The Astonishing Return of Norah Wells (14 page)

Ella said she'd be back in a minute but she was away for ages.
Being back in a minute
was code for going out to have a cigarette. Only it's started to rain, so she should have come back in.

Willa wanted Ella to come back because she'd got to the really good bit in the film, when Mr Fox has made friends with all the other animals living underground and worked out what their special talents are, and planned to raid Boggis, Bunce and Bean's supplies. But sometimes, when Ella goes away to smoke, she comes back in a better mood, so Willa doesn't say anything.

Willa stares out into the garden, which looks wet and grey. She hopes that the rain clears for her birthday.

Ella's phone buzzes on the blanket. Willa knows you're not meant to look at people's phones, just like you're not meant to read their diaries, but she's sick of not knowing what's going on. And she's kind of curious to know whether Sai's sending Ella love messages.

The buzz was a tweet coming in. Ella tweets all the time. It's for her school project on missing people – she's been doing it for ages and ages, which makes Willa think that homework at Holdingwell Academy must be much harder than homework at Holdingwell Primary, which you can usually finish in under an hour.

Someone called @onmymind has left Ella a message.

‘What are you doing, Willa?'

Willa looks up.

And so does Louis.

Ella stands at the door to the lounge.

Willa puts down the phone. ‘It buzzed. Sorry.'

‘My phone's private.' Ella snatches her mobile from Willa and shoves it in her pocket.

‘Sorry,' Willa says again, but she knows her sorry isn't a real sorry because she'd have liked to have read the message from @onmymind.

Willa expects Ella to walk off in a huff like she's been doing lots lately, but instead she flops down on the sofa and says, ‘Come on, let's see what happens to Mr Fox.'

Willa smiles and turns up the volume, and tries to nestle into the crook of Ella's arm but Ella feels all stiff. Maybe she's still cross about the phone.

They've got to the bit where the Caterpillar tractors are about to dig up Mr Fox and Mrs Fox's burrow. Willa looks away from the screen. She hates this bit: no one should have their home dug up like that. Her eyes flit across the back garden. A flash of red under the gooseberry bush. Mrs Fox must be preparing her den for tomorrow, when she's going to give birth because she's pregnant, like Mrs Fox.

Louis's lying on the sofa with his head on Willa's lap. He's heavy and drooling, but Willa doesn't want to push him away in case he gets offended. Although Ella said she wanted to see what happens to Mr Fox, she's been staring into space and checking her phone and doing her jiggling-leg thing, which means she's stressed.

‘Why did you throw away all the things in your room?' Willa asks.

Ella grabs a handful of popcorn, which they made for their breakfast, and shoves it in her mouth; Willa knows Ella did that so she doesn't have to answer right away.

‘I thought you liked the pictures of Auntie Norah.'

She hopes that Ella will confirm that No One Woman is Auntie Norah, but Ella keeps munching and staring at a bit of the ceiling.

Willa flicks her tongue between her wobbly tooth and her gum. She likes to feel the jagged bits. ‘Is No One Woman Auntie Norah?'

‘Leave it, Willa, it's not important.'

It must be important if Ella's turned her room upside down and if No One Woman's been taken to the police station.

Willa tries a different tack. ‘Why did you cut off your hair and dye it so dark?'

Ella shrugs. ‘Felt like it.'

Willa doesn't want to hurt Ella's feelings but she doesn't think her new hairstyle suits her. She preferred her when she had long goldeny hair.

Ella's phone buzzes and she scrolls down the screen. It's probably Sai.

Willa looks at the telly. Mr Fox and his family are digging into the ground next to the tree to find a new home.

Willa strokes Louis's ears.
Do you know why everyone's acting so weird?
she asks him.

He looks up at her with his droopy eyes, which say,
You'll find out soon enough, Willa.
Which is nearly as bad as Ella not saying anything and Mummy saying everything's going to be fine when Willa doesn't even know what's meant to be wrong.

She feeds Louis a bit of popcorn and takes a sip of her hot chocolate. If things didn't feel weird, this would be the best Saturday morning they've had in ages, snuggled up on the sofa watching her favourite film and having treat food.

By the time they get to the bit in the film where everyone's having a big meal and dancing and singing, Ella's body has relaxed and she's put her hand on Louis's head and moved up closer to Willa and they're all hugging again and getting sleepy from the hot chocolate and the popcorn and the fleecy blanket and from staring at the telly.

 

When Willa wakes up, the DVD has flipped to the menu bit and the theme tune's playing over and over. Ella's head is resting on Louis's shoulders and her fingers are tangled up in his fur, like she's trying to hold on to him in case he runs away. They're both fast asleep.

