The Shadow Year

by Hannah Richell

  She’d leaned out over the jetty and stared down into the lake. On the surface she’d seen her own mirror image gazing back at her, no longer the unmarked face of her youth but a middle-aged woman with a fretwork of fine lines around her eyes and the first grey hairs beginning to emerge through the hair dye. But the longer she had peered at her reflection, the more clearly she had seen not just her own reflection, but rather her dark and troubled soul. Simon was gone . . . Lila now a grown woman . . . and the truth – or a shadow of it at least – was out there now, shared and made real. She had told a story as clear and transparent as the shallows closer to shore, and yet at its heart, just like the lake and just like her own soul, lay a dark and murky truth that she knew could never be revealed. She’d rewritten the story as best she could.

  Kat stands in the shadows of the copse and shivers. She sees Lila reach out for William’s hand and squeeze it tight and the sight of their physical connection only serves to remind Kat of her own separation. She swallows down her loneliness and sinks onto the woodland floor, kneeling among the damp leaves and mulch as she watches from the woods.

  Last month, after she’d left the jetty, she had joined Mac – or rather William – as if by some unspoken agreement at the foot of Freya’s unmarked grave. There they’d stood and for just a moment neither of them had said anything. She’d known they were both remembering, both mourning. ‘Lila’s a great girl,’ he’d said to her eventually, not looking at her. ‘Freya would have been so proud.’

  ‘Yes,’ Kat had agreed, trying to control the sob threatening to break free.

  William had scraped the grass with the toe of his boot and she had allowed herself a small smile then, remembering it as a gesture of his from many years ago. ‘Were you happy with him, Kat?’ he’d asked her. ‘Was it the life you wanted?’

  She’d heard the judgement in his voice and shrugged. Was she happy with Simon? What a complicated question. How strange that everyone seemed so preoccupied, suddenly, with the intricacies of her marriage. First Lila, then William. Was it the life she wanted? Well that was the easier question to answer. Of course it was the life she wanted. Simon and Lila – they were a proper family – the thing she had always wanted most of all. For all their ups and downs, for the sacrifices she’d had to make in her own life, her own stalled career, she had been careful never to repeat the mistakes of her parents. Lila was always safe, always loved, always cared for. Of that she could be proud. ‘Yes,’ she’d told William, standing there beside Freya’s grave, ‘it was the life I wanted.’

  What she hadn’t told him though, what she hadn’t felt able to speak of, was the terrible price that family had come at. She’d always known that Simon would never truly be hers. She hadn’t been so foolish as to assume one gold wedding band would make the difference. It didn’t make him want her any more than he had during that year at the cottage. But he would never leave her, she knew that, because she had given herself to him at the time he needed her most. She had swept in and accepted his daughter and raised her as her own and for that she knew Simon had always been grateful.

  No, Simon had never left her, but there had been other crosses to bear. His parents’ snooty disapproval when they’d returned to Buckinghamshire as a newly-married couple. Simon’s struggle to resolve his ideals with the role offered to him at his father’s firm. The drink . . . the women . . . and perhaps most difficult of all, his gradual hardening towards her as his gratitude slowly morphed into something more akin to simmering resentment. The fact they had never been able to have a child of their own had also cut her deeply. She’d always felt that it would bring her and Simon closer, but it seemed a baby born to them both was just never to be and she had endured her infertility like the sentence she knew it to be.

  Sometimes she ached with loneliness – those nights without him, when she’d sat alone in their large, empty home feeling the absence of all that was missing in her life like a cold, hard stone sinking into her soul.

  And there had been Lila too: the older she’d grown, the more striking her resemblance to Freya. It had cut her to the quick. Just a glimpse of her daughter drifting through the house in a white nightdress, or meandering through the garden in the sunshine, could make that dark part of her heart throb with pain and her eyes fill with tears. Lila had been both a beautiful blessing and a heartbreaking curse. But she would never stop loving her, never stop caring for her because not only was that the promise she had made to Freya, but it was the only way she could think of to make it up to Lila for her own terrible mistakes. Until the day she died Kat knew she would be trying to make it up to Lila.

