Page 106 of The Fall-Out

Gabrielle had called Rowan first, because it had been her number that was uppermost on the scrap of paper Rowan had given her. And it was just as well, because I’d never have been able to understand the story, told in French, of how Zara hadn’t returned to collect her, one of Gabrielle’s children had developed an allergy, and Gabrielle couldn’t bring herself to abandon her at an animal shelter.

‘I can’t take her, either,’ Rowan had fretted. ‘You know what Balthazar’s like. He’d eat her for breakfast.’

So I’d made the trip to Paris on the Eurostar, this time alone, and returned with a companion. To my surprise, Bisou had fitted into my life as if she’d always been there, greeting me at the door when I got home from work, curling up on my lap while I worked on my law conversion course assignments at the kitchen table in the evenings, sleeping on the kids’ pillows at night.

She was just one of the many things in my life that had changed. At first bewildered by the idea that Mummy and Daddy wouldn’t be living together any more, Toby and Meredith had settled relatively quickly into their new routine, and Patch and I had – well, we were adjusting, too.

Just the previous week, on my way to work, I’d gone past the school gates and seen Patch dropping off the children. I’d stopped, keeping well away, not wanting to interfere or potentially upset the twins at the start of their day – even though a big part of me had wanted to dash over, squeeze them tightly in my arms and tell them that Mummy would always love them.

There they were, so grown-up in their uniforms but so small, too, one of them holding on to each of Patch’s hands. He was walking slowly, his head lowered, apparently deep in conversation with them. What were they saying? I longed to know, but also I was enjoying being a spectator – a spy almost – in this little slice of my ex-husband’s life with the children we’d always share.

I watched as he squatted down on the pavement and kissed them both, the teaching assistant looking on in approval. With a pang that was part remorse and part relief, I remembered that for the next two days, if one of them felt ill and needed to be taken home and put to bed, it would be Patch they called, not me.

Then I noticed another familiar figure hurrying along, a charcoal wool coat swinging from her shoulders, a leather laptop bag in one hand, her daughter clutching the other. Princess Lulu – Imogen.

She, too, stopped at the gate and relinquished her child with a kiss. But she didn’t turn and hurry away – instead, she fell into step next to Patch, the two of them walking together in the direction of the Tube station, chatting easily like they were old friends. Then I saw Imogen laugh at something Patch had said, the morning sunlight catching her glowing skin and shiny hair, and I thought, Hold on a minute.

When they were safely out of sight, I resumed my own journey to work, my mind whirling. Were they seeing each other? And did I mind if they did?

To my surprise, I realised I didn’t. Patch was a good man, a good father. I hadn’t been able to get past his infidelity with Zara – and I could see now that it was also my own behaviour I’d been unable to move beyond, to truly put behind me – but I bore him no ill will. Our children were an unbreakable link between us, one that had been forged with love. Whatever I did, and however I responded to what Patch did in his own life, had to be in their best interests.

Somehow, between us, we needed to make this work amicably, and if that meant giving him my blessing for a new relationship, I’d do that willingly.

And as for me – well. At Kate’s fortieth birthday party a month or so back, she’d introduced me to her friend Claude. Handsome Claude, who I’d met up with for coffee and a walk, the most tentative first date ever, and discovered made me laugh and feel instantly at ease. Who’d surprised me by messaging the next day to say how much he’d enjoyed it, and ask me out again. Who I was meeting for drinks and dinner on Friday night.

But now wasn’t the time to think about Claude, or even about Patch. This morning was about another man.

I pulled on my coat, tucked my laptop into my bag and then carefully placed the little paper boat on top of it. It would probably get a bit squashed on the journey, but I’d done enough practice runs that I knew I’d be able to reshape it easily once I reached my destination. Then I locked the flat behind me and hurried out into the street.

It was a glorious, golden November day, the sun low in the blue sky, slanting through the last crimson and amber leaves that clung to the plane trees. The wind that had scattered leaves over the pavement last night had dropped now and the air was still and clean-smelling. Around me, the faces of people hurrying towards the Tube station as I was looked far more cheerful than they would have on any other autumn Tuesday.

‘Happy birthday, Andy,’ I whispered, stepping down the stairs into the station.

There’d been no way for us to arrange to scatter our friend’s ashes. They’d have been delivered to his mother by the undertaker, to do with as she thought best. Perhaps she’d deposited them in the water of a Scottish loch, or into the Mediterranean on one of her cruises. Perhaps she’d buried them under a rose bush in her garden. Perhaps they were still sitting in an urn on her mantelpiece, a grim reminder of the son she must once have loved.

We’d never know. And so we’d decided to hold our own ceremony, not on the anniversary of Andy’s death but on that of his birth.

‘We could do a balloon release,’ Kate had suggested.

‘We could not,’ Rowan countered. ‘Clara would never let me hear the end of it – they’re so environmentally unfriendly.’

‘Andy would have loved it, though,’ Abbie argued.

‘Andy might not have cared about choking some poor otter to death, but I do,’ said Rowan.

‘Doves, maybe?’ I’d suggested.

‘Hell to the no,’ Kate said. ‘Horribly cruel, and besides they’d shit everywhere.’

‘We could plant a tree.’

‘Where, though? None of us has a decent-sized garden.’

‘We could do a memorial plaque on a park bench.’

‘God, imagine what Andy would have said about that? “Like I’m some ninety-year-old dear called Phyllis?”’

‘We could blow bubbles?’

---