Every Little Secret Read online

‘Yeah, I was. She was really supportive.’

  Max put his arm across her shoulders and kissed her temple.

  ‘I had to do all the shopping for Mum, cut her hair, and get the doctor to come to the house if she fell ill. Sometimes it felt like I’d have been better off on my own, which was a bit mean because I realise now that she must have been in a deep depression.’ She pulled out a bunch of sleigh bells woven onto a thick gilt rope and gave them a gentle ring.

  ‘Our child will know and love Christmas,’ he said, ‘I promise.’

  Maddy nodded. ‘I want everything to be right for this baby.’ She cupped the curve of her bump. ‘Mum used to say it was Dad who spoilt Christmas, not her. But it was her who let the misery go on for all those years.’

  ‘What, she blamed him because he died?’ Max wiped away her tears with his fingertips.

  ‘She said everything was his fault.’ Maddy picked out a silver fairy. It glinted in the light. Its delicate mesh petticoats were beginning to crumble to dust. ‘I don’t think she realised how much it affected me too. I wanted to go to college and on to university to study horticulture, but I couldn’t leave her alone, especially when her drinking got worse.’

  ‘I’m so sorry.’ He squeezed her hand.

  ‘Before everything happened, Christmas was a magical time for us. I remember Dad lifting me up to put this fairy on top of the tree. He bought it in Hamleys when we were in London to see the panto, Mother Goose. I’d never seen Mum so happy. She wore a glamorous sparkling emerald dress and a honey-coloured coney fur coat, and we all strolled arm in arm down The Strand, with huge snowflakes blowing about us in the night sky.’ For a moment, Maddy’s face was animated, lost in the memory. She picked out a felt Father Christmas and slipped her finger through the golden thread.

  ‘They worked so hard, we didn’t go out together as a family very much, so it was a really special day. I shouldn’t complain, we were comfortable. I always had new clothes and plenty to eat. We lived here in this beautiful house. Dad’s antique shop was thriving by then and Mum had opened the cafe, so she was working long hours too. I’d always hoped for a brother or sister, but Mum didn’t want any more children. She wanted to concentrate on building her business. Dad of course wanted loads of children, so it became a real bone of contention between them. After he died, Mum said that when they first got married, he’d expected her to stay at home, but she fought hard against it. He thought it made him look impotent only having one child.’

  ‘I hope you don’t think I’ve pushed you into giving up work.’

  ‘Not at all, I needed a change. It was time to sell the cafe and move on. I’m looking forward to being a full-time mum.’

  ‘You’re going to be great. And I promise you one or two children is enough for me.’ He laughed. ‘I doubt if my parents went on to have any more kids. I’m not even that interested.’

  ‘Maybe you’ll want to find out one day.’

  He shrugged. ‘Possibly when I’m old and grey. Anyway, enough about that. I hereby declare that we’re officially reinstating Christmas as of today.’ A smile passed over Maddy’s lips, but it was going to take a lot more than that to cheer her up. It was pretty much her whole childhood memories in that box.

  ‘We should do that sometime, go and see a show. It’s been too many years since I’ve done anything like that.’ She reached up and threaded the Father Christmas decoration on a branch.

  ‘We will, we’ll do everything with our son or daughter: panto, sledging, Father Christmas’s grotto, ice-skating, you name it.’ He stood behind her and kissed her neck. All the things he’d dreamed of doing as a child too.

  ‘Look at this one!’ she said, taking out a wooden snowman. ‘This was my favourite.’ She kissed it and cradled it in her hands. ‘Oh, why did Dad have to ruin everything?’ She sighed and dropped the snowman back in its bed of tissue paper.

  He gently pulled her round so she was facing him. ‘Tell me what you mean, what did he do?’ He took her cold hands and warmed them between his.

  She looked away for a long moment before her eyes flashed back at him. ‘My dad died of a heart attack in bed with another woman – our bitch of a neighbour at number twelve.’

