Page 21 of Perfect Wives
‘I might be,’ I call back.
There’s a silence that makes me smile. I imagine Alistair whispering something to Henry. Sure enough, my little boy’s voice carries down the stairs. ‘Naughty Mummy. Daddy says you’re supposed to be sitting on the sofa and he’s cooking dinner.’
Alistair’s voice follows after his son’s. ‘That’s right. Mummy is growing a little brother for you and she should be resting.’
I laugh. ‘Or sister,’ I call back, quickly placing the pie in the oven before doing as I’m told and moving to the living room at the front of the house to sit down. I place a hand on the small bump hiding beneath my leggings. It still doesn’t feel real. But I already love this tiny human more than I can put into words. The truth is I don’t care if it’s a boy or girl. Alistair doesn’t either. We just want our family to be complete, and soon it will be.
Unless something goes wrong. Unless Alistair finds out.
I shut the voice down before it can take root. Nothing will go wrong. I won’t let it. Six years of failing. Of my life shrinking inward, losing friends who didn’t understand.
‘You have Henry. Just be grateful.’
Of course I was grateful. Of course I love him. But I wasn’t like Georgie with her ‘one and done’ outlook. Knowing my family wasn’t complete was a sickening hurt I couldn’t put into words.
The guilt of what I’m keeping from Alistair feels like a stone lodged in my oesophagus. Unmoving and uncomfortable. It’s there when I draw in a deep breath. There when I swallow or eat or throw up. It’s guilt for what I was doing in London when Jonny saw me. I lied, of course. Gave him a story about being lost and popping into the building to ask for directions, like anyone does that anymore. He nodded, said nothing, but I could tell he saw through the lie. It would break Alistair if he ever found out. He is the perfect husband. The perfect man. I never want to hurt him, even if I did this for him. For us.
The living room, like the rest of the house, is a patchwork of colour and textures. Carved dark-wood artwork hangs on mint-green walls. There are two velvet sofas – one blue and one orange – both have two cushions on each seat, made from fabrics that catch my eye. Chunky blankets I’ve knitted hang over the arms, perfect for the nights Alistair and I curl uptogether to watch TV. The coffee table – an upcycled trunk I found at a car boot sale – bears the faint scent of lavender from the candle I lit earlier. Homemade, of course.
After my fertility issues, it’s become a little obsession to keep everything natural. All food. Soap. Shampoo bars. Even my own candles. It takes hours every day, but it’s worth it to know I’m keeping toxins out of my body and away from my baby.
I can’t fathom how people don’t seem to care about how much plastic and chemicals they pump into their bodies or how much damage it does.
I drop onto the sofa, my foot nudging one of half a dozen woven baskets I keep filled with books, half-finished knitting projects and Henry’s wooden toys tucked into the corners. I move the basket next to the others where it belongs, annoyed with myself that I left it out after using it earlier.
Boho chic, Georgie calls my house, always with a warm smile and a glow of admiration when she picks up one of the cushion covers I’ve made. ‘You really should start a business, Beth.’
That’s the difference between Georgie and me. She thinks we should always be trying to better ourselves. My life is about Alistair and Henry and Magnolia Close. I don’t need to fill it with anything else.
I sink against the squishy cushions and sigh. The quiz night last night was exhausting. Rushing around. Juggling the nausea with everything I had to do between throwing up in the toilets.
Tasha looked frazzled and on the brink of tears all night, spending most of the evening in the kitchen. She probably had a fight with Marc. He’s hardly the supportive type, the kind of man who sees childcare as her job.
Georgie was in her element, of course. The star of the evening in a red, sequinned cocktail dress.
She looked like a magician’s assistant, if you ask me.
But why shouldn’t she shine? I argue back, picturing my mother’s tsking eyeroll and wondering what it would’ve been like to have a beautiful, fun mother like Georgie when I was at school. My mother had me late in life. I’ve always suspected I was an answer to loneliness and a lifetime of failed relationships rather than any maternal need. I still remember the whispers in the playground.
‘That’s her mum? She looks like my grandma.’
I didn’t do the normal things the other children in my class did. Trips to the park and ice creams. Weekends and holidays were spent visiting the wool shop, then sitting side by side with my mother as she kept an eye on my knitting. Telling me the gossip from the office where she worked as a secretary. Names and people I didn’t know or care about.
It was only as an adult looking back that I realised how odd it was that she didn’t have any friends. She took on no involvement in school life – the assemblies or the PTA. To her, school and work were things to endure until we could be together again. I know she was disappointed when I left her to study law at university. She did everything she could to talk me out of it.
The sound of gurgling water fills the house, quickly followed by a squeal of delight and the thud of little feet. I smile and close my eyes, meaning to rest them for a moment. Except there’s something I can’t quite put my finger on – a niggling worry like I’ve forgotten something. It’s just the exhaustion though. I don’t forget things. I don’t make mistakes. It’s not who I am.
My mind turns to Keira. She seemed so friendly that night in the pub. But when I look back, all I can think about is the way her sharp eyes watched each of us. It’s been more than a week now, and Keira hasn’t appeared at the school gates, and she didn’t come to the quiz night either. No texts. No follow-ups. It’s like she’s disappeared into thin air. Like she never existed at all.
I must doze off because the next thing I know Alistair is placing a kiss on my cheek and pulling me into his arms.
‘Hey,’ he whispers as I open my eyes. His face is close to mine, the scent of Henry’s bubble bath lingering on his skin.
I reach a hand up, touching the soft grey beard Alistair has grown this year. His hair turned grey overnight the year Henry was born. We joke that it was the stress of the birth. I call him a silver fox. His reply is always to laugh and pat his stomach.‘More like a silver sloth.’
I know he feels the odd one out with Nate and Marc. Nate is tall and broad – effortless charm too. Then there’s Marc – Marco – with his olive skin and dark eyes. Quieter than Nate but just as handsome. Both of them play golf with Jonny a few times a month. They always invite Alistair to join them, but he doesn’t play.
‘Why would I want to spend my weekends hitting a ball around a field for hours and missing out on spending time with you,’ he always says when I ask him if he minds. ‘Besides, you know me – I’ll forget which direction I hit the ball in before it’s even landed.’
