by Jo Jakeman
“I was looking forward to chili.” His voice wasn’t accusing, not even annoyed. It just . . . was.
“I can do a chili this weekend if you like?” Imogen asked, throwing the cloth on the side and reaching up on tiptoes behind him to reach over his shoulder and kiss his cheek. She snaked her arms about his waist and laid her cheek on his back.
“I’ve been looking forward to that all day and you just change your mind? I suppose this is to do with your bloody pregnancy hormones and the baby, is it?”
“The baby’s been kicking a lot today. Here, give me your hand—I think you’ll be able to feel it.”
Imogen stepped back from him and pulled back her cardigan to expose her bump. Phillip turned around to look at her. He seemed hurt, like she’d missed something important.
“What?” she asked.
“Jesus, Immie, you’re not the first pregnant woman in the world.”
“Hey,” she said softly, “don’t be like that. I know that I’ve been preoccupied with the baby but I’ve got some good news. I had the scan today.”
She steepled her hands together in front of her face. She would have clapped and jumped on the spot, but Phillip’s face was darkening.
She reached out to him, but he turned away and looked at the pan again.
“I’ve had a hell of a day. The things I’ve—” He threw his head back and blinked at the ceiling. “God, I’m tired. Can we just not talk about this now? I’m going to watch a film.”
He took the wine bottle and added more liquid to the glass even though it was still more than half full.
“Don’t you want to know about the baby?” Imogen was getting impatient with him. This wasn’t how she’d imagined the evening playing out.
He held up his hand as he began to walk away. Imogen clenched her fists.
“Wait! Everyone else had someone with them today. All the other women were with their partners. Do you know how it felt to be sitting there on my own? The least you can do is pretend to be interested in your own baby!”
Her voice rang round the kitchen. She knew she should stop, but the anger in her had awoken now. “I’m sick of this, Phillip. You say I shouldn’t be preoccupied with the baby, but what about you? Perhaps if you weren’t at work all the time—”
“That’s enough!” he shouted, and took two long paces toward her until their faces were inches apart. He slammed his glass down on the kitchen table without looking. The stem broke and tilted contents over the table.
“That’s enough,” he said again, quieter this time. “Enough.”
Imogen held her breath, as startled by her own outburst as by his.
She instinctively wrapped her arms around her stomach. It wasn’t like her to argue with Phillip, nor was it like him to be so dismissive of the baby.
Phillip sighed. “I’ll be downstairs watching a film. Don’t wait up.” He turned, picked up the wine bottle, and stalked down into the cellar, his sanctuary where she wasn’t allowed to go. The only place he could get some “bloody peace.”
The outburst echoed in Imogen’s chest. She was panting as if she had run up stairs. She started picking up sharp polygons of glass among the sticky liquid. She sucked in air through her teeth as a piece of glass slipped over her fingers, causing them to split in a wide red grin. Tears blurred her vision, though they were nothing to do with the pain from the cut. She took the pans off the heat and finished cleaning up the mess with a cloth. The smell of the wine mixed with cleaning fluid was overpowering, and her face hovered over the sink for a moment waiting for nausea to pass.
Perhaps Phillip had forgotten she was at the hospital today for her ultrasound. She was bursting to tell him that all was well with the baby and that the baby was a girl. A daughter. A sweet pink bundle. They were going to be parents to a girl. Phillip had told her that he wanted a girl more than anything. A child who would adore him and admire him. He would be so proud when she told him. But she’d leave him to calm down a little first. She sat. She stood. She couldn’t settle. The news would burst from her if she didn’t tell someone.
Imogen closed the kitchen door and dialed Mother’s number, a smile already on her face as she listened to the ringing.
“Yes?”
“Mother, it’s me.”
“Oh, Imogen. I thought you were someone else. I’m expecting a call from the boiler people. It’s on the ruddy blink again. Can you get off the line? They might be trying to get through at this moment.”
