Page 9 of The 3am Shattered Mums' Club

6

MEL

‘And why aren’t you at bloody school, anyway?’ Mel shouted to get the last word in over the fence. She had been in the garden hanging the washing out – a rare moment of domesticity had come over her as the sun peeked through the clouds and a warm breeze had filtered through the house, urging her outdoors. Next door’s teenage boy had been playing football, and twice the ball had come over into Mel’s garden, disrupting her domestic-goddess psyche and filling her with an overwhelming rage.

She had thrown it back over once, but when it came over again, she had seen red and found herself locked in an altercation with a teenager who had more or less no facial hair but was trying to style it out all the same.

He had thought he had ended the argument by calling her a ‘menopausal witch’ (where do they learn such insults?), except this had only served to rile Mel up even more and she was ready to march around and bang on the door and really tell him what he needed to hear. Instead, she shouted her last words to a closed door and hoped they would penetrate through. She couldn’t remember what the lad’s name was. He had always seemed pleasant enough in a mute, tracksuit-bottoms-and-hoodie-wearing, nodding and grunting teenage sort of way. His mum, Lucy, always smiled, and they’d had coffee once there just after Mel had moved in. She had also brought flowers when Skylar was born and popped in for a ‘quick coffee and cuddle’ that had lasted three hours. In the end, Mel was forced to feign sleep and Lucy had quietly left. There wasn’t a husband on the scene, just a string of boyfriends, who all dressed uncannily similar to her teenage son.

What had worked up Mel even more was she had planned to remain calm all day. Mel knew she was fighting a losing battle with herself. It was the classic pram-in-the-hall issue for her; Mel was constantly wrestling between wanting to be a good mother, but also needing to express herself through her art – her singing and her dancing. She didn’t want to consider herself getting old either and the prospect of reproduction no longer being possible once the menopause set in and she certainly didn’t need a little jumpstart from next door reminding her of her age. But Mel couldn’t ignore the nagging feeling that was nudging at her, pestering her from time to time. Was this new recent anger to do with what had happened at The East End Club before Skylar was born? Maybe she hadn’t given herself enough time to consider the enormity of it. She had always brushed off these kinds of incidents in the past. But none had ever escalated to the extent they had that night. When she was pregnant with Skylar as well. She dreaded to think what might have happened if things had got out of hand. Would Sky even be here now? She shuddered at the thought, and yet again pushed the images that occasionally crept to the forefront of her mind away. She was a big girl, a mum of two now. It was in the past. She just needed to keep it there.

Mel was also dealing with the usual emotions of being a new mum like that dragging sensation of being in a house that was constantly messy, which didn’t seem to feel any easier second time around. She really needed to employ some daily routines that Leia could abide by, just some simple stacking of the dishwasher or putting a wash on. She was eleven now. Sometimes, just looking at the mess all around her made Mel want to run out of the house, but the desire to be out singing and dancing did not yet override the fear she felt on the last day she had performed and the very thing that was keeping her away from doing the thing she loved. She had got back to her Robbie who wanted – no, needed her – back at The East End. He said he was sure to go under if she didn’t at least give her fans something. So she had confirmed a date. She would be back on the stage within the month. The stage was where she felt most at home, but she felt an underlying sense of dread whenever she imagined herself back doing what she was born to do. Her very last gig at The East End – where she had been performing since she was twenty-eight years old – had been one of the worst nights of her life. She could still see him; still smell him. She wondered if she would ever be able to move forward and find the strength to put that night behind her.

She thought about the girls she had met last week as she finished hanging the washing up and how nice it was for Aisha to start texting. It was a lovely idea of Sophy’s, but Mel secretly hoped she would never need the night-time counselling service. Skylar was sleeping in big stints at night so far. But it hadn’t surprised Mel that someone like Sophy had instigated the 3 a.m. Shattered Mums’ Club chat on WhatsApp. Sophy was a proper yummy mummy; she looked the type of girl who liked to organise things like spontaneous girls’ spa weekends away. She had noted that expensive sleeping-bag coat and the way her nails were manicured and painted alternate shades of green and yellow. Mel imagined she would be a riot on a girls’ night out. Aisha was different – she seemed a lot more reserved, and almost shy in comparison. Mel was sure that if it wasn’t for her own bolshy behaviour, Aisha wouldn’t have come along to the café at all. But still, she was glad she had met them both now. She had friends around London, but none that were new mums. Mel had always found meeting new mums difficult. She shied away from all those mother-and-baby groups – she had only been doing Irene a favour that day by showing up for the tai chi and tea thing, which the bloody girl had the cheek not to show up to. It wasn’t that Mel was unable to make friends, but the problem was if she met someone she vaguely liked, or tolerated, they would generally want to exchange numbers and meet again, ‘Oh, we must get the girls together again. Didn’t they have fun?’ The next thing, she’d see a photo of her baby next to the other mum’s baby on social media with ‘BFFs already’ written underneath it. This sort of thing happened a lot when Leia was little. So even though Mel had been dreading the tai chi and tea group, she was annoyed that the woman hadn’t shown up. She had a mind to pass on her thoughts to Irene to share, but she had reminded herself that she was a changed woman now: no more sudden emotional breakdowns. She decided she would put the football-over-the-fence incident into the ‘one-off’ category where the C-bomb clash was also lying sheepishly. Everyone was allowed an off day (or two). Mel was sure it was because she wasn’t dancing. Surely the dancing would give her back her confidence. She knew once she got back up on that stage, she would be releasing all that pent-up energy. All that rage. Again, her mind began to ponder on just where the rage was stemming from.

