Once I’m dry and tucked back up, I’m busy congratulating Lizzie (and Alex for passing the Ikea test) and thanking her for not cringing during my bath when, without warning, my vision goes black for a second. My burning eyes sing in relief, and then, as if nothing happened, Lizzie reappears, blurry but undeniably Lizzie, with the folder still open before her.
She looks up and smiles at me. ‘Hi, Mr Ashcroft,’ she says before she turns her head back to her folder.
What the fuck just happened?
My eyes start to burn again; I imagine tiny flames inside my pupil and then, without any force – my ten-tonne eyelids suddenly light as air – my vision goes black again as my lids slide down to meet each other.
Lizzie doesn’t even look up.
Lizzie, I blinked! I think I fucking blinked!
I can feel the flames in my eyes starting to lick again, and I think it’s my moment as Lizzie replaces my folder. I try and make myself ready, remember the rush of relief, the black, but, as Lizzie comes towards me with some damp cotton, my eyelids freeze.
Come on, Frank, do it now!
But it’s no good. I’ve fucked it. I’ve lost the sweet subtle point between trying and not trying and it’s as if my eyelids are glued open again. She pads my eyes with damp cotton as normal. For once I wish she’d shut up and just concentrate on me as she says in a voice gently taut with excitement, ‘Well, Mr Ashcroft, there’s some more wonderful news today. Alice said I could let you know that it’s a girl, Mr Ashcroft! Isn’t that wonderful? Cassie and Jack’s baby is a little girl!’
I try not to care. This was supposed to be my moment, but I can’t help it; a vision of Lucy naked and newly born comes to me and then without warning my eyelids slide down, slow, amphibian. I have a moment of thick, blissful darkness before my eyes pop open to a view of the blank magnolia ceiling where Lizzie’s head was less than two seconds earlier.
Goddamn it, Lizzie, look at me!
But she’s off doing something else now, fiddling around with my bedside unit, her voice leaping octaves as she tells me about her auntie.
‘She had loads of miscarriages, the baby just wouldn’t stay until she had a little girl. My mum said all those babies she lost were probably little boys until she became pregnant with Sacha. Little girls are tougher,’ she says, finally turning towards me, with a smile, proud to be a member of the fairer, tougher sex.
Here we go!
But I see her head turn away just before I blink again, and she says, ‘Cheerio, Mr Ashcroft.’ The sound of her walking away is like a pin bursting my bubble.
I blink a few more times throughout the day, but without anyone to see, to confirm this is happening, I stop myself from getting too excited. It could be my imagination playing tricks.
Congratulations from the nurses trickle after Jack like a waterfall as he arrives for a visit. I wonder if he’s secretly a little disappointed; if he, like me, had been imagining kicking a football and playing with trucks and now the assumption of all that pink, the thought of bloody pretend tea parties, feels a bit lame, and not the story he’d pictured.
If I could I would tell him not to worry. Lucy had the best left foot of her whole year and there’s no love quite like that between father and daughter. I have a good view this evening. I watch him stroke Cassie’s hair, a habit he’s developed, before he places a hand on her stomach that is now undeniably a baby bump.
Looking towards her face, he says, ‘My little girl.’ He moves his hand round and round.
I’m not sure if he’s talking to Cassie or the baby before he sits back in the chair, places his rucksack on his knees and pulls out a small pile of colourful envelopes. He starts opening them one by one, glancing at the front briefly before showing them to Cassie and reading them out loud. I hear them all.
Some of them are formal, like they don’t know Cassie well – ‘With best wishes for a swift recovery, Alan and Cathy Jones’ – and others are more emotive: ‘I wish I could visit, Cas. You’re in my thoughts every moment. Sending you all my love.’ Jack’s not very good at reading out loud; he reads each card in the same monotone. He looks up at Cassie, every now and then, to say things about their friends: ‘That’s sweet of Beth’; and ‘Typical Sam, eh?’ A colourful paper pyre soon litters the area around his feet. He gathers the envelopes unceremoniously into a chaotic bundle before shoving them back in his bag.
He gives Cassie – and me – the daily update on his new life. He tells us it looks as though Jensen and Son are going to win the bid for the Brighton pub conversion Jack’s been working on when he’s not here at Kate’s. He leans forward and strokes Cassie’s hair back again, away from her forehead.
‘Mum says Maisie’s still sleeping with your scarf, love. She misses you. She’s eating better though. Mum said she had half a can of dog food last night, so that’s a good sign that she’s calming down, isn’t it?’
I hear Alice walk towards him. She pauses just outside Cassie’s area, behind Jack. She’s looking at him and biting her bottom lip. She’s nervous. It makes me nervous. My eyes burn and I blink again.
Over here Alice! Look!
Jack doesn’t turn towards her footsteps; he can’t hear her like I can.
‘Hi, Jack. A little girl! Congratulations!’
He stands as Alice approaches him and he opens his arms to her, smiling. He looks delighted as he pulls Alice into an awkward bear hug. She releases him before he lets her go.
‘It’s wonderful news; the father/daughter relationship is really special.’
Jack beams at her and she returns his smile, but it’s not the smile of the Alice I know. Jack doesn’t notice; he doesn’t know her like I do. She’s holding onto her smile. It looks effortful; she’s lost her natural way with him.
‘I was secretly hoping it was a little girl, to be honest. Cassie and I already picked a girl’s name.’
‘Oh, yes?’
Jack bends down close to Alice and says quietly, ‘We both always loved Freya. So she’s going to be Freya Charlotte April Jensen.’
‘Beautiful,’ Alice says.
She looks like she’s about to say goodbye when Jack says, ‘Actually, Alice, I’m glad I saw you. Can I have a minute?’
Alice reapplies her smile. ‘Of course, shall we go to the family room?’
Jack ignores her question, but he lowers his voice and turns his back towards Cassie, so he’s facing me, before he starts talking.
‘I don’t want to worry you unnecessarily, but I thought you should know that a guy called Marcus Garrett may try and visit Cassie.’
Alice keeps her eyes fixed on Jack’s face. She nods.
‘He married April, Cassie’s mum, just six months before April died.’
‘OK, so he’s Cassie’s stepdad?’
‘She never called him her stepdad.’ Jack shrugs. ‘She’s always found him difficult, but he completely broke down after April died and, to be honest, two and a half years later, he still acts like April died yesterday. He always made Cassie feel so guilty for moving on, for being happy.’
‘So he knows she’s here?’