The Puzzle of You

by Leah Mercer

  And now that’s gone.

  She won’t be going to the office today, or any day in the future. She won’t be vice-president, an important voice in the company where she’s worked for the past decade. Christ, she doesn’t even have a job, full stop. She’s not one of those women who has everything, after all. She’s become someone she never dreamed of being.

  Someone with nothing in their life but their kid.

  Charlotte lets out a cry, cradling her aching head in her hands. How could this happen? Why would she give up everything she loves for a life she’d never be happy in? And while she’s at it, how did she ever get to the point of actually wanting a child, anyway? Of being ready to have a child? Because of course Anabelle was wanted. Charlotte always took her pill religiously, and it’s unlikely she’d be within the one per cent unlucky enough to fall pregnant. And even if she were . . . well, they’d obviously decided to go for it.

  She strides over to the bookcase and peers at a large framed photo. It’s a family portrait – quite recent by the looks of things – of all three of them. She and David are sitting on a wooden bench under a leafy tree with Anabelle squeezed in between them. Anabelle is grinning brightly at the camera, while she and David are smiling down at their daughter as if she’s the most important thing in the world. Charlotte looks so happy, as if she’s glowing with love from the inside out.

  She closes her eyes, begging her brain to explain how she ended up in this strange, foreign place . . . shoved into the body of a person who’s torn the only future she’d ever wanted away from her. But her head just pounds with pain, and she’s left as clueless as ever. Fury flares inside as she stares at this woman gazing tenderly at her child, and she has to clench her fists to stop herself from smashing the glass. How can you be happy? she wants to yell. How can you be happy when you’ve thrown everything away? How can you smile with the huge, inescapable responsibility of motherhood on your shoulders . . . forever?

  Charlotte sinks on to the sofa and shuts her eyes again. It will all be okay. Soon, she’ll remember. It hasn’t even been a day since the accident, and whatever tricks her brain is playing, it’ll sort itself out.

  It better had, anyway. How else can she cope with this disbelief and blinding anger that everything she’s worked for has gone? How can she live this life when she can’t even remember wanting it?

  And even worse . . . how can she be a mother when she doesn’t even love her own daughter?

  CHAPTER NINE

  16 May

  I made it past the three-month mark this week.

  David is ecstatic. This date has given him permission to fully open the emotional floodgates, and I’ve never seen him so happy. In fact, it was him who marked the occasion with fake champagne and the teeniest, tiniest Babygro I’ve ever seen. He wrapped it up and handed it over with a huge grin on his face, and for a split second, I thought he might have bought me something to wear (although I’m glad he didn’t, as he has terrible taste when it comes to women’s fashion).

  Opening the package and finding something for a baby – for our baby – was a very strange feeling, like I’d stepped into an alternative universe. Probation period might be over for my husband and my body, but in my mind, it still feels like I’m treading in a foreign land, despite all my reading.

  It’s a strange place, a world where my husband fends off my sexual advances (God, I’m horny), saying he’s afraid he’ll hurt the baby. It’s a place where, all of a sudden, it feels like he has a say over my body, too: what I should eat (‘Is this bite going to benefit the baby?’); in what position I should sleep; and what vitamins I should take. I’m not just his wife; not just Charlotte any longer – I’m the caretaker of his child, too. That trumps everything, even me. It makes me feel . . . smaller, somehow.

  I suppose it’s part of the reason I haven’t told Lily that I’m pregnant, although I mostly don’t want to upset her. And how can she not be upset when the ‘mad auntie’ will soon become the mother she longs to be? Her journey to get pregnant has been filled with struggle and grief, whereas mine . . . well, mine wasn’t a journey at all. It wasn’t even wanted. Her journey is continuing, full of uncertainty and hope, and mine will be ending in six months at the destination she’s desperate to reach: parenthood. I can’t help feeling that my news will put even more distance between us, and there’s already enough as it is.

  And if I’m really being honest, I don’t want my oldest friend to think of me as anything other than the woman she knows now. I don’t want her to ask how I’m feeling, if I’m going to breastfeed, when I’m going back to work . . . I don’t want to default to baby talk, if there’s a chance she’s even up for that. Not yet, anyway.

