The Cinderella Reflex (26 page)

She dropped onto the sofa beside him. He moved away a fraction, perched gingerly on the very edge now, bouncing on the balls of his feet, as if he was getting ready to literally run.

Helene felt her stomach give a small, warning flip. But she forced herself to answer.

“There is something actually.” She glanced at him fearfully.

His eyes widened. “No! You’re not – ?”

He left the question hanging between them and in the split-second silence Helene knew everything was about to change.

She swallowed. “I am. I’m –
we’re
– expecting a baby, Richard!”

She scanned his features anxiously, trying to gauge his reaction but now his face was a mask of inscrutability. She forced herself to take deep, calming breaths. She wasn’t going to say another thing until he responded. She didn’t want to put words in his mouth. She had to hear his first, gut reaction. She watched as he tried to digest the information.

“I don’t understand.” He stared at her. “I thought you were on the pill?”

“I was, but … well, sometimes nature makes fools of us all,” she said, quoting her late grandmother’s words of wisdom solemnly.

“What the hell does that mean?” Richard snapped.

“I don’t know! It just sounds … comforting.” She felt like an idiot now for saying it.

“Comforting?” He looked at her incredulously. “This is not something we ever planned for, Helene.”

“No, we didn’t,” she acknowledged. “But is it so bad? I mean – you love kids! Look at how you always put Anna and David first.”

“That’s just it. I did. Still do. But I’m tired, Helene.” He said the word
tired
as if he were halfway up a mountain and had no idea how he was going to get to either the top or the bottom of it.

“We’re all tired, Richard,” she reminded him. “I’ve been working ten-hour days trying to win that ridiculous contest, as well as coping with morning sickness and fainting fits.”

“Helene, I have just finished rearing my family.” He stared into space. “I have been looking forward to having time for
myself
for
so
long
.
This is my chance!”

“Your chance to do what?” she asked, puzzled.

“I’m not sure.” He looked around her living room as if he might find the answer there. “Smell the roses?”

“It’s nappies you’ll be smelling, Richard, not roses,” Helene said bluntly. Then she noticed the horror on his face and added more gently, “It’s a baby, Richard – not a prison sentence.” She gave him a playful slap on the shoulder. “It will help to keep you young.”

He shot her a disbelieving look. “With all due respect, I think I know more about the effects children have on your life than you do, Helene. And keeping you young is not one of them!”

“Well, we’ll deal with it together.” Helene was implacable. “This is not something I can do by myself.”

A tic pulsed at the side of his mouth. “And, eh … are you sure it’s mine?”

“
Excuse me?
” Helene’s voice cracked like a whip into the air. In all the scenarios she had envisaged, when doubts had jostled with hope every time she had tried to predict his reaction, not even the most negative had come close to this.

“It’s just … eh … well, I didn’t think … I mean, I was thinking of having a vasectomy,” he stammered.

“I see,” she said slowly. “And just
thinking
about a vasectomy is a reliable form of birth control now, is it? The scientific and medical world will be thrilled with that breakthrough.”

His eyelids flickered. “Look, I wasn’t going to tell you this until later because I wanted you to enjoy your party. But I think we need to break up for a bit. Until things have settled down …”

Helene felt a peculiar buzzing sensation in her head. “I don’t understand.” She was genuinely puzzled. “How can we break up when I’m pregnant?”

He rubbed his eyes with the heels of his hands. “There’re still a few weeks before everything at Atlantic is legally binding – before I get my money, essentially. But I suspect Jack knows about us. And I can’t risk confirming that for him. He could make things really, really difficult for me. This
baby
thing,” he said this as if he didn’t quite believe it was real, “well, it’s unfortunate timing, I’m afraid.”

“Unfortunate timing? Are you mad? It’s a
baby
!” She searched his face, and saw something unfathomable in his eyes. She felt panic grip her. “I thought you loved me?”

“I did. Do.” He gave a tiny sigh. “But things change, Helene. Circumstances change.”

