by Karen Clarke
‘You can’t just walk into someone’s house uninvited,’ Elizabeth said, lowering Finn into his playpen.
‘But it’s not your house, is it?’ I spoke with more confidence than I felt. ‘Where’s Sophy?’
Elizabeth’s face relaxed into a smile. ‘Perhaps we’ve got off on the wrong foot,’ she said. She reached for the kettle. ‘Let me make you a coffee, and perhaps we can have a little talk.’
I stared, as she grabbed mugs and took a jar of coffee from the cupboard, spooned in granules. ‘Sugar?’
I shook my head. Wanted to say I preferred tea. But it didn’t seem important.
Once we were sitting one each side of the breakfast bar, I looked deep into the woman’s eyes, searching for who she really was.
‘I’ve got two grandsons,’ she said, as I sipped my coffee. ‘And I like to think I’m a good grandmother. I do my best. Natasha always says that.’
‘Natasha?’
‘My daughter. Dom’s sister. I don’t get to see her much, and rarely get to see Toby. That’s why it’s so good to help Sophy out. Be here for little Finn.’ She threw him a fond glance.
‘Liv?’ I looked up to see Sophy standing in the kitchen doorway. She looked so pale, her red hair falling about her face in a tangled mess.
I jumped to my feet. ‘Is everything OK?’
She looked at Elizabeth, then back at me.
‘Sophy’s not too well, are you, dear?’ Elizabeth’s words were firm.
‘What’s the time?’ Sophy glanced at her wrist, though she wasn’t wearing a watch. ‘I seem to have lost track again.’
Within moments the front door opened, and Dom’s heavy footsteps sounded oddly menacing as they carried him down the hallway. ‘What’s going on?’ he said as he entered the kitchen, looking at each of us in turn.
‘I’m going to stay for bit, darling,’ Elizabeth said, putting her mug of coffee down. She nodded to a small case propped against the wall. ‘Sophy isn’t at all well.’
‘What’s wrong?’ Dom looked over at his wife, a crease between his eyebrows.
‘I’m tired, that’s all. I’m always tired.’
‘I found Sophy asleep in the stables,’ Elizabeth said. ‘Finn left unattended.’
Dom stepped towards Sophy, his face full of anguish. ‘Is this true?’
I urged Sophy to speak up. Order Elizabeth out of her house. But she looked vacant, her eyes too big, her face sallow.
Elizabeth opened her handbag and took out her phone, tapped the screen and showed it to Dom. ‘Here,’ she said. ‘I felt awful taking it, but thought you should see for yourself how bad things are.’
He took the phone from her, his hand shaking, his eyes watering as he stared at the screen. ‘Sophy?’
A deafening silence fell, as though time had stopped, and Sophy covered her face with her hands.
Eventually Dom looked at his mother. ‘I’ll call Dad to fetch you, Mum,’ he said, handing her phone back. ‘Whatever Sophy and I are going through, we need to sort it out … just the two of us.’
‘Oh. OK. Right, no worries,’ I said, realising that meant I should leave too. My eyes met Sophy’s, as her hands dropped back to her sides. ‘If you’re sure you’re OK, Soph.’
‘She’s fine,’ Dom said, pressing his phone screen with his index finger. Elizabeth’s lips formed a thin line.
‘Well, I’ll be back in the morning, Sophy,’ I said. ‘You have my number if you need me.’
‘I said, she’s fine.’ Dom gave me a hard look, before turning his back. ‘Dad, it’s me,’ he said into the phone, and I headed for the front door, and out into the start of a downpour.
I sat for some moments in my car, watching raindrops wiggle their way down the glass, morphing into different shapes on the windscreen, my head still pounding from earlier. I felt a sudden, all-consuming, exhaustion. Maybe it was the trip into London, or the emotional roller coaster of today. Whatever it was I needed an early night.
Chapter 27
Sophy
Once Robert had picked up an unusually subdued Elizabeth and led her away, I tried to explain that the photo she’d shown him didn’t mean I was neglecting Finn, but even I had to agree the picture was damning. ‘I can’t even remember going to the stables,’ I said, hearing the desperation in my voice. ‘You have to believe me, Dom.’
