Criss Cross: Friendship can be murder

by Caron Allan

  Secondly, when I think of how much Thomas and I wanted a baby, and it never happened, and I think of how many doctors we saw, how many tests we underwent, of the hormone treatments, the poking, the prodding, the anguish of failure of each passing month—and now, completely by accident, unplanned, with no difficulties, no intervention, no treatment, here I am, up the duff! Bloody robust working-class genes.

  What the hell am I going to say to Matt? And how the hell are we going to break the news to Lill, and to Sid???? OMG!!!!!!

  God, that bloody little cat again, I’m sure it’s Bingley, it’s the tabby one. He’s such a little rogue. My curtains will be completely shredded by the time he goes to his new home. Must find out from Lill how soon that is likely to be.

  Anyway, so I’m completely freaking out. I don’t know what the hell I‘m going to do, and I’ve got no one I can talk to about it. I mean, this is DEFINITELY not one for Jess.

  I mean, if it was just me, I’d be thrilled, and whenever I stop panicking and just enjoy the enormous secret, I’m so excited and happy.

  I’m pretty sure Lill will be over the moon, to use her own favourite phrase. And I think Sid will be too. And I know they will fuss over me and take care of me. I mean, just look at the way our vet—before he retired to Antigua—look at the way he was called out morning, noon and night just for a bloody cat.

  Though come to think of it, cats probably rate a lot higher with Lill than humans, but even so, her own grandbaby. And Sid will just keep shaking my hand and telling me that he is chuffed. He is a brick, and I’ve got no qualms there.

  But how will Matt react? Will he be angry? Will he try to make me get rid of it? What if he hates the idea? What if he thinks I somehow tried to trap him into something?

  OMG my thoughts are just such a whirl of confusion. I’m just not getting anywhere!

  Mon 17 June—3.30pm

  Had a quick chat with Lill this morning re the kittens.

  Theoretically they should be going to new homes quite soon. In practice, I suspect she is trying to wangle them a longer stay with us. Bingley and Darcy are a pair of little fiends, into everything and I’ve lost count of the number of time I’ve had to rescue them from difficulties. They’re always balancing precariously on top of a bush or halfway up a curtain or stranded on a high shelf with no visible means of how they got there to begin with. Never knew cats could be such fun. That Darcy is the image of Twinkle—so I suppose with hindsight I realise that the fight in the shrubbery that day was not exactly that, after all!

  On the other hand, Jane is a boring, well-behaved, cautious little thing, always perfectly clean and tidy and just where you left her. Lizzie isn’t much better, she is something of a tomboy, getting into small amounts of mischief, chiefly things like running up the nearest human leg and using the resultant human shoulder as a launch pad to higher things. But her mischief is nothing to that of the boys!

  But although Lill has her contact in the village post office who has promised to broker a deal between us and a farmer’s wife in respect of Jane and Lizzie, there appears to have been no success whatever in getting Bingley and Darcy adopted.

  I am convinced Lill has no intention of letting them go, and she is probably making no attempt whatsoever to find them new homes. In fact I would not be the slightest bit surprised to find that she is making sure all offers for them never reach my ears.

  And even Sid and Matt are smitten with the furry little gits; I’m always happening upon one or other of ‘the boys’ scratching and tickling and playing with one or other of the ‘babies’. And most sickening of all is the way they talk baby talk to them if they think no one else is around!

  Can’t help wondering how everyone is going to react when I make my announcement.

  Have decided I’ve no choice but to face up to the situation—or at least, start to face up to the situation. I’ve got a doctor’s appointment tomorrow. This is not likely to go unremarked, as I’m not the sort of person to be constantly at the doctor’s.

  Quite scared about the fact that soon I’m going to have to tell the Hopkins’s. But, however much I try to pretend, this is not something that is going to go away.

  Had a call from Jess and Murdo, was I planning on coming up this August 12th? She phrased it a lot more delicately than that. But she wasn’t surprised when I declined. Have promised to go up at the end of September, it’ll be all nice and autumnal, and I won’t be there like Banquo’s ghost, ruining the shooting party for them. I think she was quite happy with that. Feel a bit bad not telling her my news, but frankly, I’m dreading her reaction. Anyway, I can’t tell her before I’ve told Matt.

