‘Your surgeon said that it could be a year from now or twenty years. Or with luck on our side, even longer.’
‘Or it could be next week. Or tomorrow. Or even tonight. Why not in the next few minutes?’
‘Ben …’
‘Why couldn’t it wait until I was in my eighties to appear, when I’ve lived my life and watched our kid grow up? It wouldn’t matter then. Why is it happening to menow?
‘It’s not just happening toyou, it’s happening tous.’
‘Well, forgive me but you’re not the one with an aneurysm inside your head.’
It was as if he resented Claire for being healthy. ‘That’s not fair.’
‘I know, it’s not … I’m sorry.’
Three hours had passed since the specialist’s diagnosis at Oxford’s John Radcliffe Hospital. It had followed a battery of tests including MRI scans, CT scans and angiographies. Finally, a dye had been injected into arteries and the shadow it created revealed what the surgeonsuspected – an aneurysm buried deep inside Ben’s brain. At seven millimetres, it was on the larger end of the spectrum and its positioning meant the risk of brain damage or a stroke was too high risk to operate.
Now back at home, they remained on the bed, hand in hand, as Claire punished herself for failing to acknowledge the recent changes in her husband. He had begun to forget things that were important to him, like his sister’s birthday and an appointment to meet a client at a nearby hotel. One morning she found him sitting at the breakfast table halfway through a bowl of cereal. She reminded him it was a Saturday and that he didn’t work weekends.
Claire had blamed each memory lapse on pressures at work and concern over whether the baby would reach full term. It was only when she discovered a handful of empty Nurofen packets hidden in his car’s glovebox that he admitted the increasing frequency of his headaches.
‘I need a time-out,’ Ben said and rose to his feet.
‘Where are you going?’
‘To the park.’
‘Can I come with you?’
‘Thank you, but I want to be alone.’
Alone was how Claire felt for the next three months. While husband and wife continued to go about their daily routines, a chasm opened that she couldn’t close by herself. Instead, she filled the cracks where and when they appeared, trying to lift Ben’s spirits even when he’d lost interest in being a husband and a dad-to-be. The dilapidated house they’d taken on a year earlier still required much renovation work, so she took on the project management in the hope it might be completed before the baby arrived.
Eventually, she could hold her tongue no longer.
‘Do you know where I’ve been all afternoon?’ she snapped, storming into their bedroom one day. ‘No, ofcourse you don’t, because you’re too busy lying here in the dark feeling sorry for yourself. I’ve been at the hospital scared shitless I was losing the baby.’
Ben sat upright. ‘What happened?’
‘Oh, now you care. I was cramping at work and started spotting so I took myself to A&E. You would’ve known that if you’d bothered to answer your phone.’
‘Sorry, I must have set it to silent.’
‘No, it wasn’t; it’s switched off like it always is because you can’t deal with reality. But while you’ve pressed pause on life, the world is still going on around you. And the paediatrician said it was just a scare, the baby is okay.’
‘Thank God.’ He lay back on the bed, relieved. But Claire wasn’t finished.
‘I’ve had enough, Ben. This should be the happiest time of our lives but you’re ruining it for us. I’ll be damned if I’m going to spend the rest of my pregnancy living with the walking dead. It’s time for you to stand up and be my husband instead of moping around and waiting for an artery in your head to burst. If you don’t want to be a part our lives, then pack your stuff and leave now, because I’m running out of strength for the three of us.’
Claire’s tough talking appeared to switch on a lightbulb inside Ben’s head. It began with a heartfelt apology and developed over the following days into the return of the husband she loved. He put time and effort into their relationship and together, they allowed themselves to imagine being parents.
‘There’s something I need to talk to you about,’ Ben began one evening. He put a plank of wood and a nail gun down on the lawn and invited her to join him on the half-completed decking. The sun began to disappear behind the roofs of the houses ahead. ‘I’ve been thinking about this and if it ever reaches a point where I know the inevitable is going to happen, then there’s somethingI need you to do. Don’t call an ambulance. I want you to get me to the office.’
Claire raised a brow as if she’d misheard. ‘You mean the hospital?’
‘No, there’s no point in taking me there. When the aneurism ruptures, that’s it, game over; there’s nothing they can do. If you take me to work and leave me there, then my medical insurance will pay out.’
‘What are you talking about?’
