Another Us Read online

  Another Us

  Table of Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  Chapter Forty

  Chapter Forty-One

  Chapter Forty-Two

  Chapter Forty-Three

  Chapter Forty-Four

  Chapter Forty-Five

  Chapter Forty-Six

  Chapter Forty-Seven

  Chapter Forty-Eight

  Epilogue

  Copyright

  Chapter One

  ‘Mum?’ Jack stopped stirring his Coco Pops and stared at the plumber. Chocolate milk dripped from his spoon and Jack blotted it with the forearm of his sweatshirt. ‘Mum, why is that man so ugly?’

  The moment hung, poised, like the one droplet of brown milk about to plop off the edge of the table.

  Of course, it had to happen now; on a Monday morning when I hadn’t engaged my brain and there was breakfast to finish, teeth and hands to clean and bags to gather before school. And it would be this particular Monday morning, September 14th. The date that had been eyeballing me from the calendar for weeks. At least Freddie, our teenager, had already taken himself off to school. He would have cackled with loud, delighted laughter and made the whole thing twice as bad.

  If that was possible.

  What were the options?

  Think, Emma.

  Think!

  Plan One: ignore the question and move on. But eight-year-old Lily was rigid with appalled fascination and the plumber was staring at me in mute humiliation, so this was unlikely to do the trick.

  Plan Two: the whispered apology. ‘So sorry. Jack tends to blurt stuff out. Tells you how it is.’ No. No. Definitely not an option. Jack was right; the plumber was – how could I put this nicely? – aesthetically challenged. Bald pate. Receding chin. Protruding teeth. How on earth could I say anything without making it twice as bad?

  Plan Three: ‘Jack, sweetie,’ I said. ‘You must stop calling everyone ugly. It’s getting very boring.’

  That was quite clever.

  But Jack just screwed up his face. ‘Don’t lie, Mum,’ he said. ‘I’ve never said it before.’

  The plumber gave us all a ‘look’ and went upstairs without a backward glance.

  There was no Plan Four.

  * * *

  There was still no Plan Four when I got back from dropping Lily off at school. In the end I fudged it. I gave the plumber freshly ground coffee, chocolate biscuits and my best apologetic smile but I didn’t actually say anything. Then Daniel got back from his run, I cajoled Jack away from the computer and we were off.

  Daniel and I didn’t say much in the car, but Daniel put a hand on my thigh and the space between the words was warm and comforting. After a while, I turned to look at Jack. Cross-legged on the back seat, he was playing Wizard World on Daniel’s iPad, fingers and thumbs a-whirr. I tried looking at him dispassionately – a small, slight boy with a broad face, a freckled nose and tousled strawberry-blond hair. His striped blue sweatshirt was decidedly grubby, though; how long had that faint white stain been there? Wrestling Jack’s current favourite item of clothing off him was hard because he liked to wear it all the time – even in bed – but that was no excuse. I should have been supervising him rather than fretting about the plumber.

  Oh God.

  Would the stain count against him?

  Against all of us?

  ‘How’s it going, Jacko?’ I asked, leaning over and scrubbing at the stain with my nail.

  ‘K.’ Jack swatted me away. ‘Can we get a McDonald’s after?’

  Despite my nerves, I couldn’t help smiling. ‘Chancer,’ I said. ‘Let’s see how the meeting goes.’

  Jack looked up. ‘How does it have to go to get a McDonald’s?’ he asked.

  Good question.

  ‘I just meant it depends how long it goes on,’ I said. ‘We need to get back for Freddie and Lily.’

  Jack gave a grunt and turned back to his game.

  I hadn’t meant that at all.

  * * *

  I wished I was somewhere else.

  Anywhere but hurtling along the M40.

  I wished it was that morning, before the plumber arrived. Or yesterday, when we were slumping at home in a lazy Sunday fug. Or, better still, drifting along the river on Frejalily, the scruffy little cabin-cruiser we’d bought in a moment of carpe-diem-ness and allowed the kids to name.

