LITMIR.BIZ

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are you?’ Harriet slowly edged further into the room.

      ‘I’m here!’ Isla shouted, suddenly appearing from a pile of clothes in the corner of the room.

      Harriet jumped, unable to control the small shriek that spilt out of her mouth as she threw her hand up to her chest, feeling her heartbeat race. Now that Harriet looked closer, she could see that Isla had built some sort of house with her clothes and duvet.

      ‘What are you doing?’

      ‘I built a den! Look, here’s the door, here’s the window and here are the flowers in the garden.’ She jumped around the mound of materials as she gave Harriet the grand tour. ‘Come inside!’ she squeaked.

      Harriet was already shaking her head. ‘No, not right now. Mummy’s busy. I thought you were packing?’ Her phone beeped and Harriet took it out of her pocket, reading the email from work as Isla began to whine about wanting her to come inside the den. She exhaled in frustration as she read the email, asking her to a meeting in Ireland next month. Another hassle to organise childcare and have her mum tell her what a failure she was as a mother because she worked instead of staying at home with her two children. She flagged the email so that she could reply once Isla was in bed and she could concentrate better. She looked back at her five-year-old who was expectantly waiting for an answer to whatever question she had just asked her mum.

      ‘Sorry Isla, what were you saying?’

      ‘Urgh! Always have to say it again,’ she said, each word spoken with each step she took towards the den. ‘I said, can we have five minutes in the den and then you can work?’

      Harriet looked at her watch. She should really be getting the packing finished so that she could reply to her emails tonight before they set off tomorrow first thing. And as much as she wanted to spend time with Isla, these things were not going to get done by themselves. The joys of single parenting. She began to say no but then thought against it. All the parenting books and sites talked about making time for your children even if you were busy – although how practical these things were, Harriet didn’t know. She nodded and walked towards the den just as her phone began to ring. Isla groaned and threw her hands up into the air as Harriet took the phone back out of her pocket.

      ‘Hello, is that Mrs Fisher, Tommy’s mum?’

      ‘Oh no!’ Harriet replied and instantly felt her heart sink. ‘I’m so sorry, I’m on my way.’

      ‘Thank you,’ the nursery assistant replied abruptly and ended the call.

      ‘Isla, we need to go and pick up your brother.’

      Isla found this incredibly unfair and sat on the bed, crossing her arms and huffing.

      ‘What are you doing? Come on!’ Harriet turned to walk out of the bedroom, so angry at herself for forgetting to pick up Tommy again. She always had so much to do that she seemed to run out of time before she realised. She looked over her shoulder as she reached the top of the stairs only to see Isla sitting back on her floor, getting a puzzle out of its box. She turned on her feet and stormed back into the room. ‘Isla! It’s time to go, come on.’

      ‘No! I don’t want to – Tommy is stinky and he always cries.’

      ‘Oh for goodness’ sake, stop being silly and come on.’ She put her hands on her hips to show she meant business but Isla was very much her mini me and had every ounce of Harriet’s stubbornness. She stayed sitting on the carpet, staring back defiantly.

      ‘Isla…’ Harriet warned and did her best mum look.

      ‘I don’t want to though,’ Isla groaned, standing up slowly.

      ‘It won’t take long.’ She turned and walked back to the stairs and again, looked over her shoulder. Isla had stood up but was now just standing still in the middle of her room staring at Harriet. ‘What now?’ she said impatiently, feeling sorry for Tommy sitting and waiting at nursery for her.

      ‘Can I have a biscuit?’

      That girl knew her far too well. ‘Fine! Get a biscuit on the way out – now come on, let’s go!’ Harriet rushed down the stairs and could hear Isla skipping behind her saying, biscuit biscuit biscuit…

      As a single parent Harriet knew to pick her battles – and this wasn’t one of them.

       Chapter 4

      ‘OK spill, what did he say?’ Harriet placed the coffees onto the table in front of Nancy and sat down opposite her, expectantly. Nancy shuffled in her seat, very aware that Jack didn’t look too comfortable at the airport. She had sent Harriet a text yesterday and said she would explain all about Pete’s visit today; she knew Harriet wouldn’t just be content with a condensed version.

      ‘He apologised and said that he wants to be a part of Jack’s life.’

      Harriet guffawed and sipped her coffee. ‘You aren’t seriously falling for that tosh, are you?’

      Nancy laughed. ‘Tosh? Did you actually say tosh? Who says that?’

      ‘Oh, be quiet, just tell me that you’re not falling for it?’

      Nancy shrugged and sipped her coffee.

      ‘Nance!’ Harriet picked up her napkin and threw it at her. ‘Come on girl, sort it out.’

      ‘Hari, it’s not that simple. He’s Jack’s dad – I can hardly tell him to piss off, can I? What about Jack?’ She looked over to her blonde-haired boy and felt the weight of anxiety drop into the pit of her stomach. ‘It’s not his fault his dad is an idiot but if Pete is going to try and make things right, surely Jack deserves to have his dad around?’

      ‘Babe I get that, honestly I do, but he’s hardly shown the best intentions over the last year, has he? It wasn’t like he was dad of the year even before he walked out.’

      Nancy stayed quiet, not wanting to delve into the mess that was her marriage. But it seemed Harriet had other ideas.

      ‘What about the time that he left you waiting at that restaurant because he decided to go to the game with his mates and not tell you? Or the time he cancelled your weekend away because tickets came up for the F1? Or the time you slaved over a romantic dinner for him on your anniversary and he rolled in from the pub at 11 p.m. with a kebab?’

      ‘Alright, Hari, jeez!’ Nancy sipped her coffee again. ‘What is this, let’s highlight how shit Pete has been as a husband over the last few years? Don’t you think I know all this?’ It was a sore subject and Harriet knew that. But she was also the kind of friend who was completely honest with Nancy. However, hearing her list these things raised the question in Nancy’s mind of whether had been going wrong in her marriage even before Jack’s diagnosis.

      ‘Look, I’m sorry; I didn’t mean to bring the mood down. I just don’t want to see you and Jack get messed around and quite frankly, you have been so much happier over the last few months since things started getting back on track, I don’t want you to spiral back down into the person you were when he was making your life a misery.’

      ‘My life wasn’t a misery,’ Nancy replied defensively, but then took in the no-bullshit look on Harriet’s face. ‘OK, well I was unhappy towards the end but my whole life wasn’t a misery.’

      ‘Mummy? Can I get a magazine?’ Isla was pulling on Harriet’s cardigan.

      ‘In a minute darling, let Mummy just finish her coffee.’

      ‘And a chocolate bar?’

      ‘In a minute.’

      ‘And a teddy bear?’

      Nancy laughed. ‘You can tell Isla’s in holiday mode already.’ She turned to Jack. ‘Would you like a magazine, Jack?’

      He

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