AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Ronan didn’t find out until I woke up. I only confided in Gerry and he promised to keep schtum. He’s my best mate. I had to tell someone, it was doing my head in.” He rubs his mouth nervously. His lips are dry and a bit cracked. “Look,” he sighs. “I was screwed up. I panicked for heaven’s sake. I was terrified you’d find out and hate me.” Well, he’s right about one thing. He rakes a hand through his hair. It’s grown longer, it suits him.
“So, go on then, if you’ve taken a truth pill. Who is she? Where did you meet her?” I take a swig of wine angrily.
“Does it matter?” I tell him that it does to me. “Just some woman I met down The Bald Faced Stag.” He stands up and starts pacing the room, a sure sign that he’s lying. I bet it’s one of the models he’s worked with. She told me herself she’s been in Vogue. They’ve probably been at it for months. “I was upset about us breaking up so I went out and got smashed. You dumping me like that really got to me, you know.” He sounds hurt. Good! “Anyway, I asked her back to mine, poured out my heart to her and one thing led to another.”
“Well, guess what, Nick? I spoke to her myself at the hospital and she told me she was your girlfriend.”
“She was lying…or maybe she’s a fantasist.” He throws his hands up. “I dunno!”
I get to my feet and walk towards him, applauding along the way. “You should get a BAFTA for that, great performance.”
“I’m telling you the truth,” he protests. I shake my head and give a little laugh that comes out like borderline hysteria. He really must take me for a complete mug.
“You never wanted to marry me,” I snap, puffing my chest out. “You were just looking for a good excuse to get out of it.” Tears sting my eyes. I don’t want them to. I don’t want him to see me crying. “And now you’ve changed your mind. Well, tough!”
“Come on, that’s not fair. I loved you. I wanted to make you happy. I still do!! Yes, I admit, I did drag my feet a bit to begin with, but then once it was all settled…I was happy, I was looking forward to it…I…” I roll my eyes and he falters. He knows he’s fighting a losing battle.
I look at my watch, it’s ten to seven. Daniel should be calling shortly. “Look, you’ve had your say, now I want you to get out. Your five minutes are up.”
He stares at the floor, hands loosely on hips. I watch his chest go up and down, up and down, hard and fast, and then he says, “You don’t believe me, do you?” I don’t reply. We both know the answer to that one. “Look,” he drops back into his chair and runs a hand over his face. “Please,” he says. “There’s more… I want to tell you everything.” More? I’m not sure I can take any more surprises today.
“Go on, then,” I drone. “Five more minutes.” I know he won’t go until he’s had his say. I top up our glasses and take a large sip. I know I’m going to need it.
“When she first told me she was pregnant I was completely floored. I asked her what she was planning to do, explained that we were back together, getting married.” He closes his eyes briefly and takes a deep breath through his nose. “I said that if she decided to keep the baby, I’d do all I could, help out with money and everything, but I couldn’t promise anything else. I made it crystal clear that I was in love with YOU, that you were my future. Obviously, I knew you’d freak out about the pregnancy when you found out, and I was going to tell you, Foxy. I promise.” My stomach lurches. I wish he’d stop calling me that. “Anyway, I left the decision to her, and she said she wanted a termination.”
“Well, I’m glad you were supportive. It can’t have been easy for her.” He scoffs when I say this and shakes his head, twirling the stem of his wine glass. I think he’s about to cry. “So, obviously, she changed her mind, then.”
“No, that’s just it, as far as I was concerned she’d gone ahead with it.” He sucks his lips in. “She sorted out a clinic, we met up for a coffee, and I gave her the money.”
“Money? Why didn’t she go on the NHS?”
“Couldn’t wait that long…” he sighs. “Anyway, I didn’t hear from her again. And that was that. It was over, there was no point in telling you.” He pauses, knocks the wine back in one. I hope he’s not driving. “Then, a few weeks before our wedding she turns up on my doorstep bloody pregnant!”
I think about what he’s saying, it is starting to make sense – his irritability, mood swings, distance. I thought it was because he was feeling trapped by the prospect of marrying me, but perhaps he was already tangled in a trap of a completely different kind.
“I asked you to postpone our wedding just to buy me some time, to find a solution, find a way of telling you. I didn’t want our marriage to start off with secrets and lies.” I raise my eyebrows, folding my arms. I suppose that’s true – he could’ve just married me and hurt me even more. “I swear on my mother’s grave, Foxy, I’m not lying. You’ve got to believe me.” I nod. I think he’s telling me the truth.
“So, let me just get this straight.” I lean forward against the table. “You gave a stranger, whom you met in a pub for casual sex, cash to have a termination?”
“Yes,” he says, pulling that annoying puzzled expression again. “Quite a bit of cash, actually.”
“And you trusted her?”
“Why wouldn’t I? She said she didn’t want my sprog if there was no future for us. And when I told her that I may be carrying a dodgy gene she bolted out the door. Couldn’t get away fast enough.”
“Well, how can you be sure it’s yours?”
“I can’t, but she swore she hadn’t been with anyone else in over six months.” An image of her at the hospital holding his hand flashes in my mind. Those tears did look very real to me – she’s probably in love with him, that’s why she kept it. “There’s a good chance that I’m the father, and, at the time, it was easier to just give in to her than risk you finding out what a knob I’d been.” Typical Nick, always taking the easy way out.
“Did it not occur to you for one moment that she’d change her mind?” He stares at his clenched hands on the table. “You didn’t think she was hormonal, unsure? You didn’t think to go with her, to make sure she was all right, to see if it’s what she really wanted? Hell.” I throw my hands up, “What you both wanted? Because, clearly she wanted to keep her baby, didn’t she?”
“God, you make it sound as if we were in a relationship.” He leaps to his feet. “We only had sex once, for goodness sake, and even that’s a complete blur. Look, I think she was just as shocked as I was to begin with. But then, once we talked it through, she got a clearer picture. She said bringing up a child on her own was out of the question – she’d just started a new job, had commitments, stuff going on in her life. I don’t think I could’ve stopped her if I wanted to. So yes, I took her word for it. I’m a mug, what can I say?”
“But you weren’t such a careless mug with me, were you?” I scream into his back. My hand comes down hard and fast on the table, the glasses rattle. He spins around, startled, and a cold shiver tears through me.
23
“I can’t believe you’ve brought that up,” Nick saysquietly. “It…it was an accident. We agreed it was for the best. We’d only been together a few weeks.” His eyes search mine worriedly. He’s right. I’m being unfair. I want to blame him for everything. I cover my face with my hands. It’s been a shit day. “You’re angry,” he says gently, “and you’ve every right to be.” He’s kneeling by my side, hand on my knee.