She reminded herself that she must text the girls tonight. Even if it wasn’t during the 3 a.m. feed, which luckily Skylar hadn’t shown any preference for. She could even try to get the message in before she fell asleep after the midnight feed, show that she was on board.

Mel spent the next few minutes standing in the doorway and looking around at the mess in the lounge. She knew the bathroom was crying out to be cleaned, hairs and dust were clinging to every surface, and Daz had wiped the mirror so many times after a steamy shower no one could actually see their reflection in it any more. Mel craved a clean-looking house. She wished she could have it all gleaming and organised like those influencers on Instagram – Christ, one of them has four kids and a job on the telly and still manages to hang her crisps from a curtain hook in the snack cupboard. Mel followed them all and bought all the products they recommended and endorsed. She had a cupboard full of shower cleaners and grout whiteners; she’d even bought a Lazy Susan for the fridge because she had seen an influencer put all her condiment jars on one so she could spin it around and find her cranberry sauce without having to plunge her hand into the unknown territory of the top shelf. But despite all the gear, Mel still had no desire to clean. And so the house stayed just that side of messy and dirty.

Mel ignored the ever-evolving cleaning chores and decided to cook instead. It was something that relaxed her. Cleaning was not for her, but an hour making a one-pot chicken dish and some brownies was right up her street. Mel settled Skylar in her bouncy chair on the kitchen island as she cooked, thinking as she bounced her with her hand every now and again that whoever made these things was a bloody genius because she couldn’t live without it. Skylar was in hers a lot. Last week, Irene had come over and said to the wee thing ‘My, you get around’ as Mel took Skylar from room to room with her as she reluctantly did some hoovering, dusting, and cleaned the bathroom, to show Irene she wasn’t completely incapable – all whilst Skylar happily sat in her chair.

She popped the chicken dish in the oven and whipped up the brownies and then put them on the lower shelf in the oven. She took herself and a sleeping Skylar into the lounge, and before long, found herself scrolling on her phone. It was a terrible thing to do; her worst habit. She did like a bit of social media but she found she could pass a whole hour and come away feeling as though she had just been released from an underground vault and was seeing daylight for the first time in weeks. She much preferred to be exercising, but recently –well, call it sleep deprivation, if you will – Mel had become hooked again. She needed some inspiration to get herself eating healthier again, and if there was one place to inspire you to make yourself look better, it was Instagram.

Overall, she thought she did pretty well; ate a rainbow from time to time, and obviously her fitness levels were pretty slick, but really she needed to get herself into a routine. But there were times when she did feel exasperated with herself, when she dropped the healthy habits and found herself reaching for the endless amounts of cake there seemed to be in the house. Daz hated sweet things but worked with a bunch of middle-aged feeders who constantly brought sponges, doughnuts and muffins to the office that had been left over from their child’s birthday/ graduation/ baptism. The events seemed to be endless. Mel would catch herself in the kitchen, picking at some neon icing and purple sponge that had been lovingly created for a child she had never met, wondering why she couldn’t just leave it the hell alone. And she so wanted to not eat that rubbish. She wasn’t fat by any stretch of the imagination. But with her stature, or her ‘big bones’ as her dear poor mum had referred to her, she had to be careful that she didn’t add any excess weight, because apart from all the health related issues, it didn’t bode well for family photos.

But Sophy had talked of her fascination with nutrition during their café meet. She had told Mel she worked in marketing, learned a bit about social media then used her love of healthy eating to inspire others. She went into the search bar of Instagram and typed inSophy West. She knew that was what she would need to focus on, getting her nutrition levels up there so she had the energy to train, be a mum, run a house and do her job as a burlesque dancer and singer. There were a few Sophy Wests, but Mel soon recognised Sophy, looking smiley and glowing in a bright white T-shirt, hair slicked back in a tight ponytail. Mel clicked on the account, curious and wanting to get a better look. The account was called ThisGirlThisBody and Mel was astounded to see she had 160,000 followers. Her account was pristine. The top few images were of baby Max, but only the first three. One flat lay, one of him in someone’s arms and another of just his fingers wrapped around a hand, presumably Sophy’s, the wording underneath was that classic poetic Instagram tripe that Mel detested.

Welcome to the world, our little prince. We are so blessed to become Mummy and Daddy to this little beauty today. Our world is truly rocked.

