When he winked at me, I turned mine off too and gave Mum a big smile. Liam shoved his in his pocket.
‘This looks lovely, Mum,’ I told her.
Mum looked stunned, although, in fairness, she was shocked most times I said something nice. I suppose I can’t blame her, I had been such a narky cow over Christmas, but my plan was to start the new year with a new me – God, I made a mess of that, didn’t I? One thing I did change was my makeup, because he’d told me how much nicer I looked wearing less. Not that I wouldn’t wear any, but I experimented a bit and found a new look that saved me a fortune on eyeliner.
‘I wanted to do something special,’ Mum said. ‘It’s a new recipe with lobster in it.’
‘Very decadent,’ I told her.
Liam laughed at me. ‘You can tell you’ve been swotting all week. Or is it those extra lessons Mr Swift gave you?’
‘Shut your face, Liam,’ I said.
‘Ignore him, love,’ Bryn said. ‘Use frilly words all you like, it might rub off on the rest of us luddites.’
Liam gave me a look. ‘How does Scarlett always manage to get people to take her side?’
‘I don’t take sides,’ Bryn said. ‘I’m equally happy letting both of you run rings around me. I presume you’ll be wanting a lift to Eva’s later?’
‘No!’ Liam said, like it had been a stupid question.
Mum’s ears pricked, but before she could say something, Bryn turned to me. ‘Oh, right. How about you, Scarlett? Would you like to book my services?’
‘I’m going to see Linus, if you don’t mind dropping me off? I won’t stay out too late.’
‘And you’ll be wanting me to pick you up again?’
I nodded politely like a good girl.
Everything was going to plan, but the minute Bryn started clearing away the dishes there was a knock at the door. No one was expecting anyone, so Mum was nominated to chase off the salesman. She’s used to it at the shop and for a minute I thought she must have slammed the door on him, because she came back really quickly, only she had this weird look on her face.
‘We have a visitor,’ she said, looking directly at me. She was dying to see my expression when Linus walked in.
‘What are you doing here?’
‘I tried phoning,’ he mumbled.
My cheeks were burning and Mum must have thought I was mortified, but I was so bloody angry. ‘And?’
Linus struggled to get the words out. He was such an embarrassment. ‘I dunno,’ he said. ‘I was just around.’
‘Aren’t you going to introduce us, Scarlett?’
It was Bryn asking and I just glared at him.
‘We’ve heard such a lot about you,’ Mum said. ‘It’s lovely to meet you at last, Linus. This is my husband, Bryn, and of course you know Liam.’
‘All right, mate,’ Liam said with a bemused smile.
Mum made Linus sit down, and straight away Liam and Bryn stood up.
‘I think I’ll have a quick shower before I go to work,’ Bryn said.
Liam didn’t make any excuses, he just followed Bryn out of the room with a stupid grin on his face.
‘You should have asked me first,’ I hissed.
‘But you were complaining about it being too cold to come out. I thought you’d be pleased.’
Oh, great, I thought. Now you’ve buggered up any plans I had for getting rid of you.
‘Well, this is nice,’ Mum said, and for a minute I thought she was going to sit back down at the table. ‘If you two want to stay in, you can go into the living room, if you’d like. I’ll stay in here and get on with my monthly accounts. You’ll hardly know I’m here.’
I knew what Mum was doing; she didn’t want me taking Linus upstairs to my bedroom in case we went too far. God, if only she knew that was the last thing on my mind. In fact, if I hadn’t been so annoyed that Linus had messed everything up, I might have laughed. It was too late to worry about taking precautions as far as Grandma Nina was concerned.
19
The Accusations
As Scarlett continued on her journey to school, Vikki remained by her car, her impulse to confront the schoolgirl ebbing away as she struggled to think of an opening line. ‘Hello, Scarlett, I hear you’re pregnant,’ was hardly a great start, but then neither was asking her directly who the father was. And even if she had been brazen enough to ask, she could hardly expect an answer. Not that a reply would be necessary to uncover the truth; all Vikki would need was to see Scarlett’s reaction to the question and the person asking. But her courage had failed her and as she heard the distant shrill of the school bell, she knew she had missed her opportunity.
