“Hey, why don’t we go to the staff room and get some towels. Maybe we could dry it off.”
She shakes her head.
“Either way, just open the door, Destiny. Please. Just open it.”
She licks her lips.
“Open the door!”
“I’m not that easy to get rid of, Will.”
“It’s Mr Coady, Destiny.”
“That’s what your other students call you.”
“Exactly.”
“I’m not like other students, am I?”
What do I do?
How do I get myself out of this situation?
I am scared. Not of her, but of what could happen if I don’t deal with this properly.
“It’s late,” I say. “After school. How about you go home, and I go home, and we can talk about this later, right?”
Her fingers grip the box of chocolates, harder and harder, twisting it and capsizing it and destroying it.
She throws it in the bin.
“I know you’ll realise the truth,” she says.
“What? What truth?”
“I know you’ll figure it out.”
“Destiny, I—”
She leaves before I can finish my sentence, opening the door, backing into the corridor, then walking away.
I breathe a sigh of relief, then pack up my stuff and leave before she comes back.
17
Harper
When I arrive home, I expect to find what I normally find. A silent home and bottles in the sink.
What I don’t expect to find is a suitcase and Mum putting on a coat.
“Mum?” I say. “What’s going on?”
She smiles at me in that condescending way adults do when they think I’m too young to understand — but I understand all too much. I would be annoyed, but this is the first time I’ve looked at her in the light for a while, and she doesn’t look like the woman in the photo frames on the fireplace anymore. Her skin is wrapped tightly around her bones and her face is thin.
She looks ill, and not the kind you can make better.
“Oh darling,” she says, looking at me as if she cares, and tilts her head to the side. Her voice is croaky. Her eyelids lull. Her breath wheezes.
“I don’t understand,” I say.
Right at that point, the front door opens, and I hate that today is the day Dad chooses to come home early from work. He could have found a note, instead he finds his wife on her way out.
Mostly, I hate how he doesn’t even look surprised.
“What’s going on?” he asks.
“I’m going to stay with my friend.”
“What, Jane?”
“No, Will. A male friend.”
I see how much its crushes Dad to hear this, I can see it on his face, the despair — but still no shock.
I wait for him to argue. For him to fight, tell her she’s not going, say he’ll take care of her like he always does, insist that they talk things through and work it out or even offer to pay for rehab again.
But he says nothing.
It is now the bastard chooses to say nothing.
“Dad…” I say, in an almost whisper, and I don’t know why it’s bothering me so much. It’s not like they are a great couple together, and it’s hardly like I’ll miss out on any days we spend as a family — those days are long gone.
I just know that I don’t want her to go.
Mum takes her suitcase and walks to the door. She pauses, looks at her husband, and he moves out of her way.
He moves out her way.
He moves. Out. Of. Her. Way.
He doesn’t stop her, doesn’t put his hand out to obstruct her or anything — he just lets her go.
And, within seconds, she is out of the door and into the darkness and gone from our lives.
Dad closes the door behind him. He doesn’t look at me.
“What is wrong with you?” I say.
He still doesn’t look at me. He doesn’t even look up. He looks at his feet, like he’s ashamed.
You’re a grown man for fuck’s sake, talk to your daughter.
“Why didn’t you fight for her?” I ask.
He doesn’t respond.
“Look at me!” I shout, and I feel my voice break under the strain of a scream I wasn’t expecting.
He finally lifts his head to look at me, but he can’t focus on my eyes. After a fleeting glance, he walks into the kitchen, muttering something like “I’ll make us some fish and chips.”
“Dad, stop it!”
He pauses in the doorway.
“I am your daughter — why won’t you talk to me?”
I can see it’s painful. I can see he’s doing everything he can to avoid thinking about what’s happened, to try not to cry in front of me.
I can’t help it.
I’m mad. I’m enraged. I’m furious.
I don’t know why; I wanted this. I wanted them apart so they could be the parents they could possibly be without the other one in the way — but, seeing Dad now, wandering aimlessly into the kitchen like he’s lost a pet, I know that it won’t improve anything.
What is Dad’s purpose now without Mum to take care of?
“Dad, please, just go get her. Tell her to come back. Tell her — I don’t know, just… Tell her something.”
“I don’t know what to tell her.” His voice is quiet, like it’s hidden away in the shadows. He hasn’t even switched the kitchen light on.
“You are pathetic. Do you know that?”
He doesn’t reply.
He doesn’t need to.
I charge upstairs, shut my door, and refuse to answer it to anyone. I swear, if anyone comes in, I will scream at them, but secretly, I hope that Dad will knock on that door, and that he will hug me and tell me everything will be okay.
He doesn’t.
18
Will
I can’t say I wasn’t expecting it, but that doesn’t make it any less shocking.
The worst part? That I don’t even have the energy to be jealous. She’s going to another man’s house. She’s leaving me for him, whoever he is. Probably another drunk, someone who will encourage her habit rather than try to help her — and I can’t even muster the energy to hate her.
Harper wants to see more from me. More vigour. More umph.
I know she does.
But I have nothing left. I’m drained. I’m soulless. I gave everything to this marriage, everything to my career, everything to being a father, and I am left with nothing but broken pieces of a home, and a wife and daughter who hate me.
I consider going upstairs. Knocking on Harper’s door. Speaking to her.
But what would I say?
Sorry I’m so gutless, I’ll do better?
She’s right to be angry, and I don’t know how I’m supposed to quell it.
I wonder how this will affect her when she’s older, and I hate myself even more. I’m supposed to be her role model. Me and Natalie are meant to be the example of what a happy marriage looks like.
All we’ve done is isolate her from us.
I find one of Natalie’s half-finished bottles of wine on the shelf. I fill a glass and drink it.