The Missing Husband

by Amanda Brooke

  Realising it was an argument she wasn’t going to win, Jo retreated into the corners of her mind and followed her mum’s instructions. She put on her coat but her hands were shaking too badly to zip it up. Refusing to ask for help, she left it gaping while her mum opened the door.

  ‘Ready?’ Liz said all too brightly. Archie was in his pram and she was waiting for Jo to push it outside.

  Jo’s tongue was glued to the top of her mouth and she struggled at first to speak. ‘I can’t do it,’ she tried again.

  ‘Oh, for goodness’ sake, Jo,’ Liz said, showing the first signs that her patience was as limited now as it always had been. She herded Jo towards the pram and then out through the door as if she were a sheepdog and Jo a nervous sheep. ‘Come on.’

  Jo held on to the pram with a death grip. Her eyes were cast down as she moved forwards, concentrating on putting one foot in front of the other, pushing the pram across the threshold, then walking down the path and eventually stepping on to the pavement. The air was cold and damp but Jo’s lungs burned with each breath she fought for.

  She tried to reason with herself. There was nothing she could think of to justify such an intense reaction. So what if David tumbled out of the shadows? While she could accept that he still had the capacity to hurt her emotionally, she wasn’t in mortal danger so why was her body reacting as if she was? She slowed down almost to a stop when she realized what it was that was terrifying her. While she could rationalize her fears, her body had a mind of its own and was preparing for an attack of a different kind, the kind that would leave her struggling to breathe and paralysed with fear. Her body began to tense as she put all her energy into fighting off the next panic attack that would strike at any moment.

  Another clash of wills ensued when Liz noticed Jo dawdling and yanked the pram from her rigid fingers. ‘Hurry up or the shops will be closed at this rate.’

  As her mum strode off down Beaumont Avenue, the gap between them lengthened but Jo was so absorbed in taking in enough oxygen to stop herself from fainting that she failed to notice. Slowly but surely her confidence began to grow and she thought she might be winning this latest battle. She didn’t look up except to cross busy roads and refused to glance behind her. She kept her gaze fixed on the ground immediately to the front and refused to give in to the feeling that she was being followed. She was so consumed by controlling her emotions that it was her subconscious that reacted to her surroundings first. Her head snapped up and she stumbled over her own feet as she came to an abrupt halt.

  Liz had taken them along a route that led past West Allerton Station and Jo found herself staring down the overgrown entrance of the shortcut that led back home. An image flashed across her mind of David slipping off down the path to shave off a few precious minutes from the final leg of his journey home from Leeds, his head bowed against the bitter wind, bare branches creaking overhead as he muttered to himself, still angry with Jo for not giving him a lift that morning, perhaps angry with himself for refusing her offer to pick him up that night. It was a false memory, but one Jo had become intimately familiar with, except it always dissolved when she tried to recreate that exact moment when David had the epiphany that would change both their lives for ever. Try as she might, Jo couldn’t imagine what had made him emerge from the shadows as the kind of man who could abandon his pregnant wife. What had happened to transform him from the man Jo’s heart still yearned for, into the person in the grainy image she had seen withdrawing money from a cash machine?

  ‘Jo, hurry up!’ called Liz who had only just noticed that her daughter wasn’t keeping up.

  Jo’s eyes darted first towards her mother and then back to the path. The sudden rush of adrenalin made her gasp. Had it been shadows dancing beneath swaying boughs or had she caught a glimpse of a figure darting behind a tree? Jo’s feet began to move before she had a chance to have first, let alone second thoughts. Luckily she was wearing trainers and put them to good use as she entered the path at breakneck speed. Brambles snagged and pulled at her coat, the material tearing when she refused to slow. But she wasn’t pregnant any more and she didn’t have the baby with her. Nothing could hold her back.

  Despite her determination to face her tormentor head on, Jo couldn’t catch up to the elusive shadow. She kept glancing down as she went as if expecting David to have left a trail, perhaps torn pieces of their son’s birth certificate. There were no such signs and soon she was struggling to suck enough air into her burning lungs to keep up with her exertions and was forced to come to a stop at the clearing where the boys had been playing football. She took a good look around as she caught her breath. The place appeared to be deserted and the only sound came from the trees shuddering in the breeze.

