I’m sure it’s no coincidence that his need for love and affection stems from a childhood defined by loneliness, tragedy, and neglect. It sounds plausible enough. I mean, if your father blows his face off while you’re waiting to open your birthday presents, you’re bound to have issues, aren’t you? Ever since he was a boy, as he’s told me many times, a wife and children was all he wanted. He wanted the opportunity to lavish them with the stability he’d been denied. Nathan had faith in the family unit. Still does. He was devastated when I didn’t fall pregnant again. He blamed me of course. Called me a failure. Threw in accusations of mental illness and poor mothering for good measure.
I switch off the bedside light and he turns away from me and settles himself on his pillow.
‘Hannah?’ His voice is hazy and quiet, caught in that place between wakefulness and sleep.
‘Yes?’
‘Vicky’s birthday.’
I don’t reply.
‘You can go.’
‘Thank you.’
‘Don’t make me regret it.’
Tears prickle in the darkness. I should feel happiness. Excitement. But what I feel is dread. As if this is a test which I’ve already failed.
It isn’t long before his snoring fills the room. I’ve considered leaving him. Of course I have. Just like I did all those years ago with my infant son clutched to my chest. I imagine waiting until Nathan leaves for work before hurriedly throwing clothes into a bag. I imagine telling Alex he isn’t going to school. Telling him to be quick. Then walking away. It was the threat of losing Alex to Nathan which kept me here back then. But now he’s nearly sixteen, the power of that threat is fading, yet I’m still trapped. Because what the hell would I do? Where would I go? I’ve no passport or bank account or savings. All I have is a few pilfered pennies in a sock in the back of my underwear drawer. Alex and I would be on the streets, another couple of nameless, faceless people to be ignored by passersby.
How could I do that to my son?
I ease out of bed and put my dressing gown on. I’m careful to open the door quietly. I walk down to Alex’s room. He’s still up. The shadow of him moves through the strip of light beneath the door. Is he old enough to hear the truth? To know why I’m here and why I stay? The lies gnaw inside me. I want to purge myself of them and the only way to do that is to smother them with truth.
I knock lightly. There’s a sound of rustling. Papers? A book?
‘Hang on.’
The drawer of his desk opens and closes. His feet pad to the door. He opens it a crack and peers out. His face is flushed and he chews at the corner of his mouth, tense and on edge.
‘What is it?’ He can’t seem to look at me. ‘Everything OK?’ His words are woven with concern.
‘I’m fine.’ I expect him to open the door to let me in, but he doesn’t. ‘Alex…’ My voice trails.
‘Yes?’
As always something stops me unleashing the truth. I can’t risk it. How can I explain what happened that night? No, it’s not fair, not right, to unburden on a child.
‘Mum?’
‘I need you to know,’ I say instead, ‘that I’m not a victim here. I know it looks that way, but I’m not. I chose to marry your father.’
Alex’s mouth twitches, opens and closes, as if he is trying to speak but thinking better of it.
‘What?’ My hand rests on his arm.
‘I need to know.’ Alex hesitates. ‘Does he… Does he hit you?’
I’m taken aback by the question which seems to come out of the blue but is obviously something he’s been grappling with. ‘Hit me? No! No, of course not.’
Alex blanches and a wave of sympathy rolls through me.
‘No,’ I say, more softly this time. ‘He doesn’t hit me. He never would.’
I can tell by the fleeting look which crosses his face that, like my mother and Vicky, he doesn’t believe me. It’s the truth though. Nathan has never hit me and he’s never threatened to. It’s not that I don’t think he’s capable of it. Because I’m sure he is. After all, anybody is capable of violence.
‘And what if he hit me?’
‘He wouldn’t.’
Alex scoffs.
‘Listen to me, Alex. He would never hurt you.’
‘But what if he did?’ As the belligerence and rebellion abandon him, he appears childlike and vulnerable again.
‘If he hurt you?’
Alex nods.
I lift my hand to stroke his cheek. ‘Then I’d fucking kill him,’ I say softly.
Later, when I’m sure Nathan is deeply asleep I go downstairs, careful to avoid the treads which creak like old bones, and retrieve my cigarettes from behind the washing powder in the utility room. I open the back door and Cass trots out in front of me.
It’s a beautiful night. Still and warm. The moon is full and bathes the fields in milky light. I climb the stone stile and follow the footpath over the grass and up to the brow of the hill and the neat copse of trees which stand like a group of sentinels. The ground beneath the trees is trodden up by the cows who use it to shelter from heavy rain or blazing sunshine. There’s a log at the base of one of the trees and this is where I smoke, hidden in the copse, crouching on a rotting log with my cigarette cupped in my hand like a convict to shield it from the unlikely appearance of Nathan. Vicky gives me a pack every other week. I usually smoke one a day and spread the remaining six over the two weeks, smoking a second back to back when I need it the most. For the minutes it takes to smoke them I am the closest I ever get to feeling like the old me. The me I was before that night. In the copse I am free. The air is light and the space feels expansive. It’s an act of rebellion, a secret I keep from Nathan which empowers me.
Beneath the log I keep hidden a battered metal tin, inside which are some gardening gloves, a woollen hat, a packet of mints, and some lavender spray. When I’ve tucked my hair into the hat and lit the cigarette, I slip on the gloves then draw the smoke into my lungs. Though I try to focus on the sounds around me, a distant owl, the clicks and scrapes of insects, it’s impossible to block the sound of the accusatory whispers from the leaves above.
It’s your fault, they whisper.
It’s your fault. You deserve it all.
‘I know I do,’ I whisper back.
I take one last drag then tread the cigarette end into the earth, and reach for the lavender spray.
Chapter Eight
Cam, 1998
The unrelenting storms had kept most of Newlyn’s fishing fleet in dock. One or two of the larger trawlers had managed to get out for a day or two here and there, but the smaller boats had been tied up for weeks. The mood in The Packhorse was sour. The men had given up searching for a crack of blue sky in the ashen grey or a glimpse of the horizon through driving sheets of rain. The storms seemed never-ending, as if the colossal waves would batter the coastline until the land was washed away.
The port was deserted, its familiar bustle replaced by wind-whipped piers and iron chains creaking as they swayed. Tarpaulins flapped like angry tethered birds and nets lay abandoned in heaps on the boats, their loose ends tanning the decks. Beyond the harbour, monstrous waves crashed against the concrete walls sending explosions of spray fifty feet into the air.