shall cook dinner,’ she announced, moving on. ‘Food is good. Food is excellent. When all else fails, eat. I need to inspect this frozen-in-time kitchen of yours.’
‘You need to rest.’
‘I have rested,’ she said. ‘I have my husband back. My family is together and that’s all that matters. We need to move on.’
* * *
Christmas dinner was a sort of Middle Eastern goulash made with leftover turkey, couscous, dried herbs, packet stock and raisins. It should have tasted weird—half the ingredients were well over their use-by dates—but it tasted delicious. The house had a formal dining room but no one was interested in using it. They squashed round the kitchen table meant for four, with Luka taking up most of the room underneath, and it felt right.
Home, Rob thought as he glanced at his dinner companions. That was what this felt like. Outside, the world was a bleak mess but here was food, security, togetherness.
Henry couldn’t stop looking at Amina and Danny. From one to the other. It was like he was seeing a dream.
That was what looking at Julie felt like too, Rob thought. A dream. Something that could never be.
But still... Henry had made a quick, bleak foray across to the ruins of his house and came back grimly determined.
‘We can build again,’ he’d said. ‘We’ve coped with worse than this.’
Building again... Could he and Julie? A building needed foundations, though, Rob thought, and their foundations hardly existed any more. At least, that was what Julie thought. She thought their foundations were a bed of pain, of nightmares. Could he ever break through to foundations that had been laid long before the twins were born?
Did he have the strength to try?
‘You have our safe,’ Henry said as the meal came to an end and anxiety was in his voice again. ‘You said you managed to haul it out.’
‘I did,’ Rob told him. ‘I’m not sure whether the contents have withstood the fire.’
‘It’s built to withstand an inferno. And the contents...it’s not chocolate.’
‘I’d like some chocolate,’ Danny said wistfully, but there was ice cream. Honestly, wrapped containers might cope with a nuclear blast, Rob thought as they sliced through the layers of plastic to ice cream that looked almost perfect.
But Amina didn’t want any. She was looking exhausted again. Julie was watching her with concern, and Rob picked up on it.
‘You want to go back to bed?’ he asked her. ‘All of you. Henry’s had a nightmare twenty-four hours and you’ve made us a feast of a Christmas dinner. You’ve earned some sleep.’
‘I’m fine,’ Amina said, wincing a little. ‘I just have a backache. I need a cushion, that’s all.’
In moments she had about four and they moved into the living room, settled in the comfortable lounge suite...wondering where to go from here.
He’d quite like to carry Julie back to the bedroom, Rob thought. It was Christmas night. He could think of gifts he’d like to give and receive...
But Danny had slept this afternoon, and he was wide awake now. He was zooming back and forth across the floor with his new fire truck. In Danny’s eyes, Christmas was still happening. There was no way he was going calmly to bed, and that meant the adults had to stay up.
Henry was exhausted. He’d slumped into his chair, his face still grey with exhaustion and stress.
Amina also looked stressed. The effort of making dinner had been too much for her. She had no energy left.
Rob sank to the floor and started playing with Danny, forming a makeshift road for his fire engine, pretending the TV remote was a police car, conducting races, making the little boy laugh. Doing what he’d done before...
* * *
It nearly killed her. He was doing what she’d seen him do so many times, what she’d loved seeing him do.
Now he was playing with a child who wasn’t his.
He was getting over it?
Get over it. How many times had those words been said to her? ‘It’ll take time but you will get over it. You will be able to start again.’
She knew she never would, but Rob just might. It had been a mistake, coming back here, she thought. Connecting with Rob again. Reminding themselves of what they’d once had.
It had hurt him, she thought. It had made him hope...
She should cut that hope off right now. There was no chance she could move on. The thought of having another child, of watching Rob romp with another baby... It hurt.
Happy Christmas, she thought bitterly. This was worse than the nothing Christmases she’d had for the last few years. Watching Rob play with a child who wasn’t his.
She glanced up and saw Amina was watching her and, to her surprise, she saw her pain reflected in the other woman’s eyes.
‘Are you okay?’ she asked. ‘Amina...?’
‘It’s only the backache,’ she said, but somehow Julie knew it wasn’t. ‘Henry, the safe... Could you check? I need to know.’
‘I’ll do it in the morning,’ Henry said uneasily but Amina shook her head.
‘I need to see now. The television...does it work?’
‘We have enough power,’ Rob told her. ‘But there won’t be reception.’
‘We don’t need reception. I just need to see...’
‘Amina, it’ll hurt,’ Henry said.
‘Yes, but I still need to see,’ she said stubbornly. ‘Henry, do this for me, please. I need to see that they’re still there.’
* * *
Which explained why, ten minutes later, Rob and Henry were out on the veranda, staring at a fire-stained safe. The paint had peeled and charred, but essentially it looked okay.
‘Do you want to open it in privacy?’ Rob asked, but Henry shook his head.
‘We have nothing of value. This holds our passports, our insurance—our house contents are insured, how fortunate is that?’
‘Wise.’
‘The last house we lost was insured too,’ Henry said. ‘But not for acts of war.’
‘Henry...’
‘No matter. This is better. But Amina wants her memories. Do you permit?’
He wasn’t sure what was going on but, two minutes later, Henry had worked the still operational combination lock and was hauling out the contents.
Papers,
