Page 7 of Best Summer Ever

We sat at the table and I squeezed my hands together in my lap while I explained that the job I had started just a few weeks ago hadn’t worked out. It was absurd that I should feel so flustered about telling them at my age, but given that I was also dumping myself back on them as a result of leaving Laurence too, I supposed it was justifiable that I felt a bit on edge.

‘But you said this was the job you’d been holding out for,’ Dad said, frowning.

He sounded confused as he repeated exactly what I’d told him and Mum when I’d been offered the role.

‘You did say that,’ agreed Mum, also tracking back to the conversation.

‘Well,’ I conceded, ‘that’s because I did think it was the one, but as it turned out… it wasn’t.’

Much like Laurence. He wasn’t the one either.

‘What never ceases to amaze me,’ said Dad, looking at me intently, ‘is how you keep getting job offers when you hop from one thing to another within months of starting. I just don’t know how you manage it.’

‘I guess I perform well at interview,’ I said, biting back what I would have once been inclined to say.

‘But badly when it comes to seeing something through,’ sighed Dad, stating what was painfully obvious.

‘Look,’ I said, refusing to get drawn in to raking over old ground, ‘I know you’re both disappointed—’

‘Only disappointedforyou, love,’ Mum kindly cut in. ‘We’re not disappointed with you, Daisy. You’re plenty old enough to know your own mind. And if it wasn’t working out…’

Dad said nothing as her words trailed off and I felt a hard lump form in my throat.

‘I do know my own mind,’ I somehow managed to croak. ‘And that’s how I knew it wasn’t working out with Laurence either. We’re not together anymore. We’ve split up.’

I half expected Dad to say that Laurence had probably got tired of waiting for me to catch him up, but he didn’t say anything. They both looked shell-shocked and it was Mum who eventually responded first.

‘Surely not,’ she choked, sounding devastated. ‘You can’t mean it.’

‘I’m afraid I do,’ I told her, though I wasn’t afraid about that at all.

‘Whatever happened?’ Mum asked, as her eyes filled with tears. ‘What went wrong?’

She was every bit as upset as I had known she would be and I felt no inclination to tell her about the scene I had been privy to in Laurence’s office. Even if he hadn’t been playing away, I would have ended things between us, so it wasn’t fair to blame him entirely for the break-up, even if it would have been convenient.

‘So, that explains all the clobber in your car,’ Dad said, before I’d thought up what to say to Mum. ‘I’m guessing you’re planning on being here for longer than just today.’

‘If that’s all right,’ I quietly said.

‘Just tell us,’ Dad then crossly asked, ‘did you give up on Laurence as well as your latest job?’

‘Robin!’ gasped Mum, batting his arm. ‘That’s not fair!’

‘It might be,’ Dad said back. ‘Did you leave him, Daisy? Was it you who ended it?’

‘Yes,’ I sighed. ‘Yes, I left him.’

‘There you are then,’ huffed Dad, his suspicions con- firmed.

‘Oh, love,’ said Mum, blowing her nose on a tissue she’d pulled out from up her sleeve. ‘I’m so sorry. We both are. Can you tell us what went wrong?’

‘I’d rather not go into it all now, but it wasn’t an out of the blue situation. These things happen, don’t they?’

‘Well, they certainly seem to have a habit of happening toyou,’ Dad said bluntly, standing up and shoving his hands deep in his trouser pockets.

I had known Dad, as well as Mum, was going to be upset, but I hadn’t expected him to be mean. His attitude almost made me regret my determination not to share what Laurence had been up to. Had it just been Dad I was talking to, I would have told him at that point, but the distressed look on Mum’s face censored the potential flow of words. And actually, given that mine and Dad’s relationship was still in a somewhat fragile state, I knew I would have regretted taking a sledgehammer to it and cracking it completely.

‘So, can I stay?’ I asked, before I had further opportunity to blurt everything out.

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