I get to work early, leaving Martin bewildered in my wake. Relief washes over me when I walk across the car park and push open the hospice doors. I’m in my comfort zone here. I know what to do and I do it well.
‘Eli, I’m so glad to see you,’ Rachel says enthusiastically as I walk in.
She has a handful of files and the look of someone near the end of their rope.
‘Busy day?’
‘Tough day,’ she says. ‘Two patients passed today, including Nicola Flanagan. Poor thing. It’s been tough for the staff, you know.’
I feel winded. Nicola is, was, only twenty-six, had been battling cervical cancer for the last three years. We knew she was very ill, but there was no way anyone was expecting her to go quite so quickly.
‘Oh God, that was very sudden.’
‘Too sudden. She just deteriorated on Saturday night and didn’t come back from it. The family are distraught, as you can imagine. And the staff, too.’
I think of her mother, who’d always tried to keep smiling any time Nicola was in for respite care, and my heart aches for her. It seems so grossly unfair. I feel tears unexpectedly spring to my eyes. You’d think we’d get used to it, but sometimes it just feels all wrong. The cruelty of it seems to get worse.
‘That poor girl,’ I say, brushing my tears away hastily.
‘At least she’s not suffering any more. That’s all we can take from it,’ Rachel says, but she looks bone tired and as if she could break down herself.
I give her a hug, tell her I’ll do my best to make sure she gets some quiet time during the night.
‘No rest for the wicked,’ she replies with a weak smile. ‘But sure, we’ll get through it. Can I bring you up to speed on everything?’
‘Of course,’ I say and follow her to the nurse’s office.
‘You’ve no idea how much you’re pulling us out of a hole tonight,’ she says. ‘I hated asking you, especially with you being so pregnant.’
‘I’ll be out of here soon on maternity leave,’ I say, ‘you might as well make the most of me while you can.’
The thought of maternity leave makes me shudder. Who knows what state the rest of my life will be in by the time this baby arrives.
‘I don’t know what we’ll do without you. What I’ll do without you. I’ll miss you, Eli.’
‘I hope very much you’ll come and see me when I’m off. You know much more about this parenting carry-on than I do. And I require gossipy updates, and a shoulder to cry on when I need it.’
‘You’ll be too busy enjoying that baby of yours to think of me,’ she says, sitting down. ‘But you know I’ll be there for you if you need me.’
‘Thank you,’ I tell her, thinking myself ridiculous that I’ve even, so much as for a second, considered that she could be having a fling with my husband.
‘Look,’ she says. ‘I’m not sure if this is the right thing to do or not, Eli. But something arrived in the post for you today.’
She sorts through the pile of paperwork she’s been carrying and hands me a crisp white envelope, with my name neatly printed on the front.
‘It looks like the same writing as that other letter,’ she says, her face filled with concern. ‘I wondered whether to keep it from you because of the stress, but then I thought you needed to see it, in case it needs to be brought to the attention of the police.’
I hold it in my hand. But it feels as if it might as well be a ticking time bomb. I sit down.
‘I’m sorry,’ Rachel says.
‘It’s hardly your fault,’ I tell her, ‘it’s not like you sent it.’
I open the envelope, take out the single sheet of white paper:
HE’S NOT THE ONLY ONE BETRAYING YOU.
SHE’S LAUGHING AT YOU BEHIND YOUR BACK.
WITH FRIENDS LIKE HER, WHO NEEDS ENEMIES?
‘Are you okay? What does it say?’
I hear Rachel speak and look up at her. A face filled with concern. With friends like her …
She has to be who this letter’s talking about. Who else could it be? She’s my closest friend her. My only real friend, who’s spent a lot of time with both Martin and me. If she needs anything fixing in her house, I send him over to help. We’ve had her at our house for Christmas dinner when her kids were with their father. I’d never even once considered that I could’ve been pushing them together. I feel sick.
I want to scream at her. I want to slap her square across her face. I want to show her the note and tell her to explain it, but I think of the patients who need us. The shift we have to get through. I focus on it. Push down the hurt and the anger and the sense of betrayal.
Again.
It’s what I always do.
Bury it. Get on with things. Make for an easy life.
Pretend there’s still good in the world.
‘It’s not from the same person,’ I lie, surprising myself at just how steady my voice sounds. ‘It’s just an invoice for something I ordered for Martin. I ordered it to come here. It’s a surprise for him.’
She looks at me as if she knows I’m lying. I don’t care. I don’t care any more what she thinks of me. I thrust the note into the bottom of my bag, which I put in my locker, and then I ask her to fill me in on our current patients.