The Forgetting(10)
Livvy’s fingers gripped tighter around the Yale lock. She thought about the night Dominic had confided in her about the misery of his childhood. She had seen the cost of him disclosing even the barest outline of what had happened, understood that he had spent years working through his trauma in order to form a relationship of his own. And now here was his mother, standing on their doorstep, complaining that she hadn’t been welcomed into her grandson’s life.
Livvy felt her voice harden, consonants solidifying in her mouth. ‘It’s not my place to get involved. It’s up to Dominic whether he replies to you or not.’
‘But you must understand, as a mother, wanting to know what’s happening in your child’s life, whatever’s passed between you?’ Imogen slid the black leather handbag from her arm, pulled out a piece of paper. ‘Please will you speak to him? You might be able to persuade him. It’s important he sees his father before it’s too late.’ She held out the piece of paper and Livvy glanced down, saw a phone number written on it, realised that Dominic’s mother had it all planned: the visit while Dominic was away, the emotional blackmail, the piece of paper prepared with her phone number so that there was no chance of the door being shut in her face as she scribbled it out.
Livvy shook her head. ‘I can’t. This is between you and Dominic. I’m sorry.’ She did not wait for a response as she took a step back and pushed the door closed, hand on the lock until she was sure it had clicked into place.
Running upstairs, she tiptoed into Leo’s bedroom with a sudden yearning to check on him. Finding him sound asleep, she left his room and made her way back down the stairs.
Passing the open door to the hallway, she noticed something on the grey coir mat. Bending down, she picked it up, turned it over, heard herself inhale sharply.
A phone number was written in careful handwriting on a piece of plain white paper. The same piece of paper Imogen had offered her just minutes before and which Livvy had refused.
Crumpling it into a ball to put it into the bin, she headed into the kitchen, trying to work out how on earth she would tell Dominic that his mother had made her first impromptu visit in over thirty years.
ANNA
LONDON
Stephen pauses. There is that hesitancy again in his eyes, as though he does not know what to say. Or perhaps I am misreading his expression. Perhaps it is not hesitancy, perhaps it is disappointment.
Clearing his throat, he studies my face as if assessing whether he is about to do the right thing. He glances around the ward, where the other patients are already deep in conversation with their visitors, before turning back to me, his lips inching into a reassuring smile, and I see what perhaps first attracted me to him: there is a quiet confidence about him, an air of competence. A feeling that here is a man you would want with you if you were stranded on a desert island. A man who can take control of a difficult situation and know what needs to be done.
He holds my gaze as he begins to speak, and I listen as he relays the story of our relationship. How we met not long after I graduated, got married six years later, have been happily married now for twelve years. He tells me about his job as a university lecturer, about our two-bedroom cottage in north-west London, about our weekend walks around Hampstead Heath, Richmond Park, Kew Gardens. Stephen talks, and it is like listening to an audiobook or a story on the radio: I am intrigued by events, want to know what happens next, but I have no greater affinity with the details than if they were the lives of fictional characters. I wait for something to spark a recollection: a phrase, a sentence, or even just a word to unlock some fragment of memory. But the story of our marriage might just as well be a novel I’ve picked up in a bookshop, or a drama I’m watching on TV: however hard I try to translate the events Stephen is describing into images of real life – my life – I find myself stumbling in the dark, not even a pinprick of light to help guide my way.
‘I brought this to show you.’
From a brown leather messenger bag, Stephen pulls out a white wooden frame, hands it to me. Behind the glass is an arrangement of dried white flowers. ‘They’re from your wedding bouquet. Dendrobium orchids. You’ve had this up on the wall in our bedroom for the past twelve years. I thought it might help you remember.’
I stare at the flowers – all the moisture long since evaporated – and scour my brain for some wisp of memory. But if there’s anything there, it doesn’t want to be found.
I shake my head, cannot look Stephen in the eye. He rests a hand on my shoulder and I flinch instinctively, watch him withdraw his hand as though he has placed it in a hive of bees. Turning to face him, I expect to see frustration but find only sadness.
He leans forward in his chair but is careful to keep his hands away from the edge of the bed. ‘I know this must be so hard for you, my love. You don’t remember who I am. I’m sorry – I should be more sensitive to that. Would it help if I showed you some photos of us together?’
It is only now he says it that the fear dares to make itself known to me: Stephen has told me that he’s my husband, the hospital has confirmed it, but a part of me still cannot trust in the fact when I cannot remember for myself.
I nod, and Stephen pulls out his mobile phone, swipes at the screen, flicks for a few seconds, and then turns the phone to face me. ‘This was last year, for our anniversary – we had a weekend away in Bath.’