‘Do you think we’d want to risk going through it all again?’ she demands raggedly.
I understand that, even if I can’t help but feel hurt. ‘Is that why you fought?’ I ask. ‘Because of him?’ Was it why you drank? ‘Why you divorced?’
My mother looks at me with bleary tiredness. ‘What do you think?’
I rise to my feet, knowing there is little more to be said. Even now, in the midst of her grief, my mother is choosing solitude over being with me, as she always had, and it hurts. I want to share this with her; I want to comfort her in her grief, a grief I feel even though I never knew this little boy. My brother.
‘I’m sorry, Mum,’ I say, and she just shrugs and looks away from me.
I am at the door when I turn back to face her, feeling strangely empty as I take in her shattered look, her still-streaming eyes. If they’d told me… if they’d tried to make us a family again, instead of choosing grief over love… but perhaps they couldn’t. Perhaps they weren’t strong enough. I know I can’t blame my mother, considering the pain and grief she has had to endure.
‘What was his name?’ I ask softly.
She gazes at me, everything about her broken. ‘Robbie,’ she whispers.
As I turn away from her, I wonder how on earth I am going to give this awful news to Milly – and how I can bear to live with it myself.
Twenty-Nine
Milly
‘Anna wants to talk to us?’ Matt sounds incredulous that I could have entertained such a prospect for a moment. ‘Absolutely not.’
‘Matt. She says she has something important to tell us. About Alice.’ I remember Anna’s broken voice and I feel a sharp stab of fear. Do I want to know whatever she is going to tell us? And yet I have no choice, because if she knows something that can help Alice…
‘What could she possibly have to say about Alice?’ Matt scoffs. We are standing in the kitchen after supper, talking in hushed voices as Alice watches television just a short distance away.
‘I don’t know, but she sounded worried. Scared, even.’ Which terrifies me. ‘Perhaps something to do with the genetic testing—’
‘Which is with Mr Williams, a highly trained specialist. If there is news about that, he’ll be the one to ring, not Anna.’
‘Still, she has something to say to us, Matt.’ I close the dishwasher and lean against it, my shoulders slumping. I feel so exhausted all the time, and at the same time completely wired, my whole being powered by this endless anxiety. I just want to know, and yet I don’t. I very much don’t.
‘I doubt it’s anything. She’s probably just fishing, looking for a way back into Alice’s life.’
‘And is that so wrong of her?’ I ask quietly.
Matt folds his arms. ‘She talked to a lawyer, Milly. She was going to sue for custody of our daughter.’
‘We don’t know if she would have actually gone through with it.’
‘And what makes you think she wouldn’t have?’
‘She gave her back rather quickly, and, after all, it was five years ago. Besides, this is about Alice.’ I lower my voice even more. ‘If she knows anything that could help her… help us with a diagnosis… we have to listen to her, Matt. For Alice’s sake.’
‘I can’t imagine she does,’ Matt snaps, but I see the acceptance in his eyes. For Alice, he’ll do anything. Just like me. ‘Fine. We’ll see her. But she’s not seeing Alice.’
‘Who isn’t seeing me, Daddy?’ Alice lopes into the room, a shuffling sort of walk we’ve become used to, glancing between the two of us. I give Matt a quelling look.
‘No one, sweetheart,’ I say, dismissing Anna as simply as that. ‘It’s time to get ready for bed.’ I reach for Alice’s hand, and her little fingers slip through and twine with mine. Together we head upstairs, each step painfully slow, reminding me how much has changed. On the third step, Alice trips and nearly sprawls flat on her face, but I manage to keep her upright – just.
‘Sorry, Mummy.’ Her lower lip trembles and I pull her into a quick hug.
‘You don’t ever need to be sorry, Alice. Never, ever. Not for falling. Not for anything.’
‘Why am I falling so much?’ she whispers. She pulls away so she can look at me seriously. ‘What’s happening?’
My heart feels like a cloth wrung for its last drops as I meet her confused and unhappy gaze. ‘I don’t know, sweetheart. But the doctors are going to find out.’