“No.”
I pull an overnight bag from the cupboard and randomly fill it with clothes. I get dressed. I zip up my boots. I walk downstairs, out the front door, along the path. My keys fall out of my hand. I bend to pick them up. The circus is all around me—the cameras and reporters—shouting questions.
“Did you know about the affair?” someone yells.
“Are you leaving him?” asks another.
I can’t answer. I lock the car doors and push the ignition, sideswiping a police car and shattering the side mirror as I pull away. I don’t care. I’ll run them all down. They can lock me up and throw away the key, as long as they leave me alone.
AGATHA
* * *
My little boy is dying. I have known it for days, but have told myself that he’ll bounce back and grow stronger. Yes, he’s struggling, but all babies feel poorly sometimes. They go off their food, or run a temperature, or cry for no reason.
I have never feared anything for myself, not since I was a child, but I fear for Rory. What if I cannot protect him the way he should have been protected? What if I fail?
Last night I fell asleep next to his Moses basket. Waking stiff and cold, I reached out and touched Rory’s forehead. His tiny body was radiating heat. I wiped him down. I gave him medicine. I waited until he fell asleep before I shook uncontrollably, knowing it was happening again. I am losing someone I love. He is fading away, disappearing by degrees, ounce by ounce.
I come awake. It’s light outside. I’m alone in bed. Hayden must have risen earlier and left me sleeping. I go to Rory’s bed. His body is so pale and bloodless I catch my breath. Terrified, I extend my hand and brush my fingers over his chest. His lungs fill. His heart beats. He lives. Just.
The fever is still gripping him. I give him paracetamol and wipe him down. I let him hold my finger in his fist as I try to breathe for him, inhaling and exhaling.
He’s dying.
Not yet.
He needs a doctor.
I can’t.
Shrugging off my nightdress, I open my wardrobe and notice something different. My clothes have been moved—pushed aside at each end, exposing the rear shelves. The middle one has a blue box made of coated metal with a hinged lid and padlock. It contains a few scant mementos from the past—the bits worth keeping: a second-place prize certificate for handwriting, a spelling trophy, my birth certificate, an out-of-date passport, a handful of wedding photographs, and a strip of photo-booth prints showing me at age sixteen, sitting on the lap of a boy I liked, whose name I can’t remember.
The box is facing the wrong way. I look more closely and notice scratch marks in the paint where the hinges have been unscrewed and reattached.
I carry the box to the kitchen, where Hayden is eating a bowl of cereal.
“Have you been going through my stuff?”
“What stuff?”
“My box.”
“Why would I do that?”
“That box is private.”
“Why?”
“It just is.”
“I don’t like secrets.”
“It’s not secret, it’s private. Don’t you trust me?”
“You lied about being married, about your mother, about giving your coat to charity. You even lied about your age.” He points to the box. “I saw your birth certificate. You told me you were twenty-nine. You’re thirty-eight.”
“A woman is allowed to lie about her age,” I say, trying to sound lighthearted.
Hayden’s face is blank. He doesn’t find me funny anymore.
“I called that number you gave me for the midwife. It was a recorded message. She’s away until January.”
“That’s not my fault.”
I feel relieved but don’t let it show. It took me a day to think up that plan—buying a SIM card and recording a message using a voice-disguising app: “You have called the voicemail of Belinda Wallace of the Yorkshire Home Birth Service. I am out of the office until January seventh. Have a wonderful Christmas and New Year.”
Hayden hasn’t finished. “So I called your doctor—I found his number in your phone—but he didn’t know you were pregnant.”
“I stopped using him. Jules helped me register with her GP.”
“Right, that explains everything,” he says cynically.
I pretend he’s joking. “What is this, the Spanish Inquisition?”
“I’m not sure yet,” says Hayden, softening a little. “I want to believe you, Aggy, but I’m frightened of what you might have done . . . and who you’ve hurt.”
Standing barefoot on the floorboards, I begin to shake and I swallow a coppery taste that could be blood. Every sound is amplified. I hear the soft swish of traffic on the wet road outside and a District line train pulling into Putney Bridge station.
I glance around the kitchen at the teapot and the breakfast cereal and the milky bowl on the pine table. I have to tell him. I have to beg him to forgive me. We both love Rory. Neither of us wants to lose him. It can be our secret.
I begin talking but my mind doesn’t work because I’ve barely slept. What if he disagrees? What if he calls the police?
“I’m worried about Rory,” I say. “He’s not feeding. He’s hardly had anything since yesterday.”
Hayden doesn’t hesitate. His questions can wait. He goes to the bedroom, where Rory is lying on our bed, wedged between two pillows. His legs are forced apart by the size of his nappy and his weight loss looks even more severe.
Hayden touches his forehead. “He’s on fire.”
“But feel his hands and feet—they’re cold.”
“Wake up, baby,” he says, gently shaking Rory. His eyes flicker.
Hayden picks him up. Rory sags in his hands, his head rolling to one side.
“He’s gone all floppy.”
“He’s just tired.”
“No. He needs a doctor.”
“Or I could give him some more Calpol.”
“How much did he have to eat yesterday?”
“I give him what he wants. Sometimes he falls asleep before he finishes.”
“What’s the name of your new GP?”
“Let’s wait a little longer.”
“No, I want you to call the doctor.”
My mobile is on the kitchen table. I scroll through the contacts list and pretend to call a number.
“Is that Dr. Kneeble’s surgery?” I say, talking to nobody. “This is Agatha Fyfle . . . Yes, that’s right. Merry Christmas to you too. I had the baby a few weeks ago and he’s running a temperature.”
Hayden whispers loudly, “Tell him it’s serious.”
I cover the phone. “I’m talking to his receptionist.”
“You’re making it sound like nothing.”
I go back to the fake call. “He’s off his food and slept badly. Yes, I’ve done that . . . every four hours . . . I see. So you have nothing until then? OK. Put him down. His name is Rory Fyfle, no, I mean, Rory Cole. He’s sixteen days old.”
“When?” asks Hayden, as I hang up.
“Tomorrow.”
“What!”
“It’s the first available.”
“That’s too long.”
Hayden picks up his phone.
“What are you doing?”
“Calling Mum. She’ll know what to do.”
“No. He’ll be fine.” I grab at his arm. He shrugs me away.