When I returned from reading the bedtime story, Heather had uncorked a bottle and served two massive glasses of wine.
‘I think I need to get quite drunk,’ she said flatly, handing me a glass and raising her own. ‘Otherwise I’m not going to sleep a wink.’
I raised my glass and tapped it against hers. ‘To the best holiday ever,’ I said sourly.
‘Indeed,’ she replied, before taking a gulp. ‘Do you think they’re together?’
‘Um?’ I said as I tasted the wine. It was a slightly rough local Spanish one, but it was chilled and fruity – it would do fine.
‘Ant and Amy,’ she said. ‘Do you think they’re, you know, together?’
‘Almost certainly,’ I said. Then, ‘Oh, you mean . . .’
Heather shrugged and squinted as if she was trying quite hard not to cry.
‘No,’ I said. ‘No, I don’t.’
‘Really?’ she said. ‘That’s not why they’ve decided to stay wherever they are? It’s not so that they can—’
‘No,’ I said definitively. My brain didn’t even want to explore the possibility. ‘No, I think they’re just dying of embarrassment, and they’re too scared to face the music.’
‘Yes,’ Heather said, with an intensity that made me think she was trying to convince herself. ‘Yes, that’s exactly what I think, too. Good.’
Heather left the house at a quarter to ten the next morning, trundling Ant’s suitcase behind her across the courtyard.
‘You’re taking him his suitcase?’ I asked, catching up with her just beyond the pool.
‘Yes,’ she said. ‘He asked for it. He’s been in the same clothes for two days.’
‘I’d make him come and get them himself,’ I said, ‘under the circumstances.’
Heather nodded. ‘You’re right,’ she said. ‘I should.’
‘Don’t you think we need to have some kind of discussion – I mean, before Ant goes home? It kind of involves all of us.’
‘Yes,’ Heather said. ‘We probably should.’ And then she continued towards the track, dragging the case behind her.
‘Where’s Mummy going?’ Lucy asked, once she’d vanished from view.
‘She’s, um, taking some stuff up to the road,’ I said.
‘What stuff?’
‘Just rubbish. For the dustbins.’
‘In Daddy’s suitcase?’
I smiled weakly. ‘Sharp little cookie, aren’t you?’ I said. ‘So . . . the rubbish was too heavy for her to carry, and she put it in a suitcase because it has wheels.’
‘Why didn’t you take it for her if it’s heavy?’
‘Because I have to stay here to look after you.’
Lucy furrowed her brow as she considered all of this, and then smiled. ‘OK,’ she said brightly.
It was ten minutes before Amy popped up, lingering at the entrance to the courtyard. She stood there, beckoning discreetly for me to join her.
‘I can’t,’ I called out. ‘I have to watch these three.’
‘Mum!’ Ben shouted, leaping from the jacuzzi and running across to hug Amy’s legs. ‘Can we go to the big pool now?’ he asked. ‘The one with the fish? And the pig. Can we go and see the pig again?’
Amy crouched down and hugged him. ‘You’re all wet!’ she said. ‘And now, so am I.’
‘But can we?’ Ben asked. ‘We’re fed up with this pool.’
‘Maybe later,’ she said, standing. ‘First I need to talk to Dad, OK?’
She walked around the far side of the pool so that she was opposite me, but at a safe distance. ‘So, how do we do this?’ she asked.
‘We can talk inside,’ I told her.
‘Go and play,’ Amy said, giving Ben, who was still lingering, a gentle push.
‘But we’re bored with the little pool,’ Ben protested.
‘Just do it, champ,’ I told him in my special no-nonsense voice. ‘Your mum and I need to talk.’
‘It’s so boring,’ he said, his parting shot, as I followed Amy into the house to find her already seated at the kitchen table.
‘Has he been OK?’ she asked, glancing up at me before returning her attention to her phone.
‘Sure,’ I said gruffly. ‘He’s fine.’ We weren’t here to talk about Ben, after all.
Amy swiped the screen of her iPhone back and forth.
‘That doesn’t pick up here,’ I said.
‘I know,’ she said. ‘It’s just nerves.’
‘Then put it away, please,’ I told her. Her phone fiddling had always annoyed me, but at that moment it struck me as unbearable.
She slipped the phone into her bag. ‘So,’ she said, fiddling with her wedding ring instead. ‘Are you going to sit?’
‘I’m fine here,’ I replied. I was resting against the cool porcelain of the kitchen sink.
‘I’m not sure how to do this,’ she said.
I coughed. I cleared my throat. ‘Well, I guess that depends what you want to do.’
‘I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘I am. I want you to know that. What happened . . . Well, it shouldn’t have.’
‘What did happen, Amy?’
‘Oh, I think that you know what happened,’ she said.
I laughed bitterly. ‘So now you can’t even say it?’
‘Do I need to?’
I shrugged. ‘I thought you placed so much onus on being honest. On naming things properly.’
‘I slept with Ant,’ she said. ‘And I shouldn’t have.’
‘You slept with him?’ I repeated.
Amy frowned.
‘I thought you fucked him, that’s all,’ I said. ‘I thought you went into that outhouse over there and you fucked him. When did the sleeping thing happen?’
‘Joe,’ she said. ‘Please don’t . . .’
‘Don’t?’ I repeated. ‘You’re telling me don’t?’
‘There’s no need to—’
‘To be honest about what actually happened?’ I said, completing her unfinished sentence.
‘No,’ she said. ‘Not like that.’
‘It might be good, though,’ I said. ‘To hear you say it, don’t you think? It might be, what’s the word? Cathartic.’
‘OK!’ Amy said angrily. ‘I shouldn’t have fucked Ant in the outhouse. Happy now?’
‘Oh yeah,’ I said. ‘Yeah, I’m really thrilled.’
‘So I’m sorry,’ she said.
‘Jesus, Ame,’ I muttered. ‘If you say that one more time then I swear . . .’
‘But things haven’t been right between us for years,’ she continued. ‘You need to admit that, too.’
I froze. I held my breath. She had stunned me into silence.
‘They haven’t, have they?’ she insisted.
‘I . . .’ I croaked. But I couldn’t think how to respond. I’d thought we were here to deal with
