Chapter 37
Pauline checks into a hotel five minutes from her house in Surrey, where she stays, avoiding the world and ignoring her problems, for the next few days.
All the bravery she’d found on the trip to Saint-Tropez – all that New Pauline energy – has deserted her.
She is absolutely wretched; bereft, broken, hollowed out. Paula again.
She still has her luggage from the holiday, though she barely changes out of the hotel bathrobe, moving from the bed to the door to fetch occasional room service food. And then back to the bed again.
She sees there are messages and calls coming in on her phone.
Lots of them. Some are from Teddy, Audrey and Ivy, but most are from John, demanding she return to the house immediately.
He wants to make a plan, relaunch his life, to start spending their millions.
His impatient tone gets more and more shocked.
His disbelief at her defiance gets more and more pronounced.
On day four, John decides to take matters into his own hands, having had enough of his silent, defiant wife.
He calls a press conference.
Pauline reads the message from the hotel’s king-sized bed, horror growing with every passing word.
It’s time to come home, Paula. I’m announcing my return to the press today.
It’s happening outside our house in an hour.
I know your new little group of friends are supporting you, wherever you are, but enough’s enough.
Perhaps you’ve forgotten that you told me all about those women in your emails to me?
All about Teddy, Audrey and Ivy. I know all of it.
I don’t want to have to talk about what I know and what they did.
It’s time to come home, Paula. We’ll be waiting for you.
She throws the covers back, feeling proper feelings for the first time in days.
She told John everything about the group! She wrote it all down! How could she be so stupid, so thoughtless? She thought it was safe, that he was dead, that those emails were just for her. She had no idea he could . . . that he was . . .
Pauline frantically pulls on her clothes, her heart pounding in her chest. She has to get home; she has to speak to John; she has to stop him saying anything.
She reaches for her belongings, throwing them back into her suitcase and looking around for any errant items. However angry she is – however let down she feels by her friends right now – she has to protect them. She can’t let John put them in danger.
She has to go back to him.
The press conference has already started when Pauline pulls up outside the house.
She parks her new car behind a row of vans and climbs out, her whole body shaking.
Slowly, she makes her way along the pavement, catching glimpses of John between the parked vehicles. Behind rows of men holding cameras.
There he is.
John. Standing in front of their home, smiling widely.
Her deceased husband is announcing his return to the world.
Floating above her own body, she can just about make out his voice as she crosses the road towards him.
He was not dead after all, he’s explaining, as cameras flash.
He was merely ill and misidentified. He lies smoothly to reporters, describing months spent stuck in a hospital in the Austrian Alps.
He had a vent down his throat preventing him from telling the doctors who he really was.
Thank God he finally recovered enough to be sent home to his loving family .
. . and to the surprise twenty-one million pounds waiting in his bank account.
He talks about how relieved he is to be back, and how thrilled he is to be suddenly wealthy.
No one questions the veracity of his story, instead they ask him what he’ll buy with the Lotto millions and he jokes about getting a new tie.
With a kindly, serious face, he adds that the truth is, he’s planning on spending it all on his beloved family. Every last penny.
He is flanked on either side by a pale Tilly and a red Seb. They look beyond shell-shocked.
‘Where’s your wife today, Mr Sheldon?’ one of the men calls out and something flickers across John’s face. Irritation. He opens his mouth to respond and then he sees her. Standing there, thirty feet away, at the end of their driveway. A smile spreads across his features.
‘Speak of the devil.’ He reaches an open palm in her direction and the swarm of journalists turn en masse. The flashes begin and Pauline covers her face with the back of a hand.
‘Please!’ John calls out. ‘Leave her be! All of this has been a lot for my little Paula.’ He continues with emphatic concern, ‘My poor, fragile wife, finding out her husband was alive all this time and stuck in a hospital eight hundred kilometres away! It’s been very hard for her.
’ He frowns. ‘Especially after so many online armchair detectives made all those cruel comments about her. Unfounded, evil comments from social media investigators who had no right.’
He says this last part with such fury, shooting angry looks at the journalists who have provoked it, like he is a loyal and devoted partner.
Pauline stares at John, feeling numb.
