S. Watson: Second Life

She smiles. Connor is her godson and she’s known my husband for almost as long as I have. ‘Swimming?’

‘It’s a new thing. Hugh’s idea. He’s realized his fiftieth is next year and he’s dreading it. He’s trying to get fit.’ I pause. ‘Have you heard from Kate?’

I look down at my drink. I hadn’t wanted to ask the question, not so soon, but it’s out now. I’m not sure which answer I’d prefer. Yes, or no.

She sips her wine. ‘Not for a while. Have you?’

‘About three weeks ago.’

‘And…?’

I shrug. ‘The usual.’

‘Middle of the night?’

‘Yep,’ I sigh. I think back to my sister’s last call. Two in the morning, even later for her, over there in Paris. She’d sounded out of it. Drunk, I guessed. She wants Connor back. She doesn’t know why I won’t let her have him. It isn’t fair and, by the way, she isn’t the only person who thinks Hugh and I are being selfish and impossible.

‘She was just saying the same old thing.’

‘Maybe you need to talk to her. Again, I mean. When she’s not so—’

‘Angry?’ I smile. ‘You know as well as I do how much good that’s likely to do and, anyway, I can’t get hold of her. She won’t answer her mobile and if I ring the landline I just get her flatmate, who tells me nothing. No, she’s made her mind up. Suddenly, after all this time, all she wants in the world is to look after Connor. And she thinks Hugh and I are stopping her for our own selfish reasons. She hasn’t paused, even for a moment, to wonder how Connor might feel, what he might want. She certainly hasn’t asked him. Once again, it’s all about her.’

I stop talking. Adrienne knows the rest; I don’t need to carry on. She knows the reasons Hugh and I took my sister’s son, that for all these years Kate has been happy with the situation. What neither of us knows is why that has changed.

‘Will you talk to her?’ I say.

She takes a deep breath, closes her eyes. For a moment I think she’s going to tell me I have to sort it out myself, I can’t come running to her every time I argue with my sister; it’s the sort of thing my father used to say to me. But she doesn’t, she just smiles. ‘I’ll try.’

We order and eat our lunch. We discuss our mutual friends – she asks me if I’ve seen Fatima recently, did I know Ali has a new job, she wonders whether I’m planning on going to Dee’s drinks party at the weekend – then she says it’s time she left, she has a meeting. I tell her I’ll catch up with her on Saturday.

I can’t resist going through the gift shop on my way out. They’d wanted to use my picture of Marcus on the cover of the brochure but I never replied to the email and instead there’s a picture of an androgynous-looking guy sucking on a lollipop. I didn’t reply to the requests for interviews either, though that didn’t stop one of the magazines – Time Out , I think – running a piece about me. I was ‘reclusive’, they said, and my picture was one of the highlights of the exhibition, an ‘intimate portrait’, both ‘touching and fragile’. Bullshit, I wanted to reply, but I didn’t. If they want ‘reclusive’, I’ll give it to them.

I look again at the lollipop guy. He reminds me of Frosty, and I flick through the book before moving over to the postcards arranged on the display rack. Normally I’d buy a few, but today I just get one, Marcus in the Mirror . For a moment I want to tell the cashier that it’s mine, that I took it for myself, and that, though for years I’ve actively avoided it, I’m still glad they used it in the exhibition and I’ve had the chance to own it again.

But I don’t. I say nothing, just murmur a ‘Thanks’ then put the card in my bag and leave the gallery. Despite the February chill I walk most of the way home – through Covent Garden and Holborn, down Theobald’s Road in the direction of Gray’s Inn Road – and at first I can think of nothing but Marcus and our time in Berlin all those years ago. But by the time I reach Roseberry Avenue I’ve managed to move on from the past and instead I’m thinking about what’s happening here, now. I’m thinking about my sister, and hoping against hope that Adrienne can make her see sense, even though I know she won’t be able to. I’m going to have to talk to Kate myself. I’ll be firm, but kind. I’ll remind her that I love her, and want her to be happy, but I’ll also tell her that Connor is almost fourteen now, that Hugh and I have worked hard to give him a stable life and it’s important it isn’t upset. My priority has to be to make her realize that things are best left as they are. For the first time I allow myself to consider that Hugh and I probably ought to see a lawyer.

I turn the corner into our road. There’s a police car parked a few doors from the house, but it’s our front door that’s open. I begin to run; my mind empties of everything but the need to see my son. I don’t stop until I’m in the house, in the kitchen, and I see Hugh standing in front of me, talking to a woman in a uniform. I take in Connor’s towel and trunks, drying on the radiator, then Hugh and the officer turn to look at me. She’s wearing an expression of perfect, studied neutrality, and I know it’s the way Hugh looks when he’s delivering bad news. My chest tightens, I hear myself shout, as if in a dream. ‘ Where’s Connor? ’ I’m saying. ‘ Hugh! Where’s our son? ’ But he doesn’t answer. He’s all I can see in the room. His eyes are wide; I can tell that something terrible has happened, something indescribable. Tell me! I want to shout, but I don’t. I can’t move; my lips won’t form words. My mouth opens, then closes. I swallow. I’m underwater, I can’t breathe. I watch as Hugh steps towards me, try to shake him off when he takes my arm, then find my voice. ‘Tell me!’ I say, over and over, and a moment later he opens his mouth and speaks.

‘It’s not Connor,’ he says, but there’s barely enough time for the relief that floods my blood to register before he says, ‘I’m sorry, darling. It’s Kate.’

I’m sitting at the kitchen table. I don’t know how I got here. We’re alone; the police officer has left, her job done. The room is cold. Hugh is holding my hand.

‘When?’ I say.

‘Last night.’

There’s a mug of sweet tea in front of me and I watch it steam. It has nothing to do with me. I can’t work out why it’s there. All I can think of is my baby sister, lying in a Parisian alleyway, rain-soaked and alone.

‘Last night?’

‘That’s what they said.’

He’s speaking softly. He knows I’ll remember only a fraction of what he tells me.

‘What was she doing there?’

‘They don’t know. Taking a short cut?’

‘A short cut?’

I try to picture it. Kate, on her way home. Drunk, probably. Wanting to shave a few minutes off her journey.

‘What happened?’

‘They think she’d just left a bar. She was attacked.’

I remember. A mugging, the officer had said, though they don’t know yet if anything was taken. She’d looked away from me, then. She lowered both her gaze and her voice, and turned to Hugh. I heard her, though. ‘She doesn’t appear to have been raped.’

Something within me collapses as I think of it. I fold inwards; I become tiny, diminished. I’m eleven years old, Kate’s four, and I have to tell her that our mother isn’t coming back from the hospital this time. Our father thinks I’m old enough to talk to her, he can’t face it, not this time, it’s my job. Kate is crying, even though I’m not sure she understands what I’ve told her, and I’m holding her. ‘We’ll be fine,’ I’m saying, even though part of me already knows what will happen. Our father won’t cope, his friends will be no help. We’re on our own. But I can’t say this, I must be strong for Kate. For my sister. ‘You and me,’ I tell her. ‘I promise. I’ll look after you. Always.’