Estelle smiled and shook her head. ‘There, you see? That’s what I mean about it being the best and worst. Heavens, I still worry about my children and two of them are grandparents! But although they look after me,’ she rested her dry, cool hand on my arm, ‘you all do; you’re all so very good to me – they don’t ask for my opinion or advice any more; if something goes wrong, instead of asking me what they should do about it, they hide it from me so I shan’t worry.’ She tutted and took another sip of her coffee, and a little of it ran down her chin but she didn’t notice.
‘But that’s because we love you. Of course we don’t want you to worry.’ But she was right; we kept things from her that maybe we shouldn’t.
‘Of course, dear, I know why it happens – it’s the natural order of things. But that’s what I mean about the balance altering. When they’re young, we care for our children, we protect them and we pass our wisdom on to them; in return, they adore us and look up to us; we are the very centre of their world. But gradually the way it works changes; our children start caring for us, taking responsibility and protecting us. And then we realise we have no more wisdom to pass on because the world has changed and our wisdom is out of date. And then they have their own babies, and we realise that our children are now the ones who must pass down wisdom and be looked up to and adored, and we, sadly, are slowly fading from the picture, making way for the next in line.’ She sighed a little shakily. ‘Goodness, whatever’s the matter with me. I’m becoming all maudlin, and we haven’t even had a sherry yet.’
*
When I got home, Duncan was standing in the hallway with the phone in his hand and a slightly perturbed look on his face. He smiled when he saw me, and nodded towards the handset. ‘That was another one. Another funny phone call. You haven’t got yourself a secret lover, have you?’ he said affably. ‘You know, “if a man answers, hang up”?’
‘Did you do 1471?’ I tried to sound light, but I realised that there was an edge to my voice.
He shrugged, then picked up the handset again and punched in the numbers. ‘Hmm, withheld number.’
I felt my blood cool.
CHAPTER SEVEN
On Sunday afternoon, we were getting ready to head off to the woods for a walk with Monty. I tried to persuade Hannah to join us but Marcus had taken Toby out so she was going to go back to bed for a while. Her voice sounded dull and flat; she hadn’t been herself at all since Toby arrived. I’d always assumed she’d take motherhood in her stride. So had she, I think; my poor Hannah. I’d seen a lot of tired new mothers, but I’d begun to wonder if it might be more than that.
I was trying to tie the laces of my walking boots when a violent surge of nausea rose up inside me. I sat back heavily on the stairs; I could see slivers of light shooting downwards at the edge of my vision.
‘Darling, are you all right?’ Duncan was at my side in an instant. ‘You’ve gone grey.’
It took me a moment to answer because I was concentrating on not throwing up. ‘I’ll be all right in a minute. I think it’s a migraine tuning up. Could you grab my pills.’
He put his hand on my forehead, like I used to do with Hannah when she was little and I was checking for a fever. ‘I didn’t know you still got migraines.’
‘I haven’t had one for ages. I don’t know why it should start again now.’
Duncan handed me a pink pill and a glass of water. Usually, that was enough to stop it, but if the pink pill didn’t do the trick, I had to take one of the yellow ones.
Monty was walking round and round in circles, his claws click-clicking on the wooden floor. Duncan hadn’t put his boots on yet and was standing there in his socks, looking concerned.
‘I’d better stay here,’ I said. ‘You go ahead. I just need to lie down for a while.’
Duncan looked at me for a moment. ‘You sure you’ll be all right?’ Again he rested his palm on my forehead and it was so soothing, I wished he could keep it there.
‘I’ll be fine. Hopefully it won’t get a grip. A couple of hours lying down in a darkened room’ll sort me out.’
Monty started to make impatient little noises. ‘Okay, fella.’ Duncan picked up the lead and Monty began leaping up to try and catch it in his mouth. Then he started jumping in ecstatic circles until Duncan told him firmly to ‘sit!’ which he did instantly, tail thumping the floor, mouth open and smiling as he looked excitedly from one to the other of us. Duncan caught hold of his collar and clipped his lead on, at which point Monty almost pulled him off his feet in the rush to get to the door.
