The House of Tides

by Hannah Richell

  But then something had crept up on her when she wasn’t looking, a feeling that had snuck into her heart and made leaving him each morning harder and harder. She found herself thinking of him when he wasn’t there, longing for his arms around her and his lips on her skin. More than that, she wanted to spend time with him out of the bedroom. She wanted long, snowy walks on Primrose Hill and hand-holding in the cinema. She wanted newspapers and freshly squeezed orange juice on Saturday mornings, and lazy Sunday-afternoon pints with friends in the sunshine. Most of all, she realized, she wanted to share her life with him.

  The thought terrified her. And yet losing him wasn’t an option either—he made her feel the most sane she had felt in a long time, and so, fighting the voice inside her head that screamed No, don’t do it! Don’t let him get too close! she had let him into her life—and her heart.

  As if sensing her gaze Dan looks up from his seat across the bar. He frowns in her direction, his eyes refocusing for an instant, and then breaks into a broad grin. He is standing by the time she reaches the other side of the room.

  “Hey, you’re back already. Fantastic.” He pulls her into his arms, planting a generous kiss on her lips. “How are you?”

  “Okay. I made good time didn’t I?” she agrees, checking her watch. “The traffic wasn’t too bad. I guess everyone decided to stay put and enjoy the sunshine. What are you doing in here on such a beautiful evening? I thought you’d have your head down in the studio, or at least be out the back here, soaking up the last rays of sun?”

  “Nah, you know me. I fancied a bit of good old-fashioned pub grunge. But how are you?” he asks, his eyes full of concern. “Are you tired? Do you want some fresh air? Shall we move outside? Would you like a drink?”

  “Dan, chill out, will you. I’m pregnant, not infirm. I’m fine just here. And what I would really love to drink is a double gin and tonic, ice, and a slice of lime…”

  Dan gives her a worried look.

  “Joking!” She holds up her hands in supplication. “I’ll have an orange juice. Straight up.”

  Dan lets out a palpable sigh of relief and nods his head. “Coming right up.”

  Gormley is thumping his tail in languid acknowledgment of Dora’s arrival and so she bends down to pat him. “Hey, Gormley. Did you miss me?”

  He thumps his tail again and yawns, showing off a fleshy pink tongue and blasting her with warm, meaty breath.

  “I’ll take that as a yes.”

  Dora settles herself at the table and reaches across for the newspaper Dan has been reading. It is some article about environmentally friendly house renovations, all gray-water tanks, compost buckets, and solar panels. Nice if you can afford it, she thinks, pushing the pages back toward Dan’s empty seat. When Dan returns he places a glass of juice in front of her before folding himself back into his seat.

  “So how was the trip?” he asks.

  “Oh, fine. I missed you and Gormley, though. How was your weekend? Did you get much done?” It is a clumsy deflection but Dan lets it pass for now. She knows he is a patient man. He will bide his time.

  “All good here. I spent the entire weekend in the studio.”

  “I can tell.”

  Dan looks at her quizzically.

  “The flat…it’s a tip!”

  “Ah, yes. Sorry about that. I was going to tidy up, but Gormley here, he bullied me into coming to the pub to celebrate. He wouldn’t take no for an answer.”

  “And what are you both celebrating?” Dora asks with a smile.

  “Oh you know”—Dan throws his arms out expansively—“the sunshine, a free bone from the butcher, the start of a new sculpture, you coming home.” He pauses and looks her in the eye. “The baby.”

  Dora reaches across for her drink and takes a big gulp. It is thick and treacly—the sort of juice that has spent too long collecting dust in a bottle at the back of a shelf and not enough time soaking up the sunshine on a tree somewhere glorious in Spain. It leaves a furry pulp on her tongue. “So how’s the sculpture coming along?” she asks. “Are you going to tell me anything about it?”

  Dan looks at her evenly. “Not this one, sorry, but it’s a surprise. I’m really pleased with it, though. I started the clay model this weekend. It’s different, for me. A real ‘departure,’ as they say.”

  “Sounds interesting.”

