The Dead Wife's Handbook (25 page)

I listen to this roll call of Eve’s attributes and interests and it’s hard not to feel that Max hasn’t merely replaced me but has managed to secure himself a free upgrade in the process.

‘Daddy?’

‘Yes, sweetheart?’

‘Is Eve your
girl
friend?’

Max’s face is full of surprise. He’d clearly underestimated our seven-year-old daughter’s astuteness. I have to admit, I had too.

A few seconds pass, during which I’m guessing Max is contemplating the potential ramifications of the two possible, opposing responses. Should he tell the truth and risk Ellie’s rejection of Eve before they’ve even met, or should he kick the difficult query into the future’s long grass and hope that, by the time the question emerges again, the answer won’t have quite the same impact?

I feel for Max right now, honestly I do. In spite of the jealousy and the frustrations and the categorical conviction that it’s an error of judgement to be introducing Eve into Ellie’s life at this premature moment in time, he’s still the man I love, still the man I married, still the man I vowed I’d always support, for better or worse, in sickness and in health. Till death do us part, which it hasn’t yet, not quite, not entirely.

‘Well, I suppose she is, yes, munchkin. How do you feel about that? Is it strange thinking of Daddy having a girlfriend?’

Ellie contemplates her response, clearly in no hurry to make a rash decision on such a critical question. I’d give anything to know what’s going on in her head right now, to be able to guess what she’s thinking. If there was a single superpower I wish the afterworld had afforded me, it would be to read the thoughts of the little girl I never wanted to leave behind.

‘Is she pretty?’

‘Well, I think so, yes. She has long blonde hair and blue eyes and a lovely smile.’

‘Is she as pretty as Mummy?’

Max’s response is oppressively hesitant. I’m not sure I’m ready to hear the answer.

‘They’re both pretty in different ways, angel. Mummy was beautiful – just like you – and Eve is pretty in a different way.’

That wasn’t quite the clear victory I was hoping for. Couldn’t he have brought himself to tell the whitest of lies, on this of all topics, just to Ellie?

‘So why is she your girlfriend? Is she your girlfriend just because she’s pretty?’

‘No, not just that, angel. There are lots of reasons. A girlfriend is just a really special friend who you like spending time with more than your other friends. Don’t any of your friends at school have boyfriends?’

Ellie’s nose curls up into a horrified grimace.

‘Ugh, no. Boys are disgusting.’

Max allows himself a wry smile while Ellie fiddles distractedly with the stitching on the arm of the sofa. Max is forever telling her to stop picking at it but today he leaves her to play with it uninterrupted.

‘Daddy. Is Eve going to be my new mummy?’

Ellie looks up at Max, her eyes suffused with emotions I doubt she yet fully understands.

Of all the reactions in either of our worlds, I wasn’t expecting that one. I feel heartbroken for Ellie, for the multitude of questions that must be weaving chaotically through her mind and for the harsh reality that has placed her so unfairly in this bewildering position. For her having to grow up so much faster than either Max or I would ever have wished.

I feel heartbroken for Max, too, for the lone parenthood he’s unexpectedly found himself practising, for the difficult conversations he’s striving to manage and for the catalogue of decisions he never anticipated having to make.

And I feel heartbroken for myself, too, fully aware of the possibility that one day the answer to Ellie’s question may be yes.

Max strokes Ellie’s hair with that gentle touch of his, tucking a stray curl behind her tiny ear and running his fingers over the smooth skin of her cheek. He looks sad, fearful almost, as though a future he hadn’t begun to contemplate is rushing forward to greet him and he’s just not ready to play host to it yet.

‘No, my angel. Eve’s not going to be your new mummy. She’s just a special friend of mine who I’d like to be a special friend to you too.’

Ellie looks at Max doubtfully, as if not quite convinced she’s being told the truth. Her head drops back down to the arm of the sofa and she begins fiddling again as though that loose thread is the only thing in the world she dare focus on.

‘But if you like her more than all your other friends, does that mean you like her more than me too?’

Her voice is barely more than a whisper and she hesitates before lifting her eyes to await Max’s answer. I’d give anything right now to be able wrap her body in my arms and restore the security she so needs and deserves.

Max instead fulfils that desire for me, Ellie half-heartedly allowing herself to be pulled on to his lap.

