by Bowes, K T
Despite the air freshener and the open window allowing the chill winter air to flood in, Hana could still detect the smell of boy-feet and sweat and if she dwelt on it, her stomach churned warningly. She gratefully drank a few sips of the ice-cold water the nurse handed to her, allowing it to rinse her mouth and get control of herself again. The sound of Caroline’s screeching voice penetrated the peace of the room, rising in her attempts to get past Boris. “I need to talk to her!”
Hana heard and she closed her eyes and laid her head back on the pillow. God help me, she thought to herself, wondering what new drama was about to unfold. There was a scuffle outside the door and the sound of clothing and bodies shifting against it. The nurse put down the glass of water and moved towards it, just as Caroline shoved her way in, her arm being held onto by Boris, who looked dismayed. She marched over and stood in front of Hana, shaking him off and putting her hands elegantly on her hips. She was dressed in a smart suit with a sumptuous cashmere coat over the top and she towered over Hana menacingly. “I need to know where Logan is!” she threatened and the nurse moved nearer to her patient, eyeing Caroline as though she was a cobra about to strike. “I’m pregnant!” the bad fairy hissed nastily, through gritted teeth and then stood back and waited for the full force of what she said to hit home.
Hana felt wretched before but did even more so now. She put her hand up to her face and squeezed the bridge of her nose with her thumb and forefinger, willing the pounding headache to go away. She heard a muffled gasp and knew it was Boris who made the sound. Maybe he knew something. She really didn’t have the energy anymore to respond. She wished with all her heart Caroline was at the bottom of the gully with Logan’s phone and that final text she sent him, but then felt guilty for thinking such murderous thoughts.
Without reaction from Hana, Caroline seemed somewhat lost, allowing herself to be ushered out of the room by the nurse and a very shocked Boris. Hana heard more raised voices outside and shook her head to make it all go away. It didn’t. Sheila appeared kindly with Hana’s handbag and keys. “Come on sweetheart, I’ll drive you home.”
The nurse forbade Hana to drive, so she promised to sit for a while in the staffroom and let the dizziness pass. “I’ll check her out in half an hour and then you can take her,” the nurse told Sheila firmly. “But not before.”
As soon as they left her alone, settled with another endless glass of water, Hana bolted for the door and was down the back steps and out of the building in moments. The blood pounding in her head, she reached Bodie’s car and was in and driving before she had given thought to where she was headed. She couldn’t go home, not now, not with what Caroline told her. “Oh, dear God, no,” Hana breathed. “She’s pregnant and she’s saying her unborn child is my husband’s!” Hana pounded the steering wheel and tried to concentrate on the road. She drove blindly and without thinking, finding herself down the tree-lined road where Amy and Jas lived. She knew where she wanted to be. She wanted to sit and cuddle a small, tousle-haired boy with a generous spirit and honest heart, to feel his tiny arms and legs snuggled up on her and breathe in the scent of washing powder and baby shampoo that clung to him. She wanted to feel his butterfly kisses on her cheek and revel in his easy company.
Hana swung into their driveway, seeing Amy’s car outside. Her Honda wasn’t there, which probably meant Bodie was on shift. Hana stumbled to the door, but when Amy opened it and was pleased to see her, she found herself unable to speak for the tears which coursed down her face and the sobs that racked her body almost uncontrollably.
It took a full twenty minutes for Hana to begin to cope with the devastation which washed over and through her tired heart. Only then could she tell Amy what Caroline said. Amy was sympathetic for a while, but then demanded detail as only a policewoman would. How pregnant was Caroline claiming to be? When was she saying Logan fathered this child exactly? She apparently thought there were holes in the accusation which Hana hadn’t previously seen. She mopped Hana up and gave her a cup of hot water, in time for Jas to stumble in from his post-kindy nap and climb up onto her knee. He was so snugly and warm and still sleep-befuddled enough to stay quiet and settled on her.
Hana drank in his nearness, drawing strength from the blood tie they shared. She remembered the words of a friend who said of her grandchildren, “They were my babies really, my daughter didn’t realise that, but I let her look after them and keep them, but honestly I knew they were mine.”
