‘You’d like that!’ I cry. ‘You’d like me to stay nice and quiet so your dirty secret doesn’t come out in front of all Diane’s prim-and-proper golf-club cronies.’
‘The girls,’ he hisses.
‘Mummy!’ Katie calls out across the hall, silencing everyone.
Robert and I freeze on the staircase. My eyes are drawn to my daughter, her eyes glistening with tears. Next to her stands Eva, her face pale and drawn, hurt and confusion etched across her features. The red mist dissipates for a moment while my maternal instincts take over. I wish with all my heart that my daughters hadn’t seen me like this. Seen their mother’s fury laid bare. But I won’t take the blame. Not for something Robert did.
‘It’s okay, sweeties,’ I call out, my voice shrill and quavering. ‘Stay and enjoy the party. Mummy’s got a bit of a headache, that’s all.’
Amelia gives me a worried, sympathetic glance and mouths,Are you okay?
I give a quick shake of my head. She nods and ushers my girls out of the hall and into the lounge, closing the door behind them.
‘Get off me, Robert.’ I shake my arm free. ‘I’m quite capable of walking down the stairs on my own.’ I keep my eyes fixed on the front door, unwilling to catch anyone else’s eye. Robert walks down the stairs with me. I wonder if Diane and Sadie are following us or if they’re still up on the landing. I refuse to turn around and check. I couldn’t bear to see the smug expression on Sadie’s face. And I’ll bet she’s feeding my mother-in-law some nonsense about poor Gemma having too much to drink and imagining things.
Well, unfortunately, I didn’t imagine it. It was all too real. And now I have to work out what the hell I’m going to do about it.
Fifty
I fumble with the key in the lock.
‘Here,’ Robert says, ‘let me do that.’ He reaches out to take the key from my shaking fingers, but I swipe his hand away, my whole body bristling. The girls are still at the party. It’s better that they don’t have to witness the fallout from this.
On the short car journey back from Diane’s, I didn’t utter a word to Robert. He tried to tell me again that it wasn’t what it looked like. But I’ve ignored my instincts about Sadie before and I’m not going to do it any more. Diane was right when she said that to keep my family intact, I would have to ignore certain things. But I’m not like her. I can’t pretend things are not happening. I can’t live a lie. What’s the point of that? Of enduring this churning, sick feeling in my belly every day?No.If Robert wanted to keep this family intact, he would never have done what he did.
I eventually get the door unlocked and head straight upstairs without looking to see if Robert is following. I hear the front door close with a bang. The house feels different, like the soul has been ripped out of it, leaving a cold, empty shell. A meaningless collection of bricks and timber and slate. Square rooms that represent nothing. That contain only the dead, stale air of a life that no longer exists. I stifle a sob, open the airing cupboard and pull out the telescopic metal rod that we use to open the loft hatch.
‘Gemma, what are you doing?’ Robert asks, as he reaches the top of the stairs. His voice is like a buzzing fly that I want to swat and silence with a rolled-up newspaper.
I reach up and unhook the square hatch. Then I use the pole to pull down the aluminium ladder. Kicking off my heels and hitching up my skirt, I climb the ladder and switch on the light to the tiny loft space in the eaves. Next, I haul myself up and crawl across the boards towards a covered mound. I pull off the dust sheet to reveal a pile of suitcases. As I tug out two of the older cases, the ones on top slide off into a messy heap. Diane bought these particular two for us. They’re expensive leather, but they’re heavy and don’t have wheels, so although they look smart, they’re completely impractical.
I drag the largest one over to the open hatch. Robert has started to climb the ladder and I’m tempted to chuck the suitcase at his head and knock him off balance. But I don’t think being accused of attempted murder will help me.
‘Can you take this down?’
He does as I ask, lifting the case and putting it on the landing.
‘I’ve got another one. Hang on.’ I go back to retrieve the medium case and shove that into his hands a little too violently. But he manages to keep his balance.
‘Gemma, don’t do this,’ he says as I switch off the light and climb down the ladder. ‘Don’t leave. There’s no need. What you saw… it wasn’t like that.’
‘Leave?’ I say, stepping back onto the landing and grasping the handles of both suitcases. ‘I’mnot leaving.’
I go into our bedroom, set both cases on the bed and flip them open. Then I pull open the wardrobe door and start transplanting Robert’s clothes from the wardrobe to the suitcases. Shoving them in, complete with their hangers.
‘What are you doing? Put those back! I thought we were going to talk about this?’ He closes the wardrobe door, but I yank it back open. ‘Gemma, for Christ’s sake, talk to me!’
I straighten up and stare at Robert for a moment. At this man who I thought I would spend the rest of my life with. ‘Okay. You want me to talk? I’ll talk. I thought I could trust you. I thought you loved me. But I was obviously mistaken. You’ve torn my heart out and stamped on it, and I will never,everforgive you. Is that enough talking?’
‘But I’ve done nothing wrong!’ he cries, taking an armful of his clothes out of the case and trying to shove them back into the wardrobe. I snatch them back, ripping one of his shirts in the process.
‘Your definition of wrong and mine are obviously two completely different things,’ I say, my voice shaking with anger. With disbelief. With sadness. The image of him and Sadie, their bodies pressed up close, playing over and over on a loop in my head. I wrench open a drawer and start pulling out handfuls of his underwear and socks, stuffing them into the cases.
‘Listen to me!’ he cries. ‘I love you, Gemma! I love our family! Do you really want to throw all that away?’
‘Methrow it away?’ I haven’t managed to pack all his things yet, but it’s taking too long so I figure he’s got enough for now. I close up the cases and start lugging them out of the room. ‘I should have kicked you out the night of your mother’s golf-club do. When I found Sadie’s hair in our bed.’ I give a bitter laugh. ‘There were so many other signs, but I was stupid. I ignored them. Not any more,Rob. I’m not going to disbelieve what I’ve seen with my own eyes.’
‘I know what you saw, Gemma. And I know how it looked. But like I keep trying to tell you, I didn’t—’