  This all sounds terrible, doesn’t it? So self-absorbed, I know, and I wouldn’t dream of saying any of it out loud. I should be lifted up by giving birth to a new life. I should feel exalted by this shift in my world, finally ‘fulfilling my role as a woman’ – as Miriam so helpfully pointed out when we told her the news. But instead I feel unsettled and unstable, like I’m trying to grip something that’s sliding from my grasp.

  Like the harder I grab, the more slippery it becomes.

  Because despite my determination that things won’t change, they already have – and this baby isn’t even born yet. It’s not just David, either. It’s worse than that, or at least it feels that way: it’s my boss, too. I mean, I knew he wouldn’t be happy when I told him the news. The few women in our department who’d dared to go off on maternity leave got plenty of stick . . . and even more when they tried to return on reduced hours. And I have to admit, I hadn’t exactly been supportive of that. Why should I need to put in more time so they could work at home? Because we all know what ‘working from home’ really means – faffing around in your pyjamas while answering the odd email to show you’re actually there. It’s part of the reason Vivek is so keen to keep our UK base open, despite plans to become a virtual office.

  But I wasn’t just your run-of-the-mill employee. This was me: ‘pitch perfect’, Vivek calls me, a dedicated professional who’s proven her worth time and again. Surely he wouldn’t let a minor detour like a baby cloud his judgement of my value, especially when I was planning to return so soon after giving birth?

  I was nervous when I went to tell him, but not too worried. I took a few deep breaths, knocked on his door, then delivered the news quickly (he hates it when you waste his time). And his response? ‘That’s a shame.’

  A shame that I’d opted out, I guess. A shame that my future was no longer what he’d envisioned. And even as I assured him I was coming back full-time within six weeks, I could tell by his dubious expression that he didn’t believe me.

  I could tell that things had changed.

  I wasn’t his successor, the one who’d knock him off his throne, like he’d joked. I was a woman having a baby . . . a woman who’d disappear soon into the same black hole that had swallowed so many other women in our workforce.

  His phone rang and he waved me out, like I was damaged goods now. I left the office with a cold, hard knot in my stomach, the terrible sense that having this baby was going to affect my career. I sat down at my desk and stared with unseeing eyes at the screen, the noise of the office fading away.

  I’m pregnant. I’m going to be a mum. But I’m also a damn good worker, and even if my boss sees me differently now, I’ll show him I’m not. I love this job, and I won’t let it slip away. I won’t let my future slip away.

  I’ll prove him wrong, no matter what.

  CHAPTER TEN

  By mid-afternoon, Charlotte is practically climbing the walls. She hasn’t been home on a weekday for ages, not since a spectacular case of food poisoning a few years ago turned her off sushi for life. She’s not used to the silence of the flat – well, silent now that she’s muted the annoying WhatsApp group that dinged every few minutes, offering some new kiddie activity. She’s examined the huge array of family photos in forensic detail, riffled through the bookcases,
and even flicked through her wardrobe so many times she could probably itemise its contents . . . as if by memorising the material items of her life, she’ll slide seamlessly back into the present. Every muscle longs to relax, but each time she glimpses herself in the mirror, disbelief and confusion at where she’s ended up propels her back and forth across the flat, like she’s seeking a foothold in this new life. David’s face flashes into her mind and she sighs. Maybe she should just tell him the truth. He’ll be stunned and concerned, but at least they can get through this together.

  She glances out of the window, thinking that now her head has stopped pounding – at least it no longer feels like it will lift itself right off her shoulders – maybe some fresh air would do her good. It’s stuffy and warm in this flat, and just being here makes her feel so close yet so far from the life she knows . . . the only life she remembers.

  Hell, the only life she wants. Right now, anyway.

  She’s about to grab her coat when she spies Miriam and Anabelle coming up the road. Anabelle is holding Miriam’s hand, practically skipping as Miriam corrals her down the pavement. Her mouth is moving a mile a minute and Miriam nods, then scoops the little girl up in her arms and swings her around. Charlotte can hear Anabelle’s delighted shriek from here, and Miriam’s positively beaming. Charlotte blinks, thinking Miriam looks a good twenty years younger. She’s never seen her mother-in-law so happy.

