The Housewife: A completely addictive and gripping psychological thriller

by Valerie Keogh

  A wave of love washed over Diane and she bent to pick her up and carry her through to her bedroom, dancing as she walked, Emma laughing, the pyjamas trailing along the floor. The bedroom was decorated with cartoon animal wallpaper she and Paul had chosen when they’d discovered she was pregnant. The shop sold furniture inspired by the paper and they’d bought the lot. There was a hippo-shaped bed, a monkey bedside table and a couple of giraffe chairs. It was a delight.

  Diane lowered her to her bed and helped her to undress, feeling her soft, still-baby skin with the same delight she’d felt when she’d first clasped her to her chest only three short years before.

  Her fingers lingered, a frown creasing her brow as the image of her naked new-born daughter flashed before her eyes. It seemed only like yesterday…

  ‘Mummy, you’re hurting me!’

  Diane looked down at her hands grasping the child’s arms. Letting go, she was horrified to see fading pale finger marks on her skin. Had she blacked out? Only for a few seconds, but she’d definitely gone somewhere else. Emma rubbed her arm and looked at her accusingly.

  ‘Mummy’s sorry,’ Diane said, brushing her hands over her arms. The marks were gone. She hadn’t hurt her, probably just scared her a little. She plucked her up into her arms again and snuggled her face into her neck, blowing raspberries against her skin until she giggled. ‘Come on, sweet pea,’ she said, and carried her downstairs.

  As they entered the family room, Emma squirmed to get down and sit beside her father. Paul, putting his coffee into his other hand, opened his arm out wide to allow her to snuggle to his side, wrapping his arm back around her.

  For a moment, Diane felt a soft brush of envy. Then she remembered the marks, however temporary, she’d left on Emma’s skin and she felt a tremor of anxiety.

  Where had she gone for those few seconds?

  Six

  Diane took her time tidying up. She cleared the table and loaded the dishwasher. Then busied herself getting ready for the morning, emptying Emma’s bag, rinsing her juice bottle, washing out the bag itself even though it didn’t need it. She’d do anything rather than think.

  She was still pottering about, wiping a cloth over the clean countertop, when she looked around to see Paul standing, a sleeping Emma in his arms.

  ‘I’ll go tuck her in,’ he said with a trace of a smile. ‘She’s out for the count.’

  Diane forced herself to echo his smile, ‘She sleeps so soundly,’ she said softly. She reached a hand out and very gently brushed a curl from her forehead. ‘Before you go,’ she said, raising her eyes to his, ‘can I ask you something?’

  ‘Sure,’ he said, with an encouraging tilt of his head.

  ‘The last time…before my breakdown…’ she gulped, trying to find the words. ‘How did you know it was happening? I mean, what were the signs?’

  He shifted Emma in his arms and buried his face in her hair for a moment before looking back at her. ‘You know what the doctors say, Diane,’ he said gently, ‘you’re supposed to let the memories come back—’

  ‘I know, I know,’ she said, interrupting him in frustration, ‘they’re supposed to come back naturally.’

  ‘Has something happened?’

  She heard the worry in his voice, saw the sudden tension in his face. Hadn’t she put him through enough already? She reached a hand up and laid it on his cheek. ‘No,’ she said firmly, ‘it’s just frustrating sometimes not knowing what happened, that’s all.’

  He put his free hand up to take hers and held it tightly for a moment. ‘But you are feeling all right?’

  ‘It’s just been a long day,’ she said, managing to smile, hoping she could keep it in place for long enough to reassure him.

  She managed until he’d left the room. Throwing the cloth she’d been holding into the sink, she moved to the sofa and sat in the still-warm seats they’d vacated, letting her head flop back and eyes close. It would be several minutes before Paul came down. If he came down. He didn’t always, sometimes he went to his office to check emails, got caught up in work and forgot she was downstairs waiting for him.

  Tears were close. She felt the warmth at the corner of her closed eyes before one squeezed out and trickled slowly down her cheek. Pressing her thumb and first finger into the corner of her eyes, she took some deep breaths and got them under control. After a few minutes, she lifted her head and ran her hand through her hair. She needed to think.

