After a moment he lets go of my hand. ‘Can I go back to my room now?’
I say yes. There’s an urge to follow him, but I know I mustn’t. I leave him for ten minutes, fifteen. I ring Adrienne, then Anna. She’s shocked. ‘Drugs?’ she says.
‘Yes. Did she—?’
‘No! No. Well, I mean, she partied, you know? We all did. But nothing hard core.’
As far as you know, I think. I’m only too well aware how easy it can be to keep these things hidden. ‘Maybe you just didn’t know?’
‘I don’t think so,’ she says. ‘Honestly, I don’t.’
We talk for a while longer, but I want to see my son. I tell Anna I’m looking forward to seeing her in a couple of weeks and she tells me she can’t wait. We say goodbye, and then I tell Hugh I’m going up to see Connor.
I knock, he tells me to come in. He’s playing music, lying on the bed, facing the ceiling. His eyes are red.
I say nothing. I go in. I hold him, and together we cry.
Chapter Twenty-Four
She’s arriving today. I’m picking her up later, we’ll have a coffee or something, but for now I’m alone. I have the newspaper spread out in front of me. I turn to the magazine, skim read something about some fashion designer, what she wishes she’d known when she was young, then turn the page. A real-life article, someone whose daughter became a heroin addict; I turn that page, too. I think of my own narrow escape – if that’s what it was, if I really can be said to have escaped – and wonder for a moment whether they’d run a story about me and Lukas. I shudder at the thought, but my story isn’t unusual. I got myself involved with a man who wasn’t the person I thought he was, and things went too far. It happens all the time.
I close the magazine and empty the dishwasher, on autopilot. I pick up the dishcloth, the bottle of bleach. I clean the surfaces. I wonder if this is how my mother’s generation felt; Valium in the bathroom cabinet, a bottle of gin under the sink. An affair with the milkman, for the adventurous. So much for progress. I feel ashamed.
When I’ve finished my chores I go up to see Hugh. He’s in his office, despite the cold he’s been fighting for almost a week. He’s working on a statement; the case against him has progressed, the patient has relapsed and solicitors have been instructed. The hospital’s legal team want to prevent it going to a tribunal. ‘They’ve said I’m screwed if it does,’ he told me. ‘The fact is I didn’t write down what I’d told them, so I might as well have said nothing.’
‘Doesn’t it make any difference that they’d have gone ahead anyway?’
‘No. They just want some cash.’
It’s Maria dealing with the family now. According to Hugh, if they were that upset they’d have sought their second opinion from a different hospital altogether.
I’ve asked him if he’ll lose his job. He said no, no one’s died, he hasn’t been criminally negligent, but I can see the stress it’s causing him. I knock on the door and go in. He’s sitting at his desk. He has the window open, despite the draught, the cool air of early October. He looks pale.
‘How’re you feeling?’ I say.
‘Fine.’ Sweat sheens his brow.
‘Are you sure?’ I say. It’s good to care for him; it’s been a long time since I’ve felt he needs me. ‘Want anything?’
He shakes his head. ‘No, thanks. How about you? What’re your plans today?’
I remind him about Anna. ‘I’m picking her up from the station.’
‘She’s not staying with us, though?’
‘No. She’s booked into a hotel. She’s coming for dinner on Monday.’
‘Where’s Connor?’
‘Out. With Dylan, I think.’
‘Not his girlfriend?’
‘I don’t know.’ Again I feel that sense of loss. I turn to Hugh’s shelves and begin straightening things. I’m beginning to worry now. Connor is still upset after our discussion the other night, yet he won’t talk to me. How can I be expected to protect him, to counsel him as he enters the world as an adult, if he won’t let me in?
And that’s my job. Isn’t it? In the last few weeks the need to protect him, to keep him safe, has only increased. Yet I know I have to trust my son. To be old enough, mature enough. Not to get into any trouble – or not too much at least, and nothing with real repercussions. There’s little point in me demanding that he lives a blameless, spotless life, after what I’ve done. He has to make his own mistakes, just as I made mine.
And he will make them; I just hope they won’t be as catastrophic. Smoking in an alleyway, yes. A bottle of vodka or cheap cider, bought from the off licence by whichever of his friends is nearest to growing a beard. Weed, even; it’s going to happen sooner or later, whether I like it or not. But nothing stronger. No accidents, no pregnancies. No running away from home. No getting mixed up with people when you should know better.
‘Is he still seeing her?’ I say.
‘I’m not sure.’ I’m momentarily relieved. I’m aware it’s a contradiction; I want Connor to be close to Hugh but don’t like the thought of him telling him things he won’t tell me. ‘What d’you make of it all?’
‘What?’ I turn back to Hugh. ‘His girlfriend?’
He nods. ‘They met online, you know?’
I flinch. I turn back to the shelves. ‘Facebook?’
‘I think so. She’s a friend?’
‘I don’t know. She must be, I guess.’
‘Well, is he still seeing her?’
‘Hugh, why don’t you ask him? He talks to you about this stuff more than he talks to me.’
He points to his screen. ‘Because I have enough on my mind as it is.’
I arrive at St Pancras, order a mineral water from the champagne bar and sit down. From my seat I can see the statue at the end of the platforms where I met Lukas, all those weeks ago.
I sit facing it. Memories come back; there’s pain, but it’s dulled, bearable. I think of it as a test. He’s won enough. I just have to get over him, finally and completely, and here is where I can start. I sip my drink as the train comes in.
I see Anna through the glass partition that separates the trains from where I sit. She walks down the platform, her phone pressed to her ear, with a case that’s surprisingly large for the week she’d told me she was going to be in London. I watch as she ends her call then disappears down the escalators. She looks serious, as though something’s wrong, but just a few minutes later she’s in front of me, her grin huge and instantaneous. She looks delighted, relieved. I stand, and she envelops me in a hug.
‘Julia! It’s so good to see you!’
‘You, too.’ My words are lost in the folds of the silk scarf she’s wearing. She squeezes me, then lets go. ‘Is everything okay?’
She looks puzzled. I nod towards the platform she’s just walked down. ‘When you got off the train. You looked worried.’
She laughs. ‘Oh! No, everything’s fine. It was just my office. Some mix-up. Nothing major.’ She looks at me. ‘You look well. In fact, you look beautiful!’
I thank her. ‘You, too.’
‘Well…’ she replies, and there’s something about the way she smiles that makes me think her delight isn’t just because of seeing me again. She has something to tell me, something she’s been bottling up but can hold in no longer.
‘What is it?’ I’m excited, too, and intrigued, though already I wonder if I’ve guessed. I’ve seen the same expression before; I’ve even worn it myself.
She laughs.
‘Tell me!’
She grins and holds up her left hand. A moment later I see it: a ring on her finger, catching in the light from the windows above.