  Charlotte studies her daughter’s animated face as Miriam sets her back on the ground. She looks clever – well, she’s definitely a talker; must have got that from her mum. She certainly seems to have plenty of energy, and she looks strong and healthy. Please God may she not be a fussy eater, Charlotte thinks, making a face. She always rolls her eyes when she sees parents cajoling their children to take ‘just one more bite, there’s a good girl’. In her opinion, they should eat or go hungry. God knows her own mother hadn’t any time for that. In fact, there were times Charlotte had starved after refusing to eat something her mum had cobbled together after a long day at the office . . . if she made it home in time for supper, that was.

  Charlotte starts, thinking of her mother. What does she think of her daughter giving up work to be a stay-at-home mum? Her mum is never one to comment on Charlotte’s life unless asked, but Charlotte’s sure she has some choice thoughts about her daughter’s life path.

  Miriam’s key scratches in the lock, and Charlotte takes a deep breath, bracing herself for her daughter’s arrival. Okay, she can do this. She may not feel like a mother, but at least she can act like one . . . although God knows what kind of parent she is. Is she like her own mum, about as maternal as a potted plant? Or is she more like Miriam, the ultimate mothering role model? Either way, she’ll have to fake it until her memory – and emotions – kick in.

  ‘Mummy!’ The door opens and Anabelle hurtles into her arms.

  Despite the mud coating her daughter’s jeans and trousers, Charlotte forces herself to hug Anabelle tightly, trying not to think about the damp seeping through her own clothes. It is nice that someone’s so happy to see her, despite the added layer of dirt.

  But . . . Charlotte draws back, wiping her cheek and trying to keep the expression of disgust from her face as she examines some goo that’s transferred on to her cheek. What is that?

  ‘Oh dear, Anabelle.’ Miriam pulls a tissue from her pocket. ‘Your nose is running again!’ She swipes at the child’s nose as Charlotte inwardly shudders. ‘Now don’t you worry,’ Miriam says, patting Charlotte’s shoulder. ‘I had her coat on all the time, and she didn’t get too wet. She’ll be fine.’

  Charlotte nods, thinking that she’s not worried at all. Should she be? Okay, so it’s winter, but London is hardly the Antarctic. Surely she’s not one of those neurotic mums who freaks out if their child so much as coughs.

  She watches as Miriam peels off Anabelle’s jacket to reveal a lurid pink sweatshirt emblazoned with Peppa Pig paired with spotty red trousers. Charlotte raises her eyebrows, thinking that as much as she admires creative flair, she’d envisioned her hypothetical child decked out in a cute pinafore with a bow in her hair. God, she must have been really out of it this morning not to notice this fetching ensemble. As Anabelle kicks off her wellies, a handful of sand tumbles out on to the floor. Charlotte cringes, thinking there’s nothing worse than sand underfoot.

  ‘You go sit with your mother while I tidy this up,’ Miriam says, propelling the two of them towards the sofa. ‘How’s your head? Better?’

  Charlotte nods. ‘Yes, thanks. Still a little painful, but getting there.’

  If only she could remember the little girl now tugging her hands so hard she almost falls over. She lets herself be pulled on to the sofa and Anabelle snuggles into her, clutching Zebby in one hand and a fistful of Charlotte’s jumper in the other. It’s as if she can’t get close enough; like she wants to burrow inside her mother and bury herself there.

  ‘So what did you do today?’ Charlotte asks, wondering what she’s supposed to say to a three year old. The last time she was alone with a child had been years ago, when David and his eldest brother had popped out to the shops during a brief visit. Charlotte had entertained his brother’s five year old by practising an upcoming sales pitch, adding the word ‘poo’ to the end of every sentence to keep him laughing. It’d been a great short-term strategy, but somehow she didn’t think it’d work in the long term.

