Bad Blood

Christine started, shaken awake from a half-sleep. She opened her eyes to see one of the nurses trundling up the ward, on her way round with her box of tricks on wheels. Temperature. Blood pressure. Have you needed a pee yet?

She turned towards the cot, seeing but still not quite believing. Not even a full afternoon had passed since her baby had been born and here he was, already denied a grandmother and homeless. They both were. She tried to chase the thought away. What a life you’ve been born into, she thought wretchedly, as she looked at him. He was opening and closing his eyes, as if trying out being alive and not yet being sure about it. And why wouldn’t he?

Christine glanced across at Josie, who was reading a magazine in the visitor’s chair, and remembered her question about whether she’d not considered getting rid of it. Him. Not ‘it’. Him. She shouldn’t have said that, not now he’d been born. Christine knew Josie would brood on that now.

As if reading her thoughts, Josie glanced up and slapped the magazine pages back together. She glanced up at the clock, high on the wall. ‘Good doze?’ she asked Christine. ‘Look, I need to be heading home soon, mate,’ she added. ‘Mam’ll be doing her nut if I don’t get my skates on. Question now, though, is what are we going to do with you? Because it certainly seems you’ve got your wish to get away from her, doesn’t it? But to where? That’s the thing. Where will you go?’

‘I don’t know,’ Christine admitted. ‘But if they need a new address to discharge me to, I was thinking I’ll give them Nicky’s. I was thinking I might ask him if I can move in with him – not permanently,’ she added, watching Josie’s expression become increasingly horrified, ‘not for ever. Just for a bit. Just for the first couple of weeks, for when the community midwife does her visits.’

‘Your Nicky?’ Josie looked aghast at this development. ‘Who I don’t need to remind you lives with the world’s druggiest druggy! Seriously, Chrissy, move in with him and Brian? Are you mad?’ Her voice was growing shriller. ‘Think about the midwife! What she’d see. What she’d think! She’d have the social on you before you’ve even changed a nappy, you div. You can’t go there!’

Christine looked at her friend, feeling a mixture of anger and exasperation. It was all very well Josie stating the bleeding obvious – which she was; she was under no illusions where her brother was concerned. But didn’t she get it? Where else could she and the baby go? She said so.

‘So it has to be Nicky’s,’ she reminded her friend irritably. ‘Because at least Nicky cares.’ And she believed that. Whatever else was true, she had never stopped believing that. Even if she knew he’d be less than pleased to see them.

Josie sighed heavily. ‘Oh, Chris …’ she began, in a tone that made it sound like Christine had suggested they relocate to one of the benches down by the market. ‘Oh, Chris, you can’t …’ She trailed off, running a hand along the baby’s cot. ‘Mate, look … I tell you what … God, I shouldn’t even be suggesting this. My Eddie’s a bloody saint, but he’s still only human … but –’

‘No,’ Christine said, shaking her head. ‘We’ll be fine. I told you, I’m going to ask Nicky if he’ll have us. Which he will, so there’s no need –’

‘Yes there is,’ Josie said, leaning forward towards the bed. ‘It’s not your Nicky – it’s that druggy bloody mate of his. You really want your beautiful baby around him?’

Of course not, Christine thought, her eyes smarting with tears now. Of course she bloody didn’t! But what choice did she have?

She tried to say so but the words caught in her throat, panic bubbling underneath them, like a welling tide.

‘You’re coming to us.’ Josie put a hand up, even as she said it. ‘Don’t start. Not for ever. Just for a couple of weeks, till the midwife’s finished with you.’

‘Josie, no,’ Christine said again, reaching for a tissue. ‘What about your Eddie? Jose, he’ll freak.’

‘He’ll do as he’s bloody told. No. That’s that. So no arguments. You tell the midwife that you’re coming to live with us, okay? And while you’re with us, we can go down the social and see about getting a flat for you. Because they’ve got to give you one. You are technically homeless now, after all.’

It was like the sun coming out when you were expecting rain all day. Almost too bright to bear. ‘Oh, Josie, really?’ she said.

‘Really.’ Josie leaned over and hugged Christine. ‘I don’t know why I even dithered about it. Some friend I’d bloody be if I couldn’t put you up in your hour of need.’

‘Only if you are absolutely sure,’ Christine said, feeling the tears come again. ‘Oh Josie, and I bet little Paula will love it – love him.’

Josie looked down at the baby. ‘I wouldn’t count on that,’ she said, smiling. ‘She’s a toddler, don’t forget. And used to getting all the attention, as well. Throw this one into the mix, and it could easily mean tears before bedtime. Speaking of which, now you know it’s a boy, have you decided on a name?’

Christine had been reluctant to be drawn on the matter of names up to now. Oh, she’d thought about it plenty. Rolled names round her tongue like they were marbles. But to actually voice any preference … She had always been much too frightened to do that. Suppose something had gone wrong? On top of everything else – everything that was already wrong in her life, suppose in this – this one thing that was hers, her choice and responsibility … No, she’d definitely not decided on a name.

But now she smiled at Josie. ‘Joey,’ she said, getting the syllables out at last. Liking the sound of the name, too, as she spoke it. She said it again. ‘Joey.’

‘That’s perfect,’ Josie said. ‘He looks just like a Joey, too. And I’m glad you haven’t come over all Bob Marley and given him a Jah name.’

Christine laughed, brushing the tears away, letting the happiness catch hold of her. She knew it would only be fleeting, so she grabbed at it hungrily. She was young, fit and strong. So was he. They’d be okay. ‘No, it’s definitely Joey,’ she said, ‘after this lad I fancied at school – Joey Brearton. He never knew I bleeding existed, but I always liked his name.’