Willa climbs off the sofa and goes to the kitchen to get a glass of water. Through the window she can see Miss Rose Pegg's round face and round marble eyes staring out of her lounge window – she's hitched up the net curtains. Miss Rose Pegg has to give herself injections because she's got too much sugar in her blood, like Louis. Miss Lily Pegg's face appears next to Miss Rose's. Miss Lily is as skinny as a stick man. The twins are identical, which means they've got the same colour hair and eyes and they're the same height, but it's like Miss Rose has been puffed up with Daddy's bicycle pump.

Just as she's about to turn away from the window, Willow notices that Mummy and Daddy's car is parked outside the house, which is weird because if the car's there, where are Mummy and Daddy and No One Woman?

She heads back to the lounge to see whether Ella is awake so that she can ask her about the car, but as she does she notices that the light's on in the den – and then she hears clomping downstairs in the basement.

When she gets to the bottom of the stairs that lead down through the den to the basement, she sees Daddy sitting on the floor of his office, surrounded by pictures of Mummy. Mummy doesn't like photos of her being put up around the house because she's shy about how she looks, which is silly because Willa thinks that she's the prettiest mummy in the world.

Willa knows that she should turn round and go back upstairs because Daddy looks like he's having a private moment and Mummy warns Willa not to disturb Daddy while he's in his zone, but he looks so sad that she can't help herself.

‘Daddy, what are you doing?'

Daddy's head shoots up. ‘Willa?'

She goes over and sits beside him on the floor.

‘Why are you looking at photos of Mummy?'

‘I'm just doing a bit of sorting.'

‘What kind of sorting?'

‘I've got so many photographs… I'm running out of space.'

‘You're not going to get rid of any, are you Daddy?'

Willa leans in and looks at a photo of Mummy wearing oven gloves and carrying a big golden turkey; she's got a funny paper hat on her head and she's grinning. Mummy loves Christmas. She's says that it's about family and that family's the most important thing in the world, which Willa agrees with – except that she thinks that sometimes you should be able to adopt people into your family, like Mrs Fox and her cubs.

‘Can I have the photo of Mummy? Just to keep in my room? I won't put it up or anything.'

Adam hands her the photograph and then leans in and kisses her forehead. Everyone's kissing her much more than usual. Maybe it's because it's her birthday soon.

As Willa goes back up the stairs she turns round and asks Daddy:

‘Where are Mummy and No One Woman?'

His eyebrows droop and he looks even sadder than he looked when she came in.

‘They've just gone out for a bit,' Daddy says. ‘They'll be home soon, Willa.'

My best friend stole my life
: that's the thought that keeps going round in Norah's head as she looks at Fay across the table. How did Ella put it?
Dad's shacked up with your best friend
…
Except shacked up doesn't cover it. Fay's done such a big renovation job on Norah's old life that, walking back into her home, she'd felt like a stranger.

Norah's sitting in front of Fay in The Holdingwell Café: plastic tables and orange plastic chairs and linoleum floors and greasy, steamed-up windows – and the best coffee in town. Katie, the owner, used to let Norah stay for hours with the girls.

The usual flush in Fay's cheeks has faded, and she won't stop fiddling. Her spoon, the packet of sweetener, the plastic peeling from the menu. Norah hasn't seen her like this since those early days, when she would panic before her medical exams.

Norah notices Fay staring at her wedding ring. Fay helped Adam pick out the wedding bands. God, it was worse than that, wasn't it? Fay had paid for the rings. She'd covered the cost of the whole wedding. And they'd never paid her back.

‘I'm sorry I got so angry,' Norah says.

Fay takes a sip of coffee and stares out of the window.

If Norah's going to make this work, she has to show them that she's sorry – and that she cares. And, from what she can see, getting Fay on side is vital to that.

Except, right now, she finds it hard even to be within a few feet of her.

Norah knows that there aren't any rules about what your best friend is or isn't allowed to do with your husband after you've walked out on him and disappeared for six years – but she still feels betrayed.

‘You look pale,' Norah says.

‘I didn't get much sleep.' Fay stares down into her coffee cup. ‘Willa came in again last night…'

Norah shifts in her seat. ‘Again?'

‘She doesn't sleep well.'

‘Bad dreams?' Norah tries not to be pleased that she's uncovered a crack in Fay's picture-perfect family.

‘Sort of.'

And when you have bad dreams, you go to your mum, right?
 

Fay looks up and Norah holds her gaze until she blinks and looks out of the window.

Willa thinks she's her mum
…
Ella had said that too.

‘She doesn't know who I am, does she?' Norah says. ‘No One Woman?' Norah laughs nervously
.
She'd overheard Willa calling her that.

Fay jumps up from her chair. ‘Sorry.' She clamps her hand to her mouth and runs to the ladies.

Norah looks at the raindrops sliding down the window.

