CHAPTER ELEVEN

In the car on the way to the doctor, both Matthew and I are quiet as he drives. Thank God he isn’t able to read my mind. He’d crash immediately.

I cannot believe Caroline asked me if I’ve already been diagnosed with something. She obviously believes it could be an explanation for what happened on Friday.

So she thinks I went to kill myself to spare everyone the pain of losing me slowly to a serious illness or life-threatening condition?

Well, first off, if I’d been told I had something like that, I’d have definitely told Matthew. I’d also cling to any chance at all to stay with Chloe and Theo, for as long as I possibly could. What parent wouldn’t? I’d want to help prepare them for losing me, particularly Chloe, so that she felt safe about it, and understood what was happening. I’d want to explain that I was going to heaven, but that it was a very long way away and I wouldn’t be coming back. That no one really knows what heaven is like, and we only go there once we die, because sometimes – not often – people get ill and the doctors can’t make them better. I’d want her to have a chance to say goodbye.

My eyes fill with tears, and I have to turn to look out of the window so Matthew can’t see. Until this morning, it hadn’t occurred to me that there might be something physically wrong with me. I try to swallow down my distress and stay calm. I know Caroline says it’s all very rare, but rare isn’t impossible, and suppose— Jesus! Another horrific thought slips into my mind, unbidden – suppose I have already been diagnosed with something like a brain tumour, only I can’t remember it? No, that really is lunacy – and surely that’s not even possible? Who could forget something as hideous as that? And it’s not as if I’ve experienced any other memory loss – it’s just those ten missing hours on Friday night. I take a deep breath. I have to try to relax. The GP will know. I’d have gone to him or her in the first place with any worrying symptoms… And as Caroline pointed out, they’d have referred me onto a specialist. There would have been tests and scans, which in turn would have been documented. I can ask to see my medical records when we get there, and make sure for myself.

I close my eyes for a moment, and lean back on the seat, suddenly completely overwhelmed. Everything is jostling for space in my mind: memory disorders, tumours, Kelly, missing money, Matthew crying, Liv, bottles of paracetamol, suicide notes, taxis, Chloe looking up at me with those big blue eyes, saying, ‘You weren’t there when I woke up, Mummy’. It’s all a tangled, frighteningly confused knot, which feels like it’s getting bigger and bigger.

‘You realize this is the first time we’ve been out on our own since before Theo was born?’ Matthew’s voice cuts through the confusion, then he adds carefully, ‘When everything has calmed down a bit, I’d really like to take you somewhere. At least we know Theo can go to sleep for other people now. We could go for dinner or something.’

‘That would be nice.’

He glances across at me. ‘How are you feeling about this?’

‘What, the doctor’s appointment?’ I look out of the window. ‘Um, pretty scared.’

He frowns, hesitates, then reaches out and takes my hand in his. ‘I’ll be there, and I’m not going to let anything happen to you. This is about you being supported, not caught out. She can’t just make an arbitrary decision about your future, Sal – you do know that, don’t you?’

He thinks I’m scared of being sectioned again. I can see Caroline’s right – Matthew very clearly has no idea of what’s actually to come. I don’t correct him, but think instead about the first time he took my hand like this – eight years ago now – and how desperate I was for him to touch me.

I’d attended several work meetings with Matt Le Bonk (slightly unoriginal moniker, given we were an ad firm), after all of which I told myself – and several trusted colleagues – that it was totally inappropriate to have personal relationships with clients… But oh my God, he looked good in a suit. In spite of everything, I smile briefly at the memory of me trying to concentrate on discussing tedious campaign details in various dull boardrooms, Matthew nodding with careful consideration and taking copious notes. Both of us, as it turned out, trying not to imagine ourselves in bed with the other.

‘What’s funny?’ Matthew asks, putting the indicator on and turning left onto the street where the surgery is.

‘Hmmm?’ I look across and almost tell him, but oddly, I feel shy and awkward. We’re so out of practice at this. ‘Oh, nothing.’

