What would have happened, if Henry hadn’t vanished? Perhaps Meredith wouldn’t have grown ever more unpleasant, as she did. Mum might not have fallen out with her as she did, finally driven to the end of her patience, the end of her forgiveness. Clifford and Mary would have kept on coming, would not have been passed over for the house when the time came. I know it irks Clifford terribly, to be missing out on the house. A king without a castle. He kept on visiting but it wasn’t enough. Mary’s refusal to come near the place peeved Meredith sufficiently. Does she want to be a Calcott or doesn’t she, Clifford? Such cowardice! Henry would be the Honorable Henry Calcott, just waiting for Clifford to die before he could slip on the Lord. Beth and I would have spent more summers here. Perhaps we would have grown up with Dinny. Beth and Dinny, together; awkward, tentative, passionate teenagers. I shut my eyes, banish the thought.
There’s a knock behind my shoulder, and a face at the black glass that makes me gasp. It’s Dinny, and I stare stupidly, as if he’s walked right out of my thoughts. The rain has slicked his hair to his forehead and his collar is turned up against the cold. I open the window and the wind snatches it, almost pulls it out of my hand.
“I’m sorry to… sorry it’s so late, Erica. I saw the light was on. I need help.” There is rainwater on his lips, and I can taste it. He is breathing hard, looks scattered.
“What’s wrong? What’s happened?”
“Honey’s gone into labor and… something’s wrong. Erica, something’s going wrong and all the vans are bogged in after all this pissing rain… We need to get to hospital. Can you take us? Please? It’ll be quicker than waiting for an ambulance to find the place…”
“Of course I will! But if I drive down to you my car will just get stuck too…”
“No, no-just go to the top of the green lane, can you? I’ll carry her up to you.”
“OK. OK. Are you sure you can carry her?”
“Just go, please-we need to hurry!”
Dinny vanishes from the window, back into the dark. I scrabble for my car keys, my coat, pause only for a second to think I should tell Beth. But she is probably asleep and I can’t wait to explain it to her. I shove my mobile into my pocket and run for the car. The rain streams over the windscreen in an unbroken wave. In the short sprint from the house my shoulders are soaked. I am breathing hard, too hard. My hands shake as I try to find the ignition and I have to stop, make myself calmer. The driveway is potted with puddles and I splash out onto the road, wipers flailing.
There’s no sign of them as I pull in at the top of the green lane. My headlights flare on the hedgerow, flood away toward the camp. I trot down the track, slipping. The ground is slimy. Grass pulls away beneath my feet, dissolves to nothing. I hear the wind plaguing the trees in the darkness. They crash like an invisible ocean. I stop at the far reach of the car’s headlights and stare into the blackness. Rain comes in through the seams of my shoes. Then I see them, making slow progress, and as I lurch toward them Dinny slips and falls onto one knee, fighting to keep his balance with the bulk of the pregnant girl teetering in his arms. Honey grips his shoulders, fear turning her hands into claws.
“Can you walk?” I ask Honey, as I reach them. She nods, grimacing. “Dinny, let go! Let her get to her feet!”
He tilts to the side, lowers Honey’s feet to the ground then levers her up. She is upright for a second before she doubles over, cries out.
“Fuck!” she howls. I take her other hand and her nails bite into me. Drenched hair shrouds her face. “This can’t be right… it can’t be right,” she moans.
“Her waters broke discolored,” Dinny tells me.
“I don’t know what that means!” I cry.
“It means trouble. The baby’s in trouble,” he says. “It means we need to move!” But Honey is still doubled up and now she is sobbing. In pain or fear, I can’t tell.
“It’s going to be OK,” I tell her. “Listen-really, it’s going to be OK. Are you sure you can walk? The car’s not much further.” Honey nods, her eyes tight shut. She is breathing like bellows. My heart is racing but I feel calm now. I have a purpose.
We reach the car and maneuver Honey into the back seat. I have mud up to my knees. Honey is soaked to the skin, pale and shivering.
“I’ll drive. You help Honey,” Dinny says, moving toward the driver’s door.
“No! She needs you, Dinny! And it’s my car. And the steering is a little snappy in the wet. It’ll be safer if I drive,” I shout.
“One of you fucking well drive!” Honey shouts. I push past Dinny, take the driver’s seat, and he climbs into the back. We skid off the verge, slalom down the lane, make for the main road.
I take us to Devizes at a reckless pace, as fast as I dare, squinting into the tunnelling rain. But when I corner Honey is thrown about in the back seat and so I slow down, unsure of what is best. She cries quietly between contractions, as if to herself, and Dinny seems dumbstruck.
“Not far now, Honey! You’re going to be fine, please don’t be scared! They’ll whip that baby out faster than you can say epidural,” I shout, glancing at her in the mirror. I hope I am not lying to her.
“It’s not far?” she gasps, eyes on my reflection, pleading.
“Five minutes, I promise. And they’ll take good care of you and the baby. It’s going to be fine. Right, Dinny?” He jumps as if I’ve startled him. His knuckles around Honey’s hands are white.
“Right. Yes, right. You’re going to be fine, sweetheart. Just hang in there.”
“Have you thought of any names?” I ask. I want to distract her. From her fear, from the cold, wet night, from the pain shining her face with sweat.
“Er… I think, um, I think… Callum, if it’s a boy…” she pants, and pauses, her face curling up as a contraction ripples across her midriff.
“And for a girl?” I press.
“Girl… for a girl… Haydee…” she groans, tries to sit up taller. “I need to push!”
“Not yet! Not yet! We’re nearly there!” I press the accelerator flat as the orange glow of town grows in front of us.
I pull up right in front of the hospital and Dinny is out of the car before it stops. He comes back with help, and a wheelchair.
“Here we go, Honey.” I turn around to her, take her hand. “You’ll be fine now.” She squeezes my hand, tears rolling down her face, and there is no trace of her attitude, her fire, the disdainful tilt of her chin. She looks little more than a child. The rain batters the roof of the car for one quiet moment, then the back door is pulled open, and they take her out, and she shouts at them, and swears, and we pile into the building, blinking in the harsh light. I follow them as far as I can, along three clattering corridors, through several doors, until I am lost. At the last set of doors somebody stops Dinny and me. A hand on my upper arm, kind but implacable.
“Partners only from here, I’m afraid. You can wait back down the hall-there’s a waiting room there,” the man tells me, pointing back the way we have come.
“You’re Honey’s partner?” he asks Dinny.
“Yes-no. I’m her brother. She’s got no partner,” he says.
“Right. Come on then.” They disappear through the doors, leave them swinging in their wake. The doors make a sweeping sound and a thump, as they pass each other, once, twice, three times. My breathing slows with them, and then they fall still. Dinny is her brother.
The clock on the wall is just like the one that used to hang in my classroom at school. Round, white plastic with a yellowing fade, the thin red second hand ticking around with a tremble. It says ten to one as I sink into a green plastic chair, and I watch as it creeps round and round, wondering how it hadn’t occurred to me that Dinny might have a sister. He didn’t have one when we were little, so I assumed he still didn’t have one. They look nothing alike. I think back, rake through all my memories, try to remember ever seeing them touch each other, or speak to each other as if they were a couple. They never did, of course. A feeling appears in me, to know he is not hers, it is not his baby. I feel a tentative hope.