I stayed where I was until the front door closed behind them and silence settled around me. Then I turned and climbed the stairs slowly, on my hands and knees. I couldn’t move too fast because I could sense rather than feel the actual headache, there on the edge of my brain, poised like a predator ready to strike. I felt as though I was pitched against it, that if I could just crawl into bed without making any sudden movements I might avoid its wrath, but if I tilted the thing into action, it would attack, knives slashing at my head without mercy.
In the bedroom, I turned back the duvet then lowered my head carefully onto the pillow and shut my eyes. Little pinpricks of light popped and fizzled around the edge of my vision, even though my eyes were closed, and the nausea rose and fell, rose and fell. I lay there, motionless, grateful for the thickness of the curtains and the stillness of the afternoon, willing the pills to kick in. So far, I still wasn’t feeling actual pain, but the tentacles were sliding ever nearer and I tried not to think about the possibility of a disabling three-dayer.
I wasn’t sure how long I’d been lying there when the phone went, each ring jabbing into my poor fragile brain. I lay still and tense, willing it to stop and trying to remember how many times it would ring before the voicemail kicked in. When it stopped, the silence sort of twinkled for a moment, and I felt my body relax. The phone rang again almost immediately, causing my body to tense and the nausea to start swirling inside me. I held my breath and counted the rings, six, seven, eight. Then blissful silence, but only for a few seconds before it started again. Slowly, I levered myself up using my elbow. The room was darker than before, but it wasn’t completely dark outside yet, which meant Duncan hadn’t been out for long. Maybe something was wrong. The ringing stopped again, and this time I simply braced myself for it to resume, cursing the fact that I hadn’t brought the handset from downstairs and put it next to the bed. A sequence of pictures flashed though my head: Hannah had collapsed with an unknown illness; the baby wasn’t breathing; Duncan had had a heart attack or slipped on the ice and broken his leg; Monty had chased a squirrel into the road and been run over. Sure enough, the ringing started again. Still moving slowly, I swung my legs round and put my feet on the floor, then I stood up and walked across the room.
‘Hello?’ I was aware that my voice sounded anxious. Duncan was always telling me off about it. He said I always sounded like I was expecting bad news.
‘Jo?’
I froze. No one had called me by that name for over thirty years. My fingers gripped the phone more tightly as another thick wave of nausea swayed inside me. I wanted to hang up but I was paralysed. I wasn’t sure if I was going to be sick or if I was going to faint, but right at that moment I felt very, very ill, like I might die. I leant back against the wall as my knees buckled and I allowed myself to sink down onto the carpet.
‘Jo?’ he said again. ‘Look, I know you’re there.’
I recognised his voice, even though it sounded softer, weaker than I remembered. So it was him I saw in Marks & Spencer’s that day.
‘Listen, please don’t be scared. I know your husband has gone out—’
I hit the End call burton and slammed the handset into its cradle, the sudden movement sending a missile of pain deep into my skull. He must have been watching the house. Oh dear God, why? What did he want? I sat there on the landing with the warm carpet thick and comforting beneath me and I put my hands out to steady myself as though I was on a b
oat that might tip me into the freezing water at any moment. I could feel my heart thudding and panic rising in my throat. The phone rang again. I stared at it until it stopped, eight rings. But then it rang again, and again. I could have unplugged the main phone downstairs, but something told me he wasn’t going to give up, and if he knew where I lived . . . On the next ring, I picked up.
‘Don’t hang up,’ he said. ‘Please, Jo. We have to talk.’ He sounded desperate.
‘We can’t talk,’ I said. ‘Ever.’ And I was about to hang up again when he said, ‘Jo, for God’s sake listen.’
‘That’s not my name,’ I breathed. ‘You know it isn’t.’
‘You might have to get used to it again,’ he said.
‘Wha—’
‘Look, I need to see you. I have something to say and I need to say it in person. When can we meet?’
‘Scott, we can’t meet. We agreed when you left. I have a husband; I have a completely new life. I thought you did, too. I thought you were in New Zealand.’
‘I did; I was. But I’ve been back in the UK for a few years now. I was in London for a while, but now . . . Jo, I’m dying.’
I half laughed. It was the sort of thing he’d have said when he’d wanted one of us to roll him a joint or make him some tea.
‘I mean it. I’m ill; cancer. There’s a tumour in my stomach and there’s nothing more they can do. I have a few months at most, maybe less.’