‘Don’t be silly, sweetheart. There’s no one in the world I love more than you. Not now, not ever. We’re a special two-person team, me and you. And no one will ever, ever change that.’

Ellie allows her body to relax into the reassurance of Max’s arms but her face still betrays the confusion of a thousand unanswered questions.

‘Sit tight a second, sweetheart. I’ve got something I want to give you. I was going to save it for your birthday but I think you should have it now.’

Max goes to the wooden cabinet at the far end of the sitting room from which he retrieves a small red velvet box and hands it to Ellie.

She opens it to reveal an exquisite heart-shaped silver locket engraved with tiny flowers. It couldn’t be more perfect for Ellie. Max couldn’t have chosen any better.

‘Let me open it for you, munchkin. I want to show you what’s inside.’

Max prises open the delicate heart. Inside are two photographs, one on either side. The first is of Max, a portrait I took of him in Greece on that final holiday, the columns of the Parthenon just visible behind his head. The other is of me, taken shortly before I died, on a long walk the three of us had made over the South Downs at Easter. That was almost two years ago now.

‘What I thought, you see sweetheart, is that whenever you wear this, you’ll have the two people who love you most right next to your heart. Because you’re the most special person in the whole world to me and one thing I know for sure is that you were always, always right in the centre of Mummy’s heart, too. And so even when you and I aren’t together during the day, and even though Mummy’s not here any more, I want you to remember just how much we both love you.’

As he says this, Max places the locket around Ellie’s neck, adjusting the clasp until he’s sure it’s secure. Ellie holds back her hair for him and I hold back my tears.

‘I know how much you like looking at photos of Mummy and I thought this way you can always have Mummy with you, wherever you are.’

Ellie is gazing inside the locket that’s now hanging around her beautiful, graceful neck. She looks up at Max and smiles before climbing back on to his lap and resting her head on his chest.

‘I love it, Daddy. Thank you. It’s really, really pretty.’

Max and Ellie remain huddled on the sofa together and I long to be with them, to hold them both tightly and never let them go. I’d give everything else I ever treasured
when I was alive, every material possession I ever owned, for a single day now with Ellie and Max.

Just one more day. It doesn’t seem much to ask, does it?

The air beneath me begins to billow gently and I know what that means. I issue a silent, unknowable goodbye to Max and Ellie before they disappear from sight, still holding on to one another tightly in the world below.

Chapter 18

‘Why are you acting so strange, Daddy? Stop pulling my arm. Are you cross?’

Max and Ellie are hand in hand, hurrying around the outer circle of Regent’s Park. It’s a grey, overcast day and there must be a chill in the air because Ellie’s wrapped up tightly in her winter coat and purple, fake-fur-lined boots, complete with woolly hat, gloves and scarf. Max seems to be in a bit of a panic, charging along at a pace that Ellie can’t hope to keep up with; he’s dragging her along as though his sheer momentum can make a seven-year-old’s legs move faster than they were ever designed to.

‘Of course I’m not cross, sweetheart. I’m just worried we’re going to be late. We said we’d meet Eve by two-thirty and it’s past that already.’

So that’s the reason. I bet this is The First Meeting. No wonder he’s nervous. I’m nervous all of a sudden and I’m not even invited.

I’ve thought about this meeting almost constantly during the solitary hours of what must have been the past four weeks or so. I’d felt so certain at first that I wanted it to be an abject disaster, that nothing would please me more than for it to become swiftly apparent that Harriet and I had been right all along. But then it began to dawn on me that if Eve and Ellie don’t get on there are only two possible outcomes; either Max feels he has to end his
affair with Eve, making him unhappy, or Max continues his relationship with Eve, despite Ellie’s objections, making Ellie unhappy. And there’s no version of either Max or Ellie being unhappy that would ever make me anything other than miserable too, with or without Eve’s involvement.

Max and Ellie arrive at the entrance to London Zoo and there she is, waiting for them, in the most stylish casual attire I think I’ve ever seen: chocolate-brown Hunter wellies over light brown jeans, a dark green semi-fitted three-quarter-length coat and a fawn cashmere scarf tied so beautifully around her elegant neck that she really ought to be giving master classes.

