by Jill Childs
I thought at first, My God, I’m too old for this, but as my eyes started to adjust to the dark, the faces became clearer and I saw how many of the people around us were actually middle-aged or older.
The young man came back with two glasses of champagne and Matt paid at our seat with a card. He raised his glass in a toast.
‘To nights out!’
My head was already swimming with Valpolicella and I had to concentrate to wrap my clumsy fingers round the champagne flute and touch it to his without spilling it. The champagne was icy on my lips and in my throat. I took just a sip, then another, then turned back to the dance floor, focusing my eyes on a distant point as I tried to steady myself. The music throbbed inside my head.
Bubbles burst somewhere deep in my stomach and a sour trace of acid rose into my mouth. Sweat moistened my hairline. I peeled off my jacket and rolled my sleeves up. Matt drummed his fingers on the tabletop in time to the thudding music and the banging travelled along the surface and into my bones.
I tried to sit back. I wondered how soon I could ask to leave, how we could get home quickly. I thought of you. Maybe you’d woken up and were crying, calling for me, and I wouldn’t even know. Why had I had so much to drink? I shook my head and the lights flew so rapidly, I had to blink to stay upright. Perhaps it would be better if I moved, if I splashed water on my face.
I took hold of the rail that ran along the edge of the balcony and used it to hoist myself to my feet. Matt looked up and I managed a vague nod before turning and groping my way back along the narrow walkway to the entrance.
The lights in the ladies’ were dazzling after the club interior, and I stood at the sink for some time, blinking, running cold water on my wrists and dousing my face. It was a relief to escape the worst of the crashing noise. I looked ghastly, my skin sallow and my eyes unfocused.
I swayed, gripped the edge of the washbasin to stop myself from falling. Time to head home. I’d go straight back to Matt and say I was really sorry, I just didn’t feel well, it must be something I’d eaten. I nodded at my reflection and saw the pale face bob, then turned and went into a cubicle.
I sat inside with my head in my hands, trying to hold myself steady. My eyes throbbed. My hands came away slippery with sweat. I wanted the headache, the sickness, to go away and to be well again and to be with you, to hold you and see you settled in my arms, sleeping, as if you were a baby again. Safe and close.
My feet juddered on the tiled floor. I opened my eyes, braced myself against the seat and managed to get to my feet, stood for a second getting my balance before opening the door and stepping out.
Thirty-Five
The lights were strobing. The club jumped and shifted in the jerky beams. I groped my way to a handrail and stood, gripping it tightly, trying to keep my balance in the thumping music and popping light. I stared across the gyrating bodies on the dance floor. Each moment was separated, frozen. A series of photographs of raised arms, grinding torsos, locked limbs.
One revealed Matt, in the background, on his feet. I focused, trying to piece together the set of jerking pictures. He was half-turned, leaning forward, talking intently to someone. To a young woman. His body obscured her face but I caught glimpses of her curves. Tall and slim and encased like a sausage in a tight, figure-hugging sheath. Sexy.
I felt my way along the handrail towards them. The floor was sticky with spilt drinks. Matt’s body was tense as he leaned in to her. The strain showed in his hunched shoulders and the jabbing movement of his hand as he talked through the music.
I found my way across the edge of the seating. As I climbed the steps up to our seats, I lost sight of them behind a row of pillars. At the top, I turned, closer now, then stopped dead as I saw the woman’s face. Her. The last woman on earth I wanted to see. Ella.
She shifted her gaze and saw me. For a moment, our eyes locked. She didn’t have the grace to look embarrassed, just stared me down with a hostile, superior glare. I stared back and she turned away, all disdain, and began to stalk off on her high heels, this woman who had wrecked my marriage, whose dangerous driving nearly killed my daughter.
Rage took me. I broke into a messy run, banging against the backs of the seats as I closed the gap between us, reached her, grabbed her arm to swing her round to face me.
‘Why’re you here?’ I paused. ‘You followed me, didn’t you?’
Her eyes showed surprise, then became cold. She reached calmly down to prise my sweaty fingers off her sleeve, brushing away all trace of them.
