A Million Dreams

by Dani Atkins

  As she held and comforted my child, I could see there were tears glistening in Izzy’s eyes at his despair. By the time the lights finally changed and I drove past them, my cheeks were as wet as hers.

  *

  There were balloons, quite a lot of them, and it really wasn’t the kind of place where you ever imagined seeing them. They were impossible to miss as they bobbed for freedom high above the deserted reception desk. Thin strands of ribbon kept them firmly tethered to the bouquets of flowers and pile of gift-wrapped presents. A greeting card the size of a small billboard stood beside them, with ‘Sorry you are leaving’ emblazoned on the front.

  A quick glance at my watch confirmed there was still half an hour until the offices officially closed, but the sound of laughter and popping champagne corks floating down the corridor made it clear that everyone had already downed tools for the day. I couldn’t have picked a worse time for a quiet talk with William, as I appeared to have walked straight into someone’s leaving party.

  I turned to go, hoping to slip out of the unmanned Reception as surreptitiously as I’d entered it, but before I reached the door a familiar voice called out to me.

  ‘Beth.’ I hesitated, but the voice was insistent. ‘Beth… Mrs Brandon, wait.’

  I pasted a smile on my face and turned to face Keeley Browning, William’s assistant.

  ‘Hello, Keeley. How are you?’

  A tiny frown marred the smooth skin of her brow. ‘Confused,’ she admitted. ‘I thought I’d cleared Bill’s diary for the afternoon. Did you have a meeting with him that I missed?’

  I shook my head.

  ‘Phew, that’s good,’ she declared, pantomiming mopping her brow in relief. ‘I’d hate to go out on a sloppy mistake.’

  It took a couple of seconds to work out what she meant. I gestured towards the gifts, flowers and farewell card. ‘Are these for you? Are you leaving?’

  Keeley’s eyes looked suspiciously bright, and there was something a little unnatural about the chirpiness of her reply. ‘Yes, I am. It’s time for something new.’ Unexpectedly, she reached for my arm. ‘Have you got a couple of minutes?’

  I nodded, and followed her curiously as she led us down a quiet corridor, away from her partying colleagues. ‘We shouldn’t be disturbed in here,’ she said, stopping before an unmarked door to unlock it. She slipped through the opening and I followed her, my nose twitching at the dry and dusty smell. Keeley flicked on the overhead light, flooding the room with the glare of fluorescent tubing. The supply room was lined with floor-to-ceiling metal shelves packed with stationery, and was a far cry from the crystal chandelier grandeur of the reception area. Keeley gave a small satisfied nod and pushed the door closed.

  ‘If anyone sees us they’ll just think I’m helping myself to some pens and Post-its before I leave,’ she joked with a quirky sense of humour I’d never heard from her before.

  ‘What is it you want to tell me?’ I asked.

  She drew in a long breath before beginning. ‘Firstly, I want to say that I’m perfectly okay with how things have worked out.’

  I had no idea what she was talking about, so I just nodded politely.

  ‘To tell the truth, it’s actually a relief now that everything’s out in the open.’

  ‘Oh, well… good,’ I said, smiling vaguely in a mystified fashion.

  ‘And I don’t regret it, not for a single moment. You deserved to know.’

  There was no way I could keep pretending I understood what was going on here. ‘Know what, exactly?’

  ‘Oh. I thought Liam would have told you. I thought you and he—’ She broke off and her cheeks flushed a becoming pink. Mine weren’t far behind her at the implication. Keeley inhaled deeply before expelling the words in a rush. ‘I was the one who leaked Noah’s identity to you. I was the person who sent you the card.’

  Whatever I’d thought she was going to tell me in the cloistered privacy of the stationery room, it certainly hadn’t been that.

  ‘I knew exactly what I was doing, and the risks, but you were in such an awful situation… and the information was right there in the files, and no one was telling you anything.’ She gave a small shrug, which belied the enormity of her actions. ‘So I did.’

