Little One

by Sarah A. Denzil

  Mary giggled. “I don’t think so.”

  “Why not?”

  Her laughter faded. “No. It wouldn’t be right.”

  “Because of your husband.”

  For the first time, Mary’s expression seemed sharp when she looked at Fran. She saw a warning in the young mother’s eyes. Don’t go there. “Come on Essie, time to go.” She helped her daughter into the car. The day was over.

  Chapter Ten

  Adrian’s thumbs dug into the flesh around her spine, a few inches below her shoulders, working through her tension. She tried to relax, to allow his hands to bring her the usual pleasure, but she couldn’t, and he remarked on it. He leaned over and kissed her on the crown, as Mary had kissed her daughter.

  “Out with it,” he said.

  They were on the sofa with wine. He’d made them moules mariniere and now they were drinking Sauvignon Blanc and watching Adrian’s favourite Hitchcock movie: Rope.

  “They both had bruises,” she said. She’d been holding in her thoughts all night and now, as she spoke, her hands flew out in a wild, sweeping gesture. “There’s something wrong with that child. She doesn’t laugh, or run, or play. God is her imaginary friend. I saw a bruise on her thigh, Adrian.”

  “How do you know that?” Adrian asked.

  “She grazed her knee and had to take off her tights. I saw the bruise as she was doing it.”

  “Kids get—”

  “Bruises all the time. I know. But it all adds up to something… bad. I know it. I feel it.”

  He sipped his wine and paused the movie. “What about the mother. How did you see her bruise?”

  “It was on her wrist. She’d covered it up by wearing long sleeves.”

  “Or alternatively, she dresses modestly because they’re quite religious.”

  Fran made a guttural noise in her throat. “I’m aware that there’s a rational explanation for everything. I know there is. That’s not what…” She paused, collecting her thoughts. Here she was, menopausal, irrational. The woman no one listens to in the movie. The hysterical hag who ends up slapped around the face by the moustachioed hero. “I’m going to relay the facts to you.” And she did, starting with finding Esther in the park, to the warning look Mary had given her when Fran had suggested Elijah stopped her from doing things. “I think he’s an abusive, controlling husband.”

  Adrian placed his glass down on the coffee table and pulled Fran into his arms. “You might be right.”

  “I usually am.”

  “Yes, you are. You have good instincts, and I’m sorry if I seemed dismissive. You might be right, but where does it leave you if you are? What can you do? She’s the one who needs to leave her husband.”

  “If Esther is being harmed, I could call the police, or tell social services.”

  He was quiet for a moment. “I don’t know, Franny. That’s a big deal. You need to be sure. Are you sure?”

  She sighed. “No, I’m not sure. They were two small bruises and I have no idea how they got them.”

  She felt his chin nodding against her head. “Then for now, this is Mary’s choice. There’s nothing you can do. So, where does this leave you?”

  “As her friend.”

  He readjusted his weight which led to Fran also readjusting. Then she felt his fingers gently running through her hair and a pleasant prickling sensation ran down her scalp.

  “I want you to be wrong this time, if I’m honest. I don’t want to think of this young woman stuck in an abusive relationship. But you need to know that you’re my priority. I want you to really think about whether to take on this… this emotional burden, because that’s what you’re doing. You’re entering into a friendship with someone who could need you, and I mean really need you, down the line and I’m not sure if you’re prepared for that.”

  Fran moved away from his arms. She lifted her feet onto the sofa cushion and rested her chin on her knees. She didn’t want to hear this, not now. She focused on the strawberries entwined with the vines on their wallpaper. The room needed redecorating, but she couldn’t be doing with the mess.

  “Franny,” he said.

  “Don’t.”

  “I can’t say nothing.”

  “I’m not a child.” Her hands tightened around her knees. Knuckles white.

  “You know why you’re drawn to them, don’t you?”

  “Of course, I know, Adrian,” she snapped. “Of course, I do.” She let her feet drop back onto the carpet, snatched up her wine and took it into the kitchen. Adrian didn’t follow her. Perhaps he rightly realised that she needed space. There, on the table was the laptop. She sat down and opened it up, heading straight over to her bereavement site.