“Oh. Well, it’s just a quick call. I was at the hospital today, for my scan.”
“Lovely, dear. Can you tell me about it tomorrow?”
“Sure. Yes. Tomorrow.”
Imogen placed the receiver back in its cradle. She refused to be brought low. She was bursting with the desire to tell someone, anyone. It was all she could do not to run into the street and tell the first person she saw. She went to the cellar door and could see a film flashing around the dark room.
“Honey? Phillip? I’m sorry about dinner. Okay? You’re so right. I wasn’t thinking. I’m happy to get you something else. Let me make it up to you. I could go down the chippy?”
He grunted, and she took that to mean yes.
“Okay, then. I won’t be long. I’ll get haddock, yeah? And mushy peas?”
“Battered sausage,” he said.
“Righty-ho. I shan’t be long.”
He grunted again and she shut the door on him. Since she was making this gesture, perhaps he would come out of his sanctuary and talk with her while they ate. She was determined to get this evening back on track.
Imogen was as glad of his cinema room as Phillip was. He wasn’t a bad man, but sometimes the weight of the world got to him. As a policeman, he dealt with death, rape, and assault on an almost daily basis. It was too much to expect him to leave it all at the station. He said that he was surrounded by people who lied to him and attempted to mislead him. It made it difficult for him to trust anyone.
Imogen’s winter coat no longer fit her, so she took Phillip’s from the coat stand. It smelled of his aftershave, musky and woody, and made her smile. She took his scarf too, but only because it was soft, not because she needed the warmth. She slid her arms into his sleeves and imagined that she was wrapping his arms around her as she closed the door behind her.
Outside, in the dark street, she saw her next-door neighbor with the hood of his car up.
“Hi, Roger.”
“Antifreeze,” he said, raising the bottle in his hand. “There’s a frost coming.”
“Yes, the temperature has dropped today, hasn’t it?”
“Not long now,” he said, pointing at her belly.
“Four more months yet,” she said, rubbing the bump. “I’ll be the size of a whale by the end. I was at the hospital today, actually, finding out about the sex of the baby.”
“Jane was too. Ingrown toenails. Gone septic, they have.”
“Oh. Sounds painful.” She paused, wondering about how she could get the conversation back to the topic of the baby, but decided against it.
“Well, I suppose I’d better get on,” she said.
It was pleasurable to be in the cool evening air watching people scurry into their houses, their breath clouding the cold air before their faces. Cyclists blinked past her with only their eyes poking out of balaclavas and scarves. Ice crystals glistened like diamonds on the sidewalk and lit her way to the high street. The journey that used to take her five minutes on foot now took twice as long. Her hips and her back ached. She’d stiffened up from sitting in the hospital waiting room for so long.
As she stopped at the crossing, Imogen could see that the queue for the chip shop was snaking out the door. A man in a donkey jacket was stamping his feet against the cold, looking to all the world like he was doing an ancient war dance. A car slowed to let her cross and she waved it onward with an
apology, turning instead to walk along the sidewalk and away from the lights. She would come back in ten minutes when the queue had gone down. She was anxious with the desire to see the shimmering sky diamonds. The village lights masked the sky’s clarity. Beyond the edge of the town, they would be waiting for her in the cloudless black.
She harbored a childish dream that her dad looked down on her from the sky, part guardian angel, part heavenly body. The thought had her quickening her step away from the cars and the people. She wanted a quiet moment alone with him to tell him her news. He’d listen. He always did.
The road signs proclaimed that the national speed limit applied on the unlit road, though cars were accelerating far before the sign was upon them. Apart from the occasional car passing too closely to the narrow sidewalk, Imogen felt remarkably serene. Not even Phillip’s foul temper and the broken wineglass could shake her contentment. She looked at the night sky and sent her mind forward to when she would have a baby in her arms and she would show it the stars. She would promise her the moon if that was what she wanted. She had never felt so happy. Significant. Useful.
