The Closer You Get

by Mary Torjussen

  Quickly I cleared my search engine history. The very last thing I needed was for Harry to see what I’d been looking at.

  I went to the kitchen to make coffee, but as soon as I opened the packet of coffee beans the smell hit me and I had to race to the bathroom again. Afterward I sat in the living room, my body shaking and sweating, and I wondered how on earth I was going to wait another couple of months before I told Harry I was pregnant.

  * * *

  • • •

  As it turned out, I didn’t have to wait at all.

  Just before five P.M. my mobile rang. I was wrapped in a blanket on the sofa; all attempts at work were futile as I could hardly move without feeling sick. My mouth tasted of metal, my breasts were sore, and I felt as though I could sleep for a week.

  “Hi, Jane.”

  “Hi.” She sounded distracted. “Sorry I didn’t call earlier. It’s been such a busy day. I can’t stay long now actually as I have to go into a meeting soon. We have to do a formal handover. What’s up? Is everything okay?”

  I suppose it was my hormones messing around, but at the sound of her kind voice, I just burst into tears.

  “What is it?” She was panicking now. “Are you okay?”

  “You’ll never guess,” I said. “I’ve just found out I’m pregnant.”

  “What?” She sounded as amazed as I felt. “But . . . how?”

  I laughed, then, choking on my tears. “The usual way.”

  “That’s incredible! Congratulations! Oh, Emma, this is the best news ever.” I heard her call to someone, “Can I see you before I go?”

  “There’s something I need to talk to you about.” I swallowed. This wasn’t going to be easy. “Something I’m really worried about.”

  “Oh my God,” she interrupted. “Pregnant! That means I’m going to be an aunt! Izzy and May will have a cousin! They’ll be so excited.”

  “Listen,” I said. “I need to talk to you. Can we meet up tomorrow?”

  “Yes, of course,” she said. “And then we can . . . Oh no, hold on a second.” I could hear her talking to someone. “I’ve got to go. Amy needs to talk to me.”

  “Jane,” I said urgently. “Harry doesn’t know yet.”

  But she’d gone.

  CHAPTER 31

  Emma

  Of course you can guess what happened.

  I was sitting in the living room just after seven that night when Harry’s car turned into our driveway. My stomach dropped at the thought of the secret I was going to have to keep from him for weeks, if not forever. My skin was clammy and I wasn’t sure whether that was from the sickness or from the dread that I felt when his car door slammed. Then I heard the front door open and he called, “Hello?” Usually I would go out to him, greet him with a kiss and a smile, but how could I do that tonight?

  And then he appeared in the doorway with the biggest bouquet of flowers I’ve ever seen. He could hardly fit through the door. They were peonies, my favorite, and their white and pink flowers filled the room with their scent. Just one glance at him and I knew that he knew. I sighed. My sister. She’d never been able to keep anything to herself. Harry’s face was flushed and he looked so happy.

  “Congratulations!” he said.

  I tried to smile. “Congratulations?”

  He laughed and put the flowers on the table. “Yes, congratulations! Don’t pretend you don’t know what I mean!”

  “Jane,” I said. “You’ve been talking to Jane.”

  He came over to hug me. “She thought I knew. But when did you find out?”

  “This morning.”

  “And you didn’t call me?”

  I winced as I remembered my immediate reaction to my pregnancy was to search for DNA tests, trying desperately to find one that would give a quicker result, and deleting my search history in case he saw it. I’d had no intention of telling him until I knew who the father was. I smiled at him, knowing whatever I did, whatever I said, I was a traitor, and if ever I was found out, he’d remember this conversation for the rest of his life.

  “I wanted to tell you face-to-face,” I said. “It’s . . . it’s such big news. There’s a lot to take in.”

  “Oh, Emma.” He held me to him, too tightly really, and it was as though he was saying everything in that hug. “We’re going to have a baby!”

  How could I possibly tell him that the baby might not be his? Probably wasn’t his. Almost certainly wasn’t his. His face was flushed with pride, but there was something else there, too. It was guilt.

  I recognized it, you see, because I’d seen it on my own face.

  * * *

  • • •

  The flowers were a waste, because the next thing he said was, “Let’s get away.”

  I pulled away from him. “What?”

  “Let’s just get out of here for a few days. A week or so. Or two, even. Let’s just hide ourselves away.”

  “Two weeks! I can’t do that. What about work?”

  “One week, then. You haven’t got a lot on at the moment, have you?”

  “No, but . . .”

  “Tell Annie you need some time off.”

  I started to laugh. “Just like that?” My mind raced through the projects we had on. We’d just finished a big project and were ahead of schedule; I knew I could afford to take some time off. “And what about your work?”

  He hesitated and my stomach dropped. Of course, he’d be thinking about her. And I could hardly criticize him for that, when I might have her husband’s baby in my belly.

  “Screw it,” he said. “I haven’t had a break for ages.”