  ‘I… I see,’ I said, processing this unexpected revelation, before remembering that Keeley – who’d broken the rules because of me – was now about to leave the firm.

  ‘Did you lose your job over this? Is that why you’re leaving?’

  A smile formed slowly on the younger woman’s face and she shook her head. ‘Well, it didn’t exactly qualify me for employee of the month, but it was more of a mutual decision kind of thing. Although in a way you are sort of responsible for me wanting to leave.’

  ‘I am?’

  ‘Well, both you and Izzy Vaughan, to be fair,’ she replied. ‘Working on your case has made me realise how easily something precious can be lost. My partner has been wanting us to go travelling before settling down and having a family. For a long time I wasn’t sure that was what I wanted, but now I am.’

  It might not have been inappropriate, but impulsively I reached out and hugged this young woman whose life I had unwittingly altered. ‘I wish you all the luck in the world,’ I said, feeling unexpectedly emotional. ‘I’m really glad everything’s worked out for you.’

  ‘I hope it does for you, too. For all of you.’

  *

  No one understood, but that was all right, because I hadn’t really expected them to. William hid his irritation well, but I could feel it seeping through the cracks in his restraint.

  ‘And the case against the clinic, are you dropping that too?’

  ‘No. Westmore Clinic was negligent and they need to answer for that. I still want you to go ahead with the claim you spoke about under the Human Rights Act.’

  William nodded and looked slightly mollified, but my only interest in the financial compensation was to pay my father back the money he’d lent me.

  My parents were disappointed by my decision, even though they spent an entire forty-five-minute telephone call assuring me that they weren’t. Only Karen applauded the decision, quite literally as a matter of fact, clapping her hands together as though I’d just won an award.

  ‘This is definitely for the best,’ she assured me, from her sun-drenched Australian garden. ‘I’m so proud of you, Beth. I know how hard this must have been for you.’

  I’d been so strong up until then, so determined not to cry, but her words dissolved my resolve as if it had never been there.

  ‘I just wanted to be a mother,’ I said sadly.

  Karen leant a little closer to her laptop screen as though those extra few inches would add emphasis to her words. ‘You already are. You’ve sacrificed what you wanted for the sake of your child. And if that’s not being a mother, then I don’t know what is.’

  29

  Izzy

  There are moments in life when your entire future changes. Like when your boyfriend unexpectedly drops to his knees outside WH Smith and asks you to marry him; or when – after years of believing it will never happen – you finally see two blue lines appear on the stick you’ve just peed on; or when your solicitor phones you up, and the first thing she says is: ‘Are you sitting down?’

  The phone was already ringing as I inserted the key in the front door. I was juggling with three bags of groceries and my handbag, and although I could see that Pete was home – his car was parked on the drive – for some reason he wasn’t answering the phone.

  ‘Hang on,’ I urged, using my shoulder to open the door and my foot to close it. I was running out of body parts to utilise, as I half stumbled over Pete’s abandoned work boots and dived for the handset before the answering machine could kick in. Floating down from the upper floor I could hear someone singing lustily – and somewhat tunelessly – along to the radio. That had to be Pete; Noah simply wasn’t capable of hitting that many wrong notes in one chorus.

  ‘Are you sitting down?’


  I recognised Frankie’s voice instantly, although admittedly it sounded considerably tighter than usual.

  ‘I’ve just walked through the front door, so no,’ I said, my heart already starting to beat just a little bit faster. It was almost as if some of my organs already knew how important the next few minutes were going to be.

  ‘I’ve been trying both of your mobiles for ages. In the end I had to call the landline.’

  I smiled. Frankie made it sound like she’d had to hop into a DeLorean and journey back to the nineties.

  I set one of the shopping bags down on the floor, noticing as I did that Pete’s phone was on the kitchen worktop, jacked up to the charger.

  ‘Sorry, I must have been in a poor signal area. What’s up?’

