The House We Called Home Read online

  ‘Sonny is going to build me a blog,’ Graham put his hand proudly on Sonny’s shoulder, ‘so I can write about all my adventures. And you can all read it. It’s called Gone Dad.’

  They all collectively rolled their eyes.

  ‘It’s a good name, yes!’ Graham looked really pleased with himself.

  Sonny said, ‘I’ve already changed your Instagram. And remember, it’s double tap to Like, the square in the middle to load and the little speech bubble to comment.’

  Graham did a slow salute. Sonny grinned.

  Graham moved along to Jack who had Rosie asleep on his shoulder. They shook hands.

  ‘Get a job,’ Graham said.

  Jack nodded. ‘Will do.’

  And then finally, at the end, was Moira. They smiled at each other. She said, ‘Good luck, Graham.’

  He said, ‘Thank you.’

  They kissed demurely on the cheek.

  He inhaled. Closed his eyes. Then he stepped back. ‘I’ll see you for dinner?’

  Stella and Amy gave their mother wide-eyed looks behind his back.

  ‘If you’re lucky,’ she said with a coy flick of her hair.

  ‘We can talk about putting the house on the market,’ he said, as if adding another incentive to make sure she agreed.

  From the other end of the line Amy gave a little yelp then silenced herself after a look from Gus.

  Moira nodded.

  Graham gave a final wave and strode round to get into his flashy car. ‘See you,’ he called before starting the engine and roaring away in a cloud of dust.

  They all watched him go. Stella went to stand next to her mother. ‘Dinner?’ she said.

  Moira narrowed her eyes as the car disappeared out of the main gates. ‘We’ll see,’ she said. Then she glanced across at her daughter. ‘Got to keep them on their toes.’

  CHAPTER 45

  Everyone walked back to the huts. Everyone except Amy, who hung back.

  Gus was strolling with Sonny and Rosie and almost halfway to the hill before he noticed Amy wasn’t with them.

  He paused and looked round. She was standing in the middle of the path. He jogged back. ‘What are you doing? What’s wrong?’

  Amy frowned, deep lines across her forehead. ‘I think I’m jealous of the hipster girlfriend.’

  ‘Sorry?’ Gus laughed.

  ‘I’m jealous of the hipster girlfriend,’ Amy said again. ‘I think about her and I hate her. I hate her charity shop dresses and ugly flat shoes.’

  Gus was looking at her, perplexed.

  Amy scuffed the floor with her flip-flop. ‘I don’t want you to go out with her. I don’t want you to hold her hand.’

  ‘Amy, she doesn’t exist.’

  ‘I know, but she will. And all I can see is me with my beefcake sitting across the table from you and your annoying girl with her blunt cut fringe and being jealous.’

  ‘You really know what she looks like, don’t you?’

  ‘Yes. And I don’t want her to exist. I don’t want her to have you.’ She looked up. ‘Believe me, I don’t want to want to have you either but that’s the situation I’m finding myself in.’ She put her hand on her chest. ‘I do not want to want you, Gus.’

  ‘This is very flattering, Amy.’

  Amy narrowed her eyes. ‘I know you don’t want to be tied in an awful relationship for the sake of the baby, but what if it wasn’t awful? I mean, wouldn’t that be good for the baby if we could be more than friends? So what if we did split up all acrimonious? Isn’t that what happens with lots of couples with kids anyway?’

  Gus didn’t say anything, just watched her a bit bewildered.

  ‘Well?’ she ordered.

  ‘I guess so.’

  ‘There you go,’ she said.

  ‘There I go, what?’

  ‘Well there you go, your argument is ruined.’

  ‘Right.’ Gus inhaled, crossing his arms over his chest.

  ‘So?’ Amy said, staring straight at him.

  ‘So what?’ Gus frowned. ‘I don’t know. I’m slightly afraid of you.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because I think in your ideal world I’d drop down on one knee now and propose.’

  ‘No you wouldn’t.’ She shook her head. Then she paused, caught out.

  Gus laughed.

  Amy suddenly felt really exposed. She blew her hair up out of her face, kicked the sand at her feet, realising she’d kind of expected them to be kissing by now. She put her hands up to her cheeks. ‘You don’t fancy me, do you?’

