Chapter 9
NINE
REID
‘I told you everything would be okay,’ I say, thankful that I don’t have to backtrack on my earlier prediction. ‘He or she is a fighter. Don’t worry about that.’
We still don’t know the gender of the baby because it’s early days, and I’m not even sure Luna wants to know before giving birth or if she wants a surprise. The main thing is that we still have a healthy baby to prepare for.
‘I love you,’ I say as I kiss my partner’s forehead before wiping away a few of the tears she has shed since she got the good news.
I’ve been on the verge of tears myself, but they haven’t flowed quite as freely as Luna’s have, probably because I’m foolishly trying to be macho in this room with the doctor and nurse.
‘Fantastic news,’ that doctor says as the nurse offers Luna a wipe to clear the gel from her stomach. ‘Now, I really want you to get some rest. You and your baby. Do you think you’ll be able to follow those orders?’
‘Yes, of course,’ Luna says, wiping the remainder of the tears that I missed before lowering her nightdress back down and allowing me to help her off the bed.
We return to the original bed that Luna was assigned when she got here, and after the nurse has fetched Luna some water and we’ve thanked her and the doctor, we are left alone. That’s when Luna returns to her worries about Sadie.
‘I think you should go and check to see if there is any news,’ she tells me.
‘I can wait here with you for a little longer,’ I suggest, but Luna shakes her head.
‘No. Go and be with Arthur and Ruby. It will be better if you are just in case it’s bad news.’
I can’t disagree with that so I give Luna another kiss before standing to leave.
‘Try and get some sleep. I’ll be back soon,’ I say, noting how wide awake Luna looks and realising, at the moment, sleep might be a bit of a far-fetched concept for her.
‘Just let me know as soon as you have any news,’ she says.
‘I will. I promise.’
I slip through the curtain that surrounds Luna’s bed, and once I’m off the ward and onto the corridor, I am trying to remember the route that will take me back to the part of the hospital where Arthur, Ruby and my in-laws are anxiously waiting.
But before I can do that, I see two police officers talking to the doctor who just helped us.
I figure it must have something to do with Luna, so I approach.
‘Is everything okay?’ I ask.
‘I’m just trying to tell these officers that your partner needs to rest before they can ask her any questions,’ the doctor replies, while the policemen look a little agitated that they are being held up from doing their job by this man in the white coat.
‘We understand that, but we would like to talk to her while she is awake and the incident is still fresh in her mind,’ the first officer says.
Now it’s my turn to be irritated. ‘She was stabbed by my ex in our home and she’s only just had a scan to check on the health of her unborn baby, so I am pretty sure this incident is going to be fresh in her mind for a long time yet,’ I snap.
It might not be the politest or most sensible way of dealing with the police, but I’m tired, it’s been a long night, and it’s certainly been a stressful one.
‘I’m sorry for what you and your partner have been through this evening,’ the second, more diplomatic officer says, but I still shake my head to show that I’m going to be as hard to convince as the doctor about this.
‘No, she needs some rest, and you can speak to her in the morning,’ I say adamantly. Thankfully, with the doctor’s backing, we are able to make the police drop it. But only partially.
‘May we ask you a few questions about what happened at your house?’ they enquire then.
‘I need to go and be with my children. They are worried about their mother, and we are waiting for an update. Can this wait?’
‘Again, we’d prefer to do it now while it’s still—’
‘Don’t say fresh again,’ I snap before letting out a very deep sigh.
‘Okay, let’s talk while I walk back to my family.
But the questions stop when we get there, understand?
’ It’s a testament to how frazzled I am that I am being bold enough to give a couple of policemen orders rather than the other way around, but I’ve done it and the officers seem happy to agree.
We start walking and as I follow the signs to the ward where Sadie is being cared for, the questions from the police begin.
‘Where were you at the time of your ex-wife’s alleged break-in?’
‘I was upstairs in bed. I was asleep. I thought we all were.’
‘You thought?’
‘Yes, but when I woke up, I saw that Luna was not in bed with me.’
‘What woke you up?’
‘I heard something. A shout. I’m not sure.
I thought it was my ex-wife’s voice, but I’d only just woken up so I was confused.
I was concerned about where Luna might be, and my children were concerned too because they came into my bedroom.
So I got up to check. I heard her calling out for me then, although she seemed far away and frightened. ’
‘So you didn’t see your ex-wife break into the house?’
‘Well, no, but she must have done. I mean, how else did she get in there?’
‘She could have knocked, I suppose. Luna could have let her in. She no longer has a key.’
‘If she had done that then she would have told me. But she says that Sadie broke in, so that’s what happened.’
I push through a set of double doors before quickening my pace, aware that the sooner I can get back to my children, the sooner this ‘conversation’ can end.