  ‘I hope you’re ready for this,’ Frankie said, and it was only then that I realised her own voice was shaky. My pulse rate catapulted up another ten beats a minute.

  ‘What’s happened?’

  Frankie cleared her throat, as though what she was about to say was so big it was in danger of obstructing her airway. ‘She’s dropping the case.’

  ‘I… I… What?’ It wasn’t that I hadn’t understood what I’d just been told; it was just that it was too enormous to immediately process it. No wonder she’d asked me to sit down.

  ‘Beth Brandon is dropping her legal claim for contact with Noah,’ Frankie said, enunciating every word slowly and carefully, as if I was a foreigner.

  The remaining plastic carrier bags fell from my fingers. One part of my brain watched as half a dozen oranges rolled for freedom across the wooden floor of the hallway; the other part was quite literally stunned into inactivity.

  ‘Izzy, are you still there? You’ve not passed out on me or something, have you?’

  ‘No. I’m still here,’ I whispered into the mouthpiece. My legs were like jelly and I stepped back until I could feel the treads of the staircase behind me. I sank down on them gratefully. ‘How did this happen? Why did this happen?’

  The sound of Frankie’s laughter travelled cheerfully down the phone line. ‘I’d like to say it’s because she realised I’m a shit-hot lawyer, and that they were never going to win this one in court – but the truth is, I simply don’t know. I do know that this is one hundred percent her decision. I got the distinct impression that neither William Sylvester nor Edward Patterson are exactly on board with it – but at the end of the day she’s the client, and they have to follow her instructions.’

  ‘And she really doesn’t want to be part of Noah’s life? Not in any capacity?’ I was struggling to get my head around this life-changing news.

  ‘No. For whatever reason, she has withdrawn that side of her legal action. I imagine she’ll probably still pursue her claim against the clinic, but as I’ve mentioned before, Westmore are going to want to settle with both of you out of court, so this gets you off the hook as far as media intrusion goes too. As far as you, Pete and Noah go, this is a win-win situation.’

  I’d become so used to walking in the shadows, I was finding it difficult to believe the sun had finally emerged from behind the clouds. ‘But what if she changes her mind somewhere down the line? What if she decides in the future that she does want to get to know Noah after all?’

  ‘Way ahead of you there, Izzy. I’ve already made it clear to William that we’d want a document drawn up, wherein she legally renounces this and any future claim to the embryo – to Noah,’ Frankie corrected. ‘We’ve still got the nitty-gritty details to work through, but basically this is like winning the lottery and finding a Willy Wonka Golden Ticket on the same day. This is a champagne-corks-popping moment, and to hell with what time of day it is.’

  The smile started slowly, almost as if it didn’t dare to believe the nightmare was over. It was still inching up towards my ears when Frankie spoke again. ‘Now, do you want to give Pete the news, or should I keep trying his mobile?’

  I was grinning so broadly it was actually quite difficult to speak. ‘No, that’s okay. I’ll tell him.’

  After Frankie had hung up, I stayed on the stairs for several minutes, uncaring that my frozen shopping was now beginning to defrost in the bags. Beth Brandon was about to step out of our life, as unexpectedly as she’d walked into it. I had no idea what had prompted her decision, or if anything I’d said or done had influenced her. I had no clue why she’d inexplicably changed her mind, and maybe I never would. ‘Thank you, Beth,’ I murmured into my empty hallway. ‘Thank you for giving life to our son, but even more than that, thank you for giving him back to us.’

  *

  I ran up the stairs in the way I was always telling Noah not to do – two steps at a time, my toes hardly connecting with each tread before they were flying upwards to find purchase on the next. Fortunately, Noah wasn’t home to witness the transgression. The school holidays had begun, and I remembered now that he was spending the afternoon with one of his classmates. That was probably just as well, because the jubilation coursing through me was way too big to be contained in hushed whispers. This was the kind of news that demanded to be shouted out loud.

