I sit against the side of the bath, knees clutched tightly to my chest, rocking slightly.
My eyes are burning and my throat is aching, but I can’t cry any more. The tear production has finally been exhausted and for the time being, there are none left. I wonder how long I’ve been sitting here. I have no idea. I don’t even know what time it is. It was dark when the police officers drove me to the mortuary, but now it’s light. It must be the next day.
I’m not even sure how I got back here, to Waverley Gardens. All I remember is standing next to the gurney, shaking my head, and shouting at the police officers.
‘No – you’ve got the wrong one. This isn’t Dominic’s real brother!’
‘I’m Simon Gill,’ the man told them, equally confused. ‘You got my phone number from my brother’s donor card. I’m here to identify his body. Dominic Gill.’
And then DS Sutherland checked his notes. ‘Let me make sure I’ve got this straight. We’re talking about Dominic Stephen Gill, born 15 September, 1986?’
‘Yes,’ the man said. ‘That’s right. But this…’ he pointed at Dominic’s dead body, ‘…this definitely isn’t him. This is someone else.’
And then the police officers said that there had been two passports in the car with him, and they produced one and showed it to Simon Gill and he said that, yes, the personal details in it were correct but the photo was of someone else.
‘The photo is of Dominic,’ I insisted, clenching my jaw to stop myself screaming.
PC Gillespie and DS Sutherland tried ever-so-tactfully to compare the photo with Dominic’s dead face. They agreed that it was the same person.
‘Yes, but it’s not my brother,’ Simon Gill’s voice was strident. ‘The details are right, but that’s not him. Here—’ He pulled a photo from his wallet and showed it to the officers. ‘This is my brother.’
After some whispered exchanges, it was decided that discussing this over a corpse was not appropriate, and the man calling himself Simon Gill agreed to go with the police officers to Paddington Green station. I was transfixed to the spot, unable to move away from Dominic’s body, but someone grasped me by the elbow and pulled me out of the viewing room. I must have been taken home at that point. I think JoJo was with me, but she’s not now. I must have asked her to leave. I must have wanted to be alone for a while.
I shift my position, because my legs are starting to go numb, and as I do so, I catch sight of something pink and white on the edge of the bath. The pregnancy test. For however many hours it’s been, I’ve forgotten about being pregnant.
I haul myself to my feet and splash cold water over my face, then brush my teeth; more from force of habit than anything. Stiff-legged as a zombie, I walk down the stairs and into the kitchen. Dominic’s wax jacket hangs on the peg next to the back door. I bury my face in it, inhaling the familiar smell. Fresh tears appear from nowhere. It’s exhausting; all this crying. That’s what I remember most from when my parents died, the sheer exhaustion of bereavement. That and the intense physical pain that seems to emanate from my body’s core.
I turn to the kettle and somehow, even though my hands are trembling, manage to make myself a cup of coffee. After swallowing a couple of mouthfuls, my body rebels and I vomit the coffee into the butler’s sink. I continue dry-heaving for a few minutes, then hang there, clutching the porcelain edge with my fingers until the nausea subsides and I’m able to rinse my mouth out under the tap. Is this morning sickness, I wonder, or grief? I glance at the clock on the wall: 9.40 a.m.
My bag is on the hall table and I retrieve my phone. There are multiple missed calls from JoJo and David, and from a couple of numbers I don’t recognise. I switch it off and go back upstairs to the bedroom, taking a fresh glass of water with me. More of Dominic’s clothes are on the chair next to his dresser. The shutters are still closed from the night before, and in the February gloom, the room is in semi-darkness. I take my clothes off, sink onto the bed and close my eyes.
A hammering on the front door brings me round, after what could have been minutes or hours; I can’t tell. I close my eyes again and attempt to ignore it, but it persists. Hauling my bathrobe over my shoulders, I go down to the front door.
‘Alice!’
David and Melanie are standing on the doorstep, their faces contorted with shock and anxiety.
‘You poor girl,’ whispers Melanie and tries to enfold me into an embrace, but I remain stiff, rigid.
‘What the hell happened?’ David’s asking, leading me through to the kitchen with his arm round my shoulders. ‘The police phoned, but they didn’t give any details, just that it was a fatal traffic accident.’
I try to speak but can’t get past a croak.
