Lullaby

by Claire Seeber

  *

  Only once before in my whole life had I almost fainted. Only once. It was just after I’d had Louis, and we were leaving hospital for the first time, me clutching this child they insisted was mine, who I had to care for. I held him like a piece of precious crockery, terrified I’d drop him. God, Mickey looked so proud as he shepherded us out, but I—well, I was still stunned. Shell-shocked by the dramatic turn my life had taken in the labour ward, my baby coming four weeks early but thankfully all right. Finally privy to the terrifying secret all child-bearing women know and hide; the mothers’ club I’d lingered outside anxiously as I grew ever bigger, peering in, wishing fervently for someone to guide me in and tell me I could do it. (Leigh was no good—she’d elected Caesareans even before celebrity culture made it cool. And my mum—well, she was my mum. No practical use at all.)

  As we reached the car, I staggered, my legs unexpectedly fragile from lack of use, a little like a foal’s. With some sixth sense, Mickey felt I was going to fall; he caught me as I stumbled, wrapped his arms around his son and me before we hit the ground. In silence we stood there for a moment, this new three, and Mickey held us tenderly. I was bemused by this new concern, quite frankly—it was so un-Mickey like. Then he took the baby from me and whisked me back inside. This time he carried Louis, clamped tightly to his chest. And I was happy that he took him.

  Shock, the midwives said. Nothing to worry about. A bit of blood loss; a traumatic birth; a baby that came too early, scaring us all badly for a short while. I stared at them, uncomprehending. A trauma I worried might do me in for good.

  Until then, before this, I’d always thought fainting was a kind of glamorous thing to do—and even Shirl, my best mate, couldn’t call me that. I might be small in stature, but I was tough. Skinny, languid girls with translucent skin, like old-fashioned TB victims, you know the type—they were the ones who should collapse. Not me. Much as I might have fancied being languid, I was the kind to make a cup of sweet tea, to just get on, you know. I’d always had to, I’d never had a choice. Only now Louis was gone I could be tough as you like, but all the tea in China wouldn’t heal this massive hurt.

  I sat bolt upright and I asked—though I was scared to ever hear the answer—I rapped out, ‘Where’s Louis? Tell me where he is, please,’ and the police lady came over all concerned but practical, just like they must get trained to be. She moved nearer, and she took my hand, but I shook her off. I was already quite sick of strangers’ sympathy.

  ‘For God’s sake, just tell me,’ I persisted, and nausea washed over me.

  I have always thought how easy and yet how hard it must be to be the official bearer of bad news—you know, coppers, doctors, that type of person. The relentless certainty that you convey despair; the constant devastation of once-happy lives. Easy because you give, and, God forbid, you don’t receive. Forever thankful it’s not you, do you grow hardened by leaving grief behind, until you learn to sleep sound again at night?

  This mop-headed girl didn’t look like she was yet used to doling out distress. I stared at a tiny vein that curled blue beside her eye. She started to talk, and still I studied her thin shiny skin, like it could block out all my pain.

  ‘We don’t know, Mrs Finnegan. We’re not sure where Louis is right now.’ She tried to take my hand again. ‘Your husband was taken to St Thomas’ Hospital about an hour ago. I’m afraid he’s been quite badly beaten; he’s still unconscious. He’s being checked for the severity of his injuries, but the good news is he’s stable at the moment.’

  Her gentle touch felt gritty on my skin. Quietly, Leigh moved to me, handed me some kind of drink.

  ‘But he was found alone.’ She took a breath. ‘I know how hard this is, Mrs Finnegan, but you need to try and keep calm. I’m afraid we do now have to say your son is missing. Officially missing, for now, at least.’

  Missing. My son was missing. Louis—his solid little weight, his chubby wrists where the fat folded over itself. His dark fluffy head, his guffaw when you tickled him, his double chin when he fell asleep sitting upright in his chair. Louis was missing. Mickey was badly hurt. The policewoman started to talk about search-parties and perhaps a helicopter; I watched her mouth open and close as I sat stock-still; still except for the glass I twisted in my hands. Simply paralysed by fear.

  Suddenly Leigh screamed. ‘Christ, Jess, what have you done?’

  Dully, I looked down. My hand was streaming blood; the glass cracked clean in two. This morning I’d lain here, first in Mickey’s arms, then cuddling my Louis, wishing lazily for more sleep. Now there was no baby. No baby anywhere; just bright red streaming blood.

