Читать книгу Cathy Kelly 3-Book Collection 1: Lessons in Heartbreak, Once in a Lifetime, Homecoming - Cathy Kelly - Страница 22

Anneliese had changed the sheets in the spare bedroom for Beth and Marcus. She’d tidied and polished, and had even roused herself enough to buy fresh flowers for the house to lift the place somewhat. There was only one big housekeeping screw-up and that was that Beth’s father no longer lived there.

Anneliese hadn’t the energy to practise telling her daughter the news. Goodness knows, she’d tried.

Darling Beth, your father and I have decided…

That wouldn’t work because it wasn’t true.

She hadn’t decided anything, it had been decided for her. Try as she might, she couldn’t put a Beth-friendly spin on this one.

Your father dumped me after having an affair with my so-called best friend sounded too like a television true-life confession. All she needed was a studio audience and an eager host with a microphone and a faux-worried manner and her spiel would be perfect. So no, that wouldn’t work either.

Blunt was going to be the only answer. When Beth arrived, eager to see them, her father’s absence would start a conversation rolling. Anneliese wished Edward was the sort of man who’d be able to tell their daughter the news, but she knew he wasn’t. All the difficult talks in their house had been left to his wife.

Beth and Marcus were due in Tamarin at lunchtime, so Anneliese had cold chicken and salad ready for them and had tried to buoy herself up to deal with her daughter’s tears.

But when she heard Beth’s key in the door a little after one o’clock, Anneliese wished she could run away.

Why hadn’t bloody Edward found the courage to phone his daughter and tell her…?

‘Mum!’

Beth stood in the kitchen doorway, her dark hair framing her face, and Anneliese instantly realised that her daughter knew.

‘Dad told me this morning,’ Beth said.

‘Ah,’ Anneliese replied flatly. ‘I’m sorry, darling, I wanted to tell you and I didn’t know how.’

‘Mum, this happened ten days ago and you never said anything. Why didn’t you tell me when you rang to say Lily was in hospital?’

Anneliese had no answer. Fear, she supposed: fear of falling apart when she told Beth the news and fear that if she began to fall apart, she wouldn’t stop. For a woman who’d tried to face life head on, this avoidance tactic felt strange but also, weirdly, like the only option.

Beth was still raging on. ‘If I hadn’t rung on his mobile this morning asking if he wanted anything from Dublin before we came, I still wouldn’t know. I found out by fluke! Dad assumed I knew and hadn’t been phoning him on purpose. Did you ever plan on telling me? You’re my parents, I love you. I could have come, you needed me, you both needed me, what with Lily being sick and everything.’

Anneliese smiled, Beth had always been a fair person. Even now, in the midst of her anger, she was gently telling her mother that she loved her dad too, that she wouldn’t be a pawn in any game between them.

‘Don’t worry,’ Anneliese said, ‘there are no sides, Beth, you know us better than that. There’s no battle, no fight for your feelings. It’s not the sort of news you can say over the phone, is it?’

‘Of course it is. You could have told me when you phoned about Lily being sick, couldn’t you?’ Beth demanded. ‘I would have come right down.’

Anneliese was about to say how she hadn’t wanted to worry Beth, but Beth was too angry now and interrupted her.

‘I can’t believe you didn’t tell me you’d split up. You’re my parents, I have a right to know. You always think I’m weak and stupid, that I’m not able to cope with stuff and you can’t rely on me.’

She looked so furious that Anneliese reeled back in shock.

‘I just didn’t want to hurt you.’ And I was hurting inside, Anneliese thought.

‘Life hurts people, Mum,’ Beth yelled. ‘Life hurts us all. You think you’re in charge of it, you can control the hurt, but you can’t. Lots of things hurt me and I have to deal with them, you’re not in charge of them. Have you any idea how hurtful it is to find that you and Dad have split up and nobody told me? I bet you don’t. But I know exactly why you were waiting till I got here to break the news to me. Because you were working out how to tell me, is that it?’

‘Beth –’ said Marcus. He was hovering in the kitchen doorway, as if waiting for the row to blow over before he came in properly.

