last thing we want is to alert the media. It was like a circus last time.’
Chapter 3
Izzy
Wednesday 25 December, 2.27 p.m. St David’s
Izzy’s parents had prepared enough food to feed an army and not the five adults and two children present. In the old days she would have been more than happy to clear her plate but that was before food had toppled off her list of things that were important. Now, a tightening waistband meant she placed her knife and fork neatly in the centre of her plate before finishing her meal. Her sister and brother-in-law, Bethan and Oscar, were still grazing and, with every additional sausage wrapped in bacon and extra spud, they were each getting a nod of approval but she couldn’t change back into the girl she once was no matter how much her mother wished it.
She pushed her chair back, unable to stand it any longer, her mind on Grace and the glimpse she’d caught of her darting out of the Royal Arcade and into the waiting taxi along St Mary’s Street. All she wanted was some peace to think it through but that wasn’t going to happen anytime soon.
Her eyes flicked between Mam, Dad and the kids. ‘Anyone for coffee or is it tea all round, as usual?’ she said, trying to push the day forward. There was still pudding to get through: brandy custard to accompany the Christmas pudding for the adults and gooey chocolate cake for the boys.
She headed into the kitchen and filled the kettle before starting on the saucepans, her gaze drawn to the window and the view out across St David’s Head and the sea beyond. While she loved her family, these long, drawn out parties were always a chore and this one seemed more of a chore than usual. She hadn’t slept a wink since returning from Swansea and five minutes alone, even if it meant starting on the pile of washing up, was all she needed. But, with the sound of the door opening behind her, she wasn’t even going to be allowed that.
‘Where did you go to make that tea then? China?’ Bethan said, placing a pile of crockery on the table before starting to scrape plates into the food waste bin.
‘It’s just coming. You know Mam likes it strong enough to strip the hairs off Dad’s chest.’ Izzy caught her sister’s eye, trying and failing to dampen down the fit of giggles at the thought of their dad, who had only a few strands of grey left on his scalp, let alone on his chest.
Bethan lifted a clean tea towel from the hook to the left of the sink and started to dry a glass. ‘So, how are you really doing, sis?’
‘Oh, the usual. You know.’
‘No, I don’t know, not really! I don’t know how you manage to get out of bed in the morning or even sleep at night. If something like that had happened to either Gareth or Dylan, I think I’d have—’ She stopped suddenly, her cheeks pale, confusion and embarrassment stamped across her face in equal measures.
Izzy stared at her for a moment, memories of the time she most wanted to forget tumbling across her mind: the suicide attempt. It took her almost a year to shake off both the depression and the psychiatrists, not to mention the constant attention from her parents checking to see if she was all right. But the truth, a truth she’d never admitted to anyone, was that swallowing those sleeping tablets was only a half-hearted attempt. It was just a cry for help. Did they honestly think she wouldn’t have done it if she’d really meant to? Did they think she’d have picked up the phone when they’d made their nightly call if she hadn’t wanted to be saved? Dying would have been an easy but unfulfilling outcome. She still needed to know what had happened to her daughter.
‘Come on. If you carry on you’ll have us both in tears,’ she said, managing a small smile. ‘Let’s leave Oscar and the parents to fend for themselves for a while. It’s James Bond on the TV and I must have seen it a million times already. What we need is a romp on the beach with the dogs. The kids are going square-eyed in front of their iPads. You’re going to rue the day you ever agreed to buy them.’
Porthclais beach was one of their favourite haunts as youngsters. It was low tide and the dogs