Marion Lennox - Meant-To-Be Family

‘Hey, it’s all done.’ There was a triumphant bang from the laundry and Mike appeared in the doorway, waving his spanner. ‘That’s that mother fixed. I’d defy any drop to leak anywhere now. Anything else I can do for you ladies?’

‘Oh, Mike, that’s fabulous. But I wish you’d let us pay—’

‘You’ve got free plumbing for life,’ Mike said fiercely. Mike was their big, burly, almost scary-looking next-door neighbour. His ginger hair was cropped to almost nothing. He wore his jeans a bit too low, he routinely ripped the sleeves out of his T-shirts because sleeves annoyed him, and in his spare time he built his body. If you met Mike on a dark night you might turn the other way. Fast.

Em had met Mike on a dark night. He’d crashed into their kitchen, banging the back door so hard it had broken.

‘Em, the wife … My Katy … The baby … There’s blood, oh, my God, there’s blood … You’re a midwife. Please …’

Katy had had a fast, fierce delivery of their third child, and she’d haemorrhaged. Mike had got home to find her in the laundry, her baby safely delivered, but she’d been bleeding out.

She’d stopped breathing twice before the ambulance had arrived. Em had got her back.

Mike and Katy were now the parents of three boys who promised to grow up looking just like their dad, and Mike was Em’s slave for ever. He’d taken Em and her household under his wing, and a powerful wing it was. There were usually motorbikes parked outside Mike and Katy’s place—multiple bikes—but no matter what the pressure of his family, his job or his biker mates, Mike dropped in every night—just to check.

Now, as Toby finished the last mouthful of his noodles, Mike hefted him out of his highchair and whirled him round and hugged him in a manner that made Em worry the noodles might come back up again. But Toby crowed in glee.

‘Can I take him next door for a few minutes?’ he asked. ‘We’ve got a new swing, a double-seater. My boys’ll be outside and Henry and Tobes’ll look a treat on it. Give you a bit of peace with Gretta, like.’

He glanced at Gretta but he didn’t say any more. What was happening was obvious. Gretta was more and more dependent on oxygen, but more and more it wasn’t enough.

If Mike took Toby, Em could sit by the fire and cuddle Gretta while Adrianna put her feet up and watched the telly. Toby was already lighting up with excitement.

‘That’d be great, Mike, thank you,’ Em told him. ‘I’ll pop over and pick him up in an hour.’

‘Bring Gretta with you,’ Mike said. ‘Give her a go on the swing. If she’s up for it.’

But she wasn’t up for it. They all knew it, and that knowledge hung over the house, a shadow edging closer.

Today Oliver’s presence had pushed that shadow back a little, made Em’s thoughts fly sideways, but, Oliver or not, the shadows were there to stay.

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