They've been here for hours, drinking coffee, staring out at the grey, rain-heavy sky, barely saying a word.

It was Fay's idea for Adam to drop them off here, for them to stay away from the house long enough to make Ella believe that Norah was being questioned by the police. Norah wonders why she agreed to the stupid plan. Wasn't it just delaying the inevitable? They should be at home, thrashing things out, explaining to Ella what really happened and deciding on a way to tell Willa.

Norah pushes away her coffee cup. Was it really that hard to get through to Ella? They'd had six years to persuade her and she wasn't a kid, she could cope with the truth. Fay and Adam had stood by as she set up a bloody missing persons campaign. Letting a little girl chase a lie – that was cruel.

Norah picks up a flyer from the table:
The Holdingwell 10k
– free refills all day.

She looks over to the corner of the room where she used to play for the customers, Willa asleep at her feet, Ella beside her, blowing on her plastic trumpet.

For a second, she allows herself to believe that maybe all this could still work out as she had hoped. That, after a little awkwardness and a few explanations, everything would fall back into place and they'd welcome her home.

She looks to the loo door; Fay's been ages.

I have to win her trust,
she thinks again. Except she hasn't got a clue how to do it. Not when she knows that, however this is going to pan out, one of them will lose everything.

She waits another few minutes and then gets up and walks to the ladies.

 

Fay's in one of the cubicles, the door open, kneeling in front of the toilet bowl. She heaves and then sits back, shaking.

Norah sits beside her, gathers up the strands of Fay's hair and rubs her back.

Fay brushes her off.

‘I was trying to help,' Norah says as she stands up and steps away.

‘I don't need your help.' Fay goes over to the washbasin, splashes water onto her face and wipes her mouth.

Tiredness doesn't make you throw up, thinks Norah, not like that, but just as she is about to make a comment, Fay bursts out with:

‘It wasn't my idea.' Fay grips the basin and looks at herself in the mirror. ‘To let Willa believe that I was her mum.'

‘No?'

Fay looks at Norah in the mirror, her eyes bloodshot. ‘She was so little. She didn't understand who I was – she just assumed…'

‘I get it.'

Fay turns round, her eyes swimming. ‘No, you don't. They were all I had left of you. They made me feel close to you. It's what people do when they lose someone: they come together.'

She's got the tone she used to have when she was at medical school, when she'd come home and tell Norah about a lecture she'd been to or an article she'd found in the stacks:
did you know that neglect affects the mechanics of a child's brain?

‘You moved into my home, Fay. You changed everything.'

‘What did you want us to do? We waited for you. For ages, the house stayed as it was. But we had to move on. Living in a time warp wasn't helping Adam or the girls. Look what it did to Ella, hanging on to the hope that you might turn up one day.' She pauses. ‘We didn't think you were coming back, Norah.'

Norah washes her hands and wipes them on her leggings. ‘I didn't think he was your type.' She tries to say this with as little sarcasm as possible. She's genuinely interested in how her best friend, who could barely stand to be in the same room as Adam, found herself in bed with him.

‘My
type
?' Fay asks.

‘You always said he wasn't good enough for me.'

‘That was a long time ago.'

A long time ago? It feels like yesterday that they stood here, in these same loos, Norah telling Fay she was pregnant with Willa, that she didn't know how Adam would cope when he hadn't even got used to Ella being around; Fay telling Norah that Adam had to take responsibility.

‘All I mean is that you and Adam never had much time for each other before —'

‘
Before
you walked out on us?'

They look at each other, their expressions strained under the strip lights.

A woman pushes through the door and stares at them. Fay and Norah walk back into the café and settle into their places by the window.

For a while, they don't say anything. Then Norah leans forward.

‘I thought you were happy with the life you had,' Norah says. ‘When we talked, you'd always say that you had everything you ever wanted. Money, a career, freedom. You said you didn't want a family. You said that my family was enough for the both of us, that being Ella's godmother was better than being a mum… I thought you had enough…'

‘
Enough
?' Fay shakes her head and then she stares out at the rain, a million miles away. Then she turns round and focuses her eyes on Norah. ‘Don't you see? Through you, they had become my family too. That didn't change because you took up and left. You leaving made them matter even more to me.'

‘I married Adam; I gave birth to the girls. Nothing changes that.'

‘No, nothing changes that.'

‘But?'

‘I did what I had to do, Norah.'

Loving them, pulling together in grief – however Fay wants to put it, Norah can get her head around that. But she won't swallow this: Fay dressing it up as her coming to the rescue. She moved into Norah's life because she wanted to.

‘Once you did what you had to do, once you'd fixed them, why didn't you just —'

‘Leave? Why didn't I just leave?'

Norah bows her head.

