**June 12th**
“I don’t need a daughter like you!” Mum screamed, shaking a crumpled page. “You’re an absolute disgrace to this family! Whatever will people think?”
“Mum, please calm down,” Chloe begged from the kitchen doorway, eyes red from crying. “Let’s just talk properly, please.”
“What’s there to talk about?” Mum’s voice climbed higher. “Dropped out of uni, can’t secure a decent job, and now… *this*? Hooking up with someone, embarrassing us for all the neighbours to see!”
Auntie Flo from next door peeked cautiously into the hall, drawn by the yelling. Mum noticed her prying glance and snapped further.
“See? The whole street knows already!” She slammed the paper onto the table. “Twenty-five years I spent raising you, gave you everything I had, and this is how you repay me?”
Chloe picked up the fallen sheet, smoothing it out with trembling hands. It was an application to register their marriage. *Her* application.
“Mum, I’m really happy,” she ventured. “Connor’s a good man, he loves me…”
“Good?” Mum let out a harsh, bitter laugh. “Divorced with a kid, no steady career, ten years older than you? He’s a bloody gold-digger, that’s what!”
“That’s not true! Connor works, he has his own little garage… car repairs…”
“Garage!” Mum snorted derisively. “That shed! So, you plan to spend your days inhaling petrol fumes and axle grease?”
Chloe sank onto a chair, legs weak. She’d rehearsed this conversation for days, hoping for understanding. But nothing was going to plan.
“Mum, I’m not a child. I’m twenty-five.”
“Precisely!” Mum exclaimed. “At your age, I was married to your dad, working at the factory, we had a house deposit saved. And you? Drifting about God knows where, with God knows who!”
“Dad left *you*,” Chloe said quietly, instantly regretting it.
Mum’s face went deathly white with fury.
“How dare you! Your father died in that crash! He didn’t abandon us!”
“Sorry, Mum, I didn’t mean it like that…”
“You most certainly did!” Mum paced the kitchen like a caged animal. “You want to repeat my life? End up alone raising a child? This Connor of yours already wrecked one marriage!”
“They divorced by mutual consent. It just didn’t work out.”
“Oh, didn’t it!” Mum sat opposite her, pinning her with a glare. “But it will with you, I suppose? Do you even grasp what you’re getting into? He’s got a child! Child support to pay! What scraps will be left for you?”
Chloe rubbed her temples, silent. Her head throbbed from the shouting, a dull ache in her chest. She’d dreamt of sharing her happiness, planning the wedding together, choosing a dress…
“And how,” Mum continued, “did you even *find* him? In some dodgy pub, was it?”
“At Daisy Thompson’s birthday. Remember, I told you?”
“Daisy Thompson!” Mum flung her hands up. “That floozy on her *third* marriage? Wonderful company you keep!”
“Mum, what’s Daisy got to do with it? Connor was there by chance, a mate invited him…”
“Chance! Men like that don’t happen anywhere by ‘chance’. They target vulnerable girls like you.”
Chloe jumped up. “Stop! You don’t know him at all, yet you judge him!”
“Why would I need to know him?” Mum stood too. “I see it on your face. You look lost, you’re wasting away, dark circles under your eyes. Is *this* your happiness?”
“I lost weight because I’m nervous. I knew you’d be against it.”
“Against it? Of course I am! I didn’t raise you all these years just for you to hand your life to the first bloke that comes along!”
The doorbell rang. They fell silent, listening cautiously.
“Is that *him*?” Mum hissed.
“Yes. We arranged to meet.”
“Absolutely not! He’s not setting foot in *my* house!”
“Mum, please! Just meet him. Maybe you’ll see differently.”
“Never!”
The bell rang again, more insistent.
“Chlo, it’s me,” came a man’s voice through the door.
Chloe looked at Mum with pleading eyes. “Mum? Just five minutes?”
Mum hesitated, then curiosity won out. “Let him in. Five minutes only. And he’s not to come back.”
Chloe opened the door. A tall man in his mid-thirties stood there, dark hair, tired eyes. He held a bouquet of white roses.
“Hello,” he said, stepping into the hall. “Mrs. Shaw? Connor Evans.”
Chloe’s mother looked him up and down. Jeans, leather jacket, strong workman’s hands. Exactly what she’d pictured.
“Hello,” she replied curtly, not offering her hand.
“These are for you,” Connor offered the flowers. “Chloe’s told me so much about you.”
“Flattery’s unnecessary,” she snapped, but took them anyway. “Come through to the kitchen.”
They sat at the table, three of them. Connor seemed calm, but Chloe saw the tension in his shoulders.
“So. You want to marry my daughter,” Mum began without preamble.
“Yes. I love her.”
“Love. Can you keep a roof over her head?”
“I can. I’ve got work, steady earnings.”
“In a shed.”
“An auto workshop,” Connor corrected. “I’ve three mechanics on the books.”
“Paying maintenance?”
Chloe flushed with shame. “Mum!”
“Yes,” Connor answered calmly. “And I will. He’s my son.”
“Exactly. How will my daughter manage?”
“Mrs. Shaw, I understand your worry. But I’m not after Chloe’s money. Quite the opposite. I want to look after her.”
“Fine words. What happened with the first wife? Looked after her too, did you?”
Connor paused, gathering his thoughts. “We married too young, didn’t think. Turned out we were chalk and cheese. She wanted high life, I was just starting out. Constant rows… in the end, we agreed to split.”
“Right. And with Chloe? Different, is it?”
“It will be. Because we suit each other.”
Mum stood and walked to the window. “Chloe, out for a minute. I need to talk to your fiancé alone.”
Reluctantly, her daughter left. Mum sat opposite Connor again, fixing him with a stare.
“Listen well, young man. Chloe is my only child. I’ve poured everything into her, hoped she’d marry well, live a good life. What can you actually offer her?”
“Love, loyalty, a family.”
“Just words. In practice? Where will you live? Squatting *here*?”
“No. I rent a two-bed flat. I’ll transfer the
Barbara Ann lay awake, the unfamiliar creak of the settling house mirroring the unsettled worry in her chest – trusting Catherine’s heart felt like letting go of the reins on a wild pony, a terrifying leap into the unknown darkness. She quietly slipped into Catherine’s room, drawn by an instinct older than words, and gently adjusted the duvet over her sleeping daughter’s shoulder, lingering for a moment in the quiet safety of the night before retreating to her own bed, clutching the worn edge of the sheet and silently willing dawn to bring more certainty than this endless, tea-stained twilight.
