‘It’s not uncommon to hide from trauma,’ Jodi explains. ‘If this happened when you were quite young, you might not have had the cognitive capacity to understand everything that was happening. Brains prefer to avoid reliving trauma, so they build protective shields.’
‘So you don’t think I’m making it up? That what I saw is real?’
‘As I explained when you arrived, we can never really know. If you want to delve deeper, I know a counsellor who might be able to help?’
I bristle, but I don’t know why.
On the way back to the car park I become aware I’m being followed. I don’t need to turn around because I recognise his deathly cold breath brushing against the back of my neck. Instead, I pick up the pace and gradually leave the boy behind. But I don’t know for how long.
Chapter 17
Melissa
It’s a bright March morning and Melissa finds Damon sitting alone at a table at the rear of Caffè Nero when she arrives. There’s already a caramel latte waiting for her in a large white mug and a wrapped biscotti on the saucer.
‘Hey,’ they say in unison and she takes a seat, removing her sunglasses to take him in.
Ten days have passed since she was last with him at the fertility clinic. Lately, her job at the ambulance service has had her working nightshifts. Yet several times, she has offered to sacrifice daytime sleep and swing by the home they once shared, for a catch-up. But he’s been fobbing her off with excuses. A headache, a stomach bug, late shifts of his own.
Something isn’t right.
She’s spoken to their mutual friends, and they haven’t seen hide nor hair of him either. So she was delighted when Damon texted her, suggesting a coffee.
The lighting at this end of the room is purposefully moody, but Melissa still notices dark rings developing under his weary eyes. He’s also lost weight and hasn’t shaved in days. He reminds herof the heroin addicts she and her crew sometimes find overdosed and blue-light to Accident and Emergency. Some people react to negativity and stress by comfort-eating. Damon is the opposite. He starves himself.
The last time she saw him like this was soon after admitting she wanted them to separate. It was the hardest thing she has ever done, and the guilt still gnaws at her. She corrects herself: second-hardest thing. Only Adrienne knows what trumps it.
‘You don’t look so great,’ she begins. ‘Do you still have that bug?’
‘It’s on its way out.’
‘Did you go to the clinic appointment yesterday to finish the counselling?’
‘Sorry,’ he mutters. ‘I wasn’t feeling up to it. I’ll remake it.’
Melissa bites her tongue as a niggle makes its presence felt. He keeps looking over her shoulder towards the doors.
‘Are we expecting company?’ she asks.
‘Sorry, no,’ he says, but offers no explanation.
He’s hiding something from her, she is sure of it. But she knows the fastest way to send him running is confrontation. For a fraction of a second, she allows her brain to consider whether asking him to be their baby’s father was a good idea. When she and Adrienne first discussed starting a family, it was Melissa who put his name forward.
‘Damon, as in your ex-husband?’ Adrienne had asked, clearly surprised. ‘You want me to carry your ex-husband’s baby?’
Melissa nodded. Though she was aware of how crazy it sounded once she heard it coming from someone else.
‘I don’t know, Mel,’ Adrienne replied, shaking her head. ‘I mean, you know I don’t have a problem with you two being close, but this relationship belongs to you and me, not you, me and Damon.’
‘He’s kind, he’s caring, he’s loyal and he’s empathetic,’ she argued.
‘So is a spaniel.’
Melissa ignored this. ‘And you know he’d make a good dad.’
‘He’s also still in love with you.’
‘He’s not,’ Melissa replied, though she knew that wasn’t strictly true. He hadn’t moved from the flat they’d shared and, on her insistence, had only recently replaced a framed honeymoon photograph that had been sitting on the mantelpiece. Sometimes she’d catch him staring at her before quickly looking away, a blush in his cheeks. He’d been on dates in the four years they’d been apart, but eventually deleted the dating apps when Tommy had pointed out that every girl he chose was a carbon copy of Melissa. Later, when Melissa asked Damon what was wrong with the girls he’d met, he’d told her simply: ‘They’re not you.’
