by Luana Lewis
‘Why here, Ben? Why are we having this conversation here? Are you trying to bribe me or threaten me? I can’t tell.’
I start to loosen the clasp of one of the earrings, but Ben reaches out and takes hold of my wrist.
‘Let go,’ I say.
He won’t. He takes hold of my other hand, too. We stay, frozen, staring at each other. There are tears in his eyes.
‘I have no idea what we’re doing here,’ he says. ‘I’ve been agonizing over this for days and I didn’t know how to raise it with you.’
‘What am I, Ben, some kind of witch you’re afraid of?’ Now I’m shouting. I imagine Mark and his father, eyeglasses on, raising their heads to listen to us argue.
‘I know how sensitive you are,’ he says, ‘how you beat yourself up about not being a good enough mother. I wanted to take you somewhere you had to listen to me, somewhere neutral, somewhere you couldn’t walk out before I’d finished. I wanted to show you how much I love you, to reassure you. It was a terrible, idiotic idea. But it doesn’t really matter where we have this conversation. We have to talk about this.’
I look into his eyes and I see something has changed. Something is broken.
‘I’ve been to see a psychiatrist,’ he says, ‘and I want us to go back and see him together.’
‘You went to see someone behind my back? You spoke about me, without my permission?’
I try to rip my hands away from his, but he won’t let go.
‘If you don’t let go of me,’ I say, ‘I will start screaming.’
Ben loosens his grip on my wrists. I pull away from him and grip the armrests. My eyes fill with tears, but mine are tears of rage.
‘What did you tell him? He could ruin us.’
‘No, Viv. You’re being paranoid. Everything I talk to him about is confidential. He wants to help us.’
‘Like Mrs Murad kept our conversations confidential?’
I’m in some kind of nightmare. The noise in my head grows louder and louder. I can’t hear what he’s saying.
‘Ben, this psychiatrist could report me to social services.’
He looks shocked. He hasn’t thought this through. ‘Why? Viv, what have you done? What have you been giving her?’
Ben puts his head in his hands.
‘We have a daughter,’ he says, ‘and she comes first. That’s the way it is, Vivien. We’re parents. We don’t matter as much any more.’
‘Fuck you, Ben.’
Mark is at the door, looking startled. He turns and makes a swift exit.
Ben sits back in his chair. His body is slumped, as though I’d punched him in the stomach.
‘As soon as I get out of this place,’ I say, ‘I’m phoning the caterer. Every single thing for tonight will be cancelled. And don’t you dare come home tonight. Don’t you dare. You can go to a hotel and have a good long think about your cosy little chat with your new psychiatrist friend.’
I stand up. My rage gives me strength. I straighten my jacket and run my fingers through my hair. I adjust my posture, so my shoulders are back and my spine is straight.
‘Don’t come anywhere near us until I’ve calmed down. Or you’ll be sorry. Do you understand?’
He nods, looking past me, not at me.
I walk, gracefully, like the ballet dancer I once was, through the front room of the jewellery shop. Mark and his father are behind their desks, pretending to look at their laptops. When I reach the door, Mark springs to his feet to unlock it for me.
I step outside, onto the pavement. I ignore Isaac as he gets out of the car. By the time he’s come round to open the passenger door, I’ve already flagged down a passing cab. The driver is old and decrepit-looking, and I get a bad feeling about it, but I climb in anyway. As the taxi pulls away from the pavement, I remember I’m still wearing the diamond studs. But I’m not going back. Ben is going to have to pay.
Chapter 24
I didn’t come to the house tonight intending to take Lexi away with me, but now it seems the only thing I can do for her. I hold her hand firmly in mine as we climb the stairs to the entrance hall.
I don’t know if Cleo is still inside the house, or what she might be doing. I need to move fast, before she tries to stop me.
The cupboard next to the front door is packed solid with coats. I stare for a moment at Vivien’s shiny black goatskin before choosing a waterproof for Lexi, one with a fur-lined hood. She allows me to put it on her without protest. I kneel down and fumble with the clasp, my hands are not as steady as they usually are, but I manage, zipping it right up to the top. I grab the smallest pair of Wellingtons. She holds on to my shoulder while I help her to push her feet into the rubber boots. I grab my own coat from the hall table.