  Everything went slow. Leigh fetched me plasters while I got dressed, very tentatively, as if I had a migraine, like I might shatter into a thousand pieces if I moved suddenly. Then I went downstairs with the policewoman, who was called Deb, and got into the patrol car, and I could feel all the neighbours having a good old gawp, and for a minute it took me back to my lost childhood. It just wasn’t the kind of street where people got taken away in police cars, if you know what I mean. I sat in the back and Deb’s colleague turned to try to comfort me but I ignored him because nothing could comfort me now, not ever, not until I got my Louis back.

  Leigh tapped on the window and I could see that she was trying not to cry herself.

  ‘Please, Jessie, try not to worry too much, babe,’ she said, but we both knew her words were futile. She took my hand, my sore and icy hand, and held it for a minute. Then she sniffed, and pushed her hair back hard, regaining control; said she’d follow in her own car, she’d lock up and meet me at the hospital. I don’t think I even answered her. I just stared ahead as I was driven through the darkening summer streets, back the way I came this afternoon, back when I still had some hope. Back through dirty London town I went, and, all the time I travelled, I wanted never to arrive.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Pluck a single hair from your head and you might notice that it twangs, reverberating deep inside your brain. Through the dim neon-lit corridors of the hospital I followed a uniformed back and I felt like I was that little hair, like someone was pulling me so tight I might just go snap at any moment. And as I walked, I ducked from the images the hospital-smells hurled at me; I was ducking and weaving from memories of my dad, so that by the time we reached Intensive Care and Deb rang the entry-bell, I was shifting from foot to foot like some prize boxer before the big fight.

  It was impossible for me to imagine Mickey in any vulnerable state. It wasn’t part of the equation. Outside the locked door, Deb smiled reassuringly, but I was terrified of going in. It wasn’t a rational terror, like you might expect; it wasn’t about the extent of Mickey’s injuries, or the pain he might be in. It was, if truth be told, more a fear of seeing him inert, exposed. Unable. Mickey was never unable to do anything. He strode through life as if movement and decision were his life-force. It was what I’d come to accept in the short time we’d been together. It was what swept me along, what took me unawares from the moment we first met.

  A nurse eventually opened the door and Deb explained who we were. She looked exhausted, this nurse, but still her almond eyes were all compassion as she ushered us in. In the dim light beyond the door everything was deathly quiet. Everything was deathly.

  ‘I’m afraid he’s still unconscious, but all his vital signs are good,’ the nurse said quietly. Then, ‘Come,’ and she laid a gentle hand on my arm. She was the first person whose touch I didn’t flinch from today.

  Outside a small room stood another policeman; he nodded gravely as we passed and I was yet more disturbed. The nurse’s shoes squeaked softly in the silence.

  And through the door there was my husband, my elegant husband, and he looked just like he was sleeping—except he had all sorts of tubes sticking out of him.

  ‘Just a precaution,’ the nurse said, following my gaze to the machine that seemed to breathe for him, and I stopped at the foot of the bed and just stared. Dark hair swept back fro
m his face, Mickey was as pale as the moon. One eye was horribly bruised, sealed entirely shut; down the other cheek a slash had been lovingly stitched. It was the shape of a big tick—Nike would love him, I thought disjointedly He was bare to the waist, Christ-like, his sore arms splayed out as far as the narrow bed allowed. His chest was covered in bruises. In fact, except for the machinery, he looked like some old oil painting that he’d hate and I would probably love, and I stifled a hysterical laugh that bubbled up inside.

  ‘He may be able to hear you, Mrs Finnegan,’ the nurse said, gently propelling me forward. ‘It’s a good idea to talk to him, let him know you’re here.’ I just gawped at her. Deb muttered something about a minute on my own, and the nurse said she’d page Mickey’s consultant. Together they squeaked back across the shiny linoleum, and I strained to catch their muffled whispers in the corridor and wished I wasn’t here. I wished I was out there, whispering with them.

  Alone, I felt horribly uneasy—as if I was being watched. Was Mickey watching me? Eventually I forced myself nearer the bed, and very carefully I placed my hand on Mickey’s pyjama-clad leg. Gingerly, like his leg might snap from any pressure.