  Gus didn’t say anything, just looked down at the dusty path.

  Amy screwed her eyes tight and leant back against one of the fat palm trees. ‘God, I’m such an idiot.’ She opened one eye. ‘I shouldn’t have said it.’ She opened both eyes and slumped against the jagged palm trunk. ‘I just—’ she sighed. ‘I did want you to kiss me the other night. I really did. It wasn’t because I was scared of being alone. I’ve been alone for two years now. I know how to be alone. I’m quite good at it.’

  She bit her lip, reached and pulled at one of the overhanging palm fronds. ‘And I know I said just now that I didn’t want to like you, which wasn’t very nice, but that’s because if I’d said what I thought it was just all too embarrassing. If I’m honest, I literally can’t stop thinking about you. I like you more than I thought I would ever like you. Things I couldn’t bear about you I now find attractive. I like that you like Rosie. That you looked out for Sonny. When you make Stella laugh, I get this rush of pride. It’s ridiculous. And I don’t even care if the baby inherits your nose because now I just think it will inherit your kindness and your humour. Your stupid logic and your laughter.’

  She pushed herself off the palm tree trunk. ‘And it’s all wasted now anyway because you don’t even fancy me, which I think I knew anyway.’ She started to walk away. ‘You’ve got your stupid hipster girlfriend to go home to.’

  Gus walked next to her, hands in his pockets.

  Up ahead the giant eucalyptus swayed in the wind. The clouds darkened over the moon. The highest flames of the bonfire were just visible on the horizon.

  Gus said, ‘I do fancy you.’

  Amy looked across at him. ‘You do?’ She frowned. ‘Why didn’t you say so?’

  He shrugged. ‘I wanted you to work a bit harder.’

  ‘Oh my God, you arsehole. You made me say all that stuff.’

  ‘Too bloody right.’

  She thwacked him on the stomach.

  He laughed, doubled over. ‘We all like a bit of romance, Amy. Me as much as the next person.’

  ‘What about me?’ she said. ‘I like a bit of romance, too.’

  ‘You’ll get romance, don’t you worry.’

  ‘Fat chance. You’ll be all: “Now, Amy, no happy ever after for you.”’

  ‘You’re going to have to stop doing that voice for me because I don’t sound like that at all.’

  She laughed, ‘You do.’

  ‘I do not.’

  He reached forward and caught her arm. She stopped. He pulled her back towards him. ‘Amy,’ he said, ‘I’m never going to promise you happy ever after because it doesn’t exist, it’s unpromisable. All I can offer you is what we have right now.’

  Amy felt his hand on her arm, was close enough to smell him, to look up at the whites of his eyes in the dark. She could see the moonlight dancing off the eucalyptus, the flicker of the fire, the glow on the wild waves through the trees, and she didn’t know what else would be worth asking for. So she nodded, tentative at first and then a proper real nod and a huge wide smile. ‘That’s good enough for me,’ she said. ‘I’ll take your right now.’

  Gus grinned.

  He put his hands on either side of her face, tilted her head ever so slightly and, when he was just about to kiss her, she jumped up on tiptoes so her giggling lips met his first.

  CHAPTER 46

  The night ended round the little table beside the hut. Lots of smirking glances across the table
as Amy and Gus appeared hand in hand. A delighted clap from Rosie. ‘She is your girlfriend. I knew it!’ A bottle of chilled Portuguese Mateus Rosé poured into the hotchpotch of camp site glasses. Some more chat, some more meaningful gazes at the beautiful trees, a snigger from Amy when she demanded to hear word for word Stella’s outburst round the pool.‘Her face went red and she was really shouting!’ Rosie again. A pause to listen to the pop and hiss of the fading bonfire embers. A rummage in Amy’s beach bag and then she held a little brown mug painted with white flowers aloft. ‘Here you go Mum, to start your new collection. It’s Portuguese.’

  ‘Oh, I love it.’ Moira was touched. ‘Where did you get it?’

  ‘I nicked it from the bar.’

  ‘Amy, you didn’t?’

  ‘Course I bloody didn’t.’ Amy grinned. ‘Gus did it for me.’

  ‘Amy! You said you wouldn’t say anything.’

  Moira looked both appalled and quite delighted that such a heist had taken place in her honour.

