clothes and cleans your house? The woman who picks out furniture and irons tea towels? That woman? Is that who you’re being unfaithful to, Ed? Is that who you’re missing?’ I can hear the hysteria in my voice as I stand up.
Kerry is leaning back against the tree like she hasn’t a care in the world. ‘Go easy on him.’
‘You’re just as much to blame for this,’ I tell her; I don’t even try to hide her from Ed.
‘He’s trying his best.’
‘Oh, shut up! You’re not even here!’
‘The devil convinced the world he didn’t exist . . . it was his greatest trick.’
‘You’ve never even watched The Usual Suspects,’ I reply from under my breath.
I should have died. The words float around my head, but I grab hold of them.
‘You should have let me die!’ My anger sends the dancing light scurrying away, hiding in the shadows and cooling the air. ‘I’m supposed to be dead.’ The light ducks its face around the corners of the shadows.
‘What?’ Kerry asks, looking affronted. ‘I saved you. I saved you and look at you . . . Look at how you’re behaving!’
A family have found their way into The Nook and are making a hasty retreat back through the archway.
‘It’s because of you that I’m shouting at thin air!’
‘Stop it, Jen, take a breath,’ Kerry says.
‘Stop telling me what to do!’ I bend down and rummage into my handbag, pop open the pill bottle, fire two to the back of my throat and swallow.
Kerry holds her stomach and raises an arm to the sky dramatically, falling to the floor like the Wicked Witch of the West. ‘I’m melllllttttting!’
I raise my eyebrows at her and bite my tongue as she sinks. At least I know she’s seen The Wizard of Oz . . . we loved it when we were little.
She breathes deeply and smiles up at me. My anger dissipates. I know what she’s doing, she’s goading me into taking the pills just like she would when we were kids and I didn’t want to do something. I take a step towards her, an apology on my lips. But Ed is behind me and is pulling my hand back towards him. I look away from Kerry and meet the worry in his eyes. I return my concentration to where Kerry was lying, but she has gone.
‘Let’s go back home.’ Ed avoids my eyes and picks up our things from the floor.
‘Home?’ I question; my thoughts are becoming muggy, warm and sticky.
‘Back to your parents.’
I shake my head. ‘No. I want to go back to Nessa’s . . . she’s the only one who doesn’t make me feel like I’m insane.’
‘I didn’t mean to make you feel like you’re insane.’
‘I know.’ I gulp down the rest of the sentence: you may not have wanted to, Ed, but you did.
‘You OK?’ Nessa asks.
I flash a glance in Ed’s direction and bite my lip. He’s apologised over and over on the way back. But I can’t seem to forget the way he turned away from me as I tried to kiss him, how he didn’t want to ‘take advantage’.
Nessa reaches for my hand and gives it a squeeze. I stroke her thumb in thanks, putting on a brave smile, and ask Hailey to help me; I glue the wrapping paper onto the inside of the cardboard box. Nessa, Erica and Hailey are making it into a house for the woodlice that have been collected and deposited into a Chinese takeaway container. I glance over to Ed, who is towelling Oscar down; my son’s fingers are pruned and there are grass cuttings sticking to his bare legs. He is completely naked, but Oscar hasn’t a care in the world. I try to catch Ed’s eye, to communicate without talking the way we always used to. But he doesn’t look at me; instead, he averts his eyes. His gaze is fixed to where Nessa and my hands are entwined.
‘Did Kerry really like to do this when she was a little girl?’ Erica asks as I smile and pass her the glue stick.
‘She did.’
‘What else did she do when she was a little girl, Mummy?’ Hailey waits for Erica to finish gluing her wallpaper.
‘Hales, time to go, sweetheart,’ Ed interrupts. Erica quickly passes the glue stick to Hailey. My time with them has gone so quickly, and the tug of longing for my old life almost takes my breath away.