‘And how was yesterday at work?’ Natasha asks me on Thursday morning at our regular appointment.
‘Professional,’ I say. ‘I shouldn’t have had that conversation with him in his office on Monday, so I went out of my way to keep things proper yesterday.’
‘So I think you only told me half of the story before we ran out of time on Monday. You said that you and Sebastian spent the night together in the city, and then you came back and tried to go to the police – you didn’t tell me how Sebastian handled you going straight back to David.’
‘He tried to call me while I was driving back from the city to the police station. I deflected his calls, but he kept calling so I turned the phone off.’
‘Why was that?’
‘I wanted him to be proud of me. I wanted to be able to ring him to tell him that I had taken out the restraining order and that I was leaving David. I knew it was all going to be terrifying – but I’d been terrified for so long – all I wanted was to get myself back into Seb’s arms, because I hadn’t felt that happy in forever.’
But then after that plan went to hell, when I was back home and things with David in such a delicate, fragile balance, I turned the phone on only long enough to send Seb a text message which I immediately deleted.
It was a mistake, Seb. I’m really sorry. David is my husband, and I love him. Please, can we just forget this ever happened? I’m fine, and I know what I’m doing – respect my decision. Please don’t text back.
‘Did he text back?’ Natasha asks me quietly.
‘No, but… David was so clingy to me that day, he wouldn’t let me out of his sight and when he saw I had the phone he took it,’ I whispered.
‘Did he do that often?’
‘Always. I was so used to David going through my phone, it didn’t even occur to me to ask him why or to resist. I just sat there frozen and I prayed that Seb could resist the urge to call me or text back – I wasn’t sure what he’d do. David went through my phone for a while then he told me it needed an update and he went into the office to download something, and I spent the next half hour sweating through my clothes because I thought David would find some magic way to undelete text messages.’
‘What was David doing with your phone, Olivia?’
‘I didn’t know at first. I thought he really was updating it. He came back later and he gave me the phone and he cuddled me and he told me that he thought things were going to be better between us – that we were about to start a whole new era of our lives.’
When I got to work the following Monday, Sebastian flicked me a quick glance, but he didn’t hold my gaze. It was awkward for a while, but he didn’t try to change my mind.
I knew he’d respect my decision, even if he hated it.
‘And when you realised you were pregnant?’ Natasha asks me now.
‘Well, Zoe really could be David’s or Sebastian’s baby. I had no way of knowing, and I knew I couldn’t leave David. So for all of our sakes, I just had to pretend there was no doubt she was his.’
I kept the pregnancy a secret for as long as I could, and when I finally told everyone at work, I did it over morning tea so that I didn’t have to face Seb alone. While the girls all cheered, Seb stared at me in shock, and so then I made a point of telling them all that my due date was a month later than it really was.
‘Did he have doubts?’ Natasha asks.
‘I didn’t think so at first. But then one day he just walked into my office and he shut the door and he asked me point-blank if the baby was his.’
‘What did you say?’
‘I lied about my due date – I told him I was four weeks earlier along than I was. He made me look him in the eye and promise him.’
‘How did you feel while you were doing that?’
‘Pretty much like I feel when I think about it now,’ I admit miserably. ‘Like the worst person in the world.’
‘Did you think about telling him the truth?’
‘I knew if I did that he would convince me in seconds to leave David, and that Sebastian would find a way to keep me safe.’
Natasha tries to hide her surprise, but fails. ‘So why didn’t you?’
‘I was scared that David would go through with his threat – and you know, as much as he was a nightmare – he was also my husband, and I didn’t always hate him – the idea of him doing that to himself… ’ My chest tightens, and I reach for a tissue. I hold it in my hands while I calm myself, and then I whisper, ‘I was just stuck. If I told Seb, I’d end up leaving with him, and the best case outcome was a bad one because David would harass us forever anyway, and the worst case scenario was… well, what happened.’
‘When did you leave work?’
‘It was that day, actually, because later that night, David was working in the study while I cooked dinner and Seb sent me a text. It just said something like I don’t believe you, we need to talk, and I deleted it and told myself I would deal with him the next day at work. But then I heard David’s footsteps on the stairs – he was running – and he ran straight to me, and he grabbed my wrist, and he pushed me up against the wall. I felt the pop of the bone as it broke.’
