After the Lie: A gripping novel about love, loss and family secrets (17 page)

I
pushed the shutters back
. The early dawn air curled its freezing mantle around my naked body. I needed a moment. A moment in which I could examine the recklessness that had brought me here. It was as though someone had yanked on the handle of a one-armed bandit the night before and come up with a winning line.

My mother telling me that she was confident she’d be as right as rain in the morning and that we should
all
have an early night. Tomaso and I shouting a loud ‘Goodnight!’ to each other and opening, then banging shut our bedroom doors, before tip-toeing down the corridor. And the final bunch of cherries to create a jackpot – the sheer joy of being with someone who didn’t think I’d be right at home popping out of a cuckoo clock. Ker-ching!

I let my mind meander through the events of the previous evening. Coffee – ‘Espresso, not cappuccino! Only foreigners drink that after dinner’ – had somehow been followed by
amaro
, a bitter liqueur made from herbs. Despite the fact that it tasted like cough medicine, I’d still drunk it, just to prove that I was capable of going with the flow, rather than the uptight misery Mark made me out to be. Somewhere along the way, I felt unfettered, as though someone had slashed at the moorings tethering me to my old self. So, as Tomaso explained that the dessert wine –
vin santo
– was saint’s wine, beloved of priests – I was all devil-may-care, look-at-me-go. As we dipped little almondy biscuits into it, I had a definite toe poking over the border between the homeland of family and the foreign wastelands of freedom. By the time we left the bar, I was heady with rebellion, truth and a desire to obliterate not only Sally Southport but Lydia Rushford and all who were disappointed in her.

And unsaintly behaviour had resulted.

Kissing under the porticoes in the square. Stumbling into the hotel, not even bothering to let go of Tomaso’s hand as we ran through reception. Wantonly – yes, that was the word my mother would have used if she’d hopped out and caught me – opening the door to my room, just remembering to click it shut quietly as we charged inside, a tangle of limbs and clothes and forgotten vows.

It wasn’t so easy to silence Lydia Rushford this morning though. It was as though the person I used to be, a blurry outline of myself, was beckoning to me from a distant shore, shouting over the wind and the waves, trying to make herself heard. Tomaso called me back to bed and I sat on the edge, shivering as he stroked my back, his hands warm on my cool skin. He pulled me down, stretching me out, his hands everywhere until spirals started to squeeze at my insides again, leading me upwards.

Until thought was forced out of the equation. Until everything was reduced to a glorious physical sensation that argued to be heard above all reason, that took away the need for questioning, for doubting, for anything but acceptance of the here and now.

‘You’d better go in case my mother suddenly makes a miraculous recovery.’

‘I’ll make a move in a minute. I wish we could stay a bit longer,’ Tomaso said.

And with those words, the transition began from our selfish little bubble into the wider, unpalatable world, where we couldn’t just think about ourselves. Back over the border again.

I propped myself up on one elbow.

‘This is all so wrong, though. Especially as you know I can’t promise you anything.’ I squirmed, thinking how arrogant that sounded. I was quite sure the possibility of ending up with fruitcake me hadn’t even figured in his equation.

Tomaso dropped a soft kiss onto my upper arm. ‘I know, but I don’t want to get back together with Raffaella anyway. She’s holding a knife to my throat, though. Realistically, she’s not going to let Giacomo come to England with me, ever. If I want to be a proper dad, I’ve got to be here. That guy, that Simone, will eventually take my place otherwise.’

‘What about when he’s older? She’s bound to let him come to England then.’ Said the mother who had tried to impose a travelling embargo on her son going two hours up the road to Suffolk. A queasy feeling washed over me. I was hardly the perfect person to be pontificating about morals to my sixteen-year-old son.

‘Not likely, is it?’

We sank back onto the pillows. Advice in hopeless situations didn’t appear to be my forte, though I was certain my mother would have been able to suggest a suitable saint.

‘I’ve arranged to come back for a week around Christmas time. We’re going to find a strategy for moving forward. I’m pretty positive a reconciliation isn’t on the cards but we might be able to work towards some civilised cooperation.’