The road began clearing of parents’ cars and the raucous chatter from the kids was eventually contained inside the school buildings. The silence only served to intensify the thudding of Vikki’s heart, bringing waves of fear that made her feel slightly seasick. She needed to act. She needed to do something. If she were going to keep her promise to her mum, she had to leave now so they could go together to the hospital, but when she did move, it was to walk away from the car.
She kept her head down and pulled her bag close to her chest as she walked through the school gates. It was easy to imagine being back at school on one of those rare occasions when she had been late for class, and she was halfway to the entrance before she reminded herself that she wasn’t on her way to lessons. She needed to turn around and leave because she didn’t belong here. What if Rob saw her? What would she tell him? What could she say to anyone when she couldn’t even admit to herself why she was so afraid?
It would all blow over, she told herself. Scarlett might think that her mystery man would stand by her and her baby, but how could he? He would know that the moment he stepped forward he would be arrested. And if Scarlett went ahead and had the baby without him, a DNA test could still be used to prove his guilt. Vikki didn’t know Scarlett, and she didn’t know what it was like to be in love at fifteen, but she knew what it was like to be in love so deeply that you would be willing to sacrifice anything and everything. Scarlett would protect him. She would do the right thing and have an abortion so that her lover would never be revealed. The suspicions would be forgotten and life would get back to normal. Who wouldn’t want that?
Veering away from the school buildings, Vikki headed towards the staff car park with no plan other than to avoid going back out through the school gates and giving up. When she reached Rob’s car she was shivering, and the touch of steel was so cold it made the tip of her finger burn as she trailed it along the length of the bodywork. She could see slithers of paper on the front passenger seat and recognized them as the remnants of a tube of indigestion tablets. Rob hadn’t eaten that morning, but his stomach had been churning, perhaps in sympathy with hers. Perhaps not. On the back seat there was one of Freya’s books, but it wasn’t images of a little girl that her mind summoned, or at least not that little girl.
I want my mum, Vikki thought, and the need for comfort was at last strong enough to send her off in the right direction, but as she approached the gates, a car turned into the school and sped past her. The driver screeched to a halt and Vikki wondered if she could slip out of the school without being noticed, but Nina was looking directly at her when she got out of her car. When Scarlett’s mum began walking towards her, Vikki felt a new surge of nausea.
‘She’s pregnant.’
‘I know, Nina. I’m sorry …’
‘She won’t say who did this.’
‘Sarah said.’
‘Did she tell you he’s married?’ Nina asked. She was talking fast. She hadn’t come to the school expecting to see Vikki, who was now wishing she had had the good sense to stay away. Nina had somewhere else to go, something else to do.
‘She did.’
‘I accused Bryn,’ Nina said, and gasped as she too swallowed back tears. ‘Do you know what it’s like to look at the man you thought you would love forever and think him capable of something like that?’
Shaking her head, Vikki’s jaw clenched along with her stomach as she tried to stop herself from throwing up, bursting into tears, or both.
‘I wouldn’t wish it on anyone,’ Nina said, and for a split second, she looked as if she were about to give Vikki a hug. She didn’t. She simply said, ‘I’m sorry, Vikki, I really am. I have to go.’
Before Nina could leave, Vikki had to ask the question she was pretty sure she didn’t want to know the answer to. ‘What are you going to do, Nina?’
Nina closed her eyes and inhaled deeply, held it, then let it go. ‘I think I accused the wrong man. I need to speak to Rob. I need to know if all those extra lessons he gave my daughter were strictly on the curriculum. I’m sorry,’ she said again, and when she turned away this time, there was no hesitation.
Vikki turned away too, heading once more for the exit, but after only a couple of steps she had to stop and throw up. After searching in her bag for more wet wipes, she pulled out her phone. Should she warn Rob? Probably, but first she needed to let her mum know that she wouldn’t be able to make her hospital appointment.
