by Deborah Finn
“What did she actually say? Did she say she wanted to take him away?”
Beth frowned and shook her head. “But what else could she want? Why would she come back?”
“Maybe she just wants to know he’s OK?” Martin suggested.
“I can’t lose him, Martin.” Once the words were out of her mouth, Beth’s eyes filled with tears. “I can’t lose him.”
“We won’t, Beth. We won’t lose him. Oh, come here.” He reached for her, and waited. She looked tired and confused, and then slowly she slumped towards him and he closed his arms around her. “He’s our boy, Beth. He’s upstairs playing. This is just a...” His voice trailed off as he tried to think what this was. This wasn’t like anything else.
She pulled away from him again, shoved her hair back from her face and rubbed roughly at her eyes. “But what are we going to do?”
“OK. Tell me again,” Martin said. “She just walked up to you in the park?”
Beth let out a long, shaky sigh. “Yes. Ben was up on the pirate ship. I was reading a book. Then she came and sat next to me on the bench.”
“She just came up and sat next to you? Did she say anything?”
“Not right away. She just sat there. But then I felt like she was watching me, and so I looked at her, friendly you know, and she was just staring at me.” Beth’s face fell as she relived the memory, her eyes far away. “It was horrible. She wasn’t smiling, wasn’t saying anything. Just sitting there right next to me and staring.”
Martin pictured the scene. It didn’t sound good. There was something threatening in that. “So what did you say?”
“I think I said ‘sorry’. How stupid is that? I didn’t know what to say.”
He touched her hand. “And then what?”
“She said: you don’t even know me. She was looking at me like she hated me, like I was the most disgusting thing she’d ever seen.”
“Maybe she was just freaked out, Beth. She doesn’t hate you. She can’t...”
“And she was right. I didn’t recognise her at all.”
“But it’s been ten years, Beth. You saw her for half an hour. How would you remember her?”
“But I should have remembered her face. She gave us her baby. She’s right. I should have remembered her face, but I didn’t. I said I was sorry, and had we met before, and just then, she took off this hat she was wearing and I saw her hair.”
He saw her eyes fill with tears. “Oh, Martin. It was so awful. Suddenly I could see Ben in her. His red hair, you know. And...” She shook her head, so defeated.
Martin felt a new wave of anger rise up in him. How dare this woman turn up with her red hair, making Beth feel less of a mother to their boy? Giving birth didn’t make you a mother. He sucked in a deep breath and tried to press down the anger.
“So what did she say then?”
Beth shook her head. “I can’t remember. I was so shocked.” She looked up at Martin, as though she’d done something wrong. “She was talking, but I just can’t remember what she was saying.” She frowned with the effort of remembering. “Something about the park. Why would she be talking about the park?”
“Don’t worry,” he said.
“Don’t worry?” Beth echoed. “What if she turns up here, at the house? What if Ben answers the door?”
Martin rubbed at his chin, thinking. “You’re right. We need to know what she wants, what she’s going to do.”
“Oh God,” Beth said. She reached for her handbag and scrabbled inside. “How could I have forgotten? She pulled out a piece of paper. “She said to call her. She gave me her number.”
Martin held out his hand and she gave him the crumpled scrap. He looked at the unfamiliar handwriting. Each number had been scored into the paper with a grinding determination. He had an urge to rip it up, to be rid of her.
“We could just ignore her,” he said.
They looked at each other silently, as though seeing the ten years of secrets they’d held together. “But what if she tells someone? Isn’t it safer for us to talk to her?”
“Who would she go to?” Martin asked. “Social services? The police? She has no proof, Beth. And anyway, they wouldn’t take him away from us now.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes.” But he wasn’t. It was illegal, surely, what they’d done. God knows, you heard stories of people having their own kids taken away for nothing much. If the system made sense, then there’s no way they’d take Ben away from the only parents he knew. But the system didn’t always make sense.
