The Couple at No. 9(2)

The pregnancy hadn’t been planned. It was something Tom and I had spoken about, loosely, after perhaps a wedding, but we’d been busy starting up our respective career ladders and saving for a deposit to buy our own flat. Babies and weddings had been for when we were older. For when we became proper grown-ups. But I’d been ill with a stomach bug, had forgotten to take extra precautions. And that one slip-up had resulted in this. A baby. I’d be a young mother but not as young as my own mum had been.

Snowy is stretched out in his bed by the oven, head on his paws, watching me as I pace. From the leaded window I can see the hub of activity in the back garden. A white tent has been erected over half of the lawn, and police officers and men in forensic suits come and go, along with another officer, a camera slung around his neck. Fluorescent yellow tape has been put up around the tent and it flaps in the slight breeze. It has CRIME SCENE DO NOT CROSS printed along its length, and it makes me feel nauseous every time it catches my eye. It might look like a scene from an ITV crime drama but its presence drives home the reality of the situation. I’d been surprised (and, actually, a little bit proud) of myself for how quickly I’d taken control of things after I’d recovered from the shock. First, calling the police and then, after we’d given our statements, sending the builders home, saying I’d let them know when they could resume work, even if my heart still pounded the whole time. Then I’d called Tom at his office in London; he’d said he’d be on the next train home.

I hear Tom’s Lambretta pull up on the driveway; he’s always wanted one and treated himself to the second-hand moped when we moved here to get back and forth to the station. It’s cheaper than running two cars, and all the spare money we had saved is going on this extension.

I hear the front door slam. Tom rushes into the kitchen, concern etched all over his face. He has his glasses on, the trendy black-rimmed pair he bought when he started his new job in the finance department of a tech company over a year ago. He felt they gave him more gravitas. His sandy-blond fringe falls over his face and he’s rumpled in his linen shirt and blazer over jeans. It doesn’t matter what he wears, he still manages to look like a student. He smells of London – of fumes and trains and takeaway lattes and other people’s expensive scents. Snowy is circling our legs and Tom bends down to pat him distractedly, but his attention is firmly on me.

‘Oh, my God, are you okay? What a shock … the baby,’ he says, straightening up.

‘It’s all fine. We’re fine,’ I say, palms on my stomach protectively. ‘The police are still outside. They’ve interviewed me and the builders, and now they’ve set up crime tape and a tent and everything.’

‘Fuck.’ He looks past me at the scene from the window and his expression darkens for a few seconds. Then he turns to me. ‘Have they given you much info?’

‘Not much, no. It’s a human skeleton. Who knows how long it’s been there? It could date back a few hundred years for all I know.’

‘Or to Roman times,’ he says, smiling wryly.

‘Exactly. Probably been here before Skelton Place was even built. And that was …’ I frown, realizing I can’t actually remember.

‘1855.’ Of course Tom would know. He only has to read things once to remember them. He’s always the first to answer a general-knowledge question on game shows and he’s forever looking up facts and trivia on his phone. He’s the opposite to me: calm, pragmatic and never overreacts. ‘It looks like serious shit, though,’ muses Tom, his eyes still fixed on the scene in the garden. I follow his gaze. Someone has turned up with two cadaver dogs. Do they suspect more bodies? My stomach twists.

Tom turns back to me, his voice serious. ‘Not what we expected when we moved to the country.’ A beat of silence before we break into nervous laughter.

‘Oh, God,’ I say, sobering up. ‘It feels wrong to laugh. Somebody died after all.’

This sets us off again.

We are interrupted by the clearing of a throat and we turn to see a uniformed policewoman standing at the back door. It’s one of those stable-style ones, so the top part is open and it frames her, like she’s about to perform a puppet show. She’s regarding us as if we’re a couple of naughty school kids. Snowy starts barking at her.

‘It’s okay,’ murmurs Tom to Snowy.

‘Sorry to interrupt,’ says the officer, not looking sorry at all. ‘I did knock.’ She pushes open the bottom half of the door so that she’s standing on the threshold.

‘That’s fine,’ says Tom. He releases Snowy, who instantly darts over to the police officer to sniff her trousers. She looks vaguely irritated while gently pushing him away with her leg.

‘PC Amanda Price.’ She’s older than us by about fifteen years with a dark bob and intense blue eyes. ‘Can I just confirm you are the owners of this property? Tom Perkins and Saffron Cutler?’

Technically my mother is but I don’t complicate things by saying so.

‘Yes,’ says Tom, widening his eyes at me. ‘This is our cottage.’

‘Right,’ says PC Price. ‘We’ll be a bit longer, I’m afraid. Is there someone you can stay with tonight, maybe for the weekend?’

I think of Tara, who currently lives in London, and my school-friend Beth, who’s in Kent. Tom’s friends are either in Poole, where he’s originally from, or Croydon. ‘We haven’t lived here long. We haven’t made friends in the area yet,’ I say, and it brings home how isolated we are, in this new village in the middle of nowhere.