Three-And-A-Half Heartbeats (10 page)

They had always been very good at observing the ‘perfect couple’ rules, never going to bed on an argument, always talking about everything, no matter how painful, being open and honest, and talking, talking and talking again. Because of that, issues had never really become problems. All the regular stuff, like jealousy of exes and anger at one-glass-too-many flirting, could be easily exorcised because they would discuss it, shout about it and make love afterwards; it was a recipe that worked for them. Both were entirely confident of the other’s fidelity and support and both agreed it was a very nice way to live. No problem was insurmountable because they had each other to go home to and that always made everything better. Until now.

Neither could have envisaged an event so cataclysmic that they wouldn’t be able to talk it out, support each other, get through it together. But Chloe’s death had blown them apart; all that was left of their former lives was a huge crater with a few vaguely recognisable fragments poking out to taunt them. It was as though they were different people now. They were different people now.

As she lay catatonic on the sofa the following day, Grace remembered a day a few months earlier when she had sat on the side of Chloe’s bed and bent down to kiss her goodnight. Tucking Chloe’s hair behind her ears and cooing as she closed
The Gruffalo
for the night, she had kissed her little girl three times, once on each cheek and once on her nose. Chloe had reached up and placed her arms around her mum’s neck, pulling her in for a heart-melting face-to-face hug. ‘I love the way you smell, Mummy,’ Chloe had whispered in the half light.

‘Do you, darling? What a lovely thing to say.’ Grace had smiled, delighted to know this.

Chloe nodded against her face. ‘It’s because you smell like bacon and I love bacon!’ she had explained.

Grace had roared, instantly shattering the peace of bedtime. Tom had come running and she regaled him through her laughter. Chloe of course had then bounced up and down on the bed, her curls flying, enthused and revived by her parents’ hilarity.

The memory made Grace smile, even now. It was the most curious mixture, crying unstoppable tears and swallowing the sobs that built in the base of her throat, but at the same time smiling; smiling at the very thought of her little girl and the joy she’d brought.

Tom hovered in the doorway of the sitting room, wrapped in a blanket. Grace looked and looked again; it took a second for her to place the small man with the big beard who stared at her with a slight curl to his lip. He looked awful: thin and yellow-skinned, with swollen eyes and a mouth loose, hanging open. Ugly, dishevelled, dirty.

‘I spoke to Mr Portland,’ he croaked.

Grace nodded.

‘They have the results of the post-mortem.’

Grace sat up, slowly.

Tom walked in and sank down in the space next to her. ‘They found something called sepsis in her organs. She died of sepsis.’

Grace sounded the word out in her head.
Sep-sis. Sepsis.
‘I don’t know what that is,’ she whispered.

Tom shook his head. ‘It’s an infection, I think. I could only take bits of it in. I thought we could look on the internet.’

Grace watched as Tom shed his blanket and lumbered into the kitchen, walking stiffly, as if his joints gave him physical pain. He returned and sat back down, flipping open the lid of his laptop. Up popped his screensaver: Chloe at the kitchen table with her head thrown back, laughing, eyes closed, happy.

Tears rolled down Grace’s face, but she made no attempt to wipe them away or stem her running nose. She no longer noticed when she was crying; it was as natural to her now as breathing. She had forgotten what it was like not to feel this way.

Tom tapped the word into the keyboard. He misspelt it, the word that would soon become branded on his consciousness. ‘Sepsis.’ He said it aloud for the second time in his life.

‘I’ve never heard of it.’ Grace spoke clearly.

‘I’ve heard of it, but I don’t really know what it is.’ Tom glanced at his wife and then turned his attention back to the screen. ‘Sepsis Trust, here we are.’ He spoke slowly, squinting at the screen through swollen eyes as he clicked on the link with his juddering hand. The first thing they saw was the fiery red logo. His finger hovered over the links and settled on ‘Information’. Then, after scrolling briefly, the two were faced with the description of the disease that had come along like a thief in the night and stolen their little girl.

Tom swallowed and read out loud, slowly. ‘Sepsis is a life-threatening condition that arises when the body’s response to an infection injures its own tissues and organs. Sepsis leads to shock, multiple organ failure and death, especially if not recognised early and treated promptly.’ He paused and looked at his wife’s impassive expression before continuing. ‘Sepsis is caused by the way the body responds to germs, such as bacteria, getting into your body. Sometimes the body responds abnormally to these infections and causes sepsis.’