59,000 likes

2391 comments

Mel shuddered as she clicked out. Is that the sort of person she really wanted to be friends with? Sophy had seemed so… so, well, so not like that, when she had met her last week. It was amazing how hard people tried to create this other persona on social media.

As Mel scrolled down through the account, she saw image after image that looked as though it had been lifted straight out of a women’s magazine: a trendy-looking pink water bottle perched on a wall with a sea landscape just out of focus. Sophy in a pair of hot pink leggings and blue trainers, against a blue-and-green-graffitied wall. As Mel scrolled further back, she realised that Sophy had managed to maintain a pink-and-blue theme throughout. This was what baffled her the most. How was this possible? How on earth did people find the time to plan all this stuff? It was beyond her. But she did like Sophy. She had liked her from the moment they’d met. Despite the cliché Instagram posts, she thought she had something going for her and that all this Insta stuff was a cover for the person Sophy really was, or maybe wanted to become.

Mel thought that, deep down, Sophy was already a success, without the need for the filters and hashtags. Mel was generally attracted to people like that, and in her experience, they didn’t come along very often, but when they did, she wanted to be around them. It was an evolution thing, survival of the fittest; aligning yourself with other like-minded or successful people was what had got Mel all the amazing gigs over the years. Perhaps, if nothing else, Sophy could teach her a thing or two about how to make her own Instagram account look half as eye-catching as hers, because that whole pink-and-blue vibe was really quite striking.

Mel noticed the time was almost 4 p.m. and she realised that Sky had been asleep for a while. Maybe, at this rate, she would be up half the night, meaning Mel might get to chat to the girls at 3 a.m. after all. Even though Mel knew she was setting herself up for a longer night she still couldn’t tear herself away from Sophy’s feed.

As Mel continued to browse through the page, she spotted that Sophy had tagged a handle in the pictures of Max.Ah, so this must be the father, Mel thought and felt a desire to see who her other half was. Mel clicked on the handle and the account went straight into the account of a one Jeff Haddon. A slim but tall man in a too shiny suit stood next to a desk with a plain white wall behind him. Mel hated to be that person who judged, but she looked at that photo of Jeff with his blond hair sticking up at a funny angle – he looked almost Swedish or Danish or something – and couldn’t help but think he was trying too hard to look twenty years younger than he clearly was.

‘Oh, Sophy,’ she said. She quickly clicked back into Sophy’s account and noted that their surnames didn’t match. So they weren’t married, or Sophy was awesomely modern and hadn’t given her surname up. Mel secretly hoped it was the latter, but she had a sneaky feeling that Sophy was merely cohabiting with this… Could Mel really be thinking the wordweasel? Although, weirdly enough, there was something about him that gave Mel the creeps. She clicked back into his account again, then began scrolling through every picture of him one by one. And there were a lot. A few posing with Sophy at a restaurant, at a beach bar at sunset, and lots more of just him. The man loved a selfie.

Now, Mel had encountered a fair few men in her time and had her fair share of bum slaps, tit gropes and leg grabs, but the longer she looked at Jeff’s Instagram account, the more she studied his face, his eyes – which were such a piercing blue she was sure you would never be able to forget them – the more certain Mel was that she knew this man.

Mel’s gut dropped and her body shuddered.

It couldn’t be. It couldn’t be! Thoughts erupted through her mind like a volcano. Thoughts she had vowed to put away somewhere and never retrieve, but they were back. And they were staring right at her through the eyes of Jeff Haddon, a man whose name she had never known, but whose face she would never forget.

Mel stood up. She felt her breath catch in her chest, the way it had for months after that night. How was it possible that by just looking at his photo, it could bring it all back again? To some, it would not seem like a big deal, but it had crushed Mel’s confidence, even made her reconsider her career at one point. She barely knew Sophy – who was to say that this friendship was going anywhere, anyway, even though Mel was only just thinking what a great girl Sophy was. Oh, why did life have to be so cruel and twisted? Of all the men Sophy could be with, it had to be him. Of course she couldn’t be one hundred per cent certain that Jeff Haddon was the same man she had encountered less than a year ago. But 99.9 per cent? Surely that had to be enough.

Mel went through into the kitchen to make herself a cup of tea for the shock. She looked at the state of the kitchen, turned upside down just to cook one bloody meal. She tutted and let out a long sigh. She noticed the bins needed emptying; it was the one job that Daz absolutely failed 100 per cent at every time. Even when she put Post-it notes on the bin to remind him to ‘empty the goddamn bin’. She put one on his car windscreen once and had been shocked to discover it was still there when he returned home from the office. She slapped her Marigolds on and hauled the stinking bag out of the bin, the bin juice dripping all over the floor. But Jeff Haddon’s face was in her mind’s eye. She was pretty sure he would stay there for the rest of the day. She cursed under her breath and carried the dripping bin bag outside.

7

SOPHY

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