The Last Wife

by Karen Hamilton

  It’s now dark. I drive down the empty lane, properly aware for the first time just how isolated the moor is and how easy it would be to get lost.

  “I’m listening,” I say, to give Camilla a prompt.

  She looks as if she might pass out asleep. It’s definitely not what I need her to do.

  It’s eerie, surrounded by darkness, apart from the headlights. I reach a crossroads. Left or right? I opt for right. Camilla stares out of the passenger window into nothingness.

  “All right. We killed Charlie accidentally on purpose. Is that what you want to hear?”

  My legs go weak. “Go on.”

  She tells the same leaving-the-party story I’ve now heard before, followed by the taking-of-the-boat one.

  “Charlie and I had a fight.” She speaks in a monotone. “Over you. He wanted to go back and find you. He said lots of vile things to me, he had a real mean streak. We fought. He wanted to turn the boat around, he threatened to jump overboard and swim back to shore. He wanted to tell you the truth about us, tell you he was sorry. I mean, who did Charlie think he was? He let me believe that I was special, that you and he were all but over. Then, out in the middle of the bloody ocean when we’re off to romantically watch a sunset, after he’d let you storm off as if he didn’t have a care in the bloody world and after I’d risked our friendship, he does a complete about-face. I didn’t deserve to be treated like that! Nina started yelling at me, too, saying that she’d been put in a shitty position. Like it was all about her! Charlie stood really close to the edge. Nina yelled at him to step back.”

  She stops.

  She pushed him in on purpose, I know she did.

  “And you pushed him.”

  She doesn’t reply.

  I’m prepared to take her silence as a yes until she says, so softly it’s hard to hear, “We both did.”

  Oh. My. God.

  “We fought some more. I tried to stop him, but then he got really nasty. We were both really scared of him, Marie. You’ve heard what you wanted to hear.”

  I’m filled with renewed rage, that she killed not only Charlie, but my future—our future—along with him. I remain silent, focusing on the road ahead. I’m not certain how long we’ve been driving. I see a sign for a village six miles away.

  “Okay,” she continues. “I hit him on the head first, with some kind of metal pole thing. He picked it up first. I panicked. We managed to wrestle it off him. Nina threw it into the sea afterward. But it was an accident. I didn’t mean to hit him and I didn’t mean for him to fall. If we hadn’t got him under control, we all could’ve died. We were out at sea, for God’s sake! Now are you happy?”

  Oh my God. It’s worse than I feared. Charlie’s head injury wasn’t from the boat or the deck.

  “What did you do afterward? You and Nina didn’t get back until it was nearly morning.”

  “We were in shock. Terrified. We returned some things to the villa, including the boat key. We talked and figured out our story. We even briefly went back to the beach, pointlessly, to see if a miracle was going to occur and that Charlie would magically reappear from the darkness, safe and well.”

  I don’t want to hear any more. It sounds more like murder than manslaughter. I need proper distance between us.

  We drive in silence. I thought we’d have reached the village by now. I check—we’ve been driving for over eight miles. I must’ve missed a turn somewhere. There are no lights, no signs of life close by. I don’t want to be anywhere near her. I’ve never hated her more. I want to push her out and leave her to find her own way home. Let her be frightened. Let her feel helpless.

  Poor Charlie. I feel winded. I pull over to the side of the road, open the window and take some deep breaths.

  Camilla watches me but doesn’t say anything. Even she seems to realize that she’s said enough. Surrounded by darkness, I can hear her breathing. Is she frightened? I reach down with my fingers and check my phone. No signal.

  Camilla, swift and predatory in her realization, lean overs me and tries to grab it. I am faster. I drop it back down to my side, release the hand brake and pull away from our secluded spot, relieved when the white signpost (only one more mile) to the next village is illuminated by our headlights.

  As we pull into the village, I see a pub. The lights are on and there is a board outside offering bed and breakfast. Perfect. For Camilla. I pull into the parking lot.

