The decorators were also from a local firm, and Jessica had already discussed at length with them her ideas for the house. She wanted the walls ragrolled in softly toning pastel shades, to add light and warmth to the high-ceilinged rooms, and she had stipulated that the paint must have a washable finish, mindful of grubby fingers and determined that the house must also be a home.
To provide continuity she had decided on a heavy-duty plain wool carpet throughout, in a mid-bluey-grey colour impervious to the odd muddy footprint.
The kitchen and two old-fashioned bathrooms had been her main problem, but she had eventually decided on hand-made fitments for the kitchen which were to be sponged and ragged in a soft peach and cream and traditional white sanitary ware for the bathrooms, conscious of the fact that she was after all sharing the house with three males, who were not likely to be particularly impressed with pretty pastels.
The decorators simply wanted to see her to check on the work schedule before they started, and once this had been confirmed they were soon busy carrying in ladders and paint pots.
‘Where’s James?’ she asked Stuart. She had promised to visit her sister, and rather to her surprise, when asked both Stuart and James had volunteered to come with her.
‘Upstairs getting changed.’
‘Umm. I’d better do that myself. And we’d better get you some new jeans, you’re shooting up like a beanstalk. I think you’re going to be even taller than your father.’
As always when Lyle’s name was introduced into the conversation, Stuart looked sullen, but Jessica pretended not to notice, casually remarking that it was a shame that Lyle was too busy to come with them.
‘I’m glad he’s not coming,’ Stuart told her. He was frowning fiercely, kicking up dust from the lawn.
‘Don’t you like your father, Stuart?’ Jessica challenged gently, feeling that it was time for her to stop ignoring his obvious antipathy towards Lyle.
‘He doesn’t like us,’ Stuart responded, scowling. ‘He didn’t want us, Mum told us that.’
‘I think you’re wrong about that, Stuart.’ She said it gently but firmly. ‘In fact I know that your father loves you both very much, because he told me so.’
‘He’s never got any time for us.’
Her
heart went out to the thin, gangly boy and she stifled the impulse to take him in her arms.
‘That’s because he’s so busy, Stuart. Being a doctor means that he always has to be available for sick people, you know that.’
Stuart was still looking unreceptive, and feeling that to press the issue could possibly do more harm than good, Jessica let the subject drop. It was true that Lyle was kept extremely busy with his practice, but it was also true that in the evenings he tended to spend what spare time he had in his office rather than in the sitting-room with the rest of them, and Jessica wasn’t sure if that was because he actually had work to do or because he wanted to avoid being with her.
Andrea was in the garden when they arrived, relaxing in a comfortable chair with her feet up. She looked much healthier, her figure plumper and her face relaxed. She greeted Jessica with a hug and an affectionate kiss, her pregnancy now showing beneath her cool smock.
‘William’s gone to play with some friends,’ she explained when Jessica asked after her nephew. ‘And David’s gone away on business for a few days.’
Jessica hoped her distaste didn’t show. She was quite sure that it wasn’t only business that took David away from his wife’s side, but if Andrea was happy with the situation she was not going to risk upsetting her. Neither of them had referred to Andrea’s state of mind prior to Jessica’s marriage, but there was a marked change in Andrea’s attitude towards her, Jessica noted thankfully.
They didn’t stay long, and it was when they were driving home that Jessica realised how much the axis of her life had changed. Andrea, who for so long had been her sole concern, now seemed less important to her than the boys.
Both of them were suspiciously quiet on the way back, which Jessica put down to being in strange surroundings, but later on when they were all sitting down for tea, she discovered that she had been wrong.
For once Lyle was home in time to eat with them. His presence at the table put a strain on Jessica which she was at a loss to understand. Whenever he was in the same room with her, she felt herself straining not to give him the impression that she had any personal interest in him, without being able to understand why she should feel this need.
‘So what have you three been doing today?’
It was James who answered him.
‘This afternoon we went to see Jessica’s sister. She’s going to have a baby,’ he added thoughtfully, his eyes going from his father’s face to Jessica’s. ‘Do all married people have babies?’ he asked her curiously. Across the table Jessica’s eyes met Lyle’s, alight with an amusement that did strange things to her pulse-rate. Quelling her instinctive desire to smile back, she concentrated on James instead.
‘Not all of them,’ she told him truthfully.
‘But will you have them?’ he persisted, and catching sight of Stuart’s shuttered face, Jessica immediately understood the reason for his silence on the journey home.
‘No,’ she told James firmly, but it was towards Stuart that she looked, watching his tension relax slightly, and feeling her heart wrench afresh. She too knew what it was to look on in anguish while her father produced a second and apparently more dearly loved family than the one he had abandoned.
It was after James and Stuart were in bed that she decided she ought to do some work. Often in the evenings she spent an hour or so sifting through her research and collating it ready to start writing, using the computer she had now had transferred from her flat and installed in her small study.