  The sun is just beginning to slouch behind the furthest hills when Tom drags the tin boat onto the shingle and holds up two silver fish for Lila and William to admire. Kat, still hidden among the trees, shivers in the dwindling light and knows that it’s time to leave. Perhaps she will come back another day, when she is feeling braver. With one last glance, she rises from the damp earth and turns her back on the gathering by the lake, carefully winding her way up through the trees towards the meadow.

  As she walks through the tall grass she brushes her hands across the bowed heads of wild meadow flowers and remembers her last farewell with Lila, how it had been stiff and yet charged with emotion. ‘Will you go back to France?’ Lila had asked her, standing beside her car on the overgrown track, barely able to look at her.

  Kat had shaken her head. ‘Not yet, no. I’ll stay a while, I think. In case . . . you know . . . in case you have more questions. Or just want to talk?’

  Lila had nodded. ‘I’m glad, you know . . . I’m glad it’s all finally out in the open . . . that we’re finally speaking the truth.’ She’d felt Lila’s careful gaze sweep over her then. ‘We are aren’t we,’ she’d asked carefully, ‘talking with real honesty now?’

  Kat had nodded. Honesty, that thing she has been so afraid of for most of her life. She’d breathed deeply, inhaling the familiar, sweet scent of the grass. It was such a fine line, wasn’t it – that space between what happens and what is told? Could it still be considered a lie if something was just omitted from the retelling, never spoken out loud? She wasn’t sure.

  ‘I should leave,’ she’d said, shivering slightly and pulling her cotton wrap more tightly around her shoulders. ‘I have a long way to go.’

  Lila had leaned in to graze her cheek but Kat, unable to bear the formality, had pulled her daughter to her and held her tight, breathing in the smell of her clean hair and the faint trace of lake water. She’d felt Lila relax for just a moment and then stiffen and begin to pull away. She hadn’t wanted to let her go, but she’d known she had to.

  Dusk is falling as Kat steers her car back down the bumpy track. A rabbit darts from the hedgerow, wide-eyed in her headlights. She slams on the brakes then slows, taking the rest of the trail more carefully until she is back on the lane and heading south.

  She should have left earlier – but even just standing there watching on the very periphery, she had been reluctant to tear herself away from the shimmering lake and the cottage and the sight of them all down there at the water’s edge; the family she had always wanted – born at the highest price.

  Gradually the dark moors and twisting country lanes fade away and Kat finds herself driving through the lit streets of a market town. She steers the car round a roundabout, then drops down onto the dual carriageway that will carry her back to the motorway. The road is quiet; just a few cars cruising down the inside lane and a ribbon of cats’ eyes darting at her from the central reservation. She has a long way to go, locked in the quietness of her car, and she knows there is nothing now that will prevent her mind from turning in on itself. The lake has pulled her darkest secrets up from the depths, where they dance like shadows on the surface of her mind.

  EPILOGUE

  Simon stands at the cottage window with the lake glinting through the glass behind him and the baby nestled tightly in his arms. ‘Come over here,’ he says. ‘Look at this.’ Kat g
oes to him and watches as the infant grabs on to his finger, opens her mouth and gives a contented gurgle. ‘Isn’t she sweet?’

  Kat nods. ‘Does Freya know she’s down here with you?’

  ‘Freya’s asleep. We thought we’d have a little father-daughter time, didn’t we?’ He isn’t talking to Kat; he’s talking to the baby in a warm, lilting voice, his adoring spotlight focused purely on the infant in his arms. She watches him for a moment, sees his swelling paternal pride, senses his unwavering devotion. Next to it, Kat feels invisible. She realises this is how it will always be now. His flesh and blood first. His daughter first.

  She is about to turn and leave when he surprises her by removing his finger from the baby’s grip and wrapping his free arm around her shoulder. Kat stands for a moment, enjoying the sensation of his warm body pressed against hers. The baby yawns. Kat breathes slowly. She steps outside herself and looks at them momentarily as a stranger might: a family. It’s what she’s always wanted – but it’s not hers. She has no right to this.

