Loving Family

Faye: Sickness

I put a little flashback in this part, just look for the section in italics.

It was inevitable that at some point before the summer Evalynn would get ill. Moving to somewhere where you mix with lots of new people getting sick is just something that seems to happen. I'd foolishly just assumed that she'd have got ill before May - maybe it hadn't been that bad when she did that's how I didn't notice. So being woken up one warm May morning by Mick telling me Evalynn wasn't feeling well, didn't look well and could I please "talk her out of going to school before she tried to leave the house" wasn't exactly the greatest suprise ever. It wasn't made much better by the fact my poorly little girl came upstairs to sit on my bed with me, though as soon as she did I could see what Mick meant about her looking ill.
"Apparently you're feeling poorly?" I asked her.
She nodded. "I feel a bit sick and hurty."
"Okay, well the best thing you can do I think is stay at home and have a relaxed day." I told her. "I'll be here to look after you." I added when she looked worried by the idea.
She nodded slightly, and I slipped my arms round her. "I don't want to miss school though."
"It'll be alright. I don't think you'll have a good day anyway if you're feeling sick." I told her.
Again this time she nodded, though a little less reluctantly. There was an unusual silence before she pushed my arms off her and ran from the room down the hallway. Guessing what was likely to be the problem, I decided to give her a minute before I checked on her, which gave me a moment to stay in bed. Eventually I got myself up and headed down to the bathroom to check on her. She was knelt on the floor by the toilet and I sighed.
"The sick feeling got worse didn't it? Or were you sick?" I asked her.
She shook her head very gently. "I don't think I should go to school today because I feel really..." She trailed off.
I'd looked after Lisa and even Claire a few too many times (in a fair few cases when we'd been out in the 90s and had too much drink) so I found myself almost on instinct brushing Evalynn's hair back from her face and taking hold of it. There's nothing worse than being sick and it getting in your hair.

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When Ev was done being sick I gave her the choice between going back to bed or going downstairs to lie on one of the sofas, she chose the latter, presumably because that way she could watch TV and she'd be nearer me. I knew that with her comfortably snuggled on the sofa with the TV on and back in her pyjamas instead of her school uniform like she had been wearing the best thing I could do was anything that took my mind off my sick daughter, just for a while. The last thing she probably wanted was for me to be hanging around the whole day and obviously worried about her. She knew I was here, knew she could call for me or if she didn't feel up to it text me, if she needed me while I wasn't alongside her. It was just a sickness bug, she'd be fine but I knew I'd still worry far too much until she was back to bouncing around the house like she normally did. So while Evalynn spent the morning sleeping on the sofa or watching TV when she could stay awake, I cleaned near enough the whole house. As I hoovered her room I contemplated asking her if I could wash her teddies she liked to have in bed with her, just so we were sure she wasn't going to make herself sick again or that Ben wasn't going to get ill from them, but I decided that was best put off until she felt a bit better.

The post came mid-morning like normal, but I just ignored it because I was in the middle of trying to tidy the kitchen at the time and then just completely forgot about it. When I went to sit down and keep Evalynn company for a while I walked past it, and told myself I'd pick it up later. I continued to ignore it until mid afternoon when I knew I'd have to at least see if there was anything for me. As I picked it up and glanced through them my heart sunk. Of course the normal types of letters were there, bills and bank statements and that random magazine subscription (we seemed to get one magazine of some description each week between Mick and I) but there was one addressed to me and Evalynn much like the one we'd been so happy to get last month. Last time I'd picked up a letter like this it had told me my daughter was legally my responsibility again. I almost didn't want to open this letter because my mind kindly decided to assume the worst. This was going to be it wasn't it, it was going to tell us they wanted to take Evalynn back away from me. What else could it be, they'd sent us all the paperwork and certificate for legally being mother and daughter this had to be a massive step the other way. I bit my lip, but knew I had to open it with her. Whatever it said I knew we'd face it together. It was just a shame it had to arrive on a day when she was really poorly.
She was dozing on the sofa again, this time with an old Top Gear episode on in the background (even I found old episodes of that quite entertaining) so I softly shook her shoulder, "Evalynn, there's a letter for us both." I told her, carefully taking the TV remote from her hand to turn the volume down for a moment.
She looked up at me bleary-eyed and then stared at the envelope. "Oh no." She mumbled, trying her best to sit up. When she managed it I sat down next to her and she lent herself up against me so she didn't have to waste her energy sitting upright.
"Whatever it says, I love you so much my mini-me and nothing can change that." I assured her. I'd of put my arm round her, but I needed both hands to even stand a chance at getting into the envelope as she wasn't well enough to help. I tried my best to steady my shaking but knew it wasn't really helping all that much. When I opened the letter and pulled the papers out she shuffled closer to me to try and read it and I slipped my arm round her. The words on the page were a relief to read compared to what I'd imagined. In fact it was almost the opposite to what I'd worried it would be. It was a termination of parental rights against Evalynn, but for my ex not me. Which meant I was legally her sole parent. It set my mind at rest slightly.
"What does it mean?" Evalynn asked me.
I smiled a little as I considered it in normal terms. "It means, I'm pretty sure anyway, that because he refused to actually reply and confirm it, my ex - so your dad - isn't going to be your dad anymore. They've taken his parental right off him and so you just have me."
"So he's not a worry anymore right?" She asked slightly excited. After a while of repeatedly asking she'd finally got it out of me that I was just slightly worried about him turning up if he ever found out about Evalynn being back in my life.
I knew Jasper and if there was something he was never going to be it was 'not a worry' but he was now much less of one considering he had no legal rights to Evalynn. Like I kept telling myself I was 10 years older, I was more mature and married to my best friend, there wasn't much J could do to me, especially given he was likely still a nobody. And now there was very little he could do to get at Evalynn either. If he wanted to though I reckoned he could still find a way to get at all four of us, but that was something I'd worry about if he ever did. "Not so much no." I replied, kissing her forehead before remembering how ill she was. I was sure it'd be fine, just one kiss wouldn't hurt me too much.