His eyes were full of misery, but Helene caught the hint of steel in his voice. The buzzing sensation in her head was back. She gripped the edge of the sofa, her fingernails leaving indentations in the soft leather. How did he think he could just waltz away from everything, when the baby they were expecting was already affecting every aspect of her life? She opened her mouth to say as much, but he held up both his hands to stop her.

“I don’t want to do this.” His mouth tightened. “But I don’t see that I have any choice. If you say the baby is mine, I’ll deny it, Helene.”

Helene felt cold. Freezing.

“I think you’d better go.” The words came out of her mouth but they sounded as if someone else had spoken them.

Richard, however, didn’t need to be told twice. He strode towards the hall door.

Then her mood switched again, frightening her with its unpredictability.

“You can’t leave me, Richard!” she wailed after him. “Not tonight. It’s my birthday! People are about to arrive for the party!”

Richard half-turned to look back at her. “It’s not as if anyone ever knew about us,” he pointed out. “So they won’t think it’s odd that I’m not here.”

“They’ll think it’s odd when I have a huge bump in another couple of months and no father for my baby!”

He took a few steps back towards her. “Why don’t we think about this? I mean – you don’t have to have it, do you? I mean, it must be only a few weeks …”

“
It
is a baby, Richard.” Her voice was icy and this time actually felt like her own as another bewildering mood change came over her. “It’s a gift. I actually thought you might have been happy about it. But that was before I realised what a lily-livered wimp you are. So you want to check out as soon as the going gets tough? So go. Do it. Get out now if you’re going.”

She turned away. She wasn’t going to think any more about what he had just suggested. She would just block it out, pretend that he hadn’t. She put her face in her hands and bit hard on her top lip to stop it trembling. She heard the soft click of the hall door.

He’s gone, she thought dully. On the night she told him she was expecting their baby Richard had left her. On the night of her fortieth birthday when people were due to arrive any moment for the celebrations, Richard had come to tell her he wanted a
break
?The tears, which had been threatening all evening, finally started – great shuddering sobs that made her feel as if she might choke. This cannot be happening to me, she told herself. This weeping and babbling was not her! She was a strong person. She struggled to regain control of her emotions but it was useless. Big wails of fear and grief shook her body and she covered her face with her hands, trying to stem the tears. Hormones! It must be the hormones.

She stiffened at the creaking sound of her hall door opening again. She sat up straight, pure relief flooding through her. He was back! Of
course
he was back. She tried to compose herself, wiping her tears, patting her hair. She would find it difficult to forgive him for his initial reaction, of course she would. But, she rationalised, maybe it had been unfair to spring it on him out of the blue like that in the first place. After all, she’d had time to get used to the idea. They would get over this, she promised herself, and their relationship would be the stronger for it in the end. She lifted her tear-stained face to the door, ready to welcome him back into her life.

“I’m a bit early, I’m afraid. The hall door was ajar.” Matt from the Travel Café was standing awkwardly in the hallway, almost invisible behind the giant bouquet of sunflowers he was carrying.

The flowers, with their yellow and black faces reminded Helene of sunshine and hope and optimism and she couldn’t bear it. She burst into a fresh, uncontrollable flood of tears.

To his credit, Matt didn’t waste time asking awkward questions. He took one look at her red-eyed face, her make-up destroyed with tears, and marched into the kitchen where he put his flowers in the sink.

“I’ve obviously come at a bad time,” he said when he came back. “But tell me what I can do to help?”

“Nothing,” she snivelled. “Nothing can help.”

He kneeled down beside her, handing her a paper tissue to wipe her tears.

“I met a guy on the way out – he was practically running down the stairs so he was hard to miss. So is this crisis to do with him? Did you have a row? Or is it worse than that?”

She lifted her head to look at him. “There’s a worse feeling than this?”

“I don’t know what you’re feeling,” he admitted. “I hardly know you. But –” He stopped, suddenly awkward, as if he wasn’t sure if he should go on – but then he continued, “It
will
get better. It always does.”