  “Get out,” I say.

  “I’m not getting out of my own car in the middle of nowhere.”

  “Fine. I’ll call the police and tell them that I had to stop you drunk driving. I want you out. You have your handbag, stay the night here, order a cab, I don’t care. But I’m not driving you back.”

  “You can’t do this.”

  “Watch me,” I say, as a surge of rage gives me strength when she makes no effort to get out.

  I unclip her seat belt, open my door, stride around the back of the car and yank open the passenger door. She tries to pull it shut again but isn’t quick enough. She leans away from me as if she’s planning on climbing over to the driver’s side, so I pull hard on her arm.

  I realize just quite how drunk Camilla still is as she loses her balance and half stumbles, half falls out of the car. She staggers slightly before putting out her arms and reaching for the side of a nearby truck, leaning against it for support. I reach inside for her bag, throw it down on the ground beside her and slam the door.

  I rush back round, slide into my seat and shift the gear to Reverse. I pull away, driving slowly enough to check the rearview mirror and see Camilla pick up her bag, briefly rummage through it, then disappear through the entrance to the pub. I pick up as much speed as possible, given my surroundings. The growing distance between us is a welcome relief.

  * * *

  I grip the steering wheel. I’ve no idea where I’m going, only that it will do Camilla good to have some more time to reflect. The area is unrecognizable in the darkness, of course it is. I must go back, this is madness. I am directionless in the middle of nowhere.

  I pull over to set the GPS, when a wave of pain knifes my stomach. Feeling sick, I open the door and lean out. Cold, harsh realization hits as the second pain forces me to get out and pace up and down the deserted road.

  As soon as it eases, I call Stuart. It goes to voice mail. Icy fear ups my indecision a notch. Do I try to drive back to the house? Call an ambulance? Camilla. God, why did I think it was such a good idea to leave her behind? Even her drunken, horrible company is better than being alone right now. I take some deep breaths.

  I feel better, much more in control, as I restart the car. Think. I must come up with a proper plan: return to Camilla, tell her we’re even (we’re not, but now is definitely not the time). She can drive me to a hospital if the pains worsen to get checked out; it’s too early for the baby to come. I turn the car around until I remember that Camilla is in no fit state to drive.

  I’m on my own.

  Thirty-Five

  The decision is made for me. The pains subside long enough for me to drive myself to the nearest hospital twenty miles away. Stuart was right to be concerned, for once. I can’t take any risks with my baby’s health, not after all I’ve been through. Camilla will be all right. Worst-case scenario, she’ll have to pay an expensive cab fare back to the property. Greg will be with her by lunchtime.

  Fresh pain hits and distracts as I leave the car in the hospital parking lot. I follow the signs to the maternity unit as I try to call Stuart again. Thank God he answers, albeit in a sleepy, hoarse voice.

  My plight spills out in a torrent of jumbled words.

  “What? Slow down, Marie. Where are you?”

  I name the hospital. “Please, call Deborah to look after Felix and Em. Get here quickly. Just in case.”

  As I walk through the automatic doors, sickness swamps. I’m terri
fied. I thought I was a strong person, could take anything. I’m not. Everything I thought I’d learned or prepared for doesn’t happen. There is no order, only sickness, pain and desperately busy staff. I want to die.

  My baby is putting in an early appearance.

  Time passes in changes of medical staff. I take every drug I’m offered and give in to the surreality. I didn’t think I’d be able to stay still long enough to have an injection in my spine, but I can’t wait for it to work its magic powers once the anesthesiologist has been located. I think I see my dead grandmother. I even see Nina at one point.

  I drift in and out of reality. I’m told to push. To not push. I’m sick. I’m hot, I’m cold. I’m terrified yet resigned simultaneously. The baby is back-to-back, meaning that he is pressing against my spine. There is talk of forceps, of a cesarean. I don’t care as long as my baby comes out alive and all this is over. Time is suspended and distorted, yet the end comes in sight swiftly.

