‘Come on, you, I’ve got something I want us to do together.’
Sophie slid over the bed, bouncing on her bottom until her skinny little legs hung off the side. ‘What?’ she asked.
Fran bent over and whispered in her ear, ‘We’ve got to make his birthday cake.’
Sophie’s eyes sparkled. ‘Can I help?’
‘Of course. I’ll need your help—lots of it.’
She spun round, kissed Mike and pulled the bed
clothes back up round his chin. ‘You go back to sleep, Daddy, for a nice long time,’ she ordered. ‘And don’t come in the kitchen without knocking. We’re going to be busy making a secret.’
He winked at her, and Fran ushered her away, throwing him a smile over her head as she closed the door.
‘Dog!’ he yelled, and she opened the door again, called Brodie and they went down to the kitchen and left him in peace.
‘How many eggs?’ Sophie asked, kneeling up on a chair at the table to help.
‘Three.’
‘Can I break them into the bowl?’
‘No—break them into this cup, and we can check they’re all right before we add them to the mixture, just in case.’
‘Just in case what?’
Just in case she mashed the shell, Fran thought, but couldn’t dent her pride. ‘In case one’s a bit funny,’ she flannelled.
‘Funny?’ Sophie said, wrinkling her nose.
‘Sometimes they smell a bit fishy or they have bits in.’
‘And we don’t want a fishy, bitty cake,’ she said sagely, and Fran suppressed her smile.
‘We certainly don’t.’
‘Can I measure the flour and the sugar and the butter?’
‘Sure.’
It took longer—much longer—and they didn’t use the mixer but a wooden spoon in a bowl, the way Fran’s grandmother had always done it, because that way Sophie could be more involved and Mike got a longer lie-in. They grated
the rind of an orange, and squeezed in some juice, and then, when it was all mixed together they spooned it into the tin, put it in the top oven of the Aga and set the timer.
‘An hour? Really? That’s
ages
! Can we make Daddy breakfast in bed?’
‘We can make him breakfast in bed if you like, but not yet. He’s tired, Sophie. He works very hard.’
Too hard, for too long, and the strain was beginning to tell. And no matter how badly she wanted to crawl back into bed beside him and go back to sleep herself, for now she had to entertain his daughter and keep her out of his way so he could rest.
‘Want to help me make some things for the project I’m doing with my class?’ she suggested, and Sophie, bless her, responded with her usual boundless enthusiasm.
If only Fran could say the same for herself…
‘Bye-bye, sweetheart. Love you.’
‘Don’t forget I’m coming next Sunday for tea ‘cos I’m going on holiday the next week!’
‘I haven’t forgotten. You take care.’
Fran watched as Mike kissed his little sprite of a daughter goodbye and closed the car door, lifting his hand to wave farewell. Sophie waved back, her hand just visible through the water streaming down the car window, and Fran waved too, her feelings mixed.
She adored Sophie; she was a lovely girl, sweet and bright, just like her mother to look at, and for that Fran was profoundly grateful. If she’d been the image of her father, the knife would be twisted every time she looked at her. As it was, it was easy enough most of the time to pretend
she was just another little girl, just like the many little girls Fran taught all day.
But delightful though Sophie was, the very fact of her existence only served to underscore Fran’s own failure to successfully carry a baby to full term.
Having Sophie to stay every other weekend, for a couple of weeks every holiday and at half-term once or twice a year was like a two-edged sword. When she was there, she brought sunshine and laughter into their lives, and after she’d gone, the house—a beautiful old house that should have been filled with the sound of children—rang with silence.
It might be better if she didn’t come, Fran thought, and then shook her head. No. That was ridiculous. They both loved her to bits, and without her their lives would be immeasurably poorer. They’d had a lovely weekend, and even the rain today hadn’t spoilt things, because by the time it had started they’d finished at the beach and were home, making sandwiches to go with Mike’s birthday cake for tea.
And Sophie had been an absolute delight.
The car moved off across the streaming concrete yard, and Fran turned away from the cover of the doorway, steeling herself for the silence. Not that she had time to sit still and listen to it. She had a lot to do. Mike’s parents and Joe and Sarah had joined them for tea, and the sitting room was smothered in plates and cups. Brodie went with her, tongue lashing, and cleared up the dropped birthday cake crumbs from the floor while she dealt with everything else.