I was listening now, of course I was. He wouldn’t lie about such a thing, would he? The pain throbbed behind my eye as I tried to guess what this meant. He’d sworn he would never . . . but if he was dying . . .
‘Jo? Are you still there?’
‘Scott, I’m sorry, but we agreed, no contact, no matter what—’
‘I know that’s what we agreed, but things change, Jo, and anyway—’
‘Don’t keep calling me that.’
‘And anyway, that’s not what I want to see you about. Listen, he’ll be back soon, your husband.’
I felt the anger rise in my throat. I wanted to scream at him but my head would explode if I shouted so I tried to control my voice. ‘You’ve been following me around the town and now you’re watching my house? You’re stalking me? Look, Scott, I’m sorry if your life hasn’t worked out—’
‘I’m not quite dead yet.’
‘I didn’t mean that. I meant, look, I’ve made a good life for Hannah. Duncan has been a good father to her, and you . . . you said . . .’ I could feel my voice rising and I had to make a conscious effort not to lose control, not to scream and shout and cry. ‘You said you wouldn’t do this. You swore you’d never contact us – Tell her I’m dead, you said. The only reason I didn’t is because she’d have probably wanted to see your grave.’ A big boulder of pain rolled to the front of my head with a thud.
‘I know.’ He spoke quietly, calmly. ‘But things are different now. When can we meet? Do you have a free day this week? Or an afternoon?’
‘No. I’m not meeting you. You have to go away; you have to leave me alone.’
‘Or what? You’ll call the police?’ There was a silence that felt full up, like swollen black clouds before a thunderstorm. ‘Jo.’ His voice was gentle, almost tender. ‘I’m sorry, but I’m not going to let this go.’
I was still hanging on to the carpet as though I might fall off the landing into thin air. Neither of us said anything, but I could sense him there on the other end of the line, waiting. After a few more seconds of silence, I realised why he was waiting so patiently – it was because he knew there was nothing I could do; that I really didn’t have any choice. ‘All right,’ I said, and as I spoke, I felt a sudden stab of vulnerability, as though I’d just unleashed something destructive and must now brace myself for the consequences. I took a breath and tried to steady my voice. ‘I suppose I could meet you at lunchtime on Wednesday, or any time on Friday – I’m off work then, anyway.’
‘Friday’s cool. As long as you don’t have anything else to do in the afternoon, because I think you’re going to need some time to yourself afterwards. You’ll want some time to think.’
‘Scott, I’m sorry you’re ill.’ I paused. He was only a few years older than me; early fifties at most. And the last time I’d seen him – well, apart from when I saw him in town before Christmas – he’d looked so strong, so alive. ‘I mean,’ I said more softly, ‘I really am sorry. But can’t you just tell me what this is about?’
‘Not on the phone, not when your husband’s due back any minute. Trust me.’
‘Oh, for heaven’s sake. All right. Make it Friday morning.’
‘Okay. And listen, we’d better swap mobile numbers – I’m guessing you’d rather keep this between us for the time being?’
My instinct was to refuse but on the other hand I didn’t want him calling the house again, so I gave him my number and wrote his on a Post-it note which I peeled off and put in my pocket.
‘Cool. I’ll meet you at ten. There’s a church I go to sometimes—’
‘A church? Which—’
‘I’ll text you the address. See you at ten, and Jo, if you don’t turn up, well, as I say, I’m not letting this go. It’s in your interests to hear what I have to say. See you there.’
And he rang off .
CHAPTER EIGHT
I found myself looking at the phone as if there was some answer hidden in there somewhere. Finally, I replaced it in its holder and walked carefully back into the bedroom. The migraine was kicking in properly now, flashing lights and all. I sank down against the cool pillows and closed my eyes. It hurt to think, but my mind wouldn’t be still. What on earth could it be that he couldn’t tell me on the phone? ‘Oh God,’ I murmured aloud, but the effort of making a sound called up another bombardment of pain, so I said it in my head: Oh God oh God oh God. I raised myself up on one arm and shifted my body so that I could bury my face in the pillow but the pain sliced behind my eyes again. Just then I heard Duncan’s key in the door, followed by the sound of Monty’s lead being hung up and then his claws on the kitchen floor as he trotted over to his water bowl. I heard Duncan coming softly up the stairs. He paused at the bedroom door. I realised I was holding my breath. After a few seconds, he whispered, ‘Are you awake?’
