Years After You

by Woolf, Emma

  Her emotions about the baby were complex too. She was surprised how calm she’d been thus far. Within their family, Olivia was the drama queen, with her endless romantic entanglements, dramatic break-ups, getting sacked from jobs—everything in Olivia’s life was a fertile opportunity for a crisis. Now it was Lily with all the drama, and she was quietly baffled where it had all come from. Should she be reacting differently, she wondered, having some kind of breakdown? Maybe it was just that dealing with Harry’s death was so damn tiring.

  It wasn’t straightforward, though. Sometimes she would feel calm all day, and then suddenly find herself gripped by a tidal wave of fear. Mostly she felt very tender towards this unborn baby, grateful to Harry for leaving something behind. It was his unintended legacy, a way for her to hold on to him. He wasn’t completely gone and she wasn’t totally alone. Then at other times she felt angry with him for being irresponsible, immature, feckless. She would throw all the cruellest accusations she could think of at him, a middle-aged man acting like a teenager, thinking only of himself and his desires, taking for granted his comfortable lifestyle and swanky car, the high-paid directorship. He had a wife providing for him when he bothered to go home, two sons waiting for their dad, and yet he wanted a pretty young girlfriend too, handy with her London flat near the office. Trying to buy her affection with his cash? Who the hell did he think he was? And then, after screwing things up for everyone else, he decided it was too much for him, and checked out of life, leaving her to deal with the consequences.

  This anger was unworthy and unfair, Lily knew that. Whether it was due to pregnancy hormones or simply the jagged, uneven process of bereavement, she tried not to dwell on it. She hoped that if Harry could hear her, he forgave her for the nasty thoughts she sometimes had.

  That brief trip to the coast was a frightening blur. She simply left London after work without telling anyone, stayed in a room above a pub for one night, walked along the coast for an entire day. She switched her phone off and had some pretty dark thoughts. Was she going to follow Harry into oblivion? If it had just been her own life, she might have considered it. But she wasn’t alone any more.

  Whether it was a sense of responsibility to the baby, her family, or just a life-force, Lily would afterwards never know. She spent hours walking along those cliffs, walking to be closer to Harry, but not to the very edge. Something pulled her through. Coming home, she’d gone straight to Cassie and Charlie’s flat, knowing she would be welcome. She spent a few days there being looked after. For the first time since Harry’s death, Lily allowed herself to fall apart a little, and it was a relief.

  “It’s OK, Mum, she’s here.” Cassie kept her voice low even though Lily wasn’t in the room. “She arrived about an hour ago, she seems tired and confused, but she’s fine and she’s safe.”

  “Oh, thank goodness.” Celia sounded close to tears. “Did she say anything? Where’s she been? What’s she’s been doing?”

  “She hasn’t said much, just that she went somewhere on the coast where she and Harry used to go. I haven’t asked too much yet. I’m running her a bath, and she’s agreed to stay here for a day or two. Depending on how she’s feeling, I could bring her round tomorrow.”

  “Yes, darling, do. Come for lunch tomorrow, just the two of you, if Lily’s up to it. I know it’s only been a day or so, but I’ve been so worried about her. After everything that’s happened, I had this terrible dread she might . . . well, you know what I mean.”

  “Of course. I had the same dread, that she might disappear or do something drastic.” The bathroom door opened, and Cassie saw her sister going into the spare room next door. “Anyway, Mum, I’ll call you first thing in the morning and let you know. Lots of love.”

  She gave Lily a few minutes and then made two large mugs of Ovaltine. She tapped gently on the door of the spare room and found her sister sitting on the bed, still wrapped in a large bathrobe, her hair twisted up in a towel.

  “I made us both a bedtime drink.” She set one of the mugs down on the bedside table.

  “Ovaltine! I haven’t had this in years, Cass—is this what you and Charlie drink these days?” Lily teased.

  “You see what a sad married couple we’ve become! Although if you want something stronger, I can put of a slug of whisky in this?”

  “Actually, no, this is delicious.” Lily took a sip, thinking how long it would be until she could drink whisky again. She needed to tell her sister.