  Fran had been an administrator on the site for a few years now. Even though she wasn’t a trained counsellor, she’d helped many people through their grief. In particular, she managed a subforum dedicated to early menopause in women. She logged in to check the new threads, see if she could help anyone. She’d set up that section of the forum to help women who had lost a child before losing their ability to conceive, because she’d had to grieve twice when it happened to her. Once for Chloe, and once for her body.

  Chapter Eleven

  A frosty few days followed their argument. Fran spent most of her time on her bereavement forum, throwing herself into group chats, not always being as positive and caring as she’d like. She found her messages started out with the best of intentions but went downhill quite quickly. I know what you’re going through, and I know it takes time, but you can make it through this. You might be scared, afraid, and sometimes completely alone. It’s going to be hard. Unbearable at times. That word cropped up every time. Alone. Was it true? Adrian had suffered, but he hadn’t been the one to carry Chloe in his body, and he hadn’t been the one to lose a part of himself in the process.

  But none of that was his fault. Neither were the words of warning that she took so personally. He was looking out for her, she was sure of that at least, and as a few days passed, she began to come around to his way of thinking. She stopped checking Mary’s profile quite so often. She avoided the Red Lion, where she’d usually pop in for an afternoon Pinot Grigio and listen to the gossip going around about the Whitakers. She tried to stop picturing little Esther’s face after the dog had knocked her over, the first glimpse of emotion she’d noticed from the girl. Her features crumpled from the pain. That was the one part she couldn’t let go: Esther.

  Three days after their fight, Adrian had spent the afternoon in Leacroft library. That evening he arrived home with a takeaway curry and a bottle of Prosecco.

  “Is a Balti going to get you to forgive me?” He spooned the food out onto plates, his puppy-dog eyes meeting hers.

  “If you remembered the chips, I’ll consider it.”

  He danced across the kitchen to the bag, slowly, like a magician pulling a rabbit out of a hat, he revealed an extra carton.

  “Oui, madam.”

  Fran laughed as she sipped Prosecco. Adrian’s arms slipped around her neck and he planted a kiss on top of her head. She didn’t tell him that she thought he might be right, but she did enjoy the food, laughter and sparkling wine. For the time being, she wasn’t thinking about Esther or Chloe, and that night she’d slept dreamlessly.

  But the next day everything changed. Fran woke, ran, took her coffee into the garden and read for a while. She and Adrian ate breakfast together before he went to their study to read. Fran was about to head into the garden to tend to her herbs when someone knocked at the door.

  Mary and Esther were standing on her doorstep hand in hand. Mary smiled sheepishly. “I’m not bothering you, am I?”

  Fran, taken aback, opened the door and insisted they come in for a cup of tea.

  “We won’t stay long,” Mary said. “I called to give you something.” Mary bit her lip and gestured to the bag slung over her arm. Fran’s eyes followed, curiosity deepening like a well inside her.

  The mother and daughter came into their kit
chen where Fran put the kettle on, all the while a too-wide smile frozen on her face. The kettle made a low rumbling noise as it began to heat.

  “It’s not much,” Mary said. “But I felt bad about you paying for everything at Chatsworth, so I wanted to do something nice for you. Esther, will you give Mrs Cole her present?”

  The little girl had her hair in a ponytail today. Intense blue eyes regarded Fran. She was unsmiling, as always. Her black shoes tapped lightly against the tiles as she stepped forward to hand over the bag.

  “Well, thank you very much, both of you,” Fran said, her voice hushed with emotion.

  “What do you say, Esther?” Mary prompted.

  “Thank you for helping me when I hurt my knee.” Her eyes never dropped to the floor, which was surprising for such a shy child. Fran was used to children playing up their traits, from exaggerated lisps to toes trailing the floor, to mischievous giggles.

  “And how is your knee, Esther?”

  “Fine.”

  “It’s much better now.” Mary smoothed her daughter’s ponytail, letting the golden fibres slip through her cupped hand. “She’s pretty much all fixed up. Now go on and open your present.”