  Also, in my mind, getting past that terrible date is key to getting over losing Thomas. It’s the anniversary, looming like a horrid black deadline on the horizon, and I feel that once I get past that date, things will be a bit easier, like getting past Christmas, and Thomas’ birthday. It’s taken me a while to allow myself the possibility of having a life without feeling guilty and treacherous. I mean, it’s not like I’ve stopped missing him, that couldn’t happen. But I’ve got used to the fact that he is gone and it’s okay for me to carry on, and now I realise I can do things differently if I wish, I don’t have to confine myself to doing what Thomas would have wanted to do. Just as well, really, considering this thing with Matt and the baby and everything. I tell myself Thomas would have been pleased for me. He might not approve of my choice, but he would have wanted me to be happy. So, happiness is what I’m going to try to aim for, if at all possible.

  It feels a bit weird to say that. It feels a bit awful too. But my mind keeps telling me this is the right way to deal with everything. Because now there’s a baby to think about, and there’s Matt—well, there’s sort of Matt.

  Which brings me back to what I was talking about earlier…OMG what am I going to do? Is it best just to blurt it out over dinner, tell them all together, get it over with? Or should I take him to one side with a quick ‘could I have a moment with you in private?’ Which will raise expectations and eyebrows and ensure everyone’s attention is firmly focussed in my direction.

  Huff. Just don’t know what to do. Maybe he’ll just somehow be around, and I’ll be around, and no one else will be around and so I can nab him and quickly get it off my chest????

  Then wait for the fireworks, I imagine.

  Oh God, what if he hates me? Suppose it’s a total disaster. What if he, and Lill and Sid, and Tetley and Bingley and Darcy all up and leave me, and it’s just me and my poor little baby all alone in this big house like Lady Catherine de Bourgh and her useless daughter?

  Same day: 6pm

  I can’t believe it. After all my anxiety about how to broach the subject, how he’d react, how Lill and Sid would react…

  I went into the kitchen at about four o’clock in search of an afternoon cuppa. And there he was, my knight in stolen armour, clearing up cat sick from under the table, bum uppermost, and he didn’t hear me come in, and jumped half out of his skin when I spoke and banged his head on the table, dropping the cloth and kneeling on it at the same time, all in one smooth move.

  What a guy!

  Obviously the language that accompanied this event was not exactly Shakespeare.

  He got up, rubbed ineffectually at the sicky-damp patch on his jeans and glared at me.

  ‘What the hell are you trying to do?’ he snarled.

  ‘I’m pregnant!’ I said, and burst into tears. And at that moment Lill and Sid walked in from the garden carrying siege-quantities of cat food.

  ‘What?’ He looked at me. Sid and Lill, open-mouthed, looked at both of us.

  ‘I’m pregnant,’ I said again, but now it wasn’t exactly the perfect moment I had been waiting for.

  Lill gasped, dropped her bag of Kitty Snax and clapped her hands to her mouth in shock. Sid said something colourful along the lines of ‘Fuck me!’ then apologised profusely.

  And Matt swept me into his arms.

  This was a huge relief
. He seemed to be pleased. I thought he was pleased. Was he pleased? Just to be certain I said, ‘You are pleased, aren’t you?’

  He looked at me and I could see his eyes were full of tears. He nodded, and gripping me close to him in his arms, he grumbled, ‘Yes, Cressida, of course I’m fucking pleased.’

  And he buried his face in my hair and held me, saying nothing more.

  Of course, it was next to impossible to have a proper discussion about it with Lill all teary and happy, and she kept hugging me and saying things like ‘Bless you, dear,’ and ‘Oh thank you, thank you.’

  It was all very moving but more than I could cope with and I had the urge to get away so I said I was a bit tired—that useful catch-all stand-by for the pregnant woman—and went back upstairs.