‘I’m so sorry we’re late. You haven’t been waiting ages have you? Anyway, Ellie this is Eve. Eve meet Ellie.’

Ellie looks at Eve shyly as if she can’t quite believe that someone this pretty is actually about to talk to her.

‘Hello.’

‘Hello, Ellie. It’s really nice to meet you. I’ve heard so much about you from your dad. He never stops talking about you.’

A bashful smile graces Ellie’s lips as she leans her body in closer to Max.

The three of them enter the zoo, Max shooting Eve a reassuring nod over the top of Ellie’s head. Eve responds with a deep breath and an apprehensive raising of her perfectly plucked eyebrows.

She’s nervous. She’s really nervous.

I haven’t, in all honesty, spared too many thoughts over the past month for how Eve might manage this meeting but now we’re all here I can see that it isn’t going to be easy
for her either. There’s clearly more riding on today’s events than probably any of us have truly dared to consider.

The three of them wander slightly aimlessly around the zoo for the first half an hour or so, Max cautiously driving the conversation, taking care to steer it towards uncontroversial topics: how parrots learn to talk, why flamingoes are pink and whether spiders can run faster than ants. It’s not until they reach the monkey enclosure that Ellie seems a bit more relaxed and the interrogation begins.

‘What’s your favourite colour, Eve?’

‘Green probably. Why, what’s yours?’

‘Mine’s pink. Daddy’s is blue. Mummy’s was purple. And what’s your favourite food?’

‘Oh, that’s a hard one. I like so many different types of food.’

Ellie’s eyes narrow with the impatience of someone who thinks procrastination is overrated.

‘But if you had to choose one? What would you choose?’

‘Probably roast beef. What about you?’

‘My favourite food of all time is ice cream. Do you know what Daddy likes best?’

‘No, I don’t think I do. What is it?’

‘Shall I tell her, Daddy?’

It’s an unconscious move on Ellie’s part, I’m sure, but nonetheless a definitive establishment of the group’s hierarchy.

Max nods.

‘Daddy likes a big, juicy steak best. With fat chips and a salad with avocado in it. Which I think is disgusting. I hate avocado. It’s so slippery in your mouth. Eww.’

Max and Eve both laugh at Ellie. She grins sheepishly but I can tell she’s relishing the attention.

‘And what’s your favourite film? Not a grown-up film but a children’s film?’

‘Gosh, that’s a tricky one too. My favourite film when I was your age was
Mary Poppins
but that’s probably a bit old-fashioned for you, isn’t it?’

‘I love
Mary Poppins
. Mummy and I watched it hundreds of times together. I know all the words to “Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious”. I can sing it for you now if you like?’

Max puts an arm round Ellie’s shoulders and pulls her towards him tenderly.

‘Maybe later, munchkin. We don’t want to frighten the monkeys now, do we?’

Ellie produces the faux-offended frown she’s perfected over the past couple of years, a look which immediately reduces Max and Eve to giggles. She’s adorable when she pulls that face. Eve’s lucky to have witnessed it on their first meeting.

‘And … what about your favourite, um, outfit? Do you like trousers best or dresses?’

‘I suppose it depends on where I’m going. Like, today, I wouldn’t have been comfortable in a dress – I’m much happier in jeans. But when I’m going to work or out in the evening I definitely prefer wearing dresses or skirts. I think us ladies look prettiest in dresses.’

Ellie nods in earnest agreement.

‘Mummy liked dressing up too. She wore dresses to work every day, usually black ones or purple ones and usually those ones you wrap round you like a dressing gown. They sound silly but she looked really nice in them.’

Eve smiles and I can’t read whether it’s a smile of genuine encouragement or polite tolerance. I’m gratified, I can’t deny, by Ellie’s frequent references to me. What mother wouldn’t feel reassured that today, of all days, they haven’t been forgotten? But I find myself feeling unexpectedly awkward, too. Because I can’t really imagine what it must be like for Eve right now, full of hope that this four-foot bundle of energy should have neither the power nor the desire to disrupt her burgeoning relationship with my husband and yet fully aware that the success of the day’s outing is in her hands. It’s confusing for all of us. If you’d told me, just a matter of weeks ago, that I’d be empathizing with Eve’s position today, and half-willing Ellie to stop mentioning me quite so often, I’d simply never have believed you.