Who We Were Before (9 page)

24

EDWARD, SATURDAY, 7 P.M.

I
push through the Saturday night shoppers, feeling like my head has a big neon sign floating above it, pointing to the carrier bag and telling everyone I’ve bought lingerie for someone besides my wife. I shove the bag behind me, feeling idiotic but unable to stop myself. In an odd way, this reminds me of the time Zoe rejected my proposal and I started dating . . . what was her name? Eva. She was beautiful and smart, the same age as me, and according to my friend who’d fixed us up, ‘gagging to get married’. I wanted to move on so much that I rushed into dating someone else, even though I was nowhere near ready.

I sigh, remembering that month away from Zoe and how betrayed I felt, how broken. I’d truly believed she’d marry me – that she’d be my wife, and we’d spend our future together. I walked miles those few weeks, trying to accept that it wasn’t going to happen. That if Zoe didn’t want to get married, then she wasn’t the one for me. All those steps, and I still couldn’t come to terms with it. Watching her grope a random bloke was the last straw.

But this is completely different, I tell myself, spritzing on cologne at the perfume counter. For a start, I’m several years older, and my naive notion of forever has been broken into a million jagged pieces that’ll never fit together again. Spend forever with Zoe? The thought makes me shudder. I’d rather spend forever in an igloo – at least it’d be warmer.

My mobile rings, and I slide it from my pocket. It’s Fiona. God, I can’t wait for her to come.

‘Hi, there,’ I say when I answer. ‘What’s the latest?’

She sighs. ‘It’s looks like we’ll be stuck here for a few hours yet. They’re saying now we can expect to arrive after midnight. So you’d better be awake!’

‘Oh, I’ll be awake, don’t you worry.’ My flirtatious tone surprises me – it’s been a while since I’ve used it. I rarely sleep more than
a few hours at night anyway. I twist and turn, flipping and thumping the pillow, but no matter how hard I try, I can’t get comfortable. It didn’t take long before Zoe suggested I sleep in the guest room, and I was more than happy to oblige. Lying so close beside my silent wife each night made the distance between us seem even further.

Fiona hangs up, and I gaze at the clothes arranged like ornaments on glistening hangers. Might as well get kitted out while I’m here. There are still a few hours to kill, and if I keep busy, keep moving, I won’t have time to look back.

25

ZOE, SEPTEMBER 2010

E
ver since that night at the restaurant, I’ve avoided the South Bank like the plague. I don’t want to see Edward again – it’s too much, especially if he’s with another woman. My heart constricts painfully at the memory of him chatting so easily with his date, of that smile he used to give me. When I managed to unpeel myself from the man on the dance floor, Edward was gone. I staggered back to the table, barely able to breathe. What the hell just happened?

I sank into my chair, and Kate reached across to grip my hand. She didn’t say anything – she’d said it all anyway; what else was there to say? – but poured me more wine, then handed me a tissue as the tears streaked down my cheeks.

That night was a definite low, and for the past few weeks, I’ve either been holed up at work or sitting at home, knitting like a crazy thing to keep my hands and mind busy. There’s a huge pile of socks sitting on the side table, socks I know I’ll never wear but just have to keep making. I guess I’ll donate them to charity or something. Kate’s been trying to get me out to a pub, over for supper,
anything
, but I always turn her down.

The fact that I feel like absolute shit makes it easy to reject anything to do with the outside world, too. People sometimes say if your heart is hurting, your health suffers too. Well, that’s definitely the case here. My stomach churns at just the thought of food, I wake up with blinding headaches, and all I want to do is sleep. I’d see a doctor if I wasn’t so obviously depressed.

I’m about to stitch together yet another pair of socks when the buzzer sounds. My heart jumps that it’s Edward – in my mind, I’ve replayed the scenario where he comes to say forever doesn’t matter and he just wants to be with me so much, it’s practically worn out. But when I hear Kate’s voice, I let out a laugh and shake my head. Of course Edward won’t come round. Why would he, after my little display at the restaurant?

I buzz her up, wondering why she’s here. I certainly haven’t invited her.

‘Christ, you look like shit.’ She hugs me when I open the door, then pushes her way into the flat. ‘Has a yarn bomb exploded in here?’ she asks, surveying the room. ‘Is this what you’ve been doing every night – sitting here in front of the telly making socks? What are you, seventy years old?’