  ‘Oh God, Maddy, I’m so sorry,’ he said, shocked by the raw pain in her eyes. He wrapped her in his arms and let her cry silently on his shoulder.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Maddy: October 2019

  All the way home, Maddy’s head is a jumble of emotions. She wants to believe that Max is alive and well, but if he is, does that mean he’s living with that woman? Is she carrying his child? That’s insane. How dare he! She smacks the seat next to her. How long has this been going on? The photos suggest a year, maybe longer, but how can that be when he’s been with her and their girls? A lump forms in her throat. Her hand goes straight to her bump. She needs to stay strong but her eyes brim with tears.

  Pulling onto the drive, she sits there staring at the garage door, not sure what to do next. The dogs won’t stop barking, so she forces herself to get up and go inside.

  The dogs run into the garden as soon as she opens the back door, almost dragging it out of her hand. Who is this woman, Alison Wood? While the dogs belt up and down the lawn, she takes out her phone and taps the name into Google. There’s probably a million people called that. She’ll be impossible to find. But no, straight away a link comes up for all Alison Wood Facebook profiles. Without hesitation, Maddy clicks and a list of photos of different people with that name appears. She clicks on the face she recognises and Alison Wood’s whole life opens up to her.

  She scrolls down her never-ending stream of posts: some are photos of her with friends at glamorous-looking parties, a nail bar having false nails stuck on, at the park with her son, on a merry-go-round, swings and football. She’s clearly much younger than Maddy, maybe as much as ten years? Her elfin features, tiny frame and the smallest eyes rimmed with electric blue eyeliner are finished off with ridiculously long false lashes. Down and down Maddy scrolls through this woman’s life. Cutsie cat GIFs, affirmation slogans, clips of beauty bloggers, celebrities on the red carpet. So much rubbish. Is this what her life is full of? Is this what Max really wants in a woman?

  She opens a folder named, ‘Isle of Wight holiday, June 22–28, 2019’. Wasn’t this the time he told her he was working in Southampton? There’s the three of them together, all smiles. Max with this woman and boy at the same bloody cafe on the beach in Sandown where they always go. Instantly, an image of him chatting to the head waitress pops into her mind. She’d not taken much notice at the time but now she wonders if she recognised Max with this other woman and said something? Was he asking her to keep quiet? Come to think of it, she was always over the top with their girls, giving them extra scoops of ice cream and lollies at the end of their meals. Did she feel sorry for her? Maddy kicks Emily’s football hard at the fence. Both dogs start barking and howling.

  She skims through dozens of photos of them on the beach, the pier, the arcade, bumper cars, even the saucy life-sized postcards where you put your head in the cut-out to have your photo taken. Why would he take this woman and child to the same holiday destination they always go to? Prickles rise on her head, her neck. Memories of her father with Lisa flutter through her mind. His lies, his carefully constructed double life. And now Max too? This is their place. There are even photos of the same hotel, the pool and gardens where they’ve spent year after year because he insisted on it. He told her it was nicer for the girls to feel like they were going to a home away from home. When she suggested they go to France or Spain instead, he said they could do that when they were older and would appreciate it more.

  She zooms in on one of the hotel photos. There’s a couple of waiters in the background. What if the staff recognised him? Were they laughing at her behind her back?

  There are no recent photos of Max but plenty of her with her growing bump. If it is his, wouldn’t he be posing next to it, to see if he can hear it or something
equally cheesy? She seems that type, wanting to show off every aspect of her life to the world.

  She clicks on the Instagram app and searches for her name. It comes up straight away with the same profile picture. Over three thousand followers. Staged photos of the perfect life: cups of creamy coffee or his and hers glasses of wine next to fairy lights in jars or trailing from a parasol. The side of Max’s handsome face holding a beer to his lips. Maddy joined Instagram several months ago but hardly uses it, so she doesn’t have much on her own page to distinguish her, none of Max or her own face, so she presses Alison’s ‘follow’ button, then closes her phone and shoves it in her pocket.

  She kicks off her shoes at the back door and slips on her gardening sandals. There are bulges where over time the leather has compensated for her wide feet. She opens the sliding door of the greenhouse and a cloud of stale air wafts out. Max’s gardening gloves are too big, but hers are worn and a mouse has nibbled through where the thumb should go. She decides to cut down the nettles around the back fences where the apple and pear trees line the garden. It’s a job Max promised to do. Tears fill her eyes. She imagines him standing on that bridge, the dark water coursing beneath him. What have you done, Max?