‘For God’s sake, Sophy, what am I supposed to think?’ Dom’s eyes were hard and tension rippled his jaw. ‘Something could be wrong with you that’s putting our son’s life at risk.’ His words landed like punches. ‘What would have happened if Mum hadn’t been there?’ I didn’t bother to argue or mount a defence. How could I? ‘Seeing that photo … it’s really brought home how bad things are.’
We didn’t say much after that, but Dom’s tormented silence was recrimination enough as he attended to Finn, suggesting I go to bed early as though I was the child, though he told me it was because I looked ‘wrung-out’.
I didn’t mention my worries about the photo at the restaurant and whether Liv might have taken it, as well as sending me the note about his mother – the one he didn’t believe existed. I did tell him that Kim had seen the social worker, which Liv had confirmed – that she wasn’t gossiping – and promised I would call the doctor’s the following morning, but it didn’t do much to banish the by-now familiar tightness in his expression.
‘The results aren’t back yet,’ I told Dom, once I’d hung up the phone to the surgery. ‘They said to try again tomorrow.’ Making an attempt to put on a normal front, I gritted my teeth against the thudding of my head while I showered and dressed, and sang nursery rhymes to Finn as I helped him eat breakfast, gratified he didn’t seem to mind. I loaded the dishwasher while Dom circled around, looking grey with tiredness, my stomach churning like a tumble dryer. I couldn’t face coffee, so made some mint tea and toast, which Dom ate standing up, his phone in his hand. He kept glancing at it with a harried expression. It had been pinging with texts since he got up and just as the sound of the doorbell pealed through the house, he said reluctantly, ‘I’m sorry, but I have to go to the office and deal with this.’ He let Liv in, eyeing her warily as he asked her to keep an eye on me, adding sternly, ‘I’ve asked Mum to come over too. She’ll be here at ten-thirty.’ He squatted to kiss Finn and stroke his hair. ‘She wants to make sure he’s OK,’ he said, catching my expression, daring me to argue. ‘She won’t stay long.’
Once he’d left, spinning the car out of the drive like a formula one racer, Liv looked at me with raised eyebrows. ‘Do you think he’s having an affair?’
‘What?’ Shocked, I looked at her as she picked up Finn and squashed a kiss on his cheek. ‘Why do you ask?’
She looked at me over Finn’s curly head of hair. ‘Just …’ She paused, as if unsure of her response, yet I had a strong sense she knew exactly what she wanted to say. ‘The way he is with you. How he goes rushing off, even though he’s supposedly worried about you.’
‘I know I told you I was worried he’d meet someone else, but …’ I thought of the text messages I wasn’t privy to, and how Dom had just left as though he couldn’t wait to escape from me. ‘But I don’t really believe it.’ Do I? ‘He’s got a lot on at work and needs his job so he can support us. It’s important to him.’
‘I’m sure your mother-in-law would be more than happy to help out on the money front.’
Even as I registered the truth in Liv’s words, I wondered why she thought she had the right to talk the way she did. I took a deep breath. ‘Did you follow me into London the other day and take a photo of Isaac and me at the restaurant and give it to Dom?’
The little colour in Liv’s cheeks faded to white. ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’
‘So, you didn’t take a picture, print it out and give it to my husband?’ My voice sounded hard but calm.
‘Why would you think it was me?’
‘I don’t know, Liv.’ I watched her place Finn in his playpen, trying to read her body
language. Forcing mine to relax, I unfolded my arms. ‘It just seems odd that it happened right after you started coming here, and you were on a train the same day I went to meet Isaac.’ I willed her to deny it, aware she’d shown no surprise when I mentioned a photograph, almost as though she’d expected me to. ‘You tell me who would do something like that.’
Liv bit her lower lip as she faced me. ‘Someone your husband is having an affair with, to make him think you’re cheating too, so he won’t feel bad.’ Her voice crept up in pitch. ‘If he feels bad. How do you even know he’s dealing with work stuff right now?’
I put a hand to my chest and felt my heart beating fast. ‘Why are you so sure Dom’s cheating on me?’ Her face worked briefly. As the moment stretched, I had the weird feeling she held my future in her hands. ‘Liv?’
‘I just …’ She gave her hair a restless swipe. ‘I’m worried about you, that’s all.’
I was certain it wasn’t what she’d meant to say, but felt a swoop of relief all the same. For a horrible second, it had struck me that she could be the one Dom was seeing behind my back and had wangled her way into our lives deliberately. I reminded myself that Dom had promised to love me forever and had never given me any reason not to trust him. Until now.
