Truly Madly Guilty

  She's not a drunk, he reminded himself. She's just drunk. For the first time since you've known her.

  'She must be exhausted,' said Holly, looking at Erika with fascination.

  Oliver smiled at Holly's use of the word 'exhausted'. 'I think you're right,' he said. 'She's exhausted. How's your drink? Not too hot?'

  'No, it's not too hot,' said Holly. She took a very careful, tentative sip. There was a little moustache of milk on her upper lip.

  'Oliver,' said Holly quietly. She held up her little blue handbag and her eyes filled with more tears.

  'Did you want me to put that somewhere safe?' Oliver held out his hand.

  'Oliver,' she said again, but much more quietly this time.

  'What is it, darling?' Oliver crouched down in front of her. His clothes were still wet and filthy from the fountain.

  Holly leaned forward and began to whisper urgently in his ear.

  chapter sixty-one

  The day of the barbeque

  The four grandparents arrived at the hospital at the same time.

  Clementine had come out of the ICU to make a quick phone call to Erika, to update her on Ruby's progress and to make sure that Holly could stay with them for a little longer until they sorted out where she would spend the night.

  To her surprise Oliver had answered Erika's phone. Holly was fine, he said. She was on the couch under a blanket with Erika watching a DVD. He said that Erika was asleep, and he sounded embarrassed about that, or bewildered, but apart from that, he spoke exactly as Oliver always did, with polite, throat-clearing reticence, as if it had been an ordinary night, as if he and Erika hadn't just saved Ruby's life.

  From where Clementine stood on the first-floor landing she could see the ground floor of the hospital and the sliding doors at the entrance. She recognised Sam's parents first as they hurried in, their agitation clear in the way they half-ran, half-walked. They would have been caught in the same traffic jam as she and Tiffany had, and they would have felt that same demented frustration. Sam's dad had grown up in the country and abhorred traffic lights.

  She watched as the four of them grabbed at each other, like the survivors of a natural disaster running into each other at a refugee camp. Her father, dressed in his 'around the house' clothes, jeans and a misshapen jumper that would never normally be seen in public, hugged Sam's tiny mother, and she put her arms up and clung to his back in a way that was almost frightening to see because it was so out of character. Clementine saw Sam's dad put his hand on Clementine's mother's arm, and they both turned around, their faces lifted, studying the hospital signs for clues about where to go.

  Clementine's mother caught sight of Clementine first, and she pointed at the same time as Clementine raised her hand, and then they all hurried up the long, wide walkway towards her.

  Clementine walked down to meet them halfway. Her mother was first, followed by Sam's parents, with her dad at the back; he'd had a knee operation after a skiing accident a few months back. The expressions on their faces were painful to see. They each looked terrified, and sick, and as if they were labouring to breathe, as if the walkway was a mountain Clementine had forced them to climb. These were four fit, trim grandparents enjoying their retirement, but now they appeared much older. For the first time they looked elderly.

  Ruby and Holly were the only grandchildren on both sides of the family. They were adored and spoiled, and Sam and Clementine lapped up the adoration with such casual vanity, for hadn't they created these exquisite little angels? Why, yes they had, so they deserved their pick of free babysitters and they deserved to sit back and be fed home-made treats when they went to visit, for look what they offered in return: these glorious grandchildren!

  'She's okay,' she said. By okay, she meant 'alive'; she wanted them to know that Ruby was still alive. But she spoke too soon, before they could properly hear, and she could see all four of them straining to understand, in a panic to get to her faster, and Sam's mother grabbed for the banister, as if it were bad news.

  'Ruby is okay!' she called again, louder, and then they were all around her, asking questions, creating a roadblock for people trying to get up the walkway.

  'They have her sedated,' said Clementine. 'And she's still ... intubated.'

  She tripped on the terrifying word and thought of Ruby's white little face and the huge tube extending from her mouth. It looked like it was choking her, not helping her breathe.

