Free Life Sentence by Judith Cutler Page B

her: they’d been talking of going to the coast this weekend, and she’d been looking forward to it. Dare he risk it? Dare he risk a ploy – hell, it was a lie! Did he look as shifty as he felt?
    She was waiting.
    Clearing his throat and fiddling with the corner of a file, he asked, ‘How far from Teignmouth is Salcombe? Because I have a friend who’s always on at me to mess about with him on his yacht, and I thought – you know, if the logistics worked out – we could share a car. I’m afraid we might have to head back on Sunday evening –I’m not one for getting up before the crack of dawn.’ He’d book in at some hotel near Teignmouth, phone her to tell her his plans had fallen through and at least shoulder some of her burden. With luck he might lure her back to sleep with him in a clean bed in a clean room.
    Yes and yes and yes. Her eyes gave her away. So did a tiny tremor as she swallowed a mouthful of tea and said coolly, ‘It might mess you around horribly. Every time I’m due to set out for home, they find another little job for me to do.’
    ‘You never know, I might do it for you.’ He added quickly, before she could change her mind, ‘It’s a deal, then? Split the driving if you like – or you can sleep all the way. So long as you don’t expect more than a service area cup of tea,’ he added with a severe frown. ‘Or snore.’
    She laughed. ‘I have been known to sing “Ten Green Bottles” very loudly indeed to stay awake.’
    She meant it as a joke. But he knew as well as she the dangers of fatigue. Hell, exhaustion, more like. After an obliging smile, he leaned forward, almost senior officer to underling, but not quite, he hoped. ‘That’s another thing I’m afraid of. Your falling asleep at the wheel. Or taking on board so much caffeine that you don’t sleep even when you should. The T-shirt’s hanging in my wardrobe. And the sweatshirt, come to think of it.’
    She nodded. ‘I’m sorry. You’ve been through this squared. And you lost a lovely woman with years aheadof her. I can’t imagine what it was like, seeing her suffer. At least Ian’s heart attack was – very swift.’
    One day they might be able to talk about their bereavements – this was the first time he recalled her bringing that tutor of hers into the conversation – but not now. He had a point to make. ‘There’s a difference between wearing yourself out caring for the man or woman you love, and prostrating yourself for your parents – who must be how old?’
    ‘Ninety. Both of them. I told you I was the afterthought. But just because they’re old doesn’t mean I don’t love them, Mark.’
    He had to screw honesty out of himself, however much he’d rather not. At last he looked her straight in the eye. ‘You come to love people…differently…when they’re chronic invalids, their personalities distorted by pain and suffering. Not less. Differently. All the demands: no matter how reasonable they are to them, they sometimes get to you. And it seems to me your parents are making – on a regular basis – totally unreasonable demands.’
    ‘Perfectly reasonable in their terms,’ she snapped back. More gently, reflectively, she continued, ‘But you have a point about loving them differently. In a sense, I’m probably in mourning for people who had died years ago. When had they stopped being the carers and become so utterly dependent on me? Was there a day, a week, a year when I lost them? Or was the change as seamless as it was inexorable?’
    He could hardly speak, so tried to bluster, ‘Perfectly reasonable! Like your driving two hundred and twenty miles and back every weekend? And twice today! Fran, when you’re not so tired, you’re going to have to start thinking the unthinkable. Don’t flare up. Have another biscuit instead.’ He got up to offer her the tin, deliberately changing the mood. ‘And tell me how you got on with Elise.’
    Perhaps she recognised his fear, or couldn’t confront