  “Yeah, I’m excited. The Grimshaw commissions will pay the bills, but they’re not exactly groundbreaking, are they?”

  Dora nods.

  “Oh, before I forget, your dad called.”

  “Did he?” Dora pauses. “Everything okay?”

  “Yes, all fine. He invited us for lunch next weekend. Do you fancy it? We can make up an excuse if you don’t want to go…”

  Dora thinks for a minute. “I suppose we ought to. It’s been ages since we went to their place. Besides, we should tell him our news, I guess?”

  “You guess? Does that mean…?” Dan trails off.

  Dora shrugs. “Well, I’ve told Mum now, haven’t I?”

  “Okay,” says Dan slowly, clearly confused. “So tell me, how did it all go down there? How was your mum?”

  “Oh, Mum was Mum. Nothing ever changes.”

  “So no breakthrough?”

  Dora pauses for a moment. “I guess not.”

  “Really?” Dan asks, taking a sip from his pint. “She must have been pleased about the baby, though?”

  Dora can hear the hope in Dan’s voice. She feels his expectation weigh heavily on her, and she chooses her words carefully in response. “Mmm…more startled, I think. Pleased? I’m not so sure. She so rarely gives anything away.”

  “But she must have said something?” Dan pushes. “It’s not every day you’re told you’re going to be a grandmother.”

  Dora doesn’t know how to explain the conversation she had with Helen. She doesn’t like to tell him of her tears, of how she’d screamed out in frustration and stormed out of the conservatory, and their subsequent awkwardness with each other before she had climbed back into her car the next day and driven home. Dan knows a little about Alfie, but he can’t know, can never understand just how much it has affected them all. She doesn’t want to disappoint him; she really doesn’t. But she also knows she can’t lie. “We talked. We talked about the pregnancy…and about Alfie. I finally found the courage to ask her if she blamed me for what had happened.”

  “What did she say?”

  Dora thinks for a moment. “She told me it was time to let it go.”

  “There you go then, and she’s right, you know.”

  Dora shakes her head. “But she couldn’t say it, you see. She couldn’t say, Dora, it’s not your fault.”

  Dan rubs at a smear of clay on his hand. “I’m sure what she meant was—”

  “No.” Dora shakes her head. “I’m sick of making excuses for her. I’ve made so many in the past. But I’m tired of it now. She told me I was only a child back then. She told me to let it go. But she couldn’t answer me when I asked her if she still thought it was my fault. So you see, I’ve been right all along. She’s always blamed me for losing Alfie.” She feels tears welling up in her eyes as she speaks the words out loud, and Dan reaches across and gives her hand a gentle squeeze.

  “Well, perhaps you have your answer then. As painful as it is, perhaps you needed to go down to Dorset to discover that you won’t ever be able to rebuild the bridge between you and your mother. But you can certainly tell yourself that you’ve tried, right? Perhaps, if your relationship with her is as dysfunctional as it sounds, well…maybe you shouldn’t see her for a while. If that’s what will make you feel better?”

  Dora nods and bites her lip. “I just hoped…you know…I just wanted…she’s my mother.” The tears are running silently down her cheeks.

  “I know.” Dan gives her hand another squeeze.

  “There was this time,” Dora said, “ages ago. Before Alfie, before he was even born. We hadn’t been at Clifftops that long and Dad was away.
A huge storm blew in off the sea.” She gives a little laugh. “I thought the house was going to blow away.”

  Dan smiles at her indulgently.

  “Cassie and I climbed into bed with Mum and the three of us lay there listening to the wild weather as it battered the house. We just huddled up together, warm under the duvet, sharing the moment. And do you know what Mum said to me then?”

  Dan shook his head.

  “I’ll never forget it. She looked down at me with the softest look in her eyes and she said Don’t be scared. We’ve got each other. Nothing else matters.” Dora gives a little sob. “I believed then that she loved me, that she’d do anything for me. But here I am.” She shrugs. “I went to her for help. I went to her for answers. And she as good as turned me away.”

  Dan strokes her hand with his warm fingers.

  “But I suppose it actually doesn’t matter now. It still doesn’t change anything, does it? We all still live with it every day.”

