like a question. And then she hears Candy’s hesitant voice, for the fourth time today. ‘Hello, Chinue, love. It’s Mum. Are you there?’
Olivia pushes the washing-machine door to, programmes a light wash and then leans against it, staring out of the utility room window which, she notes with a sigh, needs cleaning both inside and out. She knows she’s been moody and uncommunicative with the girls again today and feels vaguely guilty, but the truth is she can’t help herself.
She looks at her hands, which still have a slight tremor. Her jaw is aching from clenching her teeth. She’s seething. She seethed silently all night and all day and the churning hasn’t abated, not even a drop.
‘The bastard, the absolute bastard.’ The sheer anger and frustration brings tears to her eyes while his words repeat in a galling loop in her head. She marches into the kitchen and puts on the kettle before collapsing on to a chair. ‘Fuck you, Mike,’ she says out loud.
She considers phoning her sister, regaling her with last night’s conversation word for word. But she knows what her sister will say. ‘Come on, Olivia. He’s only human. Everything’s fine now you know he’s not having an affair with his tarty secretary or anyone else. I told you so.’
Her sister likes Mike. Everybody likes bloody Mike. But not everyone agreed to bear him another child. She really didn’t want a third child but she did it for him. She went through yet another amniocentesis to check for Down’s Syndrome and then experienced the worst of her pregnancies with horrendous sickness and overwhelming tiredness while having to care for two other young demanding children. It was she who gave birth to a dead baby; it was she who felt the pain and the fear, the impotence, the failure.
‘Fuck you, Mike!’ she declares again. And then, ‘God, what a cow’ as she leans down to pick up a piece of ceramic she’s missed from the floor. She looks at Hannah’s empty seat and feels another wave of emotion. Hannah is only five, accidents are bound to happen and it’s only a broken cereal bowl. How she wishes she hadn’t shouted quite so loudly and for quite so long. Hannah cried so much at school that the teacher had to peel her away from Olivia’s arms. Then she walked away swiftly, down the long corridor, past all the happy pictures and paintings and books, fearful that the teacher would call her back and suggest she take Hannah home.
Olivia sighs loudly. An awful mother and murderous to boot. Focusing on Hannah, her anger recedes for a spell. She’ll make it up to her after school, she thinks, her mind racing with ideas. She’ll make her a cake or buy her a treat and say sorry. She’ll try to be patient, she’ll try to be kind.
Lifting her head, she glances at the clock to check the time, but her eyes catch the wedding portrait of her and Mike hanging against the dark red wallpaper in the hall, still not replaced from when they moved in nine years ago. That couple was happy, she thinks, look how they laughed.
Stepping forward, she studies the photograph. She hasn’t looked at it, really looked at it, for a long time and yet she walks past it maybe twelve times a day. Perhaps that’s what’s happened to their marriage, she thinks, perhaps they’ve grown so used to each other that they just walk past without seeing.
She gazes at Mike’s striking face in the photograph. She can see no resemblance between him and the man who said those hurtful words about the miscarriage to her last night, even though they look much the same. The person in the photograph was fun, he was open and loving, a man who wore his heart on his sleeve. Not a man given to irrational deep thought.
Olivia shakes her head as the anger resurfaces. The bastard implied she was somehow responsible for the miscarriage, for the death of their son. She still can’t believe it; it was an unforgivable thing to say, but an even worse thing to actually believe.
Antonia looks at her watch and continues her pacing from the lofty hallway, around the staircase to the lounge. She feels guilty. Hot and guilty. She’s aware that it’s a terrible betrayal, but she can’t help herself. She’s spent half an hour reapplying her make-up and has changed her clothes twice. It’s ridiculous, she knows, but she’s nervous, more nervous than she ever expected. She catches her face in the hall mirror and somebody else stares back with long, straight, dark hair looking polished, calm and relaxed.
It’s not as though I don’t know him, she thinks. It’s me who instigated it and now I must see it through with no regrets.
She glances at her watch one more time, the white-gold strap bright against her honey-coloured skin. He’ll be here any minute and it wouldn’t do to be waiting at the door. She walks into the silent lounge and puts on an Adele CD for company. Standing for a moment, she listens, but even Adele’s intoxicating voice doesn’t seem right, so she turns it off and plumps up the sofa cushions yet again.
The doorbell is shrill in the silence. Antonia stands up, touches her hair and then takes a deep breath. Then she walks to the front door, straightens her shoulders and opens it.
‘Hello, Sami,’ she says.
Olivia is running late as she leaves her untidy house to collect Hannah from school. The afternoon has flown by as it always does and she feels hot as she searches for her keys, but the cold air swipes her cheeks at the door, so she turns back to fetch her coat. It’s only then that she stops to study the wedding photograph again. She doesn’t look at the man this time, but at the girl. She has pale hair and pastel eyes but a bright, confident smile. She holds a single bunch of yellow roses and her dress is traditional but plain. There are no feathers or frills in her hair. This isn’t a girl who needs chocolates or flowers to tell her she is loved. This isn’t a girl who craves flattery or attention to give her self-worth. This is a girl who’s said ‘for better or for worse’ and who means it.
‘Here’s the post for signing, Mike,’ Judith says as she neatens a letter escaping from the tidy rectangle of her long day’s endeavours.
Mike looks up at her and nods, then drops his head again, continuing to punch numbers into a calculator, which spews out digits on a tiny receipt. She turns away towards the filing cabinet, feeling contemplative. The filing is up to date, but she hovers for a moment, busying herself by opening cabinet drawers, tidying the hanging baskets and closing them again. Mike hasn’t said much to her at all today. He looks tired and unhappy, and she wonders how the flowers fared last night. Pretty badly, by the looks of it, she concludes.
She casts a final glance at Mike and notes that his frown line seems more pronounced than usual. It is, she reflects, the one slight imperfection in an otherwise perfect face.
She has her hand on the handle when he abruptly speaks. ‘Who’s the father of your baby, Jude?’ he asks.
Judith turns, blurting out a laugh of surprise. It’s the first time in all the years she’s known him that he’s asked such a personal question. ‘Bloody hell, Mike. Am I dreaming or did you really ask me that?’
He drops his intense gaze and picks up a pen. ‘Sorry,’ he says. ‘None of my business.’
Judith studies his slightly flushed face. There’s something vulnerable about him, she thinks, like a little lost boy who needs a big cuddle from the wicked witch or the snow queen, to be led by the hand into the land of temptation … he just doesn’t know it.
She toys with the idea of teasing him, perhaps asking if he realises his question is tantamount to sexual harassment, or something similar, but he looked so sincere
