My phone rings. I look down at the screen and see Vicky’s name. I blanch as Phil’s wearied irritation snakes through me.
You don’t need Hannah’s shit in your life.
I turn the call off, unwilling to load her with yet more of my shit, more truths I should have told her, further admission that I’d cut her out of so much of my life. I’ve always wondered if I should have told her everything and I know what a mistake I made in not doing so. Having her understanding, advice and guidance would have been a lifeline, not to mention explaining why I live a life she cannot comprehend.
But at the time, as hard as it was, I couldn’t do it.
Once Cam had disposed of the body I had no choice but to keep the truth hidden from everybody. How could I have expected her to keep my secret and not go to the police? I wouldn’t have put that on her. To keep Cam – and myself – out of prison we had to stay quiet. Nobody could know but the two of us. Now the truth is out she is going to know about it. The thought makes me weak.
My phone buzzes in my hand. It’s a text from her.
Alex called me. Was in real state. He wants to see your mum. I picked him up and we’re heading to Treliske now. He made me promise not to tell you. What’s happened? If you need a cab, I’ll pay when you get to hospital. Hope all OK? Vx
My lungs burn with the exertion of running as I trip and stumble over tufts of grass on the way back across the fields. Neither Nathan or Cam are at the house when I get there. I consider calling Cam and not Nathan, but Nathan deserves to see Alex; he is after all the only father he’s had in his life. Panting heavily, I dial the number and he answers at the first ring.
‘He’s at the Treliske,’ I say breathlessly.
‘He’s hurt?’
‘No, he went to see Mum. Can you come back and drive me there?’
For a moment I think Nathan might tell me he’s going straight there without me but he doesn’t, and in a little over five minutes he’s turning his car into the driveway.
He drives five miles an hour beneath the speed limit, hands at ten to two, feeding the steering wheel as he turns, and checking his mirrors continuously. I have to bite my tongue to stop myself yelling at him to drive faster. I can feel him waiting for me to talk, expecting, I’m sure, profuse apologies and desperate excuses. No doubt he’d like to see me break down and plead for forgiveness or beg him not to go to the police. But I do none of this. Instead, I sit in silence and I know it’s killing him. A couple of times he draws breath as if to speak, but I keep my head turned resolutely away from him, tapping my finger rapidly against my lip, my stare fixed on the world beyond the confines of the car.
Finally, the silence is too much for him. ‘So you have nothing to say?’
I don’t reply.
‘Why didn’t you tell me what that man did to you?’ His concern is contaminated with a hint of disgust, like a drop of poison in sweetened tea. ‘If you had, then maybe…’
I close my eyes and block him out as I have done so many times. As his voice drifts away from me, I take myself to a windy clifftop. I’m walking Cass. As soon as she comes into my head, however, a vivid image of her lying dead in a ditch somewhere kicks the air from me. I flick my eyes open but can still see her, her eyes turned yellow and glassy by the rat poison, her lips retracted to reveal her teeth like the macabre masks on the voles left rotting in the bin.
‘Are you even listening to me?’
‘Yes,’ I lie. ‘Of course.’
‘Tell me then, how are we going to move on from this? If I go to the police—’
‘You won’t.’
‘Oh?’ he says. ‘And you’re sure about that?’
‘No,’ I say after a moment or two. ‘But why would you risk losing your job? Maybe even prison? Imagine the headlines in the newspapers. Imagine what the people at the council would think? Their award-winning citizen sent down for helping to conceal a murder.’
He answers with a stony glower. ‘So, what? We’re just going to carry on as normal?’
This word is so comical I can’t help emitting a sharp explosive laugh. ‘Normal?’ I turn in the seat so I’m looking directly at him. ‘Are you joking? Nothing about any of this is – or ever has been – normal.’
His hands grip the steering wheel tightly. I can clearly see him trying to formulate a reply that will twist and manipulate what I’ve said. I wonder if whatever he’s constructing has him painted as hero or victim.
I don’t wait to find out. ‘I don’t love you, Nathan.’
He lets out a scoff, loud and dismissive.