‘I’m sorry, Marcus, I have to say this,’ Beth said. ‘It’s gone on too long. Stop controlling me, Mum. I’m not a child.’

‘I’m sorry,’ Anneliese said and she felt as if the ground had been ripped away from under her feet. Beth didn’t seem to understand that she was in pain and shock. No, Anneliese, who had always been in control, must still be in control in Beth’s eyes. Somehow, she’d also been cast as the villain of the piece. She hadn’t broken up the family; Edward had, but she was the one getting shouted at. She’d hoped that she might get some sympathy from her daughter. ‘It hasn’t been easy for me.’

‘I could have helped,’ shouted Beth.

You’re not helping by screaming at me, Anneliese wanted to yell right back but she didn’t. She never yelled at her daughter.

‘But you didn’t give me the chance to be there for you. You are so controlling, Mum!’

‘I wasn’t trying to control things,’ Anneliese said with absolute honesty. Or at least, the only controlling she’d been doing was trying to keep her own life under some control so she wouldn’t fall apart.

‘Yes you were,’ Beth interrupted. ‘This is all about controlling how you told me, Mum. Please, give me some credit for understanding you. I’m not a child any more, I have to face things, OK? And if you’d told me when it happened, that would be better, because then I wouldn’t have to get all this information on the day when I want to tell you something very special. But you’ve ruined it now.’

‘What?’ breathed Anneliese.

‘I’m pregnant,’ Beth said. ‘Three months. Marcus and I are going to have a baby.’ She laughed, but there was no humour in her laugh. ‘I didn’t tell you because I didn’t want to worry you until I’d passed the three months’ mark and knew everything was all right. You see, Mum, you’ve brought me up perfectly! You tell me nothing because you don’t want to worry me and I tell you nothing because I don’t want to worry you. We’re a fabulous family. No wonder Dad left.’

It was like being shot, Anneliese thought. She’d never experienced a bullet, but she imagined it must feel the same, that sudden arc of pain and weakness and the feeling of blood draining out of your body and everything going dark. How could Beth say that about Edward? Like it was all Anneliese’s fault. He’d left her, didn’t Beth realise? Or had he said she’d pushed him away? She felt sick at the very thought of what Edward might have said in an attempt at damage limitation, but she couldn’t collapse, not here, not in front of Beth. Not after hearing this news.

She summoned up every ounce of strength from inside her.

‘I am so thrilled for you both,’ she said. ‘It’s the most wonderful news. I love you, darling, and you’ll be the most incredible mother.’

‘Thank you.’ It was like a magic cloth had rubbed away the anger from her daughter’s face and now Beth looked serenely happy.

She’d been the same as a child: able to flick a switch between her passions. It was what made Beth so different from her mother. Beth’s moods changed like quicksilver and Anneliese had always envied that ability. It was as if Beth’s mind said, ‘OK, that’s horrible stuff, let’s not deal with that now, let’s deal with something nice.’

‘Marcus, I’m thrilled for you both,’ Anneliese said and she put her arms round Beth, willing herself not to faint. She would have a grandchild, how wonderful that would be. But the pain and the ache was still there, because there was a fault line in her relationship with Beth, and that was horrific. Beth blamed her for everything, and in her fury hadn’t even acknowledged the pain Anneliese must be going through. The love of a beautiful new baby couldn’t mend that, surely?

‘Thank you, Anneliese,’ Marcus said proudly. ‘It’s wonderful, but scary too!’

‘It’s taken me quite a while to get pregnant. We were trying for well nearly a year and then just when we thought we better get some help, it happened! We had a scan – I’ve pictures here,’ Beth said.

The proud parents-to-be crowded round and they looked at the scan. Anneliese kept her arm around Beth and tentatively touched her daughter’s gently budding belly. There was no kick from her future grandchild in there, and she thought of how often she’d longed for this news. How ironic that it had to come today of all days.

Yet she was happy to think that her daughter would experience that great mother-child love that she’d had. Except, they never told you, when your baby was little, that it could bring such heartbreak too.

