My Husband's Wife (31 page)

There was a light rapping on her door. ‘Are you awake, love?’

‘Yes.’ She sat up and tied her hair in a knot at her neck.

Her dad poked his head around the door, uncertain and tentative. They were still awkward with each other; it was difficult, sharing a house for the first time as adults.

‘I wanted to give you this.’ He handed her an envelope.

‘What is it?’ She stared at it, turning it over to confirm that it was indeed blank on both sides.

‘Open it!’

Rosie poked her finger under the flap and tore it open, revealing a return train ticket to London and a twenty-pound note.

‘Oh, Dad!’

‘I thought it was about time you got up there, love, and I know those girls will be missing you just as much as you’re missing them. The tickets are valid for any weekday, so pick one and I’ll drop you at the station.’

She looked up at him. ‘That’s brilliant. Thank you.’

‘You’re welcome. I think seeing them will be good for you. It’ll either help you settle or stir you into action. Either way, you should go.’ He made his way sheepishly out of the room, embarrassed by the love that cocooned them inside the small space.

She smiled after him. The thought of seeing her children filled her with a rare burst of joy.

*

Rosie anxiously trod the stairs and walked through the barrier of the Tube station, grabbing embarrassingly at her ticket as it disappeared for good at the end of her journey. She found herself in an elegant glass-roofed arcade where shops and cafés clustered around the wide walkway, each with a fancy glass fanlight above its entrance, patterned plasterwork beneath the ceiling and a festive garland of spruce and holly dotted with gold and red baubles. Despite the familiar names of the shops and cafés, which could be found on any high street, the whole place felt very Victorian.

She was nervous, clutching the bag Mo had sent her and pulling the back of her jumper down over her jeans, worried about how she looked. The pixie boots and tight jeans were charity-shop finds, but she was grateful to have something to wear other than the clothes she’d left the hospital in and her pyjamas.

Walking out onto the crowded pavement, she felt overwhelmed by the throng of people coursing towards her. Everyone looked glossy and well dressed, kitted out in branded items, and they all seemed to be talking into or staring at smartphones. She stared up at the high shopfronts with two or three floors of offices or accommodation above them. Someone grabbed her arm. Gasping, she spun round, instantly relieved to find herself staring into Phil’s face. She was very happy to see him, unsure what she would have done if he’d neglected to meet her as promised.

There was a split second when she forgot their new circumstances. The way they looked at each other reminded her of when she used to welcome him home after a long day of labouring; it was as if he’d walked into their kitchen and the girls were playing in the sitting room while she prepared his supper.
‘Hello, love, how was your day? Cup of tea?’
He smiled at her in the way he had when he’d walked into his parents’ kitchen that first day with his army rucksack over his arm and his face and arms tanned, his expression cocky, as if he knew what he wanted and how to get it.

‘Look at us, eh?’ She smiled at him, glancing over his head at the ornate fascias and rooftops where Christmas lights twinkled. There was bustle all around them: taxis beeped, neon-clothed cyclists whizzed by and couriers on motorbikes weaved in and out of the traffic with their engines revving. It was chaos, but with his hand on her arm, she felt quite calm.

‘You look really well, much better.’ He leant in towards her so he could be heard above the din.

She could smell his natural scent, as familiar to her as her own, and to be this close hit her like a punch to the gut. Stepping back from his grasp, she placed her hand over the scars around her mouth, the skin pale and shiny against her lips. ‘I am a lot better. Getting there.’

‘I thought we could go and pick up the car and then go and get the kids from school. How does that sound?’

‘Is... Will Gerri...’ She stumbled on the words.

‘No, she’s away for the night. Paris, on business.’ He said this matter-of-factly, as if nipping off to Paris was a normal thing; maybe it was in the new world he now inhabited, but to her it was just another reminder of how glamorous Gerri was and how she fell well short of the mark.

She felt her shoulders unbunch with relief at the knowledge that she wouldn’t have to encounter her. The thought of having to suffer more derogatory comments and mocking nastiness had filled her with a cold dread, although she’d decided before she set off that if that was what it took to see her girls, then she would do it.