‘What were you saying to him? Leave us alone. Haven’t you done enough?’ I plunged on, my mouth out of control. ‘You can’t bear to see me happy, can you? Is that it?’
She made again to turn away from me. She simply pretended she couldn’t hear me, that I didn’t exist. The more composed she looked, the more she infuriated me. I barged into her.
I called through the blast of noise from the speakers. ‘Who’s Catherine?’
She stopped in her tracks and swung round. Beneath all that make-up, her cheeks turned grey. You were right, my lovely girl. You were so right. Why did I ever doubt you?
‘So it’s true. You had a child, didn’t you?’ Every word hit home now. Each one pierced her. She couldn’t move. She stood there, rooted, and took the blows.
Matt stepped forward and put his hand on my arm. He tried to pull me away, but I threw him off. Someone else took possession of my tongue and I couldn’t have stopped if I’d wanted to.
‘Even Richard doesn’t know that, does he?’ I don’t know where the words came from. They just tumbled out, fuelled by the wine and the hate I felt for her. She was capable of anything. I just knew it. ‘What did you do to her? Did you hurt her, like you hurt Gracie? Too wrapped up in yourself to consider the safety of a poor, defenceless child?’
Her eyes were wide, staring. The emotion in them was raw but hard to read. Fear, perhaps. Or panic. Or just fury.
Her arm flashed out. She struck me hard in the chest and I tottered. The room tilted sideways and slid as I crashed, unguarded, to the floor. Pain stung the side of my face as it caught the hard edge of a chair. White shards flashed through my eyes and burst like fireworks. I groped blindly, stunned.
Matt moved quickly to stand between us, shielding me. He had his back to me but I saw her say something to him, her mouth twisted and tight. Then she bent over me. When she spoke, the words were hot against my ear.
‘You’re not fit to say her name.’
And she was gone.
Matt reached for my arm and heaved me to my feet. He looked pale. He picked up his jacket, held me upright against him and guided me slowly towards the exit.
In the taxi back home, I pressed close to him, feeling sick and grateful for the darkness. My head was spinning with alcohol and confusion. My ears still buzzed and whistled after the noise. My cheek throbbed.
‘What did she say to you?’
‘I don’t know.’ He shrugged. ‘She was drunk.’
‘Something about me?’ My mind was whirling, trying to work out what had happened. She must have seen us come in and waited her chance to approach Matt. To cause trouble. ‘What?’
‘I couldn’t even hear.’ He stroked my hand. ‘She didn’t make much sense.’ He paused. ‘Anyway, we don’t care, do we?’
I saw again the sheath dress, the heels. ‘You do realise who she is?’
He nodded, avoiding my eyes. ‘She said.’
I hesitated. ‘What’s she doing out anyway? Is Richard with her?’ My voice was rising. ‘Who’s looking after Gracie?’
Matt shook his head. ‘She was with a group of girls. Quite a rowdy crowd. A hen do, maybe.’
The taxi braked suddenly and I slipped forward, tumbled off the seat. Matt crouched down and lifted me up. His hands were strong and warm and his eyes kind.
‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘It’s my fault. You were right. We should have gone home after dinner.’
He settled me against him, his arm firmly roun
d my shoulders. The streets were crowded with young people, drinking, jostling, chatting in jumbled clusters. I wondered if you’d fallen asleep quickly and if you’d wake in the night and call out for me and if Richard had remembered the monitor.
‘Forget her. She doesn’t matter, does she?’ Matt whispered in my ear. His breath was hot. ‘We’re happy, aren’t we? We’ve found each other. Nothing can spoil that.’ His hand, resting on my arm, shifted until his fingertips stroked the curve of my breast. ‘Let’s enjoy every minute.’ His lips closed on the soft skin of my neck.
Thirty-Six
We spent Sunday morning in bed, then pottered to a local café for a fry-up. I kept my body as close to Matt’s as I could, conjoined by sex and sleepiness and the laziness of a slowly dispersing hangover.
He finally left in the afternoon and I was just sorting out the washing and putting the house straight again when you arrived home. You came tearing into the house – bear under your arm – as I opened the front door. You were on fire with excitement.