Helene was about to launch into a tirade about how exactly he could know that when she stopped. Something about the expression on his face, the guarded look in his eyes made her realise.
He’s been heretoo.
So Matt hadn’t landed back in Killty just because he’d got fed up with travelling the world or because he missed his folk. Something else had made him run for home. Something hard and heart-breaking.

Her anger subsided and she looked about her helplessly. “I could do with some help,” she admitted. “There are people due to arrive any minute, and and …”

He took charge before she could break into a fresh outbreak of sobbing. “So here’s what you can do. You can stick a note on the door cancelling the party, citing an outbreak of a disease so contagious that nobody will bother to knock on the door to ask any questions.”

Despite her grief, her mouth curved upwards. “Or?”

“Or you can put on a psychological mask when you’re repairing your make-up. Psych yourself up to get through tonight and deal with everything else tomorrow.” He glanced towards the hallway. “The choice is yours, but you’re going to have to make your mind up quickly. The invite said for eight sharp.”

Helene breathed in deeply. It would be difficult to explain away the contagious disease story, tempting as it was. And if she were going to survive as a single mother, faking happiness at a birthday party would probably be the least of the challenges ahead of her.

“I’ll go for the mask,” she said, sitting up straight. “Most of the people coming are from work and –”

“No need to explain. Decision made.” Matt offered his hand and helped her to her feet. “Now go and repair the damage.” He traced a finger along the side of her face where her mascara was mingled with tears.

Helene could hear her guests arriving as she scrubbed her face clean and started over with the face-painting. She brushed her hair, sprayed on more scent and gave herself a good talking-to in the mirror while she worked.
You can do this. Just put Richard out of your mind. Pretend none of it happened. You can sort it all out tomorrow.

By the time she arrived back out to the living room, nobody would have guessed what a snivelling wreck she had been reduced to earlier on. She played her part like a pro and, with the help of Matt, the near stranger with a kind heart who had come into her life just when she needed him, her party went ahead.

Matt took on his self-appointed role of host for the evening with panache, filling people’s glasses, dealing with the caterers when they arrived, even arranging an impromptu karaoke competition when everyone had a few drinks on them.

Everyone came from work. Even Ollie turned up for an hour. Helene watched the celebrations as if she were behind a glass screen. A deep sense of shock enveloped her in a protective shield and she was surprised to find it was quite easy to get through the evening. She watched vaguely as Sara and Andrea sang completely out of tune,and wondered in a detached sort of way how the hell her life had arrived at this point with so little warning?

The one concession she allowed herself was that the party should finish early. Again, Matt rose to the occasion and managed to get the last person out of the apartment just after midnight.

“Will you be okay?” he asked when there were just the two of them left.

“Absolutely,” Helene reassured him.

He seemed reluctant to leave but she was adamant she wanted to be alone.

As soon as she closed the hall-door on him she walked into her bedroom and stuffed a change of clothes into her overnight bag. Earlier in the evening, she had slipped away from the celebrations and quietly booked herself into a nearby hotel. She couldn’t bear to stay here on her own tonight.

When she was leaving, she noticed a white envelope lying on the hall table, wrapped up with a thin silver ribbon tied in a bow. She picked it up and looked at Richard’s familiar handwriting.
To Helene, Happy Birthday.
She smiled sadly. He would have written this earlier, before she told him about the baby, before he’d told her he’d come to break up with her. Another lifetime ago, before her world had tilted on its axis. She slid it unopened into her bag.

She looked back at the debris of the party – the empty bottles and uneaten cake and the fortieth birthday balloon already deflating in the corner. She stood there for a few seconds, trying to fix the image of her guests enjoying themselves in her head. But all she could see was the earlier ugly scene between her and Richard.

She gave a tiny sigh and opened the hall door. The party planners were coming in the morning to clear up. By the time she arrived home from work tomorrow, all evidence of tonight would be erased from her home. Which was now exactly the way Helene wanted it.

Chapter Eighteen