by Rona Halsall
Now she’d said it, she had to acknowledge the reality of her situation. It seemed to be getting more hopeless by the day, someone carefully taking her life apart, piece by piece.
She started walking again, blinking away a rush of tears, Frank hurrying to catch up.
‘It was stressful for you, though, wasn’t it, that job of yours?’
She considered that and had to admit he was right. But then, didn’t every job involve an element of stress? ‘Juggling childcare and doing the job was tricky at times, but I had Ruth, so that worked well. It was only a problem if Ruth wasn’t available for some reason. Carol was pretty flexible but I do think I tried her patience at times.’ She sighed. ‘It’s not easy being a working mum.’
‘You didn’t have to do it, though. Dean’s earning good money, isn’t he?’
She bristled. ‘That’s not the point, Dad. I need to do a certain number of hours a year to keep my nursing licence. Once you’ve lost it, you have to go through a load of retraining to get it back and it can take ages.’
He gave one of his little grunts and it was clear he didn’t understand.
‘I love nursing. I love caring for people and helping them get better or supporting them in later life. It’s not just a job. It’s like a… a vocation. Something that I need to do.’ She sighed. ‘After Rosie died, I promised myself that I’d always know what to do in a health emergency. Nobody would die because of my ignorance ever again. I suppose that’s where it all started.’
‘Oh, love. Rosie dying wasn’t your fault. Nobody could have saved her. She had a brain haemorrhage. That’s what she died of.’
‘But…’ The facts adjusted themselves in her head and she frowned, having no recollection of a brain haemorrhage ever being mentioned. Her assumption had always been that an epileptic fit had been the cause of Rosie’s death. ‘But if I’d made her go home like her mum wanted, then—’
‘It’s likely she still would have died.’ Frank shook his head. ‘Just one of those sad things. You shouldn’t be blaming yourself.’
‘That’s not what her mum said.’
‘She was grieving, didn’t know what she was saying. I’m sure she didn’t mean it.’
Becca was pretty sure that she’d meant every word, could clearly remember the expression on her face when she’d told Becca it was her fault.
Frank nudged her with his elbow as they walked side by side. ‘Well, you’ve got me now. So you can make do with that while we sort out all this stuff with Mia. Surely they’ll drop this nonsense now she’s okay.’
Becca huffed. ‘If only. Mia being okay will be used as evidence that it was me all along. Surely you can see that? I’m in a lose-lose situation.’
‘Oh, well… do you know, I hadn’t thought of it like that.’
‘It gets complicated once the safeguarding team gets involved. There’s national procedures to follow. Protocols. They can’t just drop it. And deliberately poisoning a child is a criminal act. They mentioned the police getting involved.’ She hadn’t let herself think further than the psychiatric assessment, but now she was talking through the process, a spike of fear shot through her.
‘Crikey. That serious?’ Frank sounded worried now.
She nodded, biting her lip.
Frank grabbed her arm and pulled her to a halt. ‘Why don’t we go round and see Dean? Talk to him together, see if we can come to some sort of agreement.’
‘He won’t speak to me. Not after this morning.’ She heaved a big sigh, remembering the accusations she’d fired at him earlier in the day. All she’d done was confirm his suspicions that she’d completely lost the plot. She gave a defeated shrug. ‘I’ve rung him, but he didn’t answer so I left a message. He hasn’t rung back yet.’
Frank’s clasp tightened on her arm. ‘I’ve had an idea. Why don’t I ring the psychiatrist tomorrow and say you’re not well and see if we can postpone it?’
She wrinkled her nose. ‘I’m not sure. I’ve done that once already. I don’t think they’ll want a further delay. It sort of makes me look guilty, doesn’t it? And it’ll make them more likely to take me in. Keep me in-house while they investigate, just in case I do a runner.’
Frank tutted, a deep frown wrinkling his forehead. ‘I’ll go and talk to Dean on my own, then. How about that? See if I can find out what the process is now and what you have to do to be able to see Mia.’
Becca huffed. ‘I don’t think that’s a good idea. You two will end up arguing like you always do.’
