‘How did you get out, naughty girl?’
Milly ‘smiles’ up at me, tendrils of drool dripping off her tongue. I’ve got a pretty good idea how she managed to escape.
Sure enough, when I reach the kitchen, the dog padding silently beside me, the door to the porch is open.
‘You’re supposed to stay in your bed until Mummy lets you out!’ I say, pointing at the pile of rugs and blankets where she sleeps at night. Milly’s ears prick up at the mention of the word ‘bed’ and her tail falls between her legs. ‘Did silly Daddy leave the door open on his way to work?’
I never thought I’d be the kind of woman who’d refer to herself and her husband as ‘Mummy and Daddy’ when speaking to a pet but Milly is as much a part of our family as Charlotte. She’s the sister we could never give her.
I shut Milly back in the porch, my heart twisting as she looks beseechingly at me with her big, brown eyes. It’s eight o’clock. We should be strolling through the park at the back of the house but I need to continue what I started. I need to get back to the cloakroom.
The contents of Brian’s pockets are where I left them – strewn around the base of the coat stand. I kneel down, wishing I’d grabbed a cushion from the living room as my knees click in protestation, and examine my spoils. There’s a handkerchief, white with an embroidered golfer in the corner, unused, folded neatly into a square (given to him by one of the children for Christmas), three paper tissues, used, a length of twine, the same type Brian uses to tie up the tomatoes in his allotment, a receipt from the local supermarket for £40 worth of petrol, a mint imperial, coated with fluff, a handful of loose change and a crumpled cinema ticket. My heart races as I touch it – then I read the title of the film and the date – and my pulse returns to normal. It’s for a comedy we went to see together. I hated it – found it rude, crude and slapstick – but Brian laughed like a drain.
And that’s it. Nothing strange. Nothing out of the ordinary. Nothing incriminating.
Just … Brian stuff.
I sweep his belongings into a pile with the side of my hand, then scoop them up and carefully distribute them amongst his pockets, making sure everything is returned to where I found it. Brian isn’t a fastidious man; he won’t know, or care, which pocket held the change and which the cinema ticket but I’m not taking any chances.
Maybe there is no evidence at all.
Charlotte didn’t squeeze my hand when I asked if her secret had anything to do with her father. She didn’t so much as twitch. I don’t know what I was thinking, imagining she might respond – or even asking the question in the first place. Actually I do. I was following up a hunch; a hunch that my husband was betraying me, again.
Six years ago Brian made a mistake – one that nearly destroyed not only our marriage, but his career too – he had an affair with a twenty-three-year-old Parliamentary intern. I raged, I shouted and I screamed. I stayed with my friend Jane for two nights. I would have stayed longer but I didn’t want Charlotte to suffer. It took a long time but eventually I forgave Brian. Why? Because the affair happened shortly after one of my ‘episodes’, because my family is more important to me than anything in the world and because, although Brian has many faults, he is a good man at heart.
A ‘good man at heart’ – it sounds like such a terribly twee reason to forgive someone their infidelity, doesn’t it? Perhaps it is. But it’s infinitely preferable to life with a bad man and, when Brian and I met, I knew all about that.
It was the summer of 1993 and we were both living in Athens. I was a TEFL teacher and he was a widower businessman chasing a big deal. The first time Brian said hello to me, in a tatty tavern on the banks of the river Kifissos, I ignored him. The second time I moved seats. The third time he refused to let me continue pretending he didn’t exist. He bought me a drink and delivered it to my table with a note that said ‘Hello from one Brit to another’ and then walked straight out of the pub without a backward glance. I couldn’t help but smile. After that he was quietly persistent, a ‘hello’ here, a ‘what are you reading?’ there and we gradually became friends. It took me a long time to lower my barriers but finally, almost one year to the day after we first met, I let myself love him.
It was a warm, balmy evening and we were strolling beside the river, watching the lights of the city flicker and glow on the water when Brian started telling me about Tessa, his late wife, and how devastated he was when she lost her battle with cancer. He told me how shocked he’d been – the disease had progressed so rapidly – and then how angry, how he’d waited until his son was staying with his granny and then he’d smashed up his own car with a cricket bat because he didn’t know how to deal with his rage. His eyes filled with tears when he told me how desperately he missed his son Oliver (he’d left him with his grandparents in the UK so he could fulfil a contract in Greece) but he made no attempt to blot them away. I touched his face, tracing my fingers over his skin, smudging his tears away and then I reached for his hand. I didn’t let go for three hours.
I push open the door to Brian’s study and approach his desk, instantly feeling that I have intruded too far. I wash my husband’s clothes, I iron them, some of them I buy, but his study represents his career – a part of his world that he keeps distinct from family life. Brian is a Member of Parliament. Saying it aloud makes me so proud but I wasn’t always that way. Seventeen years ago I was bemused when he’d rail against ‘Tory scum’, ‘class divides’ and ‘a failing NHS’ but Brian wasn’t content to sit on society’s sidelines and moan. When we returned to the UK from Greece, still flushed with happiness from our impromptu bare-footed wedding on a beach in Rhodes, he was resolute. We’d settle in Brighton and he’d start a new business – he had a hunch recycling would be big – and then, when it was established and making a profit, he’d run for Parliament. He didn’t have so much as an economics O-Level but I knew he’d do it. And he did.
I never stopped believing in him, I still do in many ways, but I am no longer in awe of him. I love Brian but I can also see only too well how vain and insecure his career choice has made him. Flattery goes a long way when you’re approaching your mid-forties, sixteen stone and balding – particularly when the person doing the flattering is young, ambitious and works for you. Brian has changed since Charlotte’s accident. We both have, but in different ways. Instead of our daughter’s condition bringing us together we’ve been forced apart and the distance between us is growing. If Brian’s having another affair I won’t forgive him again.
I take another step towards my husband’s desk and my fingers trail over the brushed silver frame of a black and white photograph. It’s of Charlotte and I on a beach in Mallorca, taken on the first day of our holiday. We’ve still got our travelling clothes on, our trouser legs rolled up so we can paddle in the sea. I’ve got one hand raised to my forehead, protecting my eyes from the sun whilst the other clutches our daughter’s tiny hand. She’s staring up at me, her chin tilted, eyes wide. The photo must be at least ten years old but I still feel a warm swell of love when I look at the expression on her face. It’s pure, unadulterated happiness.
A floorboard in the corridor squeaks and I snatch my fingers back from the photograph then sigh. When did I become so neurotic that every creak and groan of a two-hundred-year-old house sent me catatonic with fear?
I look back at the desk. It’s a heavy mahogany affair with three drawers on the left, three on the right and a long, thin drawer that sits in between. I reach for the brass handle of the centre drawer and slowly ease it open. Another floorboard squeaks but I ignore it, even though it sounds closer than the last. There’s something in the drawer, something handwritten, a card or letter maybe and I reach for it, being careful not to disturb the mounds of paperclips and rubber bands on either side as I attempt to slide—
‘Sue?’