Life as I Know It (23 page)

“Believe me, I don’t want her to be dead. I want to be who I was before.”

I gazed at the panoramic views of the countryside rolling away on either side of us, at the cows, sheep, and horses in their fields; I heard the sound of laughter from children playing on the old tractors and hay bales, and realized that what I had said wasn’t entirely true. I enjoyed being Lauren some of the time. It made parts of Jessica’s life seem empty and meaningless.

For a moment I wondered why I chose to spend the best part of my week closeted in that dingy solicitors’ office. I knew I wanted to get those extra qualifications; to strive for an improvement
in how people perceived me and also in my standard of living, but without someone to share it with—someone to love—what was the point? My relationship with Stephen hadn’t worked out, and no one since had come close to stirring my heart—not until Dan, anyway, and the prospect of trying to form a new relationship with everything that was going on seemed so terribly daunting.

Shading my eyes with my hand, I glanced down at Teddy’s tousled head, then stared back toward the play area and felt a lump rise in my throat. The children loved their mother so fiercely, so unconditionally. What must it be like to love and be loved like that? I envied Lauren that joy, and the prospect of Karen taking away that gift left me unaccountably desolate.

“What are you going to do?” I asked her anxiously. “Will you tell anyone?”

“Oh yeah. That would go down well on my CV,” she muttered. “Miss Harper, age thirty-seven. Committed for believing her sister’s dead body is being possessed by another soul. I can see it now.” She turned toward me, a wan smile on her face.

“You do believe me then?”

“Let’s just say I believe you believe it, and therefore I’ll go along with it. For now.”

“I want you to carry on being my sister,” I told her earnestly, hugely relieved that she was at least keeping an open mind. “I’ve never had a sister, and I really like you. I like the children, too,” I added, looking down at Teddy, who was staring at a sheep that had come up to the fence for food.

“It’s bloody weird all the same,” Karen commented, handing Teddy a paper bag full of sheep nuts.

“I didn’t believe it myself to begin with,” I told her. “But here I am.”

I watched as the sheep snatched at the bag through the wire fence and Teddy drew back in alarm. Karen bent to retrieve the spilled animal food.

“Have you ever had a dream that seemed so real that when you woke up you couldn’t believe it wasn’t your actual life?” I asked as she straightened up. “It’s been like that for me every day since Saturday. Every time Jessica goes to sleep, I wake up as Lauren. When Lauren’s body needs rest, I go back to being Jessica.”

“Bloody hell.”

“I want to swing more,” Teddy announced suddenly.

“Okay, let’s go back to the play area.”

We walked back to where Toby was sitting on an ancient farm tractor. The girls had disappeared inside a play tunnel. Teddy stuffed his ball under his sweatshirt so he had his hands free to hold on and pulled himself onto the only free swing.

“You like the swing, don’t you, Teddy?” I asked as I commenced pushing. “I was just saying to Auntie Karen that we should have one at home. Then you can swing while Toby digs in the sandbox. Would you like that?”

He nodded solemnly. “But Mummy won’t let me,” he said in his slow, ponderous voice. “She’ll make you take it away.”

“What do you mean, Teddy?” Karen asked quickly. “If Mummy says you can have one, she won’t take it away, will she?”

“Not this mummy,” Teddy said, twisting on the seat so he could look at me.” The other mummy will take it away when she comes back.”

Karen remained silent as I pushed Teddy back and forth. I didn’t know what she was thinking, but I decided not to say anything. There wasn’t really very much I could say, in the circumstances.

After a minute or two I looked at my watch. “I suppose we’d better round up Toby and the girls,” I said, giving Teddy one last big push. “We’ve still got to go and get Sophie packed up for her sleepover.”

Karen remained quiet and aloof in the car on the way home, and I didn’t feel I should press her. I wasn’t sure if she was going to keep this thing a secret, or what would happen to me if she decided to tell someone. It wasn’t as if I could pack my bags and go back to being Jessica. I was here, and it seemed I had no choice in the matter whatsoever.

The children were hungry again by the time we arrived home, and I put a large pan of pasta to simmer on the stove. Meanwhile, I brought in the washing from the line, sent the girls down the garden to feed their pets, and collected up their discarded straw-filled coats and boots from the car.