Hana never understood that statement until Elizabeth was born, realising the maternalism for her grandchildren was as strong as it had been for her own babies. She knew she would die for them if required. She squeezed him more tightly and he sighed and burrowed deeper into her jacket. “Luff you Hanny.”
The moment was only broken when he farted loudly and sniggered, looking up with amused brown eyes, only partly apologetic. Hana found it hard not to laugh too, respecting Amy’s authority as she told him off and sent him to the toilet. “I swear that boy gets worse!” Amy grumbled. Half way through the door, Jas turned and gave Hana a lopsided smile that almost set her off again. “See what I mean?” Amy smirked.
Sitting back in the uncomfortable kitchen chair, Hana realised she had no idea what to do now. Apart from home to Culver’s Cottage, she really had no other options, a sad fact which compounded her isolation. She thought about ringing Logan and talking to him, but felt she needed to see his face when she told him about Caroline. She prayed she would know if he was lying, but fretted and worried about being taken in. Hana decided to leave, to go and face things head on.
She hugged and kissed Jas and thanked Amy. “Please can you tell Bodie I want to swap back to the Honda as soon as he can manage it.” She also put Amy in a dreadful position. “Please promise you won’t repeat our conversation to Bodie? Something’s going on with him at the moment and I know it’s about Logan. I can’t work out if he’s jealous or suspicious but he’s working up to a blow-up. This will just give him probable cause.”
Amy tutted and argued more about the car than the promise, but finally agreed, waving Hana off into the dusk and the promise of a traffic jam home.
Logan greeted Hana with a hug as she came in the door. He felt so strong and cuddly it was almost tempting to pretend all was well. He held her tightly with one arm, lifting her face gently with his other hand and looking hard at her. If he already heard the news, then he was a very good actor as it didn’t show in his face. All that showed was concern for the whiteness of Hana’s pallor and the fact her eye make-up had seemingly slipped under her eyes and part way down her cheeks.
“I need to talk to you,” she began, pulling away and slipping out of her outdoor clothes.
“Ok,” he replied, moving through to the living room to put some more wood on the fire, “sounds serious.”
Hana followed him in and sat down on the sofa, putting her feet up to prevent him sitting next to her. She wanted to see him full on. He continued puttering around with the wood, until she said his name and then he turned towards her, the metal poker still in his hand pushing the logs further into the flames. His face was questioning but gentle. “Caroline came to see me today,” Hana started, alarmed by the shutter which came down instantly over Logan’s expression. It was so quick and so utterly blank Hana faltered, wondering whether she would be able to perceive anything within at all. She batted on regardless, “She’s claiming to be pregnant…” still the impassive face, “she implied it was your baby…”
Logan’s eyes snapped shut and his jaw worked frantically. Hana wondered what was going on in his head. Still he said nothing and the silence was deafening. “I wanted to ask you about it. I jumped to conclusions before and I didn’t want to make the same mistake again, I …”
It was futile. She was getting nowhere. Logan lay the poker down with such precision it betrayed the small shake of his hand. Still he said nothing and the atmosphere was so tense, the air crackled and jumped with the electricity of it. No response, nothing. Just the
tightness in his shoulders giving him away. He turned to Hana and when he spoke, it was to ask a question, “What do you think?” he asked, “Do you think it’s mine?”
His eyes were the colour of storm water, deep dark grey pits of swirling emotion, which seemed without end. Hana faltered and floundered under his gaze. She hadn’t expected the question and so wasn’t ready for it. She searched deep within herself and took a lucky punt, knowing he was on his toes and ready to run. “I think you would have been an idiot to go there again.” Logan raised his eyebrows slightly, so she carried tentatively on, watching his face as intently as he stared into hers, “On the way home, I hoped and prayed you hadn’t but now I’m here, looking at you…I don’t believe you’re that much of a fool.”
Logan’s shoulders visibly slumped and the mask fell away, leaving a face that seemed genuinely shattered. All he said was, “Thank you.”