Throughout her life, she had been an “add-on.” Someone who was only invited to parties as a “plus one.” Always the second name on the Christmas cards and the last person on someone’s mind when they wanted to call a friend. She hadn’t kept in touch with any friends from school and she’d dropped out of university after the first term.
It was easier to start afresh and to keep people at arm’s length, because when people knew you, they wanted to know all of you; they felt they had the right to pry. To some, she said her parents lived a peaceful life in Norfolk. To others, she said they had died days apart after a long and happy marriage. But to Phillip she had told the truth, through tears and reddened cheeks. Her father’s suicide was a constant reminder that, as a child, she wasn’t good enough to make him stay and face another day. Her head, and her therapist, told her that wasn’t the case, but there were still days when she believed it.
She had begun to think that she could create something fresh and new and pure with a family of her own and protect it from the past, becoming the nucleus of happiness and safety for a child or two. And now that she was growing life within her, she had never felt so powerful. She was capable of so much. This baby was giving her a second chance to live the childhood that had been denied to her. She’d hardly remembered what it was like to have both parents at her side. When she lost her father, she’d lost her mother too—mentally, at least. This baby would wipe the slate clean. This baby would show her what it was like to love for love’s sake and not as a means to an end. This baby gave her hope.
As she wandered into the night, the hedgerows took on a pungent aroma of earthy foliage and the bitter brown scent of turning leaves. Imogen always found autumn to be the saddest of times. She felt an unqualified sorrow for the brown and limp leaves, wondering if they knew they were reaching the end of their lives, and one strong gust of wind would end it completely. Even the ripening of black currants made her sad for the end of summer days and late-evening barbecues.
There were no cars now. A light and delicate quiet fell past her ears. She didn’t know how long she had been walking, but she knew that if she was too long Phillip would be angry. Or, rather, angrier. She should have turned back, but her feet kept on moving. Her hips ached from sitting down most of the day. The baby wasn’t big yet, but it managed to lie in such a way that it caused her immense discomfort, and the walk was loosening her joints. The cool night air was a balm on her hot skin.
She had expected Phillip to want a boy to play football with, attend matches with, teach the ways of the world to. It made her think about her own father. It was no myth that girls had a special bond with their fathers, but if Phillip were to ever let their daughter down, like her own father had, then it was likely to do irreparable damage. No, she had wanted a boy. A resilient, hard-wearing boy that she could teach to respect women and show his softer side and to know that true strength came from the heart, not the hand. But now that she knew that the life inside her was a girl, she couldn’t imagine anything else.
She’s been thinking about names. She favored old-fashioned belowstairs ones like Daisy, Alice, and Iris. Phillip liked the classics like Charlotte, Rebecca, and Elizabeth. They’d know her name when they laid eyes on her.
A car sped past her too close and she was buffeted by the force. She really should turn back. She looked over her shoulder, surprised to see how far behind her the town was now. She slowed her pace and took one last look at the night sky, imagining her father’s face becoming visible through the dot-to-dot sky.
Daddy? she thought. You’re going to have a granddaughter.
For a moment, the road was empty. A sense of unbelievable calm settled over her. She thought she heard an owl hoot, smelled frost on the air. She placed her hands over her belly, and as if the baby felt her there, it gave her a nudge and somersaulted. It wasn’t an altogether enjoyable feeling, but neither was it unpleasant.
She turned away from the open road and set her sights on the orange streetlights that fringed the village. She heard a car on the road behind her, going too fast in too low a gear. Its headlights were on full beam and they cast Imogen as a shadow across the narrow sidewalk, kinking at the knee and bending at the hedge. She heard the change in tone as the car changed gear but the engine was still laboring as it neared her. She walked slowly, in no hurry to face Phillip’s bad mood, wanting to hold on to the vestiges of contentment.