  She needn’t have worried, though, because Anabelle launches into a detailed description of what they did at Granny’s house, the sand cake she made, who she met at the play area, the puddle in front of the fountain . . . Charlotte leans back, fighting the urge to close her eyes and have a little sleep. The niggling pain in her head is flaring again, but she’s not sure if that’s down to the accident or her daughter.

  ‘I’ll just pop off now.’ Miriam runs a hand over her granddaughter’s head, and Anabelle smiles up at her. It’s wonderful that the two of them have such a close relationship, Charlotte thinks. Does her own mother come round much? Although her mum lives practically around the corner, in Kensington, Charlotte can’t imagine her playing doting grandma.

  ‘Will you be okay for tomorrow?’ Miriam asks. ‘I’m happy to help if you need me to, but I’ll have John’s three to deal with as well. It might be a very full house! The more the merrier, though.’

  Charlotte raises an eyebrow. John is David’s youngest brother, and the last thing she remembers is him having their first child. And now they have three kids? They’ve certainly been busy.

  ‘That’s all right,’ Charlotte says. ‘I’m sure it will be fine.’ David can stay home tomorrow, if need be. He seems a little clueless, but he must help out when she’s ill or has something else she needs to do. What the hell happened to make her give up work rather than him? He was the one who was chomping at the bit to quit his job, not her.

  ‘Charlotte . . .’ Miriam puts a hand on her arm. ‘It was wonderful having Anabelle today. We had great fun, and it’s good for her to get used to the house before you all move in with me. Oh, I know it’s not for some time yet, but we need to plan these things.’

  The words flow over Charlotte and it’s all she can do to nod with a nailed-on smile as she tries to process everything. They’re moving into Miriam’s house? While she’s still living there? It was bad enough when she thought Miriam might come to Chelsea, but to actually move in with her mother-in-law?

  Charlotte takes two or three quick breaths, forcing air into her lungs as she struggles to believe what’s happening. How on earth has she agreed to this? Has she had a brain transplant? She hates that house; hates it with every fibre of her being. It’s everything she detests in a place: knick-knacks on every surface, and heavy drapes covering net curtains, blocking out what little light makes it through the dusty windows. The bedrooms are a riot of mismatched colours, from the hideous blue carpets to the fading floral wallpaper.

  But forget that. She can deal with it – she can renovate the hell out of it.

 
; What she can’t change is her mother-in-law. Although she seems a bit warmer than Charlotte remembers – and although she and Anabelle clearly adore each other – Miriam is still Miriam. Charlotte may have produced a grandchild, but she’d bet her laptop that hasn’t stopped Miriam asking when the next one is coming along. Why would Charlotte want to subject herself to that 24/7? Not to mention Miriam’s infuriating belief that she – and only she – knows best . . . especially when it comes to her son’s happiness.

  And why would she and David leave Chelsea? They’re cramped here, sure, but it’s manageable. It has been for three years, anyway. They always swore they’d never leave the city, laughingly repeating that when you’re tired of London, you’re tired of life. Christ, have they somehow morphed into the exhausted couple fleeing the city for the space of the suburbs? Not bloody likely. But then . . . she doesn’t even know who she is any more, and every new piece of information makes her feel further away from herself.

  Charlotte thinks back to a conversation over lunch with Miriam one day, when David had proudly told his mother about his wife’s promotion to senior account director. Miriam had congratulated her, but then had gone on to say that no success in the workplace could compare to the joy of holding a child in your arms, and that her fondest wish was that, one day, Charlotte would experience that.

  David had squeezed Charlotte’s hand in silent support, but he hadn’t been able to keep the hopeful expression off his face. Charlotte had swallowed, feeling the walls closing in as frustration swirled inside. How the hell did Miriam know that? she’d wanted to retort. Had Miriam ever been promoted? Hell, had she ever had a job? What gave her the right to diminish Charlotte’s success, to reduce her to someone who would only really be fulfilled through procreation?

  Her heart sinks as she thinks about her life now: how she doesn’t work, how she stays at home, how her world revolves around her child. Is there a chance Miriam was right? That once she had a baby, the happiness and love blotted out everything else . . . even the person she used to be?