  “Your baby’s heart is in distress,” I’m told. “We need to take you into the operating room and deliver the baby quickly.”

  I sign a consent form while the risks are read out loud to me.

  “Is my husband here yet?”

  A midwife squeezes my hand. “He’s on his way. He won’t be long.”

  She has no way of knowing, but I’m grateful for the lie, nonetheless. I stare at the ceiling as I’m wheeled to the operating room. I look up at the largest round lights I’ve ever seen, like UFOs. I hold out my right arm to be injected. Then, nothing.

  * * *

  I open my eyes.

  Ice-cold fear floods.

  “Where is my baby?”

  Stuart is sleeping in a plastic chair in the corner. I try to sit up, but there is a burning pain, like fire, where my bump used to be.

  I am not pregnant any more.

  “You’ve had a beautiful, healthy boy,” says a midwife.

  Thank God.

  “Would you like to hold him?”

  She helps me into an upright position before she hands him to me.

  “Make sure you hold his head,” she says.

  I know, but I don’t mind her telling me.

  He is dressed in the little white onesie I chose for him, decorated in teddies. Someone has put a blue hat on his head. There is a white plastic name tag around his wrist. He has the smallest eyelashes. Every now and then he jerks suddenly as if he’s realizing that he’s out in the real world and has space.

  “You’re perfect,” I say to him.

  Stuart opens his eyes, leans forward, stands up and comes over to us. He looks tired but happy.

  “You’re awake,” he says. “Isn’t he gorgeous?”

  “He’s early. Is he all right?”

  “Yes, he’s fine. He wasn’t that early.”

  I want to cry with happiness. Finally. I am a real mother. I did do the right thing.

  I’m only given a few precious moments holding him before my blood pressure is taken and I’m told I’ll be prescribed liquid morphine for the pain. After all the years I’ve spent eating as organically as possible, trying to limit toxins, I’m a rapid convert to drugs.

  I’m offered a cup of tea and some toast. To my astonishment, I’m hungry. The tea is the nicest I’ve ever tasted.

  “I’d like to call him Jack,” I say to Stuart. “I think he looks like a Jack.”

  Stuart smiles. “It sounds like a good name.”

  I knew he wouldn’t disagree. After all, he can’t. As he keeps telling me, he’s “done this all before.”

  When I’m feeling up to it, I ask Stuart to pass me my phone so I can let my dad know the good news.

  I freeze.

  There’s a missed call from Greg asking why Camilla hasn’t answered her phone, followed by a couple of messages. He’s been delayed by an unexpected, money’s-too-good-to-turn-down job.

  I check the time. I abandoned Camilla in almost the middle of nowhere and took her car.

  My whole body feels like jelly. I hope nothing awful has happened to her. I don’t want to be like Camilla and Nina. I don’t want to be responsible for something bad happening to someone else. I do the only thing I can: confess to Stuart.

  I give him Camilla’s car keys.

  “Be quick,” I say as he leaves me and our son alone.

  I’m wheeled through to a bed in the middle of the main ward. It’s busy and noisy. Jack is attached to my bed in a plastic cot. Navy curtains are drawn around us to give an illusion of privacy, but they can’t block out sounds.

  * * *

  My first hours as a new mother are the worst of my life. I cannot feed Jack, and when he cries, I press the call bell as I’m not allowed to lift him due to my surgery, but the midwives are overworked and cannot get to me quickly. Babies cry.

  Every time the doors to the ward open, I pray to see Stuart and not the police. I ring him every twenty minutes. Panic at being trapped and so helpless is utterly surreal and petrifying. When I see a message from Stuart, I want to cry with relief.

  Camilla’s fine. She’s back at the house. She got a taxi, which she says you owe her for by the way. She’s furious, but relieved. Especially when I told her where her phone was hidden. Without her contacts, she couldn’t remember any phone numbers.