‘Mummy, Mummy, I’ve got bunk beds!’
‘Bunk beds?’ I looked back to Richard who was wiping his feet on the mat, his face turned to his shoes.
‘She’s always wanted them.’
‘I know that.’ I blinked, already cross. ‘And we always said no because they’re dangerous. What if she falls out in the middle of the night?’
‘She won’t.’ Richard shrugged, avoiding looking at me.
You skipped round the kitchen, calling out to me: ‘There’s a hidey-hole underneath the stairs! Full of toys.’
‘You should have talked to me about it first,’ I said to Richard. ‘I’m her mother.’
‘And I’m her father.’ He moved into the hall and set down your bag there. ‘It’s perfectly safe, OK? It’s got proper carpeted stairs for climbing up and down and a big lip on the top bed. She couldn’t fall out if she tried.’
We were talking in low voices and you came running back to find out what was going on.
‘Mummy!’ You stopped in your tracks, stared at my face. A red weal stretched across my cheek where I’d hit the edge of the chair. I thought I’d done a good job concealing it with make-up but you weren’t fooled for a second. ‘Was it a wolf?’
You lifted your hand and I stooped to let you touch it, tracing the lines with your finger.
‘I had a bang, Gracie. That’s all. Silly Mummy.’
You looked doubtful. ‘Will it get better?’
‘Of course it will. Now take your coat off. You can have a quick play and then it’s bath time.’ I held up my hand. ‘Five minutes.’
You disappeared into the sitting room.
When I turned back to Richard, he narrowed his eyes, looking too at my bruised cheek.
‘Your girlfriend gave me that. Did she tell you? She just happened to bump into us.’ I drew sarcastic quote marks in the air around the words ‘just happened’.
‘My fiancée.’
‘Oh, please.’
He hesitated, shuffled his feet. His brown lace-ups looked cheap compared to Matt’s shoes. I thought of him in the evenings, sitting cross-legged on the kitchen floor, surrounded by brushes and tins of polish, one hand inside a shoe and the other patiently buffing the leather.
‘Ella was very upset when she came home.’
‘She was upset?’
‘Look, I don’t know what happened—’
I opened my mouth and he held up his hand to stop me.
‘And I don’t want to know. I said the same to Ella. I’m not interested. Leave her alone, Jen. Please. This isn’t about us any more. It’s about Gracie. You two need to get along, for her sake. Alright?’
I wanted to defend myself, to point out that Ella was the one who’d bothered us, who’d gone out of her way to cause trouble, but I saw his face and swallowed it back. It wasn’t worth it. He’d never believe me anyway. I took a deep breath.
‘You told me she couldn’t have children.’
He looked taken aback. ‘What’s that got to do with it?’
I hesitated. I knew Richard and he didn’t look guilty or embarrassed. Quite the opposite, in fact. He looked indignant, as if I were the one being mean.
‘Richard.’ I didn’t know how to tell him my suspicions. ‘I think Ella had a daughter.’
‘What’re you talking about?’
‘Ask Gracie. She says she’s seen her. Ella’s daughter.’
Richard looked cross. ‘That’s ridiculous.’
I pulled a face. ‘But Gracie—’
‘What? She’s three, for god’s sake. She wants to pretend she’s got a sister. That’s all.’
I opened my mouth and closed it again. How could I tell him about the look on Ella’s face, her utter shock? About Venice and the strange giggling inside the bell tower. About the shadowy presence beside you in the mist.
He went into the sitting room to say goodbye to you, then pushed straight past me to the front door. He hesitated there and turned back.
‘I’m sorry for what happened, Jen. Believe me. I never wanted to hurt you.’ He hesitated. ‘But I’m starting to wonder if I knew you at all. I never had you down as silly. Or cruel.’
Afterwards, I joined you on the sitting room floor where you had the bricks out and were building a multi-storey garage for your cars.
‘So, sweetheart.’ I tried to join in, to win you back. ‘How was your sleepover? Did you have a nice time?’
You didn’t answer, just scrabbled through the box of bricks looking for the piece you wanted. I moved in closer and added a few bricks of my own to your wall.