Then he hooked the poker neatly on its peg, stood up and walked out of the room. Before Hana could even get up off the sofa, she heard the jangle of the BMW keys and the slam of the front door. As she got to the porch, the rear lights of the car were already climbing down the driveway and her husband was gone.
Hana felt bereft. She backed him and he ran. She stood out in the cold in her stockinged feet and leaned her head on her arms over the balustrade. Her world was cold and dark and she felt sick again. Logan had roasted chicken in the oven with some potatoes and vegetables, clearing up after himself so the kitchen was immaculate.
Hana forced herself to eat for the sake of the baby, aware her weight had plummeted significantly in the last few weeks. It was easier than it might have been as she ate without thinking, the lovely food consumed in a biogenic reflex action. She stacked her plate and cutlery in the dishwasher, fighting the feeling of nausea at the sight of some sweetcorn in the trap at the bottom and went to run a bath. Her heart felt like lead in her chest as she went to bed early, watching the tiny screen of the portable television but seeing nothing of the programmes that filtered past her eyes.
Amy texted her asking, ‘How was it?’ but to her shame Hana didn’t reply, simply not knowing what to say. She fought the dreadful thought that Logan may have sought out Caroline and went to sleep miserable and empty.
Sometime in the night, Logan crawled into bed. Hana didn’t hear the car arrive but felt his cold body snuggle up behind her. He pushed in close, almost as though everything was still normal and Hana felt rage flood up inside her and turned over, spoiling for a fight. Instead, she found his lips on hers, insistent and hard to resist. “No!” she hissed in the darkness, her body sending out very different signals from her brain. She gave in but afterwards cried bitterly and silently, regretting she had ever rued her old, lonely life and wishing sincerely she never stepped over the threshold of the New Year into the curse that surrounded her.
The next few weeks passed quickly and in a blur for Hana. She swapped back to her Honda at the weekend against everyone’s advice but seemed quiet and dogged about it. Her time alone in the car on the way to work and back was like an oasis of peace, a solace of sorts where she could be honest with herself and she often got to work, needing to wipe the tear stains from her cheeks before going in. Logan neither told her where he went that night nor mentioned the conversation again, continuing as normal and Hana could not bring herself to ask.
As her pregnancy progressed, Hana battled with sickness and the staff gossip about Logan and Caroline, both of which depressed her significantly. Only Boris seemed to understand, cutting through her misery frequently with his company in the staffroom or little gestures in the form of drinks which she couldn’t always finish or offers of help, such as carrying her things to the car each night. Hana moved around in a fog of despair, feeling she had dug herself an enormous hole and jumped in feet first.
She told Logan she believed in him and so she worked at convincing herself it was so, but their relationship suffered, becoming empty and superficial, neither wanting to disturb the tenuous equilibrium. Logan had taken to running the boundary of the property a couple of times a day, seeming more uneasy of late, especially at night. But the activity got him much fitter and he began to look more like his old self.
On one of her own jaunts up the hill Hana found motorbike tracks leading down through the gates and up, as though having passed through the wire at the back of the paddock. On closer examination, she saw the wire holders had been undone and done up not quite so tightly so the wire sagged at one corner. Logan shrugged, “It’s nothing,”
Hana thought he looked a little shifty but dismissed the notion immediately, aware she was in no way competent to judge her husband’s honesty anymore. “What the hell would I know?” she muttered to herself. Perhaps someone was coming in and out of the property. “Well let’s hope they murder me gently,” she told her unborn child and then cried because she felt guilty.
The trouble was that Hana no longer cared. Numbness surrounded her life like a shroud. If an unknown person were to murder her in her bed, she would count it a blessed relief right then. She no longer felt sure her spirit would go to heaven, but anywhere without morning-daytime-evening sickness would be fantastic.