She followed Phil along the pavement, stopping every few yards to say sorry to the people she bumped into and to allow them to cross her path, which they did without offering thanks or even acknowledging her. She had yet to master the purposeful stride that Phil had perfected. They turned immediately left into Wrights Lane, where concrete and glass-fronted offices stood opposite a row of red-brick mansion blocks. The doors had shiny brass plates and a concierge hovering in front of them; he was wearing a green hat and matching greatcoat, with gold braid on the peak of his cap and his epaulettes.

‘How’s your dad?’ Phil asked, almost over his shoulder, as he walked slightly ahead.

‘Good. The same. You know.’ She hated that she had nothing to say, nothing to offer. ‘I’ve spoken to your mum too. She sent me this bag.’ She held it up, but he ignored her.

‘These flats are upwards of a million.’ He pointed to the boxy, modern apartments to his right.

‘I’ll settle for our little house in Woolacombe any time.’ She knew how provincial she sounded, but it was the truth.

He smiled briefly. ‘Dad says he’s making a bit of progress. He and Ross have started ripping out the timber that’s been damaged, took a good couple of skips away and more to come, he reckons.’

‘I can’t wait,’ she whispered. ‘I’m so grateful, him and Ross will do a cracking job, I know it.’

Phil laughed. ‘Yep. If Kayleigh doesn’t slow them down, coming up for a moan and a good old nose.’

Rosie looked at the floor, not wanting to laugh with him, not wanting to be reminded of the old life that she had lost. ‘I’m worried about how it’s being paid for...’ she let this hang, wondering how she would face the dilemma if it were his girlfriend’s money that was putting her little house back together.

‘He’s getting materials at cost of course and they’re working for free when they have time off. I think he and mum have covered some of it personally and we need to work something out for the rest.’

‘That’s amazing.’ She felt quite choked.

They followed the road as it curved round. She liked the London street sign, the distinctive black lettering on a white enamel background that read
Marloes Road
, with the borough,
W8
, in red beneath. They strolled on. She was finding the short trek quite exhausting, having been confined to her dad’s spare bedroom for so long and with her lungs not yet working at full capacity, but her eagerness to see the girls fuelled her out-of-condition muscles.

‘This is us!’ He stood back as if to admire for the first time the five-storeyed terraced house with its white columns and tiny roof garden above the front door, whose uniform bay trees in oversized zinc containers were just visible from the street. A wide path of black and white tiles led to the front door, which was flanked by another pair of bay trees in identical pots. Black, wrought-iron, arrow-tipped railings encased a front courtyard and basement, matching the rest of the street.

The three middle floors each had a square bay window set in carved stone, painted white and fronted by a smaller zinc windowbox full of pretty pink flowers and trailing ivy. Rosie let her eyes travel the full height of the building, wondering what lay behind each window, particularly the smaller dormer in the attic, which had its own mini balcony. She noted that every window had a roman blind that was pulled to the exact same height.

‘Wow!’ It was hard not to be impressed. ‘It’s like the Mary Poppins house.’

‘Fourteen million quid’s worth!’ He nodded.

‘I don’t know about working for Gerri, you sure you’re not an estate agent, Phil? You seem quite obsessed with house prices around here.’

He ignored her jibe. ‘Do you want to look round?’

She remembered the grand tour Gerri had given her, the way the images had filled her brain for months. It had proved to be torture and she didn’t need more of that, especially now she didn’t have a home of her own.

‘Not really.’ She wrinkled her nose at him. ‘If you don’t mind.’

‘Sure.’

She could sense his disappointment at being denied the chance to impress, but that was just too bloody bad.

‘Car’s just along here.’ He gestured down the street.

She followed him past houses that were all remarkably similar.

‘Most of these are flats,’ he said. ‘There are only four houses in the street.’

She found the pride he took in all this quite astonishing, as if he’d had a role in the acquisition of the property and hadn’t simply committed adultery with the woman whose name happened to be on the deeds.

The familiar shiny Range Rover sat in the street in a residents’ parking bay. She pictured the side of it dripping with coleslaw. Phil pressed a button and it lit up like a Christmas tree. It was her first time in the car that she had both spied on and hidden from on more than one occasion. The girls were right; it was indeed high up, like sitting on a throne.

