The Wrong Mother (29 page)

‘It’s okay.’ He helps me to my feet, supports me when he sees that I’m about to fall. ‘Nick picked them up from nursery. They’re fine.’

I gulp the water. It’s gone too quickly. I’m still thirsty. ‘You . . .’
He spoke to Nick.
I close my eyes, see bursts of light that are quickly swallowed by blackness. ‘Who are you?’ I feel as if everything that’s precious to me is slipping away. I can’t let it go.

‘You need to lie down,’ he says. ‘We’ll talk later.’ He picks me up, carries me towards the bench.

‘I need to phone Nick,’ I say. ‘My head’s pounding. I need something to eat.’

‘I’ll bring you some food. And a pillow too—that’ll make you more comfortable.’ He makes a strange noise, as if he’s choking. ‘Sally, how did you get in such a state? What happened to your face? What’s . . . do you know what’s wrong with you?’

‘Who are you?’ I ask again, terrified because I can’t answer his question. I have no idea why I feel so bad, so weak. ‘Bring me my phone. Now,’ I say as firmly as I can.

‘You need to rest . . .’

‘I need to speak to my family!’ Adrenalin sets my brain spinning. ‘Who are you? Tell me! Did you leave a dead cat by my car?’

‘Did I
what
? You’re not making sense. Lie down. Take deep breaths.’

It’s easy to let myself fall back. For once, the deep breaths seem to work. I feel more solid, more aware. Aware that I’m starving. I’ve got to get something inside my stomach soon or my brain will shut down completely.

‘Lucy and Geraldine Bretherick,’ I whisper. ‘Dead.’

‘I know,’ he says.

‘You’re not Mark.’

‘No.’

I open my eyes, but he is looking away. Embarrassed.

‘You lied.’

He sighs. ‘Sally, you’re not strong enough to have this conversation now. Let me get you some food. Just lie here and rest, okay?’

‘I need to talk to Nick.’

‘After you’ve eaten.’

‘No, I . . .’ I try to sit up and nearly fall off the bench. He is walking towards the door, and has to run to catch me. My eyes are heavy and sore; I need to close them. I think a question in my mind:
Are you sure Nick said the children were all right?
I’ve used up my capacity for movement and speech. I’m being pulled away from myself. I struggle to stay in the room with the man who told me he was Mark Bretherick, but I’m too slow. My resistance breaks up, fades and flattens into calm.

From far away, I hear his voice. Soothing, like notes in a piece of music. ‘Do you remember what you said to me at Seddon Hall? You were talking about how drained and used up you felt at the end of every day, days spent struggling to attend to your family’s needs at the same time as giving a hundred and fifty per cent to your work, racing round like a maniac trying to pack it all in. Do you remember? And you said—it stuck in my mind—you said the hardest thing is being so exhausted you could collapse and at the same time having to pretend you’re not tired at all. Having to pretend you’re fine and cheerful and full of energy so that Nick doesn’t give you a hard time.’

Did I tell him that? It’s something I would normally only confide in my women friends, the ones with children. But it’s true. I want to explain, but my voice won’t start. Nick would worry if he knew how difficult I find my life, only because he cares about me. ‘Why don’t you go part-time?’ he would say. ‘Three days a week, or, even better, two.’ He said that once after Zoe was born, before I’d learned I had to pretend to be zinging with energy right up until bedtime and, more often than not, after bedtime as well. ‘I could cut down my hours too,’ he added hopefully. ‘We could both spend more time at home, relaxing as a family.’ I said no, refused even to discuss it because that would have meant telling the truth: I love my work too much. I don’t want to do even a tiny bit less, even if carrying on the way I am means I’ll wear myself down until there’s nothing left of me. I’ll take the chance. And the idea of Nick cutting down his hours and his salary in order to relax more sent chills down my spine.

‘Your body is telling you you’re not ready to go home,’ the voice continues softly. ‘Listen to it. Remember what you said, about the hardest part of going home after a work trip?’

But I haven’t been on a work trip.
My mouth still won’t work. I can’t argue.

‘You’re ready to drop; all you want to do is walk through the front door, go straight to bed and stay there for twenty-four hours. But Zoe and Jake have missed you, and Nick has been on duty alone in your absence, so you have to take over. You have to spring into action like an entertainer at a children’s party, and Nick has to be allowed to have the rest of the day off, cycling, or meeting his mates at the pub. And because you feel guilty, because you often go away overnight and Nick never does, you put a brave face on it. You dread going home after every trip because you know you’re going to have to do even more work than usual to make up for the inconvenience of your having been away—as if you owe the family that extra effort, like some sort of penance.’

Is he still in the room? He’s saying words, but they are my words. They’re what I say when I’m at my lowest ebb. Not what I really think, not how I truly feel.
No. It’s not like that. Stop.

‘I asked you why you didn’t say something to Nick. Remember? You said he wouldn’t understand. He genuinely believes he does his fair share. That’s because he doesn’t see all the other things that need to be done, the things that you take care of so that he never even notices them; they’re invisible to him.’

I try to think about this, but my mind feels as if it has been wrapped in tight material.

‘You take turns to get up with the kids at the weekend, but you’d almost rather get up early on Saturday and Sunday,’ says the voice. My words, his voice.
He remembers every word I said.
‘You don’t enjoy your lie-ins. Nick enjoys his; when it’s your turn to do the early shift, he gets up at ten to find the house immaculate, the children dressed, fed and playing happily—teeth and hair brushed—and you still in your dressing gown, hungry, just starting to think about the possibility of getting some breakfast or a coffee for yourself.’

‘I remember something else you said at Seddon Hall.’ The man’s voice cuts into my thoughts. Now I know he’s still there. Through the fug, my brain jolts. What has he been saying? Bad things about Nick. I can’t trust him.
Has he drugged me? Is that why I feel like this?
‘You said you’d never regret lying, never regret our week together. You said, “If you see that no one else is going to look after you, you have to look after yourself.” ’

His words drop into the narrow tunnel inside my head, which soon closes into blackness.

When I wake up, he’s gone. I look at my watch. It’s quarter to four in the morning. I have a bad stomach ache and I’m horribly frightened and confused, but I can move more easily than before. I jump down from the bench and hear a clink, the sound of metal rattling. What is this thing I’ve been lying on? It has one wide silver leg, in the middle, with a round base. Wheels. I remember seeing but not registering it when I was lying on the carpet before. I bend and look again, to check my memory isn’t playing tricks on me. It isn’t. I hear another hard, metallic noise, quieter than the first.

I pull away one of the towels, then another, and stare at the beige leather I’ve uncovered. I frown, trying to pin down a memory. A doctor’s examination table? Then my breath catches in my throat and I push away all the other towels at once. They fall in a heap on the floor. Something protrudes from one end of the long, thin leather table: a large horizontal loop, like a rigid noose, covered in the same beige leather. I knew it would be there. Still, my gut lurches.

If I didn’t know what this was, the noose shape would terrify me. Recognition does nothing to lessen my fear. Because this thing shouldn’t be here. It doesn’t belong here; there’s something horribly wrong. It’s a massage table like the ones at Seddon Hall, the ones I lay on for the three or four massages I had during the week I spent with Mark.

I turn, run for the door, knowing that this time no offers of food and rest will stop me from leaving. Nothing will stop me from getting back to my home, Nick and the children.

Except that something does, and the wild scream that erupts from my throat when I remember the second metallic click, the sound I thought came from the bench—from the table—does nothing to alter the stark fact: the door is locked.