  ‘I’m here David, and I’m on my own,’ she said between gasps. ‘Come out and face me. Tell me why you walked out on me. Tell me why you took the birth certificate.’ Her voice was growing louder and stronger. ‘Are you such a coward that you can’t look me in the eye and tell me why you hate me so much?’

  A huge oak on the other side of the fence creaked in response, and Jo’s gaze flickered feverishly around the clearing without resting on anything. Her eyes strained for even the briefest glimpse of her husband but it was her mind that created a vision of David striding away from her, dipping from view as the path curved. The sight was enough to break her spirit.

  ‘No, don’t leave me!’ she cried and set off again at full pelt. If only she could run fast enough she would catch him up. She would talk to him, persuade him it was going to be all right and they could somehow get back to where they were. She pushed herself harder and in no time at all she reached the other end of the path where, rather than emerging two streets from home, she prepared to burst out into a parallel world – the one that had seduced David away from his wife. She could imagine that sense of euphoria as she fell into his arms and as she lurched into the road, her own were raised to meet him.

  But of course, he wasn’t there and Jo might just as well have run off a cliff. She was freefalling, her arms flailing as she crumpled to her knees.

  ‘Sweet Jesus, are you all right, love?’ an elderly gent asked. His dog whined anxiously and sniffed the strange woman kneeling on the pavement in front of him gasping for air.

  Jo had her head in her hands and refused to look up, too intent on watching light and dark spots dance across her closed lids while she waited for her racing heart to slow.

  ‘Can I call someone for you?’ the man tried again.

  Jo shook her head. Her chest heaved as she tried to speak but couldn’t. Despite the panic still coursing through her veins there was room for an equally familiar emotion: humiliation. She attempted to get to her feet but her jelly legs weren’t up to the task. When she eventually managed to stand with a little perseverance and a lot of help from her Good Samaritan, the overwhelming need to flee had left her but she remained desperate to get away and to get home.

  ‘I only … live … down there,’ she stammered. ‘I’ll … be … fine.’

  ‘You don’t look like you can take another step, love.’

  She didn’t have the breath to argue with the man but she tried her best to smile. ‘Honestly. Thank you,’ she said, sending him away, but both he and his dog kept glancing back down the road after they left.

  On the short journey home, Jo formed an image of the black-and-white facade of her beautiful house in her mind, leaving no room for any other thoughts such as who might have receded back into the shadows to watch her. It was only when her fingers wrapped tightly around the familiar contours of the wrought iron gate that she had the courage to look up. She had reached her sanctuary and her eyes travelled along the path, right up to the front door, which for once she was prepared to open without hesitation.

  As her body recovered from its self-made storm, Jo imagined standing where she was on a blustery night in October. Was this where David had considered his options and chosen the brutality of the autumn gales rather than the uncertain w
elcome that awaited him inside? Had thoughts of his unstable and neurotic wife made him turn around and run? Jo couldn’t blame him and turned as if she too could walk away from her miserable life, but there was a pram blocking her way.

  There was no strength in Jo for flight but she still had some fight in her. ‘You shouldn’t have made me do it! You have no idea how screwed up I am but then you never did, did you, Mum? Why should now be any different?’

  Rather than argue on the doorstep, Liz said, ‘Let’s get you into the house.’ Her lip trembled and she looked as close to tears as her daughter.

  Not a word was said while Liz bundled mother and baby into the house, guiding Jo down the hall and into the dining room where she sat her down and poured a glass of water. In the hall where they had left him, Archie started to complain. Jo looked to her mother.

  ‘Don’t worry, I’ll see to him,’ she said.

  Jo’s eyes flickered an acknowledgement as her mum slipped out of the room but then her gaze settled on one of the kitchen cupboards, its turquoise door gleaming with promise. When her mum returned with a bleary-eyed Archie in her arms, Jo was standing with a box of pills in her hand.

  ‘Are they the antidepressants?’

  Jo nodded. ‘I was just … I thought … I don’t want to take them, Mum. I want to deal with this on my own.’

  ‘You’re not on your own.’

