‘Hang on – didn’t you say someone approached Sandrine in the street? She must have given you a description?’
I shake my head. ‘It was dark, they were wearing a hoodie and had a scarf up over their face. She wasn’t even sure if they were male or female. I also fell out badly with one of the NCT girls on Tuesday: she heard me bitching about her to Ed – I accidentally rang her – but unfortunately also overheard me discussing my cheating on Ben. She’s gone a bit nuts about the whole thing, firing off intense emails to our group of friends left, right and centre. It’s possible she could have already found, and contacted, Ben before I had a chance to block her on Facebook, which lends some weight to Ed’s other theory that this is Ben’s doing.’
‘What?’ Laurel says sharply. ‘Ben? That’s actually offensive. Ben would NEVER do anything like that, even if he had found out you’d been having an affair with Beth’s teacher. If Ed is coming out with crap like that, I’m not surprised you’ve left him.’
I pause. ‘I haven’t left him, Lau. I just refused to stay in the house after finding the broken knife, and he equally refused to leave.’
‘Well, given he’s behaving so oddly perhaps he ought to be careful we don’t start thinking this is in fact all his doing,’ she snaps. ‘I can’t believe he suggested Ben would torment you in such a cruel way for finding out you had a fling nearly twenty years ago. I think that says a lot more about him than he realises.’ She picks up her tea.
I sigh. She’s known Ben so long, I know why she’s defensive, but equally, this isn’t fair to Ed. ‘It’s not as simple as that. He has good reason to think that it might be Ben.’
‘Like what?’ Laurel says immediately. ‘You couldn’t find a nicer, kinder man than Ben! He’s one of the good guys, the kind that set the bar impossibly high for other men.’
I have no right to feel this way, but her words start to prickle me. I do know that; he was my husband. ‘That’s true, Lau. But even the nicest person has their limits.’ The whisky is loosening my tongue.
‘I’m sorry, Jess, but it’s been a long time since you saw Ben. I see him often now socially and he’s happy. Really happy. He doesn’t think about you any more… well, not like that. If he did find out you’d had an affair, I’m sure he’d be hurt, but it would hardly be the end of his world. He’s moved on.’
‘He wasn’t Beth’s father.’
My blurted words have the desired effect – Laurel instantly pales and for a brief second I am the triumphant victor – but it is the cheapest of thrills and I want to claw the words back the moment they have left my mouth.
‘Simon?’ she breathes, and I nod.
‘Oh, Jess…’ She puts her hands to her mouth. ‘You told Ben… you let him believe…’ she trails off and stares at me.
I have to look away, as the pendulum swings back and I begin to see myself through her eyes.
‘All this time you’ve let him think he was mourning a daughter that was never actually his?’
‘She was his daughter, in every way except one. She is his daughter,’ I say fiercely. ‘She loved him, and he loved her.’
‘That’s true, but you’ve also told him a lie that he’s been living with all this time.’ She puts down her tea.
‘I did it to protect Ben. It would have devastated him to find out after she’d gone that there was a chance he wasn’t her father – but anyway, I don’t know for certain, and to have no possibility of conclusively knowing one way or the other… I couldn’t do that to him.’
‘So instead you thought you’d wait seventeen years and let a stranger tell him?’
‘I’m actually terrified at the thought of that,’ I admit. ‘I’ve spent years preventing that happening by keeping it secret – I didn’t even tell you – but in the last couple of days, the number of other people who know the truth has gone from two to nine. It was just Simon and Ed, and now thanks to my friend, Natalia, my whole NCT group knows.’
‘And Ed thinks one of them might have contacted Ben, who – insane with fresh grief – has decided to make it clear he now knows everything by exacting some kind of revenge for what you’ve put him through?’
‘Pretty much.’
‘You wanted to protect him…’ she repeats slowly. ‘You didn’t think he had a right to know the truth?’
‘Of course I did! But Laurel, nothing is that black and white.’ I sit forward with energy. ‘You cannot understand what it’s like to lose a child unless it happens to you. It’s every pain you have ever felt turned up so loud you can’t think, move, speak – and nothing drowns out the agony, not even for a second. It’s what annihilation actually means. Even breathing hurts.’ My voice begins to crack. ‘You wanted me to confess to Ben when he was like that? You weren’t there; you didn’t hear the sound he made in the hospital when I had to tell him. You think I should have taken away the one truth that he had left, that he was her dad? Because he was her dad!’ I am now crying. ‘More so than Simon ever was. Ben was the one who was there for Beth when Simon stayed with Louise, and you know what? If Beth was only going to get five years on this planet, I’m glad – I’m GLAD I gave her the love of a father like Ben, and I know he would feel the same. So don’t lecture me on rights.’
Laurel looks down at her feet while I wipe my eyes with shaking hands and clear my throat.
‘Is that why you’re here then,’ she says after a moment more. ‘To find out if he knows the truth, and if not – tell him before someone else does?’
I shake my head. ‘I came here because I knew we’d be safe. I was only thinking of James, and my duty of care to Sandrine. I didn’t consider Ben.’
She snorts lightly and gets to her feet, bending to pick up her coat, keys, and phone. ‘You need to tell him, Jess.’
‘You’re going?’ I say in astonishment.
‘I have to get back to the kids. School tomorrow and all that.’
‘Please don’t go like this,’ I beg. ‘You of all people – I thought you’d understand.’
‘You just told me I won’t ever understand!’
‘Oh come on, you know what I meant.’
‘I actually don’t. Of course I’m sorry that you’ve had such a horrendous week, and that you can’t call the police, and you don’t feel safe. I don’t know what to say about Ed’s mistake – if you can even call it that.’
I feel cold to my bones with sudden fear. ‘You won’t tell anyone, will you? PLEASE, Laurel, he could go to prison. We’d lose everything.’
‘I won’t tell anyone about that. I promise. But I really have to go now. And for what it’s worth, I’d stake my house on it not being Ben that’s done this to you.’ She leans over and kisses me briefly. ‘Take care.’
Take care? I watch incredulously as she lets herself out of the room and walks down the hall, opens the front door and then quietly shuts it behind her.
Dad reappears as I’m staring at the flames of the fire wondering how that all just happened, and sits down on his chair.
He looks at my fresh tearstains and passes me a tissue from his pocket.
‘I’m so sorry, Jess. I can’t believe I was so stupid,’ he says as I’m wiping my eyes. ‘When you said this trouble was all down to a blast from the past, I assumed you meant a man, and then I went and just let Laurel in without so much as a second thought. It never occurred to me you might have been talking about her.’
‘Oh, she’s not who I’ve been having problems with.’ I rub my eyes tiredly. ‘She’s not happy with me, but she’d never do anything to deliberately hurt me. Don’t worry, Dad, you didn’t do anything wrong.’
* * *