‘Do you want to have shower sex?’ Gareth asked, furrowing his brow.
‘Yes, I do want to. And I realise it’s been a while since we’ve had any sex other than normal, standard sex, but I want to,’ I said, my lips curving into a precocious pout as I laid out my expectations.
Gareth nodded, as if receiving a directive from his commanding officer. ‘Very well, shower sex tonight,’ he proclaimed, giving the table a gentle thump with his fist.
The waiter came over to take our orders and already I knew exactly what Gareth was going to get. He ordered the ribeye steak, and I could see his lips mouthing my words as I asked for the cured trout. The waiter didn’t carry a notebook. When I’d once asked Gareth why he thought waiters did that, he’d given a very intuitive, detective-style response. ‘That way, there’s no evidence that they got your order wrong.’
Just as Gareth asked for some tap water for the table, I watched the waiter’s eyes suddenly shift to my handbag beneath the table. I noticed a small glint of light had flickered and landed onto his face, reflecting the bright restaurant lights directly above us. The clasp must have come undone and the bag had sagged open. My heart clambered a little further up my chest. Had he seen the knife? As the waiter’s eyes flicked upwards to mine, I just smiled as warmly as I could in response. It tookhim a moment, but after an excruciatingly long beat, he politely nodded and walked away.
‘Hey, Gareth,’ I began as I tried to quietly breathe yet another inconspicuous sigh of relief, ‘what will we do if I, or if we, can’t have children?’
Gareth exhaled, pushing his hands across his knees. He had thought about this too. I knew he had, but didn’t every couple at some point? I watched him begin to say his prepared answer that he must have run through his head a dozen times.
‘There aresomany options, you know that, right?’
‘That’s the bullshit answer, you know that, right?’ I snapped at him, with probably a lot more bitterness than was needed. Gareth just nodded silently, taking it on the chin. After seven years together, he knew how to deal with my small fits of anger.
‘What scares you about not being able to have children?’ Gareth asked calmly. ‘It’s not set, not every couple needs to have children; it doesn’t make them any more or any less of a family. Mum and Dad weren’t even sure about having me before I blessed their lives unexpectedly.’
‘I know, and I agree, but it’s always been the plan, hasn’t it? You, me, two boys, two girls, two dogs, and Mep, a picture of domestic bliss.’
‘Yeah, and if that’s what you –we– still really want, let’s keep trying. We can try IVF or surrogacy, or we can even adopt. And if we don’t want to do that, maybe it’s just not meant to happen, and that’s okay. That’s just what life has in store for us. Maybe we’d hate having kids. Maybe they’d be little arseholes.’
‘But you’ve always wanted kids,’ I said, wondering if part of me was testing him to make sure he wasn’t just saying this to make me feel better about not being pregnant yet.
‘I mean, don’t get me wrong: being a dad scares the shit out of me. But I want a life with you, Fran, kids or no kids.’
I fake-retched, and Gareth’s sincere stoicism cracked into a genuine chuckle. I knew Gareth’s feelings about becoming a dad were more complex since his own father had passed away last year, but I couldn’t help but melt a little into a smile as he reached out across the table and interlocked his fingers with mine again.
‘I love you, my beautiful girl,’ he said.
I killed O’Neill. I killed our neighbour next door. You have to believe me when I tell you that he deserved everything that I did to him. But I am terrified I am going to get caught, go to prison for the rest of my life, and lose you and our idea of our perfect life and our perfect family.
I wanted to say that all to Gareth. I wanted to tell him everything, to share every nervous thought in my brain with him. But I knew Gareth wouldn’t be up for the old Bonnie and Clyde routine. And I wouldn’t make him choose between his dutiful police heart and me. Partly because I wasn’t certain what hewouldchoose.
‘I just wish my dad and your parents were around to see what a great mum you’ll be,’ Gareth said lovingly.
I tried to smile. It was sweet of him to say, but I wanted to promptly change the subject from my parents.
‘Yeah. Me too,’ I said. I remembered that a lack of eye contact was a common trait of liars or those who felt uneasy, so I attempted to gaze longingly into my husband’s eyes as he softly stroked my hand.
‘I need a wee,’ he said lovingly.
‘Ew, gross.’ I snatched my hand away. Gareth got up, took his jacket off, and had just begun walking to the bathroom when a random woman on another table outstretched her arm to him and he turned to speak with her. I saw his face drop into a grimace, and I could just about hear his exasperated cry.
‘I don’t work here!’
As Gareth made a beeline for the loos, my gaze suddenly locked onto the waiter who had served us. He was at the far side of the restaurant, quietly chatting to a man who I guessed was the manager, occasionally glancing in my direction. I pretended not to notice, instead grabbing the last piece of bread in the basket, tearing it off, and dropping it into my mouth.
As discreetly as possible, I glanced down at my handbag again, checking that the blade was still hidden. Even though the bag had been open I thought it was unlikely he could have seen it – the black handle camouflaged nicely against the dark faux leather of my handbag – but what if hehadspotted it? What if they wanted to check my bag? Trying to make my façade seem as casual and calm as possible, I snatched up my bag and strolled casually to the loo, quickly analysing my options for hiding the knife. The sanitary bin? No, that wouldn’t work; it would be extremely visible against the transparent liner when someone came to remove it. The loo itself? No, surely it would just get clogged up there when I tried to flush. The Nesmuk knife was many things, flushable it was not.
I pushed through the heavy toilet door, realising I yet again needed some sort of last-minute plan. My eyes flicked around, searching for a vent or duct where I could stash the knife. Just as I was observing a small parting that lay in the ceiling tiles, the door behind me began to squeak open, so I hastily slipped into one of the cubicles and jammed the lock across the door. Out of ideas, I quietly lifted up the cistern lid and placed the knife next to the valve. Jabbing my finger into the flush, I watched as the knife rose with the water level before settling back down between the gasket and the valve with an almost inaudible metallic chime. Carefully, I placed the lid back, the heavy, hollow clunk of porcelain reverberating around the cubicle.
I pulled back the lock and emerged from the cubicle, smiling at the lady at the sink as I began to wash my hands, fully awarethat she had no idea she was washing her hands next to a murderer who had just hidden their weapon of choice. But as I dried my hands, it dawned on me that perhaps my actions were maybe a stroke of hidden genius. After all, when was the last time anyone had checked their toilet cistern?
SIX
FRAN
