Either Mum, or No One
“Lucy, we ought to get another ticket for the theatre,” said Tom, breaking the calm with a flick of his finger against his phone screen, as if arranging matters of state.
Lucy looked up from her dinner. The roast was still hot, but Tom was already glued to his mobile, face illuminated as if the digital glow alone guided his decisions.
“Another ticket?” she asked, voice careful and neutral. “Is someone else joining us?”
“Yes, Mum’s keen,” Tom replied, barely glancing up. “Told her last night we were going, and now shes set on coming along as well.”
Lucy carefully set her fork down, rose from the table, and turned to the counter, pretending she needed more water. Her face twisted in a way she did not intend, and even if shed tried, she couldnt have stopped it. As long as Tom didnt noticeshe had neither the energy nor desire to explain.
Of course, Mum wants to come, Lucy thought. Annette Wilkinson always wanted to come.
She listened to the tap fill her glass, wedding photos flitting before her eyes like leaves in a breeze. Two hundred and forty digital shots, all neatly packaged with a ribboned USB stick by the photographer. Shed spent three evenings sorting through, hunting for just one where she and Tom stood together. Alone. Without relatives, without guests or interlopers. There hadnt been a single shot.
Annette Wilkinson haunted every onea hand straightening Toms tie, an arm snug round his shoulder, grinning in the very centre of the picture, as if the day were hers alone. Lucy had thought it coincidence then, a trick of the angles. She didnt think so any more.
From the start, her mother-in-law had acted as if Lucy were merely a flatmate, someone assigned the spare room by pure accidentand a nosy flatmate at that. The flat itself belonged to Lucy, bought with her money. Annette Wilkinson, though, strolled in when she liked, never calling ahead, opinions on everything at the ready. Curtains, pans, over-seasoned stew, Toms pallor, Toms eating habits, Toms weight.
Lucy drank a silent mouthful and set the glass down.
Every outing, every plan unfolded the same: the cinema last month? All three together. Ice skating during the holidays? The three of them. Even the tiny tea shop on Baker Street, which Lucy had quietly hoped would be just for themTom had brought his mother too. And Annette, squeezing herself between them at the table for two, ordered a lemon tea and regaled them for forty minutes with blood pressure woes and tales of a neighbour flooding her ceiling.
This theatre tripLucy had chosen the play days in advance, found good seats on the third row of the stalls. It was meant to be their night. Just theirs.
“Lucy, why are you so quiet?”
When Tom finally looked up, his expression was soft, almost apologetic.
“Mum gets lonely, you see,” he said, falling into that rehearsed tone Lucy now recognised. Did he even notice how often he said those same words?
Lucy turned to him and nodded.
“All right. Get the ticket,” she said.
There wasnt any point in argument; shed tried before. It always ended the same: Tom would take offence, retreat to the other room in flustered silence, and the next morning Annette would ring, voice quivering with injured virtue, asking whether everything at home was all right. An endless loop Lucy had given up on escaping.
Tom, brightening, returned to his phone.
The third-row seats proved as excellent as Lucy had hoped. The stage was perfectly visible, every nuance painted vividly. Yet it felt like she watched alone, for Tom swiveled instantly toward his mother, and there he remained.
Annette Wilkinson sat on his right, and straightaway they buried themselves in the programme, chit-chatted about the foyer, acknowledged an acquaintance she declared shed spotted at the cloakroom. Lucy, on Toms left, stared at the stage long before the first act began. At the interval, Tom escorted his mum off to the bar, leaving Lucy by herself. No one invited her along, and she lacked the will to ask. They returned arm in arm, Annette retelling the entire first act so grandly it seemed Tom must have been in a different theatre. Lucy leafed silently through the programme, hopelessly aware that the third row truly wasnt worth the price.
They left together as a trio. First, they dropped Annette at her flat. Lucy waited in the car for ten long minutes as Tom walked his mother up, helped with her door, listened patiently at her threshold. When he finally returned, he beamed, relaxed and happy.
“That was a lovely night, wasnt it?”
Lucy simply nodded, turning to the window. She claimed tiredness, though sleep was distant. She couldnt bring herself to speak, for every word felt like it would dissolve, unheard, in the fog between them.