  “Here, and this.” Cassie put down a small bar of Dairy Milk beside the mug. “You didn’t join us for dinner, and you need to keep your strength up.”

  “Aha!” Lily tore open the bar and bit into it. “Now this is exactly what I need.”

  Cassie looked pleased. “I wanted to make you hot chocolate, but we don’t have any, so I thought Ovaltine and chocolate would be the next best thing.” She was relieved to see Lily. It had been the briefest of absences—barely thirty-six hours—but she and her mother had instantly feared the worst. Silence fell between them.

  “I have this memory,” Cassie said hesitantly. “I don’t know if you remember it too. When we were young, like really small kids, Dad used to take us to Primrose Hill every winter—maybe it was just one winter, I don’t know—but I remember snowball fights and building snowmen and sledging down the hill on trays.

  “After Primrose Hill, he’d take us to this café, and I’m certain it was in England’s Lane. I don’t think it’s there any more—probably replaced by a gluten-free bakery or an estate agent’s—but it can’t have been far from your flat. We’d take off our woolly hats and scarves and gloves, and Dad would buy us these huge mugs of hot chocolate topped with cream and marshmallows. It was sheer bliss!”

  Lily listened eagerly, clinging to Cassie’s words for a clue, desperate to dredge up some remnant of those precious times but finding a blank. Like all children who have almost no memories of their father, she was desperate to remember something too.

  “Oh, Cass. I don’t remember any of that. I wish I could. Imagine, hot chocolate in a café with our dad!” She smiled, but a sad smile. “I’m so glad it was on England’s Lane, though . . . You’ll have to show me where it was next time you come over.”

  Cassie smiled. “And what about you?” She wasn’t going to mention Harry, but she wanted to know what was going on in Lily’s head.

  Lily took a deep breath. “Cass, there’s something I need to tell you.” Her voice was more serious than she intended, but she went on: “You know me and Harry? Well, since he died, I’ve realised that we made a mistake. Not a mistake exactly, but something happened . . . Anyway, I’m pretty sure I’m pregnant.” She smiled, simply, and gestured her arms out to the sides, feeling silly at the dramatic announcement. It was like proposing to someone, she supposed, no matter how you said it: “I’m having a baby” or “Will you marry me?” The words made you sound like a character in a soap opera.

  Cassie looked stunned: if Lily had wanted a big reaction, here it was. “Lil, are you sure? I mean, that’s amazing, amazing news—are you OK, are you happy?” She threw her arms around her sister, then drew away, worried at Lily’s silence. “Seriously, are you OK?”

  Until this point, Lily had been keeping herself relatively together. She hadn’t cried for over a week. But with the relief of telling someone, and Cass hugging her and showing concern, she found she was smiling and crying at the same time. They both were.

  “Yes, I’m OK! I haven’t really thought it through . . . I think I’m fine . . . a bit scared, but mostly happy.” She paused. “I mean, I don’t have any plans, I don’t know what I’ll do about work or money or being a single mum—haven’t got a clue, actually—but I guess we’ll be OK.”

  At that “we,” Cassie let out a shriek of excitement and grabbed Lily for another hug. “No worrying allowed. I’ll help you make plans, don’t even think about it yet. You’ve got ages.” Then she realised she didn’t know how long, and looked closely at Lily. “
How many weeks are you—when’s the baby due, do you know? Listen to us, I can’t even believe we’re talking about you having a baby!”

  “I’m not sure exactly,” Lily admitted. “I haven’t done a test. I’m just over twelve weeks I think. I know when it happened . . . In fact, it was the last time before Harry died.” She smiled. “We were careless.”

  “And it’s definitely Harry’s?”

  Lily smiled. “I told you, Cass, there hasn’t been anyone else. It’s a hundred per cent Harry’s baby. If I’m actually pregnant, that is.”

  “You don’t know for sure—you haven’t checked?” Cassie, who loved a project, sprang into action. “Right, you need to do a test. We could go to the all-night pharmacy in Victoria now?” Lily shook her head, it was far too late. “OK—but let’s get a test first thing tomorrow morning. Once we know for sure, we can work things out from there. Have you told Mum yet?”