‘I never have.’
‘That’s not true.’
‘Nathan, listen to me. It was all a lie. From that moment you sat on my bed – when my body was aching and sore from what Davy did to me, my mind clouded with guilt and confusion over what I did to him – and told me you’d seen Cam kill a man. I lied when I told you I loved you. I lied to keep Cam out of prison. He didn’t deserve to be punished. I did. Everything up until this morning has been a lie. Every time we had sex. Every time I smiled. Every time I agreed with you. Our marriage is my punishment for what I did.’
He shakes his head as if trying to dislodge my words. His face moves through a range of emotions from surprise, to shock, to pain. Should I feel sympathy? Possibly. But I don’t. Not a whisper of it. Perhaps this isn’t fair. Perhaps Nathan did his best, a damaged man plagued by his own demons, who believed himself to be a good husband to a girl who needed saving. Perhaps it was me who manipulated him. After all, as I’ve said all along, I took his deal willingly.
My freedom for Cam’s.
‘You have a good life with me.’ Nathan stares at the road ahead. ‘I’ve provided for you and provided for your son who I treated as my own. Even when I found out he wasn’t mine. I could have thrown you both out on the streets, but I didn’t. And now you call our marriage a punishment?’ He glances at me and I see his fight is returning. ‘A beautiful house? Clothes and meals out? Presents. Flowers. A husband who treats you like a princess? You think that’s a punishment? Do you know how many women would swap their life for yours?’
The face of the woman from the award ceremony sidles into my head, her eyes consuming my husband as she fiddles with her necklace, the flesh on her finger fattened around her dulled wedding ring.
‘What about the money?’ I’m appalled to hear my voice wavering as the force I’d mustered leaks out of me. ‘You took my credit card.’
He furrows his brow. ‘Do I need to tell you again how terrifying it was when you left in the middle of the night with your depression running ragged. You were nearing suicidal. I couldn’t trust you to look after yourself. Without a credit card I knew you couldn’t try and run again. All I wanted to do was keep you – and Alex – safe. What kind of a husband would have done nothing? Did I do the right thing? Maybe not. Perhaps it was an overreaction, but I was scared of losing you. Terrified you’d do something stupid and endanger yourself. I was at a loss. Watching you struggle like you did was agonising. Do you know what it’s like to see somebody you love in that kind of state? Taking away your access to money was my way of reducing the risk you posed to yourself.’
I’m reminded of the paralysing postnatal depression which came after Alex was born. Days and nights lost in a fug. I was petrified in case I saw anything of Davy Garnett in this child. Paranoia set in. What if I walked past Sheila and she recognised him in Alex? What if she became suspicious? I was hounded by nightmares of Davy’s waterlogged body, his fingers trying to grab me, his blood turning the whole sea scarlet. I was a mess, Nathan’s right about that, and at the time I could barely dress myself let alone manage money.
My head pounds as I become confused.
Nathan slows and flicks the indictor on and waits to turn into the hospital. He circles the car park, looking for a space, and when he finds one he parks and switches the engine off.
‘All I’ve ever wanted,’ he says softly, turning in his seat, and taking hold of my hand, �
�is to take care of you. You aren’t strong enough to look after yourself. You need me to take care of you.’
His words act like a defibrillator and I feel a surge of energy. I recall all those times he thrust into me, my body dry and unresponsive, biting the pillow to keep myself quiet. I recall the time he demanded nine pence change back. How again and again he belittled me and twisted my words. I recall with an aching heart all the friends he drove away.
‘I’m leaving you.’
‘What?’
‘You and me. This.’ I gesture around us with my hands. ‘Whatever this is. It’s over.’
He swallows and needles his eyes into me. ‘And your mother? How do you think you’ll pay for the care she needs without a penny from me?’
The change from desperate, loving husband to vindictive manipulator happens in the blink of an eye. I marvel at how good he is at concealing himself. He is as good a liar as I am.
‘I’ll get a job.’
