‘Make a wish,’ Constance says as Molly blows out the candles.
‘What did you wish for?’ she asks as soon as all the candles have gone out.
‘She can’t tell you,’ Joy says, quietly chiding her sister. ‘If she does, it won’t come true.’
‘I’ve been really enjoying the yoga, Fran,’ Molly says. ‘I didn’t think I would, but I’ve surprised myself.’
Fran grins. ‘I knew you would.’ While she would never force anyone to do yoga who didn’t want to try, she loves it when someone discovers they love it too.
‘It’s very different to being in a class though,’ Elizabeth says.
‘There’s a different dynamic on a retreat than in class,’ Fran replies. ‘The energy is different. I always noticed it when I went on retreats as a student too.’
‘I think it’s because we’re all here for something more than just a physical practice,’ Elizabeth goes on, seemingly thinking out loud. ‘So many of us – and I’m guilty of this myself – just go to class, go through the postures, and then go straight back to work or straight home and forget about it. Here there’s more time to just be.’
Fran nods. ‘I think it’s why such deep bonds often occur on yoga retreats, because we’re all here just being rather than doing. The first retreat I ever went on was in Devon, just after my mother died. I cried my way through the entire week, but I made friends there too who I’m still in touch with.’
‘It’s not easy though,’ Molly says. ‘Everyone at my gym thinks yoga is a bit of an easy option, but it really isn’t, is it? Sometimes when you ask us to hold a pose I just think that I can’t do it – those forward bends the other day were a killer!’
‘Just keep breathing,’ Fran says, as though it’s that easy. ‘The things we resist the most are often the things we really need.’
‘Would you like wine, Fran?’ Constance interrupts as she starts filling up everyone’s glasses. Fran notices that it’s Rioja and is sorely tempted.
‘No, thank you,’ she says, covering her unused wineglass with her hand. ‘Strictly speaking, I am supposed to be working.’
‘Ah go on,’ Constance urges. ‘We won’t tell!’
Fran shakes her head and turns back to Molly before anybody starts asking any more questions about why she isn’t drinking.
‘You’ve mentioned how yoga helps you deal with the tough things life throws at you,’ Molly says. ‘I like the sound of that.’
‘The thing I love about yoga is that, if you let it, it helps you become more resilient,’ Fran says, leaning across the table to help herself to another piece of cake. She tries to catch Katrin’s eyes but she’s looking away again, out to sea. Fran wonders what she’s thinking about. ‘For me yoga isn’t about dogma or discipline or getting up at four a.m. to practise or eating clean all the time.’ She looks at the piece of cake on her plate as though to prove her point. ‘All those things are absolutely fine if they float your boat, but they don’t float mine.’
‘Nor mine,’ Constance agrees. ‘I haven’t seen four a.m. in a very long time and even then I was coming in, not getting up.’
Everyone laughs in agreement, even David. Nobody here is the sort of person who rises at dawn to practise or commits to juice detoxes. Everyone apart from Fran is on their second glass of wine at least.
‘For me yoga is about finding your place in the world,’ Fran goes on. ‘Doing yoga isn’t going to stop bad things happening to you: bad things are just part of life. But the stuff we practise on our mats can help us deal with those things.’
Fran can feel half the table looking at her. Her students know some of what she’s been through – it’s inevitable that they are wondering how yoga has helped her, how anything could possibly help with what she’s been through. Fran finds that she is constantly surprised by the sheer resilience of human beings.
‘I’ve not done a lot of yoga before,’ Joy says quietly. ‘But since my mother died I’ve been going to meditation classes. What I’ve found helpful is the way I’ve been encouraged to stay present, to try not to think past the next breath. It’s helped to slow down the racing thoughts in my head, the catastrophising.’
‘Absolutely,’ Fran agrees. ‘The physical practice of yoga is preparing the body for meditation so it helps you find that sense of being in the moment. But I think how we get there, what form that practice takes, is very individual.’
‘Constance and I have put Mother’s house on the market,’ Joy goes on, reaching for her sister’s hand. ‘Being here has helped me stay present with myself and not worry too much about that, about what people might be saying about the house.’