“Maybe we should let her meet him?” Beth suggested. She waved down Martin’s immediate protest. “I don’t mean like we tell him who she is, I mean just like she’s someone we know, someone we bump into in the park.”
Martin frowned. “Why would we do that?”
“Well, if we don’t let her meet him, maybe she’ll...” Beth’s voice dropped to a whisper as if she could hardly bear to say the words. “Maybe she’ll take him.”
Martin closed his eyes. Beth had said the thing he’d been trying to ignore. And she was right. The woman was crazy enough to give away a baby. Why wouldn’t she be crazy enough to snatch a child? They couldn’t watch him every minute.
“I’ll speak to her,” he said. He made a chopping gesture with his hand. “I’ll make her understand.” He would face her down, he thought. He’d let her know she couldn’t mess with his family. He looked down at the scrap of paper in his hand. “I’ll do it now.”
Martin walked out into the hallway and looked up the stairs. Ben was still busy. He went to the back of the house and into the conservatory, closing the glass door behind him. He had to be alone to do this. He keyed in the numbers and then paused. He looked up. Beth was standing in the kitchen, leaning on the counter, watching him. She looked afraid, but her eyes were rounded with trust, like a child’s. She hadn’t looked at him like that for so long. He managed a tight smile, and then pressed the call button. It rang three times.
“Hello.” The voice was guarded and muffled.
“Hello,” Martin said. “I’m...” He paused; he didn’t even want to mention Ben. “I’m Beth’s husband.”
“Hello, Martin.” Her voice transformed. She suddenly sounded sharp, almost confident.
Martin blinked at the use of his name. Well, yes, he guessed that wasn’t so surprising. She’d obviously tracked them down from the old house. She probably knew all kinds of things. She probably knew he didn’t even live there anymore.
“I thought Beth might get you to call. Bring out the big guns, you know?”
Martin closed his eyes, trying to concentrate. She already seemed to have him on the back foot.
“Look,” he began determinedly. “I don’t know what you want, but...”
She laughed. “I can tell you what I want. If you’re at all interested in what I want.”
Martin’s jaw worked and no words came out. Did he want to know what she wanted? Not really. He wanted her to go away. He didn’t suppose it was wise to say that. “So what do you want?”
“I want to see him,” she said. “I want you to bring him to the park tomorrow.”
She said it so simply, as if this wasn’t the most precious thing in Martin’s life. He coughed to clear the anger out of his chest so he could speak. “I don’t think you understand. You can’t just turn up here like this and walk into his life.”
She was silent for so long that he thought she’d gone.
“I just want to see him.”
“Well, you’ve seen him, haven’t you? You were in the park, watching him, frightening Beth.”
He heard her sharp exhale. “I was frightening her?”
“Of course you frightened her, creeping up like that. What were you thinking?”
“I thought it might be nice. I thought we might talk.”
“Nice?” Martin choked on the word. “Which part of this is nice?” he spat out.
“The part where I gave you my baby, maybe,” she shrieked.<
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The sudden change of tone made him jump. She sounded unhinged. Martin took a breath. “Listen, you said it yourself - you gave him to us. You get it? He’s ours. This isn’t some present that you decide to take back.”
“I didn’t say anything about taking him back.”
“And you’re not going to,” he said. “Not over my dead body.”
“Oh God,” she sighed. “Why did I think you were good people?” she asked. “Why did I choose you?”
It was a question Martin had asked himself many times over the last ten years. He had nothing to say.
“Now you treat me like shit, like I’m not even fit to talk to you.”
“What?” Martin said. “You just turn up in the park, you frighten the life out of Beth. What do you expect?”
“I expect you to show me some respect,” she shouted.
Martin pressed the phone hard against his ear. He could hear her breathing. Was she crying? He closed his eyes, trying to think. He was handling this all wrong. “Alright. I’m sorry,” he said. “But what is it you want? What do you expect us to do?”
