For Better for Worse

‘Well, yes, of course he does,’ Eleanor assured her gently. ‘You’re his daughter, Vanessa, and to be honest, I sometimes think he feels rather left out of it here with me and the boys…’

It wasn’t true, of course; her sons, confident now of the love of their father and stepmother and their grandparents, as well as their mother, had formed a very good relationship with Marcus.

‘I suspect he feels he rather needs an ally at times,’ Eleanor added slyly, watching silently as Vanessa digested her comment.

Nothing more was said, no response made by Vanessa. Not then. But the new bedroom and bathroom furniture had been duly chosen and before she left for New York she had mentioned casually that it seemed a pity for Marcus to waste so much money paying for her to board at school when she could just as easily live with them.

And now she was coming home. And Marcus was going alone to meet her and welcome her back.

Eleanor nibbled anxiously at her bottom lip. It wasn’t just for Marcus that she wanted things to go well, or for herself, it was for all of them. Vanessa’s resentment and unhappiness of her merely reflected her inner unhappiness with herself.

Perhaps she was too sentimental, too idealistic, but she wished no child to grow up with that kind of burden, Eleanor reflected—no child, but especially not one close to her.

She walked into the hall and looked nervously at the clock. Vanessa’s flight should be in by now.

* * *

Marcus almost missed her; she had grown taller, developed the beginnings of curves, changed her hairstyle; she looked, alarmingly, more young woman than child—and then she saw him, and hesitated, anxiety, longing, hesitation and vulnerability flitting across her face, making her once again a child… his child.

‘Vanessa…’

He moved quickly towards her, not waiting for her to come to him, taking hold of her and hugging her, surprising himself by his reaction to the slender, fragile feel of her in his arms.

His child… his daughter, his flesh.

‘Dad…’

There was a small husky choke in the girl’s voice as she buried her head against him, and her voice shook a little as she told him, ‘So uncool… Jade would have a fit. Where are the others?’ she asked him, lifting her hair from his shoulder.

‘Waiting at the house. I wanted to come and meet you on my own.’

It was the truth, he recognised, even if he hadn’t known it until Eleanor told him, suggested it.

‘I’ll bet Gavin was pleased,’ Vanessa commented. ‘I thought he’d probably bring his precious fish with him.’

Marcus laughed. ‘Oh, you’ve heard all about them, have you? I like the hairstyle, by the way. It suits you.’

He watched as she flushed with pleasure, acknowledging that the old Marcus, the Marcus who couldn’t allow himself to express even to himself how much he loved her, would never have said as much.

‘Do you really like it?’ Vanessa asked him eagerly, and when he nodded she giggled and told him, ‘It was Jade’s idea. She said that Nell would have forty fits and that she’d probably prefer me to have my hair in nice neat braids like an old-fashioned schoolgirl.’

As he listened to her, noting the way she clung naturally to his arm, pressing close against him as they battled their way through the bustle, he recorded that easy, unselfconscious ‘Nell’, and the lack of malice which had accompanied her comment, and mentally thanked Jade.

‘Has Jade decided to stay on in New York, did she say?’

‘She said that Sam wanted to marry her, but that she’s not sure. She will marry him, though,’ Vanessa told him with new wisdom. ‘She loves him really.

‘How’s the new house? Are you all settled in? Is Nell making you work hard in the garden?’

‘Fine, yes, and no,’ Marcus told her teasingly, adding with a grin, ‘I think Nell’s saving the heavy digging for you. She thinks you’ve been spoiled enough. I ought to warn you, by the way, that Tom has bought himself a metal detector and he seems to have got hold of the strange idea that you’ll be as thrilled with the potential of it as he is, so prepare yourself…’

‘Well, it’s a fairly old house… Victorian, Nell said, so there might be something…’ Vanessa told him enthusiastically, a child once more, the emergent woman disappearing.

‘Yes, probably a lot of rusting nails and rubbish,’ Marcus agreed.

‘Well, I suppose so, but it wouldn’t be fair to put him off, would it?’ Vanessa asked him seriously. ‘Not if Tom’s spent all his pocket money on it.’

Marcus glanced at her, his heart suddenly filled with an almost bitter-sweet pang of love.