There’s a moment of silence as the sisters look at each other.
‘It’s important to look after yourself,’ Fran says quietly. ‘To show yourself compassion, especially during hard times.’
‘I think society tells us that looking after ourselves is indulgent,’ Constance says. Fran notices she is still holding Joy’s hand, as though the bond between them is helping them look after each other during what must be a hard time for them both. ‘That unless we’re busy, busy, busy then we’re somehow not of value.’
‘Fix your own oxygen mask before helping other people with theirs,’ Fran says with a smile. ‘If you’re running on empty, you’re not going to be much use to anyone else.’
‘And what about you, Fran?’ Elizabeth asks quietly. ‘Have you been fixing your own oxygen mask since your son died …’ She stops suddenly, clamping her hand over her mouth, realising that not everybody here knows.
In the silence that follows, Fran sees Katrin turn around in her chair to look at Elizabeth. Molly gapes and Joy drops her sister’s hand, staring at her and not understanding why she hasn’t told her about this. David stands up, his chair legs scraping on the terrace. Unlike the previous lunchtime he doesn’t rush off, but hesitates as though trying to work out if there is anything he can do.
‘Sit down, David, for God’s sake,’ Constance says, breaking the almost overwhelming silence.
He does as he’s told. Fran wonders if the other diners are looking at them again. The yoga group are quite the floorshow this week.
Elizabeth is still sitting with her hand over her mouth as though trying to stop anything else from spilling out.
Fran takes a breath. ‘It’s OK,’ she says, even though she’s not sure it is. ‘It’s not a secret.’
She looks around the table, but nobody meets her eye. She knows she has to say something.
‘Will and I had a baby nearly a year ago,’ she says quietly. Sometimes when she hears herself talk about it she feels as though it happened to somebody else. ‘We’d been trying for years and I had three miscarriages.’ She plays with a thread on the tablecloth. Not even Elizabeth knows about the miscarriages. ‘He was called Oscar and he was born ten weeks prematurely. He only lived for a week. Will and I …’ She pauses, feeling the backs of her eyes burning. She doesn’t even know if there still is a ‘Will and I’. ‘We’re struggling to be honest.’
She stops there. She doesn’t want to talk about Will. She doesn’t want to talk any more at all because this is so complicated. She knows that part of the problem with Will has been her refusal to talk but talking here, now, isn’t going to help. She needs to talk to Will, but he’s not here and she doesn’t know what to say. She doesn’t know if he still wants this.
She stands up, the legs of her chair scraping on the terrace. David catches her eye as though to ask if it’s all right if he stands up again now.
‘I’m going to go to bed,’ she says. Everyone looks at her, their faces masks of concern. ‘Please don’t worry about me. I’m OK. And if you’re all off to Barcelona tomorrow, don’t drink too much and try to get an early night.’
She tries to smile a smile she can’t feel before she turns away.
Will
His only solace is work. Janine has had a few choice words to say to him but has otherwise stayed out of his personal life. She’s a
lways been good like that. She might be Fran’s best friend, but she would never bring those loyalties to work with her. He ignores the snide remarks and, in return, does everything in his power to resist asking Janine if she’s heard from Fran. Otherwise nobody asks anything. Nobody asks how Fran is; they just leave him alone to go about his days pretending nothing is wrong, helping his clients end their marriages without thinking about his own, just as they had after Oscar died.
He’d gone back to work too soon after Oscar – he knows that now. But he hadn’t known what else to do. Fran had shut him out, he thought he’d lost everything, and work was all he knew. But he was haunted by Oscar’s death every day. Everything reminded him of his son. He couldn’t smell the aroma of antibacterial hand gel without being transported back to the NICU, without thinking about holding Fran’s hand, without thinking about the interminable wait.
He carried Oscar’s photograph in his wallet and kept one of his footprints in the top drawer of his desk. There was a dispenser of hand gel on the wall at work – people used it when they’d been going through old documents. Every time he caught the smell he had to disappear into his office, bury his head in paperwork.
