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Having to concede that this was indeed what their Physical Health and Social Education teacher kept drumming into them, Charlotte said, “We’ll have to get some tomorrow while we’re in town, where no one knows us. If I went to the local pharmacy, it would get back to my mum quicker than you could get your knickers off.”

Relieved that the tricky moment seemed to be over, Paige laughed and checked her own mobile as it vibrated.
Heard what happened this morning. Hope you didn’t get hurt. Jx

Paige messaged back:
I’m cool. Thanks for asking. Px

Speak later?

Sure.

Deciding to tell Charlotte it was her mum rather than give her a reason to have a go about Julie again, Paige tucked her phone away and tried to return to her project. It was hard not to think about the party, though, and how upset she was at not being invited. However, she was determined not to let it show, as it would only make Charlotte feel bad, and what was the point of that? It was going to be horrible being at home on Saturday on her own, really vile and lonely imagining everyone having a brilliant time dancing and getting wasted or stoned, neither of which she’d ever done before. She’d really like to now, if only to prove to herself and to Charlotte that she was up for it. She wasn’t sure she’d go as far as having sex, unless it was with Oliver, but that was never going to happen, so she might just as well put it out of her mind.

What was wrong with her that nothing ever went right?

It was much later that day, just after she’d arrived home to find an empty house, that she received an email from Hayley telling her to check out the Happy Landings chat room. This was the school chat room, generally only used by years seven to nine, so she was surprised to get the message, and immediately suspicious. It wasn’t that Hayley had gone over to the Durmites altogether, but like so many, she’d been giving Paige a wide berth lately in case the Durmites started picking on her too. It was as if Paige was contaminated.

She was even starting to hate herself.

Hearing her mum’s car pulling up outside, she was about to open the website when a message came through from Julie.
Don’t go on the HL chat room. They’re a bunch of losers and you don’t need to read what they’re saying.

Someone knocked on her bedroom door. She shouted for whoever it was to go away, and clicked through to the chat room.

“Paige,” Josh called out. “Please, can I come in?”

“No! Go away!” she seethed. She really couldn’t deal with her baby siblings right now.

“He was put on the black bench today,” Flora shouted. “I told him me and Wills are always on the black bench, so it’s nothing to worry about.”

Though she didn’t want to remember how sensitive Josh could be at times, or realize what a big deal it would be for him to find himself on the naughty side of the classroom, Paige found herself getting angrily up from her chair and tearing open the door. “It’s not the end of the world,” she snapped at Josh. “You have to toughen up and deal with things.”

“That’s what I said,” Flora informed her.

“But I don’t know what I did wrong,” Josh protested. “The teacher never told me.”

“Then you have to ask her, not me,” Paige retorted. “I wasn’t there, was I?”

As his eyes flooded with tears she threw out her hands in frustration. “It’s not my fault you got put on the black bench,” she cried.

“I never said it was.”

“You shouldn’t be mean to him when he’s upset,” Flora scolded.

“Well, what do you want me to do?”

“Come on,” Flora said, trying to put an arm round Josh’s shoulders, “let’s go away from her. She’s just horrible.”

“And so are you,” Paige called after them before slamming the door and returning to her computer. She’d make it up to them later, somehow; she just couldn’t deal with them right now.

Minutes later, after finding the worst imaginable exchange on the HL chat room, she was staring at the screen as though the whole world had shifted to a place she couldn’t even begin to understand.

You can’t blame her dad for leaving, who’d want to live with her?

Wonder if she knows he left because he can’t stand her?

Do you think someone should tell her?

Is it true she’s got an STD?

She’s bound to have, amount of blokes she goes with.

She meets them online and goes on dates with them.

Apparently her dad found out and fixed her up with one of his mates. You know he’s not her real dad, don’t you?

Even if he’s not, that’s still sick.

Bet it’s not true.

I heard she has threesomes with her dad included. That’s why he left, because her mum caught them.

Paige was shaking with disgust and horror. How could anyone say something so revolting? It was beyond anything she could imagine herself; it was the worst thing she’d ever heard in her life.