  ‘Aren’t I?’ Jo asked and then, presuming her mum wouldn’t recognize the jibe, she added, ‘And I don’t mean because David isn’t here.’

  Liz didn’t answer immediately but opened the door of the cupboard that Jo had removed the pills from. Leaving that one ajar, she went to the next cupboard and then the next until every door and drawer was open wide, their neatly stacked and ordered contents on display in all their symmetrical glory. ‘Do you think I hadn’t noticed?’ she said. ‘Do you think I don’t remember this from before?’

  Jo was surprised her mum had actually noticed, then or now. The ‘before’ Liz was referring to had been when Jo had her first anxiety attacks. Steph had been away at university and their dad was spending so much time on the road sourcing antiques that he was scarcely home either. Liz was left to look after her teenage daughter and run her husband’s shop in Liverpool and for a while they had made quite a team. That had all changed when Jo had her heart broken in more ways than one while attempting to traverse that difficult terrain between childhood and adulthood.

  She had been about Lauren’s age when her first boyfriend had dumped her and she had sought solace in the nooks and crannies of her parents’ antique shop, creating order out of a world she couldn’t yet fathom. Jo had always assumed that her mother hadn’t noticed how obsessively neat and tidy the shop was becoming, she had seemed happy enough that her daughter was keeping out of trouble and that had included not troubling her.

  At the time, Liz had been spending longer in the travel agent’s next door than was entirely appropriate, certainly for a married woman whose husband was away on business. And when she wasn’t next door, the over-attentive travel agent was in her shop. Jo had discovered their dirty little secret when she turned up early after school one day and found them together in a less-than-chaste embrace. Liz’s response had been to dismiss Jo’s accusations and ignore the chaos it created in her daughter’s mind. She had taken Jo to the doctor’s when she had complained of chest pains, but as far as Jo was aware, Liz had refused to connect her daughter’s illusory illness or her penchant for order with her emotional state. But here her mother was now, recognising that Jo’s obsessions were out of the norm, not just now but back then too.

  ‘You knew I was suffering and you just let me get on with it? Is that the kind of support I can expect from you now?’ Jo asked, raising her voice enough to startle the baby.

  ‘I know I didn’t get you the help you needed, but in fairness, Jo, you didn’t make it easy. You wouldn’t talk to me! I didn’t know what was wrong with you, not really, and neither did the doctor. He told me he thought you were attention-seeking.’

  Jo was squeezing the box in her hand so hard that the top popped open and the sleeve of pills poked out. ‘I didn’t know what was wrong with me either. I didn’t know I was having anxiety attacks, I thought I was dying! I wasn’t looking for attention, I was looking for help!’

  Liz pursed her lips. ‘If you want me to say it was all my fault, then fine, I take full responsibility.’

  The brief burst of anger had drained Jo. She shook her head and her next words came out as sobs. ‘No, I don’t want you to say it’s your fault. I just need you to realize that I’m broken, Mum and I want you to help fix me. And for the record, changing the locks on the doors isn’t going to be enough, not by a long shot.’

  As Archie settled back to sleep in the crook of her arm, Liz closed all the cupboards before stepping close enough to put her hand on Jo’s damp cheek. ‘I will admit I thought I could come here and all I’d have to do was tell you to pull your socks up,’ she said gently.

  ‘I think that’s what you said last time,’ Jo offered but it failed to raise a smile from either of them.

  ‘You scared me today, Jo – and I mean, really scared me.’

  Jo had to swallow hard to hold back the tsunami of emotions that had been gathering momentum over many months. She wasn’t ready to talk about her growing obsession that David was lurking nearby, nor could she explain why that idea should fill her with such terror every time she tried to leave the house, but she could make a start. When she spoke, it was the barest whisper. ‘I’m scared too, Mum. I’ve already lost David and now it looks like I’m losing everything else, including my mind. I don’t want to feel like this any more. Please, Mum, tell me what to do.’

  ‘Will those help, do you think?’ Liz said, looking at the crumpled box in Jo’s hand.

  Jo dropped the box on to the counter. ‘I don’t know. Maybe, if all else fails …’

  ‘But not yet?’