  ‘Aren’t you a lucky girl?’ whispers Simon to the baby. ‘You’ve got everything you could ever need right here . . . your mummy . . . your daddy . . . your auntie Kat.’

  She sees it then as clearly as the lake gleaming through the window or the clouds skimming across the sky – Simon is never going to choose. He is never going to give up on the cottage or on Freya and the baby, because Simon has everything he could ever want: all three of them right there on a plate. For Kat, it’s as though a camera lens is twisted and he comes suddenly into sharp and brilliant focus. He isn’t strong or powerful; he is weak. And he is never going to choose. He is never going to choose her.

  The baby sleeps peacefully in her arms as she carries her back to their room, but Freya is awake, sitting up in bed scribbling on a sheet of paper.

  ‘What are you doing?’ Kat asks, settling the baby in the Moses basket before moving across to a pile of crumpled clothes.

  ‘Nothing,’ says Freya, but Kat sees her carefully fold the piece of paper in two and slide it beneath her pillow. There is a flash of silver at the hollow of her sister’s neck; she peers more closely and recognises the honesty pendant.

  ‘Nice necklace,’ she says.

  Freya nods. ‘Mac gave it to me – for the baby.’

  Kat eyes her sister. She looks different: brighter, lighter, more alive. She wonders what it is that Mac has said to her. She folds a sweater and lays it at the end of the bed. ‘There are rabbits on the hills,’ she says. ‘The boys are going out to check the traps.’ She reaches for a pair of jeans.

  ‘Is that right?’ Freya stretches.

  Kat watches her for a moment. ‘I’m going to make some tea. Would you like a cup?’

  Freya nods and rolls her shoulders. ‘Sure, thank you.’ She stands and runs her hands through her hair. ‘Urgh. I feel horrible. I need to wash.’ Kat continues to busy herself with the stray clothes. ‘And I need to use the toilet. Would you mind bringing Lila with you when you come downstairs?’

  Kat glances over at the sleeping baby. ‘Sure,’ she says and watches as her sister leaves the room. She waits for a moment, noticing how the sunlight catches on the opaque honesty placed in the window, making the seed heads shine like mother-of-pearl; but as soon as she hears the back door slam, she darts across the room and slides the sheet of paper out from beneath her sister’s pillow, her eyes racing over the words.

  Kat stares at the words scratched in blue ink, reading them over and over until their true meaning has sunk in. Her eye catches on the ink blot at the end of Freya’s name, a sign of her urgency, her haste. Freya and Mac are planning to leave. They will take the baby and go.

  She knows she should be happy. She knows this should be the answer to her prayers; in one fell swoop Freya and Lila will be removed from Simon’s life for ever and she will remain, victorious with her prize.

  Kat stands and hovers over the sleeping baby, staring down at her pale face and the long sweep of her eyelashes. Her niece will have what she and Freya never had: a family. And she will be left with Simon, to start again.

  She shakes her head. If only it were that simple. She’s seen the way Simon gazes at the baby. She’s seen the adoration in his eyes and knows that she will never be enough for him. Not now. They will all leave her. Freya and Mac. Lila. Simon. They will all leave her and she will be left alone and unloved.

  Kat puts her hand to her mouth and bites down hard, trying to control the terrifying emptiness opening up inside her. It is a black chasm yawning and stretching in her belly. This is it: her darkest fears coming true at last. She closes her eyes and tries to breathe . . . tries to hold it together, but all she can see are the pale dangling roots of the water hemlock she has hidden in the pantry. This is it, she thinks. Time to end it all, now, before Simon or Freya can hurt her any more.

  She enters the kitchen, places the basket with the sleeping baby carefully on the table. Freya is still outside as Kat retrieves one of the stems of water hemlock from where she has stowed it behind some empty crates. Deadly: that’s what Mac had told her. There are plenty of nettles left for Freya’s tea but she’ll prepare something special for herself. She’ll drink it there in the kitchen with Freya and Lila. It will be her own quiet farewell to them all and no one will know what she’s done until it’s too late.