‘I’m so sorry, darling,’ she said, a lifetime of suppressing her own needs allowing her to do so again. ‘I’m sorry that you had to find out about me and your dad today, but let’s just forget about that, that’s not important: this is important –’ she touched Beth’s belly again ‘– this new life. I am so happy, let’s focus on that. Maybe your dad and I are better off apart, who knows?’ There, she was doing it again, making everything nice and safe and sanitised for Beth. And Beth seemed to like it.

‘I hope you’re right, Mum,’ she said. ‘I don’t understand what’s going on in Dad’s head –’ She stopped. ‘We don’t have to talk about it, if you don’t want. I’m sorry I shouted at you. It’s just that what with Lily and now this…I wanted everything to be perfect when I told you about the baby.’

‘Forget everything else,’ Anneliese insisted. ‘It will all work out in its own good time. Your news is what matters now.’

Beth grinned. ‘It’s so exciting. Will you come and stay with us when the baby’s born? Because it’s going to be difficult, and you know I don’t know anything about babies. I was saying to some of my friends that they’re lucky to have older sisters and brothers so they have nieces and nephews. But being an only child, well, I don’t have that experience. I suppose I’ll learn!’ she laughed. ‘I was thinking that it’s going to be hard to tell Izzie,’ Beth went on, ‘because, well, I never really knew if she wanted kids or not and there’s nobody special in her life, so –’ She broke off and sighed. ‘I sort of thought there was someone. She referred to a guy in emails, but she sounded a bit vague about him so I didn’t like to pry.’

‘She hasn’t told me about anyone,’ Anneliese said, surprised. She and Izzie spoke a lot. But then, she hadn’t been on the phone filling Izzie in with her own life-changing details, had she?

‘She was probably afraid to tell you and Gran, because you’d be planning the wedding as soon as you heard and, well, it doesn’t work like that nowadays,’ Beth said wryly.

Yes, Anneliese thought grimly, that’s me – poster girl for marriage.

Once she’d started talking about the pregnancy, Beth kept going. Marcus took their bags upstairs to the spare room and got his wife some water, while she told her mother how she felt tired at night, how she hadn’t really had morning sickness but the nausea had been quite intense, although it was improving now. And she’d developed a burst of energy the past week. Some people found that after the first trimester, she explained.

‘You sound so knowledgeable,’ Anneliese smiled. ‘You must have been reading loads.’

‘Yes, tons. Actually, last night, I was reading a baby magazine and it mentioned this new book about the first year with your baby. I’d love to get it,’ Beth said. ‘Maybe we could try the bookshop here?’

‘Of course,’ Anneliese said. ‘I’ll just run upstairs and brush my hair.’

In her bedroom, she found the tranquillisers and took another one. Right now, she needed some help, and since divine inspiration seemed to be in short supply, medical inspiration would have to do.

After they’d bought a couple of books – Anneliese paid – the three of them went down to Dorota’s and drank herbal tea, looking out over the bay. There was no fear of meeting Nell or Edward now, Anneliese decided. Nell wouldn’t dream of turning up, and even if Edward did, she could cope with him, thanks to both her little tablet and the presence of Beth and Marcus.

After a while, Marcus went back up to the counter to order more tea.

‘How are you feeling?’ Beth asked, taking her mother’s hand and patting it.

Anneliese smiled at her pregnant daughter.

‘I’ll be fine,’ she lied.

‘Dad says there’s a whale stuck out there in the harbour,’ said Beth idly when her husband came back. ‘Poor thing, how does that happen? Do they get lost or something?’

‘Nobody knows for sure,’ her mother replied, looking out at the sea. It was such a beautiful, clear day, but there were volcanic-looking dark clouds over to the right on the horizon, a summer storm coming in. ‘There’s a marine expert here and apparently he says it’s something to do with the whale’s sonar getting messed up. They get stuck and then they can’t get out again. Quite often they die.’

‘How long has the whale been here?’

‘Nearly two weeks, I don’t think she’s going to last much longer. They say she’s weak.’