  Jo nodded.

  ‘OK, then. We’ll see how we get on, and when I say we, I mean we. I’ll stay as long as you need me, Joanne, and I won’t leave until I know you’re OK.’

  ‘Do you need me to help plan your escape?’ Heather whispered.

  She hadn’t seen Jo for almost two weeks, having been sold the same line as everyone else to keep away in case she picked up the virus. Taking her life in her hands by calling in on her way home from work one Friday night, she wasn’t surprised to find her friend tucked up in a duvet on the sofa but she hadn’t expected her mum to be mollycoddling her.

  ‘She’s been looking after me,’ Jo explained. ‘I’ve needed her.’

  Heather put a hand over Jo’s brow. ‘As I suspected, you’re still feverish.’

  ‘Maybe,’ Jo said, laughing softly.

  ‘What’s going on, Jo?’

  Jo’s smile softened. She wanted to explain everything that had been happening but for the moment she was happy to leave the past behind her. She might only be taking baby steps, but at least they were in the right direction and she didn’t want to look back. Despite being sceptical about her mum’s approach to her problems, changing the locks on the doors had actually helped. It had given Jo a returning sense of control in her life, albeit with Liz riding shotgun every time she left the house. ‘I’m getting better, is what’s going on.’

  ‘She’s had a tough few weeks,’ Liz said, arriving in the living room, laden with all the post that Jo had neatly arranged in order of envelope size and colour but had yet to open.

  ‘I’d say she’s had a tough few months,’ Heather added. She was looking curiously at Jo and then at Liz, as if listening for the first time to the things that weren’t being said. ‘Are you sure it was a bug?’

  Jo smiled. ‘If I was a celebrity, they’d call it exhaustion.’

  ‘Just wait until you get back to work, then you’ll know what exhaustion is,’ Heather joked, only seeing the warning look from Liz too late. She grimaced. ‘Although you’ve got ages yet.’

&nb
sp; ‘I’m due back on 10 March, which is less than a month away,’ Jo said glumly.

  ‘But she can take longer if she needs to,’ Liz added.

  ‘I’ve already agreed the date with Gary and I can’t afford not to go back then. You know that, Mum.’

  Liz sucked air through her teeth. ‘Gary’s told her that they’ve permanently filled David’s old job,’ she said, still speaking to Heather. ‘Even if he did show up now, he wouldn’t be able to give her any financial support.’

  ‘So no more talk of me taking any longer off work,’ Jo said. ‘I need to stay focused. I have bills to pay.’

  They all looked at the pile of unopened envelopes Liz had in her hand.

  ‘That’s what dads are for,’ Liz said, only just stopping herself from glancing over to Archie who was sleeping nearby in his bassinet when she realized her faux pas. ‘If you need a little extra help to see you through the next few years then we’ll remortgage the house if we have to. I don’t want you worrying about money on top of everything else.’

  The tears that had sprung to Liz’s eyes made Jo feel warm and weepy. This was the kind of mum she had always wanted. ‘It won’t come to that,’ Jo told her. ‘I am getting better. Give me a few more days and I’ll be behaving as rationally as the next person.’

  Heather looked quizzical. ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘I think it would be a good idea if you tell Heather what’s been going on. As much as I’d love to, I can’t stay here for ever and when I do eventually go back home I need to know that you have a strong support network in place.’

  ‘OK, but can you explain?’ Jo said.

  Liz nodded but before she said anything she heaved the pile of post she was balancing on her lap over to Jo. ‘I’ll do the talking while you do the sorting. There’s mail in there that’s been hanging around for weeks.’

  Jo obediently went through the post one letter at a time as Liz proceeded to tell an increasingly dismayed Heather how her best friend had been unravelling before her eyes without her noticing. Liz threw in her own diagnoses along the way, Jo had a little agoraphobia, a little OCD and maybe even a touch of postnatal depression for good measure despite what the doctor had said. Jo didn’t think she had a ‘little’ of anything, just an irrational fear of what might be waiting for her outside the front door coupled with the real fear that it would bring on another panic attack. But she kept quiet. She wasn’t interested in dwelling on those thoughts right now; all she wanted was to get better.