Plan of ACTION

It was a time of change but was Isla brave enough to take the next step?

Cecily was on her way to the meeting in the community centre, having left her 14-year-old son Jasper a ‘to do’ list, more  in hope than expectation. 1. Clean fish tank. 2. Feed fish. 3. Take

Angus for a proper walk. 4. Put peeled spuds on a low heat. I’ll be back to do the rest. 5. Homework before telly!

She’d underlined ‘proper’, after coming home early one afternoon to find Jasper leaning over the front gate texting on his phone. Meanwhile, Angus the labrador was waddling up and down the road unattended, taking liberties with neighbours’ gnomes and perennials.

‘That is not walking the dog!’ she’d shouted, having been driven to distraction earlier that day by a flurry of texts from her ex-husband Darren. He’d wanted to know if he could take Jasper out of school a week early to go skiing with him and his new girlfriend.

‘No way!’ she’d texted back. ‘His grades are only just recovering from events last year. He needs every bit of learning he can squeeze out of school.’

‘Events last year’ referred to Cecily’s divorce from Darren.

To tell the truth, the split itself had been quite amicable. It was since moving on from each other that her ex had driven her to distraction.

But what could she do? She couldn’t come between father and son. Darren was an excellent, hands-on dad. And – here another little voice crept into her head as she checked her ‘to do’ list – she didn’t want to deny Jasper opportunities, such as learning to ski. She wanted him to be fearless, feisty, forward-looking.