Blue Skies by Helen Hodgman Read Free Book Online Page A

tiptoe enough, though. The voice usually sprang out of the darkness just as my cautious toes left the top step and my anxious fingers curled round the fly-screen door. The bloody thing squeaked.
    â€˜Did you have a good day, my dear?’
    â€˜Yes, thank you. Did you? Was she good?’
    â€˜Oh, of course she was good, the little darling. We had a lovely time. We went to the beach this afternoon. I do so love to show the pretty little thing off.’
    â€˜Oh good. I’m glad everything was all right.’
    â€˜James came round. Well, he was hungry and I expect the poor boy was a bit lonely. He had dinner here with me and we watched television together—I did enjoy that. He left a couple of hours ago. He must be wondering what’s happened to you, my dear.’
    â€˜He does it on purpose,’ I confided to the baby as we trailed homewards. She slept peacefully on, as did her father until we reached home. He awoke the second the fly-screen door squeaked.
    â€˜Like mother, like son,’ I told the baby. She smiled sweetly in her sleep. I wheeled her into her room and left her in the pram rather than risk waking her by lifting her out into her bassinet. As soon as the motion of the pram stopped she whimpered. I flipped her over on to her tummy, kissed the furry back of her head and turned to do my tiptoeing act out of the room. Daddy stood smiling sleepily in the doorway. He looked fuzzy at the edges, dark brown with sleep.
    â€˜I’ve got to oil that bloody fly-wire door,’ he said. ‘Remind me. I’ll try and do it tomorrow. Might as well go round and do Mum’s at the same time. Have a go at that bloody pram too, while I’m at it.’
    â€˜Good idea,’ I said. ‘Why didn’t you bring Angelica back with you from your mother’s tonight?’
    â€˜Well, I knew you’d be going there anyway. You weren’t expecting me to collect her, were you? Although you know I would, don’t you? I don’t mind. Any time. You’ve only got to ask.’
    He stepped aside so that I could pass by him out of Angelica’s room. He was big and soft, with lots of shiny dark brown hair. His eyes and mouth filled his face; both were much too big for aesthetic balance.
    He seemed fascinated by something on the floor. ‘Your feet are filthy,’ he murmured.
    I took a shower. And so to bed.

    When James was back asleep I unravelled myself and got up. The chance to go forth babyless to the beach was too good to miss. Husband, wife and child asleep under one roof seemed one person too many: security goes in twos.
    Approaching the rise in the road I saw that the sky behind it had a peculiar back-lit orange quality, like the setting for some show that was about to start. It was the dawn, and I reached the beach in time to see it. I tried to ignore it. Dawns are too theatrical for me, and this one looked particularly stage-managed, with every conceivable overdone effect. After the sun had squeezed its way out of the invisible slit between the sea and sky, the water flushed momentarily red, as if covered with a slick of afterbirth. Later, when it settled down, the light was violet-coloured, and the sea and sky glowed gently like the inside of an oyster shell when wet. The air was clean and fresh, like your mouth after toothpaste. A new start.
    Someone had put up a swing. It stood there at the top of the scraggy-grassed slope to the beach, with its dark institutional-green tubular iron frame, bright new chains and plain wooden seat. It was a well-made and official-looking swing, clearly the work of the local authority. I stared at it. Small pains started in my head, one behind each ear: anger and guilt. ‘Take my eyes off you for one day,’ I screamed at the beach, ‘and look what happens.’ My voice shrilled high and horrible, running along in both directions and bouncing back off the end rocks in stereophonic fury. The sound met in the middle