I turn back to the window again, picturing the client launch event on a preposterously glamorous hotel rooftop overlooking London, where everything changed. The evening was a huge success. We had a little too much to drink, which led to… walking through Hyde Park, him taking my hand, then us kissing. Dinner out. A cinema date. Dinner at mine. Dinner at his. Sex. Sex. Sex – several weekends spent almost completely in bed. Introducing him to my friends. Introducing him as my boyfriend. A first weekend away, learning to surf in Cornwall – me trying to prove I could be sporty and outdoorsy. A luxury weekend in Paris – me giving up on the pretence and admitting I preferred galleries and cocktails. Meeting families. Disastrous weekend in Scotland. First huge row. Beach holidays. Skiing holidays. Moving in together. Promotions. Buying the flat. Buying furniture. Proposal in Cornwall at the hotel where we had the first weekend away. Wedding venues. Wedding dress. Wedding food. Wedding, everything all about the bloody wedding. Sick of wedding. Never want to see another invitation or band playlist ever again. Hen weekend. Lovely, incredibly fast wedding; immediately want to repeat it. Honeymoon spent mostly asleep and dimly aware of probably never looking that good in a bikini again. Pregnancy test. Panic-buying whole of John Lewis baby department. Exhaustedly and bewilderingly watching Matthew hold Chloe for the first time. Lots of daytime property shows. Routinely arriving for the last ten minutes of numerous expensive baby classes. Holiday in Cornwall, returning after two days with ill baby. Mind-numbing toddler groups. Return to work. Crying a lot: miss Chloe horribly, tired, guilty, doing five days’ work in three. Start to go out a bit more in evenings. Attempt to get back into gym routine. First hot holiday. Fall pregnant. Look enormous very quickly. Realize will never wear bikini ever again, full stop. Sell flat. Buy house. Pack. Unpack. Get crib out of new loft. Smugly wash saved baby clothes, as convinced new baby is a girl. Shock as midwife holding my hand the right side of the screen tells me I have a boy. Watching Matthew finally introduce a shy Chloe to a tiny Theo lying in a plastic cot, while thinking I have never felt so lucky and happy.

OK, maybe a lifetime already spent together, but it’s not enough.

Matthew takes his hand away to change gear, and I place mine back in my lap. We haven’t even had a chance to get over Theo’s birth yet. I know who we were, and how we got here, but I don’t recognize what we’ve become. We need time to find ourselves again and learn how it all fits into life’s new shape… or what I thought was life’s new shape. I close my eyes briefly. I can’t be seriously ill. I just can’t. Theo and Chloe can’t afford for me to let them down. There’s no other option. This has to be OK.

‘Here we are.’ Matthew jolts me back as we pull into the surgery car park and, miraculously, straight into a space. I try to steady myself as he switches off the engine and turns to me. ‘I’d like to come in with you, if that’s all right? Unless there’s stuff you want to tell the doctor that you’d rather not say in front of me? You know, your night at university, that sort of thing?’

I hesitate. Should I tell him he has to wait outside and protect him from everything until I know for sure what diagnosis I’m dealing with? But he already looks so worried, it’s not fair to keep him completely in the dark, even if I’m trying to do it to be kind.

‘It’s OK to come in,’ I say. If the shoe were on the other foot, I’d want to be told immediately, even if there was a chance he might be seriously ill. This is something we ought to face together. ‘But can we just talk about what they might be going to tell us quickly?’

He looks at his watch. ‘I don’t want us to be late.’

‘Matthew, no doctor ever runs on time.’

‘Well, it’ll be sod’s law they do today if we’re sitting out here. Come on, you can talk to me once we’re in there.’ He climbs out and closes the door firmly.

We’re in the waiting room, listening to several old people with hacking coughs, and watching a three-year-old happily empty several holders of leaflets about giving up smoking and signs of strokes, when he turns to me and says, ‘So what did you want to say about this?’

I shake my head. ‘It’s OK. Don’t worry.’ I can hardly talk to him about it now, and in any case, I’m actually starting to feel very nervous indeed.