  And now I’ve got to get ready to go for dinner with some people in the village—newly met—the Maxwell-Billings—and even though it isn’t very far, Sid insists on driving me.

  Tues 18 June—10.45am

  ‘Goodnight, Gorgeous.’

  That was what he said to me outside the front door last night.

  He came in Sid’s place to collect me from the Maxwell-Billings. I was tempted to sit in the back and let him be the chauffeur proper, but in the end I schmoozed into the front seat next to him. He drove slowly, then when we got back to the house, we sat in the car for a good hour, although in fact we said very little.

  I said something needy and pathetic like, ‘So you’re okay about the baby, then?’

  At the same time he said, ‘So how was your dinner?’

  I told him dinner had been fine, the M-Bs seem very nice. And then he said,

  ‘Yes, Cressida, I’m ‘okay’ about the baby. More than okay as a matter of fact. But, where does that leave us?’

  I said I didn’t know. Suddenly I felt very small and miserable. His hand came out and covered mine, and it was warm and reassuring. He asked a few things like due dates and so on, and I told him I wasn’t seeing the doctor until this afternoon but that I think the baby will be due about end of Jan, beginning of Feb. I think he’s a bit worried I’m just imagining it all now he knows I haven’t yet got any medical backing for my outrageous claim. Never mind.

  And whilst we sat there, I expected we would have a long conversation about our feelings for one another and our relationship and everything, but in the end, he simply said,

  ‘Did you see anything of Monica while you were away?’

  It caught me off guard. Surely he didn’t still have feelings for her?

  ‘Just wondered if you’d decided against bumping her off, that’s all,’ he added.

  Ah.

  I told him about my little field trip to her house late at night, and about the ethylene glycol and the lack of events resulting from its deployment. He nodded in the dark.

  ‘Ah well, disappointing,’ he said. And that was it. He kissed me on the cheek and dashed round to open the door for me. Conversation terminated at 00.26 hrs.

  ‘I’ll get the car put away for the night then. Goodnight Gorgeous.’

  That was it.

  After a few seconds of standing on the drive like the last kipper at breakfast, I went in and went to bed.

  That man is a moron.

  Same day: 4.15pm

  Just got back from the doctor. I was booked straight in to the ante-natal clinic. I assumed they would want to do their own pregnancy test, but apparently there’s no need, she said the tests you can buy in the chemist are every bit as reliable as their clinic’s own.

  Anyway, nice chat etc all okay. Now have a schedule of visits and appointments to make and will be hearing shortly from the rather nice private hospital where I have elected to have the baby. So feel like I’ve got an ‘official’ seal of pregnancy which will no doubt please ‘Himself’ who clearly thinks I am not capable of knowing whether or not I’m pregnant. Must write my due-date on the calendar—Sunday 2nd February 2014. Plus or minus two weeks, apparently.

  Same day: 9.45pm

  Today has simply dragged by. And talk about a let-down. Lill has been busy all day with cleaning and cat-sitting, and she’s been on the phone to prospective adopters.

  Sid and Matt have been out all day. I’ve been on my own virtually the whole day. Feel a bit neglected and sorry for myself. And bored.

  Got a postcard today from Mother in Switzerland. No indication she’s has met a poorly millionaire, but you never know. Just a quick note about how nice it was to have a proper chat and that they were having a nice quiet time, and she would phone me again soon.

  Speaking of phoning, I phoned Madison Maxwell-Billings to say thank you for the lovely dinner, and we had a nice chat. She’s very pleasant but we’re just not on quite the same wavelength. I think we will be friends but never exactly bosom-buddies. And she’s all for doing the church flowers and holding charity lunches. That’s just not me.

  I wandered down to the village church on the way home from the doctor’s this afternoon. It’s quite pretty, and old, one of those typical village churches built about 800 years ago and patched up once Henry VIII was safely dead and not likely to bash it about again. It might do for our baby’s christening next year.

  Sat 22 June—9.30am

  I don’t know why I’m surprised.