‘Oh, poor whale,’ said Beth. ‘Why can’t they just put her to sleep, or does that not work?’

‘I think they can do that if the whale is actually beached, but here, she isn’t and it would cause her even more distress if they tried to get close.’

‘Oh,’ sighed Beth.

‘They tried to coax her out into deeper water with a diving team, but it was a long shot and it didn’t work.’

Anneliese had watched the rescue operation from the high point between the two bays. Lots of people had been there in the harbour, silently watching and willing the plan to work.

Anneliese had brought her binoculars and she’d spotted the marine guy, Mac Petersen, in the middle of it all. Now that she knew who he was, she realised she had seen him before on the beach near Dolphin Cottage. He had a small boat, a corach like the old island fishermen used to use, and he went out to sea in it occasionally. He had a dog too, a woolly scruffy thing that was just the sort of dog he ought to own, and she’d seen him on the beach with it.

When she saw him on the beach, she went the other way. She didn’t have what it took to be polite to strangers any more.

Thanks to her binoculars, she’d seen his head hang low on his chest when the rescue plan had failed, and she felt a pang of sorrow at having been so nasty to him the time they’d met. He did care about the whale, after all.

‘You know, I think I might have another muffin,’ Beth decided. ‘I’ve been reading up on pregnancy food and muffins are really good for giving you your energy back. Milk’s good too, I’m drinking lots of milk. And then maybe we’ll go and see Lily. I don’t want to stay too long,’ Beth confided. ‘I don’t know if I could cope with it. I don’t think it would be good for the baby if I got upset, but I need to say goodbye to her.’

‘OK,’ said Anneliese, feeling her heart break. She didn’t want Lily to go. But everything was changing in her life and it was as if she had no power to prevent it all.

She thought of the whale, lost in the bay, life ebbing out of her every day, and thought that it might be quite nice to dive in and sink to the bottom with the whale.

‘Mrs Kennedy,’ said Dr Whelan, looking up from his writing as she entered the surgery. ‘What can I do for you?’

‘A lobotomy,’ Anneliese said easily. ‘I just need a bit off. A trim, so to speak. It would be nice if you could do that with brains, take out the tricky, difficult bits, like removing split ends.’

The doctor put down his pen. He was younger than she was, which Anneliese liked. Younger doctors were always up to speed on the latest treatment. Old Dr Masterson had been a nightmare when it came to talking about depression. Despite the alphabet of letters after her name, she was one of the ‘pull yourself together’ merchants who felt that depression was entirely controllable by thinking happy thoughts. Anneliese had ended up moving to another doctor in the centre of town rather than visit her, but then Dr Whelan had come along. He’d been in Tamarin for ten years and in that time, Anneliese had visited him twice over her depression. He’d been friendly, helpful and kind. But none of these things made it any easier to discuss her problems with him.

If Anneliese felt like a failure because her head was flattened by this black dog in her mind, then it was hard to convince herself that he would feel any different.

‘Lobotomies aren’t much in demand nowadays,’ he replied, falling into the same light manner she’d used. ‘Certainly not on an out-patient basis,’ he added. ‘What’s wrong, Mrs Kennedy?’

Anneliese closed her eyes. She hated this, hated it. Being the supplicant in the surgery, having to ask for help.

‘I’m depressed,’ she said. The desire to burst into tears was dampened down by the tranquilliser she’d taken before she’d driven there. It was her last one. ‘I need to go back on antidepressants.’

Damn Edward and that bloody bitch for making her have to do this.

‘Is there any particular reason?’ Dr Whelan asked, joking manner gone.

The little white tablet gave up the ghost and the tears came.

Half an hour later, Anneliese had a prescription for the antidepressant that had worked for her before, along with a short-term script for an anti-anxiety drug to tide her over until the big boys began to work.

‘Come and talk to me anytime, please,’ Dr Whelan said kindly as she’d left, trying to mop up her red eyes before she headed back into the reception area.

‘Thank you,’ said Anneliese, knowing that she wouldn’t. She felt as if nothing could help her, even the various tablets he’d prescribed. They were short-term things. She wanted a guarantee of happiness and she didn’t know if that was possible any more.

