Chapter 13

David arrived at work a little late, but he was the boss. He remembered that Marissa had taken the day off so it meant that he was catching up all day and that particular Friday was a busy one.

The financial storm clouds were gathering, and the banks were looking dodgy. He could only see big trouble ahead and a recession which would hit the company. At the end of the day, he sat back and caught his breath. Everyone else had gone home and the only people left in the building were the cleaners.

He sat for a while, this being the first time he had time to think. Business was looking uncertain and he had to upset the apple cart at home. He reprised what Alex had said. He was still confused about his reaction to Ozzy’s stupid remarks about Celia.

He knew he wanted her to stay and that he’d said some monumentally stupid things to her. Now she was going in a month and he felt a mind numbing fear. He understood she was not only a solid emotional anchor for the children, but he needed her as well. How would he run the house and cope with the children without her? He realised with a new clarity that no one else could fulfil the rȏle she played in the family as well as she did.

What to do? It was with a sinking feeling and a fear that things would not go his way that he understood exactly what he had to do. He packed his briefcase and made his way home with a heavy heart.

The evening passed as had so many others: he shared the work with Celia, and put the children to bed. This evening she was putting Beth to bed, and he was seeing to Evan. As the child’s eyes eventually closed, David’s spirits sank and he dreaded the meeting he had now to undergo.

He had a shower and put on a dressing gown before going downstairs. Each step down those steps felt like a walk to the scaffold. He emerged into the living room to find it empty: Celia was still with Bethan. He went to the drinks cabinet and poured a white wine for her and a whisky for himself. Then he sat down and waited.

When she came into the room she saw him in his dressing gown, and the white wine. She smiled briefly at him.

“Thank you for the wine.” she said, and sat in ‘her’ armchair, the one she always used. She took a drink and put the glass back down. She looked at him, and he could not read her.

“Celia...” he began and stopped, unsure fo what to say.

“Yes?” she said and waited her face open and inscrutable.

He felt wretched, guilty, a fool.

“Er,” he faltered, “About last night...”

“Yes?” she said again, and again she waited.

“Look, I’m sorry. I got so wound up by what Ozzy said and then the others backed him up, saying you loved me and were conning me by making yourself indispensable to get back with me, and I got so angry...”

“I do love you but I’m not conning you. So what do you want, David?”

“I wish I could take all that stuff I said last night back. I don’t want you to go. I’m asking you to stay. I lost it last night, and I’m sorry. Please, Celia, will you stay?”

“Yes.” Her face showed no emotion he could read, and the word hung in the room, alone.

“Sorry?” he said perplexed now at the ease of it.

“I said, yes, I’ll stay.”

David exhaled in a loud sigh of relief, and he sank back into the sofa in relief.

“I don’t understand,” he said, now worried at how easy it was.

“How long is it since she left us?” she asked.

“Five months and a few days, but–”

“Early days, David. You’re still wound up tight as a clock spring. It won’t be the last time you lose your rag. Give it time. I will.”

Then she smiled that guileless smile at him and but he could see no affection in her eyes for him. It was a gentle, relaxed, content and comfortable smile, though, and he felt a great release of tension.

“I’m so glad you’re staying,” he said with a deep sigh.

“So am I,” she said, deadpan. “I would have been heart-broken to leave the children behind.”

“But you would have?”

“David,” she said patiently, even doggedly. “From what you said last night, they said that I was here because I’m in love with you. That’s perfectly true, I am. I came to you because I loved you, always have. I haven’t hidden that from you.

“I’m staying because I still love you and I understand your outburst: you are still very bereaved. But I made you a promise that I would not make any moves on you, and that promise I will keep, come what may. If, as I do hope, one day you want me again, you will have to come to me, I will never come to you.

“If it happens and you want more from me than this arrangement, I will then have to decide if you really love me or if you simply depend on me, so it’s not certain that I would agree.

“So, if you’d continued to want me gone, I’d have helped you to find someone else to care for Evan and Bethan, and yes, I would have done what you asked. It would have destroyed me, but I would have done it for you.”