Then I take hold of Lexi’s hand again and I stop for a moment to smile down at her, to reassure her. Her strained face looks so small underneath her mussed up halo of hair. I can see in her eyes she is afraid.
‘Everything is going to be all right,’ I say. ‘I’m going to take you home with me, just for tonight.’
I open the front door. The rain is coming down hard and I feel a flicker of foreboding. I am taking this child away from her warm bed and out into a dark, wet night. Ben is going to be furious. But this house is toxic and I won’t leave Lexi again. I am the only one who can help her.
I press the buzzer that releases the front gate. Then I shut the door, grasping the slippery hexagonal handle with both hands.
Lexi pushes her hair away from her face and tips her head up to the sky. She opens her mouth to taste the rain. I cannot say if she is frightened or glad to be taken away from Blackthorn Road, but she is holding my hand and that’s enough, for now.
We walk slowly down the stairs. I don’t want her to slip and lose her footing on the wet marble. I push open the iron gate and lead her through. We’re the only people out walking on Blackthorn Road. With a small child at my side, and the rain making it difficult to see, the journey to the end of the street seems to last forever.
I imagine the neighbours, peering out from every window we pass, watching me leading the child away. I adjust the hood of Lexi’s coat, pulling it up to cover her hair. I’d rather not risk a cab, it might seem suspicious, a young child in pyjama bottoms under her coat, out so late at night. Alexandra might ask for her mother again, she might struggle or protest or ask to go home.
I imagine Cleo’s footsteps behind us, masked by the sound of the rain.
As we cross the road, a group of four teenage boys is coming towards us. Hoodies conceal their faces, their elbows jut out, their hands are hidden in their pockets. I don’t make eye contact; I grip Lexi’s hand tighter. I am defenceless. I shouldn’t have her out so late at night. I think about Ben and I imagine his reaction when he finds out I have taken his daughter. Lexi is his most prized possession. She is all he has left.
When we reach the Underground, a handful of commuters spill out of the station, their heads hunched over mobile phones. No one notices us. I don’t look behind me because I am convinced I’ll see Cleo, in her raincoat, determined to take Lexi away from me. I decide to hail a taxi after all.
The noise and the lights from the station seem to rouse Lexi, and she stops walking.
‘I want to go home,’ she says.
I try to pull her forwards, gently, but she resists. When I won’t let go of her hand, she arches her body into a C-shape, leaning away and pulling in the opposite direction. A woman in a miniskirt with sky-high heels passes us, her eyes flicker between us from underneath her umbrella. She totters by. No one wants to get involved; people prefer not to see these things.
Lexi is looking up at me, she’s pushing her hair away from her face with her free hand and trying to say something, but rain blows into her eyes and I can’t hear her. I bend down closer and she whispers in my ear.
‘Where is Mummy?’ she says.
I kneel down and hug her tight. Her arms creep around me.
‘I love you,’ I say. I hold her as clos
e as I can without crushing her. ‘Everything will be all right,’ I say. ‘You’ll see.’
I feel her body relax. I pull her hood further forward over her face. I stand up, taking hold of her hand again.
The sound of my blood churning in my ears is growing louder. I expect Ben to drive up alongside us at any moment and cause a terrible scene. I need to get away from this corner, it’s too well lit outside the station and people and cars are passing all the time. I’m squeezing Lexi’s hand; I try to relax my grip.
At the corner, the traffic lights change to green. We cross over to the other side. A taxi is approaching us, the yellow light on the roof shining. I’m about to hold out my hand to hail him when I feel a tugging at my coat. Lexi is pointing at something, at someone. Behind us, on the other side of the street, is a woman who looks exactly like her mother. A woman wearing a long black goatskin coat.
Lexi jerks away from me. Our hands are slick with the rain and she slides from my grasp.
