Summer at 23 the Strand. Linda Mitchelmore
Cally and kissed her cheek. ‘Got the boat almost to ourselves as well.’
‘Well, it is early in the season. Still May. There’ll be more people around next month, I expect.’
‘Are there whales?’ Noah asked. ‘The man said.’
‘He did, didn’t he?’ Cally said.
The man who’d sold them the tickets at the kiosk had said they were a bit late coming out to see the dolphins because they liked to feed in the mornings off Berry Head. Then he’d said a whale had been spotted in the bay the previous summer. A few lucky holidaymakers had seen it from his very own boat and had photos to prove it. Gosh, how exciting that would be, to see a whale. They’d come back.
Gosh, the first positive thought about the future since I’ve been here.
‘Can I see? Can I have a whale for a pet? I’ll help look after it. It could live in the bath.’ Noah was pink-cheeked with excitement at the thought.
‘I want to see a whale,’ Riley said. He slid from the seat and was at the rail in a nanosecond before Jack reacted and leapt up to grab him. ‘A big whale.’
‘Maybe a goldfish,’ Jack said, scooping his youngest son into his arms and carrying him back to the wooden bench where Cally and Noah sat.
‘Two goldfish,’ Noah said. ‘One for Riley and one for me.’
‘Two it is then,’ Jack said.
And there it was – Jack’s first sign of acceptance that, perhaps, his boys needed pets in their lives.
‘We’ll go to the pet shop as soon as we get home and buy a big tank and some weed for them to hide in,’ Cally said.
Goodness, the second positive thought in such a short space of time.
‘We’re going to look for whales!’ Noah announced. ‘Come on, Riley!’
He grabbed his little brother’s hand and they went over to scramble up onto a large, varnished, wooden box in the middle of the boat. They were safe there, sitting with their legs dangling, feet from the deck, but clinging on to one another.
‘Do you miss the computer?’ Jack asked suddenly.
‘Why?’ Cally asked, sharply, her little bubble of happiness deflating a little. How quickly moods, and thoughts, could change.
‘Well, you’re on it a lot at home and you haven’t got access here.’
‘I’m not on it a lot,’ Cally said, knowing just how defensive she was sounding. ‘Just half an hour or so while you read to the boys and settle them for the night. Facebook mostly, seeing what old school friends are up to.’
‘Not everyone is as they seem on chat sites or Facebook,’ Jack said, immediately planting a seed of doubt in Cally’s mind that maybe Tony, who had been diagnosed with breast cancer, might fit into that category, although Cally was fairly certain he didn’t. ‘And any information you might Google is only as accurate as however knowledgeable the person who put it there is.’
‘I didn’t know that,’ Cally said.
‘Well, you do now. I’ve looked up things about engineering when I’ve been at work and on more than a few occasions the info has been utter tosh.’
‘Oh,’ Cally said. How naïve of her to have accepted everything she might have looked at as being one hundred per cent the truth – if what Jack was saying was true.
‘And emails,’ Jack carried on. ‘I’ve noticed you get more of those than you used to.’
Cally and Jack used the same computer at home but it was a golden rule that neither tried to access the other’s emails. Cally knew Jack’s password in case there was ever an emergency and she needed to be able to contact his bosses, and he knew hers, but that’s all it was, a safety net. Wasn’t it?
‘Have you been spying on me?’ Part of her hoped he had and that he had seen her browsing history and would ask why she was looking at cancer sites, and then it would open the conversation she knew they must have.
‘I’ve not used your password to look, no. I’d never stoop that low. I like to think we’ve got a better, more trusting, relationship than that.’
‘And we have,’ Cally said. There’d never been a second in all the time she’d known Jack, and been married to him, when she’d questioned the truth – or not – of what he’d told her. But all the same, she couldn’t just blurt out here what was troubling her. She knew she’d probably burst into tears and there were other passengers, and the crew, to think about. They wouldn’t want her raw emotions spread in front of them. And Jack would be torn between comforting her and checking the boys were okay. ‘So, can we just get on and enjoy the trip?’
The boat’s engine slowed then. One of the passengers was pointing to some rocks near a cove that were exposed now the tide had gone out.
‘Oh, it’s a seal!’ Cally said.
She leapt up and went to the boys, lifting them down to take them to the side of the boat where they’d see the seal.
The captain came over the tannoy to tell them that this seal loved to swim up to boats and catch any fish thrown to it.
‘And I just happen to have some mackerel here!’ he laughed. ‘And I can see two little boys who would be very good at feeding seals, I should think.’
‘Me! Me!’ Noah and Riley yelled in unison.
Jack came up behind Cally and put his arms around all of them, and her awkward moment had passed.
Another memory was being made for her boys and she must relish the moment.
‘And to answer your question,’ Cally said, leaning in to him. ‘I’m not missing the internet. Not one bit.’ And she wasn’t, because she knew now that it had only been fuelling her fears – a little knowledge is a dangerous thing, as the old adage had it. She wriggled in closer to Jack, the slight frostiness that had been between them melting a little.
‘Good,’ Jack whispered in her ear. ‘That’s music to my ears.’
But still Cally couldn’t find it in her to tell Jack what was worrying her. She found that the best way not to have to tell him was to have the boys around all the time. When Noah wanted to paddle but Riley didn’t, Cally went with him. Even though she could have reached out and grabbed him from where she’d been sitting had he fallen.
‘The sea is sucking my feet,’ Noah giggled. ‘Look, they’re disappearing!’
Cally looked. As the tide pulled back out again, leaving the sand full of water, Noah’s small and perfect feet sank down, the tops covered with a sheen of water.
‘Do you like it?’ Cally asked.
‘I love it, Mummy,’ Noah said. ‘It tickles. I like tickles.’
‘In that case…’
Cally bent down and tickled Noah, making him squirm, making him laugh. And she found she was laughing too. A genuine laugh. Making memories for Noah.
‘Can we live here?’ Noah asked. ‘I like it here.’
‘We can come back,’ Cally said. ‘Maybe,’ she whispered under her breath. Then in a louder voice she said, ‘Yes. Yes, we will.’
‘The zoo today, boys,’ Jack said, lifting Riley onto his shoulders ready to board the bus. An open-top bus ran a round robin service. Cally and her family scrambled up to the top deck and sat in the two front seats – Cally with Noah, Jack with Riley.
‘Grandstand view,’ Jack said as the bus made its way past the pier.
‘Will there be whales?’ Noah asked.
‘Where?’ Jack said.
‘At