  Then Gus said, ‘Hey Sonny, I got to the next level on your game last night.’

  ‘You didn’t?’ Sonny couldn’t believe it.

  ‘I did.’ Gus got his phone out to show him.

  Amy said, ‘Will someone show me how to play this game?’

  ‘I will,’ Stella offered.

  ‘Show me, too,’ said Jack.

  ‘What about me?’ asked Moira.

  Rosie said, ‘You don’t want to Granny, it’s very boring.’

  ‘It’s not boring,’ Sonny scoffed. ‘You just can’t play it.’

  ‘I can!’

  ‘Go on then.’

  And that was how the evening ended. Everyone heads down, locked into Sonny’s game. The competition intensifying as their names on the scoreboard rose and fell with every attempt. Laughing. Shouting. Bashing the table in frustration. Together. As the clouds drifted across the moon and the eucalyptus leaves shook and the crow watched from its perch.

  Then, after everyone had gone to bed, Stella sat up and wrote her article. About everything that had happened with her and Jack over the period of time her dad had gone missing. Not under the Potty-Mouth pseudonym but her own name.

  And so I conclude, that along with all the extra sex, the shared grievances, the dates, the pretending to be mistresses, the time outs to speak honestly without judgement, for any relationship to work it’s about remembering that the people in it once existed quite happily without the other. They are people in their own right. Not simply cut-outs of predictable reactions to walk alongside. Be nice to each other. Be open to surprise. To change. To argument and apology. But most of all, don’t become one. Don’t lose the side of yourself that shores you up, and you alone.

  Ours was less an MOT more a swap the car for two bikes. A realisation that marriage doesn’t come with an automatic right to the other’s pocket. But instead an invite if you want to pop in every now and then. Our MOT got maybe a C+. Our bikes are brand spanking new.

  Share any comments you have with @StellaWrites

  Potty-Mouth is away.

  When it was done, Stella sent it off to her editor, snuggled under the sheet and fell asleep.

  CHAPTER 47

  ‘Ow! What are you doing?’ Stella opened her eyes, disorientated. It felt like the middle of the night. ‘What’s going on? Is it the kids?’

  ‘No, it’s not the kids, don’t worry, nothing’s going on,’ Jack said. He was sitting up next to her, T-shirt rumpled.

  ‘What time is it?’

  ‘Four o’clock,’ Jack said.

  Stella winced.

  ‘I’ve decided what I’m going to do,’ Jack said with a grin, all eager. ‘I’m going build skateparks! Don’t you think that’s a good idea?’ He nudged her for a response. ‘I have to go miles for mine. There should be more. It’s no wonder teenagers don’t go out of the house, they have nothing to do. Anyway, that’s what I’m going to do. What do you think?’

  Stella was still squinting in the early morning light. Her eyes stung, her body ached. ‘You woke me up at 4 a.m. to tell me this?’

  Jack looked immediately dejected. ‘I wanted to be upfront with you. I thought you’d be excited.’

  Stella rubbed her eyes. ‘I am excited. But could you please be upfront with me between the hours of 8 a.m. and 10 p.m.?’

  Jack laughed. ‘So, what do think, though? About my idea.’

  ‘It sounds great. Good idea. Lovely. Can I go to sleep now?’

  ‘Yes.’

  Stella yawned, lay back down and closed her eyes. She was just dropping off when Jack nudged her again.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Do you really think our marriage only got a C+?’ he asked.

  Stella’s eyes flew open. ‘Did you just read my article?’

  ‘Maybe.’

  She sighed, plumping her pillow. ‘No,’ she said, ‘I think we got an A but a C+ makes better copy. Now I’m going back to sleep.’

  She closed her eyes.

  Jack nudged her again. ‘Do you really think we got an A?’

  Stella groaned, her eyes opened in slits. ‘No, probably more like a B+.’

  Jack smiled. ‘Yeah, that’s what I thought.’

  Stella put the pillow over her head.

  Jack couldn’t sleep. He got up and went outside.

  There was a mist over the entire camp site, drifting in with sharp fresh air and catching the rising sun like glitter on candyfloss.

  A voice said, ‘What are you doing out here?’ startling him.