A few afternoons after work, Hana made the trip to Amy’s to see Jas, growing fonder and fonder of the little boy with every moment spent with him. One afternoon he asked her, “When will I see the baby?” and Hana’s blood ran cold, wondering how he found out and torturing herself with the possibility his parents also knew . But he was asking about Elizabeth, wanting to see her and asking all about Izzie and Marcus. Hana had no answers to his persistent questions, but suggested they write a letter and make pictures for Elizabeth that Hana would send. A few hours later she arrived home armed with piles of paper which cost a small fortune to send down to Invercargill.
It was another night she went to bed early, unable to eat the food Logan prepared, reluctant to talk to him and slipping ever deeper into an unbreachable chasm of silence.
In the final weeks of the term, Logan returned to work. His stitches were out and his cast gone, cleared to work by the surgeon. Hana lost her journey of sanity, forced instead to be a reluctant passenger listening to the radio instead of crying out to God to get her through the day, or just plain crying. She sat huddled in her seat, staring out of the window, dreading the holidays that loomed in front of her like an insurmountable mountain. Still the weight dropped off her and her clothes hung from her like curtains.
Out of the corner of her eye she would catch Logan watching her uneasily, like one would observe a volcano which gave out worrying seismic warnings. Life rolled on regardless and Hana plunged on with it, losing track of time and of her marriage and more frighteningly, not really caring.
Logan eased quickly back into work. The boys were glad to see him, even though they grumbled at the extra homework and the rapid pace with which they were forced to catch up on the curriculum.
Inevitably, Caroline reappeared. They were leaving for the day and going towards the Chapel car park, when she emerged from a white Vectra parked next to the Honda. She looked the same, dressed expensively to kill without an ounce of spare flesh, although Hana’s tired brain conceded she didn’t really look pregnant either.
Caroline came close to them, spitting her vitriolic spite. “How can you just ignore me, Logan? I’m carrying your baby. Don’t you care?”
His face was impassive as he unlocked the car door and the scene was bizarre, a shrieking, hysterical woman being completely ignored by her victims. It was as though she acted out a scene all by herself in the middle of the car park which nobody else could see. Fortunately the boys had all gone hours ago, but a few staff paused to watch the drama unfold.
Hana felt the now familiar nausea wash over her, induced by the sudden stress. She gripped the passenger door handle and leaned forward in an effort to suppress the need to retch onto the ground. Logan was in front of the bonnet, glancing back at Hana as he went around the car. Seeing her pitch forward, he ran back and too
k her weight under her arms. His face was fearful and she knew what he thought was happening. Exhausted beyond reason, Hana couldn’t reassure him but let him support her while the feeling passed. Caroline moved in for the kill, her face a livid flush of rage at their closeness and the futility of her performance. She yanked at Logan’s jacket hard, causing him to rebound into Hana and knock her off balance.
“Leave it,” Hana managed to whisper at him, clinging onto him to right herself. It was the closest they had been for weeks and her need for physical stability translated itself into something deeper to Logan. He rounded on Caroline, staring her down with pure hatred in his face, pointing to her stomach and hissing loudly at her. “That is nothing to do with me! We both know that. Go away and leave me alone!”
The last was a shout which caused the spectators to at least try and hide their curiosity a little, shuffling slowly towards their vehicles whilst looking back at the scene unfolding by the Chapel. Logan’s dismissive attitude made her temporarily falter, but Caroline again tugged on his sleeve, pulling him towards her well-thought-out-trap. He moved aside, attempting to release himself and continue to support his wife.
Unfortunately for Caroline, it left a clear line of fire and Hana, unable to suppress the need to puke any longer, projectile vomited right across Caroline’s exquisite Prada shoes. Caroline shrieked in horror and jumped back, leaving an outline of her pointy feet in the wet mess. Hana concentrated on her breathing and couldn’t care less anymore what was happening. She wanted to go home, get Tiger and snuggle down in bed.
To her surprise, the passenger door was squeezed open next to her, even though both of Logan’s arms were around her. She leaned her right butt cheek gratefully on the seat and tried to relax. Getting more upset would only keep her vomiting until her stomach was completely empty and even then, there was no guarantee of that. Breathing regularly, Hana tucked the other leg inside the car and felt Logan finally let go of her. He moved around to the front of the car and yet the door next to her was still closing.