  ‘You’d have a fit if you saw what they’ve got you in,’ I said. I started to laugh, which quickly turned into a wheeze, and then I stepped closer still and said, right into his shut-down face, I demanded,

  ‘Mickey, where’s Louis? You’ve got to wake up, cos Louis is gone. What did you do with him, Mickey?’ and I heard my voice go sharp and shrill, and I had a sudden urge to pummel him, but before I could Deb was back beside me, and she held my arms down and I wasn’t laughing any more. Tears rolled down my cheeks and my nose was running, streaming snot, but actually I wasn’t going to cry, I was sick of tears, I was made of sterner stuff. Wasn’t I? I pulled away from Deb.

  ‘I’m fine,’ I said. ‘Thank you. Honestly, I’m fine.’ But I caught the surreptitious glance she gave the nurse that said Of course you are not fine.

  Sister Kwame made me tea so sweet the spoon practically stood up in all the sugar, and after she’d heard my singing chest, she found me an inhaler.

  ‘He will be all right. You must have faith,’ she said in her slow African lilt. I did feel a little calmer; there was a quiet dignity in her movements that somehow reassured me.

  ‘I wish I did,’ I said, ‘but everything’s so wrong.’

  Before she could reply, Mickey’s consultant bustled into the room. Small and red-cheeked, he reminded me a bit of a cartoon Noddy. The scans showed no apparent brain injuries, he said; it should just be a matter of time before Mickey woke. Any real danger now would be from undetected internal bleeding-unlikely at this point, they thought.

  ‘He might even just be sleeping now,’ he said, beady little eyes flicking to see if I believed him. ‘But I’m afraid he must have taken quite a kicking.’ Lovingly, he stroked his beard, contemplating something on a chart he’d plucked from the wall. ‘A rib or two are broken, but we’re pretty satisfied now that most of his injuries are fairly superficial.’

  I winced at the thought of Mickey on the ground, at the idea of Louis watching his father being beaten. Bile rose in my throat.

  ‘I think—sorry, could I sit down please.’

  The doctor rattled on oblivious as Sister Kwame fetched me a chair. ‘Hopefully by tomorrow he’ll have come round. I know the police need some info from the poor chap.’

  The sister murmured something as she took the chart from him. He peered at me like I was an exotic specimen; his small cheeks as hard as apples. ‘And you, are you all right? In shock, of course.’

  Without waiting for a response he wrote out a prescription. ‘Sister Kwame can raid the cupboard,’ he winked conspiratorially. ‘Any questions, just sing.’ He tucked his pen behind a strangely small ear. Then he was gone.

  Soon after that Leigh arrived with Gary in tow, and then Deb’s detective inspector turned up to take me home. Sister Kwame gave me a printout on concussion, and some pills to keep me calm.

  ‘I don’t want them, really. Thank you.’ I shook my head. I rarely took even an aspirin. I’d seen the power of pills over my own mother.

  ‘Maybe it is best to have them just in case. Only take them if you really need them, yes?’ Leigh pocketed them on my behalf.

  There was some discussion about me staying in case Mickey came round, but I really couldn’t stand the thought. I needed to get home. What if someone brought Louis back? The policeman, whose name I learned was DI Silver, said he’d drive me back home so we could talk; then Leigh complicated things by kicking up such a fuss about me being alone that in the end they suggested she come too.

  ‘Stay at ours. That’s the best idea, isn’t it, Gaz?’ She was decided, looking to her husband for his usual affirmation.

  I shook my head again. ‘No.’

  ‘No?’ She was surprised. ‘Why not?’

  ‘Just because, Leigh.’ I was so weary now—too weary to fight with her.

  ‘But—we’ll look after you. You need to be with family.’

  Family. My family had been suddenly disbanded. I was finally relaxing into having one of my own, a proper one, after all these years—and it was all gone. Swept away in a second. I turned away. ‘I’m going home, and actually I’d like to go right now, if that’s okay.’

  DI Silver drained the Diet Coke he’d just clunked from the machine.

  ‘I’d say that was fair enough,’ he agreed mildly, and Leigh glowered at him. In the end Gary agreed to go back to the girls, and Leigh would accompany me. I slipped back into Mickey’s room a final time. Staring at him, I couldn’t shake the Christ-like image from my mind. So what did that make me, standing helpless at his feet?