  Jack looked across to see Gus leaning over from his veranda. ‘I’m going to build a skatepark,’ he said, walking over to join him.

  ‘Nice one.’

  ‘What about you? Why are you up?’

  ‘Amy snores.’

  ‘Does she?’ Jack said, surprised.

  Gus nodded, unimpressed. ‘Like a train.’ Jack guffawed.

  Amy woke up, stretched and looked out of the window. Gus and Jack were standing on the veranda. Jack was laughing. She wondered what was so funny. Then she saw her mother walk past all spritely and ready for yoga, she gave the guys a wave. At the same time Stella came schlepping out looking half-asleep, ‘Why are you all awake?’

  Behind them the sun was just rising: big, round, and red above the mist. Amy yawned and picked up her phone, snapped a picture for Instagram.

  She thought about writing something really poignant. ‘A new day begins…’

  But she didn’t.

  Instead she wrote: ‘The sun looks like a Strepsil.’

  And snuggled back down under covers that smelt of sleep and suntan lotion.

  Stella stomped back to her room.

  Gus asked Jack if he fancied going to yoga.

  Jack guffawed again.

  And a heart popped up on Amy’s phone screen. GoneDad likes your photo.

  Keep reading for an extract from top 10 Kindle bestseller The SummerHouse By The Sea

  CHAPTER 1

  Ava was standing at the crossing when her phone beeped. She took it from her pocket at the same time as glancing left for traffic.

  Instead of looking right, Ava opened the WhatsApp message from her brother, Rory: Gran in hospital, it read. She frowned down at her phone and wondered how Rory could ever think that was enough information. But then the horn of the 281 bus stopped all other conscious thought.

  The shriek of the brakes filled the air as she saw the huge windscreen, the wipers. The face of the driver in slow motion, mouth open. Her whole body tensed. She felt her hand drop the phone. Time paused.

  There was a fleeting thought that this was actually really embarrassing.

  And then – smack – she didn’t think anything else. Just felt the hard pain in her hip, then the thwack of her head as she was thrown down on to the tarmac, and an overriding sense of unfairness because she wasn’t yet ready to die.

  CHAPTER 2

  The nurse waited patiently as Ava tried once more to get through to her brother.

  ‘It�
��s voicemail,’ Ava said, apologetic. ‘Everyone’s on voicemail. No one’s answering their phone, I’ve tried everyone. I’m really sorry.’ All her friends were in meetings or on the tube or at lunch, unreachable.

  ‘It’s fine.’ The nurse’s nametag read Julie Stork. Ava wondered if using her name might aid familiarity – she found it a bit creepy when the man at Starbucks called her Ava because he’d written it on a cup every day, but she could do with an ally. The alternative was another nurse, Tina, who Julie was talking quietly with now. Tina was terrifying. Her uniform stretched tight over her solid figure, hair scraped back in a ponytail, all-seeing eyes like hungry jackdaws. She’d been the one to inform Ava that she couldn’t go home without someone to watch over her for twenty-four hours, while making it very clear that they needed the bed back as soon as possible.

  Without the pressure of having no one to come and get her, Ava might have quite enjoyed her hospital stay. Starched white sheets, lamb chops and green beans, sponge pudding and custard, and a tatty out-of-date copy of OK! magazine. But her eyes hovered distractedly to her phone the whole time, her fingers scrolling through her contacts every few seconds, texting, WhatsApping, refreshing.

  She felt her cheeks flush with embarrassment as she heard Nurse Tina mutter, ‘There must be someone.’

  So when her phone beeped she pounced on it. A text from Rory: Can’t get away. Jonathon coming to get you.

  Ava put her hand over her mouth. How could her brother send her ex-boyfriend, of all people? Send his PA, one of the runners on set, anyone. Not the guy he’d set her up with and who she’d split from three months ago.

  She sat up quickly to get dressed and out of the stupid hospital gown that did up at the back, the magazine clattering to the floor. She tried to check her reflection in anything she could find: a knife from her plate. She scrunched her flat hair. She felt dizzy. She paused on the side of the bed and looked up just in time to see Jonathon sauntering up the hospital aisle with a sardonic grin on his face.

  ‘Hi, Jonathon,’ she said with an embarrassed half-smile as he stopped, hands on hips, at the end of her bed.