Liz Nugent - Lying in Wait

‘Maybe Helen is right and you should go see her.’

‘Who?’

‘You know who. Your mum.’

Sometimes when Laurence didn’t want to discuss something, his eyes sort of blanked, as if he was shutting down.

‘No.’

‘Look, I already know she’s not going to approve of me. Helen told me as much. But if she’s really suffering, you should make the effort, Lar. She is your mother.’

‘No.’

‘Laurence—’

‘Just shut up about her, will you?’

That was the first time Laurence had ever raised his voice and snapped at me. He reminded me of Dessie in that moment. Bullying me into submission. I hadn’t expected Laurence to be like that. I wondered for the first time if I’d made a terrible mistake. Of course he apologized later, and was extra kind to me – exactly like Dessie. But I had convinced myself that Laurence was better than that. I needed him to prove me right, but I was helpless as I watched him slide further and further into himself.

My mother. I tried to get back to work, get back to loving Karen, get back to being normal, but I couldn’t get my mother out of my head. As a nine-year-old, she had killed her twin sister, and yet she had been able to compartmentalize that, to put the fact to one side and carry on as if it had never happened. Maybe it was a genuine accident, but if there had been no intention, why had she never talked about it? And now that I knew she had been involved in Annie’s death, I felt like I had been living with some kind of version of my mother. I knew her better than anyone. And yet I hadn’t a clue who she was or what she might be capable of. She could turn on the flip of a coin from an emotional wreck to a sort of robot – clinical, callous and detached. Malcolm, of course, had always wanted to see the best in her, so he was inclined to give her the benefit of the doubt about Diana, but he didn’t know anything about Annie Doyle.

I questioned every conversation I’d ever had with her about Annie’s body and why my father may have killed her. I analysed all the ways she had manipulated me, and recalled how she had spoken to my father in the few months prior to his death. She had been the strong one. He had gone to pieces. They were complicit in Annie’s murder, and I knew that if it had been a straightforward accident, there would have been no need to cover it up. I couldn’t guess what had driven her or them to kill a vulnerable young girl, but I couldn’t stop my mind from imagining all the possible scenarios and seeing Karen in Annie’s place. It tormented me. My mother was as monstrous as my father, perhaps worse because she had been so well able to lie and pretend for so long. I tried to get my head around it. My sweet, frail, vulnerable mother had killed one if not two people. It explained her neuroses, her snobbery, her fear of leaving the house. And it terrified me. Because if my parents were capable of murder, was I?

Karen was bewildered by my change of mood. Things had been so good between us, and she didn’t deserve the way I had snapped at her. If only bloody Helen hadn’t tried to interfere. I could see the trust fade from Karen’s eyes. I attempted desperately to repair the damage, and we tried to get back to normal, but I found it hard to control my moods, and after years of being relatively stable I found it hard to control my weight too. I was permanently starving. I tried to exercise to counter the increased food intake, but I was exhausted by the slightest exertion. Karen said I was depressed. She didn’t mention my ballooning stomach, but I caught her looks of surprise and dismay when I took off my shirt. I felt that old shame again, and when we made love it was different from before, until I began to avoid it for fear of further increasing my shame.

For a month, Karen put up with it all. She put up with my bad temper and my dark moods and my increasing girth, but she stopped talking about us as a couple, and I knew I was losing her. On some level, I was relieved. I didn’t deserve her, because of what my family had done to hers. I couldn’t be sure that I wouldn’t one day really hurt her. But I also knew that if she left me, I would be bereft.

Three weeks before Christmas we had endured another evening of awkward silences. I had more or less abandoned any interest in decorating the cottage. Dried-out paintbrushes stood in stiffened paint pots, and wallpaper hung half-ripped from one wall. Without saying anything, she began to collect the few items she had left around the cottage, her toothbrush, a few T-shirts, some make-up in the bathroom. She put them into a bag, leaving the gifts I had given her behind. I should have expected it. We hadn’t had sex in weeks, and apart from going to work I had barely left the house. Maybe my mother’s neurosis was hereditary.

‘You’re leaving me.’ It was a statement rather than a question.

Tears glistened in her eyes. ‘I thought you loved me.’

‘I do, you have no idea how much.’

‘So what has changed?’

‘I…’ How could I begin to explain?

‘Here’s the thing, Lar. I don’t care whether your mother likes me or not. It’s what you think that’s important to me. I don’t ever have to see her, but you do. Unless you go and make peace with her, it’s over between us. You can have her and me in your life. It’s not an either/or situation. Go and see her.’

‘You don’t understand what you’re asking. It isn’t about you.’

‘Of course it’s about me. Don’t treat me like a fool. Go and see her. Tell her we’re together, but that you will continue to see her once a week. Tell her she never has to meet me, but don’t cut her off. For both your sakes. She’s not going to be around for ever. She’s on her own. You always said she had nobody else. You can make room for both of us. You don’t have to choose.’

Karen is the kindest person I have ever met. Even though she had no idea why, she knew my mother despised her, and yet she was willing to share me with her, because she couldn’t bear to see me suffering or to hear of my mother’s suffering. I couldn’t refuse the ultimatum, and so that afternoon I arranged to go and see my mother. It was six weeks since we had spoken, the longest time I had been apart from her in my entire life.

I knew he would come back eventually. He had to. Laurence and I are bonded. I gave birth to him, and therefore he is mine.

I ate very little during the six weeks of his absence, knowing that Helen would be reporting everything back to him. I was genuinely distraught, especially when our estrangement went on so long, but I knew he was paying Helen to watch me, so it was not as if he had stopped caring. He loved me really.

I cursed Malcolm’s stupidity and indiscretion. The Hippocratic oath clearly meant nothing to him. I would never have told Laurence or Andrew about Diana. There was never any need for Laurence to know anything about that, but when I was forced to, I misspoke when talking about the pond. My son thought that Andrew and I had murdered that girl together. He may have been correct, but he could not possibly know why, and I knew that if I could just talk to him, I could make him understand.

I slept and wept in his bed, trying to hang on to the essence of him. It was my bedroom when I was a girl. And when I pulled back the writing desk, I found my old hiding place in the wall. There, I found photographs of the girl who I assumed was Laurence’s new lover. I was taken aback by how beautiful she was. They were studied, professional photographs. She could have been a film star. And then I really worried because this girl had something that I could not compete with. Beauty, yes, but youth too. I did not want her in our lives. Also, I found the identity bracelet and newspaper cuttings about Annie Doyle’s disappearance, and disturbing handwritten fantasies about him dating Annie Doyle and having sex with her. When had he written these? Why had he kept hold of these items? Why could he not let go of the past?