So two months crawled by just as Lucy had predicted. Annette Wilkinsons visits grew more frequent; Tom spent ever more time with her, while Lucy increasingly found herself alone in her own flat, hearing laughter and chatter from the kitchena world she no longer entered. Dinners for two became rare. Weekends were default outings to Annettes, or affairs for three. Lucy slept first these days, waking with that familiar heaviness, nestled deep under her ribs, so constant it became a new rhythm for her heart.
Mid-March brought an unexpected bonus at work. For three days, Lucy weighed her options. Fifteen days in Portugal. All inclusive. Sun, sea, a good hotelwith reviews to back it up. A whole week, Lucy checked flights, pored over forums, measured the walk to the beach. This, she hoped, would reset things: a clean break, a chance to be together, to remember what being a couple felt like.
“Tom, Ive booked us a holiday.” That evening at dinner, she placed the printout gently beside his plate. “Portugalfifteen days in June. Sun, sea, everything we need. I spent my bonus, but it’s worth it.”
Tom scanned the paper, lips curling around a faint smile.
“Oh, thats brilliant, Luce. Sounds wonderful.”
For once, relief flooded her chest. Maybe, she thought, they simply needed this escape. A break from routine might set them right. Lucy slept better that night than she had in weeks.
But the very next day, Tom came home, took his seat, waited for Lucy to plate up, and then, between one mouthful of shepherds pie and the next, said, as if it was the simplest thing,
“I told Mum about the Portugal trip, Lucy. Shed love to come. Can you get her a ticket too?”
Lucys fork hovered in mid-air. She laid it down and fixed him with a look, half expecting him to laugh and reveal it was a joke, knowing it wasnt.
Not this time. She would not stay silent.
“No, Tom. Im not going on holiday with your mother.”
Toms jaw stilled mid-chew; he stared as if shed uttered the unspeakable in a cathedral.
“Lu, dont be like that. She gets so lonely. She hasnt been abroad in ageswhat harm can it do?”
Lucy rose and stalked to the window, palms pressed to the cold granite worktop so hard her joints blanched. Inside, something old and angry swelled up, unsilenced, finally set free to burn.
“Shes got friends, Tom! Five friends who come for tea each weeklet them take her on holiday and leave us in peace!”
“Shes my mother, Lucy, you”
“I know shes your mother!” Lucy spun round, a years worth of swallowed words bursting free. “I bloody well know, because shes in every single part of our lives! Films, picnics, plays, even our dinnersshes there! Im tired of being a second wife in this marriage, Tom. Do you get that?”
He scraped his chair back, arms folded. “Youre heartless, Lucy. You simply dont understand what its like for her.”
“No, I dont!” Lucy closed the gap between them, eyes bright with something ruthless and alive. “And I dont need to! Youre my husband, Tom. My husband. I want a holidaya real holiday!the two of us, sun and sand, not me sunning on the side while you and your mum discuss ailments.”
Tom narrowed his eyes, taking a step back.
“Youre being unfair. You know what? Either mum comes with us, or I dont go at all.”
Lucy went still. For a heartbeat, something clicked quietly inside her, precise and final.
“All right then. Ill go without you.”
She swept past Tom into the bedroom, pulled her suitcase from beneath the bed, and flung it open. Tom lingered in the doorway a second later.
“Lucy, what are you doing? Lets just talk this through sensibly!”
“We always talk sensibly, Tom, and every time your mother is the ending of every story!” Lucy folded a dress carefully. “Im filing for divorce. Im not living another day as the third wheel in a marriage of three.”
Tom said nothing, leaning in the doorway, face slowly dawning with the reality that Lucy wasnt arguingshe had made her choice.
Two months later, Lucy sprawled on a sunbed by the hotel pool, the one shed chosen from photos and reviews herself. Sunlight pressed warmly on her skin, a breeze from the Atlantic curling round her toes, an icy G&T glistening with condensation in her hand. No one was gossiping about neighbours, nor moaning about drafts, nor retelling phone calls from Mrs Potter upstairs. There was simply silence and salt air and a space only for herself. With eyes closed, the sun on her face, Lucy realised she ought to have done this years ago, not wasted two on someone who never truly grew up.