  Yes, take me back three weeks to our overnight jaunt up the Thames. Take me back to navy-blue water and wavelets capped in silver. Long shadows along the banks, the heady smell of mown grass and a little island dense with oaks and willows…

  * * *

  ‘Someone’s tied a rope to the big tree,’ shouted Freddie, momentarily forgetting his teenage cool.

  Minutes later, all three children were taking it in turns to swing over the river and drop, shrieking, into the water below. I couldn’t wait to join them. I rummaged in the holdall for my costume, pulling out handfuls of clothes in increasing frustration. It wasn’t there. Of course it wasn’t. I’d forgotten to pack it.

  I considered the alternatives.

  Plan One: skip the swimming.

  Plan Two: bugger that.

  I was wearing sensible black knickers and the kids would never notice the difference. I slipped off my shorts and wrestled my bra from under my T-shirt. A girl has to have a dry bra to come back to – even if she’s in danger of two black eyes in the meantime.

  ‘Officially bonkers,’ said Daniel, reaching for the Guardian.

  ‘Come in with me?’

  Daniel gave me his what’s-she-asking-me-to-do-now? expression. The one where he put his head on one side and his eyes went all squinty-sexy. He’d come in with me. I knew he would. He just needed a moment to get used to the idea. Sure enough, here he was, peeling off his T-shirt to reveal his reasonably tanned and toned dad-bod. At least he was wearing his trunks.

  Coaxing the kids out of the river for tea an hour later was a challenge.

  ‘Hop on board, guys,’ said Daniel for the fourth time. ‘Time for tea.’

  Jack hauled himself out of the river reluctantly. ‘How can I hop all the way up there?’ he demanded. ‘I’m not a kangaroo.’

  ‘Don’t be weird,’ said Lily, pushing past him and climbing on deck.

  ‘You’re the weird one.’ Jack kicked out at her departing bottom.

  A pause.

  Then Daniel laughed. ‘Who said you can’t hop on board, Jacko?’ he said. He climbed ashore and stood behind Jack on the bank
. ‘Let’s go. One, two, three – hop!’

  Jack hopped and Daniel swung him into a fireman’s lift and deposited him on the deck.

  ‘There you go. One kangaroo safely aboard.’

  There was silence and I held my breath. Which way would Jack go today? Would he laugh or scream? There was no way of telling.

  Jack began to laugh.

  And thank goodness for that!

  As the sun teetered on the horizon, Daniel and I sat at the bow with a bottle of red. I liked how our body language was mirrored; knees hugged to chests, cheeks resting on knees, glasses dangling. Just two grammar school kids who found each other way back when and got lucky.

  Daniel put his arm round me. ‘Look at what we’ve got,’ he said. ‘What we’ve made.’

  His other arm, sweeping around, took in the two of us, the kids bickering companionably in their sleeping bags in the cabin, the boat…

  ‘The adventure’s just beginning,’ I said. ‘One day we’ll take Frejalily all the way to Marlow.’

  Daniel grinned. ‘Think big, Em,’ he said. ‘Oxford…’

  ‘London…’

  ‘Calais…’

  ‘Gibraltar…’

  ‘Transatlantic…’

  I looked at valiant little Frejalily with the moss around her windows and burst out laughing.

  Daniel hugged me closer. ‘Give us a kiss,’ he said.

  And I obliged.

  Slowly.

  Sweetly.

  And we sat together and watched the sun go down.

  * * *

  Daniel braked as a white van pulled in front of us. I was back on the M40 and heading into the unknown.

  That last boat trip seemed a lifetime ago.

  Another family.

  Another couple.

  Another us.

  Chapter Two

  The meeting took place in a shabby Georgian building in a scrappy part of Aylesbury.