‘My husband isn’t like that,’ I insisted. An image of Alicia Bainbridge flicked into my mind. ‘He can’t stand people who have affairs – it’s one of his things.’
Liv’s eyes narrowed, her mouth a twist of disbelief, but she merely shrugged and bent over the playpen and picked up one of Finn’s books. He slapped his thighs and gave a shriek and a gummy grin. Surely he wouldn’t be so happy to see Liv, to be in her company, if she wasn’t a good person? I thought of the note about Elizabeth and how it had vanished. Liv could have taken it while I was in London. She could have sent it. But, for some reason, I couldn’t bring myself to ask. Instead, I watched her with Finn and wished I could drop down beside her and talk to my son with the same ease that she showed as she flipped through the book, making cute animal sounds. I stayed glued to the spot, feeling redundant and slightly sick.
‘Are you feeling better today?’ She looked at me over her shoulder. ‘You seemed really out of it when I came round last night.’
I started. I’d forgotten Liv had called while Elizabeth was there. She must have seen and heard everything. ‘Why did you come round?’
‘I wondered how you’d got on at your mother-in-law’s, yesterday.’ She turned back to Finn. ‘It sounds like it didn’t go well.’
Pain pulsed behind my eyes, reminding me that a headache was never far away. ‘I don’t know what happened, but I do feel better today.’ It was true, I realised. In spite of my woolly-headedness and dry mouth, the world felt slightly more stable, colours in higher definition, as if a veil had been drawn back.
‘Actually, I didn’t feel that great when I got home.’ A frown crossed Liv’s brow. ‘I don’t even remember driving there and getting into bed. It was more like passing out than sleeping,’ she said. ‘Maybe there’s something going round.’
Her comment was oddly cheering. ‘Maybe.’
‘Hey, why don’t we go into London, see if Dom’s really at work?’
‘What?’
‘Put your mind at rest.’
Was she really suggesting following my husband, spying on him? ‘Liv, I’m not doing that.’ My breathing felt shallow. ‘Why would you—?’
‘I just thought … It doesn’t matter.’ She shook her head, her hair falling across her face so I couldn’t see her expression. ‘How about we go swimming, like you suggested yesterday?’ She rose, clutching one of Finn’s toys – a felt dinosaur Mum had sent over – and when she looked at me, her gaze was keen. ‘It would be nice to get out. I’ve got my swimming stuff in the car.’
‘I can’t.’ I tried to shrug off her first suggestion. ‘I’m worried I might pass out again.’ I wrapped my arms around my waist, a shiver rippling through me. ‘Until I have my blood test results back, I need to be careful.’
Disappointment – or maybe it was irritation – flared in Liv’s eyes. ‘OK.’ She looked at Finn. ‘Would you like me to take him out while you have a sleep, or I can just play with him down here? Maybe do a bit of housework.’ Her gaze flicked over the surfaces, which thanks to Elizabeth’s efforts weren’t too dusty, to the clothes trailing from the washing machine in the kitchen, where Dom must have pulled out a shirt last night to dry. ‘Or, we could try the soft-play centre on Granville Road. I took Evie there a couple of times and she loved it.’
‘Isn’t Finn a bit young?’
‘There’s an area specially for babies. He’ll be fine.’
‘Sure, why not.’ I was suddenly desperate to be out of the house, somewhere with life and people, where I could behave like any other mother with a baby – and a nanny. ‘I should be OK as long as I have somebody with me.’
‘Someone who’s not your mother-in-law.’
‘Exactly.’ Maybe she didn’t want me relying on Elizabeth, but it wasn’t exactly a crime. Grasping the olive branch, I smiled, feeling a stab of guilt as a memory pushed though, of Dom saying he would deal with the picture of Isaac and me, as if he knew who’d sent it. I’d completely forgotten and hadn’t had a chance to ask him about it. ‘Listen, Liv, I’m sorry I accused you just now, of taking that photo.’
She waved a dismissive hand, before bending to pick up Finn. ‘It’s fine, only natural you’d ask. It’s a pretty horrible thing to do.’