Karen volunteered to help Sophie pack up her few bits and pieces and her sleeping bag and drop her off at the friend’s house. They went off together while I finished preparing the meal. I felt that Karen probably needed time to be alone. After all, she’d just been told that her only sister had died, not to mention the rest of it.

Half an hour later she came back looking slightly better. I noticed some of the color had returned to her cheeks. She walked into the kitchen, where I was dishing pasta onto plates, and gave me a weak half smile.

“I’ve been talking to Sophie,” she said hesitantly as she helped Teddy up onto his stool. “She’s been chattering away to me about how delighted she is that you’ve allowed them to have pets at last. She says… she thinks you love her more… since the accident.”

She stopped talking as a harsh sob erupted from her throat. The children stopped sucking pasta into their mouths and stared at her, their eyes wide and round.

“I’m sorry,” she said, holding a hand over her face and rushing out of the kitchen.

“I don’t think Auntie Karen is feeling very well,” I said as calmly as I could to the children. “Carry on with your dinner while I see if she’s all right.”

I found Karen sitting on the wide bottom stair, leaning her head weakly against the wall, a tissue clasped to her mouth.

“I just can’t believe it,” she sobbed as I squeezed onto the stair next to her and put an arm around her shaking shoulders. “This is all so ridiculous! But I knew something was strange about you from the minute I walked into the house and found you cooking bloody oven fries.” She sniffed and blew her nose loudly. “What Teddy said at the farm about the ‘other Mummy,’ and what Sophie said today… it’s frightening, Lauren. Or should I say Jessica?” She took a deep breath and gazed at me through red-rimmed lids. “Lauren always put herself first, but she did love the children in her own way.”

“I’m sure she did,” I murmured. “Everyone has their own way of doing things. Maybe I shouldn’t have tried to change so much so quickly. It makes it seem as if I disapproved of the way she did things, but that isn’t true. I haven’t judged her, Karen. I’m simply doing the best I can in the situation I’ve landed in.”

“I know, I can see that,” Karen said, smiling through her tears. “And you’ve done a good job. The children are happier than I’ve ever seen them. They never liked having a succession of nannies. I don’t think Lauren was cut out to be a mother of four.”

“Grant said something about the twins not being his idea. Is it true?”

“Sophie and Nicole were planned babies,” Karen explained, dabbing her eyes as she spoke. “Lauren was delighted to have the two girls—she never liked boys. She wanted to have the requisite two children, dress them up, and show them off. The girls were very well behaved when they were tiny. But then she got pregnant again. It wasn’t planned, and she wanted to end the pregnancy. Grant certainly wanted her to terminate it. She was booked into the clinic and everything, but then she got cold feet. I don’t know if you realize, but Lauren is… was, very religious. The family attends church every Sunday. Someone there put pressure on her to keep the baby. So Lauren decided to go ahead with the pregnancy, even though she didn’t want another baby, and then further scans revealed that she was carrying two babies, not one, and they were both boys. It was too late to terminate the pregnancy by then.”

“Poor Lauren,” I said, thinking that she must have been feeling as much out of her depth then as I had done when I’d first come to in the hospital and discovered I was to be responsible for her children. The boys were a particular handful, especially for someone with little tolerance for small children. If she hadn’t been a particularly maternal person, she must have been as daunted by the prospect of them as I was. In the short time I’d been living in her footsteps, I could see from her glamorous clothes, her stylish possessions, and the personal glimpses I’d had into her life that she was a real girly girl. I could quite see that the idea of boys—and two of them at once—had very possibly terrified her.

I thought of Grant and his knowledge of his wife’s shortcomings. What had he made of her deciding to keep the twins? I wondered. It must have been a terribly difficult decision for them to make.

“Grant seems quite besotted with her,” I said, “and it must have been hard to see his wife going ahead with something he knew she didn’t want and probably couldn’t cope with.”