The temperature of a body can change in a split second. Plummet. Break out into a sweat. I grab at the back of her coat, but she’s already gone. She runs, across one lane and into the middle of the road. I fix my eyes on the back of her hood as though I could stop her, bring her back, with sheer force of will.
I run out into the road after her. A gust of wind drives the rain into my eyes as I scream her name.
She cries out as she slips and falls, pitching forward, her knees slamming against asphalt, hands outstretched to break her fall. Headlights bear down on her, the windscreen wipers of the taxi swish back and forth, the driver does not see the small girl with ginger hair and a grey coat lying in the road.
But Cleo sees, and she is closer. She runs, throws herself at Lexi, and there is a terrible, tearing sound as the taxi driver skids and cannot stop in time.
A terrible, dull thud. Two bodies in the middle of the road.
Chapter 25
It’s one thirty in the morning and I’m sitting, zombie-like, on a vinyl-covered chair in a small cubicle-type room in Accident and Emergency. My coat lies across two chairs; it’s muddied, black in places, from when I sat on the pavement with Lexi in my arms.
When I close my eyes, I can hear Vivien and Cleo chattering and giggling behind Vivien’s closed door. I can hear the tinny sound of the tape recorder as the same song plays over and over again. ‘Club Tropicana’. The girls are happy, I’m sure of it. There’s no need for me to go inside and check on them.
Lexi shivers, a small and terrified animal. I hold her and rock her, but I cannot comfort her. She is fighting me. I turn her away, so she does not see the body. She screams for her mother.
Cars form a blockade on either side of us. People stop to help, and to stare. The taxi driver turns Cleo onto her side in the wet darkness. A man drops his briefcase and covers her with a long coat. Her body is very, very still.
The flashing lights of the ambulance arrive mercifully quickly. I am surrounded by familiar sounds and familiar smells. The buzzing of monitors, the sharp, clean smell.
I hear loud footsteps approaching. Wooden soles. I pray it’s Ben, to give me news of Lexi, or even Ben with his daughter in his arms, saying she wants her grandmother. But of course it isn’t Ben, because Ben wants nothing to do with me.
When I open my eyes, Isaac is standing in the doorway. His hands are shoved down into the pockets of his rain-stained mackintosh, his shoulders are tense and his expression is forbidding. I can hear his accusation in the way he looks at me. Ben looked at me the same way when he arrived at the hospital to find me at his daughter’s bedside.
‘How’s Lexi?’ I say.
‘She’s stable. They’re keeping her in overnight.’
I exhale. ‘I thought so. I knew she wasn’t badly hurt. I had a look at her while we waited for the ambulance.’
Isaac doesn’t move. He doesn’t say anything comforting.
‘Cleo’s having a CT scan,’ I say. ‘They haven’t been able to trace any next of kin, so I said I’d stay.’
I stand up, uncomfortable under his stare, and I go over to the water machine. I pull out one of the plastic cups, and several more fall out, dropping to the floor. I pick them up, balance them on top of the machine and pour myself a cup of cold water.
I find my nurse’s persona, and I wrap it round me like a cloak before I turn to face him.
‘What happened?’ Isaac says.
‘I went over to the house to check on Lexi. Ben wasn’t home and he’d left her alone with Cleo. Cleo was unstable – crying one minute and angry the next. I couldn’t get her to leave the house. She told me all sorts of things, about her past …’
I remember, then, what she’d said about Isaac, what she’d intimated about him and Vivien. But there’s no point repeating her divisive accusations. Not now.
‘It wasn’t safe for us to stay in that house, I had to get Lexi out of there. I only meant to take her as far as my flat. But Cleo followed us and when Lexi saw her, she pulled away from me and ran towards her. You see Cleo had deliberately made herself up to look exactly like Vivien. Her hair, her make-up – she was wearing Vivien’s fur coat, for God’s sake – everything.’
My mouth is dry and stale. My head pounds and my neck and shoulders ache. I’m ready to sink under the weight of it all. But I cannot sink, because it would be selfish. I try to slow down, to sound rational.
