ANNA
Saturday, 20 July 2013
Morning
EVIE WAKES JUST before six. I get out of bed, slip into the nursery and pick her
up. I feed her and take her back to bed with me.
When I wake again, Tom’s not at my side, but I can hear his footfalls on the
stairs. He’s singing, low and tuneless, Happy birthday to you, happy birthday to
you … I hadn’t even thought about it earlier, I’d completely forgotten; I didn’t
think of anything but fetching my little girl and getting back to bed. Now I’m
giggling before I’m even properly awake. I open my eyes and Evie’s smiling too,
and when I look up, Tom’s standing at the foot of the bed, holding a tray. He’s
wearing my Orla Kiely apron and nothing else.
‘Breakfast in bed, birthday girl,’ he says. He places the tray at the end of the
bed and scoots round to kiss me.
I open my presents. I have a pretty silver bracelet with onyx inlay from Evie,
and a black silk teddy and matching knickers from Tom, and I can’t stop smiling.
He climbs back into bed and we lie with Evie between us. She has her fingers
curled tightly around his forefinger and I have hold of her perfect pink foot, and
I feel as though fireworks are going off in my chest. It’s impossible, this much
love.
A while later, when Evie gets bored of lying there, I get her up and we go
downstairs and leave Tom to snooze. He deserves it. I potter round, tidying up a
bit. I drink my coffee outside on the patio, watching the half-empty trains rattle
past, and think about lunch. It’s hot – too hot for a roast, but I’ll do one anyway,
because Tom loves roast beef, and we can have ice cream afterwards to cool us
down. I just need to pop out to get that Merlot he likes, so I get Evie ready, strap
her in the buggy and we stroll down to the shops.
Everyone told me I was insane to agree to move into Tom’s house. But then
everyone thought I was insane to get involved with a married man, let alone a
married man whose wife was highly unstable, and I’ve proved them wrong on
that one. No matter how much trouble she causes, Tom and Evie are worth it.
But they were right about the house. On days like today, with the sun shining,
when you walk down our little street – tree-lined and tidy, not quite a cul-de-sac,
but with the same sense of community – it could be perfect. Its pavements are
busy with mothers just like me, with dogs on leads and toddlers on scooters. It
could be ideal. It could be, if you weren’t able to hear the screeching brakes of
the trains. It could be, so long as you didn’t turn around and look back down
towards number fifteen.
When I get back, Tom is sitting at the dining-room table looking at something
on the computer. He’s wearing shorts but no shirt; I can see the muscles moving
under his skin when he moves. It still gives me butterflies to look at him. I say
hello, but he’s in a world of his own and when I run my fingertips over his
shoulder he jumps. The laptop snaps shut.
‘Hey,’ he says, getting to his feet. He’s smiling but he looks tired, worried. He
takes Evie from me without looking me in the eye.
‘What?’ I ask. ‘What is it?’
‘Nothing,’ he says, and he turns away towards the window, bouncing Evie on
his hip.
‘Tom, what?’
‘It’s nothing.’ He turns back and gives me a look and I know what he’s going
to say before he says it. ‘Rachel. Another email.’ He shakes his head and he
looks so wounded, so upset, and I hate it, I can’t bear it. Sometimes I want to kill
that woman. ‘What’s she said?’
He just shakes his head again. ‘It doesn’t matter. It’s just … the usual.
Bullshit.’
‘I’m sorry,’ I say, and I don’t ask what bullshit exactly, because I know he
won’t want to tell me. He hates upsetting me with this stuff.
‘It’s OK. It’s nothing. Just the usual pissed nonsense.’
‘God, is she ever going to go away? Is she ever going to just let us be happy?
He comes over to me and, with our daughter between us, kisses me. ‘We are
happy,’ he says. ‘We are.’
Evening
We are happy. We had lunch and lay out on the lawn, and then when it got too
hot we came inside and ate ice cream while Tom watched the Grand Prix. Evie
and I made playdough, and she ate quite a bit of that, too. I think about what’s
going on down the road and I think about how lucky I am, how I got everything
that I wanted. When I look at Tom, I thank God that he found me, too, that I was
there to rescue him from that woman. She’d have driven him mad in the end, I
really think that – she’d have ground him down, she’d have made him into
something he’s not.
Tom’s taken Evie upstairs to give her a bath. I can hear her squealing with
delight from here and I’m smiling again – the smile has barely fallen from my
lips all day. I do the washing-up, tidy up the living room, think about dinner.
Something light. It’s funny, because a few years ago I would have hated the idea
of staying in and cooking on my birthday, but now it’s perfect, it’s the way it
should be. Just the three of us.
I pick up Evie’s toys, scattered around the living-room floor, and return them
to their trunk. I’m looking forward to putting her down early tonight, to slipping
into that teddy Tom bought me. It won’t be dark for hours yet, but I light the
candles on the mantelpiece and open the second bottle of Merlot to let it breathe.
I’m just leaning over the sofa to pull the curtains shut when I see a woman, her
head bent to her chest, scuttling along the pavement on the opposite side of the
street. She doesn’t look up, but it’s her, I’m sure of it. I lean further forward, my
heart hammering in my chest, trying to get a better look, but the angle’s wrong
and I can’t see her now.
I turn, ready to bolt out of the front door to chase her down the street, but
Tom’s standing there in the doorway, Evie wrapped in a towel in his arms.
‘Are you OK?’ he asks. ‘What’s wrong?’
‘Nothing,’ I say, stuffing my hands into my pockets so that he can’t see them
shaking. ‘Nothing’s wrong. Nothing at all.’
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