His burst of laughter is sharp and unkind. ‘Good luck with that! Not too many jobs out there for a middle-aged woman with a couple of GCSEs and no A levels, who hasn’t had a job for fifteen years and only ever worked in her daddy’s bakery.’
The air was rancid with malicious victory.
‘Thank you,’ I say, as I open the car door and get out. ‘You’ve made this easy for me.’
When I get to the hospital entrance, I glance backwards and see his car pulling out on to the main road and accelerating away, and as I push through the revolving door I am filled with an intoxicating sense of freedom.
Chapter Forty-Eight
Hannah
The first person I see as I walk on to the ward is Vicky. She is sitting on the chairs near the reception holding a plastic cup, her hands clutched around it as if she is huddling for warmth. I falter. Last time I spoke to her she sounded so angry, so disappointed, and facing her now fills me with an ominous dread. What if she rejects me? What if she acknowledges me briefly then leaves? But before I have an opportunity to say her name, she’s caught sight of me. She places her cup on the floor and gets up and runs to me with outstretched arms.
‘I’m so sorry,’ she says, squeezing me in a python-like embrace. ‘I said awful things to you. I’ve been in pieces. I’ve been feeling sick with worry.’ She lets go of me and smiles, kissing my cheek. ‘I was just so cross with Nathan. And I couldn’t stop thinking about how he’d ruined my weekend, and even though Phil kept telling me to forget about it, I couldn’t. I was fuming. But then he told me he thought you were with me and I felt like such an idiot and, well, I was hurt.’ She lowered her eyes. ‘And I felt guilty too, because I knew you’d get it in the neck when he found out you’d lied to him.’
‘You were right to be cross. It was a shitty thing I did and you have nothing to be sorry about. It’s me who should be sorry. I should have told you and I never should have lied to you. There’s a lot I should have told you.’
Even as I say the words, I know I won’t tell her about Davy and what happened. I know Nathan won’t. Nor will Cam. I can’t be sure what Alex will want to do. It’ll be up to him and I won’t try to influence him, but I have a suspicion he’ll stay quiet. Davy Garnett’s bones will remain lost at sea and our secret will stay hidden with them. Too many years have passed and it helps nobody for Cam and I to end up in prison. Does this make me a bad person? I suspect it probably does. Perhaps, one day, when Alex is grown up and Martin has passed on and is safe from the distress and scandal, perhaps then it will be time.
Or perhaps not.
‘Over a bottle of wine, I think,’ Vicky says, rubbing my arm. ‘Right now you need to be with Alex. He’s so upset, but he wouldn’t tell me why.’
‘He had some difficult news.’
She waits for me to expand, but I don’t. It’s strange but I don’t feel any guilt about not telling her. It’s as if I’m at peace with it now. There was only one person who had to know the truth, only one person it’s relevant to, and that’s Alex. ‘Something else to discuss over wine,’ I say.
‘You and your secrets.’
‘How about being the first to know I’m leaving him?’
‘Leaving who? Nathan?’
I nod and, though she does her best to mask it, her pleasure is palpable. But then her smile fades and she folds her arms and gives me a hard stare. ‘Leaving him to be with Cam Stewart?’
Her question surprises me and I falter as I search for the words to answer her.
‘Sorry,’ she says. ‘It’s none of my business.’
‘No. No, it’s fine.’ I hesitate. ‘No. Not to be with Cam.’ And it’s true. I don’t want to be with Cam. ‘To be honest I’m looking forward to giving men a wide berth for a bit.’
She smiles, and I can see her holding her tongue, and realise there are lots of thoughts and feelings and opinions she’s keeping from me in return. ‘Look, if you and Alex need somewhere, you’re welcome at ours for as long as you need. And if you need any money, a loan or something, just ask.’
We hug each other and when she steps away from me, she dries the corners of her eyes with her sleeve and laughs. ‘God, look at us. Let’s not argue ever again, OK?’
I laugh through my own tears and nod.
‘Right, I’ll be in the car park when you’re ready to go.’
‘Haven’t you got to get back to the kids?’
‘Phil’s working from home. He can pick them up. They like that. He buys them sweets.’
