Until You're Mine (8 page)

‘So it was very important that Sally-Ann didn’t go into natural labour,’ Lorraine stated. Mrs Frith nodded. Lorraine remembered her obstetrician telling her all those years ago that if she did go into labour, she’d suffer life-threatening internal bleeding and the baby would be deprived of oxygen once the placenta detached. It wasn’t exactly a win-win for either party and a pre-planned surgical delivery was the best option. Timing was everything.

‘So awful,’ Mrs Frith managed to say. ‘That she died anyway.’ She snatched a look at her husband as if she knew what was coming. Her eyes filled with tears.

‘God wanted to take her and her bastard baby one way or another,’ Mr Frith said. He crossed himself.

‘I understand that’s your grief talking, Mr Frith,’ Lorraine said, trying to loosen the chill that had taken them all by the throats.

‘No, it’s not,’ Mrs Frith said pitifully. ‘He hated that Sally-Ann was going to have a baby.’

‘Why was that?’ It was for this very reason that Lorraine had decided to tape their meeting.

‘She wasn’t married,’ Mrs Frith whispered, as if even saying the words was a sin.

‘And no grandchild of mine was going to be born out of wedlock. It was shock enough knowing that Russell Goodall was the father.’ Mr Frith’s face was bursting red with hatred and anger. Blue-black veins wiggled across his cheeks and his strawberry-like nose, indicating a lifestyle that was most ungodly.

‘Are you certain Russell Goodall was the baby’s biological father?’ DNA testing would soon tell them but she wanted their opinion.

‘Sally-Ann told us he was,’ Mr Frith said. He let out a half growl, half sigh.

‘No, Sally-Ann wasn’t sure, Bill,’ Mrs Frith continued. ‘She was a . . . a popular girl.’

‘Slut, you mean.’

‘Carry on,’ Lorraine said to Mrs Frith.

‘She had two boyfriends. She couldn’t decide between them. When Liam found out about the baby, he didn’t want anything more to do with her. He said it couldn’t possibly be his,’ Mrs Frith explained meekly.

‘Fucking whore, that’s what she was.’

‘Bill!’ Mrs Frith said as loudly as she could. ‘Our daughter was not . . . she was not like that.’

‘What’s Liam’s surname, Mrs Frith?’

‘Rider. Liam Rider.’

‘And married with a family of his own, I might add.’ Mr Frith’s hands were balled into tight fists. He sucked air in and out as if there was no oxygen left in the room. ‘No wonder the dirty bastard went running when Sally-Ann got pregnant.’

‘So you can’t be sure who the baby’s real father was?’ What mattered more, Lorraine knew, was who each of the two men
believed
the father was.

‘Sally-Ann got herself in a state over it. When Liam wanted nothing more to do with her, she tried to forget him,’ Mrs Frith said. ‘She wanted to scribble him out of her life, but it was hard. She loved him.’

Literally
, thought Lorraine as she remembered the scratched-out name in the pregnancy file.

‘Russell stepped up to the mark. He’s a kind-hearted boy,’ the mother continued.

‘He’s a loser, that’s what.’ Mr Frith’s turn again.

‘Where did Sally-Ann meet Liam Rider?’ Lorraine asked. ‘Who did she know first?’

‘She’s known Russ since she was at primary school. Liam, though, she didn’t meet him until she enrolled on that college course. He was teaching her bookkeeping. Everything changed when she met Liam.’

‘Teaching her how to be immoral, more like,’ Mr Frith said. His face appeared to balloon at the cheeks and turn a deep shade of beetroot, then he broke down into dry, rasping sobs. He covered his face and dropped his head. The top of his scalp was swept across with strands of grey, greasy hair.

Lorraine glanced at Patrick. They gave the man a moment.

‘Let it out, love,’ Mrs Frith said, but he shrugged her hand off his back. He was going to have to do this his own way.

‘One more question.’ Lorraine drew in breath but then stopped. She’d been going to ask why they thought Sally-Ann had put Russ Goodall as her next of kin on the pregnancy file and not either of them. But staring at them in turn, she kind of guessed.

*

Liam Rider wasn’t home. A bemused woman of about thirty-five answered the door with a couple of kids peering on from down the hallway. It was a pleasant house, a Fifties semi with a neat front garden and a pot of pansies beside the front door. A waft of cooking food – baked potatoes or chips – spilled out as the woman stared at her ID. Lorraine felt her stomach rumble.