‘Hello to you too, dear friend.’ My tone is snarky, but I can’t help smiling. She’s right: it does look like a yarn bomb exploded.

‘Sit down and let me get you a cup of tea or something.’ She pushes me gently onto the sofa. ‘You’re practically skin and bones! Haven’t you been eating?’

I shake my head. ‘Not much. My stomach’s been acting up a bit. I’m just not hungry.’

‘I think that’s the first time I’ve ever heard you say that!’ Kate laughs, then leans in to study me. ‘You do look kind of pale.’

‘Yeah. I’m just tired all the time, and I keep getting these awful headaches . . .’ Yesterday’s delightful migraine felt like someone jabbing my temples with a pointy instrument of pain.

‘How long has this been going on for?’ Kate calls from the kitchen, where I can hear the kettle whistling as it boils. It’s a comforting noise, and I can’t help closing my eyes and letting myself drift off a bit. God, I am so tired.

‘Zoe!’

I jerk upright at Kate’s voice. Did I actually just fall asleep? I yawn
and rub my eyes. ‘Sorry, what?’

Kate hands me a cup of tea, then moves a ball of yarn off the sofa to sink down beside me. ‘I said, how long has this been going on for?’

‘Um . . .’ I cast my mind back over the past few weeks. It all feels
like a blur, but I don’t think I’ve eaten properly since seeing Edward
that night. ‘I guess about a month. It’s just depression, I’m sure.’

‘Well, it could be, but usually you eat when you’re upset, not the reverse.’

‘True.’ I struggle to sit upright so I don’t fall asleep again, remembering the countless times I’d gorge on chocolate cakes from Iceland or shovel in crisp after crisp, emptying the whole bag in one sitting.

‘Nausea, headaches, fatigue . . .’ Kate pauses.
‘Do you think it could be something else?’

‘The flu?’ I shake my head. ‘Not for this long.’

She stretches out her legs. ‘When’s the last time you had a period?’

I shrug, my mind working. Being with Edward meant I never had to contemplate an accidental pregnancy, to constantly monitor my periods and my body the same way I had with other boyfriends. Worry jangles inside as I realise I haven’t had a period for . . . two months, maybe?

Shit!

‘You don’t think I’m pregnant, do you?’ Even saying the words out loud makes me want to gag. ‘It’s not possible! You know I haven’t shagged anyone since Edward, and it’s not like he knocked me up.’

‘Is there any possibility – even the slightest – his tackle could be functional after all?’

‘His
tackle
?’ I shake my head. ‘I don’t think so, no. I’m sure he
would have told me if there was the slightest chance. I know he really wants kids, and he was afraid I’d take off when he told me he couldn’t have them. Surely if there was a possibility he’d have let me know.’

‘Well, maybe he doesn’t know himself. I mean, stranger things have happened. There was a couple in our antenatal group who were told they’d never have children. And then – hey presto! – she was preggers.’

Horror courses through me. ‘Oh my God.’ Any remaining colour drains from my face.

Kate lays a hand on my arm. ‘I don’t want to scare you, but I do think you should take a test, just to be sure. If you’re not pregnant, then you can put it out of your mind . . . and see a doctor, because something’s not right.’

I feel sick just at the thought of taking a test. Like I said to Edward way back when, I’m not against the idea of children, but I’m nowhere near ready. And certainly not now, without a man even in the picture!

Kate’s shoving on her shoes. ‘I’ll run out and grab one. You sit tight here.’ The door slams, and I hear her feet thumping down the stairs to street level.

I grab my needles and start casting like crazy, as if the faster I knit, the faster I can run away from the situation. The needles move frantically back and forth, back and forth, as my brain whirs. I can’t be a mother – a single mother. I can’t! I can barely take care of myself, let alone a helpless newborn. What would I do about work? Would I have to move back to my parents, do the walk of shame as an unwed mother? I know I’m thirty-one years old, an independent woman, and all that, but where my parents live they might as well be stuck in the nineteen-fifties.

And . . . what about my
life
? My future?

The needles whir faster.
Calm down, calm down.
I take deep breaths. I might not even be pregnant. You can miss a period for any reason, and I’ve certainly been stressed and off-kilter lately. Headaches, tiredness . . . that could be anything.

‘I got the test.’ Kate slams back in with a Boots carrier bag and lobs the box at me. I’m tempted to move aside and let it fall on the floor instead of catching it. ‘Here. Do it now, so you can get it over with.’