David was amazed at her, and he felt a stirring as he gazed at her loveliness, made all the more attractive by her maturity, her courage and steadfastness. She had grown so much since they were together.

The warmth of his affection engulfed him and he wanted desperately to go to her and hug her to him, but somehow he couldn’t do it. There seemed to be a distance between them that wasn’t there before. Suddenly he felt shy, and left for his office to catch up on some work he’d brought home. He wanted to get it out of the way so he could have the weekend free for Evan and Beth.

He was still working when Celia put her head round the door.

“Off to bed now,” she said. “Don’t work too late.”

“Good night,” he said, “I won’t.”

It provoked a memory of Gwen saying exactly the same thing, and with the memory came the pain of loss again. Gwen had gone. He sighed and returned to his papers for another half hour before packing up and making his own way to his empty bed.

The next day he felt it was as if there had been no crisis at all. Celia’s attitude to him was not guarded or resentful, and they had a happy time with the children. Sunday was the same and David felt relief that it was behind them.

However later in the week she asked for Friday night and to return on Saturday. David thought nothing of it and coped with her absence. She returned at midday.

The following week was the same, Friday evening and Saturday. This time she returned around teatime. David regarded her and she seemed no different. She said nothing about her time off and David did not ask.

This routine continued through the next two weeks. The next week she was back on Friday night, the week after very late on Saturday night, well after David had gone to bed, though he did not sleep until he heard her arrive. He wondered what she did, but again dared not ask her.

There was financial chaos in the country and recession was accelerating. It meant longer hours at work and more work at home. It meant that once the children were abed he was buried in his office.

So he wondered about the feeling that there was a growing distance between them, less companionable and more businesslike, and he began to feel uneasy that she was seeing someone. Was it because of his workload, or the fissure caused by his loss of temper weeks before?

He knew she was entitled to do whatever she wanted on her time off, but it did not stop pictures coming to his mind of her in bed with some man, perhaps Alex? Why did that bother him? Then he thought it might be that she would find someone and would terminate their agreement if a relationship became serious. She could hardly have a relationship with someone while living with him full time.

On the second and fourth weekends of Celia’s new regime, he went to his parents’ and stayed over until Saturday morning, and on those days he told Celia she could take the whole weekend if she wished. She never did, but returned very late on Saturdays, until in early November he planned to make the journey to Wales to see his in-laws, when he told her he would not be back until late Sunday evening.

His in-laws were delighted to see their grandchildren, and thanked David profusely for taking the trouble to make the journey. He always felt at home there. It was on Sunday morning when his in-laws returned from chapel and they had finished breakfast, when William beckoned him into the lounge and Bethan joined them.

“You’ve got a nanny for the children, then?” he said rather than asked.

“Yes, you’ve met her, she was at the wedding, Celia Thompson,” he answered feeling a little guilty, though he could not work out why.

“Used to be your girlfriend till she ran off with some footballer, if I remember what Gwen told us.”

David couldn’t work out where this was going and why, but he nodded.

“I know it’s early days since Gwen passed,” Bethan said making her first contribution, “but what we’d like to say is that we won’t be upset if things get serious between you, you understand what we mean?”

“Oh it’s not like that,” David hastened to reply. “It’s purely a working relationship. Did you know that Gwen talked with Celia about her being Godmother?”

“Oh, yes, Gwen told us. She also said that you were living with Celia for some years before she left you.”

“Yes, we were,” David said, “and I think that’s helped us to share looking after the children so well. We know each other well and even think alike.”

“We don’t want to pry Dai bach,” Beth said earnestly. “All we want to say is that you are young and you’ve got a big job on with the two little ones, so we just want you to know we won’t be upset if you get together with her, isn’t it?”

“I don’t think that’s likely, but thank you for being so kind.”

“If you do find someone, Dai, don’t forget us, will you?” she begged him.

“You are always going to be my in-laws, and the children are your grandchildren. Any partner of mine will have to understood that.”

Bethan came over to him and hugged him. “You’re a good man Dafydd Cariad. A very good man.”