sung in the shower, galloped around the house. Getting used to the new quiet had been but one of many small, painful adjustments he’d had to make over the past ten months.
He exhaled, watching his breath turn to mist in the air.
“Daddy?”
He glanced over his shoulder. Eva stood in the sliding doorway to his bedroom wearing nothing but her nightie, her arms wrapped around her body.
“You shouldn’t be out here. It’s too cold.” He pushed himself to his feet.
“What are you doing?”
“I could ask you the same question. You’ve got school tomorrow.” He laid a hand on her shoulder, turning her around and guiding her to her bedroom.
“I couldn’t sleep.”
They entered her bedroom and she walked dutifully to her bed and slipped beneath the duvet. “Can you tell me a story?”
“You need to sleep, Eva.”
His daughter was a night owl and a master of distraction and procrastination. If he let her, she’d be up half the night, demanding stories and anything else to delay putting her head on her pillow.
“Oh, all right.” Her tone was hard done by and world-weary and he couldn’t help but smile.
He kissed her forehead. “Sleep tight, don’t let the bed bugs bite.”
He pulled the quilt up so that it covered her shoulders. He started to straighten, but Eva’s hand shot out and caught a hold of his sweatshirt.
“You won’t forget about Imogen’s party, will you, like you forgot about the movies and roller skating?” she asked, her eyes fixed on his face.
He frowned. “What movie?”
“You said you’d take me to see Miley Cyrus’s new movie. Just like you said you’d take me skating with my class.”
It was on the tip of his tongue to tell her he didn’t know what she was talking about—then suddenly the memory was there, clear as day. Eva, cajoling and pleading, her hands pressed together as though in prayer, promising to do all her chores on time without him having to ask if he would please, please, please take her to the movies. He’d said yes, unable to deny her anything that might give her pleasure.
Then he’d forgotten to follow through on his commitment.
They need you to be a fully functioning human being first and foremost, Michael.
Guilty heat rose up his neck and into his face as Angie’s words echoed in his mind. He’d been too busy being defensive and pissy to actually listen to what she’d said, but it was impossible to ignore the anxiety in his daughter’s big brown eyes now.
“I’m sorry I forgot, sweetheart. I’ve had a lot on my mind lately.”
“I know, Daddy. You miss Mummy, don’t you?”
“I do. But that doesn’t mean it’s okay to let you down. I promise I won’t forget Imogen’s party, all right? We’ll put it on the calendar.”
“I asked Auntie Angie to remind you, too.”
Michael winced inwardly. No wonder Angie had felt compelled to say something.
“Good idea. And maybe we could catch that movie this weekend.”
“It’s not on anymore.”
“Then we’ll watch it when it comes out on DVD. Make a night of it with popcorn and everything. Okay?”
“Okay. Thanks, Dad.”
He kissed her forehead again and waited till she’d snuggled beneath the quilt before leaving the room.
He made his way to his bedroom and sat on the end of his bed. He scrubbed his face with his hands, exhausted. A perpetual state since Billie’s death. He thought about what Angie had said and Eva’s anxiety.
He needed to get his shit together.
It had been ten months since Billie had died and he needed to stop simply surviving and start living again—if not for his own sake, then for the kids. Because forgetting the Miley Cyrus movie hadn’t been his first screwup.
Only last week, he’d woken up, pulled on a pair of jeans and a sweatshirt, then made Eva’s lunch and set her backpack by the front door, ready for the school run. He’d gotten her out of bed and into her uniform, strapped Charlie into the car. All part of their morning routine, a routine he did without thinking about it, day in, day out. It was only when he’d been backing out of the drive and the news had come on the radio that he’d realized it was a Saturday.
No doubt if he cared to sift through the past few months, he’d be able to find dozens of similar examples. What had Angie called it? A half life.
Highly appropriate, since he felt like half a person. As though he’d lost some essential part of himself when he’d lost Billie. He’d always been too quiet, too introverted, too inclined to get lost in his own head and his work, but Billie had dragged him into the world and made him engage and taught him to live as though he meant it. As though every moment counted.
But Billie was gone. And he was not, and the kids were not.
Life went on.
He pushed himself off the bed and went into the bathroom to brush his teeth.
He needed to make some changes, to do something to shift things. He thought about Angie’s suggestion—that he go back to work early—and forced himself to really consider it as an option, even though his first response had been to reject it, as he’d rejected everything else she’d said.
He’d taken the year off because he’d wanted the kids to have some kind of continuity of care after Billie’s death. She’d been a full-time mom and therefore their primary caregiver, and neither she nor Michael had family who’d been able to step in and help thanks to the tyranny of distance—Billie’s family were all in England, his own in Perth, a thousand miles and a time zone away. At the time, twelve months had felt woefully inadequate to patch over the gaping hole left by Billie’s absence, but the truth was that the kids had been far more resilient than he’d ever imagined.
Not that they weren’t affected by their mother’s loss—they were, in hundreds of small ways, all the time—but they were far better at living in the now than he was.
He’d needed the time-out more than they had. He’d been
so shattered in those early days, like a shell-shocked soldier, and there had been something undeniably comforting and numbing about the routine of their very limited domestic life—it had become its own form of suspended animation, a holding pattern that they had existed in to get by.
But getting by wasn’t enough, not when he was letting his kids down. They deserved better from him. He needed to move beyond merely surviving.
As impossible as that seemed from where he sat right now.
He looked himself in the eye in the mirror, taking in his shaggy hair and gaunt features and bristly cheeks.
Time did not stand still, and neither could he. Tomorrow, he’d call his partners in the firm and talk to them about returning early. Then he’d start setting his house to rights, both figuratively and literally.
The thought alone was enough to make him feel heavy and overwhelmed.
Damn you, Angie. Why couldn’t you have left me alone?
He already knew the answer—because she was a friend, and because she cared enough to make the tough call, even when she knew her point of view probably wouldn’t be appreciated.
He needed to add apologizing to her to his list of things to do tomorrow.
He finished up then shed his clothes and climbed into bed. Turning onto his side, he closed his eyes. As always as he drifted toward sleep,