Josie laughed out loud. ‘You’re priceless, you are!’ she said. ‘Naming your kid after a boy who never knew you existed. And what about his last name? I’m hazarding a guess that you won’t be giving him Mo’s?’

‘Not a chance,’ Christine said. ‘He’ll be a Parker, just like the rest of us.’ She leaned across to stroke Joey’s head. Joey. He did look like a Joey. ‘Another kid in our family with just my mam’s name to carry him. Poor little fucker. Another one without a dad.’

Josie managed a smile but didn’t say anything to contradict her. She knew as well as Christine did that little Joey would be exactly that. Another kid who didn’t know who his dad was, just like his mum and his uncle. ‘But with a wonderful mam to take care of him,’ she said, rising from the chair. ‘And, speaking of mams, if I don’t get back and fetch our Paula soon I’m going to have my ear chewed off, aren’t I?’

Christine reached for Josie’s arm. ‘You sure, mate? You sure Eddie’s going to be okay with me – us – staying?’

‘Course he is,’ Josie said. ‘So let the nurse know, okay? I’ll phone here in the morning to check you’re still okay to be discharged, and if you are, I’ll be back lunchtime to pick you up.’

‘And you’ll pick up my stuff and that from home?’ Christine asked, realising there was still all that to sort yet. ‘And all the bottles and nappies and stuff in my bedroom?’

Josie nodded, and promised she’d do exactly that. Though as Christine watched her leave, and returned the wave Josie turned and gave her as she disappeared, she wondered if any of it would actually be in her bedroom. Knowing her mam as she did she wouldn’t have been remotely surprised if Josie told her tomorrow that it had all been dumped in the front garden. She sighed. Of the home that wasn’t her home any more.

If it had ever really been in the first place.

Chapter 4 (#u1d9f07eb-8571-5f7f-9ac4-ab585437e615)

Josie looked out of the bedroom window and immediately felt guilty. It wasn’t yet eight in the morning, and it was Saturday, too, but already Eddie was out the front, shirt sleeves up, spanner in hand, tinkering with his beloved Ford Escort. Well, not so beloved currently, as it was refusing to work, but she didn’t doubt he’d eventually get it going again. If there was any justice, at any rate, given the amount of time he spent taking care of it.

She’d done wrong, landing Christine and the baby on them without asking him. Inviting trouble to their door, as he’d immediately pointed out. They both knew what Lizzie Parker could be like when she was roused.

But his concern was, as ever, more for Josie than for himself, and the fact that he’d taken it as well as he had made it worse. It wasn’t just the business of getting involved in it, after all. It was also that it wasn’t fair to expect him to put up with a newborn for the best part of a fortnight. He worked all hours, and Paula was a handful enough currently, being at that age when it was all ‘me, me, me’, day and night, and with the long days and short nights of summer thrown in, she was up before six every morning as well.

Paula was sitting on her parents’ bed, flicking through a picture book and singing to herself. Josie glanced at her daughter now, and couldn’t help but smile. She also wondered, as she often did, how she’d managed to be so incredibly blessed. There was her sister Lyndsey, off her head mostly, her brother Vinnie banged up in prison, and here she was, with her Eddie, her beautiful little daughter, and, since the spring, even their own lovely home. So much happiness, which she wasn’t sure she’d any right to.

She hardly dare think about it. Dared not take any of it for granted, ever – if she did she had this horrible notion (which never seemed to go away and often visited her in nightmares) that something terrible would happen, and she’d lose it all again.

Right now, however, Josie’s thoughts were on Christine, and she wondered what kind of night she might have had. Pretty sketchy, if her own first night with Paula was anything to go by. And with everything else – with her future so uncertain, she doubted the poor girl had slept a wink. ‘Come on, missy,’ she said to Paula, holding her arms out to pick her up. ‘Let’s go down and make your dad a cuppa, shall we? See if we can butter him up a bit.’

‘Ah, bribery, now, is it?’ Eddie remarked, as Josie went out to join him, mug of tea in one hand, Paula on her opposite hip. He threw the spanner he’d been wielding back into the rusty old biscuit tin that served as his tool box.

‘Sort of,’ Josie admitted. ‘I do feel bad, love, I really do. I just couldn’t think where else she could go.’

‘Back to her fucking mother’s, is where,’ he said, accepting the tea. He’d been out there for some time now and had smudges of black on his nose and cheeks.

‘Dirty Daddy!’ Paula trilled. ‘Dirty Daddy!’

Josie set her down. Being early on a Saturday morning, the street was safe enough, being so quiet. And she was more interested in the mud in the front flowerbed than the road.

‘Seriously, love, that’s what should be happening, Mo’s kid or otherwise. Can you imagine us treating our Paula like that? Ever? I’d fucking kill for her, I would.’ He shook his head. ‘How could anyone throw their own kid out?’

Josie loved Eddie for lots of reasons – had done since she’d first started seeing him. But never more than when he talked about their Paula. Even though, at the same time, she knew she’d lived a bit more than him, which meant she knew that, in real life, it wasn’t always that simple. Thank God that, for him, it was.

‘I know, love,’ she said, ‘but perhaps she’ll come round.’

‘That mad cow had better not come round here!’ he said, and she could tell from his expression that he was purposely misinterpreting her meaning.

Josie smiled. ‘She wouldn’t dare.’ And of that she was sure. For all that Lizzie could mouth off, Josie was still a McKellan. No, there was no danger of anything like that. ‘Anyway,’ she added, ‘it’s only for the ten days while the midwife is calling – and you’ll be at work most of the time anyway, so you’ll hardly see them.’

Eddie grunted, then put the tea down and picked up his spanner. ‘Well, let’s hope so,’ he said, ‘and I mean it, babe, really. I’m not having you running around like a mad thing looking after that bleeding kid of hers, all right?’