10
Edwina
How did drug dealers and prostitutes do it?
I sat on my seat and the train, fidgeting again for the millionth time. I couldn't get comfortable. It had been like this the whole ride since London and there was still about 45 minutes left. I had the cash from selling the watch. It felt like a lead weight sitting in my handbag. Niall had told me that the piece was valued at 30,000 pounds, but I had only gotten ten thousand for it.
I said only but that was the largest sum of money that I had had in my possession for months now. I hadn’t stopped thinking about how to allocate it to make it stretch for as long as it took for me to get a job. All of my accounts were in the negative, and I had gotten ten thousand pounds instead of thirty thousand pounds! I looked out of the window. I think I was and was not looking forward to going back home. The stress of my financial situation followed me no matter where I went, but it was all the more poignant at home.
As if that wasn't enough to keep me occupied, I couldn't stop thinking about Niall. I ran away from home with no explanation after we left the birthday party. I wasn't proud but I needed to stop getting involved with him. He was consistently way to close to learning my secret and frankly messing around with him was something I did not have the luxury to do at the moment. I was trying to keep a life afloat. I thought about the money in my bag. If I was smart about it, we could get two to three months out of it. That needed to be enough time for me to find a job. That was the plan.
Was it the right plan?
It was the plan that I had made so it had to be the plan that worked out. We were pretty much out of options. Hopefully trusting myself in this instance did not go wrong.
The train finally drew to a stop. I waited for the bulk of the passengers to leave before I exited onto the platform.
“Mummy!” I heard. I braced myself for the excited four-year-old launching himself at me. I caught him and spun him around, cuddling him to my chest. My little boy. I kissed his cheeks and head. It had only been a short while that we had been separated but it was always too long when I couldn’t see his perfect little face. Riley was my world. The money in my bag was for him.
“I’ve missed you, sweetie,” I said to him. Prue smiled walking up to us. “Prue, how are you?” I asked.
“Very well, madam. Riley’s been excited to see you. He was asking to come to the train station since this morning.”
“I hope he behaved himself,” I said, looking at my son. “Were you a good boy for Ms. Prue?” I asked him. He nodded his head, making his mop of ginger curls flop over his eyes.
“How was your trip?” She asked, taking my bag from me. Prue Williams had worked at The Belshire estate for dog years. She was everything at once, nanny, housekeeper, custodian and one of my closest friends. She was the only staff still on payroll at the estate since we couldn’t afford to keep anyone else. I didn’t love leaving her with my son, but I wouldn’t do it if I didn’t have to.
“It went well,” I said, as we started towards the car. I looked down at Riley, signaling to her that we would talk about it later when he was asleep. I strapped him into his car seat and got into the drivers’ seat. I handed Riley my phone to keep him occupied as we drove the ten minutes to the estate. I wanted to see my son and I wanted to see Prue too, but that was all. I didn’t want to be home. The house didn’t feel like home anymore. I wasn’t sure when it ever really did but now, when we were struggling, more and more unsure whether we were going to be able to continue living there, it was not home.
I let us in. The house was large, not palatial but bigger than necessary with seven bedrooms and five bathrooms on three floors. It sat on acres and acres of land which had fallen into disrepair lately since we had had to let the groundskeepers go. Inside, it was almost empty. Most of the non-essential furniture, we had had to sell in order to settle Russell’s gambling debts. As it was, we didn’t use most of the rooms, but it felt especially empty without the furniture. I had plans to move us out, but I didn’t know how that even looked at this point. The estate was rightfully Riley’s, so I felt unsure about selling. Hopefully, it never came to that.
“Riley, do you want to help with dinner?” I asked.
“Can we have fish fingers and mash mummy?” He asked.
“And what are we having with that? Broccoli?”
He pulled a face. “Broccoli? Ew.”
I laughed. “Snow peas?”
“No!” He said, sulking.
“Either you pick, or I pick,” I said. He sighed dramatically and went to the open fridge where Prue was waiting by the vegetable crisper. He