Fay spreads her fingers on the table and leans forward. She doesn't look tired any more, or sad. Just angry.

‘Adam was a mess, Norah. He couldn't look after himself, let alone the girls. Willa was a baby, Ella a little girl. They were in shock. They didn't know what to do. So yes, Norah,
I did what I had to do.
And then, guess what happened?'

‘Don't —'

‘Don't what, Norah? Tell you the truth? Tell you that when people help each other out they form an attachment? And that sometimes that attachment turns into love? It's called sticking together when you've gone through a tough time. It's called being a family. A real family.'

‘And moving into Adam's bed was just an organic part of the process – that's what you're saying?'

Fay straightens her spine and looks straight at Norah. ‘You're right.'

‘Right?'

Fay's stopped fidgeting. She's sitting still and tall and she's still staring at Norah.

‘I love him. That's why I stayed.'

Norah doesn't recognise her best friend.

Fay leans forward. ‘And guess what? I've always loved him. I've loved him from the minute I met him, from the night we found you in the park and brought you home —'

There are times when a shift happens, when one small join in the great scaffolding of life comes loose and nothing ever looks the same again.

‘But you seduced him,' Fay goes on, ‘like you seduce the whole world. I didn't have a chance.'

‘Seduce the whole world? What are you talking about?'

Fay shakes her head. ‘Don't pretend you don't know what you do. How you sweep into people's lives and make them fall in love with you, how you draw them in until you're the centre of their world, until no one else matters —'

‘I didn't —'

‘You
did
.' Fay takes a breath. ‘The night we met, Adam didn't even look at me.'

‘You're crazy, Fay. He fancied me, that's all.'

‘He didn't fancy you, Norah. He
fell
for you. Head over bloody heels. Madly. Blindly.'

‘Blindly? You mean because he didn't register that you had a crush on him? What was stopping you? Why the hell didn't you say something?' Norah slumps back in her chair. ‘God, this is pathetic.'

‘Pathetic? I would have lost you both. You wouldn't have been able to deal with me telling you about my feelings for him —'

‘You didn't give me a chance —'

‘And I thought he didn't care about me – not like that.'

‘
Thought?
And now?'

Norah notices that the café has gone quiet. Customers are looking over at them and whispering. One of the waitresses turns up the radio behind the bar.

‘I don't know how he felt about me,' Fay says, her voice calm. ‘He seemed to love you…'

‘Seemed?' Norah laughs. ‘You think he loved you back then too?'

This is what couples do, isn't it? Rewrite the stories of their love.

‘We don't always know what we truly feel. The way he is now, it makes me think that maybe —'

‘He loved you all along?'

‘I don't expect you to understand.'

‘Well, Fay, why don't you explain it to me, your great theory of love and of how someone can be in love with someone without knowing it? Adam couldn't stand you. He…'

She stops herself. Getting Fay on side? Wasn't that the plan? But how could she, after everything she'd just heard? And after watching Fay throw up like that?

‘He didn't realise,' Fay says.

‘He didn't realise what?'

‘That maybe love is something different.'

‘Different from loving me?'

Fay takes a sip of cold coffee, puts down her cup and nods. ‘Yes, different from you, Norah. That there's infatuation – and love.'

Norah feels like she's been punched in the stomach. Infatuation?

She never thought the day would come when Fay would lecture her about love. None of Fay's relationships had lasted. The men she dated confided in Norah:
she's too intense
…
too controlling
…
too demanding. She wants everything to be perfect
…
she won't let me breathe.
But maybe that was what Adam needed, someone to expect him to be perfect, to stop making excuses for him.

‘I get it,' Norah says. ‘He needed someone to take over, right? To make him feel safe. He needed a fucking harbour —'

Fay empties another sachet of sweetener into her coffee. ‘Like I said, I don't expect you to understand.'

A long pause hangs between them. Norah knew this would happen, that they would both say too much and that there would be no going back.

‘So that's why you never came after me.'

‘You didn't want us to come after you. You said to give you time, that you'd come back when you were ready —'

‘You read my note?'

Fay takes her purse out of her bag and removes a folded-up piece of paper from the section where the bank notes go. She unfolds it and lies it down on the table. Norah stares at her handwriting and scans the words. They don't seem to have anything to do with her any more.

‘Why do you have it?'

‘Adam wanted me to get rid of it.'

‘And you didn't?'

‘I kept it as a reminder.'

‘That I'd left?'

Fay shakes her head. ‘That you might come home.' She pauses. ‘And we did look for you.'

‘We?'

‘All of us, in our way. Ella thought the police weren't doing enough to find you, so she saved up her pocket money to hire a detective —' Fay pulls a napkin out of the dispenser and tears at it. ‘She didn't get very far.'