  Have just come back from the kitchen. Lill is in floods of tears due to Jane and Lizzie being adopted today by a friend of the farmer’s wife. Bingley and Darcy are wandering around in a pathetic little daze, mewing for their siblings, and Tetley is prowling the house and gardens in search of her lost babies. It’s just like a crisis centre for the homeless.

  I’m still not too sure that it wasn’t all an elaborate plot to weaken my resolve. No sooner had I said the words, ‘Perhaps we ought not worry about finding homes for Bingley and his little bro…’ than Lill was out of her seat like a greyhound out of the stalls and enveloping me in one of her surprisingly strong housekeeper’s hugs.

  ‘Oh thank you, thank you! I was so hoping you’d say that. It’s almost too good to be true. With the baby as well,’ she added, as an after-thought.

  Oh God, now what have I done?

  But it has been another dull day. Must try to think of something to do to make the time go by more quickly. But somehow I had foolishly imagined I would see something of the father of my child, that somehow we’d be able to develop a relationship.

  But as always, he’s been out all day. Where the hell does he go?

  Same day: 4.45pm

  I wandered into the kitchen earlier for a cuppa. Sid was outside doing something manly with a hammer and some wood. Lill was busy getting together her baking bits and pieces—she’s making me a birthday cake! But she sat down with me at the kitchen table. Bingley was trying to eat the leg of my chair and Darcy was asleep in the middle of the table. I made some remark to Lill about Matt’s strange absences. She gave me one of those knowing looks, and then cleared her throat as if she’d made up her mind to tell me something. Felt a vague sense of dread.

  ‘He visits his son,’ she said. I gaped at her, goosebumps coming out all over my arms. ‘I told him he should tell you—you’ve got a right to know. Now you’re—you know,’ she nodded towards me.

  ‘Pregnant?’

  ‘Involved, I was going to say.’ She sipped her tea and I stared at the floor, the tiles swimming before my eyes. She patted my hand.

  ‘It’s all right, Cressida, there’s nothing going on with him and his Ex. He hates her. But he loves the little boy, obviously, and that’s why he’s spending time with the little chap when she’s at work, and he’s doing everything he can to keep out of trouble and sort himself out. He wants to get custody of the little boy. Her new fella’s not a very nice bloke from the sound of it. Matt says little Patrick’s not being looked after proper, but these things take time, and the little one’s not in any actual danger, Matt doesn’t think.’ She looked down at her skirt, biting her trembling lip. ‘He’s a lovely little boy,’ she said. ‘He’s not quite four and he can write hi
s letters and count and all sorts. And his lovely blond hair, he’s the spit of Matt when he was little.’

  And on she talked. She found a few photos and showed me them. He did look like a little sweetie, if a bit pinched-looking in the face, and a bit small for his age. Didn’t have the happy, well-cared for look of a normal pre-schooler. I felt a surge of maternal dismay when I saw how thin he was. I groaned inwardly. Another one or possibly two to go on my new hit-list. First Desmond, and now this ‘Ex’ of Matt’s, Tracey. And in all probability her new ‘Fella’ too. Not only that, but continuing the trend that began first with Sid, then the cat, then Matt, it sounded as if once again my household was about to expand. It sounded as if little Patrick should be brought home to us as soon as possible. Once again, my mind is a whirl of thoughts and feelings and images.

  As I got up from the table, I patted her hand.

  ‘Don’t worry,’ I said. ‘There’s plenty of room here for one more. I’ll talk to Matt.’

  For once Lill had nothing to say, but it was all there in her glistening eyes. She reached for her phone and began to text.

  Sun 23 June—10.30pm

  Just got the strangest text from Matt. All it said was,

  ‘Criss Cross Cress.’ And two kisses.

  Does this mean what I think it means? I mean, we’ve talked about it. And he knows what I want to do, what I’m thinking and what I’ve been planning for my ‘best pal’. He knows this is the same message, or near enough, that Monica sent to me. So I can only think it means…He must have done it! He knew it would make my day, that it would be the perfect birthday gift, and he no doubt wanted to prove his love to me. What a wonderful man! Oh the relief—to think she’s actually gone from my life. It’s all over. I can’t get over it, it’s just wonderful!