  Perhaps she should make an appointment to see that therapist again? The corners of her mouth drooped at the thought. She hadn’t like him; had found his manner condescending, his eyes cold. Maybe she should find someone else?

  Much of the year before the breakdown was a mystery to her, huge gaps in time when she couldn’t remember anything. The doctors had promised the memories would come back in time. Don’t force them, she’d been told, they will come back.

  And if she asked Paul, as she had today, he’d say the same thing, quoting the doctors or quoting research he’d read about Spontaneous Recovery. It all sounded very good except it wasn’t happening. She could remember almost as little today as she did when she left the clinic a month ago and any memories that had returned were wrinkled scraps that made no sense. But despite the gaps, the frustration of not being able to remember things, and the sometimes-frightening sense of loss at these gaps in her life, she’d felt fine. Getting on with her life, keeping up with the housework, sticking to her routines. Until today.

  The TV flickered through programme after programme that she didn’t watch. She could have switched it off, but the sound of voices was comforting. The silence might not be. Paul didn’t return; she heard his footsteps move about upstairs for a while and then nothing.

  At ten, weary, she stood, switched everything off and headed up the stairs. She looked in on Emma who was curled up, fast asleep, and then knocked gently on the door of the room Paul used as an office. She opened it slowly and peered around the edge. ‘I’m off to bed,’ she said.

  ‘Goodnight,’ he said, looking up briefly from his laptop. ‘Sleep well.’

  Diane closed the door and headed to the room they hadn’t shared since her return from the clinic. She needed space to recover, he’d said, moving his stuff into the spare room.

  It had been difficult to see the logic behind his decision at the time; surely it would have been better to resume as normal a life as possible? But at that point she didn’t really know what was good for her. Whatever had happened, she’d obviously shocked, maybe even frightened Paul, who’d suddenly started treating her like this fragile, breakable thing. Kisses she’d remembered as being passionate had become sexless. They barely touched her skin and never ventured towards her mouth – as if the temptation to go further would be too much.

  She wanted to tell him she wasn’t so delicate, that she was getting better every day, that sleeping wrapped in his arms would be the best medicine of all. She missed the closeness and, if she were being brutally honest, she missed the sex. But the pills had made her too tired to argue and she’d accepted this new way of living without question.

  When she’d stopped taking them, a week after leaving the clinic, she’d felt better, more energetic and had put a hand around his neck to draw him close. ‘I miss you,’ she’d said. He’d kissed her gently on the cheek, pulled away and looked at her with concern. ‘Don’t rush. You need to get stronger, Diane. The doctor said you need plenty of rest.’ How could she argue when she saw such concern on his face? ‘Soon then,’ she’d said. But that was three weeks ago, and he still treated her like an invalid and slept in the spare bedroom.

  With a sigh for the way things used to be, she headed to her room. If there were a night she needed a sleeping tablet, this was it. She opened the ensuite bathroom cabinet, eyes scanning the rows of packets. Before the clinic, the only medication she’d ever taken was Paracetamol. Now sleeping tablets, antidepressants, and the stronger painkillers the doctors had prescribed for the pounding headaches she’d had in the clinic
were all lined up in the cabinet.

  She took out the packet of antidepressants. She’d spent the weeks since she’d stopped them proving that she was better off without, and now everything was falling apart. With a sigh, she put them back; she wasn’t going back on them. Not yet, hopefully not ever. She was grateful, however, that the therapist had insisted on writing a prescription for sleeping tablets. Sometimes, just knowing they were there helped her to get to sleep and she’d only taken one or two since she came home. She took out the packet now, pulled out a card of tablets and pressed one from the foil, hesitating a moment before pressing a second.

  Finally, she took out the packet of painkillers. The directions on the packet said to take one or two, she took two. Throwing all four tablets into her mouth, she scooped water from the tap with her hand and swallowed them down.

  Brushing her teeth, cleaning her face and moisturising, she threw her clothes off and onto a chair in a careless heap and climbed, naked, between the sheets. With a weary sigh, she closed her eyes to wait for the tablets to kick in. She’d have a good night’s sleep and tomorrow, everything would be normal.

