She was pulled out of these thoughts by the sound of Atholl clearing his throat. When she looked at him her heart sank even further.
‘Beatrice, I,uh… I don’t want to upset you but…’
‘Oh no, what?’ She knew her skin was blanching, just as Atholl’s was flushing.
‘Beatrice… I needed the computer in the reception this morning and,uh… when it powered up there was a Facebook page frozen open on the screen…’ His Adam’s apple bobbed as his words tailed away.
‘Oh.’ She felt herself shrink. Had he seen her profile picture with Rich at the hospital? He must have, why else would he be mentioning it now, and why so awkwardly? It would certainly explain the recent softening in his attitude. Hadn’t he been kinder to her today? Hadn’t he touched her hand earlier on the waterfront when they were waiting for Gene and Kitty to arrive, and hadn’t he immediately regretted it and snatched his hand away like she was a damaged thing, something he had to be extra careful with?
She hadn’t liked Atholl being brusque with her, but this? This wasn’t what she wanted at all. Even if her first few encounters with the Fergussons had been tough, she had at least found relief in being with people who didn’t know for sure why she was a total mess and who didn’t look at her with sympathy in their eyes – but that was exactly what Atholl was doing right now. Except, there was something else mixed in with his searching gaze, not just sympathy, but curiosity and caution too. Had he seen the relationship status on her profile, which most definitely still saidMarried to Richard Halliday?
What must he be thinking? Did he think she might be married with a child and a husband somewhere out there in the world missing her? Maybe he’d guessed she’d been dumped and was hiding from the breakup? Or maybe he’d grasped at the truth of what had happened – that she was grieving for a lost child and a marriage that was all over bar the shouting? But he couldn’t know about her losing her mum too, or about the redundancy, and she was glad of that. She looked down, wanting to disappear from under that gaze.
‘Beatrice…’ Atholl was shifting closer.
‘I was just trying to contact my sister… stupid computer crashed…’
‘You can talk to me… if you like?’
Beatrice looked up from her bowl to find Atholl’s eyes level with her own, entreating her to talk. ‘You helped me with my problems,’ he was saying. ‘I hate to call Gene a problem, but you know what I mean. Will you not let me help you?’
‘How can you help me?’
‘Your sadness. I can listen, I can help…’
‘You can fix me?’
‘No, that’s not what I’m saying, but…’
Beatrice began to stand, handing him her bowl which he took, his eyes wide and mouth open.
‘What I’ve got, you can’t fix, Atholl.’
He drew his neck back and Beatrice saw the concern in his eyes.
‘Look, I’m fine. I’m just tired.’
Atholl was on his feet now, his hand running nervously through his curls. ‘Don’t go yet.’
Beatrice was already stooping to pass through the low window from the flat roof back onto the carpeted corridor that led to her room. He didn’t follow after her but she heard him bidding her a fraught goodnight.
As she turned to close the bedroom door, she caught a glimpse of him leaning taut muscled arms on the window frame, his skin pale as pearl in the moonlight, wearing an expression of exasperation and alarm that made her shudder. It was a look she had seen on Rich’s face many times in the weeks before he left her and she had tried so hard to ignore its significance then. She never wanted to see that look again.
Chapter Thirteen
Baby-making
Leaning against the closed door as if to barricade it shut, Beatrice clutched a palm to the pounding in her chest as the memories flooded back, along with the heavy, burning lump right at her core.
She’d felt it before, but tonight its presence was more pressing than ever and she at last understood what it was. It was words.
Words swallowed down, stuck inside, and never spoken aloud.
The feelings had been too large to express and the lump was compounded by her pain at the loss of her lovely mum – a woman who had barely lived her life at all when she got sick. Her mum had escaped a horrible man, whisking her children away from him to a safer place when they were just babies and worked all her life to provide for them, then just as her life was looking a little easier and there were weddings and grandbabies and travel on the horizon, the diagnosis had come and swept away all her plans for a bright future with her thriving family made up exclusively of women and a little baby girl who she adored so much.
That was when the words first started to get trapped, thought Beatrice, still leaning heavily against the door. Then Helen Smethwick had rocked up and turned her loose from the job that had anchored her for nearly two decades, the only occupation she’d known and the source of so much of her pride and confidence.
The ache of this had lain on top of her grief for her dying mum, layering it over like sediment, thick striations of shame, powerlessness, and bitter anger piling up.