  “Yes, but you have to accept it, Dora. Accept it and move on. Live your life, to the best of your ability with the people who do love you surrounding you.”

  Dora bristles. “I’m not dwelling on the past, Dan. I am living my life, right now, the one that was given to me, the only life I have…with all the good, and all the messed-up shit that comes with it. But I just can’t ignore this…this thing that happened to me. To all of us. I can’t forget him.” She stops, trying to control the tears that threaten, and looks up at Dan, imploringly. “Can’t you understand? Alfie happened to me. To us. And I just can’t forget him. I can’t let go. And if I can’t forget him, can’t live with my part in what happened, then how can I expect to move forward and be a good parent, a good mother to an innocent child? It’s a whole new life, for Christ’s sake. And it will be my responsibility. It’s too much. I don’t think I can do it.”

  “It’s our responsibility, Dora. I’m with you in this too, remember? I’ll be right here.”

  Dora looks up at Dan again. His eyes are filled with so much love and concern that it makes her want to weep. “Oh God, these hormones. They’re doing my head in. Sorry,” she apologizes, and reaches for the hankie he holds out to her.

  “Dora, I don’t know how to help you anymore. But one thing is for sure: You need to make a decision. Time is not on our side.”

  “I know that.”

  “And you know how I feel, don’t you?” He looks at her earnestly. “Dora, I want to keep this baby, desperately. But if you don’t think you’re ready…if you need to make a different choice…well…” His voice trails off.

  “I thought Dorset would help. You know, going back, remembering…talking to Mum. But it feels like I still only have one tiny piece of the puzzle. Does that make sense?”

  Dan shakes his head. He doesn’t understand.

  “I just need a little more time.”

  Dan sighs. He grabs his glass and swallows back the last of his pint. “I think I’m ready to go home. You?”

  She leaves her glass of orange juice on the table, half drunk. A ring of condensation has formed underneath it, creating an ugly white stain on the dark wooden table. She rubs at it halfheartedly and then stands to follow Dan out of the pub.

  They walk back through the half darkness in silence. Dora wills Dan to stop and take her hand, but he strides on, just a pace ahead of her the whole way with Gormley trotting along loyally at his heels. This isn’t how she’d imagined their reunion. The comforting sensations of the city have left her now. She hears the shriek of a siren in the distance and sees the ugly smears of litter, broken glass, and dogshit strewn around the street. Even the familiar silhouette of the button factory seems cloaked now in ominous shadows. They plod silently up the stairwell, and it is a relief when Dan puts his key in the front door and lets them into the flat.

  “Do you want a drink?” she asks, keen to defuse the tension between them.

  “No. I’m going to put in a bit more work before bed.”

  Dora feels the rebuff, but lets him go without another word.

  She stands at the sofa and watches him walk toward the studio, push on the door, turn on the lights, and then shut the door definitively behind him, closing himself off from the rest of the world and, more important, from her. She sighs. She knows what he wants to hear from her. She knows he needs to hear her say that she wants this baby; that it is the best thing that has happened to them; that she can’t wait to become a mother. But she just can’t. She is terrified. She is terrified of the change it will bring to their relationship and terrified by the responsibilities of parenthood and, most of all, terrified of losing not just this tiny being growing inside of her, but everything that she and Dan have built together. Families are fragile. Dan, for all his talk, doesn’t understand this. He can’t, because he has not lived her life. For so long she has lived like one of Dan’s sculptures, hollowed out, her warm clay interior and pliable wax coating removed until there was nothing inside of her but a vast, empty space. Alone, she had coped, hidden from the pain and the hurt that could come from giving too much of herself. But she isn’t alone anymore. There is Dan, and now there is their baby. How has she got herself into this mess?

  With a sigh she turns to survey the living room. The few surfaces they own are cluttered with the detritus of their lives. She ushers Gormley into the kitchen before grabbing a black trash bag and working her way back out methodically, dumping old papers and bills, dead flowers, empty wine bottles, half-eaten crusts of toast, and the stumps of misshapen candles into the bag. She stacks Dan’s art books back onto the bookshelves and carries dirty mugs and dishes into the kitchen. It takes her twenty minutes to do the washing up, and another ten to wipe down the dusty surfaces and whiz the vacuum round, but by the time she has finished the flat looks pristine again.