  Cassie dragged Lily off to buy a pregnancy test straight after breakfast. The digital display showed that she was eleven to twelve weeks pregnant, “which sounds about right,” Lily said, working backwards to a certain careless weekend in August with Harry. Next they rang Celia, inviting themselves to lunch. “We have news!”

  Lily was relieved that Cass was involved now; she’d been drifting, unsure what to do. She watched from a distance as her sister made plans, feeling slightly swept away by it all. Cass rang their doctor and secured Lily an appointment for the following day, as well as a date for her twelve-week scan and a “booking-in” date with the midwife, and then drove her to their mother’s house in Hampstead.

  Any niggling worries Lily had about Celia’s reaction disappeared as soon as she told her, as they sat with bowls of pasta in the kitchen. This wasn’t the 1950s, for goodness’ sake; had she seriously thought that her mother would disapprove? In fact, Celia was over the moon. Like Cassie, she launched into the practicalities with gusto: “So you’re eleven or twelve weeks now? Let’s see, November, December . . .” She counted off the months on her fingers. “A May baby? Oh, Lily, how wonderful. You funny thing, keeping it a secret. How long have you known?” Celia adored babies and was relishing the prospect of her first grandchild.

  With four grown-up children, Celia might have expected to be a grandmother sooner, but they had all taken their time settling down. Cassie was still the only one who was married. James lived with Su-Ki at her flat in West Hampstead, and Olivia was perpetually on and off with her Italian boyfriend Giovanni. Before Harry, Lily had usually had a steady boyfriend, and in the last two years they had accepted the older, married Harry too—he’d come to a few family parties, the odd birthday meal, and everyone liked him. But now Lily was having his baby, and he was gone.

  All things considered, Celia was taking it very well. Like Cassie, she seemed genuinely excited. After they finished lunch, she sprang up from the kitchen table. “Come upstairs, both of you, I’ve got some wonderful things to show you.”

  From her bedroom, she disappeared into the huge dressing room and emerged with an armful of her old maternity dresses, some beautiful, hippy-style smocks. They were genuine vintage pieces, delicate cottons and silks, mostly midnight blues and forest greens, all embroidered by Celia herself. She held up a wine-red burgundy dress: “I made this one when we were travelling through Morocco. I was pregnant with you, Cass; it was fiendishly hot and I needed something loose.”

  Both Lily and Cassie were trying the dresses and smock tops on over their jeans, amazed at their mother’s skill. “I can’t believe you actually made these, Mum!” Cassie said, twirling around in front of a long mirror. “How come no one ever taught me to sew? This stuff is gorgeous, not like maternity clothes at all. Oh, look at this one.” she slipped on a purple dress stitched across the bodice with tiny grapes. “Lil, if you don’t want it, I’ll definitely borrow it.”

  It was strange to be trying on maternity clothes when Lily’s stomach was as flat as Cassie’s—at three months there was still no sign of a bump. And she couldn’t imagine it happening any time soon. Everything over the past few months had been strange, and she was still taking it in.

  When they said they had “news,” Lily was pretty sure her mum was expecting Cassie to announce she was pregnant. After all, she was the oldest daughter, and everyone knew that she and Charlie were planning to have a family soon. Lily wondered privately if this was OK with Cass, her leapfrogging the queue with a baby. She felt sad for her sister, and grateful for her support.

  * * *

  What an evening. A memorial service for Harry with his work colleagues, with cocktails and canapés, speeches and a violin quartet. It was beautifully done, in one of the old guildhalls in the city of London, but God I’m glad it’s over.

  On the train home now, writing this on my tablet. How did he do this every day, twice a day? This journey, I mean: the dirty trains, the fight for a seat, car parks at one end, Tube lines the other. In all those years, I never realised how exhausting it must have been.

