I said nothing because I was certain that, if I opened my mouth to speak, I’d choke on my own tears.
‘But when I saw you today. When I saw you standing behind the bar that image popped and I realized I’d been deceiving myself. I’d been making up fantasies to avoid finding out for myself how you were.’ He cupped a hand to the side of my face and I nearly gasped as the warmth of his fingers flowed into my skin. ‘So, I’ll ask you now. I’ll ask you once and then I’ll never ask you again. And if you tell me yes I’ll walk away and never come back.’ He paused, ran his thumb over my lips and I tensed, waited for him to kiss me. Instead he let go of my face as though burnt. ‘Are you happy, Suzy? Are you happy, my darling?’
New, hot, desperate tears spilled onto my cheeks as I shook my head. ‘No.’
James leaned nearer. ‘Say that again.’
I shook my head again. ‘No. No, I’m not happy. I’ve never been more miserable. I’ve missed you. I still miss you. I miss you every night when I go to bed and every morning when I wake up.’
‘Oh Suzy.’ James gathered me into his arms and pressed my head against his chest. ‘Oh Suzy, my Suzy, my one true love. I’ll never let you go again. Never, never, never. I’ll never let you go.’
I kept my cheek pressed into his jumper and my arms around his waist for the longest possible time, only opening my eyes briefly as the sound of high heels click-clacking across the foyer floor filled the air and Maggie strode through the open double doors and disappeared onto the street. Then I closed my eyes again.
Chapter 20
‘Okay Charlotte, I’m just going to lift your nightdress to clean your legs.’
Two of the nurses – Kimberley and Chris – are giving Charlotte a wash when I arrive at the hospital. I offer to leave but they shake their heads and tell me they’re nearly done.
‘Now we’ll do your teeth.’
I watch as Kimberley gently parts Charlotte’s lips and inserts a white stick with a small, square pink sponge on the end, into her mouth. It reminds me of one of the penny sweets I’d buy as a child – a square chewy lolly on a stick.
‘Just wiping it around your mouth,’ Kimberley says as she leans over my daughter and gently manoeuvers the ‘toothbrush’ around the contours of Charlotte’s mouth. ‘And over your teeth and tongue.’
Oli was surprised when I told him that the nurses clean Charlotte’s teeth. ‘But she doesn’t eat anything?’ he said. ‘She’s drip fed, isn’t she?’ I told him it was for hygiene reasons. I didn’t mention the scent of death and decay and gingivitis that hits me sometimes if I kiss her on the lips. It’s a smell so rotten you have to hold your breath not to gag. Charlotte, who’s always been so fastidious about hygiene, would be devastated if she knew. Not that I’ll ever tell her. There are some things she never needs to know when she wakes up.
‘We’re just going to change your catheters and then you’re done,’ they tell Charlotte as they raise her blanket and reach beneath the bed. I instinctively avert my eyes, not because I’m squeamish but because I know how mortified she would be if she knew I’d watched the waste being removed from her body. Before her accident she wouldn’t even let me mention the word ‘nappy’ without throwing a cushion at me and forbidding me from talking about ‘gross stuff’ to do with her babyhood.
‘Okay, Sue?’ Kimberley nods at me as she pushes the trolley towards the door. ‘I’ll be back later. We can catch up.’
‘Hi Sue.’ Chris touches me softly on the forearm as he follows her. There’s compassion in his eyes, even though his tone can be brusque. I see it in the eyes of all the nurses, particularly the mothers. There but for the grace of God go I, and all that.
‘Thank you,’ I say as they leave the room, pulling the door to behind them. ‘Thank you so much.’
‘Hello darling.’ I pull up a chair so I’m sitting as close to Charlotte as I can. ‘Mummy’s here. How are you feeling today?’
I reach for her hand, press it to my lips and close my eyes. In a few minutes I’ll ask her about Grey’s nightclub and the footballer but I need to spend some quiet time with my child first. I need to know how she is.
‘Hello?’ I press the buzzer and peer up at the CCTV camera half a metre above my head. ‘I’m here to see Danny Argent.’
The door entry system crackles then falls silent again. I step back from the door and crane my neck upwards. The neon sign spelling out ‘Breeze’ over the door is grey and ugly without the fizz of electricity sparking it to neon life. I’ve never set foot in this nightclub – I haven’t set foot in any nightclub for over twenty years; James forbade me from going to bars or discos when we were together. They were meat markets where slags went for sex he said, not where monogamous people in relationships hung out. I tried telling him that my single friends weren’t slags and that I wasn’t going clubbing to cheat on him but to have fun and dance to the music. That’s when he reminded me about the conversation we had on our second date when I’d admitted to having five one-night stands. ‘You told me you met two of them in a nightclub, Sue,’ he’d said. There was nothing I could say to that.
A minute passes, then another and I buzz again. I’m starting to think that this was a stupid idea. It’s 5 p.m., of course there isn’t going to be anyone in a nightclub at this time of day but I had to come. I need to know more about the footballer Charlotte met in London. I need to know what he did to her.
I press the buzzer again. ‘Danny. It’s Sue Jackson. Could you let me in, please. It’s really very important that we speak.’
I press it again, thirty seconds later and repeat my request then bang on the door with my fist and listen.