It was the same now, burying himself in work to forget the fact that his wife wasn’t here. To forget that he had no idea if his wife had left him or not. To try to ignore the desperate longing he had to contact her, to try to give her the space she needed, to try not to think about what her decision would be.
And he tried to ignore the fact that he still worked in the same office he had been in when he first met her, the room in which he’d first taken her hand. He tried to ignore their wedding photo smiling down at him from the top of the filing cabinet, reminding him of happier times. He tried not to think about the terrible things that he’d done.
JANUARY 2009
We were in the shower together the next time he spoke about it. I was leaning in to him as he stood behind me, his arms around me, the warm water washing over us. Neither of us had spoken for a while, just quietly enjoying being together. Moments like this felt more intimate than sex, both of us so raw and vulnerable, feeling each other’s energy.
‘Are you ready to talk about trying again?’ he asked quietly. It took me a moment to register the fact that he’d spoken.
We were in a hotel in Barcelona for his thirty-ninth birthday. I’d planned it as a surprise. He was always surprising me – Paris, New York, Santorini – I just wanted to show him how much I loved him, how sorry I was that things didn’t work out the way he had hoped. But I wasn’t as good at planning surprises as he was, and January in Barcelona can be cold and windy. The romantic walks along Las Ramblas and eating paella in street cafés were ruined by gusty winds and sideways rain. Instead we bought bread and cheese and wine and took them back to our hotel, eating in bed using paper napkins as plates and toothbrush mugs as wineglasses.
‘I’m so sorry,’ I said. ‘This isn’t how it was meant to be.’
He smiled at me. ‘It’s perfect. I’m not at work, I don’t have a headache, and I get to spend the whole weekend with you.’
But there was a sadness about him that weekend – too many words left unspoken between us.
‘Forty next,’ he said with a sigh.
I lay awake long after his breath slowed into sleep, thinking about those two words. They were so loaded. I knew how much he wanted to be a father. I knew he felt he was running out of time. I knew I’d made him wait too long.
So when he asked the question in the shower the next morning, I felt I had no choice.
‘We don’t have to talk about it,’ I said. ‘I’m ready.’
He turned me around to face him.
‘Are you sure?’ he said, concern etched on his face.
‘I’m sure,’ I replied, even though I wasn’t sure at all. Even though I’d never been sure.
He smiled then, lifting me up. I wrapped my legs around him as he pressed me up against the side of the shower.
‘Want to start trying right now?’ he asked, smiling that lopsided smile, his brown eyes sparkling with mischief.
We lost our second baby just before Easter. We never went back to Barcelona together.
JULY 2016
Fran
By the time Fran makes it downstairs the next morning, the minibus taking the group to Barcelona has already arrived and Amado, dressed unusually casually in shorts and a polo shirt, is organising everybody.
‘Senyora Browne,’ he says as he sees her approach. ‘Are you sure you won’t join us?’
‘Us?’ she asks. ‘Are you going too?’
‘But of course! Barcelona is my city and I am going to show everybody around and especially I am going to be showing them Camp Nou, the greatest stadium in the world!’ He flings his arms out extravagantly. ‘You sure you won’t come?’
Fran sees Constance roll her eyes behind Amado’s shoulder at this. She doubts very much that anybody will be particularly interested in seeing Barcelona’s football stadium.
‘I’m sure I’m not coming,’ she replies. ‘I thought I might go into Tarragona later though and have a look around.’
Amado launches into a list of must-see places in Tarragona including a long list of shops and cafés owned by ‘cousins’ of his. Fran smiles but isn’t really listening.
She’s been awake since five a.m. throwing up everything she ate the previous evening and thinking about Oscar and wishing she hadn’t said anything. Most of the group knew that she’d lost her son last year but there was no need to tell them that she was still struggling. There was no need for them to know. She was meant to be the strong one. She was meant to be there for them.
As Amado starts to get everybody on to the bus, Fran feels a gentle touch on her elbow. She turns to see Elizabeth standing next to her.
