‘Are you okay, Alice?’
Jim’s sitting across the aisle from me on our return flight from the Sunshine Coast to Sydney later that afternoon.
I nod at him, but I’m not okay, not at all. I can feel something rising in me, like tears and yet not tears. A hundred different emotions and thoughts are swirling around inside me, fighting to find a way out. I can feel my heart hammering in my chest and blood singing in my ears. I take a sip of my mineral water and press my knuckles against my mouth. I have an overwhelming desire to scream.
Jim is still looking at me, his expression concerned. ‘You sure you’re okay?’
I manage a slight shrug, the racing in my chest speeding up so much that I’m now having to concentrate just to breathe.
As we walk down the steps of the plane, a tight band constricts my chest so much that I feel as though I’m suffocating. I can’t speak but look around wildly, trying to catch someone’s eye, pointing to my chest to let them know I’m having a heart attack. I make it to the bottom of the steps before my knees buckle under me and I tip forward onto the tarmac as I black out.
When I come to, I’m lying in a hospital bed, with a drip in my arm and a collection of heart monitor pads stuck to my chest beneath a surgical gown. Jim’s face swims into focus beside me. Outside, it’s dark.
‘What’s going on?’ I croak. My throat hurts.
‘You’re in the King George V Memorial – it’s a maternity hospital.’
I glance down at my abdomen, alarmed, but he holds up a large hand.
‘And don’t worry – they checked on the baby and he or she is absolutely fine.’
I let out a whimper of relief.
‘I’m really sorry.’ Jim wipes his palm down the side of his face; a weary gesture that makes me wonder how long he’s been sitting there. He has caught the sun during our brief trip to the Sunshine Coast, and it looks well on him. It makes his deep-set eyes stand out more. ‘I should have thought more about how this was going to affect you. Holly’s letter pretty much confirmed what we already suspected, but I realise now that it was a lot to deal with. Seeing it there in black and white.’
‘It was the realisation that this was who I was married to,’ I say quietly. ‘I’m a serial killer’s widow. It’s too much to process.’
A nurse sticks her head round the curtains of the cubicle. ‘How are we feeling?’
Before I can answer, she clamps a blood pressure cuff to my arm and starts to inflate it using a piece of handheld equipment.
‘Good – that’s coming down a bit.’ She smiles at me as she pulls off the cuff. ‘Doctor will come and speak to you in a bit, but we think what you experienced was probably a panic attack. Have you been under any abnormal stress lately?’
Jim and I exchange a Where do I start? look.
‘Yes, I say bleakly. ‘My husband was killed in a car crash.’
‘Ah.’ The nurse nods sagely. ‘This panic attack was your body’s way of telling you you need to take some time out. Time to process what’s been happening to you.’ She consults the ECG monitor next to the bed. ‘Your heart rate’s still a bit faster than we’d like, so we’re giving you some beta blockers and we’ll monitor you for a little bit.’
‘So I have to stay here?’
‘For a little bit longer, yes.’
After a couple of hours, I persuade the medical staff to release me, assuring them that I feel fine and will go straight to bed, and we take a cab back to the hotel.
‘Rest!’ Jim tells me firmly as I get out of the lift on my floor. ‘It’s the middle of the night. You need to get some sleep.’
For once I don’t argue, but jet lag is messing with my body clock and I can’t fall asleep straight away. Instead, I prop myself up on the cushions with an old episode of Game of Thrones on my iPad. Eventually I doze for a several hours, only to be woken by a short, sharp rap on the door of my room, just as the sky outside is growing pale with dawn. And that’s when I find the ring.