‘Isaac,’ I say, ‘Cleo had been stalking them for years. There’s evidence in her flat. I’ve been to see the police about it. DS Cole told me Cleo has a history of violence. She assaulted someone. I know that in hindsight what I did seems reckless, but I was afraid for Lexi’s safety.’
Isaac frowns. I’m not sure if he believes me, but he is my last hope. With his support, Ben might forgive me.
‘Ben has reported you to the police,’ he says.
I want to say something, but no sound comes out. I clear my throat and try again. ‘Reported me for what?’
‘Child abduction.’ His tone is grim. He’s serious.
‘That’s insane. I’m her grandmother. You have to convince Ben to talk to me.’
‘Ben is with Lexi. He won’t let you anywhere near his daughter right now.’
My chest has seized up. The pounding in my head threatens to take me over, but I keep it at bay. I have to think.
‘You took Alexandra out of her bed, in the middle of the night, without permission, and without telling Ben where his daughter was,’ Isaac goes on. ‘How the hell did you think he’d react?’
His voice is so cold.
‘I swear, I was trying to protect her. Help me, Isaac, please. I know how much influence you have over Ben. This can be sorted out. Lexi is safe. She’s unhurt.’
I see Cleo’s body, lying limp on the wet tarmac. I see Lexi’s palms, full of grit and blood. I see Vivien, too. All my fault.
‘I am trying to help you,’ he says. ‘That’s why I’m here. The police are looking for you and I think it’s better if you don’t talk to them tonight. You might say things you regret. Maybe you should find a lawyer, before you talk to anyone.’
‘I can’t leave Cleo here alone.’
‘You just said she’s dangerous.’
‘I know. But she’s also … I’ve handled this so badly. Cleo saved Lexi’s life, too. Even though she caused the accident.’
I hear myself. I’m incoherent.
‘Rose, stop.’ Isaac walks forward and picks up my coat. He drapes it around my shoulders and then he puts his arm around me and guides me out. The nurses are busy, nowhere to be seen, and no one notices us leave. Outside, the car park is near empty. The rain has stopped.
‘Where are we going?’ I say.
‘To my place. I’ve asked a friend to send through details of a solicitor.’
‘Is that really necessary?’
‘I think it’s a good idea.’
As Isaac walks with me towards Vivien’s car, I realize I don’t care about the police. I only fear the damage I have done to my
already fragile relationship with Ben.
His arm is heavy around my shoulders and it should be a comfort; at least I’m not alone. Yet the weight of it also feels like a restraint. I twist around, to look back at the hospital, and I shrug his arm away.
‘I need to be here, at this hospital. I’m not leaving without seeing Ben.’
‘For God’s sake, Rose, leave him alone. Do you have any idea of the damage you nearly did tonight? He’s barely begun to grieve for his wife, and if it wasn’t for Cleo throwing herself under that taxi, Alexandra might be dead too.’
‘If it wasn’t for Ben’s relationship with Cleo, Lexi would have been safe in her bed. His judgement leaves much to be desired.’
‘Ben’s right,’ Isaac says. ‘You refuse to face reality.’
‘Ben knows nothing about me.’
Isaac’s patience has run out. He raises his voice, he’s bellowing at me.
‘Ben has been trying to hold himself together since Vivien died. He’s doing his best to look after his kid and keep his business afloat and pay his mortgage and if you pull another stunt like this one, he could lose his sanity along with everything else.’
I can just about make out the shapes of tall trees against the sky, and behind them, flashes of light from the road. The sound of traffic is a comfort, for once. There are people nearby, just the other side of the trees. We’ve reached Vivien’s car and I think Isaac might try to force me to get in. But he doesn’t touch me.
‘Ben’s stability, financial and otherwise, is important to you, isn’t it?’ I say. ‘Your own future depends on his success, on him keeping it together.’
‘What on earth are you talking about?’
I stand with my back against the passenger door. ‘Were you attracted to my daughter?’ I say.
The car park is so dark, I can’t see his eyes.
‘Where the hell is this coming from?’ He leans over me, his large hand pressed against the window.
Vivien used to look so tiny, so slight, next to this same car.