  She looks back at the closed door to the studio and can just make out movement beneath the gap in the door. He is lost in his work, or angry at her still. Either way she knows she’ll be going to bed alone.

  That night she dreams she is diving for coins. The water is green and murky but she can see them glinting silver on the bottom, drawing her down. She dives again and again, her hands scrabbling through the silt, her lungs burning as she seizes upon the cold metal and returns to the surface each time with a triumphant rush of air.

  There is one more down there. She has seen it winking at her. She can’t leave it behind. With a final gasp she forces her body down below the surface. She can feel her lungs ache but the coin is within reach; she knows it, just a few more strokes.

  Her hands stretch before her in the gloom and she feels grit sift through her fingers. Nothing.

  She has to return to the surface; her body needs the air, but her mind is insistent: It is there, just one more second, keep going.

  Her hands pat blindly at the ground and suddenly she touches something; not cold metal but something warm, something strangely flesh-like. Something human. She can’t breathe. Her body is on fire, her mind dizzy. She tries to rise to the surface but the thing she has touched has ahold of her now. Fingers, insistent and strong, grip her, refusing to let go.

  She pulls one more time, her body thrashing under the water as her final survival instincts kick in.

  But the hand’s grip is firm and tight. It will not let her go.

  With a final desperate wrench, she pulls away from its death-like hold and then opens her mouth to scream.

  She wakes to the shriek of her alarm clock. It is seven AM. She turns it off and lies in bed for a moment, listening to the sound of rain drumming softly on the roof and letting the remnants of her nightmare fade away. Another wet Monday morning: She doesn’t know how she is going to muster the energy to shower, dress, and get herself on the tube to work, particularly with the revolting queasy feeling already welling up inside of her. She hasn’t even opened her eyes yet, for God’s sake. The last few mornings she’s felt like this Dan has been so sweet. He’s made her tea and toast and brought it to her in bed. She reaches ou
t a hand for him now but finds nothing but empty space. His pillow lies chastely next to hers, perfectly plumped. He hasn’t come to bed so he must have crashed out on the couch in the studio.

  She staggers into the bathroom and loses herself under a jet of steaming water, then dresses and walks downstairs, swallowing back bile as she goes. She makes tea and throws down a bowl of dog biscuits for Gormley, before sitting at the kitchen table. Taking several deep breaths, she thinks for a moment and then, before she can change her mind, Dora reaches for the telephone.

  “Hello?” The voice at the other end picks up midway through the first ring, as though the person answering has been standing by the phone all this time.

  She takes another deep breath. “Dad, it’s me…it’s Dora.”

  Chapter 13

  Cassie

  Ten Years Earlier

  Cassie sat on her bed surrounded by revision notes. She was supposed to be studying for her history A-level, but her brain felt like mush and all she could think about was the little butterfly brooch secreted at the back of her bedside table. There was an itch spreading across her skin and she couldn’t ignore it.

  Kicking her notes to one side, she reached across and pulled the diamond and mother-of-pearl ornament out of the drawer, turning it over and over in her hand. It was so pretty, shimmering its muted pastel colors back at her, even in the gloom of a rain-soaked afternoon. She gazed at it a moment longer before unhooking the clasp and testing its pin for sharpness against her fingertips. It was good enough.

  She pushed her sweater sleeve up past her elbow and pressed the point against the pale skin in the crook of her arm, the spot where the skin was most sensitive and the results of her work could be hidden. Then, sucking in her breath, she pressed harder and winced as the metal punctured her flesh. Ruby-red blood sprang up around the pin and as she watched the beads bubble and form she dragged the spike down in one long, painful stroke, exhaling deeply as the metal did its work. She repeated the action several more times, watching with satisfaction as a crazy crisscross pattern sprang up on her skin and the warm blood began to seep down her arms. Then, feeling a little dizzy, she lay back on the bed and let the pain wash over her. It felt good to feel something.