A Very Happy Halloween

Always trust your heart? Codswallop.

In her teens, Janie Osman learned that bad boys are bad news. Fun was overrated, and mundanity became her new goal—two kids, a part-time job, an unremarkable husband, and a deep and meaningful relationship with her battery-operated boyfriend. Only for it all to get torn away in an instant.

A move to the cosy village of Engleby seems like the best option, but rebuilding her life isn’t easy, especially with two young boys in tow. When a random act of vandalism brings trouble into her life in the form of Eisen Renner, the ultimate bad boy, will she follow her head or her heart? Should she choose security? Or risk everything for love?

Please scroll to the bottom for content warnings.

Chapter 1

“Mum, it hurts,” Alfie complained.

“I know, sweetie.” Why wasn’t Harry answering his phone? Usually, my eldest son was surgically attached to the bloody thing. “I’m sure the doctor won’t be long.”

“I need to pee.”

Lord, give me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the self-control not to toss a seven-year-old boy named Anvil de Witt off a balcony. Not that I knew anyone with a balcony, but I did have a second-floor window that would do the job in a pinch.

When I decided to move from Bristol back to Engleby, the quiet Somerset village where I’d grown up, I’d worried the boys might struggle to settle in, and my worst fears had been realised. They were both miserable. My own mother had tried to reassure me that it was just teething problems, that bickering between young boys was normal, but dealing with the doldrums day after day left me self-medicating with wine. Box wine, obviously. I couldn’t afford the good stuff anymore.

I’d hoped that things might get easier in the new school year, because wasn’t time meant to heal? Harry had moved up to the local comprehensive, and certainly Alfie had seemed happier over the summer holidays. But three weeks into the autumn term, disaster had kicked us in the backside once again.

Alfie had been crying when I picked him up from school, not only because his wrist hurt but because Anvil had pushed him over on purpose, and when he landed in the mud, everyone had laughed at him. I’d cleaned him up as best I could with the packet of wet wipes I kept in my handbag, but the other people waiting in the waiting room had still kept giving us dirty looks. Did they think I wanted to be there? Of course I didn’t. Half an hour ago, a nurse had moved us from the waiting room to some kind of assessment area, but that didn’t help Alfie’s fidgeting or my frustration. Right now, I should have been at home, doing yet another load of laundry and trying to work out which version of “I don’t care” Harry wanted for dinner.

Plus I’d had to skip work. I’d been halfway through cutting Sieanne Pilling’s hair when the headteacher called with a plea to pick Alfie up immediately. At least I hadn’t started with the foils because that would have been a disaster, but now I owed Sieanne discounted highlights in addition to the thousand apologies I’d already offered. 

“Mrs. Osman?”

 I gritted my teeth at the sound of my name. Of his name. Logic said I should keep it because Osman was the boys’ surname too, but the way it made me feel… Urgh. I longed to be a Taylor again.

But I smiled brightly. Smiled dutifully.

“That’s me, and this is Alfie.”

The doctor crouched in front of us. Grey hair and glasses gave him a reassuring air of experience, but if he’d spent his life working in this place, he was probably more like thirty than fifty-five. My sister’s fiancé was a doctor, only twenty-six, but he was already starting to look a bit worn down. 

“What seems to be the problem, son?”

“Anvil de Witt pushed me.”

“I see. Well, let’s take a look at you.”

“My wrist hurts.”

“We’re going to fix that. Have you ever been in a hospital before?”

“Yes, when I was born,” Alfie said earnestly. “And when I was two, I put peas up my nose, and when I was two and a half, popcorn got stuck in my ear, and when I was three—”

My phone rang. Oh, thank goodness. Saved by technology, right before Alfie could tell everyone in A&E about the “black balls” incident, although perhaps the doctor already knew? Liam—Marissa’s fiancé—had spilled the details over dinner one night, practically crying with laughter, and he worked at a hospital two hours away. Of course, he didn’t realise that I was the “hysterical mother” who’d thought her three-year-old had some weird tropical disease when all he’d done was colour his testicles with a felt tip. In my defence, I’d never had any of that drama with Harry. Until the split, he’d always been the easy child. 

I glanced at the phone screen, hoping for Harry but seeing Steven’s name flash up instead. About bloody time.

“I’m so sorry. It’s my husband.” 

My husband. The words left a nasty taste in my mouth, but over the past few months, I’d realised just how much meaning they held. “My husband” meant you were a fine, upstanding member of the community. “Alfie’s dad” left people wondering why I was divorced or whether I hadn’t been good enough to marry in the first place. Folks didn’t say as much, of course, but I saw it in their eyes. And referring to my not-quite-ex as “the asshole sperm donor” made them pass gin and tissues.

Today, I didn’t need judgment. I just needed Alfie’s arm fixed so I could go home and drink my own alcohol.

The doctor waved a hand. “No problem. Worried about young Alfie, is he?”

“He’s at work,” I said, as if that answered everything.

The doctor motioned to us to follow him, and I stabbed at the screen to answer the call as we headed for a set of double doors that led deeper into the hospital. 

