My bedroom was a tortured sanctuary. I wanted to seal off the door and windows and turn it into a coffin, like the one my little boy lay in, deep underground.
Days had passed before I could even stand up unaided by Simon. Each time I tried it alone, the ground swayed beneath me and I’d go back to my bed dizzy and defeated. The phone rang so often that he unplugged it from the wall socket so it didn’t disturb me.
I’d hear the muffled voices of friends stopping by with food parcels and offers of support, or to take the children out of our mausoleum to play with their friends. I was glad when they were out of the house because it meant they were safer than when they were with me.
But I couldn’t stop them from quietly opening my bedroom door, crawling under the quilt and curling their warm bodies around mine. I’d wrap my arms around them and hold them tight before I realised what I was doing, then I’d reject their love and send them away. They were too young to understand why their mummy didn’t want to be with them. It was for their own good: I didn’t deserve them.
Simon became both mum and dad and told them that, although I was very sad, I still loved them and I’d come out of my room when I was ready. But until then, they had to be patient.
Throughout Billy’s funeral, Simon had never let go of me, holding my head against his shoulder as my mascara melted into the lapels of his jacket. And when we arrived home, he let me stay in our bed for weeks without complaining.
I always felt worse when I woke up than when I tried getting to sleep. Because for the first few seconds of consciousness, I’d forget what had happened. Then it would all come flooding back to me and the grieving process would start again from scratch.
When I tried to focus on anything else, I’d recall the moment I found Billy’s body and it hijacked all other thoughts. Some nights I was convinced I could hear him crying, and on motherly instinct I’d jump out of bed and be by the door before realising I was hallucinating.
My body and mind operated separately. My head knew I’d lost him, but my breasts punished me further by continuing to produce milk.
I missed Billy’s babyness and longed for the cherished droop of his head on my shoulder as he slept. I missed wiping the sleep caught in his eyelashes. I missed how he’d made me feel like a woman again after what Dougie had done to me.
No matter how much Simon tried to reassure me it had just been a terrible, terrible accident, deep in his heart he must have hated me. How could he not? I did.
12 April
Simon’s support never ended, but no amount of reassurance was enough. I even took my self-loathing out on him, blaming him for not being in the bathroom where I’d expected him to be.
But he never took the anger he must have felt out on me. He dealt with his grief in his own stoic way. And he was always there for me when I needed to roar or bawl. He was the perfect husband.
I’d always said Billy had the smell of pink roses about him. So Simon dug up a patch of land under the kitchen window and planted six rose bushes there. It was a place where I later grew to find peace, by just sitting near or inhaling through the open window while I washed the dishes. It was just what I needed for my healing to begin.
22 October
When I was so completely, utterly empty and there were no tears left to fall and nothing left of myself to hate, there was only one direction left for me to go.
So I gradually opened my eyes and allowed myself to slowly fill up with the love that had surrounded me for months, but that I’d shunned.
The love from my family; the love from my friends; but mostly, the love from my husband.
SIMON
Northampton, twenty-six years earlier
3 January
I paused under the architrave behind Robbie and James, riveted by the pain that forced her body into awkward angles as she endeavoured to bring life to a little body for the second time in fourteen months.
Billy lay wet and motionless on the floor; his eyes held their sparkle but his body was lifeless. I’d often caught myself looking into them and wondering what they saw when they looked back at me.
It was the second time I’d been in the bathroom in the space of a few minutes.
When she’d called me to keep an eye on him, I’d been in Emily’s bedroom helping to dry her hair after her bath. I heard Catherine’s muffled conversation behind our bedroom door as I made my way to the bathroom. Billy was playing with his smiley-faced boat when he saw me and offered a gummy grin. I gave him nothing.
I watched him throw the boat too far to reach with ease, and he looked at me, expecting me to sail it back. I didn’t move. Frustrated, his arms, still just doughy rolls of skin, reached out to bring it closer. When he failed again, he clambered to his feet, holding the sides of the bath with his hands for support. Then, as he shuffled along, he lost his footing and slipped, spinning as he went down and smacking the side of his head on the tap and then again on the brutally hard porcelain. As I watched, his body came to rest face down in the water.
After a long, still moment, he startled me by lurching to life, arching his back and trying to force himself free of the water, but when he opened his mouth to scream, it filled with water and bubbles. His arms flapped as he tried to prop himself up but he possessed neither the strength nor the coordination to push himself back up.
And then I waited for the inevitable.
I remained stationary, as almost two years of fogginess began to clear.
I knew what I was supposed to do, what anyone with an ounce of humanity would have done. But I was no longer that person. Catherine had drained me of my compassion and left a cold, cold man in his place. Billy and I were both her victims.
My reaction was the fault of Billy’s abhorrent chromosomes. And I couldn’t live with him in my home, pretending to be like those I loved any longer. So I watched as he slowly and quietly drowned; the helpless leaving the helpless to flounder in a fight only one of us could win.
As the last bubble of air left his lungs and bathwater seeped in, I glided out of the room as quietly as I’d arrived.
18 January
In the weeks following Billy’s death, I would lie with Catherine in the darkened cocoon she’d created in our bedroom, listening to her agony until she fell asleep. Then I would replay the moments in my head that had destroyed her.
‘Oh God,’ she’d repeated after yelling my name. ‘Oh God, oh God.’
I’d run along the corridor and stood behind Robbie, James and Emily as the consequences of my inaction became clear. I panicked, and needed to take back what I’d allowed to happen. I pushed the boys out of the way and began CPR, attempting to take back the madness of those five minutes and to repair my damage.