Sunday was a huge success. We ate dinner around the dining table like one big happy family, with the children grouped along one side and Patrick and me on the other. There was lots of talking and laughing as we ate and Patrick was very complimentary about my cooking, which was nice. When I took the pudding – fresh cream chocolate trifle – from the fridge and placed it on the table they clapped and cheered, and I took a small bow. As the weather was good, after we’d eaten we went into the garden for the rest of the afternoon. Patrick and I sat on the garden bench talking while the children played various games and then impressed us with their handstands and cartwheels.
‘Look, Mum!’ Adrian and Paula called.
‘Look, Dad,’ Michael said.
‘Well done! Very daring,’ we praised.
By five o’clock Adrian was saying he was hungry again, so leaving Patrick watching the children in the garden I went into the kitchen and made cheese and ham sandwiches, which we ate on the lawn in the garden with a drink of lemonade like a mini picnic. It was nearly 7.00 p.m. before the air began to chill and we finally put away the garden toys and went indoors. Patrick said they should be going. He offered to do the washing up but I refused. He called for a cab and when it arrived Adrian, Paula and I waved them off at door to shouts of ‘See you soon’. It was a truly lovely day and one I still think of fondly.
The children and I saw Patrick and Michael regularly throughout the following month of May: all together at weekends and just Patrick and me one evening mid-week. Sometimes Patrick came to my house, when Nora or Colleen would babysit Michael, and sometimes I went to his house, when Jenny or Rose sat for me. Patrick and I also went out for a couple of evenings: for a walk by the lake, and to the cinema, where we ate popcorn and chocolates from wrappers that crinkled and we laughed just like children. There was a sense of carefree abandonment when there were just the two of us out alone and we’d left the responsibilities of single parenting behind us for a few hours. Likewise when we were all together we were light-hearted and laughed a lot. We went on family outings, to the park and to the swimming pool, where I went in the water with the children while Patrick watched from the tiered seating at the side, and we all had hot chocolate afterwards.
Patrick and I didn’t talk about his illness when we were together and for my part I rarely thought about it either. Patrick appeared well and although he was still very thin he was eating, so I was expecting him to start gaining weight. Sometimes he became breathless but recovered after a short sit-down. Only once did he mention the hospital – that he’d been to the hospital in the morning for some tests. He told me the doctor had said he was very pleased he was ‘still holding his own’. I smiled and said, ‘Of course you are. You’re doing very well.’ I didn’t hear the limitation of time suggested in the doctor’s comment ‘still holding his own’: the implication that there could be another outcome. To me the doctor’s words simply confirmed Patrick was staying well and would continue to do so indefinitely.
I suppose it was inevitable that at some point John would hear of Patrick’s existence, and although I was doing nothing wrong, when he phoned he tried to make me believe I was. Paula must have said something to her father when he’d taken her and Adrian out on the Sunday after Patrick and Michael had come for dinner. I could picture her innocently mentioning Patrick and Michael and John seizing on her remark and questioning her. The first I knew that Patrick had been spoken of was when I answered the phone on Monday morning – the Monday after John had seen the children.
‘Cathy, it’s John,’ he said tightly. ‘There’s something I need to discuss with you.’ I was surprised to hear his voice, as usually he phoned only at the weekends to speak to the children, so I thought he must want to talk about the divorce. I’d been putting off finding a solicitor and starting the divorce process, although I knew John wanted a divorce so that he could remarry. But it wasn’t the divorce John wanted to discuss, although he did mention it, and indeed he didn’t want to ‘discuss’ anything but accuse me.
‘I understand you’ve moved your boyfriend into the house,’ he began, ‘so you can forget about maintenance or me paying half the mortgage. I’ve spoken to my solicitor and he has advised me that as we’re still technically married you’ve committed adultery, so we’re equally to blame now. I therefore want a divorce on two years’ separation, not my adultery –’
‘John!’ I said, recovering. ‘Patrick is not a boyfriend. He’s a friend, and he never stays the night.’
‘Pull the other one,’ John sneered. ‘He’s there when the children go to bed.’
‘Yes, occasionally he comes here in the evening. But he always goes home before eleven o’clock.’
‘So who’s looking after my children while you two are canoodling on the sofa?’ he said changing tack.
‘They’re in bed, and we don’t canoodle. We talk.’ I was upset, and struggling to defend myself, but I stopped short of telling him Patrick was the father of a child I would be fostering. It was none of his business and he was being so irrational it wouldn’t have made any difference.
