Picture of Innocence. TJ Stimson

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СКАЧАТЬ out. But months had oozed by, and she hadn’t got any better. In the end, her mother had forced her to see the doctor. For a long while, even Dr Calkins hadn’t been able to help and there had been frightening talk of inpatient care and electroconvulsive therapy. But finally, finally, just as Jacob reached his first birthday, the counselling and the pills had begun to work. Her feelings had gradually returned; mainly negative emotions to begin with, like hate and self-loathing and sadness, prickling sensations returning to a limb that had been numb for a long time. She’d been angry for quite a while, too, but everyone had been so glad to see her feel anything, they hadn’t minded. There had been tears, lots of tears, but eventually the good feelings had come back. Things had started to matter again. She started to care.

      Through it all, Lucas had been steadfast in his support. Many men would have given up on her, but not Lucas. She liked to think of herself as independent and self-sufficient, but the truth was, she didn’t know what she’d have done without him.

      His competence with the baby had surprised her. He’d been a hands-on stepfather with Emily from the very beginning, taking her to nursery school and teaching her to tie her own shoelaces. But Emily was a little girl; babies were a different kettle of fish. Lucas was so bookish and academic, Maddie hadn’t really expected him to get his hands dirty when Jacob was born. But he’d changed nappies and soothed tears, as if born to it. Even now, he was the one who comforted Jacob when he had toothache, sitting beside his cot and stroking his back for hours until he settled. On the nights Noah was truly inconsolable, it was Lucas who strapped him into the back of his car and drove around for hours until he fell asleep.

      He ruffled Jacob’s hair now as he crossed the kitchen to put the milk away. His son slammed the palm of his chubby hand against the tray of his high chair, impatient for his breakfast. Maddie jumped and stirred the bowl of Weetabix again as Emily appeared in the kitchen doorway, still wearing her nightdress.

      ‘Why aren’t you dressed?’ Lucas demanded. ‘We have to leave in ten minutes or you’ll be late for school.’

      Emily ignored him, lolling against her mother’s chair and chewing a rat-tail of long blonde hair.

      ‘Lucas asked you a question,’ Maddie said sharply.

      Imperceptibly, Lucas shook his head. Not now. It was an argument they’d had more than once over the years. She was loath to admit it, but the truth was, the joins in their blended family showed, however much she tried to pretend they weren’t there. Emily had had her mother to herself for the first three years of her life. Together with her grandmother, Sarah, they’d formed a tight little family unit. And then Maddie had met Lucas and brought first him, and then Jacob and Noah, into their feminine circle. Sarah adored Lucas, she thought he was the best thing that could have happened to her daughter, but Emily had been slow to thaw. Even now, her relationship with him was painfully polite at best. Lucas accepted it for what it was, but Maddie bridled on his behalf every time her daughter snubbed him.

      ‘Go and get dressed,’ Maddie said, giving her daughter a chivvying push. ‘You’ll make everybody late.’

      ‘But I don’t feel well.’

      ‘What sort of not well?’ Maddie asked.

      ‘I feel hot, and I’ve got a headache,’ Emily whined. ‘And I’m so itchy.’

      ‘Don’t scratch,’ Lucas and Maddie said simultaneously.

      She handed the cereal bowl to Lucas so he could take over feeding Jacob. ‘Come here, Emily. Let me see.’ She peered down the back of her daughter’s nightdress and immediately felt guilty for her brusqueness. ‘Chickenpox. That’s all we need.’

      Lucas looked alarmed. ‘Shit. Am I going to catch shingles?’

      ‘Don’t panic,’ Maddie said. ‘You can get chickenpox from shingles, but not the other way round.’ She tugged Emily’s nightdress back into place and made a quick decision. ‘I’ll see if Jayne can have her today.’

      ‘Can’t I stay home with you?’ Emily asked.

      ‘Sweetheart, I wish you could, but we have a new horse arriving today and I have to be there. You could come with me, if you like?’

      Emily shook her head. She was terrified of the horses: their sharp hooves, their huge yellowing teeth, the sheer size of them. Maddie blamed herself: when Emily had been two, she’d put her on the back of one of her most tranquil sofa-ponies, Luna, a wide-backed, sweet-natured grey who’d taught a generation of children to ride. But that particular day, something had spooked her and she’d bolted and thrown Emily off. Her daughter hadn’t been hurt, but the episode had given her a lasting fear of horses.

      ‘Do you think Jayne could keep Emily overnight?’ Lucas asked Maddie.

      ‘I doubt it. It’s Steve’s birthday and Jayne’s taking him out for dinner to celebrate. Maybe Emily could spend the day with her and go to Mum’s tonight. I really don’t want Noah getting sick, especially when it’s only his second week at daycare. He’s just got used to his new routine, and I don’t want to disrupt it if we can help it. When you drop the boys off this morning, Lucas, tell them to keep an eye out for spots and call me if either of them run a temperature.’

      ‘I can sleep over at Manga’s?’ Emily said, brightening. ‘Can I stay there till I’m better?’

      ‘Yes, good idea,’ Lucas said hastily, thrusting Jacob’s breakfast back into Maddie’s hands. ‘I can’t be getting sick, not with all I’ve got on at the office.’

      He was already halfway out of the door. Maddie suppressed her irritation. Lucas was irrationally phobic about illness. A single sneeze was enough to send him into meltdown. Maybe it had something to do with what had happened to him as a child, an association with doctors and hospitals. A trauma like that had to have left emotional scars. Generally speaking, her husband had emerged from the tragedy remarkably sane and well-balanced, but Candace had fared less happily, even though she’d been so much younger when the fire had happened. Lucas was naturally very protective of her, but there was only so much he could do. Maddie didn’t resent their closeness, of course; as an only child, she actually rather envied it, and she adored her eccentric sister-in-law. But Candace had cost her husband many sleepless nights over the years, and there were times Maddie felt that her marriage was rather crowded.

      Guiltily, she pushed the thought away. Despite his issues, Lucas had been undeniably supportive when she’d had postnatal depression; she could hardly turn around and complain about his loyalty to his sister now. It was one of the things she loved about her husband: once earned, his support was absolutely steadfast.

      But there was only so much any man could take, even one as devoted as Lucas. Maddie had already put him through the wringer once. She couldn’t bring herself to tell him about her strange memory lapses and have him worry he couldn’t trust her with the children. She was sure the doctor was right, anyway. They were bound to stop once Noah started sleeping through the night.

       Chapter 3

       Tuesday 10.00 a.m.

      As soon as Jayne opened her front door, Emily pulled away from her mother and ran down the hall to the kitchen. Jayne’s house had an identical layout to their own, although her garden was bigger because she was СКАЧАТЬ