rather work through this awful, yearning hunger and still feel decent, than have the thing she wanted and feel guilty.
“Hannah!” Beth shrieked, suddenly yanking on Hannah’s hand with far too much force for a seven-year-old. “Ohhh my Goddd”—this was Beth’s latest Cool Girl Phrase— “look at that DOGGY!”
Hannah would love to look at the doggy who’d inspired such excitement, but she was too busy trying not to fall on her arse. Josh had started yanking her hand too—actually, he was practically swinging off of her arm, and he was surprisingly heavy. Of course, he did that to Nate all the time, without any effect on his dad’s general uprightness. He seemed to think of Hannah as similarly solid, which was both flattering and likely to result in her embarrassment.
“Josh,” she said, sounding a little more desperate than she’d intended. “Please stop jumping!”
It was only 4 p.m., so the park was filled to the brim with excitable kids and their stuck-up, glowering parents. Glowering parents who would absolutely love to see Hannah Kabbah land on her arse.
Why did she still live here, again?
Since Josh was an angelic child—once you got past his obsession with frogspawn and his hatred of underpants—he stopped yanking Hannah immediately. So did Beth. But their screeching only increased, because all that diverted energy had to go somewhere.
“Look!” Beth bellowed. Then she pointed boldly across the park, just in case her words hadn’t been clear enough. When Hannah followed Beth’s tiny, jabbing finger, she understood all the excitement.
“Goodness me,” she murmured. “That is… quite a dog.”
Dog didn’t seem entirely accurate. Was it a bear? Or a fluffy, cheerful-looking wolf? Perhaps some sort of bear-dog-wolf hybrid? Maybe. It stood by the nearest park bench—taller than the bench, mind—looking enormous and beastly with its thick, chestnut fur, floppy ears, and lolling tongue. Its tiny eyes and shiny nose reminded Hannah of a teddy bear. She’d never seen a teddy bear that huge, though.
A woman sat on the bench beside the dog, scratching its head in an absent sort of way. She was older than Hannah, maybe in her forties, with golden-brown skin and long, dark hair. She had the kind of sparkling eyes and deep laugh lines that made her look friendly; even now, when she was staring blankly into space. Hannah was surprised to see that none of the children at the park were harassing the woman and her fantastic dog already. Beth and Josh were absolutely dying to.
“Can we go and say hello?” Beth was asking, practically breathless with excitement. “Please?”
“Please please please please please?” Josh added. They were like a coordinated attack team of cuteness. Who would stand a chance?
“We can say hello,” she allowed.
A little cheer went up.
“But we must remember our manners. The dog might not want attention. The lady might not want attention for her dog. So we’ll go over, and politely say hello, and ask if the dog likes to make friends. And you mustn’t touch it.”
The cheer was replaced by groans. “Han-nah!”
“But it’s so fluffy!”
“No touching unless I say so. If I bring either of you home with a dog bite your dad will murder me on the spot.”
“Daddy would never murder you,” Beth said solemnly. “Daddy loves you.”
The words jolted Hannah for a moment. But then she remembered that Nate told the kids he loved them at least twenty times a day. They were probably so used to the word that they threw it out to describe any sort of affection.
“Well, he loves you much, much more. And either way, I would prefer to keep both of you unbitten.” Hannah crouched down and poked Josh’s belly, startling a giggle out of him. Then she ruffled Beth’s unruly hair. “So, what are we going to do?”
“Remember our manners,” the pair said in unison. Sort of. Josh seemed to forget what he was saying halfway through, probably because one of his friends was waving from the see-saw. But she trusted that he understood the key message.
“Alright.” Hannah stood and took their hands again. “Let’s go.”
It really was odd, she thought as they drew closer, how alone the woman seemed. She was sitting so close to the gated-off play-area where the children congregated, and the dog was practically a kid-magnet, but no-one even looked over…
In fact, the parents huddling together by the swings were not-looking rather pointedly. She recognised that forced, hyperaware ignorance from her own years as a social pariah. The obvious exclusion was enough to remind Hannah of the gossip she’d somehow