She saw Mike’s feet come into range as she was fishing for a fallen knife beside the sofa. There was a hole in the toe of his left sock, she noticed absently. Another failure in her wifely duties. She gave a muffled snort, and Mike
dropped down onto his haunches beside her, his hand warm on her shoulder.
‘You OK?’
Her fingers coaxed the knife closer. ‘Of course. Why shouldn’t I be?’
‘I just—I thought you looked—’
‘I’m fine, Mike,’ she said firmly. ‘I just have a lot to do and I’m a bit tired.
I
didn’t get a lie-in.’
He sighed and stood up, and she could hear him scrubbing his hands through his damp hair in frustration. ‘I’m sorry. I’ll go and get the cows in, then. I’m late starting the milking.’
She straightened, the errant knife in hand at last, and threw him a tight smile. ‘Good idea. I’ll do supper for seven.’
‘Don’t bother to do much, I’m really not hungry after all the cake. Come, Brodie.’
And that was it. No offer of help. No thanks for his birthday tea, or having Sophie for the weekend.
No hug, no cuddle, no ‘Don’t worry, darling, it’ll be all right.’
Not that she’d believe him, anyway. How could it be all right? They’d run out of time on the NHS, and she was wondering if she could psych herself up for another IVF cycle and failing miserably. Not that they could afford it, although the way things were going, she wasn’t even sure Mike wanted a child with her. It was so much hassle and, despite his assurances, he seemed more than happy with just Sophie.
And why wouldn’t he be? She was gorgeous.
Gorgeous, and his, and if she was honest Fran had to admit that she was simply jealous of his relationship with her. They’d spent hours together over the weekend, and
every time she’d looked up they’d been there, giggling about something, Mike chasing her, catching her and throwing her up in the air, turning her upside down, leading her by the hand and showing her the chicks, showing her how to feed a calf—just being the doting, devoted father that he was, with Sophie right there being the doting, devoted daughter.
And every laugh, every hug, every smile had turned the knife a little more. Sure, Sophie spent time with her, and they’d had fun, but it wasn’t the same as Sophie’s relationship with Mike. That relationship was special, different, and Fran yearned for one like it.
Yearned and ached and wept for it.
She picked up a plate, catching it on the edge of the table, and it flew out of her fingers, clipped the edge of the hearth and shattered. She stared at it, at the wreckage of the plate, splintered into a thousand pieces, just like her dreams, and a sob rose in her throat.
She crushed it down, threw the bits back onto the tray and carried it through to the kitchen. She didn’t have time to be sentimental and stupid. She had a pile of project work to mark before school tomorrow, and the house hadn’t seen the vacuum cleaner in nearly a fortnight. Not that they’d been in it much. Mike was busy on the farm, she was busy with the end of the summer term coming up and lots of curriculum work to get through in the next week. And just as if that wasn’t enough, they’d extended the farm shop in time for the summer influx of tourists and were run off their feet.
Which was just as well with the amount of money they’d sunk into that and the new cheese-making equipment, not
to mention last year’s investment in the ice-cream venture that her sister-in-law, Sarah, was running, but the result was that there weren’t enough hours in the day.
So she needed to clean the kitchen, which was pointless since it was raining and Brodie coming in and out didn’t help in the least, even if Mike wiped the dog’s feet on an old towel, and she needed to clean the bathroom and their bedroom and change Sophie’s sheets. That pretty much was it, because they hadn’t had time to make the rest dirty.
Except for the sitting-room floor, of course, which now had crumbs, dog hair and bits of broken plate all over it.
She got the vacuum out and started in there.
‘Hello, my lovely,’ Mike murmured, wiping down Marigold’s teats with a paper towel before attaching the cups to them. He rested his head against her flank for a moment, feeling the warmth of her side and the gentle movement of her breathing. She smelt safe and familiar. Nothing unexpected there, no emotional minefield, just a cow doing her job, as he was doing his.
He pulled the cluster down and slipped the cups over her teats, one at a time, the suction tugging them rhythmically, and watched in satisfaction as the milk started to flow in a steady, creamy stream.
