Chapter 16
‘HELENA BEALE?’
‘That’s me.’
‘Would you like to follow me?’
Helena picked up her handbag and followed the doctor into a small grey room.
Her palms were sweating and her heart was beating a little too fast. She always got nervous when she had a screening test. And this was even more nerve-racking than most. The results of her latest smear had come back as abnormal and she had been called in for a colposcopy to work out whether there were any cancerous cells in her cervix.
She knew it was for the best, that you couldn’t be too careful, but thoughts of her family history did nothing to calm her nerves.
‘Right, if you could remove your trousers and your underwear and climb onto the chair, I’ll give you a knock in a couple of minutes?’
The doctor clearly recognised her nerves, smiling warmly as she left the room, leaving Helena to change in private. She placed the towel that had been left behind over her lower half and sat on the chair with its padded leg supports.
During the procedure, which was uncomfortable but bearable, Helena focused on her breathing as she stared at the printouts of optical illusions that someone had stuck to the ceiling above her head.
Half an hour later, she was back in the car and on her way home from the hospital.
Her appointment had been delayed, making her home later than anticipated.
Raffy was a week into the summer holidays, so there was no afterschool club option to use.
Luckily, Noah had offered to come home early to take over with Raffy.
She wondered if he would have made a start on their dinner in her absence.
She had a few weeks wait for her colposcopy results, but she tried her best to put them to the back of her mind.
They might be fine, in which case there was no need for her to expend wasted energy worrying about it.
As she turned into the drive she saw Johnny’s new van parked outside Hazel Cottage and imagined Johnny and Margery sharing a bottle of wine over dinner.
It made her happy to know Margery wasn’t alone, though she could already imagine how much Margery would miss Johnny’s presence in the house when he eventually found a place of his own.
She switched off the engine and got out of the car. There was a gentle breeze running through the air, ruffling the leaves of the trees out on the lane. She could hear the faint thrum of someone mowing their lawn in the distance.
She came into the kitchen, looking for Noah.
There was no sign of him, they must be upstairs already.
She slung her handbag onto the island and rubbed her forehead.
She had developed a headache, probably from the nervous anticipation that had been building up at the thought of the colposcopy.
She was relieved it was over, that was for sure.
Helena climbed the stairs. As she turned onto the landing she immediately noticed Raffy’s bedroom door was wide open.
From the lightness within she could tell that the curtains weren’t drawn.
What on earth? She wondered if he had gone to sleep in their room for some reason.
She popped her head around the door to check but all the doors were open, all the rooms filled with summer evening light. There was no sign of either of them.
The hairs on the back of her neck stood on end.
Something was wrong. It was too quiet.
As she turned back and scanned the room she could see a few of Raffy’s things were missing.
Her heart rate quickened.
Within the seconds it took her to cross the landing and reach their bedroom, possible explanations flashed through her mind: had there been an accident? Had Noah taken him to hospital? She pulled her phone out of her pocket and unlocked it – there were no notifications.
As she entered the room there was no Raffy tucked up in bed, no Noah to be seen.
‘Noah? Raf?’
She repeated her cry as she searched the house, the volume escalating. Her cries reverberated in the silence around her.
Her heart leapt into her throat as increasingly worse scenarios raged through her mind. She pulled her phone out of her pocket and rang Noah. It went straight to voicemail. She rang again. The same thing happened.
She raced back up the stairs, checking she hadn’t missed anything.
Her eyes scanned Raffy’s room. Where was Buzz? And Woody? They weren’t in their usual position on his pillow. She pulled open his chest of drawers. Quite a few of his clothes were missing. And in the wardrobe too. Had they been burgled?
She ran into her room. Noah’s drawers were the same, half full. Too many bare hangers in the wardrobe.
Helena’s head span in confusion. Where were they? Why had Noah taken so much stuff with him? Was this some kind of weird surprise?
She went back down the stairs, calling Noah’s phone again.
There was still no answer. Perhaps there would be a note, telling her to meet them somewhere?
Why he would have organised something like that she had no idea, but she couldn’t think of any other explanation.
Maybe he was still trying to make things up to her?
With mounting anxiety she searched the house. There was no note to be seen.
Suddenly her eyes settled on the one place she hadn’t looked. A drawer in the side of a small table in their bedroom. It was where they kept the passports. With trembling hands she opened the drawer, her body tense with fear.
There was only one passport.
Dread snapped at her, clamping its cold fingers around her, squeezing the air from her lungs.
She looked frantically around as if someone might be able to help her understand what was happening.
That’s when she noticed it. A small envelope with her name on it lay on her pillow.
She flung herself towards the note, tearing open the paper, holding her breath as she read the words he had written.
I’m sorry to end it like this, Helena. But it’s over.
By the time you see this, we will be on our way back to New Zealand.
It has to be this way. I need a clean break, a fresh start.
So does Raffy. We all do. Things haven’t been going well between us for a long time. I’m sorry. It is better this way. N x
She read the note a second time, her vision clouding before her eyes as she allowed the words to sink in, her hands trembling as she held the paper.