  There were certain unwritten rules that we’d put in place since Pete had moved back into his former home. One of them involved waiting for permission outside any closed door. But today I didn’t even stop to think, let alone knock. I flung the door open so wildly I heard the handle collide damagingly against the plasterboard, marking on the wall the moment when the course of our future would once again change.

  Sheer momentum propelled me across the threshold and my excitement was so intense it actually took several seconds for me to notice that Pete was completely naked. He’d spun around at the sound of the opening door; the damp towel that he’d dropped on the carpet – some things never change – was too far out of reach to provide any cover. In those first few shocked seconds, before he reached for something to conceal his nudity, the reason I was there was momentarily shunted out of my head by several disquieting thoughts. The first was that Pete too had lost weight over the intervening months, although on him it looked good. The taut muscles of his stomach – which had never quite made it to a six-pack – were much more prominent than I remembered. The second thought was surprise at my body’s reaction to his, which jolted through me like an electrical charge.

  My brain rapidly pressed ‘reset’ and the reason I was there – the phone call with all its amazing implications – spilled from me in an incomprehensible jumble of words.

  ‘Iz, slow down. I can’t understand what you’re saying,’ Pete declared, still incongruously masking his dignity behind what I now saw was the Paddington Bear toy he’d given me on our first wedding anniversary.

  ‘Frankie called. It’s all over. She’s dropping the case.’

  Pete’s face crumpled into a frown. ‘Do you mean she’s not going to represent us anymore? Do we have to find a new lawyer?’

  I shook my head, wondering why Pete had suddenly become blurry around the edges. Happy tears were pooling in my eyes and as I shook my head they were released to trickle down my cheeks.

  ‘Not Frankie,’ I said, my voice hiccupping on a tiny sob. ‘Beth. She’s the one who’s dropping the case.’

  Pete took a small step towards me, still holding Paddington firmly in place. Witnessing the moment when the realisation dawned in his eyes was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen. No sunrise over the Grand Canyon, no Sahara sunset or night sky of Northern Lights could ever be more wondrous.

  ‘It’s over?’ he asked, his voice scarcely louder than a whisper. ‘She’s just giving up?’

  I nodded, too choked to speak, although I did notice when Paddington fell from Pete’s hand to the carpet.

  It’s impossible to say which one of us bridged the final distance between us first. I’d like to think that we both did. All I knew was that his arms were open and I fell into them, into him, as though I’d never been away.

  The warm length of his body burned through my clothes, setting me on fire as he
held me tighter than he’d ever done before.

  ‘My God, Izzy, is it really over?’ His question was murmured into the fall of my hair. ‘She’s not going to seek contact?’

  ‘No. She’s walking away,’ I replied, my words muffled, for they were spoken into the bare skin of his shoulder. He smelled of shower gel and a mixture of pheromones that were the unforgettable cocktail of him. I inhaled him secretly, storing the memory away and ignoring the warning klaxon that was beginning to sound in my head.

  Perhaps Pete heard it too, for his hold on me fell away. I took a step backwards, losing my balance as I stood squarely on the dropped bear. Pete’s arms shot out to steady me. Holding me as he was, at arms’ length, it was impossible to ignore his state of undress or his body’s surprising reaction to my proximity.

  My eyes dropped to the fallen bear, which at that moment seemed to be the safest direction to look. As I crouched to retrieve it, the humour of the situation crashed over me like a wave. Somehow, we had journeyed from Greek tragedy to French farce in the blink of an eye. ‘Well, if that doesn’t send him back to deepest darkest Peru, nothing will,’ I said, my fingers curling into the plush fur, still damp from a place it was safe to say it had never been before.

  Pete threw back his head and laughed so infectiously it was impossible not to join in. Our humour surfed a borderline between relief and hysteria. It was a much-needed physical reaction of release, and perhaps so too was what happened next.