At home, she made herself some tea, took one of the anti-anxiety drugs, and lay down on her bed. Her head ached from all the crying. Perhaps if she had a little rest, she’d have the energy to get up and cook dinner for herself, Beth and Marcus. They were going home the following morning and had been at the hospital with Lily that afternoon, giving Anneliese a chance to make her secret trip to Dr Whelan. She hadn’t told Beth how she felt and Beth hadn’t asked.

It was understandable: Beth wanted to protect her unborn child from stress. Any mother would do the same. But still, Anneliese felt a part of her ache inside at this evidence of her daughter’s ability to shut out other people’s pain.

Beth didn’t want to deal with her mother crying and alone, so she simply didn’t deal with it.

Lying down with several pillows cushioning her and the duvet loosely over her, Anneliese looked around the room. Maybe she should sell up. It was a beautiful cottage but it held too many memories for her now. It wasn’t as if she could redecorate it and make it different. As a beach cottage, it was perfect the way it was, all bleached wood, white walls and pale blue detailing. No, she couldn’t decorate it and change it. Selling was the only option. She ought to talk to Edward about it – well, talk to Edward’s lawyer. That would be next she supposed: his lawyer talking to her lawyer. She didn’t have a lawyer. There hadn’t been much call in her life for legal help, but she’d have to get one now. Not from Tamarin, of course. Even if the lawyer was the very model of discretion, still Anneliese winced at the thought of somebody local knowing everything about her and Edward’s break-up.

She could imagine it. Nell, sitting in a lawyer’s office, crouched like a witch on her chair, saying: ‘No, Edward, make sure you get half of everything – more than half.’

Anneliese shuddered. She’d get a lawyer in Waterford and let them deal with it. She’d say she wanted it done as simply and cleanly as possible, like amputation. Cut the limb off, cauterise it and walk away. But where would she go then? Would she stay in Tamarin? If Lily wasn’t there, she probably wouldn’t and Lily might not survive.

It had been over a week since her stroke and it was time to face facts. Lily might never come back and the more Anneliese visited her, the more she thought that Lily was getting older and frailer and more distant in the bed.

She could move to Dublin to be close to Beth and Marcus and her beautiful grandchild, but that might be crowding Beth; it wouldn’t be fair.

Her family home had been the other side of Waterford, but her parents were long dead and her brothers and sisters were scattered all around the country and the globe. There was no one place to call home any more, except Tamarin. When she’d married Edward, Anneliese had made this place her home.

God, the tablets were great, she thought sleepily. They allowed her mind to roam into areas she’d previously locked off. Which had to be good – or was it bad?

She closed her eyes, allowed herself to stop thinking about what she’d do next, and somehow she fell asleep.

The sound of a car crunching up on the stones on the drive woke her up. Beth was back. She should have been cooking and she’d fallen asleep. Blast it.

She threw back the duvet and looked out of the window, only there were two cars parking, Beth and Marcus’s car and Edward’s.

Anneliese’s chest tightened. She couldn’t cope with Edward right now. Clearly this was some idea of Beth’s to bring him here and make him talk to Anneliese. But Edward and Anne-liese didn’t want to talk to each other. They’d had two weeks to do it and neither of them had so much as picked up a phone to speak to the other. There was simply nothing to be said and too much pain would emerge during the saying of that nothing.

Anxiously, Anneliese pulled on her sweatshirt and jeans.

‘Mum,’ said Beth from the door of the bedroom. ‘Mum, I know you’re not going to like this, but…’

‘I saw your father’s car,’ Anneliese said. ‘Beth, this isn’t a good idea.’

‘Mum, please.’ Beth came into the room and sat on the bed. ‘Please.’

‘I’m not able for this.’

‘But talking is good, Mum, and you haven’t spoken to each other since he left, Dad told me.’

‘So?’ snapped Anneliese, feeling suddenly angry. ‘What is there to talk about? That he’s sorry and can we all be friends and do this amicably? I can guess what he wants to talk to me about, and I don’t want to listen. Once upon a time, he told me he loved me, and all the time he was involved with Nell. So frankly, I’m not interested in anything your father has to tell me.’