‘Have you eaten anything?’ Melanie asks.
I shake my head.
‘You need to eat… let me fix you something.’
She bustles about, assembling a bowl of plain yoghurt with honey and berries and a toasted bagel with butter. I take a small mouthful of the yoghurt, then rush to the sink to throw up again.
‘My God, you poor thing…’ Melanie holds back my hair, then hands me a damp cloth. ‘It must be the shock.’
I open my mouth to say, ‘Actually, I’m pregnant’, but close it again.
I’m offered a mug of camomile tea, and this time I manage to keep most of it down, plus a mouthful of bagel.
David places his hand over mine. ‘Al, I know this is difficult, but we need to talk about it… JoJo said there was a mix-up over the identification? Is that right?’
I nod slowly.
‘What happened exactly?’
‘They contacted someone thinking he was Dom’s brother, but he turned out not to be.’
David and Melanie exchange a look laden with meaning.
‘The thing is,’ David says gently. ‘I got the impression from JoJo that there was more to it than that. She said that this guy was who he said he was. Dominic Gill’s brother. But that Dom – your Dom – isn’t… wasn’t… Dominic Gill. He was someone else.’
Before he’s finished speaking, I’m already shaking my head firmly. ‘No,’ I say. ‘No, she’s got it wrong. It’s the guy saying he’s Simon Gill who’s someone else.’
‘Alice—’ Melanie begins, but she’s cut off by the doorbell ringing. She goes to answer it and comes in with the two police officers who broke the news.
Little and Large, I think randomly, because she is as slight as he is huge. They introduce themselves to David and Melanie as PC Gillespie and DS Sutherland. Melanie sets about making everyone tea, while the visitors seat themselves awkwardly at the breakfast table.
‘I’m glad you’re here,’ David says. ‘Maybe you could help us clear up the confusion over the identification of the body.’
‘There is no confusion,’ I state coldly. ‘The “body”, as you call it, is my husband, Dominic.’
DS Sutherland glances at his colleague and then at David. ‘It’s early days yet,’ he says with practised caution. ‘But we are making our own enquiries, and looking into Mr Gill’s – Mr Simon Gill’s – claim.’
‘How long will that take?’ Melanie asks, bringing over a tray with a teapot and mugs.
‘Hard to say,’ PC Gillespie says, taking a mug. ‘But hopefully not more than a couple of days. Mr Gill is gathering together as much documentation as he can, but that involves him taking a trip up to the North-East and back down here again.’
‘For now, I’m afraid the coroner won’t be able to release the body,’ says Sutherland. ‘I’m aware that this makes the whole process harder.’
Process, I think. Is that all this is, a process?
‘For identification purposes, we’ll also need to take some tissue samples from the deceased. DNA. This is standard practice in a case like this.’
I stare at him dumbly, trying to untangle the words in my exhausted brain. Deceased… tissue samples.
Sutherland glances at his colleague again, and she puts down her mug. ‘As part of the investigation, we’ll also need to conduct a search of the house. To see if your husband’s possessions—’
‘No,’ I say firmly. ‘No, you can’t. I refuse to give permission.’
Some nameless fear takes hold of me. Fear of what they might find.
‘Not now, obviously,’ Gillespie says quickly. ‘Down the line. When things have settled a bit.’
‘In the meantime, do you have a copy of your marriage certificate we can see?’ Sutherland asks.
I shake my head. ‘I don’t know where it is.’
‘She’s not up to looking for that kind of thing now,’ David interjects quickly.
‘Can you at least give me the date, so that we can double-check the record?’
Melanie consults the calendar on her phone. ‘It was April 1, 2016.’
‘Good – thanks.’ Sutherland makes a note, then pushes back the chair and hauls his bulky body to an upright position. ‘We’ll be assigning you an FLO – a family liaison officer – who’s trained in dealing with…’ He hesitates. ‘With situations like yours.’
As if it’s a daily occurrence for a widow to be told that her husband is not who she thinks he is.
‘Great. Thank you,’ says Melanie, starting to clear the half-drunk mugs of tea.
‘I’ll show you out,’ David says, and leads the police officers back to the front door. I catch something he says to them, in a low voice. It sounds like ‘in denial’.
But it’s not me that’s in denial. It’s everyone else who’s got this wrong.