Jen continues to shuffle papers. She’s been exceptionally quiet in recent days but I suppose it’s natural that the uncertainty Geoff’s plans have cast over our future would shake her too. Returning to my seat, I pull out the chair next to me. When Jen joins me, she fidgets with the papers she’s set down on the table. She doesn’t look up.
‘There will come a time when Geoff and I have to think seriously about retirement but I don’t want that to worry you, Jen. When it does happen, we’re not going to simply abandon you, or the rest of the staff for that matter. There’s no harm planning for the future, and that includes yours,’ I tell her, willing her to lift her gaze. When she does, I add, ‘Are you still serious about becoming a counsellor?’
‘Yes.’
‘Then you already have your new path to follow, all you have to do is take it.’ When Jen squirms in her seat, I catch hold of a half-remembered conversation that had been lost in the fog that descended as Meg’s anniversary approached. ‘Wasn’t there a part-time foundation course you were looking at? Shouldn’t you have started it by now?’
‘It was only a vague idea and I didn’t think the timing was right this year. We’ve been snowed under with the Whitespace project and the helpline relaunch, and I know you said the foundation could fund me, but there isn’t the budget and you know it. It’s fine, honestly,’ she adds when she sees me raise my eyebrows. ‘I’ll do it next year.’
‘Oh, Jen, you can’t keep putting these things off.’
‘Yes, Mum,’ she says, only for her smile to freeze when I flinch. ‘Sorry, stupid thing to say.’
It’s hard to predict or avoid the comments that stab at my heart without warning. I love Jen dearly, and there have been times when we treated her more like a daughter than a niece, but she isn’t. Meg is my daughter and always will be, and it feels like a betrayal having the kind of conversation with my niece that I can’t have with Meg.
Bringing Jen back into my life was always going to be a blessing and a curse. My sister-in-law, Eve, had distanced herself and her daughters from her brother’s family as if suicide were contagious and for a time, that suited me because Jen’s presence served only to amplify Meg’s absence. But I’d been furious when I heard Jen had turned down her place at university, angrier still when I found out she was working as a cleaner for Charlie’s fledgling company. I had to do something and I still do. I need to make sure Jen reaches her full potential because I know that’s what Meg would be doing if she were here.
But it’s not easy, and there are times like this when it bloody hurts.
I brush off Jen’s comment with a smile. ‘Just promise me you’ll do something about it. If you’ve missed the September intake then find out if there’s one that starts in January. At the very least, apply for next year and send me the bill. If this is your dream, go for it.’
Jen relaxes. ‘It is, and I will.’
‘Good, because I don’t want you stuck here shuffling papers for the rest of your life.’
‘But I love it here and I’ll do anything to keep the helpline going,’ she says with such conviction that it takes me by surprise.
‘You’re already doing more than enough. Geoff pulled up the stats and was surprised at the increase in activity … although I did have to point out that a good few were put-down calls. You didn’t have any on Wednesday night, did you?’
Jen’s lips are pressed tightly together. She shakes her head.
I tilt my head, sensing there’s more to Jen’s unease than I’d first thought. ‘Anything else that’s making you anxious?’
With a tentative shrug, she says, ‘I had a good chat with Gemma. Well, when I say good, she’s still being hounded by Ryan.’
‘We’ll need to watch her carefully. She says she doesn’t want him back again but he’s creeping into her life by stealth.’
‘They always do,’ Jen replies sadly.
Her anxiety creeps into my bones and I resist gnawing on the acrylic nail I stroke across my lip. ‘Is it possible someone’s doing that to us?’
Jen’s eyes widen. ‘Lewis?’ she asks.
‘I can’t help wonder if the put-down calls on Monday were from him. It seems a coincidence for it to happen on the same day we received the solicitor’s letter.’
‘He wants to intimidate us,’ she agrees.
‘He can want all he likes. If I get any nuisance calls on my shift tonight, I will be polite and professional and I’ll send a note to the others asking that they do the same. We do not quake in fear from dead air at the end of a phone.’
‘No, we don’t.’
The determination in Jen’s voice is a contradiction to the fear in her eyes and I look away before we both lose our nerve. Across the office, Geoff remains absorbed in the designs we’ll need to resubmit to the planners. I can’t imagine him turning his back on his life’s work. He thrives on the glory when our designs are brought to life, but I know my husband: he didn’t mention retirement on a whim. The subject hasn’t been dropped, and one way or another, I will have to follow the advice I gave Jen and consider my own future.
The foundation isn’t the only legacy of Meg’s that I’m struggling to keep alive. She loved her family and there was a time, before Lewis, when Meg would have done anything for me and Geoff. She went to great lengths to keep our marriage together and in spite of the horrific odds of parents breaking up after the loss of a child, we kept going after she’d died. We had to, for our business and the staff, for our sanity, and for Meg most of all.
‘I’ve finally built up the courage to watch Meg’s videos, or at least the earlier ones that remind me of what mattered to us all back then,’ I say. I tip my head towards the window: the red brick and Portland stone striped hotel on the opposite corner of the Strand was once the White Star Line offices. There’s a bride and groom out on the balcony, surrounded by guests. ‘Remember our twentieth wedding anniversary?’
‘I helped Meg organise the party.’
Jen’s smile chases away our fears and reminds me how good it is to have her around to share happier memories. Our lives had been peppered with simple moments that I didn’t appreciate at the time, but I do now as I think back to the day my caring and thoughtful daughter decided to patch up her parents’ failing marriage.
‘How many guests were at your wedding, Mum?’ she’d asked as she came tumbling downstairs with Jen in tow.
I was in the sitting room leafing through a community newsletter that advertised all kinds of night school classes. I’d found it that morning on the kitchen counter and I was fairly certain it hadn’t been Geoff who had turned the corner of the page for ballroom dancing. The summer holidays were drawing to a close, Sean was all set to go to uni and, as Meg kept reminding me, she was old enough to look after herself. Geoff and I needed new challenges.
‘We only hired a small function room,’ I said. ‘So not many.’
‘But you would have liked a bigger party?’
‘We were busy building up the business at the time and we didn’t need the expense. What mattered back then was exchanging vows and committing ourselves to each other. Isn’t that right, Geoff?’ I added through gritted teeth, pausing until he peeked over the top of his newspaper.
‘What was that?’ he asked as if he hadn’t been listening.
‘Mum was saying how she missed out on a big party and we should have one for your anniversary.’
I was about to correct my daughter but she was pulling Jen into the centre of the room so they could present their plans.
‘We’ve