Strategies were such a man thing. I couldn’t help thinking that no woman, half-broken from missing her children, would ever think about a ‘strategy’ for rectifying the problem.

‘Don’t you want to stay here now? Try and sort it out?’

‘I can’t think while I’m here. I need a bit of space to sort through what’s best for Giacomo.’

I resisted the temptation to point out that he’d had nine months of air flapping around him freely while Raffaella had been toiling away. I couldn’t imagine not seeing Izzy and Jamie for ages, having a quick few hours with them, then deciding I needed a bit more bloody space to work on a plan. And although Mark didn’t have a perfect scorecard when it came to sports days, drama awards or recorder concert attendance, he never went to bed without checking on the kids, took great pride in cooking scrambled eggs for Jamie before he went off to rugby – ‘Put some hairs on your chest’ – and was the last word as far as Izzy was concerned on whether she looked beautiful.

A knock on the door and then ‘Lydia! Lydia! Are you up yet?’ ended the conversation.

If I’d have sneezed, I’m not sure I could have controlled my bowels. Tomaso was quick to react. He shot into the bathroom, kicking his clothes under a chair as he went.

‘Coming.’

I ran to the wardrobe where I’d hidden my stripy pyjamas from Tomaso’s view. I pulled the bottoms on, struggling in my panic to get my feet into them. I pulled a T-shirt over my head rather than fiddle about with buttons and rushed to the door. I adopted a groggy, just-opened-my-eyes face.

‘Morning. How’s the ankle? Did you sleep all right? Not in too much pain? You’re able to walk on it then?’

I felt as though Tomaso’s kisses were highlighted on my neck in neon yellow. Although I was standing blocking the view into the room, my mother appeared to be practising a little limbo dance of the sort Mabel performed when she got bored in the garden and tried to slither under the gate.

‘I’m much better this morning, just a bit sore. Thought I’d make myself useful and give you a hand packing as you’re up a bit late.’

I just fielded a scream. ‘No!’ I cleared my throat and managed to produce a more normal voice. ‘It’s only eight o’clock. I’m just about to have a shower. There’s hardly anything to do, anyway. I didn’t bring very much.’ Jesus. How did anyone get away with a crime when they were interviewed by the police? My babbling would give me away immediately. It took all my willpower not to look round and see if my knickers or Tomaso’s boxers were lying in the middle of the floor.

But my mother wasn’t finished yet. She stepped forward to come in. ‘I need some more Ibuprofen.’

It was enough to convert me to Catholicism the way the gods had lined up to salute me. I’d taken some Ibuprofen first thing for my hangover, which now, gloriously, was sitting on the bedside table within arm’s reach. I handed it to her, saying, ‘I’ll give you a knock when I’m out of the shower’, then banged the door shut.

I sat on the bed, whimpering with relief, shock coursing through my body as though I’d narrowly missed running over someone who’d suddenly stepped out in front of me.

Tomaso poked his head round the bathroom door. ‘Did we get away with it?’

‘I don’t know, I think so. Quick, you’d better get out before she comes back.’

And like something out of a slapstick comedy, a barefoot Tomaso scuttled across the corridor while I kept watch and wondered how, in a matter of months, my safe little life had converted itself into a bomb waiting to detonate.

W
e landed just
before three o’clock.

The second we’d touched down onto British soil, the tense, edgy feeling that resided permanently in my stomach magnified. Tomaso took advantage of the immigration officer distracting my mother by peering closely at her passport to whisper that he didn’t think she’d noticed anything. Indeed, when Tomaso took my mother’s arm as she hobbled along, she was friendly and charming, all ‘Tomosi, you
are
kind.’

As we exited the blue channel, Tomaso asked, ‘Are you getting a train home or is someone picking you up?’

It was astonishing how the words I was hearing were about modes of transport but the speech I was reading in his eyes was completely different. I didn’t want to leave him without getting a chance to talk. With my mother hawk-eyeing on the plane, I hadn’t even dared let my elbow stray onto the same armrest.

