don’t be like that,’ she says as I shove the trolley one more time, and mercifully it starts to move but not before Henry squirts a tube of something all over me. I recognise the torn yellow and blue box from my pregnancy days. Preparation H. I’m not quick enough to miss Emily’s look of disgust.
Hot needles stab my eyeballs as I walk away. I don’t look back and Emily doesn’t call after me. I make my way through the checkout as quickly as possible, for once thankful for the checkout lady’s super speed. When I leave the shop, I let out a heavy breath.
When I’m home and the shopping is put away, I stick the kettle on. I’ve got a life to sort out, children to raise and a house to run. I haven’t got time to worry about Emily and the rest of my so-called friends. If they’re uncomfortable staying friends with me, sod them all. Henry is asleep in his crib and my tea is hot and brewed to perfection. The washing machine has finished but emptying it can wait. I have to take these moments of bliss as and when I can because I never quite know when the next one will be.
After my tea, I take the opportunity to use the loo in peace. One thing they don’t tell you about having kids is that the toilet becomes a sort of sanctuary of bliss. A few minutes of self-preserving loo-time can do wonders for your sanity and can mean the difference between being able to take a few deep breaths and get on with things, versus completely losing your composure and letting all hell break lose. Unfortunately, as most parents are aware – the little buggers nearly always find you in there. With Ralph and Ava at school, and Henry asleep, this is my perfect moment – I even have a game of Candy Crush. I’m in heaven. That is until I finish, and realise there’s no loo roll.
‘Shit!’ Pardon the pun. ‘Bloody Emily!’ Thanks to her catching me off-guard, I didn’t pick any up!
I waddle, with my jeans around my ankles, to the changing bag in the hall and then back to the downstairs loo where I clean up and bag the baby wipes because the last thing I need is a blocked soil pipe (that isn’t a euphemism).
When Henry wakes up, I change and feed him and pop him into the pram.
‘We’re going for a walk,’ I say, smiling at his podgy face.
As I’m wrestling the pram down the steps to the pavement, my phone rings.
‘Mike?’ My heart plummets. He’ll be welching on father duties, no doubt – he never calls otherwise.
‘Hi, Stephanie, listen do you think the kids would be okay with me picking them up from yours on Saturday morning instead of from school on Friday?’ Almost!
Yes, they’ll mind – their entire week revolves around the exciting things that Daddy will do with them on the weekend. It’s their break away from boring Mummy and her homework schedule and reading routine.
‘They’ll be disappointed,’ I say, not wanting to lay on a guilt trip just in case his mother is dying or something. Side note – the best thing about divorce is that you also get rid of the mother-in-law, not that I hope she’s dying. The physical distance and absence of obligation is enough.
He sighs dramatically. ‘I can get them, it’s just that I’ve had this awful week at work and it’s only going to get worse over the next few days. I’ll probably have to work late Friday and then there will be team drinks after …’
Ding ding ding. There we have it. Twenty-one-year-old wannabe Mike fancies a night out with his work friends. Poor cherub!
‘Whatever you think is best,’ I say. Yes, I’m being passive-aggressive (one of the things he threw against me in the divorce – he just couldn’t take it anymore) but, well, I don’t care because ninety-nine per cent of my passive-aggressive instances would never have occurred if he wasn’t being such a twat in the first place.
‘Stephanie, don’t make me feel worse than I already do. It’s hard juggling a job like mine and, well, you don’t work.’
And there it is. I. Don’t. Work. Another reason for his emotional stress even though he was the one who told me to give up my job and be a stay-at-home mum because he earns a bloody fortune and the kids need a parent around. Turns out that’s not at all true in Mikelandia where kids raise themselves.
‘Yet,’ I say, and he laughs nervously. I could rant about how being a one-woman feeding, cleaning, bathing, clothing, emotional support machine is a full-time job. I don’t because he’ll come back with some retort about how he has to fund us all, then things could get quite nasty – I’ve been there before. I know plenty of single mothers work but we’ve built a life this way and unpicking it is a process.
‘So, you are looking for work?’ He sounds hopeful.
‘Of course I am,’ I say, and it’s true. I am, but who wants to hire a bookkeeper whose only bookkeeping experience in the last ten years has been neatly stacking nursery rhyme books and filling in reading logs?
‘That’s great, Stephanie.’ His voice tinkles like a fruit machine dispensing pound coins.
‘Is that everything? I’m sort of busy.’
‘Henry running rings around you is he? That’s my boy.’
Oh fuck off! ‘Something like that.’
‘See you Saturday morning then, about elevenish?’
Because we can’t do without a proper lie-in on a Saturday, can we?
‘Fine, see you then.’ I end the call and stare at my phone. I don’t even know why I have the thing because all it does is bring misery.
When Henry and I get to the Tesco local, I grab a packet of toilet roll but before I get to the till, I panic and check my purse. I paid cash at the supermarket earlier and I gave the cashier everything I had in note form. I rummage through the coins. There’s a queue behind me but I just need ten more pence. I dig deep and catch a large coin between two of my fingers. Yes! A small victory. But the victory is short-lived when I pull it out and it’s a murky brown two-pence piece.
‘Sorry,’ I say, coming out of the queue. I walk back to the toilet paper section hoping for a budget version of the normal own-brand stuff I’d picked but the only alternative is Andrex and I’m not exactly made of money. As I stare at the toilet paper that I’m eight pence away from, everything comes crashing down on me. The divorce, going it alone, juggling the kids, budgeting, my deserting friends, the fact I can’t get to sleep at night, and everything knots together in my stomach before propelling itself into my throat like a grenade. My eyes water and my chest heaves. A loud sob escapes and before I even realise it’s me making that awful wailing sound, a firm hand lands on my shoulder.
‘Stephanie?’
I turn my head and, through watery eyes, see a lady who I recognise as a neighbour from across the street. She’s a little shorter than me with frizzy brown hair that she always has tied back. She bears all the hallmarks of a frazzled mum; for starters, her white and navy striped top is inside out.
‘Janey?’ I say uncertainly. She nods and smiles warmly.
‘Are you okay?’
I nod to give myself time to recompose. ‘I’m just having one of those days and now I’ve come here for loo roll and I’m eight pence short – I should have checked my purse before I left but—’
‘Shh,
