyed her quizzically. ‘Not a lot of point ordering next day delivery then?’

‘Oh.’

‘Stay,’ he said, ‘until you can sort yourself out properly at least. You might need to be on hand for the insurers anyway.’

Andrea debated. It wasn’t a begrudging offer, made out of politeness. She could see he was genuinely being kind. And she knew it made more sense than booking into a hotel without a scrap of luggage, but still … ‘Well, if you’re sure?’

‘I wouldn’t have offered if I wasn’t.’

‘Thank you,’ she said again, her heart warming to this man she’d thought an arrogant bully. ‘It really is very kind of you.’

‘It’s no problem,’ he assured her, turning towards the stairs. ‘Oh,’ he turned back, ‘is your husband working away or something? It’s just that he doesn’t seem to be—’

‘He’s not,’ Andrea said quickly.

David cocked his head curiously to one side.

‘Neither my husband, nor around, just now,’ Andrea elaborated, not sure why she’d mentioned the husband bit, other than she felt utterly deserted by Jonathan.

David nodded, looking somewhat pensive, and then headed off downstairs as the doorbell rang.

The first of many concerned well-wishers, Andrea suspected, knowing how fast news travelled in the village. She held Chloe tight and, wet undies still in hand, made to follow him, supposing she’d have to face them sooner or later.

‘Andrea!’ Sally exclaimed, bustling past a very surprised looking David as she spotted Andrea coming down the stairs. ‘Honey, I am so, so sorry.’ Sally blinked up at Andrea sympathetically. ‘I tried to get to you last night, but the firemen had everything cordoned off and … Oh, Andrea, I can’t believe it. It’s so awful. Eva said everyone had got out all right, but … How are you, sweetie?’

Sally threw her arms around her as Andrea reached the hall, stood back to look her over and then, ‘Good God, Andrea. You look just like one of the Teletubbies. What have you got on?’