My heart was full by the time the children went home. I could almost forget all the nastiness of the last few days. When I’d been with them, I’d allowed myself to become immersed fully in their worlds. I’d listened to them talk about their schoolwork. Their hopes for the summer. Their badgering of their poor father to get them a dog just like Izzy to play with. They’d invited me into their lives, sharing every little detail with such enthusiasm that I swear I’d felt so much lighter, both physically and emotionally, just for having seen them.
As we’d played together in the yard, the hot sun beating down on us, their laughter ringing in my ears, I could almost remember what it had been like years before, when the sound of my own children’s laughter rang through this old farmhouse in the Seventies and Eighties.
Maybe that was part of the reason the house was falling apart around us now. Just like me, it had been sustained by laughter and love, but there was little of that left in either of us these days.
I’d pushed away those thoughts and concentrated on what I could do and that was to make the rest of the day as pleasant as possible for Max and Ava.
They’d astounded me with their ability to eat so much ice cream and even when I’d warned them they’d end up with a tummy ache, they’d insisted on one more scoop. I didn’t have it in me to refuse them, so they’d each got one more, very generous, serving.
By the time their daddy came to pick them up, they were sitting on the sofa in my living room and we were looking through old family photographs. They loved that. Loved seeing their mother when she was a little girl. Seeing me with bad hair and worse glasses. Seeing pictures of their granddad, their uncle; people who were no longer a part of their lives but always a part of their family. Seeing us all in different, easier times.
Ava looked so much like her mother had as a young girl. Sometimes it would catch me unawares. It would almost feel as if Laura were back with me.
‘Look, Daddy!’ Ava called as he’d walked in. ‘Have you seen this picture of Mammy before? When she was my age. She’s reading one of the books from her room that I’ve read.’
‘That’s lovely, pet,’ he’d said, giving little more than a cursory glance at it before urging the kids to pick up their things and get ready to go home.
As he’d sat waiting for them, I couldn’t help but notice he still looked as if he had the weight of the world on his shoulders, as if there was something he was trying to tell me but couldn’t.
‘Is everything okay?’ I’d asked.
He’d sighed. ‘Just a long day,’ he’d said. ‘Maybe it’s just with it coming to the end of term, I’m almost as worn out as the children. A holiday’ll do us the world of good.’
‘It will,’ I’d said. ‘And no one deserves it more.’
He’d lifted the photo album from where Ava had left it on the table and started to flick through it, smiling every time he saw Laura.
‘I do miss her, you know,’ he’d said. ‘I wish she could see how the kids are growing. Ava’s coming to an age where she needs a mother’s influence, if you know what I mean.’
‘I can have those kind of talks with her if you want,’ I’d offered.
‘That would be good,’ he’d said, turning the page.
I remember looking over his shoulder, when I noticed something strange. There were blank spaces in the album. Spaces where pictures had been stuck in but where now only remnants of backing paper were left stuck to the glue. I hadn’t taken them out. I hadn’t looked at those albums in a long time.
By my reckoning, the missing pictures were the ones Laura had taken herself when we’d loaned her our camera to take into the school fun day. We’d been so excited when she’d shown us pictures of groups of girls. Girls she’d said were her friends. She was in some of them herself. Maybe standing to the side. Not grinning at the camera like the rest of them but offering her small, shy smile instead. She’d insisted we put them in the album and we did as she’d asked.
‘That’s strange,’ I’d said. ‘There’s some pictures missing. I’m sure I didn’t take any out.’
‘Do you think maybe Ava did? Or Max? Maybe they wanted a picture of their mum.’
My heart had contracted a little at the thought of the children smuggling pictures of their mother out of the house.
‘Sure, all they had to do was ask,’ I’d said, my heart too sore at their loss to be cross with them.
They’d run back into the room and I’d watched as their father asked them to sit down, then asked them very solemnly if they’d taken any pictures from my photo album.
Both children shook their heads.
‘It’s important to tell the truth,’ he’d said.
‘I didn’t take them, Daddy,’ Ava had said and Max just shook his head.
‘It’s okay if you did. I know you love your mum very much. I just need to know,’ I’d said.
They’d both looked at me.
‘I swear, Granny, I didn’t,’ Max had said.
‘Me neither,’ said Ava and I could see her bottom lip wobble a little.
I’d no desire to upset the children over a couple of photos, so I’d told them I believed them. I’d made sure to give them extra hugs and slip a fiver into each of their hands before they left.
It had felt like order was restored in the world and I’d sat down to bask in the memories of a mostly very lovely afternoon.
It still didn’t answer the questions about where the photographs were, though, or who’d taken them.