As I walk away from Vicky and down the corridor thick with disinfectant and institutional food, my nerves jangle and grate. How can I face Alex? What if everything he’s heard has turned him against me? I would understand if that was the case, but even so, if he rejects me, what on earth will I do?
My mother’s privacy curtain is drawn around her cubicle. I approach quietly and peer though the gap in the tired, blue fabric. My heart splinters when I see them together. They are serene, connected, like two subjects in a painting called Tenderness. Alex has pulled a chair over and is sitting with her hand held in his. The oxygen mask has gone from her face and her expression is peaceful; aware, I’m certain, that her grandson is with her. It’s then I notice the storm glass, the delicate glass bird I took from her room at Heamoor, sitting on her bedside table beside a posy of flowers in a small vase.
As I step through the curtain I clear my throat. I’m surprised at how nervous I am and how terrified of rejection. When he looks at me my stomach clenches, his face is red and puffy, cheeks burning hot from crying, and clearly exhausted.
I sit at the foot of Mum’s bed and he drops his head, resting it on top of her frail hand. I reach out and rub his shoulder, wondering at how difficult it is to speak.
‘Are you OK?’
He turns his head, and tries to smile. His shoulders shrug imperceptibly and he sniffs.
I nod in the direction of the little glass bird, the crystals inside suspended like a moment in time. ‘Did you bring this to her?’
He glances at the bird then nods. ‘I saw it at home. I know how much she loves it and I thought it would make her happy. You can take it back if you want.’
I bite back tears. ‘No. Let’s keep it here with her.’
We are quiet for a while, until finally, he says, ‘Mum?’
‘Yes?’
‘I need to ask you something and I need you to tell me the truth.’
There is a breathless quavering to his voice, as if the words hovering on his lips are so terrifying they’re causing him actual physical harm, and it breaks me in two.
‘Of course.’ I’m trying my best to disguise my trembling nerves, but I know I’m not managing it. ‘Ask me anything.’
He glances at my mother then back at me and I watch as he plucks up the courage to spit the toxic words from his mouth.
‘I need to know…’ His voice is so quiet. ‘Do you hate me? Because if you do, I’d understand.’
His words slam into me. ‘Hate you? How could I possibly hate you?’
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‘Because…’ Alex hesitates. I watch him squeeze my mother’s hand for reassurance, and wonder how much of it he’s told her peaceful sleeping figure, the perfect confidante. ‘Because of him.’
‘Oh, Alex, you must never think that, do you hear me? Never. Hate you?’ I put my arms around him and pull him gently in towards me. ‘There is nothing in this entire world I love, or have ever loved, more than you.’
He nods but the sadness seems to intensify rather than ease. He looks down at his hand and watches his fingers stroking Mum’s paper skin. ‘Do you,’ he says so softly I can barely hear him, ‘ever wish you’d got rid of me?’ He hesitates, his eyes flicking briefly up to mine. ‘When you found out you were pregnant. You must have thought about it. Do you ever wish you had?’
I don’t answer him straight away. He wants the truth and the truth is I did consider it a few times at the beginning of the pregnancy. I think if I’d been less scared and felt less alone, then there’s a possibility I might have. But it wasn’t that easy. There was a part of me that thought if I just ignored it, pretended it wasn’t happening, then perhaps the pregnancy would just go away. Of course it didn’t, and as my stomach swelled it was hard to separate what was happening inside me from what Davy Garnett did. But when Alex was born, things changed. Something kicked in. Perhaps the helplessness of this little tiny creature. There was nothing evil about him. And, though it surprised me, looking at my baby didn’t remind me of anything bad, instead it dulled the pain. I had something – someone – to take my mind off it all. A greater purpose.
‘No. I have never wished I got rid of you. As soon as you came into this world, the moment the midwife put you in my arms, I knew deep inside me you were supposed to be here. I believe you are my guardian angel and I believe it with my whole heart. You were given to me to give me something to live for,’ I whisper. ‘I’m not sure I’d still be here if it wasn’t for you. You are the most important thing in my life.’
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