A Home Like Ours Fiona Lowe (good novels to read .txt) 📖

in her veins. She tried the Dusseldorps, but it seemed half the town was taking advantage of the pupil-free day and had gone away for a long weekend. Tara fought tears of frustration and despair. Why had Shannon left her?

She shoved her phone into her pocket and blew her nose. As she stepped into A&E, she met Fiza coming the other way with her handbag on her shoulder.

‘Ah, Fiza?’

‘Yes?’

Tara licked her lips. ‘I appreciate that you brought Jon to hospital, but I think the children need to be here too.’

Fiza frowned. ‘Hospitals are not good places for children.’

The need to protect Flynn and Clementine surged. ‘I never leave my children with people I don’t know. Especially teenagers.’

Fiza’s eyes flashed—a lioness defending her cub. ‘Amal is a good boy! He works hard. He wants to be a doctor. Without his strength, your husband would still be lying on the ground.’

She punched some numbers into her phone, then spoke rapidly in a language Tara didn’t recognise before thrusting the device towards her. ‘Speak to your son.’

‘Flynn, it’s Mummy. I’m at the hospital with Daddy but I’m going to come and get you and Clemmie and bring you here.’

‘But, Mum! We’re playing totem tennis and I’m winning.’

‘Who are you playing with?’

‘Amal, Leila and Sammy.’

‘Is anyone else there?’

‘No.’

‘Are you hungry?’

Flynn sighed as if Tara was being excruciatingly difficult. ‘Amal gave us cheese and apples.’

Her throat burned with tension. ‘Do you feel safe?’

‘Duh! Clemmie, it’s not your turn! Mum, I have to go.’

‘Tell Clem—’ But Flynn was gone, leaving only the buzzing of static in Tara’s ear. She handed the phone back to Fiza. ‘They’re playing a game.’

Fiza’s brows rose. ‘Of course. They are children. Now you know they are safe and happy, go and look after your husband. He needs you.’

Something about the command riled Tara. She opened her mouth to object, but the other woman with her air of authority was already striding towards the exit.

Jon was dozing or avoiding talking to her—these days it was hard to tell. It was a long time since Tara had just sat and watched her husband without him noticing and saying, ‘What?’ in an aggrieved tone. The skin under his eyes was the colour of Clemmie’s HB pencils and the once faint lines around his eyes were now carved in deep. The scar on his head was still raised and livid from his last accident a few weeks earlier.

Jon was rarely sick. ‘Fit as a Mallee bull’ was his usual response whenever people asked how he was, but he didn’t look fit now. He was a faded version of himself. It shocked her how much he looked like Ian after a bender with Gerry.

Jon’s leg jerked, hitting the rails on the side of the bed, and his eyes popped open, wide and frantic. ‘T?’

‘I’m back. I was checking on the kids.’

He turned towards her voice, his movements stiff. ‘Fiza said—’

‘Hello, Tara.’ Stephen Illingworth, their GP, tanned from his recent Queensland holiday, walked into the room. ‘Looks like Jon’s been in the wars.’

‘Twice in a month.’

‘So I see.’ He closed the door and pulled up a chair. ‘Jon, I’ve been reading your file and it seems the locum prescribed Viagra.’

Jon made a strangled sound.

‘I’m assuming he didn’t do a physical examination?’ Stephen asked.

‘I asked for the prescription,’ Tara said. ‘Things have been … difficult.’

‘I imagine they have.’

‘Tara’s making it out to be worse than it is,’ Jon said.

Tara didn’t know whether it was the sympathy on Stephen’s face, the horrifying realisation that things between her and Jon were so strained she’d plumbed a new low by trying to have sex with Zac, or her frustration with Jon not admitting they had a problem, but she wasn’t staying silent any longer.

‘I’m not exaggerating. We haven’t had sex in months. You’re either gaslighting me because you’re having an affair, or you’re drinking too much and sticking your head in the sand.’

Jon’s uninjured hand moved robotically through his hair. ‘How many times do I have to tell you—I’m not having an affair!’

‘Then admit to the drinking and get some help!’

‘Jon, Tara,’ Stephen said firmly. ‘Let’s focus. First up, erectile dysfunction at thirty-eight is usually a sign of other problems so the prescription for Viagra was a red flag. When I was stitching your hand, I noticed a lot of muscle rigidity. That’s why I did a full physical examination. Jon, have you been feeling more tired than usual?’

‘You know …’ Jon glanced away. ‘Life’s busy.’

Bloody men’s egos! ‘He falls asleep on the couch most nights around eight. Then from three, he’s up half the night,’ Tara said.

‘What about mid-afternoon? Do you feel like you could nap then, Jon?’

‘Sometimes.’ Stephen’s caring gaze was unflinching and Jon sighed. ‘Yeah. I’ve come home some afternoons. Like today.’

‘Fiza told me Flynn said you were using the nail gun and then you seemed to fall over.’ Stephen checked his notes. ‘Like a tree.’

Panic tightened Tara’s chest. ‘Please tell me you weren’t drinking.’

‘Jesus, Tara!’ Jon’s leg banged against the trolley’s sides. ‘I’m not Dad! When have you seen me drink in the afternoon other than at a weekend function?’

The awfulness of the year ran into her need to tell Stephen the truth. Make Jon acknowledge it so he could get help. It wasn’t like telling their doctor the cold hard facts could make things any worse between them.

‘He’s been stumbling drunk at least twice recently,’ she said.

‘I have not!’ Jon’s anguish bounced off the neutral palette of the walls. ‘Stephen, tell her you breathalysed me when I arrived. Tell her I blew 00.’

‘It’s true, Tara. He did.’

A kernel of fear broke through the malignant resignation that had hardened in her. ‘Then what’s going on?’

‘Based on Jon’s muscle rigidity, the erectile dysfunction, the pill roll tremor—’

‘The what?’ Tara and Jon asked in unison.

Stephen tilted his head towards Jon’s uninjured hand. ‘It’s what you’re doing now. Rolling your thumb over your fingers. That’s called a pill roll tremor.’

‘I noticed that months ago. I thought it was just