Page 58 of The Wish
When he arrives, she takes him through the house to a large kitchen that opens onto the backyard. Alex hears the shouts and laughter of young boys playing.
‘Alex, what are you doing here?’ Sam runs up to hug him.
‘Hi, Sam, I’ve come to talk to your mum. What are you lot playing?’
‘Football! Mum’s taking us to the beach soon.’
‘Honey, do you mind if Alex and I have a chat?’ Mandy says, ruffling her son’s hair. ‘As soon as we’re finished, I’ll take you to the beach.’
‘OK, Mum, see you, Alex.’
As Sam goes back to his friends Mandy pours Alex a glass of water from a beautiful jug. He takes in the lemon and orange slices flavouring the water, the clinking ice.
Sitting opposite Alex, Mandy sips her own drink, watching the boys play. ‘Thank you for coming. I wanted a chance to speak to you and when I got your call, it was like a sign.’
‘Thanks, I want to tell you about—’
‘Let me say something first: thank you. For what you’re doing for Jesse.’
Mandy pauses, looking out at the boys in a tangled heap in the garden.
‘What you have given her already is incredible. The balloon ride, for one. Her face lights up when she talks about you, and we haven’t seen much of that from her recently.’
‘She’s remarkable. You and your husband must be so proud, you have clearly done a wonderful job as parents.’
‘Yeah, well, Dean would say we failed. We can’t fix her. And Sam’s losing his sister, the person he loves most in the world.’
‘That’s being very tough on yourselves.’
‘Alex, I don’t want to go into too much detail, but I do want to tell you a little about Jesse’s dad, Dean.’
‘You don’t have to tell me anything.’
‘I know that, but I want to. When we first met, at university, I was the nerdy, English Lit student, he was top of his class in law, represented the uni in so many sports: football, athletics, swimming. I didn’t know what he saw in me, but we dated and fell in love. The moment Jesse was born I saw something change in him. He held her and melted into the world of fatherhood; he didn’t need to learn how to be a dad, he got it that first minute. The two of them formed such a bond that I have to admit, sometimes I was jealous of him, but not for long. Jesse makes everyone feel special.’
‘I agree with that.’
‘She was kicking a ball before she could walk, she never walked, she ran. He taught her to swim in the ocean as a toddler. She wanted to run all the time, not just run, but chase, Dean, me, the cat. We got her into athletics when she was five and she excelled, she was beating the boys her age for years. We didn’t take much notice of the early symptoms. Occasionally she had a low-grade fever which never developed into anything serious, the bone and joint aches we put down to growing pains and pulled back on her training, we even ignored the occasional nose bleeds. They stopped. It wasn’t until her times started going backwards in her best events at athletics, and I noticed her clothes were suddenly loose that we took her to a doctor.’
‘Oh, Mandy, I’m so sorry, I can’t imagine what that was like.’
‘So, when you say we are good parents, we don’t see it like that. We missed the early symptoms, and there’s not a day goes by that I don’t beat myself up for failing to be a good parent and getting help for Jesse sooner, and I know Dean feels the same way.’
‘I don’t know much about ALL, but you did nothing wrong. No one would know that those signs were symptoms, they sound mild.’
‘They were, and she bounced back from every fever, or nose bleed. But still. When you become a parent, you have one job and one job only: protect them at all costs.’
Alex looks out at Sam and his friends kicking a ball between them. The noise of their play disappears as he travels back to his time as a boy. No loving mother, no friends to kick a ball with. He’d had so little, and yet somehow, he survived. Beautiful Jesse has it all, and yet now it seems it will all be taken away from her and her family, a family like he’s never known. He looks at Mandy, who wipes silent tears from her eyes.
‘Mandy, I don’t know what to say.’
Mandy gives a little nervous giggle.
‘That’s OK, so many people don’t shut up, but their words don’t help. I appreciate the honesty, there is nothing to say.’
‘I’m sure there is, I just don’t know the words.’
‘Actions speak louder than words. Alex, what you are doing for Jesse, for all of us, is beyond any words, beyond anything that could be done for us. It is Sammy, Dean and I who don’t have the words to thank you.’
