‘Fuck!’ I blink back tears as I clean up the shards.
‘Mummy?’ Isaac is in the doorway, blinking at the light. Serves me right. ‘What’s up, chicken?’
‘I heard a noise,’ he says.
‘That was me clearing up,’ I say.
‘No, in my room.’
I can’t face this, the ritual of checking and reassurance, the debate about whether Isaac can sleep in our bed ‘just tonight’.
‘Where’s Daddy?’ I say.
‘I don’t know.’
‘See if he’s in bed. He can-’ I hear what I’m doing. ‘Never mind, just a sec.’ I put the shards of pottery in the bin.
‘What’s that?’ Isaac says.
‘Lori’s mug.’
‘Her star mug?’
‘Yes. I knocked it off.’
‘Oh.’ He glances up, no doubt checking I haven’t destroyed his Tiger mug. He gives a little shudder. His feet must be cold and I have a flashback to being that age, to the powerlessness of it, the bewilderment and sudden heady delights.
‘Come on, then.’ I scoop him up and take him back to bed.
Finn is asleep on the lower bunk.
Isaac climbs up the ladder. I adjust the night light so it’s brighter and he pulls the covers up to his chin. ‘Can I have a story?’
All I want to do is sleep. ‘One, then I’m going to bed and you go back to sleep. Deal?’
‘Deal.’
Leaning against the beds, I rattle off The Three Bears, the shortest story in my repertoire. Isaac yawns, which is a good sign.
With the boys safe in their beds, I go to mine. Nick is there, awake. He clears his throat and turns over as I get changed.
We say no more than ‘Night.’ Drifting off to sleep, I wonder if he’s becoming depressed, and if he is, what on earth I can get him to do about it.
Lori in the Ori-ent
Park life
Posted on 18 March 2014 by Lori
Back home our park is used mainly by the following people for the following activities:
a) Parents and kids at the playground
b) The above feeding the ducks
c) Tennis players, whose numbers mushroom every year around the time of Wimbledon, then fade away
d) Bowls players, Wednesday afternoons only, must have a bus pass
e) Footballers, Saturdays and Sundays on the pitches. Little ones with their parents screaming at the ref, big ones screaming at each other and the ref
f) Dog-walkers (plus dogs)
g) Lovers, walking in the rain, lazing in the sun, snogging
h) Teenagers, smoking, drinking, snogging
i) Extreme frisbee players, Saturday only, by arrangement
j) A couple of old men, who share the bench by the rose bed all day long, each with a carrier bag of lager
Today is a typical day in the park near my flat in Chengdu. There are variations of all the above here but there are also
