18
‘Libby!’
I raised the torch beam until it hit the blinking, squinting face in front of me.
‘Toby?’
‘Yeah.’
‘And Hazel?’
He nodded, lifting up the car seat he was holding as confirmation.
‘What are you doing here?’ After the conversation I’d earwigged in the salon, I could have a good guess why Toby wasn’t at home. Why he was standing at my front door with a rucksack on his back was another matter.
‘Courtney came home stinking of weed and Mum went ballistic. She’d left this list of stuff we needed to do, but Hazel’s teething again so it was impossible to get done by myself. I asked the others to help and they grassed me up, so she was already mad about that.’
‘Courtney didn’t help?’ I stood back to let him in. Whatever the situation, I wasn’t about to leave a tiny baby on my doorstep.
‘She’d been out since yesterday morning. I tried to message but she’s blocked me again.’ He followed me into the living room. ‘To be honest, Libby, I don’t think it would have made any difference. She only came home to pack a bag.’
‘She’s moved out?’
‘Moved before she was pushed.’
‘Where’s she gone?’
He collapsed onto my sofa, his large frame causing the cushions to sag so low the mess I’d stuffed underneath was probably jabbing into his backside. ‘I dunno. Someone sent me a Snap of her with some bloke. I don’t think it’s in Bigley, though. She’s been getting the train up to Sheffield to hang with her cousin and their mates.’
Sheffield was nearly an hour’s drive away.
‘What did she say about Hazel?’
Toby ran a weary hand over his face. ‘She said she couldn’t deal with it right now. Why should she get landed with her, just because she’s the woman?’
‘Oh, Toby. I’m so sorry.’
Hazel began to grizzle, so I gently lifted her out of the car seat and cradled her against my shoulder, adopting the universal bounce-and-sway motion to settle her again.
‘Don’t be. I wouldn’t have let her take Hazel if she’d tried.’
‘Well, I’m sorry that she didn’t want to stick with you both and work something out. I’m sorry she found being a mum so hard, and you’ve been left to figure parenting out on your own.’
He sat up. ‘Yeah, but I’m not on my own, am I? I’ve got my sleeping bag so will be fine on the sofa, and Hazel can go in the travel cot from the cabin. We’ll be no trouble.’
‘You want to stay here?’
He wanted to stayhere?
‘You said if I needed any help to just come over.’
I wracked my brain, trying to dig out the conversation we’d had earlier in the week. I’d said I’d help, but couldn’t remember saying anything about my sofa. Everything in me wanted to call them another taxi, or at least ask his mum to take them back for one more night so we could find an alternative option tomorrow. I couldn’t manage my own family’s problems, let alone take on this one.
Then I caught a glimpse behind Toby’s determined expression – the raw fear of finding himself homeless with a baby when in so many ways still a child himself. I felt the warmth of Hazel’s head as she nestled into my neck.
‘You can stay here tonight,’ I conceded. ‘The key to the cabin is hanging on a hook by the noticeboard in the kitchen. I’ll fetch some bedding.’
It wasn’t much later before we had the travel cot set up beside the sofa, Hazel gently snoring inside it, and Toby huddled under a duvet sipping a hot chocolate in between stuffing down slices of toast.
