The Good Mother (22 page)

But then, with a flash of remembrance, I see hospital gowns. I see male patients groping me. I see nurses patronising me. I feel the horrible powerlessness of being unable to make myself understood through layers of medication and prejudice. The inability to discharge myself. When I finally was let out, rushing back to Craig as if he was somehow a pillar of strength in my life, even though he instigated me going there. Because I was so shattered by that place, on top of everything else, that I had no alternative to cling to what I knew.

No. No. I’m not going back to that. Maybe it was fifteen years ago, but nothing moves on that much.

I must just stay here. I must stay here and I must try to get back my daughter. My actual daughter. My Cara. I must remember her as she was when she was eight.

There’s only one thing for it.

I stand up.

‘I’d like to go back to my room now, Paul.’

‘What?’ he asks, clearly alarmed.

‘I need to go back to my room. Where you were keeping me. I need to be with my Cara. My real Cara.’

Chapter 57

Alice

‘We should have done this a long time ago, Alice,’ says Alice’s mum. ‘I’m sorry.’

They’re standing, the three of them – Alice, her mum and her dad – in front of Cara’s grave. Hand in hand. Each of them looks at the granite headstone. The dates between birth and death so short. ‘C A R A’ chiselled in spooky but solid white. ‘A daughter, much loved’. Roses, withered. A card: Dad.

Alice wonders which dad. At home dad, or meeting in strange cafés dad. Mr Belvoir dad. Either way, it looks like they can’t be bothered to visit too often.

Her parents didn’t let her go to the funeral. They said it would upset her too much. She knew which day it was on, and sat in her room wearing black and wanting to be with Cara. Alice looks at the grave now. She no longer wants to be with Cara. Not there. Not now. It’s too final. Not like the happy times in school corridors or each other’s bedroom. Alice had thought for a while that heaven might be like that, full of whispers and giggles. But this grave doesn’t show any sign of it. It doesn’t show anything of her Cara at all.

If only Cara hadn’t agreed to go on that car journey to see her ‘real’ dad. And made Alice an accomplice. If only Cara hadn’t felt the need to hide from her mum that she knew her dad wasn’t her real dad, and that she was visiting the real one. Or maybe if only she’d lived with her real dad the whole time. Because what her fake dad had done was horrible. So horrible. Alice thinks back to when Mr Belvoir/ aka real dad had first told her what he suspected, that time in his car. When he made Alice show him where Cara lived. Alice had such shivers and chills. The idea that someone would lock up their own wife in their own house, when their daughter had just been killed in a car crash! How could people do that to each other? Maybe it was a good job Cara was dead, if her fake dad was so crazy. Was Cara’s mum still there, locked up, or had Mr Belvoir managed to set her free? Maybe she should try again – not just ringing the doorbell and running away.

Alice’s dad squeezes her hand. She looks up. Maybe she doesn’t need to do anything. It will all work itself out, without her. Even though she’s nine next birthday, there’s a limit to how much she can do. It’ll be different when she’s ten. When you’re ten, you’re practically a grown-up.

Poor Cara, to miss out on that.

For now, the adults will have to sort themselves out. But there’s still one more thing for Alice to do. She breaks her handhold with her parents and puts a hand in her pocket. She pulls out a friendship bracelet. Pink and purple. Cara’s favourite colours. Solemnly, Alice advances to the grave and places the bracelet down in front of it.

I didn’t betray you, Cara, she think-whispers to the gravestone. I’ve helped. I helped Mr Belvoir. I told him what I knew. I told him where you lived. Where your daddy – or fake daddy – lived. And now your mummy will be safe. All will be well again. You can rest in peace.

Chapter 58

Paul

I don’t know what to do.

She just stays in the room.

The door isn’t locked, but she just sits there, on the edge of the bed, one hand pressed against her forehead.

I try to go divert her, go in and keep her company. Tell her stupid anecdotes. Remind her of when we first met. Sing. Cry. Shout. But she either ignores me, or just fires out random questions:

‘Did she have pigtails?’

‘Did she prefer maths or English?’

‘What was her favourite colour?’

‘How many of her milk teeth had she lost?’

‘What was her favourite bedtime story?’

‘We’d shown her ‘Pinocchio’, hadn’t we? I love ‘Pinocchio’. With that little cat, whatever it’s called. But oh, the wooden boy, not a real boy …’

Then tears. Always tears.

