Page 44 of A Midlife Marriage

‘I mean to try and keep an eye on Ben … I was thinking.’ She leaned forward. ‘My place is much larger and it’s all on one level. I was thinking you and Ben might be more comfortable there?’

Libby’s eyes widened.

Encouraged, Helen continued. ‘You’ll be able to watch him easily when you’re in the kitchen. And with ––’

‘Really, Mum?’

She paused. Something felt off track. ‘You see,’ she started, ‘I wanted to talk to you. I’ve been offered this ––‘

But Libby was on her feet, throwing her arms around Helen’s neck. ‘I’d love that!’ she said. ‘We won’t be any trouble. Ben’s little bed will fit easily into the spare bedroom with me.’

We won’t be any trouble.Had there been a misunderstanding? Helen didn’t speak. Pressed against her cheek, her daughter’s skin felt smooth as silk, the press of it against her own opening up seams of memory, years and years of easy, warm cuddles.

‘It will just be until I start working,’ Libby said. ‘I’ll do my share, I promise. Dad said I could move back in at home, but if I did, I’d lose this place, and he’s selling so I’d need somewhere anyway.’

Helen’s hand moved as if it were not a part of her, patting Libby’s arm to the rhythm of her mind as it replayed words.We won’t be any trouble, He’s selling.Slowly, she pulled out of the embrace. ‘Dad is selling the house?’

Libby nodded. ‘Didn’t you know?’

‘No.’ And although she kept her voice light, the shock carried weight. She didn’t live there anymore; she didn’t own any part of it. Lawrence had bought her share, and she’d moved outover a year ago. Still, the news was visceral, a punch in the guts that bridged both her rational and irrational mind.You’re not the house. You’re not the house.No, she wasn’t. But she’d invested deep. Time and energy. Maybe the best years and maybe the best energy, spent on fabric choices, garden plans, re-decorating, extending. What else had she talked about with as much consistency and frequency, other thanthe house?Which was still there. The lemon curtains she’d chosen for the front bedroom still fluttered in a March breeze, and the joke about grabbing the nose of the fox-head door knocker could still be made. All those little flags she’d planted, on all those little moons.I was there, this was my family, I existed.But Lawrence was selling. So, what would happen when the door was re-painted? When the curtains got replaced? When Libby and Jack’s pencilled growth lines got slapped over in someone else’s colours?

‘You won’t even hear us,’ Libby said. ‘He sleeps right through now.’

Slowly, Helen turned. ‘The thing is,’ she managed, mining the words from a place deeper than she knew existed. ‘I wouldn’t actually be there.’

‘What do you mean, not there? You’re not going hiking again, are you?’ Libby laughed, and watching, Helen felt cold.

It was obvious thatnot there,for Libby meant something different to thenot there,she was trying to say.Not therefor Libby, meant that she would be in the next room, or the next town, or at the worst on another solo trip. She had no concept of thenot thereHelen had in mind, not even a glint of it. But Lawrence was selling the house, Jack was off living his life, and she hadn’t asked her daughter to have a baby so young. She hadn’t encouraged Libby to make a grandmother of her at fifty. Guilt crushed her as she watched Libby’s face darken. Why would she understand? Why would she have seen it coming?Mothers didn’t leave. Children did. It was children who packed rucksacks and applied for visas and had vaccinations. Parents stayed home, moving shoes that were no longer worn to the back of the cupboard, eventually taking down posters from a wall in a room busy only with the silent fall of dust mites. ‘I’ve been offered a job,’ she managed, the whisper so forced, she could hear it drag.

‘A job?’

‘In Bolivia.’

The colour drained from Libby’s face. She sat down.

‘So, I was thinking …’ She was laying a minefield, and she knew it. One wrong word and there would be casualties. Either of them could be blown apart. As she stopped talking, her mind started sprinting. Her limbs tingled, she felt weak. If she had known it was going to be this hard, if she’d been shown a picture of the distress on her daughter’s face, would she have even started this conversation? All her beginnings, melted away,It’s the opportunity of a lifetime … I really feel I can do this … I always wanted to travel …Saying what she had come here to say, was going to take the kind of courage she wasn’t sure she had. It meant turning her back on every idea of motherhood she had ever assimilated. It would make leaving her marriage feel like a walk in the park.

‘Bolivia?’ Libby said. ‘What do you mean, Bolivia?’

Helen took a deep breath. ‘I’ve been offered a job with a medical NGO. Initially it’s a six-month contract.’

‘So, you wouldn’t be here?’

She shook her head.

‘You’d be in Bolivia?’

She nodded.

‘I…’ Libby’s voice dried. She turned to Ben, reached for his hand and held it. ‘You won’t see Ben,’ she whispered.

Helen’s throat was on fire. ‘We have WhatsApp,’ she said. ‘I’ll see him ––’

‘That’s not the same!’ Libby cried, her voice weak and strong, breaking like glass, sliding away like sand. ‘It’s not the same at all, Mum. I thought when you said …’ She put a hand on her chest and gasped for air. ‘I thought you wanted us to come and livewithyou. I thought you wanted to see more of Ben, not less.’

‘No.’ Helen shook her head. ‘That’s not what I meant. I just –’

But Libby had dropped her head to the table, her shoulders shaking with grief. ‘Don’t go,’ she sobbed. ‘You’ve only just come back. Please, don’t go, mum.’

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