Читать книгу Hide And Seek - Amy Bird - Страница 17

Chapter Six

-Ellie-

It’s pretty obvious why Gillian was on the verge of crying yesterday, I think to myself, as I get ready to go out to Will’s parents for dinner (because, of course, we are seeing them again). Like, not specifically why she chose that moment, over the CD. But generally.

Jealousy.

Or over-cotton-woolling, non-chopping of apron stringsing, over-mummy’s-boying. You get my drift. Not letting go. Even her jacket – that dreadful, 80s power-shoulder-pad thing – was green. That says a lot, right?

She was like that before we got married, me and Will, three years ago. Took me to one side, did the ‘are your intentions honourable?’ bit on me. OK, not quite in those words. But she actually said: “You do understand the phrase ‘in sickness and in health’, don’t you? You’ll have to look after him, if things don’t go right. Like I’ve always looked after him.” Classic jealousy. Classic not wanting another woman in the life of her precious son. When my father gave me away, I half-expected her to tell Will to give me back again. She knew I knew her game, though, because she covered her tracks. “And give him a family,” she said. “That’s what he needs.” Presumptuous. What if I wanted to put my career first, like everyone else? I knew she didn’t really mean it. Otherwise why would she be getting all teary now?

Although, to be fair, she had looked after him. My God, she had. Over looked after him. Like, he won’t do any of his own admin, ever. When we got married, I was trying to get all our papers together, prove to the registrar we were able to get married. I had this little pack of documents, and I asked Will for his birth certificate, and he was like “Oh, Mum does all that stuff.” So I was like, what do you mean, and he said “Yeah, she looks after that, for all the ID stuff, she just takes care of it.” First time, apparently, that he needed all the ID things, he was away with school and so his mum did it, and she’s just kept doing it since. So, yeah – over-mothered.

And I know where she keeps it all too. In that study of hers. All those lockable little drawers. As if she’s got all these secrets, neatly filed away. I bet that’s where she keeps Will’s baby pictures: it’s like an emblem of filial closeness. If she can keep baby Will locked away, he’ll forever be her little boy.

That’s where I got the Max Reigate CD from. Not our house. Obviously. No, from her witchy little study. Actually, it’s quite a nice study. Green, wood, armchairs, all that stuff. After all, this is Surrey, darling. But it’s still witchy because it just has this air of ‘do not touch the secrets’. So one day, as I told her, I was there looking after the plants, and even though I’d been told not to bother about the spider plants in the study, I was like, who is she to decide when they need water? So I went in and watered them, and – just while they were absorbing the water, obviously – I had a little look round. Tested a few drawers, see if they would open. Didn’t, of course. But the bureau lid came open. Miraculous, because Will says it was always locked when he was little. He puts that down to the fact he kept trying to make origami models out of her writing paper. I think she just wanted to control what he had access to in this world. Either way, when he was little, it was locked. When I was in the room, it was open. So I pulled up the lid (to admire the fine craftsmanship of the interior, obviously) and what caught my eye, because of its redness, was the Max Reigate CD case. Underneath that was a Max Reigate LP. Weird, right, having both? And then of course I saw the resemblance to Will, so I had to bring it home to show him, and then Will’s parents came back from holiday so there was no way to slip it into the study again, so…we kind of kept it.

And yes, so, this is what her tears were all about. Not the missing CD. That would be odd, particularly as she still has the LP. Although I have a theory about that CD. I’m not telling Will yet, because he is still totally puzzled by mummy’s almost-tears. He’s not admitting it, but look at him now, reading his lecture notes while he waits for me. He is drumming his fingers, drum, drum, drum, the way he always does when he’s stressed. Was doing it in his sleep last night. Really annoying – don’t need to wait until we have this baby for unbroken sleep. But yes, the baby – that’s why Gillian was crying. Because if your son has his own son with his wife, that’s him gone, right? He has this whole other family, that he’s co-head of (not head: things have moved on since Gillian was a girl). Never again can she put him over her knee and smack him, literally or figuratively. She becomes less and less relevant, slips away, into a kind of outsourced childcare provider.

“Shall we drive?” Will asks me, taking a break from his drumming and his notes. “Looks a bit dark out there. Forbidding.”

I follow Will’s nod to the windows. Yes, it is dark. That’s because it’s night. It happens.

“If my master plan were to allow my arse to take over the entire bed, maybe,” I retort. “But as it’s not, let’s walk.”

And I predict that when we get there, there will be more fun and games with Mrs S. Because when I have a theory, you see, as I do, I don’t let it go. Not until I’ve explored it thoroughly. Will may be the scientific breadwinner, but I can be just as forensic as him.