The Missing Husband (22 page)

‘I just want us to squeeze all we can out of life before we settle down,’ David said by way of explanation. ‘That way we can give our children the perfect foundation to go on and create wonderful lives of their own.’

‘We already have a perfect foundation, don’t you see that, David? Look how much we enjoy looking after Luke and Lauren. Don’t you want one of your own? Don’t your arms feel empty when you hand Luke back, because I know mine do.’ She thought she glimpsed a flicker of agreement in David’s eyes but it was still annoyingly out of reach. ‘I’m thirty, David,’ she said, reminding him of their original plan.

David had the good grace to sound guilty but he wouldn’t back down. ‘A short delay is all I’m asking. Not years and years, just a little bit longer. Does that sound OK?’

Jo couldn’t understand his pain but she could see it on his face and it hurt her too. She wanted so much to heal him and she knew that she could if only he would trust her. She cupped his face gently in her hands. ‘I’ll wait,’ she promised, leaning in to kiss him and hoping that she could convince him sooner rather than later. It was fatherhood and not time that would heal him.

How wrong she had been.

‘We can’t keep calling him Baby Taylor,’ Irene said when Jo hadn’t answered.

Jo almost suggested calling him FB but she wasn’t that cruel, and as she placed a tentative hand on the plastic shell that separated her from her son, she didn’t understand how David could have been. ‘I’m not ready yet,’ she said. ‘But if you’re going to push me then how about Barry?’ she asked, her voice dry.

‘Maybe it is too soon to think about it,’ Irene said hastily. ‘Baby Taylor will do for now.’

In the yawning pause that followed, both women became aware of the space to the side of the incubator where David should have been standing.

‘I’m sorry he isn’t here for you,’ Irene said and it was a testament of her strength that the tears welling in her eyes didn’t fall.

‘It isn’t your fault, Irene.’

‘And it’s not yours either.’

Jo looked down at the defenceless little boy sleeping uneasily in the rigid incubator which was a poor substitute for a mother’s womb. Her body’s rejection of him had been inevitable given that her heart had been doing the very same thing. When she looked at her son, she felt an overwhelming sense of guilt and an obligation to care for him but there was no desire to do it. That initial rush of devotion was now a distant memory and she wondered when it was that she had turned into the kind of monster who could not love her own child. Had David seen it? Was it
Jo
he had been thinking of when he had said they weren’t ready?

18

‘Joanne, where are you?’

‘Why, where are you?’ Jo answered in a tone neither she nor her mother had heard since her teenage years.

‘I’m at the hospital – where I’ve just been told that you’ve discharged yourself.’

Jo was looking out of the nursery window, her gaze following the path leading from the house to the wrought iron gate. Of the small section of Beaumont Avenue she could see, the road glistened in afternoon sunshine that was only now strong enough to melt the morning frost. Occasionally her pulse quickened as she caught a glimpse of a passer-by who would inevitably do exactly that, pass by without a second glance.

‘I need to be home,’ she explained, knowing it was no explanation at all. She couldn’t tell her mother how she felt completely out of her depth with the baby, how she felt she was drowning under the weight of the responsibility for a new life who needed intensive care and unconditional love, neither of which she felt qualified to give. She needed David and she had come home to wait for him because that was something she was expert at.

There was a sharp intake of breath, which gave Jo enough time to move the phone an inch away from her ear before Liz began her tirade. ‘You need to be here, Joanne, with your son who is doing amazingly well but would do a lot better if his mother was caring for him and not a bunch of strangers.’

‘Those strangers are qualified nurses who have been giving the baby the intensive care he needs. I’ll keep going in every day, but there’s no point me living at the hospital, Mum. All I’ve been doing for the past couple of days is expressing milk like a prize cow or changing his nappy when I’m allowed to get within an inch of him.’

‘Nonsense,’ Liz snapped. ‘I’ve just been feeding him.’

‘They let you hold him?’ gasped Jo, immediately crushed that the nurses had judged the grandmother to be more capable than the mother.

‘No but I dripped a little milk into his feeding tube to help the nurse. They wanted
you
there, we all do. Now don’t be silly, come back to the hospital.’