Beautiful. He loved his Guernseys. Their milk was fantastic, the cheese and ice cream and clotted cream they made from it a lifesaver in the current dairy-farming climate. ‘Clever girl,’ he murmured, running his hand over her rump and patting it before moving on. Clever, uncomplicated, undemanding, a lovely old girl who still, after six
calvings, delivered the goods better than any other cow. If only his own life were as straightforward.
Her daughter Mirabelle was next to her, her head in the trough, and he ran his hand over her udder and frowned. There was heat in the right front quarter, and when he tugged the teat down gently, she raised her head and lowed in protest.
She had mastitis. Damn. As if he didn’t have enough to do.
‘Sorry, sweetheart,’ he murmured, and he wiped her other teats, attached the cluster to the three which were OK and then, taking advantage of the let-down reflex which the routine of the milking parlour always stimulated, with gentle, rhythmic movements he stripped out the infected quarter, discarding the milk. After dodging her disgruntled kick, he carefully inserted the nozzle of an intermammary tube of antibiotic ointment into the teat canal, squirted it into the udder and left her to finish.
The others were waiting patiently, the sound of their gentle mooing and soft, warm breath endlessly relaxing.
Funny. Most people who came to watch him milk, and it could be hundreds over the course of the summer, were fascinated from a distance, but thought it was smelly and dirty and couldn’t understand why anybody in their right mind would want to get up at four-thirty in the morning and work right through till seven at night.
Including his ex-wife.
Kirsten had thought he was insane, but he loved it, and couldn’t imagine doing anything else in the world. He could have been a vet, and he’d thought about it long and hard. He was clever enough, his school exam grades
more than adequate for the entry requirements, but he’d gone instead to agricultural college because the farm was in his blood.
OK, it was hard work, but he was young and fit and it didn’t hurt him. You had to do something with your waking hours, and the warmth of the animals and the relationship he had with them was all the reward he needed.
It was servicing the investment in the ice cream, clotted cream and cheese-making equipment and expanding the farm shop that made him tired and brought him stress, but that was only the other side of the coin, and he could deal with it.
Or he would be able to, if only Fran wasn’t so stressed out herself.
He let the first batch of cows out and let the next ten in. It never ceased to amaze him the way they came in, all bar the odd one or two, in the same order, to the same places every time. It made his job that much easier.
Too easy, really. So easy that he had far too much time to think, and all he could think about was the look in Fran’s eyes every time she saw him with Sophie. Which, when she was with them, was always. Sophie was his shadow, trailing him, helping with the calves and the chickens and the milking, asking endless questions, nagging him about having a pony, tasting the ice cream and chattering about the cheese, wanting to stir it and cut it and sieve it.
She was too small to reach right across the vat so he had to lift her and hold her, and she’d been known to drop the spoon into the vat. Not that it mattered if the paddles weren’t turning, but if they were still at the mixing stage, he had to strip off to the waist, scrub his arm and plunge
it nearly to the armpit in warm milk to fetch the spoon out so it didn’t foul on the paddles.
Yes, she was a hazard, but he missed her now she was gone, and he knew Fran missed her too, although her presence just rubbed salt into the wound.
He sighed and let the last ten cows in. They were nearly all pregnant now. The last three had calved in the past six weeks, and it would soon be time to artificially inseminate them.
He was trying to build the herd on really strong genetic lines, and he’d got a young bull growing on his brother’s farm which had excellent breeding and was showing promise. When he was mature, they’d see about using him, but until then they did it the clinical way, in the crush, with a syringe of frozen semen.
He gave a hollow laugh.
Not quite the same, not for the bull or the cows. He could empathise. He’d done his share of producing semen for his and Fran’s fertility investigations and treatment, and it was the pits.
It was all the pits, the whole damn process. So many questions, so much personal intervention that in the end they’d felt like lab rats. He couldn’t remember the last time he and Frankie had made love for the hell of it.
Not had sex, not timed it to coincide with her ovulation, or gone at it hammer and tongs for a fortnight in an attempt at quantity rather than quality, or done it out of duty and guilt because it had been months since they had, which was the current state of affairs, but made love in the real sense of the words, slowly, tenderly, just for the sheer joy of touching each other.