  Seven

  She felt groggy the next morning, her eyes heavy. Looking at her reflection in the bathroom mirror, she groaned before reaching for the concealer to hide the dark circles under her eyes. It was tempting to pull on the same clothes she’d worn yesterday, but they were creased. Her pallor and dark circles might escape Paul’s notice, but wearing yesterday’s crumpled clothes certainly wouldn’t. As far as he knew, she was heading to the charity shop after dropping Emma off and she needed to keep up the pretence until she found a way to tell him.

  Dressed in clean clothes, she went into Emma’s room and ran a gentle hand over her curls. ‘Time to get up,’ she said softly. As usual, she woke almost immediately and stretched her arms over her head. She was an easy child in the morning, happy to wear whatever Diane chose, dressing without fuss in the pink corduroy trousers, long-sleeved T-shirt and raspberry-coloured jumper she took from the chest of drawers. No longer a baby, soon she wouldn’t need her help at all. The thought sent a frisson of sadness through her.

  Ten minutes later, they were downstairs, Emma rushing ahead, already babbling to her father about what she was going to do in nursery that day. If Paul noticed anything amiss with Diane, he said nothing, concentrating his attention on his daughter, listening to her every word. Relieved, Diane organised breakfast, setting a bowl of cereal and a glass of milk in front of Emma, noticing with surprise that Paul had almost finished his. She checked the clock, eight-thirty. It was later than she’d expected. She felt her gut clench with anxiety. She would have sworn her clock said eight when she left her room. Had she lost time somewhere? Another blackout?

  ‘I’m off,’ Paul said, putting his bowl into the dishwasher. ‘Have a good day, I’ll see you tonight.’

  She felt his kiss on her cheek, conjured up a smile and said goodbye, her eyes wandering to the clock again.

  Leaving Emma to eat her cereal, she nipped back upstairs to make the beds. It didn’t take long, a shake of a duvet and plumping of pillows on the single bed Paul now slept in, a quick tidy of Emma’s. She’d already straightened her duvet so gave the room a cursory glance, startled when she saw the time. The alarm clock was an old battery-operated one that Paul was constantly saying should be thrown out, but it kept good time. It said eight o’clock. It took a few seconds before she let her breath out in a relieved laugh. She hadn’t had a blackout. It had stopped, that was all. A simple problem that new batteries could fix.

  Emma was just finishing her breakfast when Diane arrived back downstairs and she smiled at the white milk-moustache on her upper lip. ‘Well done,’ she said, taking the glass and bowl away. She dropped them into the sink and turned on the tap, leaving them to be dealt with on her return. After all, she had all day to fill. ‘Right,’ she said, wiping Emma’s face with damp paper towel before helping her into her coat.

  Diane lingered at the nursery after dropping her daughter off, spending a few minutes chatting to Miss Rogers. She was pleased to find that the teacher seemed fond of Emma and that she was settling in well. She then looked around, hoping to strike up conversation with some of the other parents, but most were rushing off to start a day’s work. As she should be, Diane thought sadly before brushing away the feelings of self-pity. It was stupid, she had so much to be grateful for.

  Back at home, she took out her mobile to ring the shop, hesitated, and put it down. She was too humiliated; they’d guess when she didn’t turn up that she wasn’t coming back. If they rang, she wouldn’t answer. She didn’t want to have to explain her decision; just the thought of speaking to them made her skin prickle with shame. Making a cup of coffee, she switched on the radio, listened to a chat show and tried to think of how she was going to fill her day. She’d look for something else soon, but not today.

  Lost in her thoughts, the doorbell startled her. She put down the near-empty mug she’d been cradling for the previous half hour and stood still. She waited a minute, hoping whoever it was would just go away, but it rang again, for longer this time.

  The door to the hallway was shut. In a moment of bravado, she opened it and stood in the doorway looking towards the front door. It was solid wood, no glass panels to help her out, no indication of what lay on the other side.