Beth looked taken aback. Anneliese knew she should apologise. It wasn’t her daughter’s fault, after all, and she never spoke to Beth like that, but she was fed up with considering everyone else’s feelings before her own. That was the old Anneliese.

‘Beth,’ said Anneliese firmly, ‘I do not want to talk to your father. Now get him out of my house.’

‘Please, Mum.’ Beth’s eyes filled up with tears.

She looked so forlorn and Anneliese knew at that moment that she’d have to go down to talk to Edward.

‘How did you get him here?’ she asked.

‘I told him to do it for me. He didn’t want to come, but I know if the two of you would just talk to each other, it would help.’

Anneliese raised her eyes to heaven. She knew that Edward, like herself, could never deny their daughter anything. Even now when Anneliese couldn’t bear the thought of being in the same room as Edward, she knew she would endure that because it would make Beth happy.

Nobody else would be able to make her do it. They were hardly at the family-mediation stage, unless mediation involved throwing kitchen implements and screaming blue murder. Oh well, she’d talk to him for five minutes, that was all. Anneliese glanced at herself in the mirror. Her hair was wild and her face tired. She looked like she looked when she came in from a wild, windy walk on the beach, except that then she might have some glow in her cheeks and now she just looked drained. There was no point primping or beautifying. Edward had gone. He’d hardly come back just because she was wearing lipstick.

‘I’m ready,’ she said.

‘But your hair…’ began Beth.

‘My hair’s ready too,’ said Anneliese grimly.

Downstairs, Edward was standing just inside the front door, looking anxious. Sitting down on one of the armchairs was Marcus, looking more anxious. Anneliese was very fond of her son-in-law. He was kind and gentle as well as being a clever, thoughtful man. He probably thought it was an appalling idea to see his in-laws turning out-law and screaming at each other in the same room, but Marcus was another one who would do anything for Beth. She’d undoubtedly twisted his arm too to make him go along with this crackpot plan.

‘Do you want to come in?’ Anneliese said to her husband.

‘I wanted to wait until you invited me in properly,’ Edward said formally.

‘I think the time for formality is over,’ she snapped.

Edward sat on the edge of the armchair opposite Marcus.

‘Come on, darling – let’s go for a walk on the beach,’ said Beth, grabbing Marcus and hauling him to his feet.

‘Yeah, sure. We’ll be just outside if you need us,’ Marcus said, shooting anguished looks at both Edward and Anneliese.

Anneliese felt the faint stirrings of a grin.

‘I’m not going to kill him,’ she said reassuringly. ‘I’ll just rough him up a little bit, OK?’

Beth hustled Marcus out of the front door before he could respond to this.

‘I’m really sorry about my turning up, Anneliese,’ said Edward, still formal. ‘It’s just, Beth insisted.’

‘I know,’ said Anneliese. ‘I understand, not your fault.’

‘You’re being very magnanimous,’ Edward said.

‘I’m not magnanimous at all,’ Anneliese replied. ‘I’m just tired and I don’t have the energy for gilding the lily. We’re here because we love Beth, she’s pregnant and we don’t want to upset her.’

‘Isn’t it wonderful news,’ Edward said eagerly and then stopped, as if he suddenly remembered that they weren’t normal would-be grandparents discussing their imminent grandchild. Anneliese thought the same thing.

She’d allowed herself to think about how she and Edward would react to the news that Beth was having a baby and this scenario had never figured in her imaginings.

‘It is wonderful,’ Edward went on, ‘that something nice is coming out of all of this.’

‘You talk like there has just been a natural disaster and none of us are responsible for it,’ Anneliese snapped. ‘There’s nothing natural about it at all. You cheated on me, left me for Nell. Nell! For God’s sake, how could you do that, Edward? Nell was our friend. I used to feel guilty inviting her over all the time, in case you were fed up of there being a third wheel at dinner. How stupid of me: you loved having her here. I was probably the one you wanted to get rid of.’