His grip was too hard and the angle was all wrong and my ulna snapped clean through. But David was beyond rationality – still holding my wrists in his fists and shaking me as he shouted and I was in too much shock to feel the pain at first – focused purely on his bewildering rants.
Who does he think he is, texting my fucking wife? He has no right to talk to you outside of the office, he’s fucking lucky I even let you work there – you’re mine. And what the fuck was that even about?
‘I figured out a few weeks later that David had set up my iCloud account on his laptop, so he saw Seb’s text as soon as it came in,’ I tell Natasha softly. ‘The stupid thing is that at the time, I didn’t even wonder how he knew about the text – because in our house, David was all powerful. It was no surprise at all to me that he might have developed an omniscient knowledge of every little thing going on in my life.’
‘You were pregnant when this happened?’
‘Yeah… six or seven months.’
‘Didn’t that raise alarm bells at the hospital?’
‘He told them I tripped on the stairs and landed badly. They didn’t buy it at first – the nurse took David away for paperwork and the doctor asked me point blank as soon as I was alone.’
Olivia, this injury just doesn’t look like the result of a fall. Is there anything else you want to tell us?
‘Were you tempted to ask them for help?’
‘No. Because they’d call the police, and I knew from experience that wouldn’t work.’
‘So – how did Sebastian handle the fractured wrist?’
‘He didn’t,’ I sigh. ‘He probably still doesn’t know exactly what happened, I didn’t tell him and I didn’t see him, I barely left the house for the rest of the pregnancy. David told me to call and resign the next morning, and I did call but… I just told Seb we’d had a scare with the pregnancy and I had to go on maternity leave early.’
‘Did Sebastian have his suspicions?’
‘He didn’t buy it for a second,’ I whisper, staring at my wrist. I wore the cast for two months. It only came off at the end of April, and Zoe was born in May. ‘As soon as I told him I wasn’t coming back, Seb suspected David had seen the text. But what good would it have done if I told him the truth?’
‘How did you convince him?’
‘I was a bitch, just like David always said I was. I was cold with him, I wanted to hurt him and to push him away. So I told him I was fine and that my welfare or the welfare of my baby was none of his business.’
‘That must have been so difficult for him to hear. Particularly looking back now and seeing where things wound up… ’
‘I know I hurt him so much, and he has this way of wearing his pain on his face. Even yesterday when I was at work and I was trying to keep things normal, every time I caught him looking at me, he looked like his heart was breaking for me and I don’t understand it and I don’t know how to deal with it.’
Natasha has her notepad on her lap, but she lifts it now and carefully rests it on her desk before she turns back to me.
‘I have some new homework for you, Olivia.’
I stare at her warily. ‘What is it?’
‘The next time you’re speaking to Sebastian and you see that pain in his face, can you think really hard about what might be behind it? And I know – I know it’s easier to stop when it hurts so much, but… when there’s a tragedy like this, there really are phases of grief. And contrary to popular opinion, everyone works through grief in their own way and in their own timing, and there’s no right way to deal with it. But I do think there comes a time when the methods we use to cope in the early days after a trauma can start to hinder our progress if we hang onto them too long.’
‘What does all of that mean?’
‘It means’ – Natasha takes a deep breath, and she says very gently – ‘denial is only going to get you so far, Olivia. You are going to need to look Sebastian in the eye sometime soon and face what’s happened to you both.’
I sit up thinking about Sebastian that night, and in the end, I need to take one of Dr Eric’s sleeping pills just to get some rest. This means I sleep in – and I wake up feeling strange. My head aches, and it’s a struggle to get ready for work. I’m flustered by the time I get Zoe to the day-care centre. I kiss her and pass her to Ellen, who gives me a concerned look.
‘Are you okay? You’re awfully pale this morning.’
‘Just running so late,’ I mutter. ‘Couldn’t sleep last night – then I couldn’t wake up this morning. But hey – Ellen – I keep meaning to ask you, I haven’t had a bill from you yet for Zoe’s care?’