  Did she say anything else? I message back.

  What I mean is, is she going to call the police and tell them I locked her in her room, then stole her car? I doubt it—she’s hardly likely to want to get them involved after confessing to murdering my old boyfriend—but being helpless creates powerful paranoia.

  I’m going to drive her to the hospital to get her car, then she’s heading home. She’s not going to say anything, but she’s as mad as a snake. I’ll check into a hotel, get some sleep. I’ll see you both as soon as poss in the morning.

  The woman next to me sobs relentlessly, yet I’m unable to move to go and comfort her. The pain, the spaced-out feeling, the sheer sense of powerlessness is overwhelming again. This is not what I had in mind when I craved being a mother, not at all. When I look at my baby, rather than being in awe, I pray that he doesn’t start crying again.

  I’m wrung-out by the time Stuart visits. I can’t feed Jack. Formula is a totally frowned-upon no-no. I learned this in prenatal classes, where everything sounded so straightforward and simple. I’m desperate and exhausted.

  “I’ll sort this,” Stuart says.

  It’s such a relief to hear those words. He arranges a single room for me, reserved mainly for women who need longer hospital stays. Once I’ve been assisted upright and proved I can stand, then walk, unaided, I’m wheelchaired to the relative sanctuary of the private room. Finally, Jack feeds. He feels calmer in my arms. I cry in gratitude. When he falls asleep, Stuart lifts him from me and places him in his Perspex cot attached to my bed.

  From where I’m lying, all I can see are windows. Yet, my world exists here, in this room. It’s tricky to imagine that life really is going on outside.

  Yet it is. A message from Camilla among the many good wishes (there’s even one from Ben) bursts my bubble.

  Greg’s dumped me. But that’s not the problem. We need to talk as soon as you get back. (And not through a bloody door this time or on some drive in the middle of nowhere.) Don’t think I won’t hold that against you forever. Btw, I know I’m supposed to say “congratulations” and ask how you are, etc. But this is important otherwise I’d be ignoring you.

  I message back. OK. Sorry.

  Me too.

  It doesn’t let her off murder—not by a long way.

  I no longer think of Greg as benign “Greg from the book group.” I’m certain he has had a hidden agenda for a long time. If I’m right, then he’s dangerous to us both. Who’d have thought that after all this time, Camilla and I would have to join forces for both our sakes.

 
Nina’s legacy is becoming increasingly twisted in ways I don’t think even she could have foreseen.

  Thirty-Six

  Everything at home looks the same, yet my whole life and outlook is different. One of the first things to catch my eye is the camera. It strikes me as odd how so very recently I was obsessed with watching the footage. The shift in my priorities is stark. Actually, thinking about it...

  “We need to dismantle that one,” I say to Stuart, pointing at it. “I don’t want to use Greg’s stuff anymore. We can buy and install our own.”

  I can’t be too careful. I don’t need to feel paranoid in my own environment.

  While Jack lies asleep (thank goodness) in his car seat, I read congratulations cards, admire flowers and open gifts. Exhaustion hits at the same time that Camilla opens the back door and lets herself in.

  Strange to think that I haven’t seen her since that night. Time has distorted, like it could have happened weeks or months ago. The memories are dreamlike, almost as if they never happened.

  She makes a show of oohing and aahing over Jack, but I can tell that she’s desperate to speak to me.

  “He’s gorgeous.”

  “Thanks. Please don’t stand too close to him,” I can’t help saying.

  She throws me a look.

  What does she expect? She confessed to murdering my ex-boyfriend.

  “Coffee?” Stuart asks.

  Camilla shakes her head.

  Stuart gives me an are you all right to be left alone with her? look behind her back.

  I reply with a discreet nod.

  He retreats to his study, closing the door behind him.

  “It wasn’t true, what I said,” she begins. “I was angry, I wanted you to stop questioning me. I thought that if I told you what you wanted to hear, I could sort it out later.”