I’m questioning now, really questioning, whether I’ve done the right thing. Because drugs alone, they can’t handle this, can they? She needs proper medical and psychiatric help. Help that I can’t provide. Five times a day, I’m this close to calling an ambulance, or a mental health services team. I’ve Googled ‘depression’ and ‘psychosis’ and ‘when does it end’ and ‘what the fuck should I do’ innumerable times. Seek help, it tells me. And then my search engine advertises self-help books down the side of the page.

She takes food, thank God. I’m still making up the two sets of trays, one for her, one for me. Doesn’t look at the food – I could feed her a processed Mr Kipling cake and she wouldn’t blanch. Takes the pills too. Possibly even sleeps – hard to tell, with her hand shielding her eyes all the time.

But, what’s worse is, I can’t answer all her questions. I only came on the scene when Cara was four. I don’t know about ‘Pinocchio’. I don’t know whether she had a red phase before the purple one. I don’t know whether she’d ever been to London Zoo. All I know is that Suze is in agony.

Standing in the doorway biting my nails isn’t going to help. But what will? If I hadn’t already punched the bathroom mirror in frustration what seems like weeks ago, reduced it to bloody shards, I’d do it now. Even if it meant Suze calling me a child-murderer again. Christ, that accusation hurt. Much more than the glass cutting my fist. Our perfect mirror picture future shattered just as the mist was starting to clear. But the mirror was a better target for the punch than Suze would have been. Bad enough I locked her up so roughly afterwards. Please forgive me, for whatever wrong you think I may have done.

Wait, Suze is standing up! What’s this? She’s pushing the chair to the window. I rush to help her, or restrain her, whatever seems more appropriate. But she doesn’t seem to need me. She’s standing on the chair, looking out.

‘What’s up?’ I ask her.

‘Just checking,’ she says.

I’ve no idea what she’s checking.

‘Anything I can help with?’ I ask.

She looks at me directly, for the first time since I showed her the newspapers. Well, some of the newspapers anyway. Not the one with that accusation in it.

Suze seems to be considering her answer.

‘Can you see her?’ she asks, gesturing for me to stand on the chair.

I stand on the chair and look out. There’s a little girl skipping.

‘Yes,’ I say.

Suze exhales and closes her eyes. ‘Good,’ she says. ‘Just checking.’

Then she sits down on the bed again.

Did she think she had made up the girl? That she was Cara’s ghost? I have no idea. But my answer seems to have cheered her up because she’s not holding her head any more.

Oh, but less good – she’s crying again.

I can’t take much more of this. I throw myself at her feet. ‘What can I do, Suze? Let me help.’

She nods, rubbing away tears. ‘OK. OK. I thought I could do it all in here.’ She taps her head. ‘But I’m going to need external stimuli. Her clothes. Her toys. Her books. Her flute. Photos, little scraps of papers, mementos. Everything. Anything.’

I don’t say anything. How can I? She continues, maybe thinking she needs to explain.

‘I made up a new foreground. A teenage foreground. All her real life faded into the background. I need to bring it out again. Wherever you’ve packaged it up, can you get it for me?’

She looks me in the eyes.

I avert my gaze.

‘The thing is, Suze …’

‘What? What now?’

How can I admit this? How can I hurt her more? How do I tell her I gave every last thing her daughter had to Craig sodding Belvoir in exchange for his silence? That he took away all of Cara’s belongings in that car of his, a long with the cash, the cash that would have been Cara’s inheritance, our old-age security, in exchange for letting me keep my Suze secret. In exchange for him staying away from her – he knows the pain he would cause, for her, and for me. For not trying to expose me. He didn’t need Cara’s things. He didn’t care about Cara. He just wanted to screw me over. Hurt me. Because that’s what he does to people.

I can’t do it. I can’t tell her what Craig has taken. It will destroy her. And she’ll hate me. She’ll hate me for ever. So I’m going to have to call Craig. Explain. Beg.

‘Sure,’ I say. ‘If that’s what you need.’

She nods then goes back into herself.

I slip out into the corridor and take out my mobile. I press Craig’s number. Let’s hope to God he’ll agree. And hold his tongue. About Suze. And about the other thing.

