And in the centre of the photo, cradled in my arms, face out towards the camera, is a tiny baby wearing a blue sleepsuit.
My head swims as I read the caption beneath.
Three generations of the Nicholson family: me, my little boy, and my （very proud!） parents.
The photo was posted nine months ago.
My stomach lurches and my head feels light, as though I have inhaled helium.
I stare at the photo and I know, without any need for confirmation, that these are my parents, that this is my son. I do not remember them and yet I know it is true.
This is the family Stephen told me were dead.
‘I don’t understand. Why is there a Facebook profile for me under a different name?’ My voice is tight, strained, as though it is being wrung from a damp cloth.
Zahira takes hold of my hand, and her voice, when she begins to speak, is gentle. ‘Remember when I said I looked for you online and couldn’t find any trace of you? It’s pretty much unheard of these days. Everyone has some online presence, whether they want it or not. I thought it was weird at the time. But now . . .’ She pauses, and my thoughts swirl as though being pulled deep into a vortex. ‘This profile has to be yours. You must be Livvy Nicholson.’
The suggestion reels in my ears and I shake my head. ‘But I’m not. My name’s Anna Bradshaw.’
Zahira squeezes my hand and I feel it there in her fingers: the tentative delivery of difficult news. ‘I don’t know what your husband’s playing at, but whatever he’s been telling you, it’s clearly not true. That’s you there, with your family, less than a year ago.’
I know she is right, but it still makes no sense. ‘But if I’m Livvy Nicholson, then all those letters to Stephen would be from me? And I don’t remember writing any of them.’ My voice feels shrill in my ears.
‘But would you remember writing them even if you had?’
I scour my brain, in search of a crumb of memory, however small. I try to recollect having once been a woman called Livvy Nicholson, of having written those letters to Stephen. But my memory is a dark, hollow cave and there is nothing to light my way.
And then a thought splices into my mind, at once hopeful and terrifying. Nine months ago I had a son who was alive. Whatever story Stephen has told me about a child of ours dying two years ago, there has to be another truth.
‘But if that’s me – if I’m Livvy Nicholson, and that’s my child – then where’s my baby now?’
ANNA
LONDON
Neither of us speaks for a moment. The thought of my child, possibly still alive and yet separated from me, claws at my heart.
‘I think we should call the police.’
I tear my eyes away from the photograph on the screen, look at Zahira. ‘And say what? That I can’t remember who I am but there’s a profile of me on Facebook with a different name? What are they going to do?’ I hear the hysteria in my voice, panic ballooning in my chest.
‘Something’s really wrong here. All these photos . . . They suggest you have a whole life Stephen hasn’t told you about. A whole family he’s deliberately kept you from.’
The words sink in and I know Zahira is right. Pulling the laptop towards me, I scroll through the profile, see that Livvy Nicholson has uploaded very little about her life in the past year apart from that single family photograph. But posted just before that, there is a selfie, standing on a bridge, a wide river beneath. And, beneath it, a caption.
As if I need any other reason to love being a born and bred Bristolian. Just look at that view!
Bristol. Not London.
A year ago, I was living in Bristol. And yet Stephen has never mentioned Bristol to me. He told me I was brought up in Gloucester.
I scroll some more, find a photograph of me from eighteen months ago, standing on a stage behind a podium, a picture of a rainforest filling a screen behind me. I read the caption, feel as though I am falling from a great height.
Delivering a speech at this weekend’s climate conference in Manchester. I’ve been working in environmental policy my entire career and things have only got worse, not better. Let’s hope the world starts listening soon.
I swivel the laptop so Zahira can see the screen, watch her face as she absorbs the information.
‘He told me I was a librarian, that I’d left my job two years ago, after Henry died.’
Zahira pauses, the silence suffocating. ‘All these lies. How do you even know Stephen is who he says he is?’
The question seems to suck all the oxygen from the room. ‘He must be . . . Who else would he be?’
‘Where did you say he worked?’
I tell her the name of the university, the engineering faculty, watch her tap rapidly at the keyboard.
‘And he’s got the same surname as you – Stephen Bradshaw?’
I nod, a voice in my head pleading for this not to be another betrayal.
My eyes train themselves on Zahira’s face, searching for a clue as to what she might find. Her fingers scroll down the trackpad and then she squints, clicks, frowns.
‘What is it?’
She turns to me and there is a beat of silence, a thousand possible permutations tumbling into it. ‘Is this him? Is this Stephen?’ She swivels the laptop towards me, and Stephen’s face stares back, enlarged on the screen, the banner of the university’s name strapped across the top of the page. I feel a rush of relief that he is there, it is true, he has not lied to me about that too. But then my eyes scurry across the text, and I see it, in bold font beneath the photo: Dominic Bradshaw, Associate Professor in Civil Engineering. Something seems to slip inside me, like shifting tectonic plates. ‘But that’s Stephen. Why does it say his name’s Dominic?’
Zahira shakes her head. ‘I don’t know. But I honestly think we should go to the police.’
I push back my chair, the legs scraping against the white ceramic tiles. ‘I have to talk to him.’ The urgency is immediate, like flames bursting into life, licking their way across my thoughts.
Zahira places a hand on my arm. ‘I don’t think that’s a good idea. Not on your own.’
The alarm in Zahira’s voice makes me sit back down, and it takes a few moments for me to understand the cause of it. ‘Stephen’s not dangerous. He wouldn’t hurt me.’ Even as I say it, there is a voice inside my head, whispering, probing, like a finger jabbed into the flesh of an arm: Are you sure?
‘What time did Stephen say he’d be home?’
I try to straighten out my thoughts, rewind my memory. ‘About five o’clock.’ I glance down at my watch, see there are still three hours to go, do not know how it will be possible to fill such a great gap of time.
‘Call him. Ask him to meet you in the park when he gets home.’
‘Why?’
‘Because I think if you want to see him, you should meet him in a public place. I’ll come with you, sit nearby with Elyas, be on hand in case you need me.’
I feel myself hesitate. ‘Do you really think that’s necessary?’
‘Maybe not. But just indulge me on this, okay?’
I release a breath I was not aware of holding. ‘Thank you.’
‘No need to thank me. Just phone him before I change my mind and insist you go straight to the police.’