‘I’m so sorry about last night,’ Elizabeth says. ‘I didn’t mean to blurt everything out like that.’
Fran smiles. ‘Don’t worry about it. Like I said, it’s not a secret.’
‘I’m sorry you’re both still struggling. It seemed as though you were both doing OK, Will in particular.’
‘He’s very good at putting on a front,’ Fran replies. ‘Especially at work I think.’
‘It’s not even been a year though, Fran. It’s inevitable that you both still feel devastated. I can’t even imagine what it must be like and I hadn’t realised you’d lost other babies.’
Fran feels the familiar burning behind her eyes, the tightening in her throat. She knows if she doesn’t change the subject right now she’ll end up telling Elizabeth everything and she doesn’t want to do that. It’s too complicated and Will is Elizabeth’s divorce lawyer. She needs to respect both her own and Will’s professional boundaries.
‘Don’t worry about me,’ she says, patting Elizabeth’s hand. ‘Just go and enjoy your day. Amado’s coming too I hear.’
‘What’s that supposed to mean?’ Elizabeth asks jovially.
‘I’ve seen the way you two look at each other!’
‘Don’t be so ridiculous.’
‘Elizabeth, you’re a free agent. Go to Barcelona, have fun, be happy. I’ll see you this evening.’
‘Are you sure, Fran?’
Fran sighs. ‘Life goes on. It’s harsh, but it’s true. Please, I insist that you have a good time and tell me all about it so I can live vicariously through you and Constance this evening!’
As she watches the minibus leave, Fran hears her own words again in her head. Life goes on. Well it certainly did for Will, and pretty quickly at that.
But she knows that’s unfair. Whatever he’s done, however he has behaved, she knows that grief has destroyed him over the last year as much as it has her. He is a shadow of who he used to be and she knows deep down that she wasn’t there for him when he needed her most. She isn’t excusing his behaviour, but she knows he thought he’d lost her when he lost Oscar.
She sinks down onto one of the sofas in the atrium and tries to work out whether she can fa
ce breakfast. Even Mia’s seemingly endless supply of ginger sweets isn’t working this morning. She’s surprised to see David hovering in front of her.
‘Aren’t you going to Barcelona either?’ she asks.
He shakes his head. ‘May I?’ he says, indicating the space on the sofa next to her.
‘Of course.’
‘Don’t worry,’ he says. ‘I’m not going to tag along with you all day. I know you need some space away from us. Did you say you were going to Tarragona?’
‘Yes, apparently it used to be an old Roman city,’ she says. ‘I thought I’d go and have a look around. It’s been a long time since I did anything like that. My husband’s never very interested in looking at old ruins or museums.’
David smiles. ‘I’m going to Reus,’ he said. ‘It’s where Gaudí was born.’
‘Gaudí of the famous cathedral in Barcelona?’ Fran asks.
David nods.
‘That’s one of the few things we did see when we were in Barcelona a few years ago,’ Fran says. She stops as soon as she feels the lump forming in her throat. Barcelona will always be a memory of what could have been.
‘Were you not there for very long?’ David asks.
‘Terrible weather,’ Fran replies. ‘We barely left the hotel.’
‘Well, there’s a museum dedicated to Gaudí’s life in Reus. I thought I’d take a look.’
Fran smiles, not sure what else to say and they sit in silence for a moment.
‘I wanted to say something if I may,’ David mumbles, quickly, almost inaudibly. There’s an urgency to his words though and Fran turns to look at him.
‘Of course – is everything all right?’
‘I hope you don’t think I’m intruding and you can tell me to mind my own business, but it’s about what you went through last year with your son. Oscar?’
He says Oscar’s name like a question, as though he’s not sure if he’s allowed to say it out loud. Fran feels her mouth go dry and nods, unable to form any words.
‘I had a daughter,’ he says, his eyes downcast. ‘I was married and we had a daughter. She died ten years ago. SIDS. Sudden Infant Death Syndrome. Cot death. She was three months old.’ The sentences are short and they come out in a breathless staccato as though David is trying and failing to hide his emotions.
The Things We Need to Say Page 11