‘I’ll be on my best behaviour, honest. It’s worth a go, isn’t it?’
She knew he was trying his best to help and didn’t have the heart to knock his suggestion back again. ‘Okay, we’ve got to try everything, I suppose.’ She nodded her assent. ‘At least then we’ll know where we stand.’
After their walk, they went and got themselves some fish and chips, eating them out of the paper because neither of them had the energy to cook or deal with washing up. Kate had gone out, leaving a message to say she’d be back late, and Becca was relieved not to have to face her, see the pity in her eyes. She knew Kate saw her as a weak, neurotic failure, and she didn’t need to have her shortcomings rubbed in her face.
‘Right, I’m going to get off and nip over to see Dean now,’ Frank said as he balled up his fish and chips paper and threw it in the bin. ‘He’s bound to be in this evening. The little one’ll be in bed, so I reckon it’s the perfect time for a sensible conversation.’
‘Good luck,’ she said, nerves curdling the contents of her stomach. ‘Play nice.’
Frank gave her a quick hug and kissed the top of her head. ‘Best behaviour, love. Don’t you worry.’
Once Frank had left, Becca sat for a while, in the silence, so weighed down by her predicament she hadn’t the energy to move. Everything marched in front of her eyes; her suspicions, all her theories which had been proved wrong. Then a face appeared in her thoughts and stayed there. Connor. His possible involvement was something she still needed to explore.
She pulled her phone out of her pocket and checked the time. It would be morning in Sydney now. Heart racing, she found his number and rang.
‘Hey,’ a man’s voice said. Sleepy, as if he’d been woken up.
‘Is that Connor Cywinski?’
‘Yep.’
Her words dried up as her heart raced. It was really him. After all this time, she was speaking to him.
‘Can I just ask where you are?’
Silence for a moment. ‘Darwin.’ Another beat of silence before he spoke again. ‘Wait a minute… who is this?’
‘It’s Becca. Becca… Pritchard.’
‘Oh my God, Becca. Really? Christ! How are you? Bloody hell.’ She could hear rustling and wondered if he was still in bed. ‘Is everything okay?’
The sound of his voice made her crumple, her chest heaving, and she disconnected, her whole body tensing as she tried to stop her emotions from tumbling out. She stood, walking up and down the kitchen, hands pulling at her hair. He was in Darwin. It couldn’t be him that had been poisoning Mia. It was just a coincidence, nothing more.
Hold on a minute. She had another thought and rang his number again.
‘Hey, is that you? Becca?’
‘Yeah, sorry, I… um somehow got cut off.’
‘Phew. I’m so glad you called back.’
‘This is going to sound really odd, but… are you Surferdude on Twitter?’
He laughed. ‘Twitter? Nah, don’t ever go on there. I don’t do social media, not after all that stuff on Facebook. You know that.’
She nodded to herself. He was right. She did know that. They’d had long conversations about it, and he’d told her how he’d deleted all his accounts after a bit of cyberbullying had tested his patience. But Twitter hadn’t been a big deal when they’d been together – so it had seemed possible that he’d be on there.
‘So, you’re in Darwin now. Not Sydney?’
Another laugh. ‘Come on, Becca. You know me
and cities don’t go together. I live in a wooden… well, you’d probably call it a shack, on a forty-acre plot just outside Darwin. No surfing for me any more though.’ He sighed. ‘I had a wipeout and smashed up my ankle. I can’t do it now. Anyway… I’m a regular working guy, you’ll be pleased to know, with a piece of rainforest to call my own.’
‘Well, that’s um… that’s great to hear.’
Silence, only the sound of her pulse whooshing in her ears. The messages had been fake, the profile made up. Her brain felt numb, her assumptions wiped out like a huge wave clearing pebbles from the beach. For a moment there was no thought, just a mental picture of Connor’s face, hers next to it, the broadest of grins, happiness sparkling in their eyes.
‘What’s going on, Becca? This is really weird.’
‘I’m sorry, Connor.’ Her voice was little more than a whisper. ‘I’m sorry I left you like that.’