Resting her head on the cold glass, Jo closed her eyes. ‘I’m not running away,’ she said carefully. ‘I’ve had things to do. I’ve been in touch with the police and Mary Jenkins has put together a press release to let the world know that I’ve had the baby and that I can’t so much as give him a name yet without his father around. It’s just made the midday news on the radio. I
need
to be here – in case David comes home.’

There was a pause and then Liz sounded more amenable when she said, ‘Maybe you’re right. He’ll know you’re in hospital and might think he can come back and clear you out. Did you ever get around to changing the locks?’

It was one of the few scenarios that Jo hadn’t and wouldn’t consider. She was simply trying to tempt David out of the shadows and she had already decided what she would say when he appeared. She wouldn’t be angry with him; he would have his reasons for running away and she would listen. She would promise him anything if only they could go back to the way they were. He didn’t need to be frightened; the baby was still in hospital and, if it came down to a choice, if he didn’t want the baby to come home, then maybe that was for the best. There was surely a better, more worthy set of parents out there that would give their unnamed baby the love he needed. Jo was ready to consider anything, sacrifice anything, if only she could have David back where he belonged.

But before Jo could leap to her husband’s defence, something outside caught her attention. There was a man on the other side of the road, partially obscured by a tree. She couldn’t see his face and had no idea how old he might be, but he was about David’s height and he was standing still, facing the house. Watching.

‘It’ll be fine, Mum, and I’ll come back in later,’ Jo said. ‘I have to go now. I’ll phone you when I’m there.’

The call was ended before Liz had a chance to respond and then Jo took a step away from the window so she couldn’t be seen from the road. For one long, heart-stopping minute she didn’t move and neither did the man. She was about to rush downstairs and into her husband’s arms when the watcher stepped out of his hiding place.

When Jo flung the door open, he was already halfway up the path and jumped in surprise.

‘I didn’t think you’d be at home,’ he said.

‘So what the hell are you doing here, Steve?’

Her brother-in-law made a point of scanning the length and breadth of the house and garden. ‘I was passing and thought I’d better check to make sure everything was OK. You can’t be too careful these days.’

‘You don’t have a key, do you?’ Jo asked, not even trying to hide her suspicion.

‘No, of course not. I was only going to check the outside. I wasn’t about to break in, Jo,’ he said with a nervous laugh.

‘Glad to hear it,’ she replied and reluctantly let him into the house.

‘Is the baby home then?’

‘No, I’ll be going back and forth to the hospital for a while, but I – I had to come home. The news is out that I’ve had the baby and I thought …’

‘That David might turn up?’

‘Do you think he will?’ she asked, desperately. She stared intently at Steve, looking for the slightest hint that he knew more than he was telling. There was no denying he had helped immensely since David’s disappearance but Jo didn’t yet understand why. Was he making up for his brother’s failures or was it guilt? And if it was guilt, then whose? Could it be that Steve was a puppet and his strings were being pulled by someone else?

‘It’s great that you and Mum have that reassurance that Dave is out there but he’s been gone two months now, Jo.’

‘What are you saying?’ she demanded, her voice quaking. ‘Please, if you know something, anything, tell me. Please, Steve.’

Holding up his hands, Steve said, ‘I don’t know where he is, Jo, I swear I don’t. But I can’t help thinking he must have made a new life for himself and that maybe you should too. I don’t blame you for wanting to cling on to the hope that he’s coming back but … I hate to say it, but maybe it’s time to let go of that dream.’

As Steve returned her gaze, the ghostly similarities between Steve and her husband were enough to make Jo shudder but it was the last words he had spoken that made her soul quake. She had heard David say the exact same thing to her earlier that year, two months after she had conceived the child of which he was still unaware.

‘What do you mean, let go of the dream?’ she had demanded. She had been building up to telling him about the baby and couldn’t put it off any longer. He had sent her an invitation request through Outlook to take two weeks’ leave in October for a trip to America and, as they lay in bed that night, he had asked her why she hadn’t accepted it. She had started off subtly, reminding him of the plans that had been on hold for too long, and she certainly hadn’t been prepared for his response.

