“It’s going to be incredible when you give them their gifts.” I give her a smile and ask, “So, what about you? Do you like to cook?” I can easily picture her in the kitchen looking just as she does now with a towel tossed over her shoulder. The image elicits a tiny smirk.
Her brow furrows as she catches my playful expression. “I do. I love it. I did all the cooking growing up and my brothers can eat, let me tell you.”
“I’m sure,” I chuckle good-naturedly. “What was it like living with a bunch of athletes?” My curiosity over her lifestyle is definitely piqued. I grew up watching football on the telly and my entire family is Manchester United fans through and through.
She shrugs. “I don’t know any different.”
“You played too, I assume?”
She scrunches her nose and shakes her head. “No, I didn’t. I traveled with my dad and brothers instead.” Suddenly, she stops what she’s doing and looks up at the ceiling as if she’s having an epiphany. “You know what I just realised? Without even knowing it, I grew up as a mum. I submerged myself in their world and their schedules so much that playing football myself didn’t even occur to me!”
I frown. “Surely there were some things you did for yourself.”
She looks at me seriously as if she’s just been whacked in the face by a sad truth. “Not a lot. I didn’t even have many mates. Really, the first proper thing I’ve done was get my own flat last year. That’s pathetic.” She shakes her head in frustration.
“It’s not pathetic to be close to your family. Growing up traveling with them sounds amazing. I’m sure being in a house with your brothers and dad was a life experience all in its own.”
“You have no idea,” she chuckles in a secretive, knowing way. “Are you, Theo, and Daphney close?”
I pause and try to determine the best way to answer without turning the conversation around on me again. “We used to be. Then we weren’t. Now we are again.”
Her face screws up in confusion. “Mind embellishing a bit?”
“Tonight isn’t supposed to be about me. It’s supposed to be about you, and you’re treading into day three material here.” I squint at her speculatively.
She laughs and her smile lights up her eyes. “It’s a give and take, Hayden. It’s called conversation for a reason. This isn’t an interview. Go on then, we’ll get to day three eventually anyway.”
She turns back to her box and swipes her cloth over the excess stain, her tongue flicking out as she applies more effort to a particular seam.
“Day three was a rather painful experience that Theo and I discussed in great detail during my stint in rehab. Theo has a tendency to blame himself for everything, from Marisa’s death, to my attempt, and all the darkness in the cracks. Perhaps it’s an older brother thing. Regardless, it took a great deal of opening up for him to relieve himself of that lot.”
“Why would he blame himself for your attempt?”
“A few days before the charity gala last year, he and I…Well, we exchanged some very painful words right here in this shop. I was completely pissed out of my mind and had caught wind that he was bringing Leslie to the event. It just set me off.”
“Why is that?” she asks, her brow quizzical.
“I felt he didn’t have the right to be happy because no one else in our family was. It had been three years since Marisa’s death and I was in no way moving on from my guilt. So Theo bringing a date to the gala felt like a slap in the face. Like he didn’t care. About Marisa. About our family. About me. I took it all wrong, which I know now was ludicrous.”
Vi frowns and shakes her head. “I don’t think any feelings you had back then were ludicrous. You guys were all living in the wake of a very tragic accident. There’s no way to know how long it takes you to get over something like that. I’m sure everyone processes at their own pace.”
I half smile at her comment. “You sound like Doc, my therapist. I was so rat-arsed that I shoved Theo into one of his works in progress and it busted all to pieces. He exploded on me, telling me what a royal fuck-up I was and that I was going to end up dead in a ditch…He even took a swing at me with a two-by-four. It was bloody awful.”
“God, were you hurt?”
Shaking my head, I answer, “No. I don’t think he was really trying to hit me. I think he was just trying to snap me out of my stupor. But I was too pissed and too depressed. No one could get through to me. After that I just spiraled further downward.