‘Has your ex ever done anything like this before? Or hinted at it?’
‘Has she ever broken into my home and used a knife to attack my girlfriend before?’ I ask rhetorically. ‘No, she has not, or you would have heard about it.’
‘What we’re trying to establish is whether or not there was any pattern of behaviour or anything else at all that could have suggested that something like this could happen.’
‘No, nothing at all. Sadie has never made any of us feel threatened before. Sure, she’s been upset and struggling since our divorce and it can’t have been easy for her to see Luna move in with me, but she has never shown any sign of wanting to hurt her. Until tonight.’
‘There is a conviction for drink-driving on Sadie’s record,’ an officer says, clearly having run a background check on the suspect. ‘Could her problems with alcohol have contributed to this?’
‘I don’t know,’ I mutter, and it’s true. I didn’t know that Sadie had a problem with alcohol before she got caught drink-driving, and I also don’t know if she has continued to have problems to this day.
We pass through another set of doors before I turn left onto another corridor, and the two policemen scurry to keep up with me. I know I’m almost where I’m headed now, so hopefully there won’t be too many more questions before I get there.
‘We’re simply trying to establish the facts around what happened tonight,’ the second officer says. ‘Which is why it is important we speak to Luna as soon as possible.’
‘I’ve already told you, just like the doctor has. She needs to rest.’
‘And we need to determine exactly what happened because we cannot just take somebody’s word for it,’ comes the curt response.
I stop walking, which won’t help me get back to my children any quicker, but I cannot help it.
‘What do you mean by that?’ I ask.
The police officers share a glance.
‘Hopefully, Sadie comes through this and we can interview her too,’ the first officer tells me. ‘But if not, we only have Luna’s version of events to go off and that could be tricky because, as I’m sure you can imagine, that could be biased.’
‘You think Luna is lying?’
‘No, I didn’t say that. But we have a duty to investigate this fully.’
‘What you need to do is make sure that something like this can never happen again,’ I snap back. ‘That’s your job as police officers. Not to doubt innocent people who have just been stabbed and could have lost a baby tonight. Now, if you will excuse me, I need to go and be with my children.’
I storm away from the police officers then, but they have the good sense to let me go, otherwise my mood would only escalate and I’m sure they don’t really want to have to arrest me for causing a scene on top of all the other work they have to do tonight.
I pass through one final set of doors before I see Arthur and Ruby where I left them. My son is watching something on his iPad while Ruby is reading a book, although I can tell that neither of them is engaged in their activities, and they are just trying their best to distract their worried minds.
I want to wrap each of them in a hug and reassure them that we will get through this, whatever happens. But before I can do that, I see another doctor emerge from a room and he approaches Sadie’s parents. I hurry over to join them in time to hear what he has to say.
But just before he speaks, Sadie’s father intervenes. ‘Excuse me, can you wait over there?’ he asks me, though it feels more like he is telling me.
‘I want to know what’s happening,’ I reply.
‘You’re not married to our daughter anymore,’ I’m reminded, as if I needed to be. It’s a sign that Sadie’s father is harbouring some anger towards me over the events of the past year.
‘I am well aware of that, but I need to know what to tell my children about their mother,’ I respond.
‘You started all of this. She was fine until you had that affair with that woman from your work, so whatever happens next is on you,’ he tells me, but I don’t have time to reply or correct him on the fact that I did not have an affair at all.
‘Just tell us, is she going to be okay?’ Sadie’s mother asks the doctor, who has been standing by while our heated discussion has been going on.
‘Sadie is currently in a coma,’ the doctor says carefully.
‘The head injury she sustained was a serious one and we have operated to relieve the pressure on her skull. She also suffered a mild cardiac arrest at the scene of the incident, and while she was saved, we made the decision that the best chance for her was to induce a coma.’
That all sounds terrifying, and bad, and like Sadie hasn’t got much of a chance.
But she is alive, so she does, and while Sadie’s parents comfort one another, Arthur and Ruby rush over.
I turn away from the doctor and distract them so they can’t hear any of the scary things that the doctor might still have to say, although as I usher them away, I do hear some of what he says.
‘It’s fifty-fifty as to whether or not she is going to pull through. The next seventy-two hours are critical.’
I know what update I can give to Luna when I go back to see her shortly because I know she is anxious to find out what is going on.
But it’s not so easy to give an update to my two worried children, so I’m going to have to navigate this carefully.
While I try to figure out how to do that, I wish I had some support.
It doesn’t seem like I’m going to get it from Sadie’s side of the family, based on how things just went between us.
So I need Luna to recover quickly now.
I need my girlfriend by my side.
Together, we can deal with whatever happens next.