  It was at that moment Adrian walked into the kitchen. Fran noticed that Mary’s eyes dropped to the floor for a moment and her face paled. Esther also looked away.

  “Thought I heard voices,” Adrian said cheerfully. “Let me guess, Mary and Esther? I’ve heard so much about you both.”

  Mary nodded her head. “Nice to meet you.”

  “Mary brought me a present,” Fran said, using a high voice to lighten the mood. She placed the bag on the table and pulled the bundle from the plastic; it was gift-wrapped in brown paper and tied with hessian string.

  “How lovely.” Adrian leaned against the door; his eyes fixed on Mary.

  The kettle boiled, the power flicking off.

  Fran untied the string and allowed the paper to unfold on its own. Inside she found a black polka dot tea dress. When she lifted it to her body, she realised it would be a perfect fit. “Oh, Mary. This is beautiful.”

  The young woman’s face lit up with her smile. “You think so?”

  “Yes, it’s lovely.”

  Adrian stepped forward to finger the fabric. “Gorgeous.”

  “You took the time to make me this?” Fran said, unsteady and overwhelmed by the gesture, a catch in her throat.

  “It was no trouble.”

  “Let me pour you ladies a cuppa while Fran tries it on,” Adrian said.

  “Oh, Mary, this is too much!” Fran couldn’t stop touching the fabric. Its softness against her fingertips. She felt transported to another time, when women cooked and sewed for each other, brought bread to share in times of emergency. She cleared her throat and added, on a whim. “We must do something to reciprocate such a wonderful gift. Why don’t the three of you come to dinner one night?”

  Mary’s eyes widened. “I don’t know… Elijah works late sometimes.”

  Adrian glanced from one woman to the other, his expression unreadable. For a split second, Fran thought he was annoyed.

  “Well,” Fran said, “have a think about it. Speak to Elijah and let us know when you’re available.”

  Mary nodded, then her eyes tentatively lifted up to Adrian, who turned and walked silently out of the room.

  Chapter Twelve

  “What on earth did you do that for?” Adrian was standing next to the sink, wrist deep in soapy water.

  “Sorry,” Fran said. “It just came out.” She was still wearing the handmade polka dot dress, which fit her perfectly, and made her feel younger. It had a full skirt that she could imagine swishing around a dancefloor.

  “I thought you were going to let this go!” He rattled mugs around in the water. The surface sloshed as pottery chimed against the stainless-steel basin.

  “I know. But I just couldn’t help it. She made me this beautiful dress.” Fran laid a hand on his shoulder. “Sorry. I know it’s a hassle for you, but it’d be kind to invite them over. Don’t you think? They don’t know anyone here and all the oldies are gossiping behind their backs. You should hear Emily at choir.”

  “Well, now I’m going to have to cook.” He sighed.

  “You love cooking.”

  “That’s… That’s not the point.”

  “Why?”

  He sighed again. “You do look stunning in that dress.”

  Fran laughed. “Oh, my dear Silver Fox, I believe you’re just as big a softie as I am.”

  His features relaxed into a smile. He stepped towards his wife and wrapped his arms around her waist.

  She leaned in at first, but when his soapy hands threatened to drip onto her new dress, she gently extricated herself from his embrace. “What did you make of them? I want to know. Did you notice how shy they were when you came in the room?”

  He dried his hands and eased himself into a chair. “Yes, I did. Like two startled mice. I can see why you find them interesting, but I still think it’s just a case of youth and a sheltered upbringing.”

  Fran joined her husband at the table. “If they actually come, we’ll get to meet Elijah.” She imagined him to be bearded and rotund. A powerful older man with a hard glint in his eye.

  “She looks younger than twenty-seven,” he said.

  Fran was relieved to hear him engaging, albeit cautiously, in talk about the mother and daughter who had become a large part of her life. “Do you think we would have put Chloe in those cute dresses and plaited her hair?” she mused.

  Adrian was still for a moment. “I think Chloe would have grown up to be the kind of girl to tell us what she wanted to wear.”