Matthew takes my hand again and squeezes it. ‘This is going to be OK, Sal,’ he whispers, then leans over and drops a kiss on my forehead. ‘Try and relax. You’re allowed to feel anxious, but everything is going to be all right, I promise you.’

Oh, Matthew – please God you’re right. I try to take my mind elsewhere. ‘I hope Mum’s going to be OK with getting Theo down for his afternoon nap.’

‘She’ll be fine. He actually slept better over the weekend, didn’t he?’

‘Yes,’ I admit. ‘Which I have to say I think is grossly unfair of him.’

Matthew snorts gently. ‘Yeah, it was. But I know how bloody hard you’ve worked all this time, Sal. I’m so annoyed with myself that I didn’t step in and try to break the cycle of him needing you to get back to sleep sooner, though. I should have done. I’m sorry.’

‘Well, you say that, but we were only a month away from properly sleep-training him. We would have got there if… events hadn’t overtaken us.’

‘You think?’ he says, after a pause.

‘Of course! Things weren’t that bad. In any case, he was up to his old tricks again last night. I had to get up with him at—’ But my words die on my lips as a buzzer goes, and over the head of the receptionist, a sign flashes up: Appt Sally Hilman. Dr A Sawyer, room E.

I inhale sharply. ‘That’s us.’

Matthew gives me a look of concern. ‘Sally, this is going to be fine. I’m not going to let anything happen to you.’

As we walk into the small room together, having knocked politely, a woman about the same age as me turns and gives us a friendly smile. ‘Hello. I’m Dr Sawyer.’

‘I’m Sally Hilman and this is my husband Matthew. I’d like him to stay, if that’s all right?’

‘Of course!’ She stands up and pulls over another chair. ‘Please, do sit down, both of you… So, Sally,’ she turns to me. ‘I’ve actually received your discharge information from the Crisis team since your call this morning. You’ve had a rough couple of days?’ She looks at me sympathetically.

‘Not my best, no.’ I try to smile.

‘How are you feeling now?’

‘Er, pretty frightened, to be honest.’

Matthew takes my hand.

‘What’s particularly bothering you?’ Dr Sawyer asks calmly.

I try to clear my throat. ‘I don’t know how much the Crisis team have told you, but I went to bed on Friday night as normal and woke up in the back of a taxi on Saturday morning three hundred miles away on a clifftop. The hours in between seem to have just vanished. I’ve had a complete mental blackout. Nothing like this has ever happened to me before. At first, for a number of reasons, everyone was concerned that I was attempting to commit suicide, but I’m convinced that’s not the case. I am obviously very concerned about why I can’t remember what happened to me, however. I was sick on the Saturday morning when I woke up in the taxi, and my vision was blurred. I also had a very bad headache. I’ve been excessively tired recently, and I also think it’s fair to say I’ve been quite irritable and short-tempered.’ I pause, take a deep breath, and squeeze Matthew’s hand tightly to brace him. ‘I’m aware all of that could be symptomatic of a physical condition like a brain tumour.’

Matthew, who up until now has been listening carefully while focusing on a spot on the floor, immediately jerks his head up and looks at me in shock. Oh God, I should have made him wait and discuss this in the car with me first. I can see exactly why Caroline was worried now.

‘In fact, there’s something else I just need to clarify, if I may?’ I ask quickly. ‘There isn’t anything in my medical records at the moment to indicate I’ve already been diagnosed with something, is there?’

Dr Sawyer blinks in surprise, then turns to her screen and scans it. ‘No, there’s nothing here at all. You can read for yourself, if you like. The last record I have for you is for a post-natal checkup back in January?’

I glance at Matthew, to make sure that’s sunk in. ‘I only ask because on Saturday, I had what appeared to be a suicide note in my pocket – it wasn’t, I hasten to add – and my mother-in-law told me she was worried I might have already been diagnosed with a terminal illness; presumably because that’s about the only circumstance under which she can imagine I might have considered suicide. An attempt on my part to spare everyone a lot of suffering, I suppose.’

‘What?’ Matthew exclaims, completely horrified. His hand has gone limp in mine.