‘Is everything OK?’ the woman asked, paling a little. ‘Is Liam all right?’ She took hold of the doorframe as Lorraine convinced her that everything was fine, there were no accidents. She couldn’t bring herself to say that no one was dead.

‘It’s Mr Rider I’d like to speak to,’ Lorraine said. ‘Do you know where I can find him?’

‘At the college, I think,’ she replied. Her eyes were flashing everywhere from beneath a neat blonde fringe. She didn’t look like the kind of wife to be cheated on. Then again, Lorraine hadn’t thought she was the type either until Adam, drunk on guilt, had decided to tell her that he’d had a brief –
oh so brief
– affair. Lorraine swallowed it away. Now wasn’t the time.

‘Craven Road Campus?’ Lorraine asked.

The woman nodded. It was the place where her husband both worked and played away, except she didn’t know it.
We have something in common, you and me,
Lorraine wanted to say, but didn’t.

Brief . . . meaningless . . . over . . . 
Adam had gone on to tell her he’d been stupid, drunk, that he was having a crisis, that she’d pursued him and it wasn’t his fault. What advice would she give the younger woman, Lorraine wondered? Get out while you can? Do the same back? Take him to the cleaners? While the house looked pleasant enough, it was clear Liam Rider wasn’t exactly cleaning-out material. Neither was Adam, though that hadn’t stopped her fantasising about it.

‘If he comes home before I’ve spoken to him, will you ask him to call me?’ Lorraine handed the woman a card. ‘It’s urgent.’

‘He’s not in any trouble, is he?’ She shooed the children back as they approached the door.

‘No. I just need him to help with some enquiries.’ Lorraine smiled tersely before leaving for the college.

*

‘You know the first thing he said?’ Lorraine was perched on a bar stool in the kitchen. Once the girls were sorted for the evening, she was back to the office.

Adam shook his head.

‘You won’t tell my wife, will you?’

Adam pulled a face. He hadn’t been present at the interview. ‘Natural.’

He’d just come in from his run and was dripping with sweat even though a frost had begun to creep across the pavements and railings. He wiped his face on the tea towel. Lorraine snatched it and tossed it through the door to the utility room. ‘That’s a disgusting thing to do,’ she said. ‘On both counts.’

She couldn’t help the occasional comment. It hadn’t quite been a year. Mostly, she was able to cope, to put it behind her, get on with life. Then there were the times she couldn’t and all she wanted to do was make the rest of Adam’s life as unbearable as possible.

‘What else did Rider have to say?’ Adam bit into an apple. ‘Did he agree to a DNA test?’

‘He’d heard about Sally-Ann on the news so he’d had a couple of days to absorb the shock. He was still very upset though. It wasn’t a great way to find out. He said she was a promising student, trying to make something of herself by taking a course, blah blah.’ She took a breath. Now wasn’t the time. ‘And yes, he agreed to give a swab straight away.’

Adam pulled off his luminous running top and tossed that onto the utility-room floor with the tea towel. ‘Has the time of death come through yet?’ he asked.

‘I spoke to the pathologist. Best guess is she’d been dead a minimum of thirty-eight hours and a maximum of forty-one. Rider told me without being asked that he could prove his exact whereabouts for the last week. That’s when he virtually begged me not to tell his wife. “It would kill her” I think were his words.’

Lorraine bit her cheek. Adam didn’t look in the least bit uncomfortable.

‘Rider had ended it with Sally-Ann several months ago, when she insisted the baby was his. She wanted money from him and he didn’t have it to give. And of course he didn’t want his wife to know about the affair or the baby. He took a risk, if you ask me, by dumping her, said that if it all came out, he was just going to deny it.’ Lorraine stood up and leant against the worktop. She felt her heart kick up. ‘Do you know what else he told me?’ She paused. ‘He told me that unless you actually get caught in the act, no one can prove a thing.’ Lorraine had wanted to slap him at that point.

‘I’ll remember that then,’ Adam said sourly, and went upstairs for a shower.

THE WORST THING
about not being pregnant is that everything in life seems to suddenly involve babies. And the worst thing about having to make up so many stories, literally living in the centre of an ever-changing lie, is that the stories get deeper and deeper, more twisted and untrue, so that eventually I have trouble remembering who I really am.

But, all things considered, I decide that for the moment being someone else isn’t so bad; that being the real me would be dangerous and unhelpful in my current predicament. I am here for one reason only and my time will soon come. The wait itself is a gestation.

