It helps a little, the welcome of friends, the surprise and hugs and laughter. But it also makes it worse because everyone in the market asks about my ‘wife and daughter’ which feels like a fishhook in my diaphragm.
I explain again and again that I’m only here to meet with Philomena Hill and it’s too long a journey for the baby, yada, yada.
Millie finally rescues me. “Let the man catch his breath.” She leads me away to the Municipalité where there is a large conferencing hall set up with tea and coffee. She then summons Philomena to sit with me and we talk business all afternoon.
“Come to the house for dinner,” Millie says when I am finished. “Everyone will be there.”
I’m not sure that’s a good idea, all things considered. “Don’t worry. They know.” She pats my arm. “Not everyone, but our friends. They won’t bring it up.”
“Thank you.”
It would be good to spend the evening with them all.
But in the end, I don’t go. Even after a shower and change of clothes. Even after repeating the advice to myself about how wonderful it would be seeing Pierre and Gabriel, Hal, George, all of them. I can’t because it’s New Year’s Eve and at midnight they will all be kissing and all that. I don’t feel strong enough to withstand all that lovey-dovey displays of affections. Not when I’m so empty inside. Better have an early night and find some alcohol to take to bed with me.
The smell is the first thing that alerts me when I go down to the kitchen, a subtle hint of something … I don’t know, something that makes the painful hooks in my chest feel better and worse at the same time. I push open the kitchen door and stop, blinking over and over to make sure I see what I think I see.
Lessa, holding Malinara over one shoulder, stands in front of the fridge reading the list I stuck there earlier that afternoon.
My impossible wish.
Is this a hallucination? I haven’t even started drinking yet.
She looks a little different, her maple curls are smooth and glossy and twisted back in a low chignon. And she’s in city clothes, a slim black dress that comes to just above her knees and shiny, high-heels. She turns and sees me; her eyes are the same. Exactly the same… except for the tears.
“It’s not the same.” She gulps, wiping at her cheeks. “It’s not the same at all.”
Chapter Fifty-one
Lessa
It all happens quickly. One minute I’m in the limo, all dressed up for the New Year’s Eve lunch, then I’m not.
We’ve been invited for a weekend party in the New Forest. Clive is coming by helicopter from some important meeting and will meet us there. This weekend is supposed to mark the start of our official relationship. There will be an accidentally-on-purpose run-in with some journalist to snap us together holding hands.
I got tired of all the pretending and living a lie and put my foot down on at least one thing. Clive couldn’t spend the night in my home if it’s a secret. So, he’s been pushing for our relationship to come out into the open, now that he and Viv are divorced.
If only he’d push as hard for the Phoenix Bill. The last five months have seen nothing but delays. He says it’s political suicide.
It was just as much political suicide two years ago when we started working on it. But back then he didn’t have as much to lose. Now he’s in the cabinet and tipped for further promotion, he’s anxious not to ruffle feathers. Now he says he has to wait to make a deal with others, a quid-pro-quo, ‘support my bill and I’ll support yours’ kind of thing. And it takes time. Waiting for the right moment, the right conditions to call in favours.
How have I never seen this before? When political wheels turn, if they turn at all, they do so with grinding slowness.
So, the only change has been in our private lives.
Both Clive and Sir Alan insisted we hire a nanny to look after ‘the baby’ and free me to be available when Clive needs me. Even going to a weekend party, the nanny comes with me because God forbid we should miss out on the fun while looking after ‘the baby.’
He never calls her Malinara. “That’s just a weird name. You’re not on that island now. We can change it.”
Right on cue, I get a text message from him. More suggestions.
CLIVE: How about Marianne or Madelaine. Or Melanie.
The phone is still in my hand as I look out of the window. Our limo is speeding towards the New Forest, signs for various destinations swooping past us: Basingstoke, Winchester, Southampton.
Southampton.
The next minute, I’m pressing the comms button to speak to the driver. “Can you take the next exit please?”
