‘Right,’ he says. ‘Speak to me. Are you still on about the coat?’
‘I laid it out last night,’ I reply, trying to stay calm so I don’t get sweaty. 7.01. This carefully curated ‘back at work and still dressing like a non-mum, don’t write me off’ midi dress and new trainers outfit doesn’t need sweaty. ‘Right there.’
I gesture to the kitchen chair.
‘Your denim jacket is on the coat rack,’ he says like he’s come up with an ideal solution, standing up and putting some bread in the toaster. My heart is hammering in panic. ‘You can wear that!’
I stare at him.
‘I cannot wear my denim jacket on my first day back in the office, Ed,’ I hiss. Poppy is on the floor with her chunky little arms in the air, asking to be picked up. I pick her up. I have my dressing gown back on over my dress: this child knows when to projectile vomit. Dry-clean only silk Whistles is just her thing.
7.03.
‘Why not?’ said Ed. ‘Just ditch it as soon as you get there. No one will notice.’
He smiles.
‘And you always look lovely in a denim jacket.’
I stop for a second and smile back.
Yes, in beer gardens, Ed. When the sun stops warming us at 10 p.m. over a G&T.
I don’t have time to explain to him that if I turn up to work in anything less than new, slick attire, my obscenely young team will tuck me away in that mum file.
Since we had Poppy, he still wears the same suit on his same-sized middle. When she was born, he took no more time off than a colleague who went on a summer trip to Majorca. There has been no seismic shift. It’s one of the ten thousand or so double standards in our life now.
She’s been on maternity leave, they would think. She’s not a serious player any more. Expect her to leave at 4.59 p.m. for pick-ups; one eye on the clock. She’s a mum now and that explains the denim jacket. Next week: meeting in her Ugg boots; work wines in her baggy leggings.
The sweating starts again.
‘I’ll just have to go without a coat,’ I bark, before asking the digital speaker what the temperature is outside.
‘Quicker to stick your head out of the door,’ mutters Ed.
‘Luddite,’ I mutter back, as I shove a dishwasher tablet in and whack the machine on while brushing my teeth.
Why is the dishwasher still my job, I think, when I am going to work now too?
Ed bends down to kiss Poppy in my arms and I notice his hair is greyer than before.
‘Good luck, darling,’ he says, as he kisses me too, hard on the mouth, one hand on my bum cheek. Even in the chaos, I think, I still fancy you.
Ed leaves for work. Like he is used to doing; like is normal to him.
‘Thanks,’ I yell as the door slams and I collect a handful of bags while holding a wriggly Poppy.
The speaker says it’s fifteen degrees but I leave the house without a coat anyway.
Piling a babbling Poppy into her car seat, I mumble to myself. ‘A denim bloody jacket.’
As Poppy and I drive in silence to the childminder’s house, I think about Ed, now on his own in the car to work. It’s only a thirty-minute drive away but he needs to be in early today. He looked distracted this morning, like he often looks distracted these days, and I wonder if it’s work or something else. I frown.
He needs order, Ed. Not chaos and lost jackets and Weetabix on the floor and lateness.
I have a pang of regret that I can’t provide that for him but another pang of regret that he doesn’t play a role in making that happen in our house himself.
Because in my enthusiasm for meeting a respectable, handsome man with a proper job and a close family – a man who also looked at me like I was the hottest woman he had ever seen, and the feeling has always been mutual – I overlooked the fact that he is Radio 4 traditional and I am … not.
The differences weren’t so noticeable when we rented in a city and ate Deliveroo for tea but now we own a house in the countryside and have a child? They’re sticking their head above the parapet, about chores, about parenting, about work, and sometimes it’s like I’m a Trotskyist in a coalition with the far right. But still, I think, we love each other. We don’t have to agree on everything.
A few minutes later I pull up outside the childminder’s up the road. Ed hadn’t offered to do it but I wouldn’t have let him anyway. This was my multitasking horror show; no one else’s. I wanted to settle her in. I wanted to mourn the end of maternity leave. I wanted to write lists and pack seventeen bags last night like a ritual and huff about it. Parental gatekeeping, I think the books call it.
Apt for a gatekeeper, I make Poppy hold on to the gate of Ronnie’s house with her tiny Peppa Pig backpack on and snap her from behind so I can use the picture for a back-to-work post on my parenting blog later.
‘Is it okay?’ Ed asked, concerned at first when I launched Cheshire Mama. ‘Privacy wise, to show off our home and our daughter?’
But I swept away his concerns.
‘Oh, everyone does it, Ed,’ I said dismissively. ‘It’s the twenty-first century. Life’s online. I’ll keep an eye on it, make sure there’s nothing weird posted on there.’
Ed didn’t raise it again. He trusted me. I worked in digital marketing, did a lot of social media. This was my world. Plus we saw kids’ films for free in the best seats when they first came out and a fancy coffee machine arrived by courier. I told him that potentially, this blog and my Instagram could start to make us money. That was enough to stem any objection.
It gathered pace, the numbers rolling in.
‘We’d get more followers if we showed the whole family off,’ I told him, with a grin. ‘You, topless at the coffee machine should do it.’
I raised an eyebrow, questioning.
Based on the number of women who stared at him on the street though, I knew a lot of women would enjoy staring at him in the privacy of their own homes. And funnily enough, when I did start to include him, it boomed fast.
‘You do that all the time,’ my half-sister Josephine tells me whenever I give that verdict about the brand’s success. ‘Give Ed all the credit; don’t give yourself any. Cheshire Mama is successful because it’s a good blog. You have the eye, you’re funny, you know your stuff on social. The whole leaving the city and being new to the countryside is relatable.’
I drop my phone into my bag. ‘Okay, Pop, got it!’ I say. She’s used to posing for my iPhone by now.
I take her hand and we walk in.
Ronnie was recommended to me by Emma, whose son Seth goes to her too. I’ve met Ronnie twice. She seems lovely. She also obviously has, you know, paperwork and things.
But I am leaving my child with her all day. Is this insanity? Is it legal?
‘Good morning, Poppy!’ singsongs Ronnie in her gentle Brummie accent as we walk in, heaving four bags and a suitcase-load of anxiety. ‘And good morning, Scarlett.’
She looks at me with pragmatic empathy. It’s a very specific expression.
‘Big day today, I know,’ she says. ‘But we’re going to have fun, aren’t we Poppy?’
I fend off tears by speaking fast, with no let-up.
‘She doesn’t have a dummy except for her nap, which will be at eleven, eleven thirty but definitely not after three because otherwise sleep is a nightmare later,’ I ramble.