Chapter 17 #3
Esther opened her mouth to protest, but the words wouldn’t come out.
She wasn’t certain Danni would have heard them even if she’d managed to speak.
In the end it was Joe who directed a string of questions towards his sister, his voice sounding almost otherworldly, as though this was some kind of dream – and maybe it was.
‘How do you know all of this? Who gave you the photographs? Was it Laura? Have you seen her?’
‘I haven’t seen Laura, but I’ve met your daughter.’ The last two words of Danni’s sentence sounded so alien that Esther couldn’t believe she’d heard them. Did Joe really have a daughter?
‘You’ve met her?’ Esther blinked rapidly as though her vision might suddenly clear and reveal this really was all an illusion, but Danni nodded.
‘I found out by accident, because I overheard her telling someone that she was Joe’s daughter and that meant she had to tell me everything.’ Danni let go of a deep breath and then shook her head, almost as if she was still in disbelief herself.
‘What do you mean you overheard her? How did you even come into contact with her?’ Joe sounded incredulous, but at least he was asking some of the questions they needed the answers to. None of this made sense. It had to be some kind of horrible mistake.
‘She came to Port Agnes to find you.’ Danni shut her eyes for a moment and shook her head.
‘But after I overheard her talking to someone about you and asked if what she’d said was true, she told me she couldn’t face telling you.
She didn’t know how you’d react, and I think she was scared.
But now that you know she exists, she should have the chance to tell you the rest herself.
It’s not my story to share and I think, if she explains why she hasn’t been in contact before now, it will give you an insight into the kind of person she is.
That might make it easier for you to form a bond, because even though this isn’t the way it should have come out, I don’t have any doubt that she had the best of intentions. ’
‘A bond?’ It was another word that felt weird, as though Esther’s mouth couldn’t make it fit.
How could they possibly form a bond with this stranger?
A grown woman who’d arrived in their lives out of the blue.
But Joe was nodding, seeming to understand his sister’s logic, even though a big part of Esther wanted to scream that Danni couldn’t just detonate a bomb in their life like this and not even give them the whole story.
Did she really expect them to just let her walk out of there, without sharing everything she knew?
‘Can you at least tell us her name?’ Joe’s question was just one of the things that Esther needed to have answered, but Danni shook her head.
‘If I do, I might as well tell you everything.’
The realisation hit Esther like a bolt of lightning. ‘We’ve already met her, haven’t we?’
‘Yes, at the hospital. I really don’t want to say any more, but I can try to call her now and ask her if she’s able to come over.
I just think it will be much better if she’s the one who explains it to you.
I don’t want to put words in her mouth or mispresent her.
You need to have this conversation face to face, not second-hand. ’
‘Do you think she’ll be willing to do that?
’ The look Joe was giving Danni was so full of hope and, as his sister nodded, relief flooded his face.
He desperately wanted a chance to meet his daughter, and Esther loved him far too much to even try to stand in his way, but that didn’t mean this hadn’t shattered her world.
Although, right now, the closest Esther could come to describing how she felt was completely shell-shocked.
She could barely process that this was true and yet she was still wracking her brains trying to think who this woman could possibly be.
There were over six thousand staff at St Piran’s and endless streams of patients passing through the emergency department.
Any woman of the right age could potentially be Joe’s daughter, but she couldn’t picture the young woman’s face.
No matter how hard she tried to imagine it, her brain just wouldn’t let her.
Nausea was swirling so fast now that she was certain it was only a matter of time before she was going to be sick.
Her husband, the man she’d spent all these months dreaming of starting a family with, already had one.
The realisation of just how much this changed everything was closing her throat up, until it felt as though she’d forgotten how to breathe.
Joe was saying something else now, but she couldn’t seem to make out the words.
All she could hear was the soundtrack repeating in her head, over and over again. Joe got someone else pregnant.
‘Is that what you want to do, Esther?’ Danni put a hand on her shoulder, making her jump.
‘What I want to do?’ She blinked, trying to work out what Danni was asking, but it was no good. ‘I don’t know what you mean.’
‘Danni was asking if we want her to call…’ Joe hesitated for a moment, clearly not knowing whether he should say ‘my daughter’, and Esther suspected it was the look on her face that made the decision for him in the end.
‘For her to call the woman who gave her the photos, so she can explain everything. I said it had to be up to you what we do next. It doesn’t matter if you’re not ready to make any decisions, darling. I just need to know you’re okay.’
Joe’s tone was gentle, and he looked pale and stunned by his sister’s revelations, but Esther could see that look again, the hope that his could somehow all work out okay.
She had to focus on the here and now, getting through this one breath at a time.
It was the only way, because if she thought about their future, one that had somehow changed beyond all recognition in less than ten minutes, she wasn’t sure she could cope.
Joe had got someone pregnant during a teenage fumble on the beach and yet all the things they’d done to try and have a baby of their own had come to nothing.
It hurt so much she wasn’t sure she’d be able to find the right words, but somehow, she had to give Joe this chance, because it might be the only one he ever got.
‘Of course, I think we should do it as soon as she can.’ Esther nodded, her voice sounding robotic.
Joe was someone’s father. She almost laughed at the thought this time, teetering on the brink of hysteria and praying that the shock would give way to numbness instead.
It had already stolen the tears she knew would come eventually and she was grateful for that.
She didn’t want to cry in front of Joe. She couldn’t bear him to know just how much this hurt, and that it felt as though the news had robbed Esther of her greatest dream.
Someone else had carried Joe’s baby and made him a dad.
As that realisation hit her again, it was all she could do not to push past him and run out of the door.
She was terrified if she did, she might never find the strength to come back again.