‘Comfy?’ Phil asked as she clipped the seatbelt into place.

‘Don’t think I’d be able to park it.’

‘Rosie, I’ve seen you trying to park your old banger and I would have to agree.’ He winked at her, again like they were on a jaunt together, happy. It made her feel uneasy, as if behaving this way together was illicit and they might get thrown out at any moment.

‘Are you happy, Phil?’ She felt bold asking.

He stared ahead and breathed in. ‘I’m living in the best city in the world, in a mansion—’

‘Yes, you said. Fourteen million.’ She couldn’t help herself.

He continued. ‘Work is easy, I’ve got money in my pocket and my summer will be spent somewhere hot, probably a private villa with a swim-up pool. What’s there not to be happy about? I’m living the life.’ He started the engine.

Rosie placed her bag on her lap and wondered if he realised that not only had he failed to mention his daughters, his girlfriend or their impending new arrival, but also that he hadn’t answered her question.

He threw the car around tight corners and down narrow residential streets with ease. She got the sense that he did so for her benefit, keen to show that not only could he handle the powerful engine, but also that he could navigate the streets of Kensington and Chelsea as if it was second nature. Eventually they pulled up outside a playground on an ordinary residential street. If you didn’t know it was a school, Rosie thought, you might easily have missed it. It was quite unlike the girls’ school at home, where signs, the staff car park, the football pitch and numerous sprawling, low-rise, felt-roofed buildings left you in no doubt.

There was a square of tarmac with high mesh fencing reaching up to the sky; it reminded her of a cage. She thought again of the wide sloping field that their school had at its disposal and the vast expanse of beach on which they could run; this felt rather claustrophobic in comparison. Or maybe she was just trying to find the negatives.

‘I’ll go get them.’ He smiled, jumped down and walked through a side gate, into which he had to punch an entry code. She watched with her nose pressed to the tinted window as he joined a line of other mums, dads and, judging by their age, demeanour and the way they bunched together, a host of nannies and au pairs. She felt a little sad for Phil; he looked out of place among the tweed-jacketed, bearded hipsters in their skinny jeans and aged-leather lace-up boots and the uber-skinny, blonde mummies who reminded of her of Mummy von Trapp. She smiled at the thought of her: Phillippa, the woman who had saved her life.

The front door of the large, higgledy-piggledy Victorian villa opened and out walked an upright woman with a serious face, who was a lot younger than her clothes and stance would suggest. She was wearing a soft, lavender-coloured wool suit and her hair was in a loose chignon. She stood to one side and a stream of little girls in identical hats and coats stepped in front of her. One by one, they shook her hand and then walked slowly with their head held high towards the person collecting them.

Rosie laughed involuntarily as she compared this to the mass evacuation that happened when the bell rang at their school. She pictured the kids running, arms raised and hands clutching cardboard still wet with paint, lunchboxes and daps dangling from their fingers as they hollered at their mums and dads:
‘Did you bring me something to eat?’
She thought of Mel for the first time in a long time and felt an incredible sense of longing for all that was familiar to her.

The girls continued to exit like a little trail of straw-boater-wearing ants. And then there was Naomi! Her beautiful girl was in her sights and she was real, no longer just the child of her dreams whom she had missed every day and every night. Here she was, only a few feet away!

Rosie opened her mouth and cried silently, overwhelmed by the sight of her child. Her body pulsed with the need to hold her. She undid her seatbelt and opened the heavy door. Climbing down from the seat, she hovered on the pavement by the car, waiting impatiently.

Minutes later, Leona emerged, looking so grown-up and tiny all at once, doing her best to walk slowly and shaking hands solemnly with the lady in the doorway.

It was only when the girls took their dad’s hands and made their way across the playground towards the security gate that Rosie realised what was so different about them.
Oh no! For the love of God! No!
Someone had cut off their hair.

Her heart raced with nerves as her girls drew closer.
Don’t be ridiculous! You’re their mum!
she reminded herself, but still her insides churned. The trio walked across the square of tarmac and through the gate and there they were!