‘If you give me any reason to believe my children are being neglected, I’ll apply for custody,’ John said. It was the worst threat he could have issued and he knew it. I felt hot and sick and my heart pounded with fear. John had always been a tower of strength but now he had turned against me I was no match for him.
‘The children are fine,’ I said, struggling to keep my voice steady. ‘You know I always put them first. If you really don’t want Patrick to come to the house then he won’t until everything is sorted out. I’ll find a solicitor tomorrow and make an appointment to start the divorce process.’ Which seemed to placate him.
‘So I can tell my solicitor he can expect to hear from your solicitor soon? And the divorce will be by mutual consent not my adultery?’
‘Yes,’ I said quietly.
‘Good. I’ll phone at the weekend to speak to the children. Goodbye.’ And he hung up.
I stayed where I was on the sofa in the sitting room and slowly replaced the handset. My heart was pounding and tears stung the back of my eyes. It wasn’t only the injustice of John’s false accusations – that I was neglecting the children and ‘canoodling’ with Patrick – that had upset me, but the manner in which he’d spoken to me. I knew I couldn’t put off finding a solicitor any longer, for to do so would antagonize him further and he would seize on everything I did or didn’t do to make life difficult. As I sat on the sofa staring unseeing across the room I finally had to admit my marriage was over and the loving person I thought I’d be with for life had gone for good.
On a lighter note it wasn’t only John Paula had mentioned Patrick to. The next time my parents visited Mum and I were in the kitchen preparing dinner when Mum sidled up to me and asked conspiratorially, ‘So who’s this Patrick Paula’s told us about?’
I smiled. Mum wanted nothing more than for me to have a ‘companion’, as she put it. ‘He’s a friend,’ I said, slightly defensively, but then realized I could say more. ‘He’s a widower, the father of the boy I fostered for a weekend last month.’
‘Oh, I see,’ she said, her eyes lighting up and doubtless marrying me off on the spot. ‘When can we meet him?’
‘Not for a long while. When my divorce is through.’
‘So why were you fostering his son?’ she asked after a moment, pausing from chopping the carrots.
‘Patrick has been ill. He was taken into hospital and there was no one else to look after Michael.’
‘How sad. That was very nice of you, though, dear,’ which is what Mum says whenever I tell her about a child I’ve looked after – although it’s my parents who deserve the praise for unreservedly welcoming every child I foster into their home and hearts.
I didn’t hear from Jill or Stella during May. I wasn’t surprised. There was no need for them to contact me, as I wasn’t fostering Michael. What was unusual, though, was that as a foster carer I was left without a child to look after for a whole month. There is always a shortage of foster carers and beds are not usually left empty for long, so that as one child leaves another arrives. However, I was still technically on ‘standby’ to look after Michael so, although Patrick was well, the bed had to be kept free. Assuming Patrick continued to make the progress he had been making, I knew I would soon be taken off standby so that I could foster another child.
It was the first Sunday in June and Adrian and Paula were out with their father for the day. The weather was fantastic, with the sun shining in a cloudless blue sky and a gentle warm breeze stirring the leaves on the trees. I was in the back garden, pulling up some weeds, breathing in the smell of the grass I had just cut and feeling life was pretty good, when the phone rang indoors. I straightened and, brushing the dirt from my hands, left my shoes at the French windows and went into the sitting room, where I answered the phone.
‘Mrs Glass?’ a male voice asked.
‘Yes. Speaking.’
‘It’s the duty social worker. I understand you are the foster carer for Michael Byrne?’
‘Yes, but he’s not here now. He went back to his father,’ I said, wondering why the duty social worker was phoning me. The ‘out of hours’ duty social workers are often supplied by agencies who do not always have access to the latest information.
There was a short pause before he asked, ‘When was Michael with you?’
‘Last month. He came for a weekend. Why?’
Ignoring my question he said: ‘You are listed as the foster carer for Michael on an “as and when” basis.’
‘Yes, that’s right.’
‘Can you collect him now? He’s been taken to St Mary’s hospital with his father.’
Finally I realized why the duty social worker was phoning me. ‘Michael’s father is ill?’
‘Yes. I understand he collapsed on his way home from church. A passer-by called an ambulance and Michael went with his father in the ambulance. How long will it take you to get there?’
‘I’ll leave straight away. I can be there in twenty minutes.’
‘I’ll phone the hospital and tell them you’re on your way. It’s St Mary’s.’
‘Yes. Tell Michael I’ll be with him soon.’