Page 95 of The Perfect Son

“Jamie... I’m sorry.” I gasp, fighting for breath as his words cut into me. “I’ll do better. I’ll—”

“TESS,” Ian bellows, making me jump.

There’s a split second of silence and somewhere in the background I can hear a George Michael song on the radio.

I don’t know who moves first, but the second ticks by and in the very next one we are scrambling for the knife—Jamie, Ian, and me.

Jamie reaches for it at the same moment I do.

Shelley is screeching, “Stop it, Tess. Stop it, stop it, stop it.” And I’m trying, but then Ian is grabbing for the knife and reaching right over Jamie to get it. A pressure squeezes my body. Ian’s hand is almost at the handle, but so is Jamie’s. I can’t let Ian get it. What if he wants to hurt Jamie? I leap forward. Too fast, too far. Jamie’s hands are on the handle, Ian’s too.

I’m moving too fast. I try to right myself but it’s too late. The bladeslides right into my stomach with the same ease as the cake it was intended for.

Oh, Tessie, oh no.

Your voice is distant, crackling like the radio.

The pain is hot and scorches a path out from my stomach over my entire body and I stare at the O shape of Shelley’s face, and Ian’s too as he stumbles back.

CHAPTER 60

Panic swirls like a tornado inside me. The knife is sticking out of my stomach, half in, half out. I can’t bear to look at it, but I can’t look away either. I reach for the handle and yank out the blade. Warm stickiness soaks through my top as the knife drops to the floor with a clatter of metal.

I clutch my stomach and feel blood ooze through my fingers.

“Jamie.” I sink to the floor, clenching my teeth through the pain crippling every muscle in my body; forcing myself to sound calm against the panic clawing to get out.

He’s just out of reach, standing over me in his new black and yellow Batman pajamas.

I hear their voices—Shelley’s and Ian’s. They are talking to each other or maybe to me and Jamie, but the only noise in my ears is the ragged inhale and exhale of my breath and the drumming of my heartbeat.

This isn’t happening. This isn’t happening.I repeat the words over and over in my head as if saying them enough times will undo the last few minutes—the last few months—of my life. A wave of pain crashes through me, returning my focus to the wound, the blood, the knife. I raise my voice and allow the desperation to ring through it: “Jamie!”

Jamie’s eyes are wide and the clearest blue, like the sky on the day you died.

My hand shakes with the force of an electrical current, and even though every movement causes an inky fog to float in the corners of my eyes, I stretch my fingers out toward him. He stumbles back to the doorway and disappears.

My breath catches and an ugly, guttural noise escapes my throat.

Ian’s voice comes fast and low and when I look up I see a mobile pressed to his ear.

“Oh, Tess,” Shelley cries out. “Hang in there.”

She picks up the knife and I watch droplets of blood run from the blade down her hand. Shelley puts the knife in the sink and crouches to the floor beside me.

“Hang in there,” she says again, but I don’t think I can. The blood is flowing out of me too fast. I can feel a puddle already cooling around me as my body collapses to the tiles.

“You can’t take Jamie away from me.” I force the words out.

Then darkness takes over my vision and all I can think is:If only I’d chosen a smaller knife; if only I hadn’t trusted Shelley; if only I’d been a better mother, then I wouldn’t be about to die.

CHAPTER 61

Transcript BETWEEN ELLIOT SADLER (ES) AND TERESA CLARKE (TC) (INPATIENT AT OAKLANDS HOSPITAL, HARTFIELD WARD), WEDNESDAY, APRIL 11. SESSION 2 (Cont.)

ES: So, Tess, I have your notebook here. Would you like to look at it?

TC: Have you looked at it?