  She chops the plant leaves and roots and places them in two mugs: nettles for Freya, hemlock for Kat. She is careful not to contaminate Freya’s mixture with her own. Freya returns and as Kat waits for the water to boil she sits with her sister and watches her feed the baby, enjoying the sight of them. Yes, she thinks, a proper family.

  ‘If it’s OK with you, I’ll go and take my swim,’ says Freya. ‘I’ll be quick.’

  ‘Don’t go,’ says Kat hastily, ‘not yet. Sit with me a moment longer.’ Now it’s here – the goodbye neither of them will admit to – she doesn’t want the moment to end. ‘Stay and drink your tea with me . . . then I’ll watch the baby while you wash.’

  ‘If you’re sure?’ asks Freya.

  ‘Yes,’ she says, ‘I’m sure.’ She allows herself to imagine it then, the slow creep of the poison through her veins. The very last thing she sees will be her niece’s face, peaceful and still, evidence of a beautiful future.

  Kat stands and turns back to the pan on the range, now billowing steam across the kitchen. She pours water into both mugs then carries them across to the kitchen table. The baby stirs at her sister’s breast.

  ‘Look,’ says Freya, ‘I think she’s smiling.’

  Kat lowers the mugs to the table and bends to look more closely. ‘Oh yes,’ she says and reaches for the baby’s finger, tears springing in her eyes. ‘She’s beautiful, isn’t she?’ She bends down closer and nuzzles the baby’s soft skin. ‘You’ve got your mummy’s eyes,’ she murmurs.

  When she looks back to the table she is shocked to see only one mug standing on its surface. She glances across at Freya just in time to see her sister raise the other to her lips.

  ‘Thanks for this,’ she says and drinks deep.

  ‘No,’ says Kat. ‘Not – not . . .’ but she can’t speak. She just looks on helplessly as her sister drinks from the wrong mug.

  ‘What?’ asks Freya, a bemused smile on her lips. ‘What is it?’

  Kat shakes her head but she cannot move. She feels the blood drain from her face, a hot dart of fear shoot up her spine. She could stop this. She could knock the mug from her sister’s hand. Before it’s too late.

  Freya looks down at the baby, now snuggled in the blanket. She hesitates for just a moment, then says, ‘I’m sorry, you know, about the way everything’s worked out.’

  Kat can hardly look at her. Tears sting her eyes. She struggles to blink them back. It’s still not too late. She could do it now. It doesn’t have to be this way. She swallows. ‘I’m sorry too,’ is all she says, eventually.

  ‘I think things will be better from now on. You’ll see.’ Freya sips her tea slowly, until it i
s all gone, Kat watching on, mute with distress. ‘Thank you,’ she says, returning the mug to the table.

  Kat nods. She can’t take her eyes off the mug. Her mind churns: did she make this happen? Did she place it there in front of her . . . just a fraction too close? Was this the answer she was looking for, all along? She is dizzy at the thought and reaches out for the table with a steadying hand.

  ‘And you don’t mind looking after her?’ Freya stands and holds the baby out to her. Kat shakes her head and accepts Lila into her own warm embrace. ‘I won’t be long, little one.’ Freya bends to kiss her baby’s pale forehead, reaches out to sweep a lock of hair from her brow then turns and leaves the room.

  As Freya makes her way outside, Kat holds the baby close and feels the first of her tears begin to fall. They splash down onto the purple knitted blanket and dissolve into the fabric. Freya continues across the grassy bank and then sways down towards the water. Kat sees her stumble once then right herself before splashing into the shallows. She turns back to the baby in her arms. ‘Silly Freya,’ she whispers in a soft, sad voice, ‘she’s still wearing her nightie.’

  The baby is warm in her arms. Sunlight filters through the window and lands on her shoulders, her neck. As Freya wades into deeper water, Kat sees her sister’s nightdress rise up around her legs and bloom like a waterlily upon the surface of the lake. All she can do is watch and wait with the baby nestled safely in her arms.