I lost a lot of blood. They put me under. I don’t remember that happening.
But when I woke, there Nick was, by my side, holding my hand in both of his. It was our hands that he was looking at when I opened my eyes. He didn’t immediately realise that I’d come around, so he didn’t know I was looking at him.
It was the only time I saw him cry.
‘I’m sorry,’ I said, my voice cracking, because I couldn’t bear it. I just couldn’t bear it.
‘No,’ he said, pressing my hand to his lips. ‘None of this is your fault.’
‘It is.’
‘No. I should have been here … ’
‘You couldn’t have done anything.’
‘I should have been here,’ he repeated.
‘You’re here now,’ I said, and had been grateful for that at least.
I’d still been able to need him, then.
We’d still been able to need each other.
But the next day, I spiked a fever, started bleeding more, and had to go back into theatre. The day after that, my OB broke it to us that it was unlikely I’d ever be able to carry a baby to term – scarring, misshapen uterus; I couldn’t listen to her words – and Nick told me that he didn’t mind, all he cared about was that I was all right, but I didn’t believe him. Icouldn’tbelieve him. How could he not mind?
My heart was shattered.
I think it was then, even before we left the hospital, that I started to pull away from him. Because it made me angry, it made me so bloody furious, that he was pretending like everything was going to be all right, when, to me, our whole world had ended. He didn’t ask me about the labour, and I can see now that that was probably because he was afraid to make me relive it, but at the time, I resented his silence. Resented that I’d had to endure it when he just got to ignore it, which I know wasn’t fair, or right, but it was just so much easier being angry, than being sad.
Nick was patient with me, at first.
‘Fine, Claude,’ he said, ‘you need a punching bag. Use me. I’m here for it.’
But it wasn’t long before he fell back on anger too, and we rowed, a lot, screaming rows, neither of us listening, just raging at the single unchangeable loss that was tearing us apart. Until quickly, way too quickly it got so it was easier to be silent, thansay anything, and better to be apart than together, because the being together was just too painful.
That was when the running started: to South Africa, then Sicily, for me; into all those bars for Nick. And the faces of the women he was pictured with weren’t always different. There was one in particular who kept cropping up. The tabloids never failed to highlight her, drawing comparisons between her pretty, smiling features, and Nick’s long line of exes.
Who is she?I’ve asked Nick.
I’ve got no idea, he’s told me.
I’ve wanted to believe him.
I’vetriedto believe him.
I used to trust absolutely that he left his good time ways behind when we got together, but god it hurts, taunting myself with how far his need to escape might have taken him backwards.
I’ve hurt him too. I do know that.
We keep hurting each other.
And yet, when we each got the call about doing this movie, our agents making it clear that the studio was only interested in securing us as a double-act, we both agreed without hesitation.
We drove up here to Doverley together.
We’re lying together now, beneath the same 1,000 thread count sheets.
I really want to think that means there’s some hope left in us.
