hear me?’
He’s pouring himself a drink. I can hear it trickling into the glass. Either that or he’s decided to have a piss.
‘Liam?’ I demand, the fury and frustration seconds from eruption. From across the room, I get told to ‘pipe down’ by Terry, who’s in the middle of obtaining some old dear’s credit-card number.
‘Lana, just go, all right. This isn’t fair on you. God, you don’t even know me. Just go.’
I don’t speak, but I don’t hang up either.
Liam, 2.45 pm
I tell her to go because it is the right thing to do, even though I want nothing more than to carry on talking to her. The truth is, now it’s come down to it, I’m absolutely petrified. I don’t want to die. What if it’s painful? What will be waiting for me on the other side? How long will it take Elliott to forget I ever existed?
Living, unfortunately, just isn’t an option. She’s seen to that… Jessica. How they will all feel sorry for her. Poor Jess. How could he? With little Elliott in the house as well?
I guess you’d get the odd person on Team Liam, them do-gooder types that go to church and always volunteer for Neighbourhood Watch. But nobody will ever know the real truth. I suppose I could leave a note? Expose Jessica? But there really isn’t time. And would it really matter, anyway?
‘Lana? You’re still there, aren’t you?’
I feel slightly drunk now, having knocked back the Stella with a full pack of aspirin. My fingers hover over the box of Valium but, instead, I down more aspirin. I don’t want the Valium to knock me out before I make sure there’s enough inside my stomach to end it all. Closing my eyes lightly, I tip my head back and take a deep breath, fighting back the panic slowly bubbling away inside of me. Its okay, I tell myself. You’re just going to sleep, and all the pain, all the betrayal and hurt… will float away.
‘I’m still here. Tell me, Liam, do you have a family, a wife?’
Suddenly, an image jolts me almost sober. I allow it to swim into focus.
Standing at the altar, I fidget with my shirt button, my stomach crunching with nerves. Looking over my shoulder, I give a small smile at my foster mother, Barbara, who in turn beams at me, her thumb up in the air. Her hair is freshly permed and for some reason that makes me prouder than I ever thought possible. Flicking my eyes over to my sister, Patty, I notice how she is clutching the order of service tightly to her chest, like it is the most precious jewel in the whole world. Suddenly, tears spring to my eyes as Elton John’s ‘Your Song’ fills the church. At first I don’t dare to look around, terrified I won’t be able to control my emotions.
But of course I do look… and my life changes for ever.
‘Liam, are you still there?’
Opening my eyes, I stutter as I try to reply, unsure of how to respond. But Lana is talking about the present… isn’t she? Only I am trapped in the past.
‘Yes… Jessica.’ Her name feels like poison on my tongue.
‘Children?’ she continues, oblivious to the images that are now scratching around inside my head. ‘What about children?’
I think about little Elliott, out for the count in his bed, unaware of just how much I love him. I briefly consider mentioning my stepdaughter, Amy, eighteen and a mini version of her mother. What about the others? Should I mention them?
‘Just one,’ I finally say. ‘Elliott. He’s the sweetest boy you could ever wish to meet.’
‘I have a daughter,’ she responds. ‘Her name is Amber and, likewise, she’s the sweetest, funniest girl you’d ever wish to meet.’ She laughs a little and then sighs and I briefly hear her sniff up, as if tears may be forming. I suddenly feel incredibly sick.
‘I need to go, Lana. I’m sorry.’
‘I just want to understand.’
She sounds sincere, genuinely interested. Maybe I could tell her? It’s not like it’s going to matter much. In approximately half an hour, I will have passed out; an hour tops and I’ll be dead. Perhaps I could tell her. So at least one person in this whole world knows the truth…
The real truth.
Liam’s Story, January 2009
It was 7 January 2009 and the snow had fallen overnight. Standing at the window of our modest semi, I admired the beauty of the frozen crystals, effortlessly wrapping themselves around houses and trees; sparkling and dancing. We thought it was a sign, Alice and I. She wrapped her winter coat tightly around her, smiling shyly when the coat was a little too tight.
‘I’m getting big,’ she laughed nervously.
Kissing her softly, I felt the warmth of her lips against the icy-cold air of the bedroom. Her dark, coffee-coloured complexion was a sharp contrast to the pure white snow on the other side of the window pane.
‘It’s like a fairy tale, Liam.’
I gripped hold of her hand tightly in response and gave it a small squeeze. ‘Come on… it’s time for our happy ending.’
Moments later, we clambered into my Ford Escort, bringing in fresh snow on the bottom of our shoes, which was sure to morph into a sopping, wet puddle in a matter of minutes. Turning the ignition, I prayed silently that the car would start. It was a battered old thing in desperate need of an upgrade. Alice had been pestering me to buy another car for months but I was kind of attached to the crappy piece of junk.
‘What do you want?’ she asked, breaking into my thoughts. ‘Boy or girl?’ She pulled on her seatbelt as she spoke, stretching it over her rounded bump.
I shook my head. After three miscarriages, I really didn’t care. Alice must have read my mind, as she placed her hand on mine, just as I was about to reverse the car. ‘You need to stop worrying now. It’s all going to be all right.’
At twenty-four weeks, I truly hoped so. The twelve-week scan had been horrendous. I’d thrown up twice that morning. Alice had joked that she was meant to be the one with morning sickness but I just couldn’t help it. After being told three consecutive times that our baby had no heartbeat, I couldn’t take a fourth. But Alice had been calm.
‘It’s different this time,’ she’d said, while rubbing her then tiny bump in semicircles. And she had been right. A small flicker of a heartbeat, a squirming little tadpole with tiny arms and a huge head… I’d fallen in love right at that second, as if nothing else truly mattered.
‘I think it’s definitely a girl, you know,’ I declared, after pulling out of the avenue. The local kids were out in force, shoving freezing-cold snowballs down each other’s backs and dragging each other along on beer crates; Manchester’s answer to a sledge. As the heater gently thawed us out, we spoke about baby names: Grace for a girl, after my late grandma, and Alice was championing Chesney for a boy, because she’d had a teenage crush on Chesney Hawkes.
‘Let’s hope and pray it’s a girl then,’ I teased.
At twenty-four weeks, we would definitely be able to tell the sex. We’d been to the hospital a few weeks previously but the little mite had its legs crossed. On the way home, I’d joked that if it was a girl her legs would stay crossed until she was forty-five! Desperate to know what we were having, we’d paid private for another glimpse at our little miracle.
Ramming the car into second gear, I pushed my foot down on the accelerator as we clambered up the enormous hill. I looked out over the embankments, where forest and ravines lay below, all covered in freshly fallen snow; unspoilt beauty, unlike the roads, which were slowly turning to grey, wet mush.
‘When