The engine sound was rising. Boy racers, she thought to herself. She began to turn, intending to shake her head at the driver as he sped past, but the car veered wildly toward her. The front end of the car lurched upward as it climbed the deep step and hit her side on. The lights scorched her eyes and made green imprints on her vision.
It’s true what they said about time slowing down when your life was being torn from you, though she didn’t see her life flash before her eyes. She saw a young girl with red hair, smiling, skipping, and then fading as her future was wiped away. Iris. She looked like an Iris.
Imogen’s feet left the ground and she arced through the air. The car lights were beneath her now. She soared through the purple night, closer to the stars than she had ever been.
She had time to think, Look after her for me, Daddy, before she blacked out. And then there was nothing. Only darkness, inside and out.
CHAPTER 23
10 days before the funeral
I put the phone back, letting my hand linger on the smooth black arch of the handset. The game had changed.
Phillip had been almost playful on the phone, asking how we’d done it. He wanted to know who’d let us out of the cinema room. There was genuine interest in his voice, but I wasn’t about to tell him our secrets. Through terse laughter, he said he had ways of finding out.
“I know every little thing you do. A little bird whispers in my ear,” he said.
I didn’t rise to it. I knew he wanted me to think the worst of Naomi and Ruby, and to doubt whose side they were on. The truth was, I didn’t need any encouragement to distrust those around me, but I was as sure as I could be that this was another one of his games. If either Naomi or Ruby was working with him, he wouldn’t be so keen to alert me to the fact.
“Why don’t you come on over?” I asked. “It’ll be like old times. You can sleep in the cellar and we’ll go back to plan A. We’ve got a lot to chat about, you and me.”
“Oh, don’t worry. I’m not far away. I’m always watching you.”
“So what are you waiting for?”
“The grand finale,” he said, then hung up.
I slammed the back door. There would be no luring him into the cellar now. He was back in control and we were back to waiting to see what he was going to do next. There was no point hiding in the shadows and waiting for him now. We turned the lights back on and sat in front of the fire. Ruby was in
the armchair and Naomi and I sat on the floor with our backs against the sofa. If he was watching, let him see that we weren’t scared.
“If I hadn’t answered the phone, he would’ve thought we were still in the cellar. I’m such an idiot.” Naomi was being hard on herself.
“It was always a long shot,” I said. “In some ways nothing has changed, except he has the freedom to do something unexpected. Some things stay the same. We have to gather enough evidence against him to get a restraining order. We can do that with or without him in the cellar. If either of you want to leave now, I won’t stop you.”
Naomi patted my arm like I was a deluded elderly relative. “You don’t honestly think I’m going back home to let him lay into me again? Safety in numbers, duck. I’m going nowhere until we know he can’t hurt us.”
“What about you, Ruby?”
“Yes. Yes, I might. If someone has taken the dogs to a vet’s, they’ll have found they’re chipped and be calling my home. I should probably get going while the weather’s good.”
I nodded. “Stay safe, though, yeah? I don’t think he’ll go after you—he’s most angry with me. And if he does contact you, don’t tell him where Alistair is.”
“I don’t know where Alistair is,” she said. “Where is he, by the way?”
Naomi deflected the question by turning to me and saying, “Just me and you, then.”
I watched the flames dance in the hearth and wondered what Phillip would do next. He’d already hurt us physically, and Alistair was safe from his reach for now. But Phillip didn’t know that.
I’d already called Chris Miller, the DC whose wife had had an affair with Phillip; he’d agreed to see me on Monday morning. I hoped I could count on him to help me build a case for a restraining order.
I was sure Phillip’s desire for custody of Alistair was at best a passing whim and at worst an attempt at revenge. In a fair fight, a court would rule in my favor, but Phillip didn’t play fair. If I was to get the upper hand, I needed to stay one step ahead of him. His reputation was spotless, his service record exemplary. If I could put the slightest question in people’s minds as to his suitability as a father, then he would have no power over me.
