Here she was again. How her life had changed since those days when she’d sat in the park with a pram and a small baby. Her world was completely different now; divorced from Jeremy, no longer a politician’s wife, but living in her dream house and with a wonderful new partner. She needed to be more grateful for that and more mindful of how far she had come instead of wallowing in the woe is me.
The accident, though, was always on her mind and as she stood in the middle of the wildflower garden watching Maggie sniff the middle of a flower, she was different to how she used to be. Everyone had said that it would get better. That the pain would fade, but she couldn't really see how. She knew, recognised well enough, that other people had things a lot worse. Other people suffered more. Other people lost children, terrible things happened to other people, but in Juliette’s little world she couldn’t seem to accept what had happened to Bella. To Juliette, the whole thing was devastating. She knew that she should be counting her blessings, but somehow, she’d lost sight of being rational in it all.
There was guilt wrapped up amongst all the other feelings too. She knew from her job that some people had a lot more to put up with; Bella was still alive, still overall okay. She should be more appreciative, and she’d tried to be more grateful. Every day she’d mentally gone through the things that she should be and was thankful for. For Maggie and Bella, for the house, for her bike, for her job, for Luke. But mostly none of it made her feel better. She just felt really tired and over it all.
She’d tried to hide how exhausted she was from everyone and primarily she’d done okay on the surface. But it was Luke who had noticed that she’d stopped going out, saying no to invitations, and not going out with her friends. Not seeing anyone and simply existing; going to work where she was doing the bare minimum hours she could and coming straight home and sitting on the sofa.
She’d even tried to avoid doing the school run as much as possible, asking Jeremy if he’d mind, or seeing if it fitted into Luke’s schedule on the way to the hospital. It was like Juliette was exhausted by everything. Bella's accident had seemed to deplete her of her energy, and nothing was making her feel any better.
Juliette sat on a bench near the section of the garden full of forget-me-nots, opened her bag and fished around in the bottom looking for a bottle of bubbles she’d had sitting in the utility room cupboard for ages. She’d just remembered it at the last minute and had popped it into her bag for Maggie. Maggie loved bubbles and Juliette had thought Maggie would love to blow bubbles over the flowers.
‘Ooh, Mummy! Bubbles! I love them!’ Maggie said as Juliette took the top off the bubbles and passed them over to Maggie who took out the wand and started to blow the bubbles out in front of her.
‘Mummy, are you still feeling really sad about Bella’s foot?’ Maggie asked as she dipped the plastic wand in the liquid and continued to blow a long stream of bubbles into the air.
Juliette watched as the bubbles popped onto the flowers and some of them floated way up into the sky overhead.
‘I am sad, yes Maggie, but Bella’s on the mend and I’m starting to feel better now and spending a lovely day with you is cheering me up.’
Maggie smiled and continued, ‘Maddy at school told me that her mum was sad for ages too.’
‘Oh really. What was her mummy sad about? I didn’t hear anything.’
Maggie stood up and clapped her hands over a bubble and it popped, ‘Maddy’s grandpa was in an accident and it made Maddy’s mummy cry.’
‘I didn’t know that. That’s not very nice, her poor grandpa,’ Juliette replied.
‘Yep, Maddy said her mummy was crying all day one day. For like the whole day. And then she said that she got better, so I think that will happen to you.’
Juliette picked up the wand and started to blow bubbles for Maggie, ‘I’m already feeling better just being with you, darling. I think you’d do a very good job of cheering anyone up.’
Chapter 30
It had been a few weeks since Bella had been back in Oxford. In the end, after all the questions and uncertainty the toes had healed sufficiently well, and with each appointment with the consultant she had been happier with Bella’s progress.
However, once Juliette and Jeremy had dropped Bella off in Oxford and made arrangements for Bella to get around, rather than Juliette feeling better, she had found herself absolutely exhausted. It was like the adrenaline, the hospital, and the caring for Bella afterwards had kept Juliette going, kept her getting out of bed, and now that Bella was back in Oxford it seemed to have the opposite effect on Juliette than anyone would have thought. She was depleted of all her energy. All her usual get up and go had ridden off into the sunset.
Juliette lay on her back in her bed staring up at the ceiling not blinking. She’d been lying there for ages, things flitting in and out of her thoughts. She didn’t even know how long it had been. She’d been lying there thinking about getting up, but not actually getting up. She was that tired.
She turned on her side and looked over at the bright sunshine streaming through the gaps in the shutters. A thought floated through her mind that she should be throwing open the shutters and looking out over the sea in the distance and embracing a new day. She should be making the most of the summer days outside in the garden at the very least, rather than being cooped up indoors with no energy.
She
