THIRTY-FIVE

Angela

TUESDAY, APRIL 10, 2012

It’d been a difficult and long weekend, but they had weathered Easter as a family and it was over now. Nick would be back at work today and she could stop tiptoeing around the house. He’d shouted at her on Saturday, as she knew he would, when she finally told him about going to London and having the DNA test.

“What, you sneaked off without telling me?” he’d roared, and she’d hoped the neighbors were out.

“Stop shouting, Nick,” she’d said. “The neighbors will hear. Look, you were so busy and worried about work last week, I didn’t want to add to your stress.”

He’d looked at her, trying to detect the lie, but she’d kept her wifey face on.

“I don’t want you getting all het up again,” he’d said. “I’m saying this for your own good, Angie.”

Normally, she’d have smiled at him and thanked him for being so caring. But she couldn’t.

Everything was churning in her head, the hope and the hurt and the betrayal rising to the surface after so many years.

“I won’t get all het up, Nick. But this is something I have to do. For Alice.”

At the mention of her name, Nick had closed down and disappeared into the garage, emerging only for silent meals.

Angela had cleaned the house to vent her fury, wielding the hoover like a weapon, crashing it into skirting boards and doors, leaving chips of paint in her wake as she thrust her way through the rooms. In her head she was screaming her accusations: You never wanted Alice. She was the price you paid for being unfaithful. That’s what you felt.

I bet you saw that woman again.

She hated herself for thinking it, but her internal rants almost always ended with that. She couldn’t help it. It was always there, waiting to torture her. She’d never said it out loud to Nick. What would she do if he admitted it? Better not to know.

They’d slept back to back on Saturday night, not even saying “good night.” She’d lain awake, trying to quell her thoughts, and had finally drifted into troubled, sheet-twisting sleep. When she’d dredged herself awake, Nick was lying beside her, eyes open, studying the ceiling.

“Hello, love,” she said through force of habit.

He grunted.

“Patrick is bringing the children round this morning so we can give them their Easter eggs. I thought we could take them to the park,” she said, determined to wear him down.

Nick grunted again, still looking at the ceiling.

“What are you thinking, Nick?” she said.

“That this will never be over,” he said, his voice flat. “That it will never go away.”

“It? Do you mean our daughter?” she said, sitting up.

Nick had rolled away from her, but she couldn’t let it go.

“She is our daughter. And I need to know, Nick, if Alice and I can count on you.”

“For God’s sake, Angie, what does that even mean? Whatever the police say it will be bad news—either it isn’t Alice and you will be devastated, or it is and our baby is dead. Look, Angie, it won’t bring her back. We don’t need tests. Our baby is dead and gone. You know that in your heart of hearts, don’t you? We don’t need graves and bones and policemen. It’s too late for that. We need to let it—her—go.”

“You may feel that, but I need to know, Nick. I need to know for certain where she is so that I can find some peace and say good-bye properly. The fact that you don’t want to makes me sad, but it won’t stop me,” Angela said, hugging herself against the growing storm.

“I know you never felt the same as me about Alice,” she went on and felt him stiffen beside her.

“What do you mean?” he said. But she knew he knew. They hadn’t had this row for a long time, but its legacy was as instantly toxic as a nuclear winter.

“I’m not discussing it, Angela. It was forty bloody years ago. It was one night and I’ve said I was sorry. There is nothing else I can say. Making me suffer won’t bring Alice back. It wasn’t my fault. I wasn’t the one who left her on her own.”

Her gasp of pain silenced him. He knew he’d gone too far. Way too far. And he reached for his wife’s hand, unclenching the fingers of her fists.

“God, Angie, why do you do this? Make us say things we’ll regret? You know I don’t blame you. Of course I don’t.”

“I know,” she said. But she didn’t. After all, she had left Alice on her own.

The shouting was over in seconds—it always was, that was their way—but the silence lasted much longer. These rare rows left them both shattered and unable to think about anything else.

It was Angela who got out of bed first, pulled on her dressing gown, and went to make tea.

•   •   •

By the time Tuesday came, a grumpy peace had been declared—the grandchildren had forced them to put on brave faces. Nick had held her hand when they walked to the swings and slide down the road, and she’d made him his favorite roast dinner on Sunday.

“Bye, love,” he’d said that morning and kissed her on the top of her head.

“I’ll call you later,” she’d said.

She tried to sit still and read her magazine. But she couldn’t move on, getting stuck on the same sentence, the same words, over and over again. She made cups of tea that grew cold in a row beside her. She felt she could hear her heart beating.

She hadn’t told Nick when the DNA results were due—she’d been vague. She needed to deal with them herself first.

They’d said it would normally take two days for the results. The police. But Easter would delay things. There was nothing they could do about bank holidays. But they must ring today.

She checked again to make sure her phone had not switched itself off or gone to silent. The blank screen looked accusingly at her. She rang Kate.

“Hi, just wondered if you’d heard anything,” she heard herself say.

Kate hadn’t, but said she would call and try to get a steer on how things were going.

Angela sat with the phone in her hand.

When it rang, five minutes later, she yelped and cut off the call by fumbling and pressing the wrong button. It rang again immediately.

“Kate? Sorry about that. What did they say?”

“They say they’ll probably—and they wouldn’t promise more than probably, Angela—have a result tomorrow,” Kate said.

Angela gripped the phone tighter. “They said it should take two days, Kate. They’ve had five! Did they say if there were any indications yet?”

“No, they’re keeping everything close to their chests, I’m afraid. Look, I know how horrible this must be but we have to sit tight, Angela.”

Angela knew it made sense, but the idea of sitting tight for another day made her feel physically sick.

“Why don’t you go and do something? Go to the shops or see a friend,” Kate said. “Just make sure you have your phone with you all the time so I can contact you.”

“Yes, maybe. You will ring as soon as you hear, won’t you? Promise me,” Angela said, hating herself for sounding so needy. So desperate.

“Of course,” Kate said.