Seven Days(68)

‘Then sell up,’ Sandra said. ‘Work for them for a while, maybe go part-time, and we can spend some time together. Let’s live life.’

He kissed her head. ‘OK. We’ll sell. Travel. I just wish we could do it with Maggie and James. Go to Asia, New Zealand, the Rockies. It’d be perfect. I still miss her, Sandy.’

Sandra sipped her water. ‘Me too. I often imagine Maggie watching me. If I’m running and I feel like giving up, I imagine her there, telling me to carry on. And if she was here now, she’d be telling us to take the money and enjoy ourselves.’

‘I think you’re right,’ Martin said. ‘That’s what she would say. But I’d give every one of those three million pounds and more for one chance to hug her again.’





Four Years Earlier: July 2014


Maggie



1


Leo was a slow waker. She watched him every day – he slept later than her, unlike Seb, who had been her alarm clock – so she was used to watching his body start to jerk and move, his feet kick and his lips twitch, his eyes open and focus as a new day began.

Today he was three. She had been thinking about it for weeks, the memory of Seb’s third birthday still an agonizing, raw wound.

The only thing worse was the fear it might happen again.

But it might not.

‘Happy birthday, Leo,’ she said.

He looked at her for a while, then climbed off the bed. He was wearing his Batman underpants and a faded blue T-shirt. His legs, longer and leaner than Seb’s, were bare.

‘I’m thirsty,’ he said. ‘Water?’

He was very different to his brother. Seb had smiled often, and, for a toddler, was very even-tempered. He rarely got upset, rarely flew off the handle.

Leo, though, had tantrums. Maggie remembered the first one. After breakfast, she had asked if he wanted to hear a story.

No, Mummy.

He folded his arms and stared at her.

I do not want a story.

OK. What do you want to do? Draw? The man had brought some paper and crayons, and Maggie had drawn pictures for Leo to colour in. She picked up one – a dragon – and offered it to him.

He slapped it down.

‘No,’ he shouted. ‘No, no. NO.’ She tried to pick him up and comfort him, but he twisted in her arms and kicked and scratched her, hitting her with his fists. When she put him down, he ran from wall to wall, banging into them so hard she was worried he would hurt himself. She called to him, sang to him, shouted at him to stop, but none of it made any difference. While it lasted, he was totally unreachable.

Eventually – like a storm – it faded. She picked him up and held him for a long time. He said nothing. He lay motionless, eyes closed, in her lap.

It had happened a few times since. She wondered whether it was something she was doing, but she couldn’t think what. She never shouted at him – there was enough misery in here without her adding to it – and constantly told him how much she loved him. It was simply his temperament.

Same mum, same situation, two totally different children.

And she loved them both the same. For different things and in different ways, but she loved them with the same terrifying intensity.

Leo frowned. ‘I’m thirsty,’ he said again.

Maggie reached for the jug and poured some water into one of the plastic cups. She handed it to Leo and he drank it.

‘So,’ she said. ‘My little boy is three years old. I can’t believe it. You’re growing up so fast.’

She didn’t have a present. With Seb, she had begged the man for something to give him. He had given nothing; instead he had taken him away. She had often wondered if her begging had brought it about in some way – for a time she had been sure it had, and the guilt had tortured her – maybe, if she’d kept quiet, he would not have even known it was Seb’s birthday.

So this time, she said nothing. In the last few weeks she had acted as though everything was normal. The man came with breakfast and dinner. Sometimes he came in his blue bathrobe and sometimes he left her alone.

She never mentioned Leo’s birthday.

He never mentioned Leo’s birthday.

And she thought, maybe, hopefully, that he had forgotten. And if having no present for her son was the price of that? Well, it was a price she would happily pay. And when she got out of here she would make it up to Leo with all the presents money could buy.





2


She heard the scraping noise. She beckoned to Leo and he came and sat on her lap. The door opened and the man came in.

He put a tray on the floor. Two bowls of cornflakes. A new jug of water.

He gestured at the old one. ‘Leave that by the door later,’ he said.

Maggie watched him, waiting for him to say, Happy birthday, Leo or Give him to me, but he said nothing. Her heart skipped; the weight in her stomach lifted.

He backed out of the room. The door clicked shut behind him.

‘Leo,’ she said. ‘Let’s have breakfast.’





3


‘Hands out,’ she said. ‘Watch the socks.’

Leo stood in front of her, his hands cupped in front of his chest. She sat cross-legged, a balled-up pair of white socks in her hand.

‘Ready?’