‘No, it wasn’t like that,’ Edward said.

‘Well, what was it like? You know, now that you’re here, you can answer some questions.’

She sat on the edge of one of the chairs opposite him and glared at him.

‘When did you start screwing my friend? Please tell me – not that I expect you’re going to tell me the truth,’ she went on. ‘Because you won’t, will you? That’s one of the rules of infidelity, isn’t it?’

‘No,’ he said.

‘Yes,’ she argued. ‘You make it sound like it was only going on five minutes and then, eventually, I’ll learn you’ve been together months, years, so that everything I thought was real wasn’t real at all. Talk about a recipe for making someone go mad. That’s what I keep doing, Edward: thinking of the past and what bits were real and what bits involved you faking happiness so you could spend more time with Nell.’

Anneliese slipped into the seat properly. She’d intended to sit on the edge in case she wanted to run out of the room because she couldn’t stand to look at him any longer, but the weariness came over her again.

‘Were you together at Beth’s wedding, for example?’

‘No,’ he shouted.

‘Well, when then? Christmas?’

He didn’t answer.

‘OK,’ said Anneliese. ‘Christmas then: you were together at Christmas. So when before Christmas did it start? Just tell me, so that I can draw a line under the time you were with her and remember the memories before that, because they were real. I hope they were real.’

Another thought occurred to her. Had there been somebody else, other women? A man who could cheat once, could have cheated before.

‘Was there anyone else, before Nell?’

‘No,’ he said. ‘There was never anyone else. I wish you didn’t think that of me –’

‘You mean you wish I didn’t think badly of you,’ Anneliese interrupted. ‘How can I not think badly of you, Edward? You cheated on me. If our marriage was so terrible, you should have told me. You could have given me a choice. But you didn’t. You played a game, where you stayed with me and waited for someone else to come along.’

That was one of the biggest injuries, she realised with stunning clarity. Instead of walking away from their marriage, he’d waited, thoughtfully watching. ‘Is that what you did?’ she demanded. ‘Waited, while looking around for someone, and Nell just happened to fit the bill?’

‘It wasn’t like that,’ he said. He leaned forward and put his head in his hands. ‘It wasn’t like that at all. You were…’

‘Oh, my fault again, right,’ said Anneliese bitterly. ‘I behaved in a particular way or I wasn’t what you wanted, and that’s why you had to look elsewhere.’

‘No,’ his voice was getting harsher. ‘I’m not saying it’s your fault. I’m saying we, we as a couple, had drifted apart, that’s all. I was vulnerable.’

‘Vulnerable to what?’ she demanded. ‘Vulnerable to Nell boosting your ego, telling you how fabulous you were?’

He flushed and she sensed that she’d made a direct hit. ‘That’s not a relationship, Edward. That sounds like something schoolgirls do. You’re so wonderful, Edward, why don’t you leave your boring wife to live with me? You know what, I wish you happiness.’

She pushed herself off the seat. She didn’t want to sit in the same room as him any more, there was no point. He wasn’t going to answer any of the questions she needed answers to, and this was too raw to talk about. She’d been doing it for Beth and, in truth, if Beth had understood either of them better, she wouldn’t have pushed them into this.

‘Edward, why don’t you go. We have nothing to say to each other.’

He got to his feet obediently. ‘I’m so sorry about Lily,’ he said. ‘I know it must be terrible for you. I know how much you loved her.’

‘Don’t talk about her like she’s already dead,’ snapped Anneliese, ‘because she’s not.’

The look Edward shot her was of pity. Anneliese turned around and went upstairs into her bedroom, slamming the door. She heard a car door bang shut and then the sound of tyres on the drive as Edward drove away.

Two weeks ago, Edward had been everything to her. They’d spent hours together, happy, content in each other’s company, or so she’d thought. Except that they hadn’t been happy, apparently. If it hadn’t been for a simple migraine that made her come home unexpectedly, she mightn’t have ever known that. The randomness and powerlessness of life hit her again. Why had she been so stupid as to think she had any control of her own life, because she didn’t.