  ‘Please wake up, Mickey.’ He didn’t stir. ‘I’m really scared. I don’t know what to do,’ I whispered, and then I kissed his hand quickly, his long-fingered hand which lay so frighteningly still. There were grazes on his knuckles.

  ‘I love you,’ I whispered, quieter still. Allowed to say in crisis what I never dared to in real life, what I’d hoped to hear every day at the beginning, until eventually he’d whispered it once into my hair in the stillness of the night, just before I had Louis, so quietly I’d thought I might have been dreaming. It had been enough—for a while.

  When I went back out, Leigh and Gary were muttering; they jumped apart like guilty teenagers. Not good at being separated, those two.

  ‘Thanks for coming, Gaz,’ I managed, and he shook his big blunt head at me.

  ‘Don’t be stupid, darling,’ he muttered, and awkwardly he hugged me, following with a peck that ended in a painful clash of cheekbones. How poorly we all did affection.

  ‘So, shall we?’ Silver gently cleared his throat. He looked a little like his name. Salt-and-pepper hair and a suit that looked suspiciously expensive for a copper. Gum in his long, straight-lipped mouth; slightly hooded eyes.

  ‘The car’s this way, Mrs Finnegan, Mrs-?’ He looked quizzically at Leigh.

  ‘Mrs Hopkins,’ she said, with a toss of hair.

  In silence we waited for the lift, a gloomy trio, when I had a sudden thought. I sped back down the corridor to the ICU, ignoring the voices protesting behind me. This time Sister Kwame answered the door immediately. She smiled enquiringly.

  ‘You forgot something?’

  ‘No,’ I was breathless already. ‘It was just—I just wondered,’ I stuttered, ‘what did Mickey—did my husband have anything with him when he came in?’ She held me softly in her direct gaze.

  ‘I mean, like a—a bag, or something. Anything really.’ I trailed off uselessly. What was I hoping for?

  ‘Nothing, my love, I don’t think,’ she said. ‘He had nothing but the clothes he stood up in, as far as I’m aware. The police dealt with all that, you know.’

  ‘Oh.’ I felt a crushing disappointment. ‘Oh well. Thanks.’ I staggered a little as exhaustion snatched greedily at me. ‘I just—you know. I just wondered. See you later.’ As I turned back towards the lif
t, DI Silver appeared noiselessly at my side.

  ‘Wait,’ the nurse called softly, ‘actually, there was one thing. I meant to give it to the police earlier. I’ll get it.’ She disappeared inside.

  ‘All right?’ Silver asked, and I detected a northern burr. I nodded stiffly, attempted a wan smile but my face had frozen. Sister Kwame reappeared. She handed me a see-through bag, which held a padded brown envelope, like the ones Mickey used at work for disks and negatives. I opened it with trembling fingers, shook the contents out. A passport slid into my hand.

  CHAPTER SIX

  Blindly, I clutched it, but DI Silver quickly eased it from my grasp.

  ‘I’ll need that, Mrs Finnegan,’ he said smoothly. ‘Fingerprints, you know, all that jazz.’

  ‘Please,’ I said, ‘I just want to know whose it is. I don’t understand why—’

  He took pity on me; flicked open the back cover. Mickey, younger, scowling, stared out.

  ‘Cheerful chap, your husband?’ Silver said, but it wasn’t a real question. I walked away from him, down the corridor, away from my unconscious husband. Away from my only link to Louis.

  When I’d first met Mickey, he didn’t smile for weeks. In fact, we hadn’t really met at all; having just started my part-time foundation at St Martin’s College of Art, his assistant Pauline hired me as a graphics junior. I knew it was my big chance—years behind my peers, I was ready to do anything to prove myself. Clamped to my computer, I watched Mickey come and go when he was in the office, although he never deigned to say hello. I’d watch him lounging behind the glass divide the few times he was actually there, hand-stitched shoes up on the desk, anxious minions darting in and out as he pushed his dark hair back distractedly and perused their work without a word. I watched him share his enthusiasms with his underlings, although his frustrations were often obvious. Most of all, I watched the girls in the office preen and flirt with him, always dressed best on the days he was expected in. He seldom responded to their wiles, but when he did, when he flashed a quick rare smile, his face was truly illuminated and, reluctantly, I saw what they saw—although I fought it. The only person he ever looked relaxed with was the sassy Pauline. He’d laugh with her like no one else and, bizarrely, his casual arm around her once made me feel quite jealous.