Claire puts her head under my arm, taking most of my weight, then leads me back out to the car. I let her, I’m not sure I can stand on my own anyway. I’m still bare foot as we stumble down the driveway, wet gravel slicing at my toes. She lowers me into the passenger seat and I notice she’s wearing red leather gloves I’ve never seen before. I’m sitting sideways and I can hear someone crying inside the car, it takes a few seconds to realise that it’s me. She gets in behind the wheel, fastens her seat belt and closes the door.
‘Where are the diaries, Amber?’
‘I told you, I burned them.’
‘You’re lying.’
‘For God’s sake, just get me to the hospital.’
She’s never driven Paul’s MG before but reverses out of the driveway as though it’s her own car. One red glove on the steering wheel, the other resting on the gearstick at all times, like a racing driver; someone in control. I close my eyes and place my own hands over my belly, as though I’m trying to hold her inside of me. I’m sure it’s a girl.
Claire and I don’t speak as she steers us out of her road. The only voices I can hear are on the radio, but even they’re not real, it’s all pre-recorded. Occasionally, I open my eyes to look out of the windows, to make sure she’s going the right way, but all I can see is black. I have to press one hand against the dashboard to hold myself steady as we turn a corner.
‘I thought you couldn’t get pregnant,’ she says, changing into second gear. I think we’re on the main road now, it won’t be long.
‘Neither did I.’
Third gear.
‘Does Paul know?’
‘No.’
Fourth gear.
‘Why didn’t you tell me?’
‘You always said we didn’t need anyone else.’
Fifth.
I open my eyes and realise that the cramping has stopped. I don’t know what that means.
‘The pain has gone,’ I say and try to sit up a little. ‘I think I might be OK.’ A trickle of relief floods through me. I look over at Claire but her face hasn’t changed, as though she didn’t hear me. ‘You bled once when you were pregnant with the twins, didn’t you?’ I ask.
‘You should still get yourself checked out at the hospital, better safe than sorry.’
‘You’re right. But you can slow down a bit now.’ She doesn’t respond, just stares straight ahead. ‘Claire, I said you should slow down, I think I’m OK.’ My hands move instinctively back to my stomach.
‘You should have told me,’ she says, so quietly I’m not sure I would have heard the words at all if I hadn’t seen her lips move. Her face has twisted into something ugly. ‘We used to tell each other everything. If you just did what I told you and stopped telling lies none of this would be happening. You’ve only yourself to blame if it’s dead.’
‘It’s not dead,’ I say. Tears burst the banks of my eyelids and roll down my cheeks. I’m sure of it too, I swear I can feel my unborn child’s heartbeat as well as my own. Claire nods. She believes me that the baby is still alive. I close my eyes and grip the side of my chair a little harder. I just need to hold on, it can’t be much further. We’re going so fast now, we must nearly be there.
‘Amber.’
Claire puts her gloved hand on mine. It’s cold and I open my eyes to see her staring at me instead of at the road. She smiles and the instant terror numbs me.
‘I love you,’ she says, before turning back to the road with both hands on the steering wheel.
I hear the brakes screech, and then everything slows down. My body lifts from the chair and I’m flying. I crash through the windscreen, hands first, as though diving through a pool of glass. A thousand tiny pieces rip through every part of my body. It doesn’t hurt, all the pain is gone. I fly high into the night sky. I can see the stars, so close I can almost touch them, but then my head smashes into the tarmac followed by a shoulder, then my chest, tearing pieces of my skin as I skid to an abrupt halt. Everything is still. I’m not flying any more.
The pain returns except now it’s everywhere and so much worse than before. I’m broken inside and out and I’m afraid. I don’t cry, I can’t, but I feel the blood run down my face like red tears. I hear a car door slam and the faint sound of the radio, a Christmas song is still playing. The agony increases until it turns everything black. And then I can’t feel the pain any more, I can’t feel anything, I can only sleep.
Now
Tuesday, 3rd January 2017
‘You left me there.’
‘I’d been drinking, I shouldn’t have been behind the wheel. I was scared.’
‘You were scared? Did you even call for help?’
She looks away. ‘I thought you were dead.’
‘You hoped I was dead.’
‘That’s not true, don’t ever say that, I love you.’
‘You need me, you don’t love me. The two things are different.’
‘Do you know what would have happened if they found out I was driving? I have two young children who need me.’
‘I was pregnant. And now I’m not.’
‘I know. I’m so sorry. I would never deliberately do anything to hurt you, you know that.’
‘Have you told Paul?’
‘Told him what?’
‘That you were driving?’
‘No. Have you?’
‘Do you think he would have let you in here if I had?’
The anger hisses out of her then. ‘It was an accident, Amber. I was trying to help you. I was trying to get you to the hospital. Don’t you remember?’
‘I remember you fastening your own seat belt, driving really fast, then slamming the brakes. I remember me flying through the air.’
‘I had to stop.’
‘No, you didn’t.’
‘We were driving along, you were crying in pain and then you said something about a little girl in a pink dressing gown. I thought there was a child in the street. You screamed at me to stop.’
She empties her words into my ears and eventually they find me. I don’t know what’s real any more. I don’t know which version of events to believe. My sister’s or my own. The room attempts to nurse my wounds in the suspended quiet, but Claire tears out the stitches.
‘There was no child when I got out of the car, I never saw her. Either you imagined her or she ran away,’ she says.
Both.
I turn away, I can’t look at her any more. It took a lot of love to hate her the way I do.
‘I shouldn’t have left you there. But you should have told me about the baby. And you should have told me about him. This is what happens when we lie to each other.’
‘I didn’t lie.’
‘You didn’t tell me the truth either. I’ve looked him up, Edward Clarke. He was thrown out of medical school not long after you broke up with him.’
‘Because of the letters you wrote.’
‘Maybe. Either way, I was right, I knew there was something wrong with him. He took odd jobs at different hospitals until he got this one. I think he chose this hospital to be close to you. Do you understand? I think he’s been following you for years and I don’t think this is over. Tell me where he lives.’
‘I don’t remember.’