“I don’t know,” she said. Her voice sounded thick, maybe with tears. “It’s not like I’ve done this before, you know.”
“Ben’s fine,” Martin said at last. “He’s happy. He has a good life. Isn’t that all you need to know?”
“You just want me to go away,” she said. “You want me to crawl back under a stone.”
Martin sighed. He did want her to go away. “I don’t want you messing up my son’s life.”
“He’s my son too! He wouldn’t even have a life if it wasn’t for me.”
Martin felt the frustration building up inside him. He tried to speak in a measured tone. “I know that,” he said. “But all that matters here is Ben and what’s right for Ben.”
“I matter too,” she said in a small voice.
Martin shook his head, not trusting himself to speak.
“I can see him whenever I want,” she said. “He’s ten years old. He goes out on his own. He goes places without you.”
“Is that a threat?”
“Why are you being like this?” she yelled.
“Well for God’s sake woman, what is it you want?”
There was a long pause and he could hear her ragged breathing.
“I want you to bring him to the park, tomorrow at two o’clock. I’m not going to say anything to him.”
Martin laughed. “I know you’re not.”
She laughed bitterly. “I’m not going away, Martin,” she said. “This time I’m not going away.”
He heard the heavy finality in her voice.
“Can’t you understand?” she said. “I just want… I need… I need to see him. Ten years…”
“Alright,” he agreed suddenly. He couldn’t have this threat hanging over his family forever. He’d go and meet her, without Ben. He’d talk to her face to face and find out what on earth it was she thought she wanted after all this time. He’d make her see that there was nothing she could do. He’d make her go away.
There was silence for a moment, as if she hadn’t expected him to agree. “OK,” she said. “So I’ll see you at two, by the pirate ship.”
“Yes.” Martin clicked the end call button and lowered the phone to his lap.
The conservatory door clicked open, and Beth came into the room, her eyes all questions. He smiled at her, trying to look better than he felt.
“I’m meeting her tomorrow at two.”
“Just you?”
“Just me. Why don’t you take Ben out for the day? Get together with Susie and Alex?”
“Away from here?” she whispered. She looked around as if their home had become toxic.
He stood up. “I’ll sort it out, Beth.” He tried to sound convincing, but he could hear the false note. He saw her face change, the barriers going up again. She didn’t trust him. He’d let her down too many times before. Her face was full of doubt.
He wanted to touch her arm, to feel some contact. But she walked to the back door, pulling the slatted blinds aside to look into the garden. She looked back over her shoulder, stared hard at him, and nodded.
Suddenly he felt awkward, like a guest in his own home.
“Do you want me to stay?” he offered. “I mean, I could stay for tea. I could...” he looked at the floor. “I could sleep in the spare room.”
She shook her head with a trace of irritation. “Rachel’s coming over in a bit. She’s bringing Tommy for a sleepover and we’re going to watch a film.”
“Oh, right.” He nodded brusquely. “Will you tell her?”
Her eyebrows shot up. “Tell her? Tell Rachel? About this?”
“OK. I just wondered.”
“Jesus, Martin. We agreed we wouldn’t tell anyone about Ben. Not even our own parents. You haven’t told anyone have you?”
He looked at her desperately. Who would he tell? He didn’t have those kinds of conversations. He shook his head.
She walked past him, back into the kitchen, and started getting food out onto the counter. “I’m making fajitas for the kids.”
Martin nodded. He suddenly felt so very low. He wanted to be there with them, round the big farmhouse table, slopping the chicken and the salsa into the tortillas, telling the kids to put salad in there too, watching Ben struggle to pour from the big Coke bottle – a special treat when friends came round for dinner. It was always Martin who sorted out the blow up mattress and the sleeping bag. She must do that herself now. There must be so many things she did herself now, without him. He should be there, looking after them. And it was all his own fault.
He swallowed hard. “Well, call me, you know, if you get worried or anything. I’ll just be at the flat.”
