I’ve never really been one for the newspapers. There’s nothing good to be found there, no more than there is on the television news or the radio. It seemed to affect me more than others, to pain me more, seeping into my dreams and anxieties, causing me to wonder if the human race wouldn’t be better off extinct than killing each other like savages. Years ago, I remember telling Dr Selton how the daily news so often caused me to weep, and he said, quite pragmatically, ‘Well, I advise you to stop listening to it, then.’ But yesterday morning as I was making my way to the Botanic Garden I stopped off at the little shop in Freshwater to buy some fruit sticks for Chloe, and there he was on the news-stand – James. It was a close-up photograph, and I was surprised by how much older he looked, and how much more serious. He looked angry, and I picked the paper up and stared at it in amazement. And then Chloe reached out her chubby little hand and made grasping movements towards it and I thought, of course, she recognises her daddy! How lovely, I thought, knowing she would be able to see him in a few hours, but when I unfolded the bottom half of the paper I saw the words: DAISY DAD FEARS ‘UNSTABLE’ EX-WIFE.
It was too much, and I dropped the paper and left the shop, forgetting to pay for the apple slices gripped in my hand, and I ran with the pushchair bumping over pavements and kerbs, splashing through puddles and soaking my shoes, back towards the bus stop where I’d just alighted. Daisy? The paper said ‘Daisy’, as if I don’t know my own daughter’s name! Is it a trick? I felt sick with the fear of it. I stood and stared at the pole-mounted timetable, and I knew I couldn’t go now. I couldn’t meet James now I knew that was what he really thought of me, could I? I felt mortified that I’d been so foolish as to think he’d want me back in his life.
An elderly man was approaching on the pavement ahead of me, and he smiled gently, and I asked, ‘What’s in Yarmouth?’ and I pointed towards the timetable to explain myself.
‘The ferries, love,’ he replied. ‘What are you after, then?’
I turned to look at Chloe, who was grizzling now, getting damper by the minute. ‘A day trip, I suppose.’
‘You wanna go over to Lymington,’ he said, ‘’s’lovely in Lymington,’ and he carried on up the path, and then the bus to Yarmouth arrived and I paid the fare, and that was that.
Last night we stayed in a nice little B&B looking out over Lymington harbour, and I thought of those early days with James, when we were young and full of hope, when we couldn’t stop looking at each other, couldn’t stop touching each other, perhaps to check it wasn’t a dream, because surely that’s all happiness really is?
The rain has eased up now and the quayside is bustling around us as we sit on a weathered old bench near the water’s edge. It must be lunchtime. Does Chloe want feeding? My gaze rests on the horizon, back in the direction of the island, in the direction of James. What is he doing now, what is he thinking? Is he disappointed that I didn’t come? A thought occurs to me: that perhaps he didn’t say those hateful things at all, that the news people have twisted it, distorted it to keep us apart. It’s a terrible thought! Perhaps I should return, take the next island-bound ferry and make myself known to him? But I’m so tired, so, so tired and so profoundly sad, more sad than I’ve been in a very long time, and I know I won’t make that journey today.
Despite the icy, sharp wind, the rhythmic shimmer and furrow of the sea’s surface is soothing, like the mermaid’s song. I look at Chloe, my sleeping water-baby, swaddled beneath her layers, oblivious to the evils of the world, and I feel lonely. I consider the idea of Lily, allowing the digits of her phone number to run across my thoughts; perhaps I’ll call her from the B&B and see if I can meet her tomorrow? She’ll help me. Lily will know what to do. And then I think about those newspaper articles, full of their bloodshed and horror, and again I wonder, wouldn’t we all just be better off dead?