She couldn’t do any of this. Not any more. It was all too much – the driving, the organising, the chasing round after everyone and never having any time for herself.
‘It would really help if you could—’
‘I can’t!’ she said louder. Didn’t the man understand English? ‘I’m on my own and I have a sick child and I just … can’t.’ And then she pressed the button to hang up the phone.
She stared at the handset for a couple of moments, and then she walked into her bedroom and shoved it under the stack of pillows and cushions she always arranged nicely at the head of the bed. It might have made a noise under there, but she couldn’t tell if it was a call coming in or the ringing in her ears.
She felt like an inflatable raft on a deep and churning river that was desperately trying to stay above the surface as it headed for the rapids. All she could do was cling on and hope she survived the ride. But instead of the sound of roaring water in her ears, all she could hear was ‘Happy Holidays.’
It was coming.
She could feel it coming.
Juliet picked up the nearest pillow, buried her face in it and screamed for all she was worth.
Violet stood in the doorway of Juliet’s bedroom, biting her lip.
Juliet began to shake. It started deep down and reverberated through her limbs. She hadn’t been aware of it, but she’d sunk to the floor and now her top half was draped over the edge of the bed, her legs crumpled beneath her. She steadied herself by placing a hand on the mattress and pushed herself to her feet.
It hadn’t been easy to keep a lid on it all before, but it had been do-able. However, since that chat – that argument – with Gemma a couple of days ago, she was starting to think she was losing her mind. From the look on Violet’s face, her daughter was starting to think so too.
Get a grip, Juliet. You can’t have that. You will not turn into your mother. You will not pile all the things on this sweet girl that she piled on you.
She pulled oxygen into her lungs as best she could, considering her ribs felt as if they were being squeezed in a vice and she was finding it strangely difficult to breathe properly. ‘Is Jake okay? He hasn’t been sick again, has he?’ Her voice was high and soft, much like Violet’s, actually. Much like her own when she’d been that age.
Violet shook her head. ‘He says he’s feeling better now it’s out. He wants to watch TV.’
Juliet shrugged. ‘Okay.’
Violet frowned. ‘But you always say no TV before bedtime.’
She just kept on staring at Violet, too weary to even say she didn’t care about that rule tonight.
Violet stepped forward. ‘Are you okay, Mum?’
Juliet pressed the fingers of one hand against her forehead and rubbed gently. Was she all right? She really didn’t know. She swallowed. ‘Um … I think I’m just a bit stressed, actually. I’m not feeling … not feeling very well. I think I’ll give the party a miss and just go to bed early.’
She looked longingly at the bed. She’d love to dive in it now, but there were children to be reassured and a puddle of sick to be cleared up still. She fancied she could catch a whiff of it, even up here in the bedroom.
She inhaled through her nose and out through her mouth, just as she learned at Pilates, and then she turned to face Violet. ‘Why don’t we all snuggle up on the sofa and watch a movie together? It’s been ages since we’ve done something like that.’
Some of the fear left Violet’s eyes and she nodded. And then she smiled gently. ‘I’ll go and get the others rounded up.’ Then she walked over to Juliet and flung her arms round her. ‘I’ll even clear up the sick, if you like?’
A tear slid down Juliet’s cheek and she squeezed her daughter back. ‘No, it’s fine,’ she whispered, ‘I’ll do that. You go and ask the others what they want to watch – and try and let it not turn into World War Three, okay?’
She nodded and walked towards the door, but glancing back repeatedly as Juliet swiped the single tear away with the end of her sleeve. Violet took one last look at the threshold before she disappeared down the stairs.
Juliet picked up the pillow, faintly smeared with nude lipstick, and peeled the slip off of it.
Just for a moment, she’d been staring at herself instead of Violet – overwhelmed, but trying to take on grown-up responsibilities to ease her mother’s load – and it had scared her more than even the screaming had.
She was woken by the sound of her sons pounding the life out of each other on the landing. She stumbled out of bed, her hair standing up on one side and told them to put a sock in it. Both boys froze and smiled innocently at her. From the way Jake had his brother in a headlock, she guessed he was fighting fit again.
She felt strangely light and strangely empty, as if something had stopped pushing her down, but at the same time she just couldn’t settle to anything. She kept wandering into rooms and forgetting why she’d gone in there. She didn’t even look in her Christmas notebook once. In the end, partly because she’d noticed the mismatching pillowcase she’d got out the evening before, she decided to change the rest of her bed linen. There was something about the smell and feel of clean sheets that made one feel as if everything was going to be all right.
As she was stripping the duvet cover she became aware of a presence in the doorway. She turned to find Violet there again. Was her daughter checking up on her? Had their roles somehow become reversed? Because it shouldn’t be that way, it really shouldn’t. She knew that from experience.
She smiled at Violet, a bright, sunny smile that she mostly had to fake, but she wanted her to know that everything was back to normal. No more outbursts. No more screaming. She didn’t even think she had the energy in her to do it this morning, anyway.
Violet studied her, but when she spoke, the question that came out of her mouth was a bit of a surprise. ‘Mum … What Auntie Gemma said about going on holiday wasn’t a joke, was it?’
Juliet tried to think up a breezy denial, but her head was empty. ‘No, it wasn’t a joke …’
Violet nodded thoughtfully. ‘We didn’t think it was.’
We?
But Juliet couldn’t think about that at the moment. She needed to reassure her daughter. ‘Auntie Gemma might not have meant it to be a joke, but it might as well have been.’ She opened her arms and walked towards her daughter. ‘I wouldn’t do it to you, sweetie. I wouldn’t go away and leave you at Christmas. I just couldn’t.’
Juliet folded her arms around her daughter and breathed in her scent.
‘Don’t take this the wrong way, Mum,’ Violet mumbled into her shoulder, ‘but maybe you should.’
Juliet pulled sharply back and stared at her. ‘What do you mean?’
Vi looked up at the ceiling and shifted awkwardly. ‘You’re not happy.’
Tears sprang with force to the backs of Juliet’s eyes. ‘Of course I’m happy! I’ve got you … and Polly … and the boys. What more could I want?’
Violet looked back at her and one side of her mouth tipped up in a rueful smile. ‘If you’re anything like me, you might want a boyfriend.’
Juliet shook her head. She knew it had been two years and she really should want a boyfriend, but she wasn’t sure she did. Even her maybe-it-is, maybe-it-isn’t relationship with her next-door neighbour was enough to freak her out. ‘There’s more to life than boyfriends,’ she told Violet.
Vi gave her a