  I said nothing about his trip to Paris just weeks before. The less I said about that weekend the better.

  “Come on, what about going to the Lakes? Or abroad somewhere? Let’s find somewhere special with lots of pampering for you. Are you feeling sick yet?”

  I nodded. “I feel horrible. Everything tastes of metal; it’s disgusting. That’s how I realized I was pregnant.” I outlined all my symptoms and he listened avidly, just as I’d known he would, when I’d first daydreamed about this moment years before. I felt horrible knowing he probably hadn’t caused them, but honestly, I couldn’t think of a way out of it. And then I thought of Ruby and Tom, and all I wanted was for us to get as far from them as we could. I looked carefully at him and saw strain in his eyes and knew he wanted to get away, too.

  “Okay,” I said. “Let’s just take off.”

  “Where do you fancy?”

  “I don’t care. Let’s just get into the car and see where it takes us.”

  He grinned at me. We’d had that sort of holiday so often when we were young. We’d set off from home not knowing where we’d end up; as long as we were together it hadn’t mattered at all. I ran upstairs ahead of him, not wanting him to see the deceit on my face.

  It took us ten minutes to pack our bags. I know I felt dreadful lying to him like that and I assumed he felt the same, for when I came out of the bathroom with an armful of toiletries I saw him standing by the window. On his face I saw the expressions that I had felt myself: shame and grief, but joy, too, at being given a second chance.

  * * *

  • • •

  For nine glorious days we stayed away from home and spent every moment together. I’d insisted we fly from Liverpool, not wanting to go to Manchester airport after seeing him there with Ruby, and we’d ended up on a late flight to the South of France. It was like a second honeymoon. We slept in every morning, with no alarm to waken us, and lazed in the sun and swam in the pool. I tried and tried to find something I could eat without feeling ill. When I discovered ginger biscuits did the trick, Harry would call down to reception and ask for them to be delivered to our room, where he’d feed them to me, a tiny piece at a time. I could see how much he loved me, how much he wanted this child, and with each
passing day I could see him move closer to me, farther away from Ruby.

  Of course I let myself wonder at times what would have happened if I hadn’t gotten pregnant. Of course I did. But then I forced myself to remember the night I’d spent with Tom, too. If Harry had been smitten by Ruby, I think that week away cured him of it. Put it this way: In bed it was as though there’d never been anyone else in our marriage. And now we didn’t wait until dark. Afterward there were whispers and caresses, instead of us turning away and never referring to it again. There were sly smiles the next morning and a race to bed in the afternoon. It was better than it had been for years.

  “Let’s switch off our phones,” he’d said the moment we left our house. “Have a real holiday.”

  “What? But you never do that.”

  “I am now. Things are going to change, Emma. I don’t want real life to intrude on us. I want to celebrate this baby.” His eyes were bright with tears. “I feel as though we’ve had a new chance.”

  I leaned over to hug him. I was so relieved that he didn’t want to contact Ruby that I accepted what he said at face value, never realizing for a minute he had another reason for going off-grid.

  “Send Annie a message saying we need a holiday,” he said. “I’ll e-mail Dave”—Dave was his right-hand guy at work—“and tell him to take over everything. Let’s have a complete break from real life.”

  So we sat in the car, each sending a message to our business partners, then switched our phones off and put them in the car’s glove compartment.

  For those days we were away, he never left my side, and, rather than finding that irritating, as I would have done recently, I grew to love it. I felt like we were conjoined twins, that we depended on each other in some kind of essential way. At night in bed he’d lie behind me and stroke my back and we’d suggest baby names to each other for hours.

  “Daniel?”

  “That’s the name of a boy who used to bully me.”

  “Vanessa?”

  “Vanessa was my best friend in elementary school. Until she spat in my dinner.”

  I was so tempted to say Ruby, but I held back, thinking how I’d feel if he said Tom. So we ignored certain names, locking them in a room where things from the past lay.

  It was one of those times where you immerse yourself in another world, and at the end, it seems as though a year has passed. We came back from France closer to each other than ever, but no closer to resolving the problem that lay between us.

  CHAPTER 32

  Emma

  Before we had left the house that night, I sent Jane a text to say that we were going away and wanted a bit of time together.

  Good idea, she’d replied. Treat it as a fresh start.

  I frowned. Had she guessed what I’d been up to? What do you mean? I replied.

  I just meant, she sent a couple of minutes later, that this is a blessing for you—a chance at having a family with Harry. Make the most of every minute x

  * * *

  • • •

  A few days after we returned from France, she came round for dinner, full of apologies for telling Harry I was pregnant. “I thought you’d already told him,” she said as she hugged me. “I didn’t think you’d tell me first!”

  “Forget about it,” said Harry. I noticed he wasn’t looking at her and thought he must be furious with her. He’d waited years for news like that, and I knew he would have wanted to hear it from me first. His voice was cold and I wondered whether this would affect their friendship. “I’ll go and sort out dinner. It’ll be about twenty minutes.” He went off into the kitchen and closed the door. I heard music playing and knew he wouldn’t come out until dinner was ready.