Tom stared at the screen, reading and rereading the words, trying to make sense of them.

‘How did Chloe get it?’ Grace asked.

‘I don’t know. It must be something to do with when she had surgery. I don’t know.’ Tom clicked on the list of names under the heading ‘Personal Stories’. The two of them skim-read one or two entries before collapsing back against the cushions, overwhelmed by the stories similar to Chloe’s.

‘Did I give it to her? Was it my bug?’ Grace wondered.

‘I don’t think so. I don’t think it works like that.’ Tom spoke to the floor.

‘Is it our fault? Should we have done something? Got her medicine?’ Grace was aware her voice had gone up an octave and that she was breathing a little too quickly.

‘I don’t know.’ Tom answered truthfully, his voice still a growl, his eyes downcast.

Grace knitted her hands in her lap and tried to let the facts crystallise. Their little girl had died from a disease they had never heard of. And she didn’t know if there was something she could have done to stop it. She felt her stomach cave with a new wave of grief that hit her sharply and left her winded.

Tom reached up to place his arm around his wife, but Grace stood, unable to cope with physical comfort or any words of solace, no matter how well intentioned. She was raw, angry and hurt; no arm across the shoulders could possibly help that.

People suffering from sepsis may have mottled or discoloured skin

The blinds were pulled, allowing little natural light into the room. Grace sat in front of her dressing table and stared into the mirror. She barely recognised the face that looked back at her. It was older, worn and etched with exhaustion. Her greasy hair lay limply against her skull, her skin was dull and her lips pale. It was amazing how grief had invaded every aspect of her, changed every single bit of her. Lifting her fingers, she touched them to the cool glass and ran them over the outline of the image of the woman that looked a little bit like her, but different, muted somehow. It was as if she had been scooped out, made hollow, and what was left was this flat representation of the person she used to be. She tried again to understand how in such a short space of time her entire world could have got so broken, all the joy extinguished.

It was January the twentieth. Grace tried to remember what she’d done on this date last year, or the year before that. She couldn’t be sure but could hazard a guess: breakfast, work, home, supper and bed. A day pretty much like any other, and yet now this date would always be a significant one in her diary, a day that could never feel normal again. January the twentieth would always be the day that she had buried her little girl. Grace closed her eyes, taking gulps of air, trying to stay present, trying to gather the strength to make it through the day without cracking.

Reluctantly she left the solace of her room and found herself at the door of Chloe’s bedroom. It would always be Chloe’s bedroom, the place she had laid her beautiful head, bounced on the bed in her nightie and cuddled her toys, the walls where her snores had rippled and echoed, the creaky door that alerted them when she was on her way. Tom had beaten her to it. He sat on the tiny bed with his daughter’s small pink and white duvet folded into his chest, hugging it closely and taking deep breaths through the fabric, drinking in her ever-fading scent. His eyes were red and swollen from crying, his stubble untended, his speech muffled as he whispered to himself like a madman. Grace looked at the stranger her husband had become and noticed how he, like her, was physically altered.

Leaving him alone with his grief, she returned to her room and pondered the clothes that hung in her wardrobe. She was vaguely aware of having to wear something dark. Her suits, the costume in which she faced the world of work, held no appeal. She thought about all those mornings when she’d rushed to get to the station, always up against the clock, the minutes between the alarm going off and her leaving the house invariably disappearing far too quickly. There was never enough time and Chloe would insist on hanging around her legs while she tried to select her ensemble for the day. It used to irritate her, the continual inane questioning when she simply didn’t have the time to respond. Had she tutted or snapped? Probably both. What wouldn’t she give now to feel that chubby little body sitting against her leg, babbling on about something entirely irrelevant. Showing her pages from books or telling her in great detail about something funny Mr Tumble had done. Grace had only ever half listened, concentrating instead on planning her day, thinking about Jayney and Jason and work and meetings…
I’m sorry, Chloe. I’m so sorry. I thought we had all the time in the world. I thought I would always be a weekend away from spending time with you.