Silence.
He cleared his throat. ‘Is that why you rang? After all this time… to say sorry?’
‘No, but I just need to say this first. I should have tried harder to contact you at the time. I know I should, but Mum had just died, and I was so angry and upset and confused I did this really stupid thing and then…’ She sighed, her face burning. ‘Then I was too ashamed.’
‘It’s okay. I sort of understand.’ He gave a quick laugh. ‘You know I poured out my heart and soul in that letter, and I waited and waited for you to reply, and then when you never did, I knew you weren’t coming back.’
She frowned. ‘Letter? What letter?’
‘I wrote it at the airport. It broke my heart to see you going back on your own when I should have been going with you. I hated myself for being such a self-centred prick. It was a bit of a defining moment, if I’m honest. A turning point.’ He was quiet, just his breath in her ear. ‘I’m not gonna lie, Becca, not getting an answer broke my heart at the time, but I can’t say I blamed you. It’s not like I was good husband material just floating around, picking up jobs here and there. What could I offer you? Certainly wasn’t the stability you wanted.’ He gave a quiet laugh. ‘In a way, you leaving was good for me. Gave me a kick up the arse and made me get my shit together.’ His sigh rattled down the line. ‘I know you’re married. I know you have a child.’
A worm of suspicion wriggled into her mind, adrenaline speeding up her heartbeat. ‘How do you know if you’re not on social media?’
‘I keep in touch with Tina. She told me.’
Tina! She hadn’t thought to ask her friend, because she hadn’t thought Connor would stay in touch. Now she had a way to double-check.
She took a deep breath, confused. ‘I honestly didn’t get your letter. As far as I was aware, you just went quiet on me after you’d said you’d be in touch. That’s how we left it. I thought… well, I thought you didn’t care.’
She heard him blow his nose. ‘Yeah, well, I did lose my phone, lost all my contacts, but I’d put Mum’s address on the letter and kept checking with her to see if anything had arrived. It never occurred to me that my letter wouldn’t get to you. Bloody hell.’ Silence for a moment. ‘Anyway, I bumped into Tina and she told me you’d met someone and were having a baby and I knew you’d found what you wanted. It just hurt that it wasn’t me.’ He sighed again. ‘I thought I should leave it there, not bother you. Life moves on, doesn’t it?’
‘I suppose it does,’ she said, unwilling to acknowledge the feeling of disappointment that had settled in her chest, heavy as lead. What had happened to Connor’s letter? If she’d received it, would it have changed her behaviour, her choices? Would her life have turned out differently? Her head felt like it was being squeezed by a large hand, fingers digging into her neck, her temples. There was so much she didn’t understand.
‘So now,’ he said, ‘you’ve got to tell me why you rang.’
33
‘I don’t want to make you late for work,’ she said. Does he need to know? He was her past and there was no need to burden him with the troubles of her present.
‘I’ve got a while before I start.’ She could hear the sound of a kettle boiling, the clink of a teaspoon, the slam of a fridge door. ‘Come on, Becca. There’s obviously something bothering you. Maybe I can help? Sometimes just talking things through sorts it out in your mind, doesn’t it?’
She cleared her throat, decided she had nothing to lose, and the whole story came pouring out. Suddenly, the time had gone, and he was cursing because he was going to be late. He made her promise to call him the following day after she’d had the psychiatric assessment, and she rang off, feeling better for having told her version of events to somebody who didn’t doubt her.
Talking to him had clarified things in her mind and she was certain now that someone was deliberately trying to break up her marriage and separate her from her family.
She opened her Twitter app and scrolled through the messages, and by the time she’d finished reading, it was starting to make sense. The neediness, trying to push her to say she still loved him. Someone trying to get evidence that could be used against her to break up her relationship with Dean, or encourage her to leave him? It seemed to be both of those things.
And it had worked. If Dean hadn’t seen the messages, she doubted that he would have been so willing to accuse her of hurting Mia. That was him lashing out. Or… was it him engineering things?
