Mums Just Wanna Have Fun. Lucie Wheeler

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      Harriet always managed to look stunning. Even now, her black swimsuit was styled in such a way that she looked like she was about to step onto the London catwalk and her hair was poker-straight, with not a strand out of place. Her designer sunglasses and a chunky necklace nicely finished the look. Nancy – on the other hand – had on her trusty swimsuit of the last two years, a deep shade of emerald, hair pulled up into her usual mum bun and zero jewellery on. She wasn’t really an accessories person. Simple and easy was her fashion style, if you could call it a style. Usually Nancy was comfortable in her own skin and was happy being the less glamorous one in their friendship, but she felt a tad self-conscious right now with Harriet looking so presentable next to her own Mrs Plain Jane look, as she was introducing this hot guy. Maybe she should make a conscious effort to dress up a bit more, look after her appearance now that Pete was well and truly off the cards.

      ‘I’m not, I just heard my name.’ Harriet poked her tongue out and Cameron laughed.

      ‘Nice to meet you guys. And this is Aiden.’ He tapped his son on the leg. ‘Right Mr, it’s time we made a move. We have a waterpark to go to.’

      The little boy jumped up excitedly. ‘Yeah! Let’s go, bye!’ he called over his shoulder as he ran off to where his clothes and towel were.

      ‘It was nice to meet you, Nancy,’ Cameron said as he shook her hand again. ‘Hopefully I’ll bump into you again if you’re here for a while?’ Another huge smile, revealing a row of perfectly white teeth. He had one of those faces that instantly made a person feel relaxed and at ease.

      Nancy nodded. ‘We only arrived yesterday.’

      ‘I’ll see you around then.’ He saluted and smiled before running off to where Aiden was. ‘Last one to the room has to pay for dinner!’ he called and Nancy could hear Aiden’s giggling again.

      She pulled her feet out of the water to walk back over to Harriet, and she couldn’t help but smile.

      ‘Look at you all smiley. Does someone have a crush on the hot guy?’

      ‘Shut up,’ Nancy said as she plonked herself down onto the sun lounger.

      ‘I will not. I want to hear everything.’ She put her phone down.

      ‘I’m pretty sure you did – pretending not to hear and then making the rookie mistake of responding when we talked about you.’ She laughed and shook her head.

      Harriet giggled. ‘I know! I could’ve kicked myself. But I didn’t hear everything; I was at the bar remember?’ Harriet picked up Nancy’s new sangria and passed it to her. ‘I think you’ve earned this.’

      She took the glass, ‘What? For talking to some guy?’

      ‘Yes, for taking some time for you and enjoying yourself with a hot guy, something you haven’t done in I don’t know how long. It’s about time you forgot about that loser Pete and put yourself out there!’ She picked up her phone again and started tapping away.

      ‘Hari, I chatted to some guy, I’m not about to marry him. Or even date him. This isn’t an 18-30s holiday where I am looking to hook up and get my leg over. My marriage ended a year ago!’

      ‘Oh come on, you’re not exactly going to let Pete back in, are you? So why not explore your options?’

      ‘Hari, I am here for a holiday with my boy and my friend. Nothing else.’ She leaned back onto her sun lounger and pulled her sunglasses back down over her eyes. ‘And anyway, we’re too old for an 18-30s holiday.’

      ‘Hey! We aren’t that old! 32 isn’t old! 30 is the new 20!’

      ‘Still too old.’ She giggled and made herself comfortable. Just because she wasn’t going to act on anything with Cameron – didn’t mean she couldn’t fantasize about him.

      She turned her attention to Jack who was still watching videos on his iPad. She hated how much time he spent on there but equally, she knew it was a source of comfort for him so she didn’t like to take it away. She shuffled on her lounger to be closer to him, placing her hand on his forearm. He looked up at her touch, his big blue eyes wide with interest. He slid off the head phones after pausing his video and waited for her to speak.

      ‘You ok, little man?’ She had really struggled with his meltdown earlier in the kids’ club but that must be nothing compared to how he must’ve felt.

      He nodded.

      ‘Are you feeling a bit better now?’ She knew he didn’t really like to talk about it afterwards, but she tried anyway. He might change his mind one day, so she always kept trying. He shrugged. ‘What’s up? You feeling sad?’ Another shrug. ‘Didn’t you want to talk to that boy? He was just trying to be your friend.’

      ‘I don’t like it.’

      ‘What?’ she frowned. ‘The boy?’ No reply. ‘He was just being friendly.’

      ‘I don’t like it. I don’t know … he’s … I just don’t like it.’

      She smiled at him. He looked so innocent, and with the sunshine beaming down onto his light blonde hair and making him squint just a little bit, he looked younger than his seven years. She didn’t know if it was just because he was her only child and because of the upheaval over the last year, but she felt so much more protective over him. He might be seven now, but he was still her little blue-eyed baby. She missed spending time together when life hadn’t always been so stressful. They had some great times together still, but a huge part of his everyday living – especially as he grew older and the social expectation of him – seemed to cause him more angst than happiness. She tried so hard to make his life easy, but she was still learning. It would take time, she knew this, but it was a hard pill to swallow.

      She decided to change tactic. ‘What are you watching?’

      ‘A video.’ He seemed unsure. Nancy didn’t normally ask much about his iPad and what he was up to – mostly because she didn’t want to intrude on his down time and, if she was being honest with herself, partly because she was too stressed.

      ‘What’s it about?’

      ‘Building.’

      Jack loved building programmes, and she smiled as she should have guessed that’s what he would be watching. She picked up her drink and shuffled closer to him. ‘Can I watch it too?’ she asked, hoping that he didn’t reject her. But instead he just shrugged and put his headphones back on.

      She sat quietly with Jack as the video played, wondering how she was going to help him get through his life. Today had exhausted her and she feared that things were only going to get worse for them if she didn’t come up with a way to help Jack handle life better. She already felt like she had exhausted every avenue available to them to find solutions, strategies and coping mechanisms, but clearly there was a lot more work to do. Where was she to start? She wasn’t sure anymore.

      As she rested her hand on his little back, she smiled at the fact that she couldn’t hear anything being said on the video, but at least Jack was letting her get close to him. It was a start. And everything has to start from somewhere.

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