Page 50 of My Husband’s Wife

Forty-Nine

She lies in bed, listening to Theo banging around downstairs as he attends to Emily. She doesn’t want to get up. Her mum has tried to phone her several times but she keeps cutting the calls. She sends a message, telling her that she’s busy.

Theo eventually came home hours later than he said he would the night before, and he’d brought her some dried-up pasta in a polystyrene box which she’d thrown in the bin. She’d been dreading him looking at the camera footage showing her poking a knife near his camera.

‘I’ve just watched the footage. What’s wrong with you, taking Emily into the woods at night with a knife?

I think you need help, Madison. There’s something wrong.

You’re not eating, you’re forgetting things…

I’m thinking postnatal depression.’ He shows her a still on his phone, and she looks away. She looks deranged and scary.

Thanks for the diagnosis, Doctor No Qualifications she wants to reply but she bites her tongue. Her stomach gripes, probably because she’s hungry and hunger causes nausea and nausea makes her not want to eat. It’s a vicious circle and Theo is making it worse.

‘What were you doing out there?’

‘I told you. Someone was out there. I was checking to see if they’d broken into the shed after what happened at the cabin. I was scared, so I took a knife.’

‘And you took Emily. Don’t you know how dangerous that could have been if there was someone out there?’

After exhaling slowly to try and calm her jitters down, she replies, ‘I should have left Emily in the house but she’d been unsettled. What if something had happened to her? I tried to call you but you wouldn’t answer.’

‘I told you. Mum knocked back a few shorts and I had to deal with her. I had enough on my plate last night, without you putting yourself and our daughter in danger.’ His fists are clenched and she’s never felt his breath hot on her face while he shouts at her.

That’s a first. ‘I had a look at that hair by the way, the so-called mystery hair you found in Emily’s hand. It’s yours.’

‘It’s not. My hair’s red.’

‘Do I have to go and get it?’

She sits up in bed, arms folded and bottom lip over her top lip, like a child who’s been told off.

He storms down the stairs and comes back up with a small rolled-up clump of hair, then he throws it at her.

It’s red. She picks it up and stares with furrowed brows.

It had been brown. She’d taken a photo on her phone, knowing how dippy she’d been lately.

Reaching around, she grabs the device and scrolls through her photos.

It’s gone, just like the message. She’s going mad and there’s nothing she can do about it. Huge ugly sobs escape from her mouth.

Theo sits beside her and pulls her close. ‘I’m sorry I shouted. I’m so sorry. I can see that you’re not well. You’ve always been here for me and helped me with my problems. I’m here for you now. I’ll do everything I can to get you the help you need.’

His warm kiss reaches her head, and she sinks into him.

She can’t believe he’s being so understanding after everything she’s put him through.

There is one thing she can’t let lie, though.

It doesn’t matter how much he hugs and kisses her, and tells her that he’ll look after her.

‘Theo, I love you and I know I’m going through something but can you humour me and take me to the shed?

I need to see inside the locked drawer.’

‘Promise me you’ll start trusting me if I open the drawer?’

She nods. Theo carries Emily as they trudge back to the shed. He unlocks the door and they enter. He stops the camera from recording, pulls a key from inside a tin on the bookshelf and opens the drawer. ‘This is all I keep in it.’

The two lenses make the drawer look almost empty. ‘I came in here the other day. There was an old newspaper clipping, a picture of a boy. Who is he?’

He shrugs. ‘I used to have a lot of newspapers in here at one point, to line hedgehog houses with. It was probably just torn newspaper.’

‘It was cut, not torn.’ Without telling Theo that she took a photo of it, she checks her phone to see if it’s still there but it’s gone.

‘Everything okay?’

‘Just seeing if Camille has messaged.’ She kneels on the wooden floor and peers under the desk. There is no sign of the clipping.

‘Can we go now? We have a lot to do and it’s our big day tomorrow.

I can’t wait to marry you, Madison. In sickness and in health.

I am yours forever.’ He helps her back up onto her feet.

From behind his glasses, his brown eyes meet hers.

‘I think we both need a new start. Being here isn’t good for you so I put the deposit on that house.

I had a word with Orla and Tammy and they’re happy to keep everything ticking along at the salon until the sale goes through.

This place is playing with your mind, Madison.

You need to be on a lovely estate with other parents and neighbours.

We’re too isolated here. I’m going to take you away from all this and I’m going to look after you. ’

She goes to protest but she can’t speak.

Her chest tightens and she can’t breathe.

It’s all too much. It’s moving too fast and she doesn’t even know her own mind anymore.

As she collapses, he’s there to catch her fall with his spare arm.

She looks up at him, mouth gaping. She’s never noticed the faint blue rim of his iris.

The person she’s seeing isn’t the man she met. She doesn’t know Theo anymore.