been run out in the park all morning, like dogs, Polly and Eadie were still full of energy. They usually got on pretty well but today were directing it all towards fighting with one another, forcing Jennifer to act as both bouncer and mediator. When she wasn’t stopping them from killing each other over, of all things, a broken Barbie, she was putting on washing, taking it out or shoving it in the mountainous ironing pile. All in all not the most riveting of afternoons and, as she took out load after load, she thought wistfully of pre-children days when Sundays meant lying in bed with a hangover, which would eventually be cured by a Bloody Mary and a roast dinner at the pub, followed perhaps by a movie and some lovely sex. God, she was becoming obsessed. This must be how people felt when they came out of prison, or the army.
‘Come on, you two,’ she said now, or rather yelled, because by this point both her daughters’ whining had developed into full-blown wailing. ‘Eadie, bash your sister again and I’ll bash you.’
Of course she would never bash her kids in a million years so the threat was rather empty which Eadie could tell.
Eadie eyeballed her mum through the wonky brown fringe Jennifer had gifted her with only the week before, as if weighing up how much trouble she’d be in if she ignored her. Then, obviously having concluded she could handle whatever was flung at her, proceeded to whack Polly again.
‘Right,’ growled Jennifer, who had now officially had enough. ‘That’s it, up to your room.’
As Eadie burst into noisy sobs, Jennifer sighed heavily, sick to the back teeth of all the squabbling but partly blaming herself for it. No doubt her children had picked up on her generally unenthusiastic mood? Perhaps if she’d been perkier today and more inventive in finding ways to entertain them, they’d be behaving fine but frankly she just wanted to be able to leave them to their own devices for more than five minutes. She was tired and would like nothing more than to get into her pyjamas and zone out to a bit of crappy afternoon telly.
Max scampered into the kitchen.
‘All all right in here?’ he said, charging to the fridge to get a couple more beers. ‘Did I hear wailing?’
‘Yes you did,’ snapped Jennifer. ‘They’re behaving like a couple of deranged chimps. I’ve sent Eadie to her room for bashing Polly.’
‘Yeah Daddy, she hit me really hard,’ said Polly, rubbing her arm to demonstrate how much it hurt.
‘Er, it was the other arm, Pol,’ said Jennifer wryly.
‘How could you miss that, you bloody idiot?’ Ted yelled from the front room at which point Max literally ran back out of the kitchen, bottles of lager in both hands and one under his arm, skidding on the wooden floor of the hall in his socks. As he disappeared he yelled over his shoulder, ‘Be good for your mother.’
‘Come on you, let’s get some colouring stuff out,’ said Jennifer to her youngest, ‘but hurry up because I need to go and make sure Eadie’s OK. And don’t think I’m massively happy with you either, Madame,’ she added, noting Polly’s smug expression as she gloated over how much trouble her sister was in.
Later, after thirty minutes spent with Eadie in her bedroom, who by now had worked herself up into such a state she’d needed soothing and stroking, despite the fact it had been her who had been in the wrong, Jennifer decided to join the boys in the lounge. That way if the children wanted anything their father might be forced to do something.
‘Hello,’ Max said, looking distracted and surprised to see her standing in her own front room.
Max was on one sofa and Ted was on the other. Both were sitting wide-legged on the edge, beers in hand.
‘You all right? Second half’s just started. Why don’t you see if there’s a nice movie on upstairs? There might be a rom com or something.’
‘Because Eadie’s watching Tangled on our bed and as much as I actually quite enjoyed it the first time round I can probably live without seeing it again,’ she replied, flopping onto the sofa that Ted was sitting on. He shuffled up, slightly reluctantly, to make a bit of room, his eyes never leaving the TV.
‘All right, Ted?’ she asked.
‘Yeah, great thanks,’ he said, reminding her of when Eadie’s friends came round to play and answered her questions about school politely, with enough clues in their tone to suggest they’d rather not be talking to her at all.
‘How’s Annabelle? Is she well?’ she continued, not really caring if Ted didn’t want to talk. She did. She was bored.
‘Not bad thanks. Bit stressed. Callum’s been off school with tonsillitis but other than that OK.’
‘Good,’ she said, flicking through Style magazine.
‘Hey, have you seen your ex’s latest chart position in this year’s Rich List?’ said Max, throwing the supplement in her direction.
‘Oh god.’ Jennifer rolled her eyes. ‘Go on then, let’s feel sick for a second.’
‘reUNIon floated this year,’ Max informed Ted, almost proudly. ‘He’s worth a billion now.’
‘You are having a laugh,’ said Jennifer, though soon she knew it to be true for there it was in black and white, accompanied by a picture of him. Tim Purcell. The ex-boyfriend she’d put up with for two and a half years, now worth a billion quid. She scrutinised the picture of him. His blond hair was slightly silvery around the edges, but only slightly. He was a little more jowly but on the whole looked remarkably similar to how he had done fifteen years ago. He was good looking in a Nordic sort of way and had always had incredibly good skin, though his blue eyes were flinty and rather too deep set and his nose was a little too sharp. His face couldn’t have been more different to the one she’d eventually married. Max’s mop of brown hair and friendly face may not have been anywhere near as chiselled but it was one that overall she far preferred staring at.
She wondered what it would be like to see Tim now, after all these years. Would they get on? They’d had a strange relationship really. She’d always felt as if more than anything she’d amused him. She’d known he’d found her funny and sweet but she’d never got the impression that he massively fancied her. Then again, for her, it hadn’t necessarily been a relationship based on physical attraction either. She’d just been so terribly impressed by him, by his flair, and had liked being associated with someone who everyone on campus was aware of. If she did ever meet up with him again she’d love to ask him what he’d seen in her. She doubted they ever would though. They were hardly likely to bump into one another. They mixed in totally different circles. Plus they’d never kept in touch due to the fact that they’d broken up on such desperately bad terms, which ironically was the one time he’d demonstrated that actually she had got under his skin. Or had it just been his ego making him so angry and upset when she’d told him she wanted to split up?
‘What I’d do with a billion quid,’ mused Ted.
Buy yourself a Sky Sports subscription hopefully, Jennifer thought to herself, smiling blankly at him.
‘Perhaps I should get in contact with Tim and ask him if I can have a thousand pounds that I could use to get the tumble dryer fixed, pay some bills and have a splurge in Whistles eh? It would be pocket money to him,’ she joked.
‘Bet you wish you’d stuck with him, eh Jen? Instead of hooking up with this here loser,’ said Ted.