20
Before
Monday, 15 February 2016
The old Ellison House had an air of mystery that had captivated Vikki from the moment she had first seen it. Her dad had taught her how to deconstruct old buildings in her mind’s eye, stripping away the decay in search of foundations on which to build. Even during those visits when her mind had been on other things, she had wondered what potential lay undisturbed behind the large oak doors trapped behind crude metal shutters. But as she and Sarah walked up the steep limestone steps, Vikki couldn’t summon up the initial excitement she had felt when Sarah had taken her by surprise by inviting her along to view the property.
It had taken Sarah weeks to track down the landowner, but she was making up for lost time and had already visited with a property agent. She was back, she said, for a second opinion and a business matter she wanted to discuss with Vikki. What that might be, Vikki could only imagine, and she was trying not to. She wasn’t sure she could deal with what would be a tantalizing glimpse of the life of a professional, not now, when her life was taking her down another route.
‘You’re very quiet. Are you all right?’ Sarah asked.
‘Just tired.’
Sarah smiled. ‘Ah, young love. Was Valentine’s Day exhausting?’
‘Actually, it was pretty quiet. Mum and I were at a spa on Saturday and stayed over, so yesterday I was having breakfast with Mum. I thought those things were supposed to reenergize you, but I got into my onesie as soon as I got home and spent the rest of the day snoozing on the sofa. Rob was exhausted too because Freya had been playing up for him while I was away. I think he was expecting to have her in bed by seven so he could watch non-stop sport and have a few beers – which is what he did on Sunday afternoon instead.’
‘I can’t say I’m sorry to hear someone else’s day was as mundane as mine,’ Sarah said as she unlocked the padlock on the metal shutters. ‘Miles does his best, bless him, but even diamonds can’t add much of a sparkle when you’ve been married as long as we have. Not that I’m complaining. I wouldn’t want to be a newlywed again, far too tiring. Nina, on the other hand … she’s off to Rome on a mini-break this week for a belated honeymoon. It must be nice, being so easily pleased.’
‘She seems such a lovely person, and Bryn too.’
‘Like I said, easily pleased,’ Sarah said, almost to herself as she opened the metal shutter. She searched out the last key to open the oak doors, and when she twisted the doorknob, it turned with surprising ease. ‘Shall we?’
Although the day was clear and bright, the house was trapped in complete darkness and the meagre light that crept over the threshold surrendered itself to the inky blackness after only a few steps. With all the windows boarded up and no electrics, Sarah had come prepared with two spotlights which they used to sweep across the rooms, bringing brief life to the ornate cornices and high ceilings. It was possibly a blessing that there wasn’t enough light to pick up the full extent of the dilapidation, not to mention the décor, which was more in keeping with the eighties than the period features it clashed with. Whoever had been responsible for the later interior design had been more interested in covering over cracks with Artex than reviving the house to its former glory.
After a very quick sweep of the ground floor and the two principal upper floors, the women stopped to catch their breath. There were additional rooms in the attic space and, if they were feeling adventurous, a basement too, but for today, Sarah had only wanted to get a feel for the place.
‘OK,’ Vikki said. ‘Are you ready to tell me why I’m here, Sarah?’
Rather than answer, Sarah asked, ‘What do you think?’
‘You’d have to get a proper structural survey, but it does feel solid enough.’
‘If I were after a surveyor’s opinion, I’d have brought one,’ Sarah said softly. ‘What do you think?’
Pressure began to build at the back of Vikki’s nose as tears threatened, making her feel not only silly and childish, but unworthy of Sarah’s belief that her opinion might count. ‘I love it,’ she said. ‘I want to pull down the shutters so we can get some light and life back into the place. I want to start peeling away all that ugly woodchip, strip away the layers of flaking paint and pull down the plasterboard you know will be hiding some amazing original features.’
‘But what would you do with the house? Create one grand estate or split it up into apartments?’
