She barely cried as I hugged her and cleaned her up, but I bawled.
I cried because she might have ended up with a tiny scar—little lips are so fragile. I cried because Jim would be upset and we would probably have a clipped exchange of cross words, and that always unnerved me. But mostly I cried because we had been having so much fun. And I’d felt so free.
To my surprise, we hadn’t had cross words when Jim came home. That evening he’d scooped her up to brush her teeth, noticed Violet’s lip and asked me the story. After listening, stroking her hair while I told the story, he’d gone off to do bedtime. I’d heard him ask her to tell the story again as they disappeared up the stairs. “We were dancing, Daddy. It was funny…”
A little later, Jim had come back downstairs. “Nice bedtime,” he’d said. Then he’d put the television on and got some papers out for work.
And a few months later, there it was on the list. He hadn’t believed my version of events—or hers. Number seven: the blood.
ROBIN|PRESENT DAY
The Magpies had been fighting a lot recently. It seemed worse at weekends, their house turning into a pressure cooker. The little boy seemed to know when to clear out of the way—just as Robin and her sister had as kids—but the flare-ups were getting more frequent.
Perhaps, Robin thinks, Mr. Magpie needs a little help to see what’s going on under his nose. To shake his cheating wife loose so he could get on with parenting his kid. Right now, they were feuding in a directionless, painful circle. Far better to cut it at the root, cleanly. The longer it goes on, the less healthy everyone becomes, as Robin knows all too well. The last time she tried to steer the course away from disaster, it had been ham-fisted and messy, the results catastrophic. This time would be precise.
She’d ordered a gift to arrive when she knew they would both be home. Something for Mrs. Magpie, to encourage Mr. Magpie to ask some tricky questions. Underwear, something sexy but classy. Something that said “hotels and anticipation” rather than “thanks for the random bunk-up.” She’d dredged her memory for moments of desire, of being desired, and for the gift message had chosen: “The thought of your body in this drives me crazy, X.”
The email had just come through to the dummy address; the parcel had been signed for. Now Robin watches from behind the curtain as it is opened in the kitchen and the fight begins.
She sips her tea and wishes she could hear what was happening. She can see the little boy covering his ears in his bedroom, feels a pang of guilt.
But it hasn’t worked. There’s still an edge. Mr. Magpie hangs back away from his wife and accepts an awkward hug only briefly, but she’s still there. They’re still together. The champagne-colored silks have been put back in the box, bundled up. Robin knows without even checking that her card will be refunded in a few weeks, the box returned under the guise that it must have been intended for someone else.
Maybe he hadn’t asked the right questions or jumped to the right conclusions. Maybe he’d chosen to accept a flimsy lie over the painful truth. Either way, Mrs. Magpie got away with it again. The lies were deepening and Robin hadn’t saved them from the inevitable. Poor Mr. Magpie: it would only get worse.
FOURTEEN
SARAH|1991
After a few long weeks of not doing much, we finally get to meet up with Callum and his family. It’s halfway through the summer holidays, and Robin and I have been kicking about at the park or riding our bikes around the woods that curl round the back of our village. There’s a rumor that a farmer lives in the middle of the woods and he once mistook a child on a bike for a dog coming to eat his hens and that he shot the child dead. I used to be terrified of this, until Robin pointed out that no one telling the story ever knew the kid’s name, which was very suspicious, and anyway, if a farmer had done that, he’d be in prison right now.
Every time we go to the village playground I hope we’ll see Callum there but we never do. So we don’t get to play our intricate three-person games and have to make do with stunted versions. Sometimes, other kids from school come and we all squint into one another’s faces and bark out instructions for games or compete to see who can jump off the swing when it’s going the highest. It’s always Robin. I don’t know why anyone ever bothers going against her.
But today we’re finally doing something different. It’s a Friday, but Dad is home, which is weird, and he and Mum have been locked in their room all morning. When they come out, Mum is wearing one of her good dresses but she looks like she’s been crying. And, actually, Dad looks like he has been too. They squeeze each other’s hands, just a tiny squeeze when they don’t think I’m looking, and then we get into the car to drive to a beer garden in a nearby village.
We arrive and park up at the other side of the car park to the Grangers’ BMW, even though there are spaces nearby. We go through the wooden fence and into the garden, and I see that Callum is dressed in a shirt and jeans and has gel in his hair. He has a Coke and he’s taken the straw out and laid it next to his glass.
He looks at Robin, tries to catch her eye, but she’s too busy nagging Dad for a Coke and a bag of crisps to pay attention. He looks at me and for a moment we share a look that makes my tummy feel funny. I want to ask, “What? What is it?” but he bites his lip, sees his dad watching him and shrinks back down.
My mum and dad stand awkwardly at the table, while Robin and I clamber over the bench seat and wedge in next to Callum.
This means that Mum and Dad have to perch on either side of us, so without saying a word, there’s a big reshuffle among the adults and it ends up that Mum and Drew are sitting opposite us and Dad and Hilary have wedged in at either side of us kids.
“Are you okay?” I ask Callum. “You look a bit weird.”