‘Really? You don’t have weekend plans?’ she asks.
‘I was going to be in London but not any more, so I’m around. It’d be good to do something wholesome for a change.’ Dennis stirs underneath Jonny’s chair as Jonny keeps talking. ‘I warn you though, I’m only good for donkey work – moving boxes, driving, that sort of thing. I can’t do any sales chat at all and I’ll only accept payment as long as it’s fruit-and sugar-based, sealed in a jar.’
Dennis pulls himself out from under Jonny’s chair and rests his big bear head on his master’s lap.
Cassie glances over at her husband; he’s telling Nicky about Jamie, a monosyllabic solicitor friend of his who’s single. She hears Jack suggesting an after-work drink in London when he’s next up, so he can introduce Nicky to Jamie. He’s always trying to fix things, find solutions for people. Jack feels Cassie looking at him, and turns away from Nicky to smile, his lopsided, adorable smile at his wife. Cassie feels her insides warm.
She turns back to Jonny, and watches his Adam’s apple bob as his throat swallows more wine. Jonny’s help would be a neat solution to her little problem.
‘You’re sure you don’t mind?’
‘No, like I said, it’ll be good to be helpful. So it’s a fete, right?’
Cassie nods. ‘Brace yourself, it’ll be all purple rinses and tea cosies.’ She picks up her wine. ‘The café in the park is doing cream teas and using my jam so they said I could have a stall, sell a few jars at the spring fete, just to see how it goes. I thought I may as well. You know, get involved in the village and all that.’ Maybe, she hopes quietly, in a few months she’ll be selling paintings as well as jams.
Jack and Nicky’s conversation has lulled, and Jack leans forward across the table and says, ‘Did I just hear you getting an offer for help with the fete, Cas?’
Cassie nods and smiles at her husband as he keeps talking.
‘Funny, I’d had the same thought.’ To Jonny, Jack says, ‘Thanks, mate, that’s good of you.’
‘Don’t mention it,’ Jonny says, shrugging and scratching Dennis behind his ear.
Cassie had been prepared for making friends to take a while. In fact, after London it was a relief to have the peace and time to paint, to enjoy being a newlywed, but she feels it’s now probably time to make some sort of an effort. She doesn’t want to piss anyone off, so it’s good she doesn’t have to cancel.
Jack has stood up from the table and come to stand behind Cassie.
She didn’t notice, so she flinches as she feels his hands rest on her shoulders.
‘Cas, it’s too sweet!’ Nicky says, smiling across the table at her friend. ‘Honestly, less than two years ago you were partying in Brixton, and now you’re selling your jams at the village fete!’
‘I know, who would’ve thought it?’ Cassie says, smiling back at her friend. Above her, Jack kisses the top of her head.
‘I’m sure Cas is secretly writing a book: From Brixton to Buscombe: An Odyssey,’ Jack jokes.
Jonny laughs and Cassie slaps Jack’s hand.
‘It’s my gypsy blood,’ she says with pomp in her voice. ‘I’m very versatile. I can make a home wherever I go.’
Jack kisses her on the head again. ‘I know you can, my lovely gypsy.’
Cassie, emboldened by wine, bends her head back to kiss Jack full on the lips. In her peripheral vision sees Nicky’s smile fade and the same flicker in her expression Cassie saw earlier in the shed, and she pulls away from Jack, because something feels wrong. She shouldn’t kiss Jack in front of Nicky like that; it feels too much like showing off, especially as Nicky so wants to meet someone.
Dennis starts wagging his tail, noticing the shift in the atmosphere. He barks and Jonny stands up from the table, his wine glass almost empty.
‘Right, I think Dennis is telling me it’s time to go home for a walk.’ He looks at Cassie. ‘Give me a call in the week and let me know what time you need me on Saturday, I’m free all day.’ Jonny gives Cassie and Nicky a kiss goodbye on their cheeks, thanking them for lunch, and he hugs Jack in the brief, slapping way men do.
Cassie watches Jonny walk away across the lawn, Dennis jogging by his feet. He takes his car keys out of his pocket just before he turns around the front of the cottage. He shouldn’t be driving after all that wine, but no one else seems to notice and Cassie reminds herself that the rules are different in the country. Jack carries some dirty glasses into the kitchen, asking who wants coffee and Nicky starts stacking the plates on top of each other. Cassie takes another sip of wine, feeling it slide, silky around her mouth and she’s not sure why but as she listens to the sound of Jonny driving away she shudders, cold suddenly.
‘Oh, someone must have walked over your grave,’ Nicky says, turning away from Cassie towards the kitchen, a pile of plates in her hands.
Cassie smiles at the old schoolground superstition. She hasn’t heard it in years. Typical Nicky to remember these things.
Cassie shakes again, harder this time, the spring chill spreading into her bones, and she thinks that Nicky’s wrong. It doesn’t feel as though whoever it is strolling around in the future is walking over her grave; it feels like they’ve stopped and they’re standing on it.
7
Alice
By 4.38 a.m. resisting the urge to get up is more exhausting than still being awake. I gently move David’s arm from around my waist and pad to the little alcove desk he grandly calls ‘The Office.’
I love the bottomless peace of early morning; it reminds me of sitting with Frank. The chime of the computer as I turn it on is a shock in the silence, and my fingers freeze over the keyboard. What should I search for? I type ‘Woman, coma, pregnant’ into the search bar. The words look crazy together, but I think of the scan image, remember what I saw, and bite my lip and smile as I press search.
There are two reported cases, both in America. One of the women – Tiffany Prescot in Phoenix, Arizona – had been in a head-on collision. She was sixteen weeks at the time. The baby, a little boy called Noah, was delivered naturally for fear the drugs used for a caesarean at that time would harm Tiffany. A comatose mother giving birth naturally doesn’t sound possible, but Noah is the proof. He’s now four years old and living with his older sister and father. Tiffany died last year. Her heart, already weak before the accident, withered and fragile, finally disintegrated after his birth.