  Polly offered to come with me, but I said I was fine going alone. I’m getting used to it. The boys were invited, of course, but they were reluctant, and I didn’t want to force the issue. They barely knew Harry’s colleagues, and it’s a school night, and anyway I think they’re still in shock from the funeral. All three of us are. You think you understand what death means, but you don’t until it happens. This is our reality now, this is what Harry’s death means: he hasn’t come home and he never will. I’m still really up and down. I have entire days where I think I’m coping just fine, and then the tiniest thing—the way Dan laughs, the expression on Joe’s face, or just a song on the radio—makes me fall apart. Some people have been brilliant, my parents, Poll especially, but most of the time I feel like a social leper. At the school gates, those mums who avoid me, pretend they haven’t seen me, look away or don’t know what to say. It’s been over three months now, and I’m just about functioning, getting dressed and driving my boys to school, so why the hell can’t they treat me like I’m still a human being? No one invites me to the café any more, no one invites me to their dinner parties or picnics. I know, I know, a single woman is inconvenient, a widow is an embarrassment, but honestly, bereavement is not a contagious disease.

  But a couple of the older women from my book group have been very kind, and also some of the men from the tennis club. They invite me round for lunch or a drink and let me just talk, or not talk, about Harry. About the shock, the grief, the numbness. The anger. My feelings are so up and down.

  She wasn’t there tonight. I made sure Colin understood from the very start, since he insisted on organising this memorial, that I wouldn’t go if Lily was going to be there. I wasn’t having her at the funeral, and I wasn’t having her at the memorial. I’m not sure whether I hate her (can you hate someone you don’t even know?) or just envy her for having been loved by my husband.

  Some days I hate him, other days I find myself wrapped in one of his sweaters, weeping with tenderness and love. He lied and cheated and made some terrible decisions, and he’s wrecked our lives, but he also brought us so much happiness.

  But is it all her fault? We’d had some bad patches over the years, all marriages do, but it was when he met her that everything started spiralling out of control. I don’t know who to hate, or who to forgive, I just know I’m tired and a bit drunk and really fucking lonely. No husband to collect me from the train station, no one to curl up with tonight. One thing’s for sure: if it wasn’t for Lily, Harry would still be alive.

  Once Lily had told Cassie and Celia about the baby, they persuaded her to take a few weeks off work: she had accrued a lot of holiday anyway, and the office was quiet at that time of year. Just before Christmas, Colin had held a formal memorial service for Harry, to which Lily was conspicuously not invited, but heard about from her colleagues. Obviously she was aware that it was for Harry’s wife, and she wouldn’t have gone anyway, but she was relieved to be away from the office during that time.

/>   And it was good to finally stop working and take stock. Cassie came and spent a few nights at her flat in England’s Lane; they took long walks on the Heath, did some yoga classes, talked and shopped and cooked—and it helped.

  But still, life wasn’t simple. A week after Christmas Day, the next hurdle came around: New Year’s Eve. Lily spent the day with Cassie and Olivia, bargain-hunting in the pre-January sales. They returned to Cassie’s flat for hot chocolate and leftover Christmas cake, and began preparing for the festivities. Olivia was going to a New Year party later on, and Cassie and Charlie were having a group of friends over for dinner. Lily watched Olivia getting ready, and helped Cassie make an apple crumble for dessert, but she’d decided not to join them, despite their insistence. She simply wasn’t in the mood. It had been comforting to celebrate Christmas with her family, but she felt too raw for New Year’s Eve. It was not quite four months since Harry had died, and she was still adjusting to this new, emptier world.

  Lily escaped around six p.m. despite her sister’s repeated invitations to dinner, and promised to ring if she changed her mind. Even though Cassie didn’t want her to be on her own, Lily knew that she understood.

  Coming out of the Tube station, she drifted around the shops in Belsize Park, vaguely thinking she might cook. She bought some food and a good bottle of wine, a white Burgundy—Harry’s favourite—although even as she bought it, she knew she wouldn’t open it. A small glass would be fine and wouldn’t harm the baby, the midwife had told her, but she hadn’t felt like alcohol for months. She walked home along England’s Lane, passing noisy pubs and restaurants, hearing the music spilling out, dodging the gaggles of revellers who’d started early, feeling removed from it all.

  Lady Archer was away with friends at a country house party, so the house was blessedly silent. Lily desperately needed to be alone. Still, she smiled to find a luxurious bottle of sparkling elderflower champagne and a card propped up against her front door: Happy New Year Lily! Non-alco bubbly to put some fizz in your celebrations . . . Susan x