The Spark by Jules Wake

Author:Jules Wake [Wake, Jules]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780008444334
Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers

Neither of us said anything until we got into the car, and for a moment both of us stared out of the windscreen. My legs were shaking and my heart banged so hard and fast, the beat thudded in every part of my body.

‘God, I’m so sorry, Jess.’ Sam put an arm round me and pulled me towards him, our bodies twisting awkwardly over the gear stick and handbrake. ‘I’m so sorry.’ He stroked my hair and I could feel his own thudding pulse and the tremor in his limbs. ‘I … I don’t know what’s wrong with her.’

I let his fingers soothe away the tension and tried to relax into his chest, keeping my eyes tightly closed, trying to keep the seditious memory at bay. Shut it out. Keep out that knife-edged pain of not knowing what to do or how to help. Of being eight again, and powerless in the face of my mother’s all-encompassing grief, her rage, her impotence and her disintegration.

‘We can’t even seem to avoid her. It’s doing my head in.’ Frustration seethed in his words before he added in a much softer way. ‘I just want to get on with our life.’

Despite all the swirling crazy punch-you-in-the-head emotions bouncing around my mind, I calmed at those two little words and laid my hand over his and squeezed.

Our life.

I was so torn. Guilt and hope. But there was one puzzle I could solve. One practical thing that I could do.

‘Your phone,’ I said wearily. ‘I think it’s your phone.’

‘What?’

At that moment I spotted Victoria and froze. She was stalking across the car park on her long stork legs, her high heels ringing out her pace. She passed us without even looking our way and I heaved a quiet sigh of relief and watched as she got into the convertible Mercedes three cars down and didn’t say anything until I saw the personalised number plate VIC 29 disappear from view.

‘She does well if she’s driving a car like that,’ I observed. Being an influencer obviously paid big time.

‘Daddy – or it might have been Mummy. I lose track. They spoil her to death to make up for the fact that both of them have new lives now.’ He winced. ‘I think that’s why she’s being so difficult. I was hers and she was mine for four years. I guess that’s why I’ve been trying to be gentle with her. Despite all her front, she’s desperately insecure. She wants to be the centre of someone’s universe.’ He buried his head in his hands. ‘God, Jess. I feel so guilty, but I’m so angry with her as well.’

I knew how he felt, but he didn’t deserve to feel like that; he had tried to do the right thing.

‘Sam, her insecurity is her problem. You can’t be the solution.’

‘You know she was never the centre of my universe. I thought I loved her but,’ he paused and turned to me and lifted a hand to cup my cheek, ‘it was nothing compared to how I feel about you.

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