“What’s Alfie done this time?” was Steven’s opening line.

“He hasn’t done anything. A boy pushed him over in the playground, and now his wrist is sore and swollen.”

“Well, I hope you put in a complaint.”

“Between finishing up at work and bringing him to the hospital, I’ve been a little busy. Can you look after Harry this evening? He went home with a boy in his class, but I barely know Shawn’s mum, and I’m worried.”

Mainly because she wasn’t answering the phone either.

“I’m on my way to a work dinner. Can’t your mum pick him up?”

“I told you my parents are on a cruise this month.”

“Who goes on a cruise for a month?”

“It was a treat from Marissa.”

Tokyo to Seattle via Alaska, Mum’s dream trip. She and Dad had been looking forward to it for months. Their absence meant I’d needed to cut down on appointments at the salon for a few weeks, but how could I complain about them taking a much-deserved break?

“Can’t Marissa take care of Harry?”

“She lives a hundred miles away, and you know she hates driving on the motorway.” And besides, Marissa wasn’t Harry’s father; Steven was. Just for once, couldn’t he lift a finger to help? “Can’t you back out of the dinner?”

“I need to make a living, Janie.”

“So you can carry on not paying child support?”

“The judge hasn’t set an amount yet.”

“So? Why should that stop you from contributing?”

“I do contribute. I buy them stuff and look after them at the weekends.”

“You look after them every other weekend, and you buy them phones and computer games when what they need is food and PE kit. Do you even know how much school uniforms cost?”

“I don’t have time for this right now,” he said in that whiny “you’re being unreasonable” voice of his.

Neither did I. The doctor was holding open a cubicle curtain, waiting for me, and there was no point in arguing with Steven. He wouldn’t change his mind. Once, I’d found his tenacity attractive, but now I realised he was just a stubborn git.

“Fine. Keep shirking your responsibilities, but don’t come crying to me when your bad decisions bite you in the arse.”

“Janie, that’s not fair—”

I ended the call and hurried to catch up with Alfie and the doctor. The corridor smelled strongly of cleaning products, but even the floral scent couldn’t cover up the faint underlying aroma of vomit. I hated this. Hated it. Not just that Alfie was injured, but that my life wasn’t my own anymore. Ever since I’d found the empty condom wrapper in Steven’s pocket, things had fallen apart. He’d moved in with Luisa, who was not only his bit on the side but my boss—ex-boss, now—while I’d lost my job, my home, and my sanity. If it wasn’t for my sister, I’d probably be living in a shop doorway.

Alfie needed an X-ray, which meant more waiting. And more worrying. What was the point in having mobile phones if people never answered them? I desperately wanted to call Marissa, to hear a friendly voice and for her to offer to drop everything and drive to Somerset to help. She would, I knew she would. Which was ridiculous because I was the older sister. I was supposed to be the capable, responsible one. And until the condom incident, I’d lived up to those expectations. Yes, I’d had a couple of wild years in my teens, but after being ghosted by one tattooed bad boy, cheated on by another hot jackass, and then fished out of the gutter by a virtual stranger when I tried to erase the memories of my poor decisions with alcohol poisoning, I’d settled down. I’d met a nice, respectable man with a nice, respectable job. Steven worked in the finance department at a software company, no ink or piercings in sight. Okay, so my first pregnancy hadn’t exactly been planned, but we’d made it work. Steven had proposed, and we’d married in a beautiful ceremony at a country hotel. Everyone said we made a lovely couple. We shared a dream honeymoon in Antigua, I quit my office job and retrained as a hairdresser so I could flex my hours around childcare, and we moved into a dull but sturdy semi-detached home on the outskirts of Bristol. 

Life was perfect.

Slightly boring, perhaps, but my only worries had been what to cook for dinner and whether Alfie had stashed any more creepy crawlies in his bedroom. Steven said it was a phase and I should let him grow out of it, but Steven wasn’t the one left picking snails off the curtains.

No, Marissa had been the daughter our parents worried about. They’d never discussed it with me, of course, but once or twice, I’d overheard them whispering about whether her latest loser boyfriend was taking advantage of her the way his predecessors had. Whether it had been wise of her to leave Engleby on a whim with no real plan for where she wanted to go in life. Whether she was just too nice. Then she’d hooked up with a dishy doctor and won the bloody lottery, in that order, and now I was the one they whispered about.

I was thrilled for my sister, really I was, but sometimes, seeing her happiness made me want to weep.

Maybe that was why I hadn’t called her right away? Because I didn’t want to be reminded, yet again, of my own inadequacies?

I dialled Harry’s number, beyond relieved when he finally picked up.

“Harry, why didn’t you answer when I called before? I’ve been worried.”

“Harry?” The voice was deep and raspy, and it definitely didn’t belong to my son. My stomach knotted in an instant. “So that’s his name.”

“W-w-who are you?” I stuttered. “Who are you, and where’s my son?”

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CONTENT WARNINGS

     

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