‘Even talking about having a baby is causing friction between us,’ he said. ‘Imagine what it would be like if we had one.’

Jo stifled a laugh that was too close to a sob. ‘I
am
imagining it, and it looks pretty damn good to me. What are you so frightened of, David?’

‘Me! I’m afraid of me!’ he confessed, his voice cutting through the darkness of their bedroom where they lay, side by side but not touching. ‘Having a baby will change us and I don’t want to lose what we have. I don’t want to lose you, Jo.’

Jo could feel the heat of his body next to her and wanted to reach out and hold him but she could hear the tension in his voice. He was wound up so tightly he might snap in two if she touched him. But it wasn’t so much her touch that she was afraid might break him, as it was what she had to confess. ‘And I don’t want to lose you,’ she said. ‘But I still don’t understand why you think that would happen. Tell me, David. Make me understand. I know losing your dad changed your perspective on things, but I won’t believe you’ve reached the point where you don’t want kids at all.’

‘He really screwed around with my head, Jo,’ David admitted as he brought his hands up and began tugging at his hair. His breathing had become ragged and it took a while, but eventually he added, ‘I wish I could give you what you want.’

Jo’s stomach did a somersault and her pulse raced as she prepared to reveal her secret. ‘You can, David. You already have,’ she whispered softly.

David fell silent. He had stopped moving and Jo couldn’t even hear him breathing. She pulled herself up on to one elbow and this time couldn’t stop herself from reaching out. Her fingers sliced through the darkness in search of the connection she had lost. David’s body tensed as Jo took hold of his hand, but he didn’t resist when she pulled it towards her. She kissed his fingers, his wrist, trailing her lips up his arm then his neck. When she kissed his cheek it was salty with the tears that had been falling silently and she wasn’t so delusional to think they were tears of joy. She had never seen David cry before, not even at his dad’s funeral and was so shocked that she pulled away.

‘I’m sorry, David. I should have told you. I should have listened to you.’

‘You’re pregnant?’

Jo mumbled a reply that was enough to give David the confirmation he was clearly dreading.

‘But you’re still … We talked about it, but …’ he said stumbling over his words until his thoughts caught up with him. ‘When did you come off the pill, Jo?’

His voice was flat, devoid of emotion, and Jo felt a shiver run down her spine. ‘Just after our trip to Paris.’ David didn’t respond and silence filled the growing void between them until she dared to ask a question of her own. ‘Do you hate me?’ she whispered.

Turning towards her, David lifted his hand to her face and discovered the tears slipping down her cheeks, too. ‘No, never.’

‘I know it’s a bit of a shock but this is a good thing, David. It might not be a trip to America but it’s going to be a new voyage of discovery for both of us,’ she said in an attempt to wring out some of the joy that was missing from the announcement. ‘I love you, David.’

He didn’t say anything as he pulled her towards him. He kissed her lips so softly it was barely a kiss at all. Jo was holding her breath.

‘And I love you,’ he said.

But he had said little else that night and they had clung on to each other a little too desperately. She had torn his dreams from his grasp and replaced them with her own and now it was her turn to know what it was like to have life taken out of her control.

‘Maybe you’re right,’ Jo said to Steve, trying to quell the nausea her memories had inspired. ‘I should let go. I can’t go back and change things, however much I’d like to.’

‘Why don’t you concentrate on getting the baby home?’ Steve said. ‘That’s something you can do.’

‘Is it?’ Jo said. He had yet to see the look of terror on her face every time she came within two feet of her son.

‘He’s certainly got a decent pair of lungs on him,’ Heather said. She had been working in France during the whole trauma of Baby Taylor’s birth and it was the first time she had seen him since he had been born a week ago.

Jo was looking down at the squirming baby she was trying to subdue and could barely hear her friend’s voice above the ear-piercing cries coming from her supposed bundle of joy. Although the baby was still in hospital, he had been moved out of special care and was undoubtedly going from strength to strength, while in stark contrast his mother could scarcely summon the energy or enthusiasm to leave the house to visit him.