‘Sorry, sweetheart, just a second.’ I turn to him beseechingly, then back to Dr Sawyer. ‘I really want all of us to be very clear that’s not the case. You have no record of my being tested for anything so far?’

‘None at all. But you do have symptoms now?’ Dr Sawyer prompts. ‘Have you still got this headache?’

‘No.’

‘You haven’t been waking each day with a headache or pain?’

‘No.’

‘And when you did have it, was it worse when you coughed or sneezed?’

‘Not so I noticed.’

‘You were also sick on Saturday morning too, and had visual problems?’

‘Yes,’ I confess. ‘My sight was blurry when I first woke up, shortly before I vomited. The pain in my head was pretty excruciating, like the worst hangover I’ve ever had.’

‘OK, Sally.’ She looks at me reflectively for a moment. ‘Well, we’ll take a look at you now, and I think we’ll also run some blood tests. I’ll see if we can get one of the nurses to do that while you’re here so you don’t have to come back again later. I’m also happy to refer you for a CT scan too. Then what I’d like to do is book you in for another appointment for the end of this week, so we can run through everything in more detail then.’

‘Sorry, what are the blood tests and CT scan for?’ Matthew interrupts.

‘We’ll do a full blood count, renal function, liver function, bone profile, and thyroid function, to make sure that there isn’t a reason like high calcium, an infection, or an underactive thyroid behind Sally’s symptoms. The CT is to make sure there isn’t any kind of condition affecting the brain,’ Dr Sawyer says. ‘These unusual things can present sometimes, and it’s important that we rule them out, but I would stress that they are rare.’

‘You don’t think this sounds like amnesia of any kind, though, do you?’ I say.

‘No, I don’t. Transient global amnesia doesn’t present like the episode you’ve described. Are you on any other medication at the moment, Sally?’

I shake my head. ‘I had a glass or two of champagne on the Friday night, and I’ve not been drinking alcohol at all recently, but that wouldn’t account for blacking out like that, surely? My mother-in-law did offer me a sleeping pill, but – no, wait.’ I stop suddenly. ‘That was last night, anyway. Sorry. I’m getting confused – like I said, I’m very tired—’

‘Whoa, sorry. Can we just stop here for a minute?’ Matthew cuts in, looking very frightened indeed. ‘Sally, you don’t have a brain tumour. That’s not possible.’

This is dreadful, but I had no choice but to be honest with the GP about everything. It’s too important. I squeeze his hand again. ‘Even if I do have something, we’ll deal with it, OK?’

‘No, no, no.’ He shakes his head vehemently. ‘This isn’t… right. What I mean is,’ he turns to Dr Sawyer, ‘we’ve been under massive stress recently. Sally’s been amazing, but life has been extremely challenging for her. She had a very traumatic birth with our son six months ago. She had to have an emergency section, and our son needed to be resuscitated immediately after delivery. They put an airway into him –’ to my horror, Matthew’s voice wobbles suddenly and his eyes fill with tears – ‘and took him straight down to the special care unit. He was there for a couple of days and it made things like feeding him very challenging for Sally. Sorry.’ He swallows and tries to gather himself.

I had no idea he had been so affected by what happened – or is he actually upset about what he thinks I was trying to do on Friday night? Because I’m not sure, and don’t want to say the wrong thing, I end up saying nothing at all.

‘I mean, he’s fine now, and Sally is too, although she picked up an infection. It was just a very, very scary time. We’ve found it quite hard to get back to normal since then. Particularly as our son doesn’t really sleep. Sally’s been dealing with the nights completely on her own so I can hold down my job, but over the last few days she’s been – very understandably – vocalizing to our family and friends that she can’t cope any more, telling them that she hates her life – that kind of thing. But on top of all of that, after what happened on Friday, her friend told me that Sally has in fact tried to commit suicide before. I’m now really desperate that Sally gets some support with this, if it’s some sort of post-natal depression, because I don’t want whatever happened on Friday to have been the start of something; some sort of trigger. I’m saying all of this really badly, but this isn’t a brain tumour.’ He looks at me pleadingly. ‘It just isn’t,’ he whispers.