‘Oh, we can sort that out later,’ Ellen assures me, but I see the odd way she pauses. I wait for her explain herself, and she smiles at me. ‘I’m just very happy to help you out for now.’
‘I don’t need your charity; I really can afford to pay for her care.’
‘I know, Olivia. Why don’t we sit down and figure something out soon?’
I drive the short block to work and park, but my head is still pounding and now I’m thinking about Ellen’s awkwardness when I reminded her about the bill. I go to the kitchen for a coffee and Sebastian is there, and he greets me with a polite, ‘Good morning.’
‘Hi.’ I say, and I reach for my own mug and slip it under the coffee machine. ‘How’s your week been?’
‘The same,’ he says. ‘How are you going?’
I smile at him and echo, ‘The same.’
‘Are you doing any better, Olivia?’ The words seem to burst from his lips, as if he’s been holding them back for weeks. I try to reassure him with a smile.
‘Of course I am. Being back at work is helping me more than you could ever know.’
‘And… Zoe?’
‘She’s settled into day-care well.’
I can see from the way he’s staring at me that Seb desperately wants to say something, and so I pause, waiting expectantly – and then my eyes widen because it suddenly strikes me that maybe he’s going to ask to come around to see her – or to start to get to know her? There’s really no reason why he shouldn’t… not now.
Could we be a family one day?
I wait, but he only stares at me, and I feel myself soften towards him. Maybe he’s finding it difficult to ask. Maybe he feels awkward.
‘Seb,’ I say gently. ‘Do you want to spend some time with her? To start to get to know her?’
Sebastian picks up his mug and he leaves the room abruptly. As he passes me, I see that his eyes are glistening, and I’m taken aback. Why would he react like that? I know it’s late – but it’s not too late. Maybe this is our chance? Maybe everything can still be okay?
I stand there for some time, but I can’t untangle the mess of thoughts in my mind, and I decide I’ll try to go into my office and prepare for the day. I’ll talk to Seb again later. In the meantime, I have to de-sex three pups this morning, then lunch with Ingrid, and then this afternoon Gilly has booked in a few routine procedures – a feline tooth extraction and the excision of a mystery mass from a prize bull.
It’s a busy day, but as the morning passes, I’m constantly distracted by the thought of Sebastian in that kitchen. I keep picturing the tears in his eyes, and it doesn’t make any sense at all. Why does he keep crying? He’s a sensitive man and he cares for me, so perhaps it’s natural on some level – but this isn’t my mirrored grief I’m seeing, it’s his own. Is it because there’s a very good chance that Zoe is his, and he’s never had a chance to spend time with her?
Is it because he’s angry with me about hiding the truth from him? Well, if that’s the case, fair enough. My options had just felt so limited. I felt like I was trapped in an impossible situation from which there was no safe way of escape, so I took the route that seemed the least dangerous to him. But maybe when I transferred the risk to myself, I transferred the cost to Sebastian.
If that’s what he’s upset about, we can fix it. Zoe is only a few months old – it’s nothing at all in the scheme of things.
But despite my attempts to console myself, that unsettled sensation in my chest just won’t ease, because every explanation I can come up with for Sebastian’s odd behaviour just doesn’t convince me. There’s still something else going on here and I just can’t see it and it’s starting to frustrate me. It’s almost like everyone is looking at me with a knowing look in their eyes all of the time and I have no idea why.
It’s a good thing I’ve done hundreds of pup castrations before, because I’m barely concentrating as I perform the procedures. My hands work methodically, but I lose time in my thoughts, trying to figure all of this out, like it’s a puzzle I can solve. I feel like I’m just a heartbeat away from an Aha! moment that will make all of this make sense, but it’s maddening – my heart keeps right on beating but my mind can’t connect the dots.
‘Liv, Seb’s had to go home sick,’ one of the nurses says as she appears is in the theatre room doorway, and she grimaces. ‘Must have eaten something bad I think. Just wanted to let you know.’
I look up at her and nod. Maybe that’s all it was, he was sick.
That makes sense, but somehow, I can’t convince myself that’s what really happened.