  'They've done a CT scan and there is no sign of swelling or brain injury, everything looks fine,' said Clementine. Swelling or brain injury. She tried to make the medical words feel meaningless, like a foreign language, just sounds coming out of her mouth, because she couldn't risk letting herself feel their full significance. 'They've done a chest X-ray and there is some fluid on the lungs, but that's to be expected, they're not too concerned, they've started her on a course of antibiotics. Her ribs are okay. No fractures.'

  'Why wouldn't her ribs be okay?' asked her father.

  Clementine cursed herself. She was trying to tell them anything positive she could but there was no need to tell them all the things that could have gone wrong but didn't.

  'Sometimes the force of the compressions, the CPR - but it's fine, it didn't.' She heard Oliver counting out loud and for a moment she couldn't speak. 'In the morning they'll reduce the medication, wake her up, and get her breathing on her own.'

  'Can we see her?' said Clementine's mother.

  'I don't know,' said Clementine. 'I'll ask.' She shouldn't have let them come to the hospital. It would have been more sensible to tell them to wait at home, better for their elderly hearts. She hadn't thought. She'd just expected them to come, as though she were still a child and she needed the grown-ups.

  Once, she and Sam had been out at dinner with Erika and Oliver and they'd got into a conversation about whether they felt like grown-ups. She and Sam had said they didn't. Not really. Erika and Oliver had looked perplexed and kind of appalled.

  'Of course I feel like a grown-up,' said Erika. 'I'm free. I'm in charge.'

  Oliver had said, 'I couldn't wait to be a grown-up.'

  'So then,' said Clementine's mother, breathing heavily. Was she having a heart attack? Suddenly she lunged at Clementine. 'Why weren't you watching her?' She was so close Clementine could smell the spicy scent on her breath of whatever she'd been eating for dinner. 'You shouldn't have taken your eyes off her. Not for a single second. Not around water, for God's sake.'

  'Pam,' said Clementine's father. He went to take his wife's arm, and she shook it off. A young pregnant woman squeezed her way past them and stared curiously.

  'You're smarter than that. You know better!' continued Pam, her eyes fixed on Clementine with such intensity it was as though Clementine were a stranger to her, as though she were trying to work out who this person was who had harmed her granddaughter. 'Were you drunk? How could you? How could you be so stupid?' Her face crumpled into a million lines before she covered it with both hands.

  Clementine hadn't even told her yet that it was Erika who had saved Ruby. Erika. The better daughter. The grateful daughter. The daughter who would never have made a mistake like this.

  Clementine's father put his arm around his wife. 'It's okay,' he mouthed over her head. He led her up the walkway. 'Let's go and sit down.'

  'It's the shock,' said Sam's mother, Joy. She was a woman who never left the house without 'her face', but tonight it was bare of make-up. Clementine had never seen her without lipstick before, maybe no one had. It looked like her lips were missing. She must have been having her nightly read in the bath when she got the call. Clementine imagined her panic. The throwing on of clothes before she was even properly dry.

  'Come on, darling,' said Joy. 'Chin up.'

  Clementine could barely stand for shame.

  chapter sixty-two

  The morning after the barbeque

  'Clementine.'

  'What?'

  She must have dozed off. She didn't think she'd closed
her eyes all night, but Sam was leaning over her, shaking her shoulder where she sat in the green leather chair next to Ruby's bed.

  There were purple shadows under Sam's red-rimmed eyes, black stubble along his jaw and a thin line of white spittle around his lips. He had refused to sit at all. 'Darl, you're not helping your daughter by standing for the whole night,' the nurse had told him, but Sam seemed psychopathically determined to stand, as if Ruby's life depended on it, as if he were guarding her from harm, and eventually the nurse gave up, although every now and then she shot Sam a look as if she were just itching to stick a needle in his arm and knock him out.

  The nurse's name was Kylie. She was a New Zealander and she spoke slowly and simply to them, saying everything twice, as if English were their second language. Probably all parents were dull-witted with shock. Kylie explained that in intensive care every patient got their own nurse: 'I've only got one job tonight and that's Ruby.' She told them there was a room available on the same floor where they could sleep, and she gave them little toiletry bags with toothbrushes and combs, of the style you might receive on an overnight premium economy flight. She advised them to try to get some sleep because Ruby was sedated and she wasn't going to know if they were there or not, but they'd already let Ruby down once, they weren't leaving her again.