I was about to reply that we were getting a cab, when I spotted Mark at the arrivals barrier, a couple of feet from us. With Izzy. What the hell were they doing there? A surprise apology for letting Jamie go off with the McAllisters? Or had Mark discovered one of my many lies and couldn’t wait to confront me? The scene fragmented in front of me in a kaleidoscope of details I couldn’t process. Tomaso was saying something about the cabs being on the right-hand side of the airport. Mark had that bloody awful T-shirt on, with the frayed sleeve. Izzy hadn’t done her hair. Neither of them was smiling or waving.

I darted over to the barrier, away from Tomaso and my mother. ‘Hello! What are you doing here? Hello, Izzy darling, did you miss me?’ I sounded like someone presenting a TV programme for kids. My heart was hammering, waiting for Mark to accuse me of something that would change our family panorama forever.

He just nodded towards the exit. ‘There’s a bit of a problem. I’ll meet you over there.’

‘What problem? Is it Dad?’

‘It’s Jamie. He’s been taken to hospital. They think he’s got appendicitis.’

‘Is he okay? Where is he?’

Mark paused for a fraction of a second. ‘He’s in hospital in Suffolk.’ He hurried on. ‘If we get moving, we might make it before he goes into theatre.’

‘I can’t leave Mum, she’s hurt her ankle.’

‘Well, she’ll have to come with us then.’

I couldn’t let my mother be in the same space as the McAllisters. She’d never be able to pretend she didn’t know Sean. Katya would sniff it out straight away. Then Mark would find out.

Oh god. Oh god.

My boy would be so frightened.

I couldn’t let Mark meet Tomaso.

Mum wouldn’t be able to manage that enormous bloody case on her own, with her ankle like that.

The desire to get to Jamie wiped out any British reserve. I ran back to Tomaso, who was still shuffling through the crowds, my mother leaning on him, as he dragged her suitcase and juggled his own rucksack.

‘That’s my husband, sorry, my son’s in hospital with appendicitis. Could you put Mum in a cab, please? Mum, sorry, we’ve got to dash up to Suffolk.’

Her hand flew to the cross round her neck. ‘Why is he in Suffolk? Why isn’t he in East Surrey Hospital?’

‘He was on holiday with a friend.’

Thankfully, I didn’t have to admit
which
friend. My mother shook her head as though we’d deliberately complicated things before saying, ‘What are you waiting for? You’d better get on your way.’

‘Will you be okay?’

‘I’ll have to be. Tomosi will show me where to go, won’t you, dear?’

I thrust some money at her, briefly registering Tomaso telling me he’d take her home first then make his way to Guildford. I shouted my grateful thanks and pushed through the crowds, not caring that my case was banging into ankles and threatening to catch the wheels of overladen pushchairs.

I finally erupted out of the flow. Mark grabbed my case.

‘Why didn’t you phone me?’ I asked.

‘Sean’s only just rung me. I knew you’d be on the plane.’

I ached to be with Jamie. ‘Are they going to call you from the hospital?’

‘Yes. With a fair wind, it should only take us a couple of hours to get up there.’ He reached out to touch my arm. ‘Sorry you’re coming back to this.’

I shrugged him off. ‘Let’s go.’ As we roared out of the airport, I was vaguely aware of Tomaso standing with my mother at the taxi rank. This was my punishment. While Jamie had been writhing in agony – how long had they waited to take him to hospital? – I’d been closing my eyes on the plane, reliving the previous night, with a little buzz of desire pulsing round my body. My poor boy.

‘Anyway, how did it go in Florence?’ Mark said.

I knew he was trying to distract me but I could only think about Jamie. ‘I can’t concentrate on that now.’

Mark patted my knee. ‘He will be okay, you know. It’s a bit unexpected but it’s not the end of the world.’

‘But what if it turns into peritonitis? That can be fatal, can’t it?’

I was trying to bring to mind what I’d read on the internet every time the kids complained of stomach ache when they were little. I was brutally unsympathetic with Mark when he was ill, ridiculously resentful that he could lie in bed groaning and weakly requesting tea. I never allowed myself to believe that I was ill enough to merit a day in bed, too beset by guilt over unanswered emails, dirty laundry and Mabel’s ‘When is it walkies?’ whimpers. The children were a whole different matter. They’d spent half their childhoods with a thermometer jammed in their mouths. Jamie had been about twelve before I could watch him on a swing without shouting, ‘Careful.’

