How many days have passed since that night I discovered I used to be a mother? I have no idea. Time has stood still like a stagnant pond, brackish and foul, unable to sustain life. I have been festering in this bed, slipping in and out of disturbing sleep littered with dreams of my dead son, listening to the sounds of family life continue around me. As if nothing has changed at all.
They bring meals and medication, sit on the edge of the bed and try to slip pathetic morsels down my throat. A plate encrusted with last night’s untouched food still sits at my feet. People come and go, doorbells ringing, music and television. Last night I heard laughter in the hallway, the sound of the front door closing. I got up, peered from the window, saw Dr Thurwell leaving with an armful of folders. Discussing cases again. I stayed there to watch the red blur of his lights as he disappeared back to his own life.
On that day when he came to see me in hospital, sitting on the edge of my bed, he asked if I was feeling any better. He asked if I was looking forward to going home, and if I felt like I was making progress. Whether or not things were getting to be too much, and whether I’d had any thoughts about taking my own life. I thought it was strange at the time, his concern that I might be feeling low enough to kill myself. As far as I could see, I was doing everything I could to survive. But now I realise it wasn’t strange at all: he assumed I’d already tried to kill myself once by crashing my car into a tree while my son was inside. Last night, as I watched him walking to his car, he turned back and spotted me, raised his hand to wave. I did nothing in return, edged back from the curtain, slipped back into the shadows. I didn’t want to be seen by him.
But this morning my self-imposed isolation has come to an end. I can hear the heavy footsteps on the hallway floor outside my door, the brief knock, the handle being tested. My father stands in the doorway, his face cast in silhouette with the subtle yellow glow of the hallway lamp behind him.
‘You remember what is happening today?’
I nod my head. His shoulders are slumped at the thought of what is to come. The police called to let us know they are eager to talk now that I am well enough. Just the idea that he has been delaying their case, keeping me locked up and out of their reach, makes me so nervous my limbs shake.
‘Now that you know the truth, Chloe, I can’t hold them off any more. Just keep in mind what we agreed. You don’t remember anything.’
That morning after breakfast, Mum pops out to get her hair done, and returns half an hour later, neatly coiffed and ready for the police. Their arrival is tensely anticipated, rippling through the house in energetic waves since we all woke up. Some of us haven’t slept. The hallway floor has been mopped and what I assume must be my father’s best suit is back from the dry cleaner’s and hanging over the door to his study. The scent of winter roses drifts past me in waves. There’s a vase on the hallway table that I saw Ben position there earlier on this morning. I watched him from the top of the stairs, lingering, waiting for what I didn’t know. He glanced towards the kitchen, then poked his head around the study door, giving my father’s suit a closer inspection than was necessary. When he saw me watching him he made an approach as if he had something to say. But at the last moment I heard my father’s footsteps and Ben changed his mind. What did he want to say to me? The smell of the flowers makes me feel sick.
I remain on the sofa with my right leg up on a footstool while my mother works around me, plumping the cushions and setting a fire as if we were getting ready for Christmas Day. Dust circles the air. Jess is sitting with me, the television on in the background, a winter fashions special playing on This Morning. She asks me what I think of the outfits, tells me she thinks the polo necks make the models look chubby. She wants to make small talk, make her lies disappear. But I can’t concentrate on the television. Despite what she probably thinks, I’m not angry with her. I don’t have the strength. I may have intended to kill myself and my son. Nothing else has any meaning.
My father passes by as we sit there, peers around the door, regarding us with concern. He approaches, stops in front of Jess, blocking her view of the television. Only when she can no longer see the screen does she bring herself to look at him.
‘We must create the right kind of impression, Jessica,’ he tells her, looking down at her baggy pyjamas. ‘Please go upstairs and dress appropriately.’ She begins her defence but he holds his hand up to show his inflexibility. He watches as she skulks away and then turns off the television.
All morning I have been trying to decide what to do. Do I tell the police I can’t remember anything about the crash like he wants me to? Or should I tell them what I think I know? That maybe I am to blame. That maybe I was driving recklessly. That perhaps I even crashed on purpose. My father told me three times last night and once again this morning that any flashbacks I might be having are all in my mind, that it is something he has come across many times with other patients. But the memory of being in the car that night seems so real. Tangible, almost. These snapshots of broken movement are like an old movie, or a flickering of light shining from the past. Like stars; not really there any more, yet still they can be seen. ‘Just false memories, Chloe, the brain trying to get a handle on things,’ my father tells me. The thing is, I don’t believe a word he says any more.
He sits down beside me, gives me a cursory inspection, his fingers meddling painfully at my head as he checks my dressing before his eyes settle on my face. I pull away, not wanting him to touch me. ‘Are you feeling all right, Chloe?’
I nod, reach up to my dressing, pressing it to ease the discomfort. ‘My head hurts.’ My words are cold, sharp. I don’t want to talk to him any more than I want to talk to the police.
‘Are you anxious about the visit from the police today?’
‘No,’ I lie. He looks satisfied enough, but I know deep down he doesn’t believe me, any more than I believe him. ‘I’m going to go and get dressed too,’ I say, attempting to get up. But I turn to see him shaking his head, reaching one hand out towards my arm.
‘I think it’s best that you stay as you are,’ he says, straightening the neckline of the robe I’m wearing. He fluffs my hair, adjusts my hat to expose the dressing for all to see. I pull away, stare at him out of the corner of my eye. ‘There’s no point in hiding your injuries, Chloe. We want them to see how poorly you’ve been, not mistake you for a reliable witness.’ He sits back, frustrated by my resistance. ‘And there’s no point looking at me like that either. I know you’re upset, but I did what I did with your best interests in mind.’
He leaves, taking his suit from the study door, calling to my mother to find his cuff links. The silver ones with the rubies in them. As he ascends the stairs he glances back just once at me, shaking his head with disappointment. But he doesn’t realise that I’m scared; scared that he is right. That I’m the one who caused the accident, and that by leaving my husband I gave him reason to take his own life. Scared because I don’t know how I’m supposed to live if my husband and son are both dead because of me.