‘How was Auntie Ella? Was she fun?’
You nodded without looking up.
I reached round you and kissed your hair, inhaled its fresh, lemony smell and tightened my arms in a hug.
‘Don’t, Mummy.’ You fought me off, cross. ‘I’m busy.’
Thirty-Seven
On Wednesday, the weather lifted. It was bright and typically English: warm in the sunshine, cool in the shade. When I picked you up from nursery, we headed straight to the park on the far side of the river, the sprawling one with ducks and rose gardens and zones for everyone, from the skateboarding youths you stopped to watch, eyes wide, to the dog walkers and the joggers in Lycra.
We spent an hour at the play area, on the Big Girl swings without backs, which you still tended to fall off, on the seesaw, and on your favourite, the roundabout. I ran round, turning it for you, getting dizzy and out of breath, as you beamed.
We ate ham and cream cheese sandwiches on a bench by the river and counted boats. Small racing yachts with white sails. Rowers, schoolboys mostly, wrenching their way in packs against the tide. The strains of the cox’s voice, made monstrous by a megaphone, bounced across the water like skimmed stones. A police launch bounced at speed through them all and made waves that tipped and tossed the sailing boats, the rowers and made us laugh.
You pushed down from the bench after a while and took the remains of your last sandwich to the rail along the steep embankment to the river below. You threw bits of bread, aiming at the stray ducks below on the water but attracting a sudden swirl of seagulls who made a cloud round your head and frightened you into dropping the lot.
‘London seagulls,’ I said. ‘Cheeky.’
I pulled out an apple, polished it on my trousers and bit into it. The gulls moved on and you wandered along the rail, a hand trailing on the bar, looking down at the river. You looked suddenly old in your cream coat, a proper child now, lost in your own thoughts. A girl, already growing away from me and getting ready for school. I tried to imagine dropping you off at the school gates and walking back to an empty house. I sucked juice from the apple and chewed. Richard was right. I’d be ready to go back to work by then. I needed to get earning again and, besides, I’d need to fill my days and not just count the hours until I could be there at the school gates, looking for you.
I closed my eyes and saw Richard there, standing so awkwardly in the sitting r
oom we’d furnished together, as a couple, all those years ago. The same sitting room where we had fallen asleep, slumped against each other, a thousand times. Where I’d nursed you, stroking your downy head with the tip of a finger, utterly content, feeling as if I had at last joined the human race, joined the cycle of life. Matt was right. It was time to move on. Let him marry her, if that’s what he wanted. He could find out the hard way what she really was.
Ella was brassy. I thought of her tarty dress at the club. She couldn’t bear to see people happy. She was that kind of person. Destructive. She’d taken Richard from me. He was so naïve when it came to women. He couldn’t understand why she and I hated each other. I knew what she was up to. She wanted to drive a wedge between me and Matt, if she could. Well, she couldn’t.
I thought of Venice and the smell of the salt air from the Lagoon and the firmness of his body as he reached for me. I missed him, now, sitting here in the sunshine, more than ever. He’d done so much for me, for us. It was a miracle that he’d walked into our lives the way he did.
Someone passed, walking a panting dog, and blocked the sun for a moment. I opened my eyes, looked for you. The rail stretched along the edge of the path, empty. I pushed the last sandwiches back into my bag and got to my feet. No sign of you, no flash of cream coat, of shoes with light-up heels.
I took a step to the rail, half-smiling at myself for worrying. Of course you were there. I’d see you any minute. You were testing me again, making a point about how grown-up you were, how independent. You never went far.
I stood at the rail, the peeling paint pricking my fingers, and scanned the river below, fearing you’d somehow climbed or fallen through. No cream coat. I started to walk down the path.
‘Gracie!’
You liked hide-and-seek. Maybe that was it. I peered into the bushes along the verge, green and full-leaved now.
‘Where are you?’ I tried to make my voice a sing-song, to keep it a game. A bush stirred and I spun round, ready to smile, ready to see your face, laughing at me. A large dog, collar jangling, sniffing as it ran out onto the path.
