Happy Mother's Day! - By Sharon Kendrick Page 0,168

of all places.

‘My dad made this one before I was born,’ he heard Kane say.

‘It’s beautiful,’ he heard Siena say, and his knees all but collapsed beneath him. He was overwhelmed by the relief flowing through his veins.

‘Dad didn’t make this one. It was Mum’s. She liked things a little flashier than Dad and I like. We like the classics.’

James leant back against the hallway wall and bit back a smile. What a funny kid.

‘What’s your mum like?’ Kane asked, out of the blue, and James’s smile slipped.

He almost decided to burst in to save Siena from answering that question but he knew he had to let this play itself out. Kane had brought it up. Kane was the one asking questions and talking about Dinah. And Kane had never once done that off his own bat with anyone bar James in the year since his mother’s death.

‘I never knew my mother,’ Siena said, her voice now a little quieter so James had to strain his ears to hear. He listened so hard his head hurt. ‘She died when I was born.’

‘Bummer,’ Kane whispered in some kind of awe that someone else he knew had lost their mother too.

‘My thoughts exactly,’ Siena said.

James was disappointed to think that might be the end of it until she said, ‘I wish I could have known her. Even for just a little while.’

Her voice was even, but he heard a creak of bed-springs and he knew she’d had to sit down. On his bed. Siena Capuletti was right now on his bed. How the heck had they ended up in his bedroom of all places? His mouth twitched as he pictured her snooping and Kane catching her out. If that was how it had happened, maybe he was in luck after all.

‘You’re lucky, Kane-o,’ she said. ‘I am?’ Kane asked. ‘But—’

‘Uh-uh,’ she said cutting him off. ‘No buts about it. You know what your mother looked like outside of photographs. How she laughed. What her favourite food was. What time she liked to get up in the morning. The type of furniture she liked, even. Right?’

Kane sighed and said, ‘Yeah, I do.’

‘And, besides all of that, you have a truly great dad. A dad who loves you so much that he would leave a perfectly nice barbecue lunch with sausages, and steak even, to pick you up early from school.’

‘You think my dad’s great?’ Kane asked, and James held his breath for longer than was probably healthy.

‘I do, Kane.’ She paused, and then said, ‘I think your dad is the greatest man I have ever met.’

James let out his breath nice and slowly. The greatest man. She hadn’t said the greatest dad, but the greatest man. Oh, boy.

‘Heck, Kane-o, I reckon to have a dad like that you are spoilt rotten.’

There was a small silence before the bed-springs creaked a little more and James imagined his son climbing up on to his bed beside the woman who had so quickly moved into his own heart.

Come on, Kane, he wished as hard as he could. Do right by the both of us, kiddo. Show her we Dillon boys are worth sticking around for.

‘She hated mornings,’ Kane finally said. ‘Dad was on morning patrol to get me ready for school but she was a night owl, so she always lay beside me on the bed until I fell asleep at night. I sometimes wake up thinking she’ll be there …’

More squeaking bed-springs. What was going on? James risked a peek through the slit of the doorway but he could only make out their legs—Kane’s skinny with knobbly knees below his school shorts, and Siena’s shapely, tanned, barefoot with hot red toenails and crossed neatly at the knee.

‘The last thing our mums would want is for us to be sad, Kane. Don’t you think yours would want you to be doing well in your school projects? And making friends in class? And smiling all the time like you do when you’re on your trampoline?’

‘I guess.’

‘And I think your dad would want that for you too. You must know that’s what he wants most in the whole world, for you to be happy.’

‘I know.’

‘So, be happy.’

‘Just like that?’

‘Just like that. Wake up, whack a smile on your face and aim to have a good day every day. It’s that simple.’ After a pause she added, ‘Okay, so it’s not that simple. But it’s a good start, right? And I think we would both do well to remember