Page 81 of The Engagement

‘Don’t even think of going anywhere,’ Rob says as I swing my feet off the bed. ‘What do you want?’

‘The loo,’ I say, laughing. Since we’ve been home, he’s barely let me or Belle out of his sight. ‘That OK?’

‘Leave the door ajar,’ he says. ‘Then I can hear if you need anything.’

‘Yes, boss,’ I say with a salute, going into the bathroom. Like I said, Belle and I, miraculously, were the lucky ones, with no lasting lung damage detected, though we each have follow-up appointments in several weeks at the hospital. That isn’t my main concern though, I reflect, washing my hands. While my mind has grown used to living with my past, conditioned to look over my shoulder at every turn, having carried around my secret for so long, Belle’s young brain is not. Her damage is fresh, still raw, with shame engulfing her. I see it in her eyes. She’s going to need a lot of time to recover.

‘I’m going to book her in for counselling,’ I tell Rob.

Rob agrees. He’s been a complete angel since he came down to the hospital in London. Natalia has also stepped up, taking care of Amber, Leanne and Kate while no one was home. The two sisters have since been allocated an emergency foster family while their situation at home is investigated. Leanne will always have a job at Greene & Clean, and I know they’ll both be OK. Leanne’s a fighter. Like me.

‘There’s so much I don’t understand,’ Rob had said on the drive back from the hospital. Belle was on the back seat asleep, her head resting against the window and her body wrapped up in one of the blankets he’d brought for us. He’d come armed with supplies – water, food, pillows. And the Met police had contacted him about recovering my car and bringing it back home.

I’d put a finger over my lips when Rob had briefly looked at me, hoping for answers. There was no way I could discuss everything now, not with Belle in the car. But of course, it was just another way to protect myself, to stall the inevitable. While Darren, Luba and Vaughn were gone, never to be a threat again, I was still carrying my secrets around with me. There was no way to set fire tothem, after all. So I could either live with what I’d done for the rest of my life, have Rob oblivious to my past, or confess to him that Belle wasn’t really my daughter, that I’d stolen her, and that her mother was dead because of me.

‘Come on, back into bed with you. Doctor’s orders,’ Rob says now.

‘I can’t stay here forever. I’m fine. I feel perfectly OK.’

‘Rest, rest and more rest is what they said at the hospital.’

I admit, I’m not good at doing nothing. Amy is perfectly capable of keeping things running at Greene & Clean, but I’m itching to get back. Or at least to go downstairs and tidy up or cook a meal.

‘Could I have my laptop, then?’ I ask him.

‘Netflix or work?’

‘Both?’

‘Nope, not if you’re going to work,’ he says. ‘I’m going to make you two some lunch. I’ll bring it up.’ And he disappears downstairs for a while, leaving me with my thoughts stewing around my head.I get up and go into Belle’s room.

‘Hey,’ I say. She looks up, taking off her headphones. The duvet is pulled up over her legs and she’s wearing her pink butterfly sweatshirt on top. I love the sight of it on her – wrapping her up in innocence, just how it should be. Hopefully she’ll be binning all the skimpy clotheshebought for her, shaking off the person he tried to turn her into. It was never her style, and Belle always took pride in having her own look – edgy but tasteful with a mix of stuff from when she was younger as well as items that marked her transition into a young adult, showing she wasn’t growing up ahead of her time. I want all that back for her, not for her to be turned into someone she’s not.

‘Hey.’ She pats the edge of her bed and I sit down.

‘How are you feeling?’

‘Bored. You?’

‘Same.’ I roll my eyes.

‘Mum…’ Belle has a pained expression on her face, as though if she tells me something, it will unfurl the creases on her brow.

‘Yes, love,’ I say, taking her hand.

There are words on the tip of her tongue that are rooted in feelings that defy language. ‘I’m sorry,’ she says finally, looking me in the eye. ‘Really, I am.’

‘Oh, darling,’ I say, pulling her in for a hug. ‘No,I’msorry.’ And again, words can’t express how deeply I mean that and, even if they did, she won’t ever know the exact reasons behind my apology.

‘I wanted so much to be grown up, you know, like a real adult. It was as if I was fast-forwarding through ten years of my life. But in doing that, it’s just made me feel like even more of a little kid.’

I cup her face, tucking back a strand of hair. ‘Trust me that in the next phase of your life, my love, you’ll learn so much about yourself. You’ll learn what you love and don’t love, who and what you want in your life. And you’ll barely notice all this happening because it’ll be a natural and gradual process. One day you’ll look back and remember this summer, realising that you wouldn’t be the person you’ve become without the past shaping your present.’

‘You mean, like, what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger?’

‘Actually, no,’ I say. ‘That’s a tired expression, if you ask me.’ I let out a little laugh, trying to find the words to explain. ‘Trauma is…well, it’s devastating. It affects every part of your life and how you trust and relate to others or make decisions. It’s not always true that it makes you stronger. In fact, it can have the opposite effect. But what it does do is make you consider things more carefully, so you don’t repeat past patterns. The irony is that if you ignore it, those patterns repeat anyway.’

‘A bit like hammering a point home, you mean, like a life lesson?’

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