It’s too late now. It’s all too late. She should’ve taken her chance to kill him when she had it, because now it’s over.
It’s too late to do anything about him – about his return.
She’s trapped. Everyone knows he’s back.
He’s told the world. He’s told the kids.
She’ll have to be his wife again. She’ll have to go back to being controlled and mocked and – a term she has newly learned from Ivy – gaslit .
She’ll have to go back to being Paula again.
As the reporters shout more questions, Pauline finds herself moving towards the front door.
She needs to get away from all this noise, all those penetrating stares, all that John .
She finds the handle at last and quickly pulls the door shut behind her, leaning against it and allowing herself a little cry.
She’d come so far . . . She’d been feeling so good – so new .
Yes, she felt anxious and frightened a lot around the other women, but in a positive way.
It was exciting! She was doing brand-new things and discovering for the first time what kind of person she was, underneath all that John-ness.
She was figuring out things she liked – like cars – and things she didn’t like – private jets – and it felt good.
It felt right! For the last few weeks, Pauline’s body has been zinging with adrenaline and excitement.
John’s death had given her the chance to finally feel alive for the first time in decades.
And now he’s back from the dead, it’s like he’s killed her.
She stumbles through to the kitchen, collapsing onto a chair and sinking her head onto her arms.
She hears the front door open and close. ‘Mum?’
It’s Tilly. It is the first time she’s heard her daughter’s voice since their fight. Since before Saint-Tropez. Since before Pauline found out about John. Since before Audrey’s confession. Since before.
The sound reverberates in her ears and she sinks further into herself. But then she stands up. She can’t ignore her daughter, no matter what’s gone on. She’s missed her so much. She needs to see her.
And then she’s there, in front of her. Tilly’s kind, warm, infuriating, judgemental, overbearing face. The sight of her fills Pauline’s heart with love.
‘Tilly,’ she says simply.
‘Mum!’ She sounds so relieved, though her skin is ashen.
‘He’s back. He’s really back. Did you know?
Where have you been? What’s—’ Tilly starts crying quietly and Pauline reaches for her, wrapping arms around her oldest child.
Tilly continues speaking into Pauline’s shoulder.
‘He called us this morning and we rushed over here. It’s a miracle.
’ She’s mumbling through her tears. ‘It was all just a mistake, Mum. He’s fine!
He’s OK.’ Pauline lets her speak, afraid to breathe.
‘Everything is OK now. Everything will be all right. Dad’s home. ’
‘I know, Tills. I know.’
There is a pause and Tilly pulls out of the hug, looking at her mother with fearful eyes.
‘Is it . . . Are you . . .? Oh, Mum, I’m so sorry about our fight.
I’m so sorry I accused you . . .’ Her voice breaks again.
‘I’m really sorry I said that . . . thing.
I didn’t mean it. I could never mean it!
Not really. I think I was having some kind of breakdown or .
. . I don’t know, something . Maybe it was a delayed reaction to grief.
Those grief tentacles reaching out and pulling me down.
Or maybe I’m just a crappy person. But there’s no excuse.
’ She shakes her head. ‘I can’t believe I said it and I hate myself for it.
Of course you’re not happier without Dad.
Of course you’re not.’ She breathes out slowly, trying and failing to regain her composure.
‘I’ve been so worried about you, Mum. I’ve not slept a wink since I said those awful things.
I’ve kept Misha up all night talking about you, wondering what I should do.
I’ve felt terrible.’ She pauses, smiling a watery smile.
‘But it’s all fine now, because Dad’s back!
He’s back. He’s not dead! Our lives can go back to normal. ’
‘Normal,’ Pauline repeats faintly. ‘OK.’
‘It’s all going to be all right, Mum,’ Tilly says again with emotion. ‘It’ll be even better than it was before. John and Paula Sheldon, reunited after all these months. We’re getting so many messages! No one can believe it’s real! It’s like a love story!’
‘Yes. Like a love story,’ Pauline repeats robotically, hating the words.
But a part of her knows this is true. It is like a love story.
Because – after everything she’s been through and seen – she knows better than most that not all real-life love stories are romantic. And even fewer have a happy ending.