Grace pulled a navy skirt from its hanger and stepped into it before fastening the zip. She let go of the waistband, only for the skirt to fall down to her hips. She knew she had lost weight and this garment was proof of just how much. Grace ran her palm over her jutting bones, hating the living, breathing body in which she was trapped.
Why couldn’t it have been me? Why did it happen to her? I would have swapped, I would swap.

Instinctively balling her hand into a fist, she thumped hard into her abdomen. The effect was intoxicating; she liked feeling the physical pain that she craved. How many times she struck herself she couldn’t be sure, but it built into a frenzy of blows.

Tom seemed to appear from nowhere; he caught her by the wrists and held her fast. ‘No!’ he shouted at her.

His grip hurt. The thin skin of her wrist bit against the bone as he twisted. Still he didn’t release her. His pupils were pinpricks as he fixed her with his gaze.

‘Why are you doing that? Do you think it helps? It doesn’t. Trust me.’ And then his tears were flowing again.

‘I’ve lost my little girl and I will not lose you. You are not going to cause yourself harm, do you hear me? Do you hear me?’ he shouted, even though he was close.

Sinking down onto his knees, he slumped onto the carpet and she, tethered to him at the wrists, had no choice but to sink with him.

‘Where is she, Grace? Where has she gone?’ He was sobbing now. ‘I can’t bear to think of her on her own somewhere. I keep looking for her.’

There was nothing she could say to heal or console him. They sank further down until she lay with her head on his chest and they fell into a fitful sleep, welcoming the oblivion that it offered, exhausted by the outpouring.

They woke some time later to the pip-pipping of Tom’s phone alarm and were surprised to find themselves in a heap on the bedroom floor, neither mentioning or recalling the drama that had led them to that point. It was nearly time for them to leave.

Grace pulled on her navy jacket, applying neither make-up to her face nor a comb to her flat hair; this, like everything else, seemed utterly pointless. Tom had managed a sports jacket and suit trousers, an odd combination, which no one would question or care about but plenty would notice.

They stood in the hallway and stared at each other. ‘I wish I could fast-forward the day,’ Tom mumbled.

‘I wish I could fast-forward forever,’ Grace replied levelly, rubbing at eyes that felt full of grit.

The front door opened to reveal a beautiful crisp blue day. Despite the cold, wisps of cloud danced in the subtle breeze. The long black shiny car sat in the middle of the frosty driveway. Grace noticed the glossy paintwork and the slick gleaming chrome of the mirrors. Two men she didn’t recognise sat up front, very smartly dressed. Her eyes were drawn to the back of the vehicle, where there was a large space filled with flowers. Amid the huge daisies sat a little white wooden box.

Grace felt her knees buckle and the bile rise in her throat. Tom held her arm and kept her on her feet. She fought the overwhelming desire to run. Tom then let out a loud sob, the kind of noise a person would normally only be comfortable making when they were alone. But there was nothing normal about this day.

‘Where is she, Grace? Where’s she gone?’ he asked again, as though she might have the answer.

She matched his tears, sobbing now. ‘I don’t know. I don’t know where she is. I can’t bear to think of her on her own somewhere. I can’t. I think she might need me, but I don’t know how to get to her and she won’t understand why I’m not there. I’m her mummy!’

Grace heard a whimpering behind her and was aware for the first time of other people. Quite a large group of people, actually – how had she missed them? Some of them she recognised: her best friend Ruthie, Jayney, Tom’s parents, the lady that owned the flower shop in the village, and some people she couldn’t quite place, though they were vaguely familiar, women from pre-school maybe? How did they all know where she lived? She wished they would all go away.

Her eyes returned to the little white box that was not much more than three feet long and a foot wide. Grace could imagine the whispers.
‘Apparently it can happen to anyone. What was it they said – sepsis? Never heard of it…’

Tom guided his wife into the arms of her mother and father, one on either side, her supports. She was too distracted to acknowledge them; they were merely another two blurred faces in this surreal pantomime. She travelled to the church behind the hearse, sandwiched between Alice and Olive. Mac and Tom sat in front of them. Mac kept his steady hand on his son-in-law’s shoulder. Olive made small whimpering sounds, as if she had run out of tears and this dry heave of distress was her new norm. Alice squeezed her sister’s arm and whispered repeatedly, ‘It’s okay, Gracie. You’re doing great. It will all be over soon.’ But Grace knew that no matter how sincerely offered this was a lie. It would never, ever be over.