God knows how I’d cope when Jamie started driving. I’d have to stowaway in the boot, a ghostly voice seeping through the backseats:
Slow down for that corner
. I should probably start stockpiling sleep now.

Izzy put her hand on my shoulder. ‘He will be all right, won’t he, Mum?’

‘Of course he will, lovey. He’ll be in a bit of pain at the moment but the doctors will sort him out.’

I pulled out my phone and rang Katya.

She sounded so relieved to hear from me. ‘Oh my god, Lydia, how terrible for you to come back to this. You must be so worried.’

I couldn’t cope with her hysteria when I was only just managing to stop screaming myself. I butted in, way beyond social niceties, with a question that shocked me. ‘Is Sean there?’

‘He’s just been in with the doctor. Hang on, I’ll pass you over.’

Sean was clear, calm and reassuring, talking me through the operation Jamie was about to have. Disloyally, I was glad Sean had taken charge – for all his faults I knew that he would have asked the right questions, refused to accept any answer that didn’t satisfy him and stayed focused on the facts, not the emotions of the situation. ‘Your lad’s been a real trooper. You should be proud of him, he’s a star.’

It was a day of surprises. I couldn’t remember the last time I felt so grateful to anyone.

He promised to call me if anything changed before we arrived. My initial relief that Jamie was in good hands faded the further I got into relaying the conversation to Mark. I stared out of the window. My mother had been right. God did know what was in my heart.

And now he really was going to get me back.

Even Izzy looked as though she would do anything to have Jamie irritating her to death, deliberately humming in her ear when she was trying to do her homework.

At fifteen-minute intervals, Mark kept saying, ‘He’ll be as right as rain in a couple of days,’ as though he were reading the weather forecast.

Katya was waiting outside when we got to the hospital. Mark dropped us at the door and went to park. Katya hugged me but I all but pushed her off. She got the hint and led the way. ‘It was Sean who realised it was something serious. I was all for getting out the Rennies and a hot water bottle but he knows Jamie so well. Said he was very stoic on the rugby pitch even when he’d taken a real knock. He was sure he wouldn’t make a fuss for nothing. Jamie hadn’t wanted any breakfast because he had stomach ache. Then during the morning he’d been in real pain, lying on the sofa groaning. When he started being sick, Sean just bundled us all in the car and drove him straight here.’

I was too grateful to Sean to temper my thoughts with anything other than pure unadulterated thankfulness.

We galloped up the stairs, herding up to the third floor and clattering along the corridors. Sean was waiting on a plastic orange chair, Eleanor next to him, looking younger and more vulnerable than I remembered. Sean leapt to his feet. No pleasantries, for which I was grateful.

‘He went down forty minutes ago. Sorry. I did tell him that you were on your way and that you’d be here when he came out.’

‘Was he frightened?’

‘No, not really. He made a joke about hoping that the knife didn’t slip and deprive him of his manhood. To be honest, I think he was in so much pain, that he just wanted to get it over with.’

‘How long did they say he’d be?’

‘The doctor said he’d probably be back on the ward within two hours.’

He stepped closer and put his hand on my arm. He looked directly into my eyes and dropped his voice in that way he had of making you feel he’d crafted his words for your ears only. ‘Sal, he’s going to be okay.’

I froze at his use of ‘Sal’. Katya was fidgeting on a chair close behind me. I mouthed ‘Lydia’ to him and backed away, conscious of Katya monitoring Sean even in a situation like this.

Mark hurried along the corridor, shaking hands with Sean and thanking both of them. ‘You can disappear now, if you like. Sorry that we’ve rather messed up your holiday.’

Katya turned to me on the verge of tears. ‘I’m so sorry that he’s been ill. He’s a lovely boy. The son Sean never had.’

