Rosamund Lupton - Afterwards

I feel her comforting warmth and another vivid memory of sports day flashes into my mind. Not a detective one, but one that comforts me and I’ll allow myself to play it for a moment; a paracetamol for my aching mind.

Maisie was hurrying across the bright green grass, in her FUN shirt, stepping over the painted white lines, delphinium blue sky above.

‘Gracie…’ she said, giving me a hug, a proper bear-hug kind, none of this air-kissing.

‘I’ve come to give Rowena a lift home,’ she said, beaming. ‘She texted me a little while ago, said the tubes were up the spout. So Chauffeur-Mum to the fore!’

I told her that Rowena had gone to get the medals from school and that Addie was getting his cake; an M &S chocolate tray-bake we’d turned into a World War One trench scene.

‘Fantastic!’ she said, laughing.

Maisie, my surprising kindred spirit. Our daughters, those chalk-and-cheese little girls, never became friends but Maisie and I did. We’d meet on our own and share small details of our children’s lives: Rowena’s tears when she didn’t make the netball team and Maisie offering Mr Cobin new team outfits or sex if he’d make Rowena wing attack – and having to explain the second offer was a joke! Rowena’s horror when her big teeth came through and demanding the dentist give her small ones again; exchanged like a gift with my dentist story of Jenny refusing to eat or smile when she got a brace until we found a make that was bright blue.

And it was Maisie I turned to when I started my third miscarriage at Jenny’s seventh birthday party, when you were away filming.

‘Listen to me, kiddly-winks! Jenny’s mummy has to go and visit Father Christmas now – yes, it is three months early! – but he needs advance warning of REALLY GOOD children – and because you’ve all been so FANTASTIC this afternoon she wants to make sure you’ll all get an extra special present in your stocking .’

Aside to me. ‘Materialism and Father Christmas, usually works.

‘So it’ll be me now doing musical bumps, alright? Everyone ready?!’

And it was alright. And nobody knew. And she kept twenty children entertained while I went to hospital; had Jenny to stay that night.

Three years later, she waited for those twelve weeks with me till Adam was safely inside and likely to go to term. Like our family, she understood how deeply precious Adam is to us; our hard-won baby.

And now she’s sitting next to me, my old friend, crying. She cries all the time – ‘ Stupidly soppy! ’ she’d say at carol services – but these are painful tears. She tightens her grip on my hand.

‘It’s my fault,’ she says. ‘I was inside, going to the loo, when the fire alarm went off. But I didn’t know Jenny was in the building. I didn’t know to call for her. I just went looking for Rowena and Adam. But they were fine, outside in no time.’

At sports day I’d told her Adam and Rowena were at the school. If I’d said, ‘ And Jenny ,’ she’d have called for her too, made sure she was out before the fire took hold.

Two words.

But instead I’d wittered on about Adam’s cake.

Her voice is a whisper. ‘Then I saw you running towards school. And I knew how relieved you were going to be when you saw that Addie was safe.’

I remember Maisie outside, comforting the reception teacher, Rowena comforting Adam by the bronze statue of a child, as black smoke was swirled by the wind, dirtying the blue sky.

‘And then you shouted for Jenny and I realised she must be in there. And you ran inside.’ She pauses for a moment, her face pale. ‘But I didn’t go to help you.’ Her voice is staccato with guilt.

But how can she think I blame her? I’m just moved that she thought, even for one moment, of going into a burning building after me.

‘I knew I should help you,’ she continues. ‘Of course I should. But I wasn’t brave enough. So I ran to the fire engines that were still on the bridge instead. Away from the fire. I told them there were people inside. I thought if they knew they’d get there more quickly, that it would be more urgent. And they did. I mean, as soon as I told them, one of the fire engines drove at a parked car and shoved it off the road onto the pavement. And then people parked behind them realised what was happening and got out of their cars and the firemen were shouting that there were people in the school and then we were all pushing cars out of the way. Everyone pushing the cars out of the way so they could get through.’

I can see that her memory is over-spilling into her present, so that it’s happening now in front of her, and she can smell it and hear it – diesel fumes, I imagine, and people shouting and horns going and the smell of fire reaching the bridge.

I want to interrupt her from her reverie, rescue her from it. I want to ask her if Rowena’s alright because I remember seeing her in A &E when I was searching for Jenny. And I remember the suited man talking to the journalists and saying Rowena was in hospital too. But I hadn’t paused to think about her since; anxiety for my own child selfishly pushing out space for anybody else.

But why is Rowena hurt when I saw her safely outside next to the statue with Adam?

Dr Bailstrom arrives on her precipitous red heels and Maisie has to go. I think she leaves reluctantly as if there’s something more she wants to tell me.

It’s late now and the pull of home is unbearably strong. Own bed. Own house. Own life back again to be lived as usual tomorrow.

You are on the phone to Adam and for a few moments I hang back, as if it’ll be my turn in a minute to speak to him. Then I hurry close to you, listening for his voice.

‘I’m going to spend the night with Mum and Jenny here. But I’ll see you as soon as I can, OK?’

I can just hear him breathing. Short, hurried breaths.

‘OK, Ads?’

Still just breathing, terrified breathing.

‘I need you to be a soldier right now, Addie, please?’

Still he doesn’t speak. And I hear the gap between you, the one that used to make me sad and now frightens me.

‘Good night then. Sleep tight, and send my love to Granny G.’

I have to hug him, right this moment ; feel his warm little body and ruffle his soft hair and tell him how much I love him.

‘I’m sure Granny G will bring him to see you tomorrow,’ Jenny says to me, as if reading my thoughts. ‘I’d probably scare him too much, but you look alright.’

You want to spend the night next to me and next to Jenny – splitting yourself in two, to keep watch over both of us.

A nurse tries to persuade you to go to the bed they’ve sorted out for you. She tells you that I am unconscious and therefore unaware of whether you’re with me or not, and that Jenny’s too deeply drugged to be aware of anything either. As the nurse says this, Jenny pulls a silly face at her and I laugh. There’s really a lot of opportunity for bedroom-farce-style comedy here and I think Jenny will try and beat me to it.

The nurse promises you that if my condition or Jenny’s ‘worsens’ they’ll get you immediately.

She’s telling you that neither of us will die without you.

Perhaps I jumped the gun a bit in the potential for comedy.

You still refuse to go to bed.

‘It’s late, Mike,’ your sister says firmly. ‘You’re exhausted. And you need to function properly tomorrow for Jenny’s sake. And for Grace’s.’

I think it’s her advice that you need to function properly tomorrow that decides you – it’s optimistic to go to bed, demonstrating your belief that we will still be alive in the morning.

Jenny and I stay with you next to the single bed they’ve given you in the family room, just by the burns unit. We watch you as you fitfully sleep, your hands tightly tensed.