Like she’d ever sleep with her dad.

She wanted to be sick, tear out her hair, or do something really terrible, like beat herself up or throw herself out of a window.

She snatched up her phone as Charlotte came through on FaceTime.

“Please tell me,” Charlotte cried desperately, “that you haven’t been on the HL chat room.”

“I’m looking at it now,” Paige choked out. “How did you know about it?”

“I got an email from Hayley. Jesus Christ, what are they thinking? They’re a bunch of fucking perverts. And they’re such cowards—not one of them has used a real identity.”

“The whole school is going to see it. Even those who never use the chat room will hear about it and go on to have a look.”

Charlotte couldn’t deny it.

“What shall I do?” Paige whispered through her tears.

“We’re going to tell someone,” Charlotte answered decisively. “I’ll come with you tomorrow to see Miss Kendrick. Or maybe we ought to go straight to Mr. Charles?”

Shuddering at the very thought of involving the headmaster, Paige said, “What if they’re right and he did leave because of me?”

“Just no way did that happen,” Charlotte insisted, “and you can’t let them get away with the other stuff they said. It is totally
disgusting.
We are going to see Miss Kendrick tomorrow, and if you don’t want to come with me, I’ll go on my own.”

—

Jenna looked up as Paige wandered into the kitchen, wearing her slouchy pajamas and a depressingly sullen expression. “Are you OK?” she asked, peering at her closely. “Have you been crying?”

“No,” Paige retorted. “Why would I be crying?”

Jenna’s eyebrows rose.

“I haven’t been crying, all right? But you have—your eyes are all red and your face is puffy.”

Jenna’s smile was wry. “I was about to make myself an omelette,” she said. “Would you like to share it with me?”

Paige shrugged and went to perch on one of the bar stools.

“I’ll take that to be a yes,” Jenna decided, and turned to the fridge for more eggs. “Cheese, ham, mushrooms, tomatoes, or all of the above?” she offered.

“Whatever.”

“Then we’ll have it all. Would you like a glass of wine to go with it?”

Paige looked up in surprise. It wasn’t that her parents never allowed her wine with a meal, but she usually had to ask for it. “If you like,” she responded.

After pouring them half a glass each, Jenna returned to the hob. “So how are things at school?” she asked.

“Same old,” Paige mumbled.

“Do you feel you’re on top of things?”

“I suppose so.”

Jenna opened a bag of grated cheese and added it to the eggs. She could feel her daughter’s tension as if it were tightening the air, trying to strangle her, and because of it she found herself struggling for something to say.

“Have you seen Dad?” Paige suddenly asked.

“Not since yesterday,” Jenna replied. “He came here. We had a few things to sort out.”

“Did you row?”

“I’m afraid so.”

“What about?”

Since she didn’t want Paige knowing anything about the company issues, Jenna said, “Nothing really. I mean, silly things.”

“Was it about me?”

Jenna’s eyes rounded. “Why would you think that?”

Paige’s face was pinched as she shrugged.

“No, we didn’t row about you,” Jenna told her.

Several minutes ticked by with lots of thundering about upstairs, an unwatched TV blaring from the sitting room, and Wills shouting at Josh to “come and look.” Jenna poured the omelette mixture into a pan and picked up the phone as it rang. After speaking to another mother about a birthday party after school next Thursday, she rang off. Moments later it rang again. This time it was Bena. The call was short and left Jenna feeling wearier than ever.

“Apparently Aiden’s got nits,” she told Paige. “That means we’ll have to check Josh and the twins tonight.”

“What do you mean,
we
? That’s Dad’s job, get him to do it.”

“Dad’s not here, is he, and it has to be done.”

“But it’s not up to me…”

“I need your help. Will you get that, please?” she added as the phone rang again.

Paige picked it up, listened to the person at the other end, and said, “No, we don’t need new windows, but if you’re any good at finding nits…”

As she hung up Jenna smiled. “That’s one way of dealing with them,” she commented.

Paige didn’t smile back; she simply sat staring at the wine she hadn’t touched, her face as pale as Jenna had ever seen it, her young heart clearly badly troubled.