I turn back to the doctor. ‘Is it possible that if I did have a brain tumour I might have behaved in an extreme way that I now can’t remember? Like taking myself off to the other end of the country in the night?’

‘Yes, it’s possible.’

I hesitate. ‘Can tumours also alter your behaviour? Make you irrational, or paranoid?’

‘People with tumours may experience negative changes to their personality, yes.’

‘Would I be aware that I was behaving like this?’

‘Well,’ she says carefully, ‘someone might not realize that their behaviour has changed, or become problematic, no. Let’s wait and see what the results of the tests are before we jump to any conclusions, though, shall we?’

Back in the car, we’ve been driving to collect Chloe from school in silence for about five minutes, when I finally clear my throat.

‘Matthew?’ I say tentatively.

He jumps slightly, and turns his head worriedly to me. ‘Yes?’

‘I’m so sorry you had to see all of that happen to Theo when he was born.’

He doesn’t say anything, but I watch his fingers grip the steering wheel a little more tightly.

‘It must have been horrific for you.’

‘I thought I was going to lose you both,’ he says simply. ‘You were on the table and they were stitching you up while they were trying to get Theo to breathe—’

‘You saw that too? Them working on me?’ I’m appalled.

‘I saw some of it, yeah,’ he says flatly. ‘It was a much smaller screen than when Chloe was born, which I wasn’t expecting.’ He exhales. ‘And then when it all started to go wrong…’

I wait for him to continue.

‘I felt so helpless. Two of them were sewing you up, the other lot were putting the mask over Theo, and then when that didn’t work and they put the tube down him…’ He shakes his head. ‘He was so fucking tiny, Sal.’

‘I’m so, so sorry, Matthew. You should have told me.’

‘Of course I shouldn’t!’ he exclaims. ‘I wasn’t the one it actually happened to, was I? You had enough to deal with.’

‘Do you think about it still now?’

He doesn’t look at me. ‘Yes. I tend to get flashes of it when I’m not expecting it.’ He clears his throat. ‘I’ve dealt with it all quite badly, I think.’

I simply had no idea at all about this. And I’ve just taken him to an appointment where he’s been hijacked with the news that there might be something else new and seriously wrong with me, on top of also thinking I tried to commit suicide two days ago. My poor, poor husband.

‘But listen, this isn’t about me. I’ll sort myself out, and I don’t want you to worry, because I can handle it. It was quite a shock to hear you come out with all that at the doctors, though.’ He stares at the road ahead. ‘You mentioned Mum had some concerns? Did she discuss them with you?’

‘Yes, she did, but I’m glad. She was worried that my not telling the truth, and insisting I can’t remember what happened, was going to lead Dr Sawyer down a path that would unnecessarily frighten everyone. The thing is, I am telling the truth, and while it obviously has scared you, and I’m very sorry for that, I honestly have no memory of Friday night at all – and until your mum brought it up, I didn’t even know my not remembering what happened might be caused by something being physically wrong with me. So I’m actually very grateful to her. I didn’t want to have to tell the doctor everything, but what choice did I have? It would be completely irresponsible of me to have some symptoms and not get checked out as soon as possible, wouldn’t it? For Chloe and Theo’s sake.’

His jaw tenses and he doesn’t say anything for a moment, but then suddenly bursts, ‘Actually, I’m just amazed all that doctor gave you was that patient health questionnaire to take back next time.’ He nods tersely at the piece of paper I’m holding in my lap. ‘Tell me what question nine says again? In the last two weeks have you—’

‘—had thoughts that you would be better off dead, or of hurting yourself in some way,’ I read.

‘Jesus Christ!’ He shakes his head crossly. ‘I mean, forget everything else fundamentally – that doctor had, seated in front of her, a woman with a baby who’s had a tough time recently, has told everyone she can’t cope, and it turns out in the past she took a paracetamol overdose! What the hell point is there in that fucking questionnaire?’

I look at him carefully, but stay quiet. He’s really frightened. That’s what this outburst is about.

