Last night’sLove on the Landepisode swam before her eyes again. Had Spencer watched baby Fred grow with an envious eye? Had he studied the boy’s soft hair, so much like Jeff’s, and the nose and chin that were all Mia? She eased out a breath.
‘Hey babe, you look a tonne better. What are we gossiping about?’
Leearna leaned in. ‘I was just about to tell Clem that if you ask me, if Spencer and Emily were really shacked up together, she’d be here with him this close to Christmas, wouldn’t she?’
Mia’s eyes glinted with mischief. She glanced over her shoulder. ‘The suspense is killing me. Has he said anything to you, Clem, while you’ve been back there painting?’
Clem was stumped about how to answer this.
Mia’s jingle bell earrings chimed as she adjusted Fred’s baby carrier. ‘Erghh, I’m guessing he’s frozen you out too. Did you see the show last night? He would make such a great dad.’
And there it was; the unflinching truth that she couldn’t give him the one thing he truly wanted: babies of his own.
Mia and Leearna headed backstage to unload the clothes and Clem returned to the props room. She paused in the doorway, watching Spencer paint and wishing she could press pause on this moment. Even with the secrecy of their relationship, things had felt so right but the words she’d heard him say on TV last night echoed through her mind.
He turned, catching her in the doorway, and came towards her.
‘I’ve missed you,’ he murmured, capturing her lips in a kiss.
Clem wanted to sink into the kiss and enjoy the stolen moment, but she couldn’t leave it alone. ‘What about children though, Spence? I caught last night’s episode, and it was clear Emily’s family were obviously thrilled to hear how you want to go through the joy of seeing your wife’s belly swell, hold her hand while your kids are born, see which traits they’ve inherited from you, ensure your family name’s continued.’
He frowned. ‘I didn’t say all that. Maybe the bit about my family name, but I wasn’t the one talking about pregnant bellies and labour wards. That’s not my style.’
Clem sighed. ‘Maybe I mixed that up, but you were nodding and your eyes were all glassy and look, that’s totally fine. You absolutely deserve that, no questions asked. But I can’t give you that. That’s not something that can ever happen with you and me.’
‘You’re still young, Clem. And you’re an amazing mum. Plenty of women have gone back for more babies in second relationships, a decade older than you even. You wouldn’t even consider it?’
She shook her head.
‘Not a chance. I was so, so sick after I had Harriet. So dangerously sick, I had to be locked in a psych ward. I thoughtthe people I loved most, Jack and my pop, were trying to hunt me down to steal my baby and sacrifice her for a cult ritual. And every time I heard someone else’s baby crying, I thought it was a coded message I needed to interpret or else they’d find me.’
She watched his expression change, his face growing ashen.
‘It was terrifying, Spencer, and I was in there for weeks. Too much of a danger to be with my baby. Stuck in there with a whole bunch of strangers, rocking in the corner. And honestly, in my psychotic state, I probably looked and acted every bit as mad as everyone else in that ward.’
She jammed her hands into her pockets, shuddering at the memories she had filed away. There was a reason she never mentioned this, a reason she worked so hard to keep any dalliances on her terms, but he’d seen her failed visit to Mia’s maternity ward, he already knew part of her story.
She needed to end things with Spencer so he had a chance at the babies he so obviously wanted, and she needed to do it right here and right now.
‘Obviously not everyone ends up as an involuntary inpatient like me, and once I had the right meds, I was as stable as the next person. But I’m not going to risk that again. Once you’ve had post-natal psychosis, you’re twice as likely to have it with subsequent babies.’
‘But you went back for a second baby.’
Clem felt her heart pounding and a tightness in her chest as she tried to explain. ‘Indi wasn’t planned. I’d never have got pregnant again intentionally, not after that nightmare. I ran the gauntlet twice, but I’m never going back. Not at the risk of an encore performance, and especially not after hearing the news about that poor Glenelg mum and her baby. I’m sorry, Spencer—not even for you.’
Spencer watched Clem cross to the small CD player in the corner and press pause on the cheesy Christmas music, her stiff gait matching her tense expression.
She was every bit as brave and resilient as she was beautiful, he realised.
It would only take two steps to be beside her, one moment to reach out and knead the tight muscles above her shoulder blades. But instead, he stood frozen, considering the right words to say, because he didn’t want to say the wrong thing in his rush to fill the space. He’d heard enough platitudes and glib one-liners after Belle died.
His shoulders felt every bit as tight as hers looked.
‘I’m sorry you had to go through that,’ he said eventually. ‘I can’t imagine what it was like. I’ve never heard of it before.’
Clem gave a sad sigh. ‘They hardly even mention it at antenatal classes. A one in a thousand chance doesn’t seem so bad until it happens to you. Post-natal depression and anxiety are terrible, horrible illnesses that I wouldn’t wish on anyone, but post-natal psychosis is like the worst of those conditions, amplified by a factor of ten until you lose touch with reality. New mums and their families should at least be warned what to expect, so they can look out for the signs.’
She pulled off the reindeer antlers and tossed them onto the bench. ‘I didn’t want to get into all that, but I’m sick of hiding stuff.’