  She takes a scythe and hacks at the expanse of tall nettles, until they are only a few inches high. A sharp tug and they snap at the base. With a fork she digs into the ground; there seems no end to the stringy, knotted roots, the earth’s veins, buried deep, choking the other plants. If she doesn’t get rid of them, they’ll be back next year. Max told her it’s not until you start on them that you realise what a huge task you’re getting into. Why have you lied to me? She shuts her eyes and lets herself sink down to the soft earth, rubbing her bump in circles.

  Her mind slides back to the first day Max walked into the cafe. She remembers giving a huge sigh as if she’d been holding her breath all her life waiting for him. His ruffled sandy-blond hair and unshaven face reminded her of Robert Redford as the Sundance Kid. He had one of those open faces that was always smiling. But he seemed lost, drifting. For the best part of a week they chatted and joked like best friends. She’d never felt at ease with anyone like that before. He needed work, so she let him decorate her house. She needed a fresh start after Mum died, so it suited her. They got on so well, but it scared her because she wasn’t sure she could trust another man. But equally, she couldn’t bear to let Max walk out of her life.

  The dogs come sniffing round, panting in the sudden warmth. She pats her bump then pushes herself up and continues digging, eyes squinting until the low autumn sunshine switches off, the coolness returning. Amongst the clumps of earth, the stones and dust, a metal edge catches her eye. She picks it up. The sunshine switches on again like a spotlight. She loosens the disc from the mud. It’s a silver pendant. She slips off her gloves, turns the water-butt tap on and rinses it. An engraved letter ‘C’ emerges. She dries it on her jeans. Chloe lost it last summer. She hunted for it everywhere and cried on and off for days over the loss. They bought one for each of the girls. She stares at it, cupped in her hand. Tears fall easily from her eyes. Every day there is something to remind her that Chloe has gone. She gives it a kiss and tucks it in her pocket. Max promised to buy her a new one, but he never did.

  A breeze picks up, blowing around in all directions, chilling her arms. She shivers and wipes her eyes and nose with Max’s cotton hanky from her pocket. One of many she’s borrowed and forgotten to give back. In the shed she finds the largest spade and slices into the earth like a guillotine. Her muscles burn as she digs deeper, shovelling the earth to one side. I trusted you, Max, how could you betray me?

  When the last of the sunshine has gone, she slumps into a weather-faded chair and sips a glass of water. The velvet darkness of the black flowers draws her eye. Now the colour has been stripped from every bed, there’s a strange sense of calm, an acknowledgement that part of her has died too.

  Sarah calls to her over the back gate.

  ‘Come in,’ Maddy sighs. She’d rather be on her own but doesn’t say so.

  ‘I wanted to check how you are, if you need anything?’ Sarah hovers beside her. Maddy guesses she can sense her prickly mood.

  ‘I’m coping,’ Maddy says, but is she? Grief plays tricks on her, lets her forget for a few moments then it’s a physical thump to her gut all over again. Max should be here helping her and Emily through this, they should be helping each other come to terms with losing Chloe.

  ‘When’s your next check-up with the midwife?’ Sarah reaches out then lets her hand drop down again.

  ‘In about two weeks, I can’t remember exactly.’ Her phone lights up as it buzzes in her pocket. She takes it out. The message is fixed on the locked screen.

  Alison Wood has accepted your friend request.

  Maddy holds her thumb down to unlock it. Sarah pretends she isn’t having a nosy at the message.

  ‘One of the mums at the clinic,’ Maddy tells her before she asks.

  ‘Good you’re making friends.’

  ‘Yeah, it is.’ She should go to the police, tell them Alison Wood has information about Max. But how can she face the humiliation of not knowing what’s been going on? Anyway, she wants to deal with it herself. If Max is alive, she needs to hear the explanation from him. She pushes the phone deep into her pocket. Now she can keep a close eye on Alison and if she knows where Max is, she will find out.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Max: February 2012

  Max was soap washing the walls of the nursery when Maddy came in wearing dungarees, loosely held up over one shoulder. The other strap dangled to her waist.