For a moment, I considered pretending to be asleep, but then I raised my hand slowly and waved. Duncan came over and sat on the bed, gently pulling the duvet back so he could see my face. ‘How are you feeling?’ he said. ‘You still look rough.’
‘Awful,’ I whispered. ‘It’s a bad one.’
‘Right, you stay there. Can I bring you anything? Pills? Tea? Water?’
‘Water, please, and could you bring me the yellow pills.’
‘Oh dear. That bad?’ He kissed me on the top of the head, covered me up with the duvet again and went downstairs. For a moment, I was overcome with longing for my mother. Not as she was at the end, but as she’d been when I was little and I had mumps or measles or something, and she’d sit by my bed, tucking the duvet around me, stroking my hair and making sure I was comfortable. I sighed and closed my eyes again. I tried to empty my mind by picturing Scott and then drawing a black velvet curtain across the image so that there was nothing there but blackness. But then I remembered it was Eve who taught me how to do that, so then of course I started thinking about him again.
*
On Thursday night, I couldn’t sleep. The shock of Scott’s call had faded a little, but now, knowing it was Friday tomorrow, it was all coming back. I’d been in a state all day. This morning I took the toast out of the toaster and put it in the dishwasher instead of on a plate, and I was so distracted at work that the poor woman I was talking to actually asked me if I was all right, when she was the one whose child had just been diagnosed with leukaemia. This evening, Duncan caught me checking out of the window to see if Scott was watching the house. ‘What you looking at?’ he said, sliding his arm around my waist as he stood behind me. ‘Or are we being nosy neighbours?’
&
nbsp; But there had been no sign and apart from sending the address of the church by text, he hadn’t been in touch again either. I looked at the numbers on the digital clock; it was almost two, and the alarm was set for seven, so even if I went to sleep within the next half-hour . . . Oh, stop it, I told myself; watching the clock like this only made insomnia worse.
I kept wondering what would happen if I didn’t turn up, but then I remembered how desperate Scott had sounded and how he’d laboured the point that he wasn’t going to let this go, whatever it was. As I lay there in the darkness, I kept turning it over in my mind. My first thought had been that he was going to demand to see Hannah, but if that was it, why wouldn’t he have just said so? And would he bother to talk to me about it first anyway? He’d managed to find me easily enough, so I was sure he could find Hannah. Maybe he just wanted to know what I’d told her about him? Duncan snored softly and turned onto his side, facing me. I tried to put Scott out of my head as I moved closer to Duncan and curled into his warmth. Duncan had always made me feel safe. He slipped his arm around me without waking, and amazingly, I drifted into sleep.
In the morning, I felt calmer. Somehow, I’d managed to convince myself that I’d misunderstood, or misinterpreted, and that it was a simple matter of him wanting to leave Hannah something in his will. He may not even want to see her. Perhaps he didn’t want to storm into my life and wreck everything after all. Bright winter sunshine streamed into the kitchen as I sat, still in my dressing gown, drinking coffee, as Duncan got ready to leave for work. ‘What are you going to do with your day off, then?’ he said, after he kissed me goodbye.
‘I thought I’d go into town, have a wander round the shops.’ I did plan to do this while I was there, so I wasn’t lying. ‘And it’s a lovely day, so if it’s not icy I might put Monty in the car and have a drive out to the moors for a walk.’
‘That’ll be nice,’ Duncan said, and I could see that he was thinking the same thing – the same thing we always say, that we should drive out there more often; to the moors, to the hills; we live so close to the Peak District and yet we hardly ever take advantage of it. The last time we’d been out there together must have been months ago. In fact, it must have been in the spring, because I remembered the moors had been covered with heather in various shades of pink, lilac and purple. We’d held hands as we stood looking at the view across the valley. Monty was sniffing around in the undergrowth and the sun was beginning to set, casting a golden glow over the fields. ‘I know we always say this,’ Duncan said, and then I joined in so we spoke in unison, ‘but we really should do this more often.’ We both laughed, and then I found myself thinking about a colleague whose husband had just died of a heart attack at the age of forty-two. ‘Yes, we should make the most of every day, shouldn’t we?’ I’d said. ‘You never know what’s going to happen; when things are going to change.’
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