  We were shepherded along a warren of tatty corridors and into a utilitarian room with a one-way mirror. It reminded me of work, except there I was the one doing the interviewing, the one in control. A psychiatrist called Grant with a bald head, a bushy red beard and a soft voice greeted us and launched straight into questions. ‘Does your son overreact to situations?’ ‘Does he find it difficult to interact with other children?’ ‘Does he avoid eye contact?’ Whatever happened to not leading the witness? I was tempted to say that if I asked such closed questions in my interviews, I’d be sacked and quite rightly too, but a lady called Maggie with a long, dark plait and a nose-piercing was taking notes and I was afraid it might count against us.

  Jack didn’t stand a chance.

  Then Grant moved on to an exercise. A test in all but name. It was all a test at the end of the day, wasn’t it? Judging us, judging our son. Grant read out groups of words and Jack had to say what linked them.

  ‘Apple, orange, banana?’

  ‘Fruits,’ said Jack cheerfully. He liked games like this.

  ‘T-shirt, trousers, jumper?’

  ‘Clothes.’

  This was better.

  ‘Nose, eyes, foot?’

  ‘Parts of the body.’

  ‘Fingerprint, signature, face?’

  Whoa…

  ‘Don’t know,’ said Jack with a frown. He hated getting caught out.

  ‘Not to worry,’ Grant said cheerfully, getting to his feet. ‘It’s identity. A tough one.’

  Daniel and I exchanged a grimace.

  Grant returned with a piece of paper.

  ‘Have a look at this,’ he said, putting it on the table in front of Jack. It was a black and white picture; the kind you get in a child’s colouring book. In the background, rolling fields and a sky full of birds and, in the foreground, a little girl pushing a baby in a pram at the top of a steep hill. Look a little closer and the girl had let go of the pram.

  ‘So, Jack, what’s going on here?’ asked Grant.

  Jack looked at the picture and then gave Grant a fleeting glance. ‘How d’you mean?’ he asked.

  Come on, Jack, I urged. The pram might roll away and the baby might get hurt. The pram might roll away. The baby might get hurt. Come on, my beautiful boy. You can do this.

  ‘Say what you see, Jack,’ Grant said encouragingly. ‘No right or wrong answers.’

  Of course there was a bloody right and wrong answer.

  Jack scratched his head. ‘There are three tractors and one is bigger than the others,’ he said.

  The tractors were microscopic. Seriously, I could hardly make them out without my glasses; I’d thought they were smudges or hedgerows or something. That’s how small they were.

  But Jack loved tractors. They were one of his ‘things’.

  It wasn’t fair.

  Maggie asked Jack to show her his iPad game and Daniel and I were ushered into a little meeting room with Grant. Grant put his hands into a steeple and I almost expected him to pull on a black cap.

  ‘Jack meets the criteria for an autism spectrum disorder diagnosis,’ he said.

  And that was that.

  It wasn’t even noon.

  * * *

  Grant left us alone and Daniel and I stumbled to our feet and into each other’s arms. I was crying, I realised. So was Daniel.

  Daniel never cried.

  ‘I think I already knew,’ he said.

  ‘I think I’ve always known.’

  We looked into each other’s eyes, defences down.

  ‘Oh, Dan,’ I whispered, scratching my scar. ‘I don’t want Jack to have Asperger’s.’

  I didn’t want history to repeat itself.

  For the family genetics to play out in exactly the same way.

  I didn’t want Jack to become another Teddy.

  There. I’d said it.

  Thought it.

  Daniel stroked my hair. ‘I love you,’ he said.

  ‘I will always love you.’

  ‘I know you’re upset,’ said Daniel, ‘but try to keep it together for Jack.’

  Words and tears and heartbreak and love.

  * * *

  ‘I’ve got Asperger’s,’ Jack announced cheerfully, ten minutes later.

  ‘You have,’ replied Daniel, jollity personified. It was like they were discussing a Wycombe goal. ‘It’s OK. It’s… great, in fact.’