  “It’s all right,” I said to Jane, who was now red in the face. “He’s so happy. You really shouldn’t have told him, but it doesn’t matter, not in the long run.”

  I thought of the alternative: I knew I wouldn’t have told Harry by now. I would have pretended the sickness was from food poisoning or a bug, and then he would have panicked and come to the doctor’s with me. I knew him; he always wanted to take care of me if I wasn’t well. It was a lovely trait, but not really the kind of thing that’s useful if you’re trying to hide the fact you might be pregnant by another man.

  Jane looked at the closed kitchen door then leaned forward and whispered, “Is everything okay?”

  “What do you mean?” I stared at her. Had she guessed the baby might not be Harry’s? Or did she know about Ruby? Was it known at work that they were a couple?

  I felt mortified at the thought of people knowing, but then she said, “Oh, nothing. I just wondered how things were between you,” and I realized I needn’t worry about that. There’s no way she’d keep quiet if she knew he was having an affair. She was my sister. I trusted her.

  “They’re great,” I said. “Really great. It’s as though I’ve got the old Harry back again. And he’s so attentive. Honestly, if I make the slightest suggestion that I need something, he’s on to it.”

  “You’ve got him running around after you?”

  “Yes, at night I lie on the sofa and issue commands. He hasn’t disobeyed one yet.”

  She laughed and said again, “So everything’s okay?” There was something in her tone then, and I knew she knew something. I just couldn’t bear to discuss it with her. I was really comfortable in this position, with my head buried deep in the sand. I didn’t want to confront things, didn’t want to talk things over with her, to be brave and honest and all of that. Talking is vastly overrated sometimes. All I wanted was a happy pregnancy, whoever the father was. I didn’t want to think about whether Harry and Ruby were having an affair and I didn’t want to think about sleeping with Tom. I just couldn’t face up to things.

  So I just said, “Which names do you like?” and within seconds we were laughing and I could nearly—almost—forget what both Harry and I had done.

  That night I had the best night’s sleep I’d had in months, wrapped in Harry’s arms. I felt protected. Safe.

  And then Tom found me.

  CHAPTER 33

  Emma

  The morning after Jane came to dinner, I arrived at my office just after eight, planning to get some work done before Annie arrived. Harry had left at six that morning to fly to Edinburgh for a couple of days of back-to-back meetings. I was prepared for a long day at work and had a bag of ginger biscuits and raspberry tea for emergencies. I’d put on some makeup, but nothing could disguise my pallor. I’d been feeling queasy all night. I was trying to decide whether I’d tell Annie that I was pregnant or whether I’d fudge the issue and say I wasn’t well. I knew I wouldn’t get away with saying nothing, but didn’t want her to worry that I’d pass on a bug. My mind was on the reassurances I would give her for meeting the deadline when, frankly, I looked as though I was on my last legs.

  In the office car park I opened the trunk to pick up a box of stationery that I’d bought for work. I walked toward the door to the building and saw Tom. I jumped so hard I nearly dropped the box.

  He was standing across the road, leaning against his car; I recognized it from the driveway outside his house a few weeks before. He was wearing a leather jacket and jeans, and his dark hair shone in the early-morning sunlight. He was looking pretty good, really. I remained still by my car, unable to think what the etiquette was of bumping into someone who was essentially a one-night stand. Should I wave? Ignore him?

  The decision was taken out of my hands then as he crossed the road toward me.

  “Hi,” he said.

  “Hi.” I gave him a quick glance and then looked furtively around. Anyone looking at me just then would know immediately that I’d been up to no good. The last thing I wanted was for Annie to see me talking to him; I knew I wouldn’t be able to answer her questions. “What are you doing here?”

  “I’ve just had an early appointment with John Holt.”
He nodded to the building adjacent to ours. “Then I realized you work next door and thought I’d try to see you.” He smiled at me. “How are you?”

  “Fine, thanks,” I said automatically.

  “Do you have time for coffee?”

  I hesitated. I really didn’t want to talk to him but I didn’t want to be rude. I glanced at my watch. Annie would be taking her kids to school and wouldn’t be at the office just yet. “I have half an hour.” I winced. It sounded so miserly, to restrict his time like that. So unfriendly, particularly given the last time we met. “Sorry, you’ve caught me off guard here. I’m supposed to be meeting a colleague at nine.”

  “Have you got time to go to one of the cafés down the road?”

  I nodded. “Just give me a minute. I need to leave this inside.” While Tom stayed outside in the car park, I left the box with the receptionist and went into the bathroom. Luckily nobody else was in there. I ran cold water over my hands and wrists, feeling faint with stress. What did he want? And how had he found me? I hadn’t said anything about where I worked. After a few minutes I knew I’d have to face up to him. I sent Annie a quick text to tell her I might be a few minutes late and went outside to Tom.