I couldn’t cope with smoothing Katya’s feathers today. She’d hinted before that Sean would have liked a son. I couldn’t think about that now: I had no caring about anyone else other than Jamie left in me. Sean’s son-wanting, Katya’s insecurity about it, Mark’s own fear taking refuge behind his ‘He’s going to be just fine’ bulletins.

‘Honestly, don’t feel you have to wait,’ I said. ‘I’ll text you and let you know when he’s out. We might not even be allowed in to see him till tomorrow.’

Without even glancing at me, Eleanor turned to her mother. ‘I’m not going home until I’ve seen him.’

I was expecting Katya to do the big-eyed drill stare that I would have done if Jamie had suddenly decided to tell Eleanor’s parents what he found an acceptable course of action. But no. Katya put her arm round Eleanor and said, ‘All right sweetheart, we’ll see what we can do.’

Never had I wanted to stand in front of a hospital ward door more and declare, ‘Family only.’

I moved away, clamping onto my retort until the nerves throbbed in my teeth.

Time ticked by. Now and again someone would make an effort to speak, but the conversation kept fizzling out. Mark kept pacing up and down, his agitation amplifying my own.

‘Izzy, why don’t you go with Daddy to find a drink?’ Mark was much better if he had a task. I, on the other hand, liked to concentrate all my efforts on worrying as much as possible as a perverse insurance against the horrors of my imagination actually coming to pass. Mark went off with Izzy. My phone bleeped. I waited for someone to whirl out of a medical theatre and tell me that I was interfering with their heart monitors. I sneaked a look. Tomaso. My mother was home safely. I breathed out. For the time being, Mark hadn’t paid him any attention beyond a distracted ‘Thank god he was there to stick her in a cab’.

I switched the phone off.

Finally, a young doctor, his face mask round his neck, appeared. He looked to Sean, who introduced me. ‘It was more complicated than we thought. We caught it just in time.’

‘He will be all right?’ The air in my lungs felt thin and sparse.

The doctor nodded. ‘He’s young and fit. We’ll keep him under close observation overnight.’

‘Can I see him? Can I stay?’

‘He’s just about to go onto the ward. You’ll be able to pop in shortly. Unfortunately we don’t have facilities for parents of children over twelve to sleep here. Visiting hours only, I’m afraid.’ He was still addressing his comments to Sean, including me as an afterthought.

Sean shook his hand. ‘Thank you very much.’

This was all wrong. Thirty years vilified as the person who put my dad in prison and now he was acting in loco parentis to my son, while I had been off like a sow having a last hurrah before the final slaughter.

The doctor was suggesting that we contact the information desk for a list of local accommodation. Sean said, ‘We have room for them in our holiday cottage. Thank you.’ Before I could react, the doctor told us where to find Jamie and hurried off.

Mark and Izzy appeared clutching various drinks.

‘Come on, Jamie’s out, we can go in,’ I said.

Eleanor got up, her tiny zebra-print skirt out of place in the drab corridor. Sean must have caught the look on my face and stepped in. ‘Not you, Ellie. You can see him tomorrow.’

‘I’m going now.’

Sean took hold of her wrist. ‘No, you’re not.’

I barely registered her fury and the tussle with Sean. I was having to stop myself from running through the corridors, shoving trollies out of the way and scattering Zimmer frames. At the door of the teenage ward, I forced myself to smile when I caught sight of Jamie’s pale face. I was afraid to hug him in case I hurt him. Still groggy from the anaesthetic, he managed a wan smile and a joke about incorporating the scar into a tattoo. The sister on the ward kept flitting past to tell us that he needed to rest, just stopping short of shooing us out. ‘It’s only a minor operation. He’ll be grand in a couple of days.’

Minor to her, maybe.

I kept stalling until Mark patted Jamie’s hand and told him we’d be back first thing the following afternoon. I tried to hold myself together as I kissed his forehead but there was no disguising the tears plopping onto his pillow. Jamie flinched in pain as he tried to reach up to hug me. ‘Mum, I’ll be okay, don’t worry. Is Eleanor coming to see me?’

His voice sounded small and young. I managed to produce a neutral-sounding ‘Tomorrow,’ before I allowed Mark to lead me away.