  The fear that it was the woman from the previous day was irrational…crazy, even. But who else could it be? She wasn’t expecting anyone. She’d no friends locally to drop by. Moving forward, one shaky step at a time, she reached a hand to the wall for support and then grabbed hold of the newel post. The front door was now within arm’s reach; with a final, deep, steadying breath she gripped the doorknob and wrenched it open.

  Whatever words were on the tip of her tongue died as she looked into the startled eyes of the woman who stood in front of her, her hand raised as if to ring the bell once more.

  ‘Anne?’ Diane started to laugh and stopped herself abruptly, holding a hand over her mouth. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said after a beat, standing back and waving her inside. ‘This is a bit of a surprise,’ she said.

  Anne, as usual, was wearing black, her hair tied up on top of her head with a garish red and orange scarf, escaped curls dancing around her face. ‘I was in work this morning,’ she said, ‘Red was so upset when you didn’t turn up. She wanted to explain that everything was okay, that—’

  Diane interrupted her. ‘There wasn’t money missing when she totted up yesterday, was there?’

  Anne shook her head, sending tendrils of hair swinging. ‘No, there wasn’t.’ She stretched out a hand towards Diane’s defensively crossed arms. ‘I didn’t think you’d taken those books, but you rushed away so fast it made you look guilty, you know, and Red has been let down by people before.’

  Diane looked down at the hand resting on her arm. ‘Come on inside,’ she said and led the way into the family room, waving Anne towards a seat at one end of the L-shaped sofa and taking the other end for herself. ‘I rushed away because I was embarrassed,’ she said quietly. ‘It was obvious what you all thought.’ She held a hand up when she saw Anne was going to interrupt. ‘Obvious to me, anyway. It was too late then to explain what had happened, that a woman wanted to buy the books and changed her mind after I’d keyed in the price. I had no idea how to void a transaction and was going to wait until after Beth came back but then, stupidly,’ she ran a hand over her hair, ‘very stupidly, I decided the easiest thing was to buy them myself. And that’s what I did.’

  It was mostly true. She’d left out the part about the strange look the woman had given her. And, of course, she’d no intention of mentioning the rest of yesterday’s very bizarre events.

  ‘How did you know where I lived?’ she asked, when Anne said nothing.

  ‘Red told me,’ she said, tucking a rebellious curl into a fold of the scarf. ‘She’s really sorry about it and hopes you’ll consider coming back.’

  ‘She sent you around to
plead with me, did she?’ The words were tinged with bitterness, and edged with sadness.

  ‘I wanted to call around,’ Anne said. ‘I told her that you and I got on so well it might be better coming from me.’ She met Diane’s gaze squarely. ‘I am right, aren’t I? We got on really well. I thought we might become friends.’

  Diane had thought the same. Standing, she moved over to the kitchen to switch the kettle on. ‘Would you like a drink? I was just about to make one.’

  Anne smiled before standing to unbutton her fitted black coat. She took it off, flung it over the back of the sofa and sat with a more relaxed expression on her face. ‘I thought you were going to throw me out,’ she said with a slight laugh.

  Diane took down a couple of mugs and put them on the counter before looking across to meet Anne’s eyes. She did her best to smile, feeling a lessening of the tension that had been twisting her gut tightly since the day before. ‘I almost did. Tea or coffee?’

  ‘Coffee, milk, one sugar.’

  Diane took her time, the ritual of making the drinks giving her time to think. She added milk to both and sugar to Anne’s, watching the woman from the corner of her eye. She brought the coffees over and put one in front of Anne, sitting herself down on the far end of the sofa with her own mug cupped in both hands.

  ‘I am sorry,’ Anne said softly, reaching for her coffee. ‘Won’t you reconsider and come back to the shop?’

  ‘No, I wouldn’t feel comfortable there now,’ she said. And it was the truth. Apart from the wrongful accusation, she’d be constantly worrying about that woman coming into the shop. But Anne didn’t need to know that. ‘I’m going to look for a job.’ She smiled briefly. ‘One that pays.’

  Anne picked up her coffee and sipped it before saying, ‘Red said you’d worked in IT before you had your daughter?’