She grabbed the car and launched it at the wall. It fell short and bounced under the television stand. Jade limped to the couch and sat, rubbing the sole of her foot where the car had left a hot red mark on her pale skin.
Now she really did need that drink.
*
Greg Lowe sat in the rocking chair, cradling his daughter in his lap. She was buttoned snugly into fleecy pyjamas covered in frolicking unicorns, a dummy in her mouth. Occasionally she would suck half-heartedly on the dummy as she nodded off, but as the minutes ticked past, the sucking slowed and the dummy began to dangle from her ridiculously red lips.
Greg gazed at her in awe. The smoothness of her skin and the tufts of white-blonde curls that refused to be tamed, the tiny nub of a nose and impossibly small fingernails.
The story he was reading her had long since finished, but still he sat, gently rocking back and forward in the chair, not wanting to break the bond by putting her in her bed.
Maddie would love this. He could imagine them fighting over who would read her a story, both of them desperate for one last cuddle. He felt bad about not letting her come over that morning, but as soon as he’d mentioned the text to Gemma, she had made her feelings clear, saying in an arctic hiss, ‘You spent all of yesterday with her. You don’t need to see her today as well.’
‘Greg!’
He shifted his gaze over to where Gemma now stood in the doorway, her arms crossed over her artificially modified chest.
‘You’re spoiling her! I’ve told you not to let her fall asleep in your arms. She’ll expect it all the time. Come on, enough now. And take that dummy out of her mouth.’
Greg sighed. ‘I’m coming.’
Gemma tutted and stalked off, leaving a puff of disappointment behind her.
Greg sneaked one last kiss onto his baby girl’s forehead and gently tucked her into her bed with a smile, leaving the dummy within easy reach of her fingers in case she needed it.
3
When the rest of Maddie’s new furniture was delivered on Monday, she was still in her pyjamas and dressing gown, her shoulder-length brown hair pulled into a messy ponytail and her teeth furry and unbrushed, despite it being 11.30 a.m. The delivery men made no comment, merely came in, unpacked the furniture and left with a signature to say that all of Greg’s purchases were now safely installed in Maddie’s new home.
Sitting on the stiff new couch made her feel pathetic. She gathered up all of the leftover packaging and shoved it into black bin liners. Leaving her front door open, she carried the bags out of the main door to the communal bins at the side of the building. As she returned, she was met by a thin, pale man standing with his foot propped in her door. She pulled up short.
‘Hi.’
‘Oh, hi, I figured you were outside,’ he said in a quiet voice.
‘What are you doing?’
‘Um…’ He ran his fingers through dark, scruffy hair, looking awkward. ‘I saw your door open and that door open—’ he pointed to the outside ‘—and then your door started to swing shut and…’ He shrugged.
‘Oh, thanks. I would’ve been locked out.’
‘Yeah, I figured,’ he said. He still had his foot in the door.
Maddie shuffled past him back into her flat. ‘Thanks,’ she said with an embarrassed smile.
He shrugged again and wandered away. With a backward glance, he said, ‘I’m Luke. Flat number 3,’ and nodded at the stairs.
‘Maddie,’ she said in reply. ‘Flat number 2 obviously.’
He smiled and disappeared.
That brief interaction seemed to sap the strength out of her and since she had nothing to do and nowhere to go, she took herself back to bed.
*
On Tuesday, an engineer arrived to install her broadband and phone line. He avoided eye contact when she answered the door, still in her pyjamas and dressing gown at 12.15 p.m. Another signature and he was on his way.
She sat on her stiff, new couch and logged into the Wi-Fi with her laptop, immediately looking up Greg’s Facebook page. The smiling, happy faces and jaunty status updates made her feel bilious, so she returned to bed, pulling the covers over her head.
She had no reason to even get up on Wednesday. No deliveries. No calls. So she didn’t. She ate a stale doughnut and immediately regretted it. She opened her laptop while propped up in bed, logged into her Netflix account and scrolled through her list, but it was mostly Greg’s choices and some others she didn’t remember adding. Then she realised this was now Greg and Gemma’s account. She deleted all the programmes that were clearly Gemma’s choices in a sudden fit of childish rebellion and burrowed back under the covers.
By Thursday she couldn’t avoid how hungry she was, but the milk in the fridge had turned and the vegetables were limp. She considered getting dressed and going to buy more, but ordered Uber Eats instead and ate Thai food in bed, marvelling at how you didn’t need to ever leave the house these days and trying not to drop noodles on her new duvet cover. Greg would be horrified and Gemma probably hadn’t eaten a noodle since 2003, which made the food taste even better.
She received a text from Greg that evening asking if she still had access to their old Netflix account and knew she’d been busted for deleting Gemma’s romantic comedies.
On Friday afternoon she managed to get herself out of bed and onto the couch, although still with her duvet on top of her. She created a new Netflix account for herself and was midway through a binge session of Gilmore Girls, wishing she had a Luke Danes in her life to bring her food and coffee, when there was an insistent knock on