She’d gone back round the same circle and ended up with Dean as the culprit again. But he’d been away when Mia was ill the second time and a couple of the other times after that. It couldn’t be him unless… unless he’d left something for Mia, a secret treat that Becca knew nothing about. Alternatively, it could be someone he was close to. She nodded to herself. He didn’t have to actually physically be there, so she shouldn’t discount him yet.
Frank’s comment came barging into her thoughts: just because Dean wasn’t having an affair with Alice didn’t mean he wasn’t having an affair. Given the number of people he came into contact with through his work events, the potential for meeting someone else was endless. Like-minded people at that.
Becca stared at the pictures on the mantelpiece, not really seeing them as she inspected her relationship with Dean. If she was being completely honest with herself, when it came to interests, they’d never had much in common. He loved socialising and golf and could be quite competitive. She was all about the outdoors, the mountains and beaches, enjoying nature. Her job was sociable enough, and afterwards, she liked some time to herself.
The desire to have children was the glue that had stuck them together originally and had kept them together through all the emotional agony of miscarriages. But now they had a child, their differences were becoming more apparent, their lives travelling in different directions. His focus was on making his business a success, increasing his profits every year. That was the challenge he got out of bed for. Becca didn’t really care about money. Or golf, for that matter.
Are we even compatible?
Maybe not on a shared-interest level, but Dean was a kind bloke, decent and honest. She couldn’t imagine him being able to think up a twisted scheme like this to get rid of her, let alone able to harm his daughter. Yes, they had drifted apart, but she’d taken it for granted they still loved each other, even if it wasn’t that mad, just-fallen-in-love passion any more.
How well do you know the ones you love? Now that was a tricky question and the answer seemed to be not at all – Dean’s willingness to separate her from Mia being the biggest shock of her life. He’d always been on her side. Always.
The front door opened and banged shut, shaking her from her thoughts. Frank appeared in the lounge, red-faced and flustered.
Becca frowned. ‘How did it go?’
Frank shrugged off his jacket and went back into the hall to hang it up and take off his shoes. He came back in, puffing out his cheeks and shaking his head. ‘He wouldn’t let me in.’
Her heart sank. ‘A wasted journey, then?’
‘He said to
tell you he wants a divorce and don’t even try for custody because you haven’t a hope in hell.’ Frank’s chin started to wobble and she thought he might burst into tears.
Becca gasped, her hands flying to her mouth, her brain fixed on the word ‘divorce’. She was shaking and sank back in her seat, too dazed to speak.
He came and sat beside her, looking contrite. ‘I’m sorry, love. I probably should have found a better way to say that.’
‘A divorce,’ she murmured, hardly able to comprehend how quickly her marriage had fallen apart. After everything they’d been through, surely their union was stronger than this? The news ran on a loop in her mind and she was unable to think or move or do anything apart from repeat the words ‘he wants a divorce’, her unseeing eyes staring at the wall.
She didn’t notice Frank leave the room, but he came back in a few moments later and pushed a hot mug into her hand. ‘I’ve put lots of sugar in for the shock. You’ve gone awful pale.’
Divorce. No discussion, no attempts to salvage their relationship, refocus and get back on track – that’s what people did; they didn’t just suddenly throw everything away. Especially when there was a child involved.
She sipped at her tea as her thoughts zig-zagged backwards and forwards through recent events.
‘I found something out,’ she said eventually, and the words didn’t seem to be coming from her, distant and weak. ‘Connor and that Surferdude Twitter profile were fakes. Just somebody trying to cause trouble for me. Can you believe that?’
Frank blinked, the conversation taking a turn from what he’d expected, and it took him a minute to catch up with her. ‘What? Are you sure?’
‘I rang him. I found his number and I rang Connor. The real one.’ She told her dad about her awkward conversation, how he was in Australia and didn’t use social media. How he couldn’t possibly be involved. ‘It’s all part of a set-up. This whole thing has been staged to make me appear mentally ill, a criminal, in fact, and put doubts in Dean’s mind about my commitment to him and our marriage. It’s all about getting me out of the house, making sure I stay out and then having evidence to use against me.’