‘I’m sorry,’ he says a moment later. ‘It’s just… the one thing I’m clear about is that I love you more than anything. I just want to keep you and the kids safe, and all of us together.’

‘I know,’ I manage eventually. ‘I love you too.’ We pull up outside Chloe’s school, and Matthew starts to look for a space along the already crowded roadside.

What on earth will we do if there is something wrong with me? I can sort everything else, but not that. Somehow my own body already feels slightly alien… Although that is completely absurd. I don’t know for certain that anything is the matter. I need to hold onto that.

Having found a very tight space, Matthew eventually manages to squeeze into it, and turns the engine off. ‘Are you all right? Do you want me to go in and get Clo?’

I nod, not quite trusting myself to speak.

‘You don’t want to come too? She’d like that – it’s not often we get to pick her up together.’

He’s right. Chloe will be so delighted to see us both that she’ll come running towards us, arms outstretched, shouting, ‘Mummy! Daddy!’ and I don’t know that I’ll be able to keep it together. She doesn’t need that.

I shake my head, my eyes bright with tears. ‘I think I’ll just stay here, if that’s OK?’

Matthew looks at me and says shortly, ‘There’s nothing physically wrong with you, Sally. Those tests are going to come back just fine.’ He opens the car door. ‘I’ll leave you the keys, just in case.’ He climbs out, and I watch him stride towards the gates and bang in through them.

He gets so angry under pressure. I know that’s just how he copes, but I wish he wouldn’t. It doesn’t make it any the easier; in fact, it just adds to the stress.

It occurs to me suddenly that even if Caroline is wrong and I’m not OK, I’m still won’t be able to explain why I put the note in my pocket. Or why I cleared my phone down. But then, I suppose that’s the whole point about irrational behaviour – you can’t explain it, only what causes it. Far more importantly, suppose I do it again and this time I actually do fall. I try to swallow my rising panic. I just can’t be ill… I can’t!

There’s a sudden knock at the window and I jolt, to see one of the mums standing alongside the car, holding her daughter’s hand, a lunchbox and several bits of paper with drawings on them in the other. I open the door and am immediately assaulted by a heady waft of perfume.

‘Hi, Sally.’ She smiles with the passive-aggressive steel of someone pissed off at being held up for point five of a second longer than they have to be because of the sheer stupidity of everybody else around them. ‘Do you think I could ask you to pull back so I can get my car out?’ She nods at her massive Lexus. ‘It’s a bit tight.’

‘Sorry, Lydia. Matthew was on a mission,’ I apologize, and for reasons best known to myself, opt to slide inelegantly across to the driver’s seat rather than getting out and walking around.

I have to arch my bottom up to get over the gear stick, which makes me lose my balance a bit, and, yelping in alarm, I stick my right arm out, which in turn makes the buttons on my already straining shirt ping open over my boobs, revealing my bra. I look up to see the mum and her daughter watching me incredulously, as I perform my bizarre in-car yoga.

Face flaming, I carefully ease our Renault back as they climb into their Lexus, and the mother waves tightly – it’s actually closer to a fist-shake than a gesture of thanks. I’m instantly reminded of Kelly as the Lexus roars off, only to have to stop impatiently at the red traffic lights at the top. Everyone is just getting in her way.

I watch them pull away again determinedly and think about Mum telling me I’m wrong about Kelly, she’s played no part in this; Caroline telling me this morning to stop concentrating on Kelly; Kelly herself insisting I’m crazy, she’s totally innocent… I close my eyes. After this morning at the surgery, surely I should concede I might have been unduly paranoid and obsessive about her?

Except I know Caroline warned me about Kelly – that definitely happened. And Kelly swapped the ring too. It’s hardly as if my fears are totally baseless… But then I have to accept it is also possible I had no control over what my body was doing and my mind was thinking on Friday. Maybe the very fact that I’m thinking about it all now is irrational?

I realize suddenly it’s not a question of not knowing who to trust around me. What’s truly terrifying is now I don’t know if I can trust myself.