Don wandered into the kitchen, smile drooping as he took in their expressions. ‘Oh, guys, come on! Bon’s waddling round like a duck in there, you know! It’s hilarious!’ He patted John on the back and made his way to the bathroom. John barely even noticed him, frustrated as he was with Jules. When they returned to the lounge, moments later, with a plate of biscuits, the television was playing for an empty room. John called up the stairs and Jules rushed out to the garden. They screamed and cried her name but the voice they so hoped to hear didn’t call back.
‘What are you doing? She’s in the lounge!’ Don walked up to them, expression puzzled, hands spread in a question.
‘She’s gone! She’s gone!’ Jules cupped her face, eyes shooting back and forth across the room as if Bonnie was about to reappear suddenly and shout, ‘Here I am! I’m good at hide and seek, aren’t I, Mummy?’
Don wrapped a comforting arm around Jules. ‘John, I’ll take the car and have a scout round; you go on foot in case I miss her. Jules, go and ask the neighbours if they’ve seen her. She’s only been gone a few minutes, she can’t be far away!’
They jumped into action as if it was something they’d rehearsed. John rushed out of the door and down the street, making laps around their house, inching further away each time, scanning the area for her. For some reason, it was her shoes he kept hoping he’d see. Her sparkly red Dorothy shoes. They were getting too small for her but she insisted on wearing them, polishing them with a cloth twice a day, proud of the way they shone. Those shoes were lodged in his mind. Sometimes he thought he saw them, but when he looked back they weren’t there. He spotted Don twice on his frantic laps but not Bonnie, never Bonnie.
They assumed at first that she had run away, but ‘Bonnie wouldn’t do that!’ they told themselves and then repeated it to the police, to be met with looks of nonchalance and boredom. With nothing else to go on, they began to think she’d just wanted a walk and got lost. The police trawled the streets and neighbourhood. They checked the little village shop, the play area, rechecked where John had already looked. But it was all for nothing. She hadn’t run away or got lost. She’d been taken.
John doesn’t know how. It is one of the questions that bombard him; even when he is asleep it finds a way to dig its fingers into his subconscious and prey on his ever-befuddled mind. How was she taken? They were only in the kitchen for a few moments. Don was only in the bathroom for a few moments. Did this person lure her outside and kidnap her? Did he walk into the house they were supposed to be safe in and simply take her hand and walk right back out again? No, he couldn’t have – Bonnie knew not to go with strangers. She knew the world was a scary place. She knew, she knew, she knew. But then, he asks himself, would he have heard her talk, shout? Don wouldn’t have from inside the bathroom. All this person had to do was hold his hand over her mouth and leave. As simple as that.
And now they are sitting here, while their little girl is suffering God knows what. Over and over. Again and again.
Jules places his hand on her bump. He feels a slow, firm kick against his palm and smiles sadly. How are they supposed to care for a second baby when they’ve spoiled things so badly with their first? This is their fault. His fault. Their only job since the day she was born has been to protect her. And now they have failed, it seems they will surely fail with the next one as well. How can they not? How is this one going to fare any better in their care?
His eyes slowly begin to flutter closed, exhaustion creeping up on him. They sleep like this for hours. And he dreams that when he leaves their newborn in its crib to fetch a nappy, it has gone when he returns. And in its place is a photograph of both his children together, side by side, broken and bruised, tears and blood forming a pool at their feet.
Maisie
Friday 15 January, 2016
She supposes he is a handsome man. With his attractive face and messy hair, she imagines him to be someone who draws eyes easily. But despite what the nurses say behind closed doors, how they gossip and prate about the poor man, she doesn’t see him the way they do. She thinks he looks kind, sweet, honest. And when he smiles, she thinks he might be a funny man. With his teeth slightly crooked and the crow’s feet beside his eyes nestling deeper into his skin when he frowns, she wants to know more about him. More about his life. More about the man beyond the chemical smell of the ward and the bleeping of the equipment. She looks at Heidi, sitting opposite her, and wonders whether she should ask. They washed his hair with warm water and shampoo moments before, carefully avoiding his stitches.
Heidi looks at her husband, silently. Thoughtfully. Maisie notices that if he smiles, she smiles too – like a reaction to a joke he’s just told. Something only they are privy to. Holding his hand to her lips, she kisses it softly. ‘It still feels like he’s in there. You probably don’t know what I mean, do you?’
Maisie shakes her head, leaning forward.
‘We’ve been together for fifteen years. We know each other’s sounds and signals, every inch of each other. Every single like and dislike even if we aren’t familiar with it ourselves. I know that when he grits his teeth, he isn’t angry, he’s upset. I know that if our daughter jumps on his lap and falls asleep, he’ll fall asleep too. When I’m stressed about something, he twirls me around the kitchen. If he fiddles with his keys, he’s nervous. If he grins just before he has dessert, he’s thinking about his mother’s apple pie. Even if we’re just watching a movie, he holds my hand until the end. Before we eat out, he checks the restaurant serves meals we like so my daughter and I won’t be disappointed. He can’t whistle and he hates broccoli. He loves books and hates comics. Loves the Rolling Stones, hates the Beatles. Loves life but isn’t afraid of dying.’
Heidi glances at Maisie and her calm expression falters. But it isn’t just sadness Maisie sees. It is something else. Something akin to dread. It blankets her face and shrouds the room in a thick haze. Maisie is reminded of the first time they met, when Heidi stood beside Tim, her hand flying from her chest to her bump, some unnameable emotion streaking through her eyes. It bothered Maisie then but it bothers her now even more. It is a quick flutter of concern in her chest, a creeping unease that settles across her skin. Mostly Heidi keeps calm, smiling and talking about their lives together. But then comes the shift in her behaviour and it taps out a restless rhythm in Maisie’s mind.
Maisie wonders if Heidi is thinking about the attack. Is she afraid it will happen again? Does she think she is in danger? Maisie catches herself before she asks. Tim’s presence has prompted a surge of twittering and clucking from the nurses. Gossip is currency. And in their breaks it flows freely, theories and suggestions shared hastily over homemade sandwiches and limp salad. The investigator they see plodding up the corridor and the article crushed into the corner of page six of the local newspaper tell them he was attacked and left for dead in the street. Maisie can’t even begin to imagine what it must be like hearing your husband was attacked.
Heidi brushes a strand of hair from Tim’s eyes, the dread in her own dissipating. ‘I know how he feels. Even before I hear him, I feel him walk into the room. I’ve loved him for fifteen years. And—’ she pauses and looks at Maisie ‘—he’s still in there.’
‘I think I know what you mean,’ she whispers, taken aback.
‘He’s going to get better. I know he is.’
*
Maisie’s thoughts inevitably find their way back to Heidi. They had spoken of their childhoods, their work and their parents to stave off grim topics. Maisie had told her she grew up in Cornwall with her mother. That she was given all the encouragement, help, support and freedom she’d ever needed, even with the tedious tests and studies she went through to become a nurse. Her mother was there every step of the way.