‘We don’t know her. Not really, and besides, she’s a bit …’ Lotte scrunches up her nose. ‘A bit out there.’ Her eyes flicker to Vita, excited, before she turns back to Eddy and says, ‘You know, she claimed Margot, her second daughter, is a sperm donor baby? I mean, imagine? She was already a single parent, had Lily when she was a teenager, and then she decides to have another? I mean, I don’t like to judge but that’s pretty extreme – if it’s even true. Makes you think what else she’s capable of …’
‘Lotte, surely the fact this poor woman hasn’t come forward should indicate that she wants privacy and not this … this crazy …’
‘Come on, Ed, don’t give us that,’ Vita says. ‘This is about protecting our community as well as protecting the woman. Anna’s told me what happened in her own childhood, that there was literally a brothel next door to their house, that she had to step over used condoms on the way to school, that no one saw it coming in Ruston either …’
‘But it’s got nothing to do with you!’
‘And that’s precisely why places like Ruston go to shit! Because no one is prepared to protect …’ She stops and they all turn as Anna comes back into the kitchen, a little guilty, like it was wrong of them to talk about Ruston without her approval and participation.
‘Oh hi, Ed, you’re home,’ Anna says, looking tired but reaching for her wine glass.
‘What is this, Anna?’
‘Like Lotte said,’ Vita answers for Anna, reaching back to the table for her list, ‘we’re here because we have a right to know who she is. It’s wrong to keep it from us. As mothers we need to protect our kids …’ Eddy must have heard these words a hundred times in the last week but as Vita talks something crystallizes in him. Yes, their kids need protecting, but not from Seb or even Abi. He looks towards the back door for Blake’s trainers, his football kit, signs that he’s home, but there’s nothing. He could have stopped at one of his mates’ houses or perhaps gone to the park for a bit to clear his head. His boy needs him to do the right thing.
He looks at Lotte and Vita as he says as calmly and politely as possible, ‘I think you should go now.’
‘Eddy!’ Anna scolds, because even now being a great hostess is the most important thing. ‘Sorry, guys, I don’t know …’
‘No, I mean it. Please leave.’ Eddy walks towards the front door and holds out his arms, showing them the way, standing firm as they splutter, mouths downturned, shaking their heads but still moving in the right direction, squeezing past him in the hall. Anna doesn’t protest, just keeps apologizing, promising to message them later, even as she waves them goodbye and out into the dusky night.
‘Well, that was rude,’ Anna says as he follows her back into the kitchen. Eddy notices how dull her eyes are, how she holds on to the table, how weary she is, how scared.
‘Anna, what are you doing?’
Anna shakes her head, rejecting any blame. ‘I didn’t tell them anything, Ed!’
‘They’re not going to stop – you know that, don’t you? If you give them Abi’s name, you’ll be destroying her life here, but you’ll be destroying ours too.’
Anna splutters, shakes her head, but she doesn’t say anything, so Eddy does. ‘It’s ironic, isn’t it? Our home, our private space being invaded like this.’
Anna shrugs and mumbles something indecipherable as Eddy sits down heavily at the table and rubs his hands over his face, tugs again at his beard.
He feels his heart suddenly expand, like an airbag filling his chest, as his body again makes contact with the truth he’s been trying so hard for so long to ignore.
‘I can’t do this any more.’ He says it quietly but clearly.
‘What?’ Anna snaps.
‘This whole thing, this mess we’re in – you’re not doing this to protect the kids or Rosie, and it’s not even about what happened between Seb and Abi, is it?’
He looks up at Anna, takes her hand in his own, feels an overwhelming tenderness towards her as he whispers, ‘It’s about us.’
She frowns, but too late; he saw the break, the crack in her eyes. ‘No, it’s not.’ She pulls her hand away.
‘You haven’t forgiven me for Singapore – that’s what this is really about.’
‘Oh God, Ed!’ she shouts now, slaps her palm down hard on the table. ‘You always have to make everything about you, don’t you?’
She’s angry and that’s fine. Eddy just feels tired and sad. His swollen heart stunned that he is at last listening to its frantic beats.
‘I can’t go on like this.’
‘You mean, you’re tired of being wrong the whole time.’ Anna tries to scoff, sound dismissive, but it’s unconvincing.
‘Yes, I think you’re right,’ he agrees. ‘I am tired of feeling wrong the whole time.’
‘It’s hardly my fault we haven’t moved on!’
‘No, you’re right. It’s not your fault and I really, wholeheartedly believe that. But I don’t want either of us to wake up one day, eighty years old and still angry, still full of bitterness.’
‘What are you saying?’
Eddy feels like he’s pushing a pin into the airbag of his heart as he says, ‘I want to move out.’