‘Oh, definitely apartments. From outside, you can see the natural divisions that would give you a penthouse with a roof terrace and two apartments on each of the other floors, maybe even a sixth in the basement.’
Sarah nodded. ‘That’s exactly what I expected you to say. And now I have a proposition for you. I’ve all but given up hope of Charlotte returning to take up her position in the family business, and I need help. I’m not looking for an expert – I have a team of builders, architects, technicians and project planners – I simply want someone to help with the paperwork and act as my sounding board. I know you’re looking for work, and I’m not suggesting I could offer you either a full-time or permanent position, but assuming this project gets off the ground, then the job is yours.’
‘I can’t.’
‘Of course you can,’ Sarah said, never having considered the possibility of Vikki refusing. ‘It’s not only the Ellison House I see potential in, Vikki. You would be an asset too.’
‘Oh, Sarah,’ Vikki said as the sob she was holding back caught in her throat. ‘Six months ago this would have been a dream come true, but things have changed. My family has to come first.’
‘Nonsense, a girl like you can do both. I know you have other commitments, but I can be flexible. I wouldn’t need much help immediately, it’ll take months to get the project off the ground – you never know who’s going to object when we go for planning permission,’ she reminded her.
Vikki felt like an imposter. She had somehow tricked Sarah Tavistock into thinking she was something she very clearly wasn’t. ‘I’m sorry, Sarah. I’m shocked that you’d put so much faith in me, but I can’t accept. I’m …’ Vikki had to take a deep breath as if she were about to impart terrible news. ‘I’m pregnant.’
They were standing beside a large picture window that would provide the perfect vantage point to take in the full beauty of the surrounding Cheshire countryside, but it was impossible for Vikki to see through the dark.
‘Are you happy about it?’ Sarah asked eventually.
‘It was planned,’ she said, although it had come as a shock to both her and Rob that her body should respond so quickly to the decision they had taken on Christmas morning.
Even in the dim light, Vikki could sense the curious look Sarah was giving her. ‘My goodness, I don’t know what to say. I suppose I should admire you. I could barely cope with one, let alone two babies at your age.’
‘It makes sense to have another
one before I start concentrating on my career, and it gives Mum more time to enjoy her grandchildren.’
‘But I thought her treatment had finished. She was doing so well.’
‘And she still is,’ Vikki said quickly. ‘Mum has a meeting with her consultant next week and hopefully he’ll tell her she doesn’t need any more treatment.’
‘Oh, I see,’ Sarah said, in a tone that suggested she blatantly didn’t.
‘I’d rather you didn’t tell anyone else I’m pregnant. It’s still early days and we haven’t even told Mum yet.’
‘I won’t say a thing,’ Sarah said. ‘Wow, you have taken me by surprise. I had you down as a career girl.’
‘But I am,’ Vikki said, shocked by her own admission. She had been telling herself for so long that she didn’t really know what she wanted, but when she had stepped into the Ellison House and let her imagination run free, she had known exactly what she wanted to do with her life. ‘I want a career more than anything.’
‘Except another baby,’ Sarah reminded her.
And that was the point: Vikki did need reminding.
Friday, 19 February 2016
Vikki could remember quite clearly her first trip to the midwife when she was pregnant with Freya. She had felt out of place amongst the other expectant mums, who seemed much older and far more experienced than she. Second time around, she had earned her place amongst the other mothers, and as she looked around the waiting room in search of familiar faces, she was pleased to spy an old school friend.
‘Hi, I haven’t seen you for ages,’ she said as she took a seat opposite the girl whose name escaped her for the moment. ‘What have you been up to?’
Rubbing the swell of her belly, the mother-to-be said, ‘I would have thought that was obvious.’ She smiled and added, ‘Bloody hell, it must be five years since we saw each other. And if you really want to know what I’ve been up to, well, I went to uni, obviously, got my degree, came home, got a job, and then, oops, got pregnant. My boyfriend is still in shock. We were saving up for a house, but it looks like that’ll have to wait until I go back after maternity leave.’
The Affair Page 16