He saw the little flick of irritation in her eyes. It was always there whenever the flat came up. If she only knew the monkish life he had lived there since she’d kicked him out. If only it was enough to make it up to her.
Eight
Lester Gallagher had been running for an hour and his lungs were burning. The end was in sight – thank Christ for that! But it was up a bitching incline. Gallagher put his head down. Sprint! Fucking sprint, he told his legs, but they were shaking. It was like slow motion, each step his legs were begging to stop.
“Shit!” he gasped as he got to the top. He staggered to the lodge building, pressed his sweating palms against the red brick and doubled over. His diaphragm was slamming up and down, his lungs trying to suck in air faster than he could breathe. He waited, and then it started to slow, and then he cranked himself upright.
He swiped the sweat from his eyes with a forearm and checked his watch. Four minutes to one. Any minute now she’d arrive. Gallagher turned back to the wall of the lodge and stretched out his hamstrings. He kept an eye on the gate.
And there she was. Shit, she looked terrible, but that was definitely her. There was no mistaking that red hair, hanging down to her hips. He remembered the way she used to toss it over her shoulder, the way she used to strut about in her smart little suits, so buttoned up; thought she was too good for everyone. She’d always needed taking down a peg or two. But God, look at her now. That was what ten years had done. She looked old. She was just bones; bones all wrapped up in a fucking disgusting sweatsuit.
Gallagher waited. Marilyn was scanning the park and finally her gaze arrived at him. He saw her eyes widen, saw the way her shoulders braced, her feet suddenly still. She looked like she couldn’t move, couldn’t even run away. He kept his eyes fixed on hers as he walked the short distance between them. A smile was forming on his lips.
“Marilyn,” he said. He didn’t hold out a hand.
Her head bobbed in acknowledgment; it was more like a flinch.
“Let’s walk,” he said, gesturing back down the path. He started off down the slope without waiting for her response. “There’s a nice route further down, through the trees. I’ve just been running that way. Doctor’s orders, you know.” He looked over his s
houlder, found her trailing along behind him. They reached the bottom of the slope and entered a narrow tree-lined path.
“You working out these days, Marilyn? You used to be such a gym bunny.” He laughed. In his mind he saw the prim pink sports bag, her pretty lycra outfits.
She stopped walking. “I didn’t come here to chat.” Her voice seemed lower than he remembered.
He turned towards her. “So what did you come here for, Marilyn? What are you after?”
She looked away from him then, her eyes on the long grass at the side of the path. “I want...” He could see her jaw muscles working. “I want compensation,” she said. Her eyes leapt up at him then. “For what you did.”
Gallagher allowed his eyebrows to lower in confusion.
“No!” Marilyn raised a hand, her skinny fingers waving pathetically. She stepped back from him, her chest heaving. “Don’t you act like you don’t remember. You shit!” Her voice was rising to a scream.
The stupid hysterical cow. Gallagher forced his features to soften, to melt over the bones in a loose expression of sympathy. “Marilyn, take it easy now.” He stood still, let his hands fall to his sides, and waited. “You came here to talk, right? So let’s talk.”
Her eyes narrowed on him. If she kept working her jaw like that she was going to dislocate it. She turned her head away. “I can’t look at you,” she muttered.
He laughed. “I’ve heard worse. Come on, let’s walk.” He set off again. He didn’t turn, but was listening out for her footsteps behind him. She was light-footed, but he could just about sense her movement, the shadow of her presence on his shoulder. “Where are you working now, Marilyn?”
She made a grunting noise. “Nowhere you’d know.”
“No? Try me.”
“Steamship Laundry.”
Gallagher nodded. “Yeah, I know the place. Steve MacKinnon. You his PA then?”
“I work on the machines. I do ironing.”
He stopped then and turned to look at her. “What?” He looked her up and down, for the first time really taking in the significance of the shabby jogging suit, the wretched nylon jacket pulled over her skinny shoulders.