  Sam spent the night watching Ruby and the screens monitoring Ruby's heart rhythm, her temperature, her breathing rate and her oxygen levels, as if he knew what they meant, and indeed he had asked Kylie to explain, so maybe he really did understand. Clementine hadn't listened to the explanations. She spent the night with her eyes travelling back and forth between Ruby and Kylie's face. She felt that Kylie's face would tell her if there was anything to be concerned about, although she was wrong, because during the night Ruby's oxygen levels dropped, and Kylie's face remained exactly the same, while the doctor on duty was called and Sam moved quietly to the corner of the room with a clenched fist pressed hard against his cheek, as if he were poised to knock himself out. Ruby's oxygen levels went back up to an acceptable level again, but the adrenaline buzzed through Clementine for the next few hours. It was a reminder that they could not, should not relax, even for a moment.

  'The doctor is here,' said Sam now as Clementine rubbed her eyes and swallowed, her mouth dry and sour. 'They're going to extubate, wake her up.'

  'Good morning!' said a pale-haired, pale-skinned doctor. 'Let's see if we can wake up this little sleeping beauty, shall we?'

  It was fast. The tubes came out. The mask was removed.

  After twenty minutes, Ruby frowned heavily. Her eyelids twitched.

  'Ruby?' said Sam, as if he were begging for his life.

  Ruby's eyes finally fluttered opened. She stared at the cannula in her arm with an expression of pure disgust. Thankfully, her thumb-sucking hand was free, and she jammed her thumb in her mouth. She looked up, found her parents, and looked angrier still.

  'Whisk,' she demanded hoarsely.

  The relief Clementine experienced as she rushed to deliver Whisk was exquisite, glorious; like the cessation of an agonising pain, like a gasp of air when you'd been forced to hold your breath.

  She looked for Sam with the vague expectation that something would now happen between them, something important and climactic. They would grab hands, for example, their fingers would lock together in mutual joy and they would smile down at Ruby while tears rained down their faces.

  But it didn't happen. They looked at each other and yes, they did smile, and yes, their eyes were full of tears, but something wasn't quite right. She didn't know who looked away first, she didn't know if it was her coldness or his coldness, if she was blaming him or he was blaming her, but then Ruby began to cry, distressed by her sore throat from the tube, and the doctor started talking and it was all too late. It was another moment they'd never get back to do right.

  chapter sixty-three

  'Dinner is ready!' called Sam, and he sounded perfectly normal, not at all like the stranger who, less than one hour ago, had discussed separating. I think I'm done with us. Now he sounded just like Daddy, like Sam, like himself.

  The smell of Sam's signature dish, shepherd's pie, filled the house. Clementine loved his shepherd's pie but the girls hated it, which was annoying because it seemed like the sort of nutritious, kid-friendly food they should like, so every week they kept deluding themselves and trying again.

  'When will it ever stop raining?' asked Holly as she turned off her iPad with all the technological insouciance of a millennium kid. 'It is actually driving me crazy.'

  'Me too,' said Clementine. 'Ruby! Come on! Dinnertime.'

  Ruby looked up from where she was sitting in the middle of a circle of dolls and soft toys. She had placed them around her in imitation of 'story circle' at day care, and had been pretending to read them a Curious George book, holding it up in the same way that her teacher obviously did, and carefully licking her finger each time she turned the page.

  'It's nap time!' said Ruby cheerfully, and knocked the toys into sleeping positions with a casual backhand. Hopefully she hadn't learned that at day care too.

  'What's for dinner?' Holly ran to the table and sat herself up. She grabbed her knife and fork with ominous enthusiasm. 'Pasta? It's pasta, right?'

  'It's shepherd's pie,' said Sam as Clementine strapped Ruby into the 'big girl' booster seat she now used instead of a high chair.

  'What?' Holly slumped as if to news of a great injustice. 'Shepherd's pie? Again? We had it last night.'

  'You did not have it last night,' said Sam evenly, putting the plate in front of her. 'You had pasta with Grandma last night while Mummy and Daddy went out to dinner.'