“Did Dad leave because of me?” she suddenly blurted out.

Jenna stopped what she was doing and turned to her. “No, of course not,” she replied. “It had nothing to do with you. Why do you even think that?”

Paige didn’t seem comforted.

“I know this might come as a shock,” Jenna pressed on, trying to put a tease in her voice, “but not
everything
’s about you.”

Paige’s surly expression told what she thought of that little joke.

“It really isn’t,” Jenna insisted, “and I can promise you—”

“All right, it isn’t about me,” Paige cut in irritably.

“Paige…”

“So let’s make it about Josh. He’s really upset about what’s happening. I can hear him crying at night, even if you can’t.”

“Mummy! Mummy!” Flora screamed. “Wills is scribbling on my walls.”

“She scribbled on mine first,” Wills yelled.

“Mum, he’s hitting me.”

“She hit me first.”

“Go and sort them out,” Jenna sighed. “Tell them no stories if they don’t brush their teeth and get into bed by the time I come up.”

Looking about as thrilled to play mother as she was to be in the house at all, Paige took herself off upstairs, leaving Jenna to gulp down her wine and refresh the glass.

Seconds later the phone rang again. This time it was Hanna.

“How are you?” she asked. “Have you heard from Jack today?”

“No,” Jenna replied. “He’s supposed to be calling the children this evening, but no word from him yet. Maybe he’ll ring Josh’s mobile to try and avoid me.”

“Where did that yellow streak come from?” Hanna muttered. “So what’s happened about the auditor?”

“He’s been here for most of the day, and I’m due to see Richard Pryce on Friday to go over the findings.”

“I take it you’ve told Richard about the conversation you had with Jack yesterday?”

“Yes, we spoke on the phone earlier.”

“And he said?”

“Not much really.”

“No, lawyers never do, but he must have been mightily impressed by Jack’s suggestion that you transfer your money to him.”

“In order to cheat my publisher of it. You know, I don’t think he even sees it that way.”

“Whether he does or doesn’t, I wouldn’t trust him with a dime of my hard-earned money after all this. Tell me how you’re feeling.”

“If you really want to know, terrible. It’s like it’s all starting to crowd in on me now, getting bigger and heavier and darker…I keep reminding myself I should hate him, but that doesn’t help, because I don’t actually want to hate him. I just want to go back to the way things were. OK, I know it’s not going to happen, but you can’t just wipe out fourteen years of your life as if they meant nothing….” She took a breath. “I keep wondering if it was losing his job that changed him, or if it was something I did.”

“Losing his job was hard,” Hanna agreed, “we know that from the depression he sank into, and looking back I’d say he’s been quite…
extreme
since then. You know, the way he suddenly bounced you all off to the Gower without much of a discussion. Then he was launching a new business, joining every society and club going…Maybe we shouldn’t even get into all the money he’s spent on cars and gadgets and heaven only knows what else. It’s as though he’s lost his brakes, or his off switch, or his reality checks, and this affair with Martha is another example. He can’t just have an affair, as if that’s not bad enough; he has to abandon his family and go and live with her. I mean, how extreme is that?”

Though these same thoughts had been going round in Jenna’s head for days now, it was the first time she’d heard them spoken out loud, and while in a way they were giving her hope that there might be a cure for Jack’s excessiveness, in another way she felt horribly flattened by them. “Even if he is experiencing some sort of backlash from losing his job, which is what I guess you’re saying,” she responded, “I’d never get him to admit it, much less to see anyone about it.”

“No, I don’t suppose you would, but I think it’s something worth mentioning to Richard when you see him, because if this does end up in court it could help your case no end if it turns out your husband has a mental condition.”

Jenna flinched. Jack with a mental condition? It just didn’t seem feasible, much less anywhere she wanted to go. What would it mean for their three youngest children? “Maybe it’s a midlife crisis,” she suggested, realizing even as she said it that this new label wasn’t really making anything better.

“Whatever it is, it has the potential for getting you into a lot of trouble, and it has to be sorted out.”