“And he was right, as it turned out. I think she felt out of her depth when the boys were born,” Karen continued. “And when it was discovered that Teddy was brain-damaged, it was as if she stopped trying to be a good mother. She hired the first in a succession of nannies, refused to allow any sign of the children to interrupt her precious house or beautifully manicured garden, and escaped with her friends at every opportunity. And I don’t mean just for the day. She had long weekends and even weeks away with her girlfriends, leaving the nanny and Grant at home to cope with the children.”

“Why did Grant allow her to go off so much?”

“I told you, he’s a weak man. He adored Lauren and I think that deep down he believed he wasn’t good enough for her. He wanted to control her, but she was growing up, growing away from him. I think he let her go off to keep her happy, but the fact that she wanted to leave him so often made him feel even more inadequate. Then he began to suspect she was having an affair.”

“Did he actually tell you that?”

“This morning, when I was giving him a piece of my mind for what he tried to do last night, he confessed he’d thought for a while that she might be seeing someone else.” She looked at me and laughed tearfully. “I can’t believe I’m talking to you about my sister in the third person. You look exactly like her. This is so unreal!”

We were still sitting huddled together when Nicole poked her head around the kitchen door.

“Teddy has tipped his pasta into his lap,” she told us. “Toby is laughing at him, and Teddy’s getting cross.”

We rose to our feet in unison and headed toward the kitchen, the conversation over.

An hour and a half later, when the children were in bed after the usual routine of bathing, toothbrushing, and storytelling, Karen and I went into the lounge together to continue the conversation. However, before either of us could broach the subject that was uppermost in our minds, we heard Grant’s car turning into the drive, and I stood up again, drawing the curtains and turning on the lights.

He stuck his head through the lounge door a few minutes later, and I hung back, waiting to see what kind of mood he was in. He flicked a nervous glance in my direction and I wondered if he was doing the same thing with me. Deciding to be magnanimous, I went to him, feeling sorry for him after what Karen had told me about Lauren’s careless treatment of him, I asked how his day had been.

“My nurse phoned a couple of days ago to tell me that the locum dentist wasn’t much good,” he said, crossing to the sideboard and pouring himself a whiskey. “She was right. I’ve had patients coming back today complaining of tooth pain and loose crowns; it’s been a complete nightmare.”

“I’m sorry. Would you like something to eat? I’ve made a pasta dish.”

He looked at me over the rim of his glass and nodded. “Yes, I am rather hungry. Thank you, Lauren.”

He was no longer treating me with casual familiarity, but rather with the formality of one talking to a guest. Presuming Karen’s chat with him in the early hours must have done some
good, I felt a wave of relief wash over me. If he was prepared to behave properly, then I would find a little charity in my heart for this man, who must be feeling almost as confused by the change in his wife as I was in myself.

He followed me to the kitchen, which Karen and I had cleared up after the meal, and settled himself at the breakfast bar while I placed a dish of food in front of him.

“This looks good,” he said, taking a mouthful and chewing thoughtfully.

“Thank you. The children liked it, too.”

“I can’t get used to this new you,” he said, washing down a mouthful of food with the remains of his whisky. “You seem very attentive toward the children.”

“I suppose after my brush with death I feel I should make the most of them,” I said evasively. “You never know what’s around the corner.”

“No indeed,” he said, considering me closely. “The thing is, though, as I said this morning, I was hoping it might stretch as far as you and me. I know you wanted to include the children today, but would you like to come out with me this evening, just the two of us? Karen would babysit if we asked her, I’m sure.”

I wondered if my newfound forgiveness would stretch as far as spending some time with him and reckoned I could maybe give him a chance to redeem himself. I glanced at the kitchen clock. It was eight o’clock. Frankie needed to be let out soon. Tonight was out of the question.

“I’m really tired, Grant,” I said, watching his face fall. “But as tomorrow is Saturday, I could have a long nap and then maybe we could go out somewhere later?”

Grant beamed at me, and I felt a pang of guilt about how easily I could please him. I suspected that all he wanted was a
partner who showed she cared enough to spend time with him; someone to make his life easier and make him happy.

“Where would you like to go?”

“I don’t know. What do you like doing?”

He held out his hand and I had no option but to take it. It was cool, dry, and steady, but there was no electric current running between our connected fingers, as there had been with Dan.