  ‘Coffee?’ She stood sideways in the doorway, filling the gap with her bump.

  ‘Mmm, please,’ he said, squeezing the sponge in the solution and slapping it back on the wall.

  ‘We need to decide on a colour,’ she said.

  ‘What’s the hurry?’

  ‘I want everything finished in time for this little one.’

  ‘It will be. I’ll have the basecoat on by the end of the day.’

  She stood facing him, the neat bump thrust forward, straining the strap in its buckle. He cupped her chin with his wet hand and looked into her eyes.

  ‘Trust me, okay?’ He gave her a kiss on the nose.

  She smiled. ‘The cot will be delivered on Thursday,’ she said, ‘and I was thinking of bringing the rocking chair in here for when I’m nursing.’

  Her face had a beautiful natural glow. Sometimes, when she wasn’t looking, he liked to observe her unselfconscious beauty. She was one of the few women he’d ever seen really bloom when they were pregnant. He’d never felt part of a proper family, but here he was with a wife and a baby on the way. He wiped his hand on his overalls and reached out to touch her belly. He shut his eyes as he felt for movement. Like a puff of smoke, thoughts of Ali clouded his head. What if it was her standing here with him instead? His eyes snapped open, disgusted with himself.

  ‘Shall we stick with off-white?’ Maddy asked. ‘Then it won’t matter if it’s a girl or a boy.’

  ‘Off-white it is then.’ He couldn’t bring himself to look at her.

  * * *

  They were in Marks & Spencer’s looking through a rack of baby clothes when Maddy’s waters broke, three weeks before her due date. An hour later, she was in Hillingdon Hospital wired up to a monitor. Despite looking forward to this moment for months, Max wished it was all over. They were told she was only two centimetres dilated, which meant it could be a long night.

  As each contraction came, the tightening of her belly became harder to bear and with no quantifiable progress. The contractions were still six minutes apart, but Maddy seemed to perk up, even complaining she was hungry.

  It was already getting dark outside when Max crossed the quiet road to the small parade of shops. A breeze picked up, sweeping the rubbish along the pavement. Only the Fish and Chip Bar was open. It was empty except for a woman behind the counter hunched over a crossword. It surprised
him that life was still going on outside the labour ward. The woman took his order and emptied a bag of frozen chips into the sizzling hot fat.

  ‘They’re for my wife,’ he said, sorting through a variety of coins he’d found in his pocket, ‘she’s in labour.’

  ‘Is it your first?’ The woman smiled looking up and shook the metal container submerged in the bubbling gold liquid.

  He hesitated for a second. ‘Yes, it is,’ he said.

  ‘You never forget your first being born,’ she said, shaking the metal container again.

  He’d quite like a boy, but he hadn’t the nerve to say so to Maddy. It wouldn’t matter if it was a girl as long as they could have a boy next time. Next time! Hark at him. He pictured Maddy in pain, calling for him, the skin across her stomach stretched with pink jagged lines.

  The woman seemed to sense his urgency. She lifted the metal container out and scooped a generous helping of chips into a paper bag.

  ‘Salt and vinegar?’

  ‘Please.’

  The smell made him realise he was hungry too. She wrapped the chips in paper and took his money.

  ‘All the best for your new family,’ she said, holding the small package out to him.

  The wind carried him back across the road. A waxing crescent moon was lighting up as the sky darkened. His new family. He could hardly believe it. At last he was going to be a dad.

  * * *

  Emily Alexandra was born the following morning at 4.12 a.m. Max cut the cord but struggled not to keel over with exhaustion. Maddy was barely conscious and didn’t respond when they put the baby on her chest. They lifted Emily away, weighed and cleaned her up before handing her to Max.

  ‘She weighs 5lb 6oz,’ said the midwife as she wrote it on her sheet of notes.

  He’d never held a newborn baby before. She felt so light. He couldn’t believe he’d hoped for a boy when nothing was more beautiful than his baby daughter.