‘You don’t really do adult festivals either any more, do you?’ he asked. ‘It’s been so long since Two Germans. I know there was that other little book after that – what was it called again? The Cubbyhole? Something like that? – but as far as I understand, that’s best left unmentioned.’
‘Actually, my husband has just sold his latest novel,’ I said, stretching the truth a little, but it seemed clear that this was only a matter of weeks, if not days, away.
‘Really?’ said Garrett, his face falling a little. ‘An actual novel or just an idea?’
‘An actual novel,’ you replied, smiling. ‘Full of sentences and paragraphs and chapters.’
‘Well, good for you,’ he replied. ‘Are you going to tell us what it’s about or is it a state secret?’
‘I thought I’d go for something really original,’ you said. ‘Animals that can’t talk. Like in real life, you know? No, I’m just kidding, Garrett. Don’t look so annoyed. If you don’t mind, I won’t tell you the story right now. You can read it when it comes out, if you like. I’ll make sure to get my publisher to send you a copy. But let’s not talk about all this right now. It’s someone’s birthday, yes? Shouldn’t we be celebrating?’
And we did celebrate. And when we got back to our apartment, we celebrated again, just the two of us. A celebration that was only slightly marred when you asked what George had been talking about the previous morning when he’d said about my applying for a job and I was forced to tell you that I’d been thinking of staying on at UEA. But you said no, that it was important that we get back to London when your book came out, as it was important that you be in the heart of things.
‘I’m sure you’ll find another teaching job there,’ you said. ‘From what I understand, you might have found your true calling in the classroom.’
‘Thanks,’ I said, although for the life of me I didn’t know what I was thanking you for.
7. March
When I woke that Tuesday morning, how could I have known that everything I had worked for since I was a girl, every dream and ambition that had found its way into my heart, would be stolen from me by nightfall?
It seems ironic in retrospect but I remember opening my eyes to the sun pouring through the curtains and feeling an overwhelming sense of well-being. A few days earlier, I’d finished my novel and was finally ready to show it to my editor. Unlike when I completed Fear, which you’d encouraged me to submit to agents despite my doubts about its merits, I felt a measured confidence in this one and had even decided on a title, The Tribesman. I knew it still needed some work but, I felt, not an enormous amount. It would certainly be ready by the end of the academic year, which had been my original plan when we’d arrived in Norwich.
It had already been an exciting week. Two days earlier, Peter Wills-Bouche had sold your manuscript for an astonishing four hundred thousand pounds to one of the most prestigious publishers in London and it was currently on submission with five American publishers. To my surprise, you’d been quieter than usual over recent days, less ebullient than I might have been in your position, and I worried that your distance sprang from anxiety or a sense of anticlimax.
I could hear you in the shower as I climbed out of bed, opening a window on to the bright, clear morning and reaching my head outside for a moment to breathe in the air. As I did so, however, I felt an unexpected convulsion in my stomach, and it was all that I could do to run to the kitchen sink before I threw up. I kept my head over the porcelain for a minute or two until the retching came to an end. Feeling shaky, I sat down at the kitchen table, placing a hand against my forehead. My skin was slick with perspiration and, a moment later, I touched my stomach and then felt the tenderness of my breasts. I knew the symptoms only too well; I’d been pregnant four times already, after all. And now I was pregnant for a fifth.
A rush of conflicted thoughts shot through my head simultaneously. How would this affect the publication of both our books? No, I’m being disingenuous. I wondered how it would affect the publication of my book. Would I carry the baby to term or lose it like I had lost the others? Where would we live? I liked Norwich and wanted to stay at the university but even if I could convince you that we were better off there than in London there was no way we could stay in a small flat with a broken staircase. The idea of trying to get a pram up and down the stairs several times a day was ridiculous. I’d kill both myself and the child. We’d have to find somewhere else.
I said nothing to you about any of this when you emerged, fully dressed, slipping past me wordlessly as I made my way towards the bathroom.
‘Edith?’ you said, perhaps surprised by my silence. ‘Are you all right?’
‘Fine,’ I replied, not turning around. I guessed my face was still pale and sweaty. ‘Just desperate for the loo, that’s all.’
When I was showered and dressed, you were already gone, a note left on the pillow saying that you’d be out for the day and would see me that evening. No mention of where you were going, but I assumed it was the library in the centre of town. You’d been spending a lot of time there recently as you worked on your rewrites. I didn’t give it much thought as I made my way to the pharmacy at the end of the road, where I bought a pregnancy test then took it back home.
The line turned blue. The line had always turned blue for me. I was incredibly fertile, we both were, but my inhospitable womb, as my gynaecologist described it, was still the enemy.
‘Please let her live,’ I said quietly, uncertain whether I was addressing God, my womb or the universe itself. ‘Let me keep this one.’
And somehow, I felt absolutely certain at that moment that the child would survive and that we would be a family.
Later, when the doorbell rang, I was both surprised and annoyed to see Rebecca standing outside. It was the first time that she’d visited me in Norwich and, naturally, she hadn’t bothered to call in advance to say that she was coming.
‘I’m not actually visiting you,’ she said as she sat down, pushing the students’ scripts off the seat and on to the floor as if they were worthless things.
‘It feels like you are,’ I said. ‘I mean, you’re here, after all.’
‘No, I’m only passing through. I had a meeting in King’s Lynn this morning and, as I was driving through Norwich on my way home, I thought I’d stop by to tell you what a terrible sister you are.’
‘Marvellous,’ I said, feeling my heart sink and wishing that we had one of those video cameras at the front door so I could see who was outside before admitting them. ‘Would you like a coffee before you list all the reasons or are you happy just to get started?’
‘No, I would not like a coffee,’ said Rebecca. ‘And if I did, I would go to a coffee shop.’
‘Well, there’s one at the end of the road,’ I said.
‘I’d go there because you’d probably poison me.’ She sat back and looked me up and down as if she were trying to figure something out in her head. ‘I don’t know what I ever did to you,’ she said.
‘Really?’ I asked, already fed up with this conversation. ‘Not a single idea? When you look back to our childhood, there’s nothing there that rings any bells?’
‘I was such a kind and loving sister. Always attentive to your needs.’
‘Don’t be ridiculous. You were horrible to me from the day I was born.’
‘What rubbish. Your problem, Edith, if you don’t mind me saying so, is that you’ve always thought you were superior to other people. Morally superior, I mean.’