‘So . . .’ Pip says, trying to fill the gap. We’re running out of conversation. Lilly and the twins are in the playroom. They seem to be getting along well enough. I can hear clattering and chattering and occasional whoops and at least they are not killing each other. Pip and I are sitting at Claudia’s kitchen table (I think of everything in this house as belonging to Claudia) and exchanging banter about children and babies and pregnancy and giving birth. Then Pip strikes me full in the face: ‘Haven’t you ever wanted children of your own?’

It’s one of those unanswerable questions. Well, it is if I am to remain in my newly-constructed bubble of lies and deceit as well as keeping my job, anyway. Mess up too soon and I’m out on my ear. Explanation is impossible.

To field it, I try a laugh. Then I try a long sip from my mug of tea. Next I try a shriek to the children to check they are still playing nicely. I glance at my watch and stare at the wall clock but Pip’s only been here ten minutes. She won’t be leaving yet. Besides, I haven’t answered her question.

Haven’t you ever wanted children of your own?

‘I . . .’ I falter. I have no idea what to say. ‘Well . . .’

Pip’s interested smile has diminished and now she is also looking for ways to stop me having to reply. My body language has become awkward – pained face, crossed arms hugging my very un-pregnant body, both feet jiggling nervously on the tiles; I couldn’t make it more obvious that I don’t want to talk about this. But now I have to.

‘It’s complicated,’ I say. The syllables are razors in my mouth.

Pip just stares at me, feeling wretched, wishing she’d never asked.
Look at her, sitting in Claudia’s nice pine kitchen chair, all pregnant and wide and brimming with life and hope and love. Her breasts are big and heave together within her oversized sweater. It could be homemade – a hand-knitted effort to go with her home-grown baby. How lovely. How very not me.

‘I haven’t really met the right person yet.’

I don’t need to say any more. I should stop right now. She would never understand. Pip would simply be relieved that her faux pas has passed and we could talk about baking or schools or how long she’s known Claudia. Instead, for some unknown yet horrific reason, I continue. ‘It’s not for want of trying, I can assure you. I know what you’re thinking, that I’m obviously in my thirties and no man in my life so I’d better get a move on, but how on earth am I going to do it without a partner?’

What am I saying?

I dig my nails into my palms to silence myself. I know only too well there are many ways to get a baby without a partner. It’s just that none has worked yet.

‘You’re in your thirties?’ Pip says in a lame, flattering attempt to change the subject. Her cheeks are crested scarlet. Pregnant women get hot easily.

‘Thirty-three,’ I tell her. ‘Thirty-three, an old maid and no children.’ I laugh, but it comes out slightly demented. I hear my mother’s words from beyond the grave:
Fancy, she’s not married, no children. Told you so . . . 
Then another little laugh to lighten things up as, while I somehow want Pip – someone,
any
one – to feel my pain, I mustn’t let it ruin everything. The last thing I need is for her to tell Claudia I’m some baby-obsessed psycho. She’d kick me out in nothing flat. This is all so finely timed. I catch my breath. ‘But it’s OK. I’m lucky to be working with children.’ Another laugh. More convincing this time.

‘I’m glad to hear that,’ Pip adds with a sigh, which is clearly one of relief. A punctuation mark; a full stop.

‘Mummy, Noah broke Barbie,’ Lilly says, thrusting a contorted naked doll at her mother.

‘Oh dear,’ Pip says with a sideways glance at me as if it’s somehow my fault. ‘Let me see.’

‘Noah,’ I say with forced disdain, ‘why did you do that?’ Really, I’d quite like to pat him on the head and tell him well done.

‘Cos Barbie’s stupid and not real,’ he says, echoing my thoughts.

‘That’s not a good reason to break someone else’s doll,’ I tell him. ‘What do you say to Lilly?’

Noah shrugs. He bites his lip until it bleeds.

‘Say sorry,’ I tell him.

‘She’s not broken any more,’ Pip says, handing back the mended doll to Lilly. ‘Just bent a bit.’

I watch Noah’s eyes track Lilly and slightly-bent-Barbie as they leave the room. He’ll have another go for sure. I’m learning that he’s quite like me: things that are perfect are just asking for it.

*

When Pip has finally left with a sullen Lilly in tow and a promise to make the play-date a weekly occurrence, I get started on the boys’ supper. I promised homemade soup, didn’t I?

I peek into the sitting room and see that the twins are glued to some cartoon or other. A double-take shows me that Oscar is actually asleep, lolling on the arm of the chair with a string of drool leaking onto the upholstery. Noah glances at me idly, our new bond stretched silently between us, and turns back to the telly without a word.