I tried to explain. Sleep when baby sleeps, that’s what they say. It should have been okay. I’d put her in the Moses basket from now on. It wouldn’t happen again. He nodded slowly, looked back to the blue light of the screen.
While I shakily packed up my things four days ago, watched by the awkward parade of Jim’s family, I’d asked pointlessly, “What did you mean by neglect?” I just wanted to hear him say it. Because it really seemed like such a small and common thing to fall asleep like that, and I wanted his voice to shrink it back to size for him and for them.
“When Violet was younger, sometimes you’d stare into space, ignoring her. She’d cry for you and it’s like you didn’t hear. She’d need her nappy changed, she’d be sore and you would fucking—sorry, Mum—fucking ignore her, Sarah. That’s what I mean. I caught you. I caught you once and I told myself it was a one-off but it wasn’t. Because I caught you again.”
I’d lowered my eyes, zipped up my holdall and left the room. My God, I’d thought, I really believed that I’d managed it.
SIX
SARAH|1990
Our dad is a gardener.
“Landscape gardener and tree surgeon,” he’s started to say, because he had this big talk with Drew Granger, who “sells big ideas” for a living. Drew Granger told him that you can call yourself anything you want and people will believe you. That if you say your services are better than anyone else’s, and if you look confident enough, you can charge more. Dad didn’t seem sure but Mum got some new leaflets printed up that made it sound like Dad had been trimming the lawns of mansions with nail scissors all his life, and he started to get more work from big houses on the outskirts of the village.
Mum’s never really taken an interest in the actual gardening side of things. Like me, she likes a nice green lawn or a pretty flower, but it’s not something she’s obsessed with. Robin likes gardening. I think it’s because she’s allowed to get muddy and dirty if it’s with Dad in the garden. It’s funny because I would have thought Hilary was the same as Mum and me. She has flowers on her dining table and neat little flower beds outside their modern house, but the thought of her so much as kneeling down let alone touching soil is at odds with everything I’ve seen so far. And yet the last time we went to Wellington Country Park, I noticed that Hilary had dropped back to ask Dad something about soil acidity, and hours later at lunch they were still nattering away about seedlings and polytunnels and the best secateurs for roses.
There was something I struggled to read on Mum’s face. Gardening wasn’t her passion but Hilary was her friend, and maybe she was jealous that Dad was leaning over the beer-garden table to talk to Hilary, that he seemed so excited that someone besides Robin was finally interested. Mum was sitting next to him but had to make do with listening to Drew Granger tell her why it was the best time to get an Access credit card and that the economy was booming and she and Dad should sell our house and buy something bigger. Mum muttered something and they both looked at Dad and then started laughing. Robin knocked her knife onto the floor near me, and when I dropped under the table to pick it up, I thought I saw Mum’s and Drew’s feet untangling.
ROBIN|1990
Robin didn’t want to like Callum. He was “boy Sarah” and her sister was everything that Robin wasn’t. The girls clashed a lot, as sisters do. But there was something else with Callum, something she couldn’t help but be drawn to. A look in his eye, like he had seen something amusing that he couldn’t dare share. Or like he knew something secret and had zipped his mouth shut. Like maybe, if he really trusted you, he might unzip it.
At school, the kids had their own clusters of friends. Callum was tall and poised, and when he wanted to, he could jump into a soccer game and dribble, kick, header the ball perfectly well. But most of the time he preferred to read or chat about books or television with whoever might be nearby. His ability with the ball and his height meant that the other boys—the loud, fast, brash boys—afforded him space to do both.
When the Marshalls and the Grangers got together outside of school, Sarah would practically perform for Callum’s approval. The three kids would climb trees or make up spur-of-the-moment, complex, ever-changing games, but Sarah seemed to care the most. And yet. Robin noticed that Callum’s shoulders seemed to shake more at the things she herself said and did. He’d never say anything cheeky or rude to his parents, but if Robin backchatted her mum or dad, Callum would practically vibrate with excitement, his eyes wide.
This thing had started with Robin’s mum and Hilary, but the two families had soon squished together to form a new shape. Despite herself, Robin started to look forward to staying over at the Grangers’, watching films or learning card games like Shithead, which they had to play in late-night whispers.
She noticed that the lines were blurring with the adults too. The mums were still the organizers, the confidantes and the ones who met up the most without the others, but the adults were more of a group now. Sometimes, Robin’s dad and Hilary would even pair up. Hilary had turned up at the Marshall house once in jeans and a sweatshirt, hair tied up in a scarf, so that Dad could take her to the nursery he bought his seeds and soil from and help her with her garden. And Drew and Angie started to have their own little smirks and jokes. Robin noticed that her mum had started to repeat things that Drew had said, as if they were the gospel. Or she would begin sentences about money or shopping with “Drew says…” Robin didn’t like that and expected that her dad wouldn’t like it either, but it looked like he hadn’t noticed.
SEVEN
SARAH|PRESENT DAY
4. Anger
Anger was number four on Jim’s list. “Everyone gets angry,” I’d said quietly. They’d ignored me. It wasn’t fair. I worked harder than anyone to crush those feelings. Even as a child, I’d always tried very hard not to get angry. I’d make a fist, bite the flesh of my cheeks, think about ponies. I wanted to be described, always, as “a good girl.”
But Violet, Violet is a good girl. She could push my buttons with the endless questions, she could drain my patience with the odd tantrum, but she didn’t make me angry. Not really.
I think it took about six months to really slide into clichés—hardworking man who just wants some peace and quiet when he gets home; frazzled woman, alone all day with the endless demands of a child. I remember reading an article somewhere that highlighted all the ways caring for an infant compares with mental torture. It’s impossible to be your best self in those conditions, and it’s the time you most want to be.