  ‘Is it great enough to get a McDonald’s on the way home?’

  * * *

  McDonald’s was packed.

  Daniel and Jack grabbed a table, leaving me to queue up.

  ‘Having a good day?’ asked the cheery cashier when it was finally my turn. Her golden curls were tumbling out of her cap and she didn’t look much older than Freddie.

  ‘Lovely, thank you,’ I replied. As you do. I mean, how much worse did my day have to get before I said, ‘Shite, thank you’?

  When I got back to the table, Jack was absorbed in a booklet called Asperger’s and Me. There was a cartoon of a smiling boy on the front and I took an instantaneous dislike to it. I’d had more than enough of cartoon children for one day.

  ‘Mum, do you know the difference between a meltdown and a tantrum?’ said Jack.

  ‘Um, not really,’ I said, doling out the Big Macs (no mayo, lettuce or gherkins for Jack).

  ‘Toddlers have tantrums. But I have meltdowns. I’m being another me.’

  ‘Right.’

  Who knew?

  ‘So, from now on, you mustn’t tell me off when I shout. OK?’

  ‘OK.’

  I needed to read that leaflet. All the leaflets. I needed to find out how best we could help our lovely boy. I fought the urge to fold Jack into my arms. Not that he would let me. He winced if I ruffled his hair. Flinched if I patted his shoulder.

  ‘I’ve found a good bit, too,’ said Daniel, brandishing a leaflet at me. ‘Apparently we need to have lots of Mummy and Daddy time. Meals out, that sort of thing.’

  ‘Sounds good to me,’ I said cheerfully. ‘We haven’t been to the Crown for ages.’
r />   ‘The Crown?’ Daniel put his arm round me. ‘Come on, Em, you can do better than that.’

  ‘Ha! Silly me,’ I said. ‘How about Il Cantina?’

  ‘Oh, I think the Manoir aux Quat’Saisons at least.’

  I giggled and snuggled against Daniel. It was all going to be OK. We’d get through this, just like we got through everything else. Together…

  ‘Don’t forget weekends away,’ I said. ‘I’m thinking Paris. Special Mummy and Daddy time.’

  ‘That’s my girl,’ said Daniel with a grin. He pulled me closer and kissed me lightly on the lips. ‘Special Mummy and Daddy time sounds exactly what the doctor ordered.’

  ‘What’s special Mummy and Daddy time?’ asked Jack, cramming in a handful of chips.

  Daniel and I shared a conspiratorial smile. ‘It’s just an expression, Jacko,’ I said.

  Jack grunted.

  ‘Something that will help us beat that statistic,’ added Daniel, nuzzling against my neck.

  Er…

  ‘What statistic?’

  Daniel didn’t answer. I felt his arm stiffen against my shoulder.

  ‘What statistic?’ I persisted, pulling away to look at him.

  ‘Nothing,’ said Daniel. ‘Talk about ruining a lovely moment.’ He gave an embarrassed little laugh and started singing. ‘And then I go and spoil it all by saying something stupid…’

  The first chill of unease ran up my spine. ‘Tell me, Dan,’ I said. ‘Please.’

  We both glanced at Jack, who had lost interest in the conversation and was fiddling with Dan’s iPhone. We turned back to each other.

  ‘OK,’ said Daniel. ‘But I promise it’s nothing. I read somewhere that 80 per cent of marriages with an autistic child break up before the child is sixteen.’

  Oh God.

  ‘Was that in these leaflets?’ I asked incredulously. Talk about a double whammy. Your child is on the spectrum and…

  ‘No, no. Online somewhere.’

  ‘Where online? What were the sources?’

  ‘I don’t know. I shouldn’t have mentioned it. It’s clearly bollocks.’

  And yet he’d stored the information. Mentioned it.

  Suddenly his arm wasn’t so reassuring. It might not be able to protect us, after all.