  'There's some still in the fridge!' said Holly excitedly. 'I remember! We didn't eat it all! And Grandma said that -'

  'There's none left in the fridge,' said Clementine. 'I ate it last night.'

  'What?' cried Holly. Life was a series of travesties. 'But you went to a restaurant!'

  'It wasn't a very good restaurant, so we came home early,' said Clementine. Mummy and Daddy can no longer stand to go out to dinner together. Mummy and Daddy no longer like each other very much. Mummy and Daddy might be 'separating'.

  'What?'

  'Sit up straight, Holly,' said Clementine mechanically.

  Holly squawked.

  'Please don't make that sound,' said Clementine. 'Please.'

  Holly made the sound again but softer.

  'Holly.'

  'Yuck,' said Ruby. She picked up her spoon and held it limply between her fingertips over the plate. She let it swing back and forth. 'No fank you.'

  'I'll give you "no fank you",' said Sam. 'Come on, girls. Just a little bit.'

  'Mmmm, delicious,' said Clementine, taking a mouthful. 'Good work, Daddy.'

  'Well, I'm not eating any of it,' said Holly. She folded her arms and pressed her lips together. 'I have too many tastebuds.'

  'What do you mean you have too many tastebuds?' said Sam as he determinedly shovelled food into his mouth.

  'Kids have more tastebuds than grown-ups, that's why it tastes yucky,' said Holly.

  'She saw it on that TV show,' said Clementine. 'Remember? The one with the -'

  'I don't care how many tastebuds you've got,' said Sam. 'You can try a mouthful.'

  'Blerk,' said Holly.

  'Let's see some good manners,' said Clementine.

  Sam didn't look at her.

  It was as though he'd just been waiting all these years for the perfect excuse to hate her and finally he'd got it. Her throat filled. The shepherd's pie wasn't as good as it normally was. Too heavy on the Worcestershire sauce.

  She put down her fork and had a mouthful of water.

  'I've got a sore tummy,' moaned Holly.

  'No you don't,' said Clementine.

  Clementine's mother thought their marriage was a problem that could be fixed with a good dose of common sense and elbow grease. Marriages were hard work! But what could they say to a counsellor? They
weren't fighting over money or sex or housework. There were no knotty issues to untangle. Everything was the same as before the barbeque. It was just that nothing felt the same.

  She looked at Ruby, who sat in front of her in perfect, pink-cheeked, giggling, naughty health, and remembered how strange it had felt when Ruby was transferred out of the hushed, important environment of ICU and into an ordinary ward with ordinary patients and busy, distracted nurses. No lovely Kylie just for them. It was like going from a five-star hotel to a youth hostel. Then, after two nights in the ordinary ward, an extraordinarily young, tired doctor flipped through Ruby's paperwork and said, 'You should be able to take her home tomorrow.' Her chest was clear. She hadn't needed physio. The antibiotics had successfully fought off the chest infection before it took hold of her. Of course there would be neurological check-ups, out-patient care, she'd be monitored, but she was fine.

  First world medical care meant they didn't have to pay for their first world negligence. They'd brought her home to a stack of presents and an overly loving big sister, who at intervals would try to pick her up and cuddle her, something she'd never done much of before, and would inevitably squeeze too hard and Ruby would shriek and Holly would get yelled at.

  No one behaved normally except for Ruby, who clearly wanted the fuss over. She did not want to sleep in the big bed with either of her parents. She wanted her own cot. And she did not want a parent sleeping on the floor of her bedroom. She would stagger to her feet in the cot, her thumb in her mouth, and point Whisk at the offending parent: 'Go away!' she would say. So they went. Ruby seemed to sense if anyone became too clingy or sappy. Clementine sometimes sat holding her, quietly crying, and if Ruby noticed she would look up angrily and say, 'Stop dat.' She did not want to be cherished, thank you very much, unless it involved an extra biscuit.

  They should have been like lottery winners. They'd got a reprieve, a last-minute pardon. They were allowed to return to their ordinary lives and their ordinary worries, to arguments over shepherd's pie. So why were they not living their lives in a permanent state of joy and relief?