He had left her.
He had taken Raffy and gone. He had threatened to leave, to go back to New Zealand, but she had never for one second believed that he would.
She gripped hold of the table as ice-cold dread replaced the blood in her veins. No. He couldn’t do this to her. He couldn’t.
She felt so nauseous she could barely breathe.
She kept shaking her head, repeating the words ‘No, he wouldn’t’, over and over. Suddenly overwhelmed with nausea, she ran to the bathroom and retched.
Raffy. He had taken him.
He knew she loved him as much as her own child. How could he do this to her? To Raffy? She imagined Noah telling him that he’d never see her again. She pictured his face, tears brimming in his golden blue eyes and she howled in despair. It was a deep, guttural sound. It didn’t even seem human.
Tears coursed down her cheeks. With shaking hands she reread the note, again and again.
She dialled his number once more. It went straight to voicemail.
She hung up and dialled again. Over and over and over.
Eventually, screaming in frustration, she allowed it to ring through to the automated voicemail message.
‘Noah, please,’ she stammered. ‘You can’t do this. I know things haven’t been great between us, but you can’t leave. You can’t go. You can’t just take Raffy. We haven’t even had the chance to say goodbye…’
The words wouldn’t come out properly, they were drowned in hysterical sobs. She began to hyperventilate. A stabbing pain pierced through her chest.
She hung up the call and dropped the phone to the floor.
It clattered on to the bathroom tiles. She stood frozen for a few seconds, paralysed with indecision.
Barely thinking straight she raced down the stairs, picked up her keys and ran out to the car.
She got in the driving seat and screamed with frustration, slamming her fists on the steering wheel.
She didn’t know where to go. To the airport?
Was he really going to take him to New Zealand?
So quickly? Surely not. This had to be some sadistic manipulative ploy.
Was he trying to teach her a lesson? He had said it himself.
‘Be careful what you wish for.’ But she refused to believe anyone could be that cruel.
And certainly not Noah. Not the love of her life.
How was this even happening? ‘FUUUUCK!’ she screamed at the top of her lungs.
Her head span. She wanted to call someone, but who? She had no parents, no siblings, no real friends. She could call the police… She went back into the house and looked up the number of her local police force.
Eventually she got through to an officer in the relevant department and explained what had happened, begging for help, by now completely hysterical.
The officer listened quietly and although he was sympathetic, and let her talk, he then explained there was nothing they could do.
She wasn’t Raffy’s parent. She wasn’t married.
She had no legal right over his whereabouts.
Noah was acting perfectly lawfully. It seemed she was owed nothing.
Four years, she kept sobbing down the line.
She had been his mother for four years. How could that count for nothing?
Terrified and desperate to do something, anything to stop this unthinkable situation, she ran back to the car and turned the keys in the ignition.
Wiping the tears from her cheeks with the back of her hand, she drove as fast as she could to the airport.
She didn’t care that she looked like a mad woman as she frantically raced around the check-in desks, looking for a tall man and a curly haired child.
She pushed her way to the front of the help desk, aware of the startled looks of those standing beside her as she explained what had happened.
The young man behind the desk stated calmly that there was no way the airport could give out passenger information.
He repeated that he was sorry, there was nothing they could do to help her, until she broke down, once again, into hysterical tears.
A kind lady gave her a small packet of tissues.
She clutched it in her hand and stumbled, blindly, over to an empty seat.
She called Noah, over and over again, leaving increasingly desperate messages on his voicemail.
A flash of dread shot through her as she realised why his phone might be off.
He may already be on a plane as his note had suggested.
She did some time calculations in her head.
She had left at four to go to the appointment.
She had been home by around seven thirty.
There was no way they could be on a flight by now.
No, he must have turned it off, knowing she would call.
A volley of questions raced through her brain. When had he decided to leave? When had he packed their things? What must Raffy have thought? What must he be thinking now?
Her heart felt as though it had been ripped out of her chest and shredded.
She had never experienced anything like it.
It was worse than grief. She had never felt so completely powerless.
If this was really happening, if Noah had really decided to leave, to take Raffy with him, there was nothing on earth she could do to stop him.
She had no rights. Everything she had done for them amounted to nothing in the eyes of the law. Every kiss, every cuddle, every tear she had wiped away, every whisper, every word: it counted for nothing.
She had no choice but to cling to the frenzied hope that this was all some kind of sick joke, even though she suspected deep down that it wasn’t.
She left the airport and drove back home, praying all the way that when she got back, they would be there.
The house was dark. She realised as she tried the door that she hadn’t even locked it. She knew as soon as she walked inside there was still no one there.
An empty shell, she climbed the stairs and curled up in Raffy’s bed, breathing in his smell.
She found his teddy under his pillow, surely Noah wouldn’t have left that behind?
She clutched onto it, praying that Noah would be teaching her a lesson, that he would bring Raffy back the following day, that this nightmare would be over.