Chapter 59

Suze

He’s given me access to my clothes again. Which is good of him. He suggested I might want to come back into ‘our’ bedroom and look in the wardrobe. But I don’t. It’s too full. And Cara’s room is too empty. My new room, the beige room, the spare room, is just right for now. I still can’t believe I lived – was trapped – in this room not knowing it was a room in my house; or that it is in fact a room that I furnished. Did I suggest the dreaded potpourri? That terribly dated armchair? I’d ask Paul if there wasn’t already so much else to ask him.

He tells me he’s getting Cara’s things from where they’re stored. Says it was too painful for him to keep them in the house. A courier is going to bring them round in a bit. I’m ready, dressed for the occasion. A full skirt, in purple, because Paul says that’s the colour she liked best by the end. And I’m wearing a yellow sleeveless shirt decorated with pink cupcakes. I look presentable. As if I’m meeting Cara herself rather than …

I still can’t bear it.

Perhaps if I had another child, it would be better. A ‘spare’ for times like this. One of my clients told me once that was why her belly was protruding for a second time.

Perhaps if Belle had lived.

But there’s always just been Cara. Really. She always seemed to be enough, once I had her. She seemed – seems – to be everything.

I stare at the ground. My feet, I notice, are not what the outfit requires. Colourless. I have no shoes on, and my toenails are au naturel. If Cara was fifteen again, alive again, we could have had a girly afternoon painting each other’s toenails. Because that’s what some mothers and daughters do, right, in the teenage years? Cara wouldn’t have been the moody type to storm off to her room, or hide inside earphones at family gatherings. I know that. But even if she was, I would take that. I would take a thousand days of silence over this lifetime of it.

Close my eyes. Try to stop imagining small hands painting my toenails. Aquamarine, purple, pink. I’d let her choose. Open my eyes again. Paul is there, lurking by the open door, fiddling with his phone.

‘Any update?’ I ask.

He nods. ‘The courier’s on his way.’

‘Good.’ I nod too.

‘Cup of coffee?’ he asks me.

I shake my head. I don’t know why. Coffee would be good. Pick me up. Restore me.

‘I’ll put the kettle on anyway,’ he says.

He knows me well, then, Paul. I watch him as he leaves the doorway and heads off towards the kitchen. I should follow him. He’s being good to me. Protecting me, cushioning me. Somehow normalising what is happening to me. Many husbands would throw their hands up in horror, take me off to some institute and leave me there. Visit diligently, of course, talk at great speed about nothing, after I answer silently the question of how I am. Then delightedly resume their daily lives when free of seeing my captivity.

Not that I’m bitter, Craig.

I plant my feet more firmly on the floor. Maybe there are some slippers somewhere I can use to cover these toenails that are now haunting me. I’d put on socks, but that would be so wrong with a skirt that I’d know why I was wearing them and I’d see my naked toenails straight through them. Grief giving me X-ray vision.

When I get to the kitchen, Paul isn’t making coffee. He’s talking on his phone, his back to me.

‘Just stay across the road,’ he’s saying. He sounds angry. Then he must sense my presence because he turns round. And hangs up the phone.

‘Everything OK?’ I ask him.

‘Fine.’ He nods. ‘The courier is just being a nuisance. Says he’s going to drive off. I’d better go out and meet him. Why don’t you back to your room and I’ll bring the coffee and Cara’s things through?’

I nod and I turn in the direction of my new room. But I’ll be missing something if I go. The journey of Cara’s things back to us. It’s like an after-life voyage. I want to see the means of transit. Paul can’t shelter me from everything. So, when Paul goes to the door, I’m hidden behind a pillar that separates the kitchen from the hall. I expect to have a clear view of the doorway.

What I don’t expect is to see Craig there when Paul opens the door.

And nor, I think, does Paul. Because he immediately hisses, ‘I told you to stay across the road!’ and steps outside, putting his hand round to pull the door shut behind him.

But before he can do so, he sees me.

Paul freezes. His face goes pale and his mouth gapes.

Craig, the ex-husband who I hate. Who Paul knows I hate. He’s the ‘courier’? Why does he have Cara’s things? I know he is Cara’s father but why would Paul give them to him? Why be so generous to Craig, so callous to us? Craig hasn’t seen Cara since she was one. When he left, because it was all too difficult. For him. Not enough to have me committed all the years before. Had to leave me alone with our baby too, just when I was beginning to rebuild myself (baby steps).