My friend knows me well. Left to my own devices, I’d probably stare at it for hours, convincing myself I don’t need to do the test, that everything is all right, and pregnancy is a laughable concept when it comes to my body. But I know I need to bite the bullet.

I haul myself up, clutching the box in one hand, and head for the loo. The pressure on my bladder means I need to pee again anyway, and my heart starts beating fast as I realise I’ve had to pee a lot lately.

Just do this and get it over with, I tell myself, opening up the
box, then the foil, then sliding off the cap. I lower myself onto the
toilet and try my best to pee onto the stick, almost hoping I’m missing my target and putting off the result.

I replace the cap, set the test on the window ledge, then wash
my hands. Seconds tick by and I can’t bear to look. As if in a
trance, my feet carry me back out to where Kate is sitting on the sofa.

‘And?’ she asks, her head snapping up as soon as she hears me enter.

I shake my head. ‘I don’t know. It’s in there.’ I jerk a thumb towards the loo door as if it’s contaminated.

‘Do you want me to go see?’

I nod. ‘Please.’ I don’t know why, but if the news comes from Kate, it will almost feel cushioned . . . filtered through another reality. If the result is positive, of course. While my brain knows it could be negative, my body is telling me a different story.

Kate nods, then strides purposefully into the bathroom. There’s nothing but silence – no sharp intake of breath, no ‘hurrah!’ of relief – and my fingers furiously work a sock as I hear her footsteps come back into the lounge.

She sits down on the sofa beside me, and I tilt my head slowly to meet hers. I can’t make out her expression.

‘Well?’ I ask finally, when I can’t bear it any longer.

She takes my hand, and I know, even before she tells me, what the answer is.

‘I’m pregnant,’ I say, and she squeezes my fingers. ‘I’m going to
kill
Edward.’

26

ZOE, SATURDAY, 7.15 P.M.

M
y feet burn from walking so much. Liquid seeps from broken blisters, where my shoes have rubbed them raw. I’ve only been in Paris a few hours, but it seems like days. I feel . . . I pause, trying to get a grasp on my emotions, and a muttered French curse drifts over my head as the person behind me steps past. I don’t know how I feel, exactly, other than I don’t feel like me. At least, not the ‘me’ who got off the train this morning.

Although the evenings are lengthening with summer approaching, I know it’s only an hour or so until darkness falls. I should be panicking at the possibility of spending the night on the Paris streets alone, but I’m not. Not yet, anyway. I’m suspended between the past and present, not caught in either, and still unable to envision the future.

I felt this way when I was pregnant with Milo, too: incapable of believing I was actually going through with it, knowing my past was behind me now that I was a mum-to-be, yet the future as a mother seemed completely unfathomable. That first pregnancy is a no-man’s land, where you’re neither a person in your own right any more or a mother yet. I wish now I’d enjoyed it more, instead of wishing it away – anxious to finally meet the baby growing inside of me.

I used to laugh when people told me to enjoy the newborn days, the toddlerhood, because ‘they grow up so fast’. Some days – when Milo had colic or screamed like a banshee because he hated his buggy – time seemed to stretch for hours.

But in the end, those people are right. It
does
go fast. And when you only have that child for two years, it seems like the blink of an eye. His little face – the face that was fading slightly, like a photo greying over time – bursts into technicolour. I close my eyes, trying to imprint the sharpness of the image on my brain before I lose it again. For just a second, it feels like he’s right there in front of me. I can almost smell the mix of baby wipes, yeasty bread and earth his body gave off, and the rush of love overwhelms me. Memories whoosh through my mind, from his red-faced newborn days all the way through to his mischievous expression when he grabbed the forbidden TV remote.

It’s hard for me to think now that I almost didn’t have him. That I almost missed out on . . . well, to call it
love
feels trite. It’s more than simple love. It’s a fierce, visceral emotion that resonates from every cell, the feeling that you’d do anything for this tiny being you brought into the world.

Because, I realise, no matter what else happened – how my fairy tale fell apart – I wouldn’t give up having that love for anything. For the first time since Milo’s death, I want to hang on tightly to the memories instead of blanking them out, to remember every minuscule detail of his life. I can take solace in that, I discover. It will never wipe away the blame, but right now, the comfort outweighs the pain.