  Fran liked that. For the rest of the morning they talked about Chloe for the first time in a while. Not the bad part, but the good. The anticipation. The buying of her onesies, the building of the crib. Later, Fran walked up to the nursery and took a deep breath. There was no crib, no tiny socks, no pretty floral wallpaper or the mobile of farm animals she’d bought from a boutique store. At one point, they’d boxed all of those things up and put them in the attic, wondering if maybe, just maybe, they might come around to an alternative—surrogacy or adoption. They never had. Her hand lightly grazed her stomach as she surveyed the gym equipment and stacks of books.

  Neither of them had known what to do with the room after Chloe had died. Part of Fran wanted to seal it closed, like her insides had been sealed shut. No fruit would be born from those loins. She stepped into the room and took a paperback. It was old, written by a Russian man, the kind of solemn literature that Adrian loved the most. She tucked it under her arm and walked out of the room, pretending that this book was her intention for going there in the first place. Adrian didn’t say a word when he saw his wife reading the book stretched out on the sofa. Fran knew that he knew. Perhaps she’d taken the book to show him that she’d been in there. Perhaps she wanted him to realise what she was doing. She did not know. She sat there and pretended to read while all the time thinking about Esther, and Mary, and Chloe and herself.

  Chapter Thirteen

  It was Saturday evening, with warm weather and a clear sky. At 7:00 p.m., the dusk approached, pouring dark ink over the landscape. Fran had spent the day biting her thumbnail as she and Adrian bickered over how to cook potatoes. Now she opened and shut the oven door, checking on the leg of lamb roasting with rosemary and garlic. Adrian tossed the roasties around in the baking tin, making yummy noises as they bounced against the edges. The kitchen smelled like Sunday afternoons at her mother’s house—boiling hot goose fat and slightly singed garlic. Fran’s mother would whip up a roast dinner in no time, catering for several people, taking on all the work herself and never breaking a sweat. Fran wasn’t like that, she needed Adrian’s guiding hand, especially today. It was his recipe, with garlic cloves tucked into the lamb, and red wine in the sauce. Her help felt like interference.

  She was wearing the tea dress, no tights, no shoes and gold, dangly earrings. She�
�d spotted the line of grey roots as she’d changed, and hastily gave her hair a little volume in the hope no one would notice. As she decanted mint sauce into a serving dish, Adrian massaged her shoulders.

  “They’re going to enjoy it, you know. Relax. Everything is going to be fine.”

  But there were too many thoughts racing through Fran’s mind for her to relax. She almost pushed Adrian away, but had to admit that his fingers kneading her flesh was actually quite pleasant. There was a knock at the door, and she straightened up her spine, whipped the apron from her body—bumping Adrian’s hands away at the same time—and smoothed down her dress.

  Adrian popped a small potato into his mouth. “Game faces on.”

  She flashed him a glare before heading through the house into the hallway. By the time she opened the door, her game face was, indeed, on. She was smiling broadly. “Hi! Come in, make yourself at home.”

  There were handshakes and much bumping of limbs in the narrow corridor. No coats due to the warm weather. Esther mostly remained glued to her mother’s side as Fran showed them through to the lounge. She hadn’t had a chance to get a good look at the father but noticed that he was tall and broad.

  “We brought something. I don’t know if it’s right.” Mary thrust a small parcel into Fran’s hand.

  She peeled away the brown paper to unleash the aroma of freshly baked bread. It was still warm, bouncy, with a nice firm crust. “This looks absolutely delicious. We’ll have it with our dinner. It won’t be long. We just took the roast potatoes out of the oven. Let me put this in the kitchen and I’ll introduce myself properly. We haven’t met yet, Elijah. Thanks for coming.”

  “Thank you for having me.” His voice was warm. He had deep, brown eyes, almost the exact same shade as his pupils. They sat heavily in his round face, large enough to draw a person’s attention. He was fairly pale in complexion, with rosy-pink cheeks like a garden gnome. A full, salt and pepper beard. Greying hair. His build was strong, but stout, with a stomach that poked over khaki trousers. He wore a white shirt open at the neck, the sleeves rolled up to his elbows. His hair had been parted neatly and slicked to one side. Fran took a moment to figure out his age. Around the same age as herself, she thought, practically double Mary’s age. “You have a lovely home.”