‘It’s just, with social services coming round, and then the photo, and the note warning me to watch Elizabeth—’ I kept my eyes on her face, but there wasn’t so much as a ripple ‘—it really does feel as if someone’s out to get me.’
Liv looked at Finn cuddled against her. ‘We should get ready to go,’ she said, as if I hadn’t spoken.
‘I’ll go and get changed.’ I was aware of my shapeless jumper and baggy mum-jeans, and the kink in my hair where I’d slept on it. ‘I’m not fit to be seen in public.’
Once upstairs, I tried calling Elizabeth to let her know I was going out, but the line was engaged. I left a voicemail, knowing she’d pick it up as soon as she finished her call. On impulse, I checked my emails for the attachment from Isaac, containing details of the new quiz show, but there was nothing in my inbox, or the spam folder. Perhaps he hadn’t got round to sending it. He was busy, I reminded myself, squashing a pang of disappointment. I’d check again later.
It was a fifteen-minute walk to Granville Road, the October sun warm on our backs. I was hot and bothered by the time we arrived after trotting to keep up with Liv, who didn’t seem inclined to talk as she marched along pushing Finn in his buggy. Already, I was wishing I’d gone for a sleep instead – anything to stop the stream of questions circling my mind, demanding answers I didn’t have.
When I entered the overheated building and spotted Kim with Dougie, my heart dropped, until I realised she was putting their coats on, ready to leave. I didn’t fancy another gossipy encounter.
‘I was going to suggest we keep our heads down, but looks like they’re going,’ Liv said, as I busied myself taking a twenty-pound note from my purse. ‘You take him through, I’ll pay.’ She took the note and thrust Finn’s pushchair at me. ‘You can leave it over there.’ She nodded to an area crowded with buggies, before pulling up her coat collar and hurrying to the reception. She obviously didn’t want to bump into Kim either.
‘Hey, Sophy, good to see you!’
I inwardly cringed at Kim’s greeting, busying myself with parking Finn’s pushchair while he drummed his legs and started to cry. ‘Hi,’ I mumbled, noting how calm Dougie was in his sling, his round face placid. ‘Is it very busy?’
‘Not too bad at this time of morning.’ Kim’s smile was tinged with faux-sympathy as she watched Finn flex like a fish. ‘I tend to leave before the hordes get here.’
‘Right.’ Turning from her too-bright gaze, I bent to unstrap Finn.
‘Ooh, I’ve just
seen your gorgeous husband.’
My hands stilled. ‘Sorry?’
‘Is he joining you here?’
I straightened, attempting to keep a neutral expression in spite of my racing heart. ‘He’s working, actually.’
‘Ah, so that’s why he was in that funny little café,’ she said. ‘I suppose if you have a laptop you can work anywhere these days. My hubby spends a lot of time on the golf course, closing deals.’ She gave a trilling laugh.
‘Café?’ Why was Dom in a café? Unless Kim was mistaken and she’d seen someone who looked like him, as I had the other day.
‘That awful greasy spoon on Victoria Street,’ she said, seeming not to notice I sounded baffled. ‘I don’t normally walk that way, but we were early this morning and took the long route here.’ She pulled on her woolly gloves. ‘He stood out like a sore thumb, I must say, but I suppose he won’t be bothered by anyone he knows in there. I certainly wouldn’t set foot inside.’ Another laugh, less certain this time. ‘Nice to see you out and about. I do hope you’ll make it to Mums Meet Up next week.’ Her greedy gaze scanned towards the exit. ‘No Olivia today?’
Still struggling to understand why Dom wasn’t in London, I turned. There was no sign of Liv. ‘She must be in the ladies’ room.’
‘Probably the cold weather.’ Kim gave an exaggerated shiver. ‘I can’t wait to get out to our place in Spain again. We’re thinking of spending New Year there.’ Her eyes moved to Finn. ‘Exciting that this year will be his first Christmas,’ she babbled on. ‘Not that they remember anything about it, but it’s nice for the grown-ups. I’ve already ordered a tree.’
Christmas seemed aeons away. Mum had mentioned coming over for a week. I hoped she would. I felt a longing to see her in person. ‘It will be nice.’
Sensing she wasn’t going to get a conversation out of me, Kim finally stepped past. ‘Right, we’d better get home for elevenses.’
‘Bye,’ I said weakly, watching her retreating back, Dougie’s legs bouncing either side of her waist.
