Celia had asked me about Poppy’s art club three times before I noticed that she always followed the question with another about who collected her.
I remembered it on Wednesday while completing the school’s contact form. There were practical reasons to know a collection arrangement. There were also limits to who needed to know it.
That afternoon, Celia rang to ask whether I could return a serving dish left after an earlier visit. I found it in the cupboard and offered to leave it at her door on the way to school.
“Come in for five minutes,” she said when I arrived. “The kettle’s on.”
I had time. I did not want fear of an uncomfortable conversation to become my only reason for choosing anything.
Her kitchen was untidy. Letters lay beside a vase containing flowers past their best. A saucepan stood in the sink. She noticed me looking and said she hadn’t had the energy to keep up.
“You don’t need to apologise for a saucepan.”
“You should tell Vivienne that.”
We almost smiled.
She asked whether Tom had decided about his new job. I told her we were discussing the arrangements.
“Which days would you be alone?”
“We haven’t agreed the pattern.”
“But if you need help, I’ll need to know.”
“I’ll ask if I need something.”
She stirred her tea after the sugar had dissolved.
“You all say that now.”
“It’s a reasonable answer.”
“It makes it impossible to anticipate anything.”
“I haven’t even worked out which days I want yet,” I said.
“That’s easy to say until they’re stranded.”
“Then they can call someone.”
“And who answers?”
There was genuine hurt in her voice. I could hear years of answering, the satisfaction and the resentment tangled together.
“You have,” I said. “I’m not asking you to this time.”
She set down the spoon.
“This is about Beth.”
“It’s about the question you asked me.”
She looked away first.
On the way to school, I thought about my own habits. I had once told Tom Beth was arranging somewhere to stay and been relieved not to know the address. At other times I had accepted Celia’s questions because explaining felt easier than refusing.
I could not turn every remembered kindness into an information-gathering operation. That would be another way of pretending I had always known. What I could do was answer differently now.
At the gate, a parent asked if Beth still lived locally. I said she could contact Beth directly if she wanted to speak to her. The parent looked mildly puzzled and moved on to the subject of the school play.
At home, I checked the permissions on the shared school calendar, something I could do without examining anybody else’s account. The collection details were visible only to the people we had intended. I did not embark on a frantic search for hidden access. I simply confirmed what I controlled.
Tom found me putting the contact form in Poppy’s bag.
“Do you want my Bristol days on the calendar yet?”
“Mark them provisional until we’ve agreed.”
He did. Then he asked what I needed for Friday’s late shift. I told him the specific help: collect Poppy, make supper, no report required unless something changed.
“I can manage not reporting supper,” he said.
I laughed and believed that he would try.
Later, Celia sent a message asking whether Beth’s new project would involve overnight travel. I didn’t know. More importantly, she wasn’t asking Beth.
Ask Beth, I wrote.
The typing indicator appeared, vanished and appeared again.
Finally, Celia wrote that she was only concerned.
I turned the phone over. She still hadn’t said why she needed to know.