‘I can’t wake her up. She’s in a coma. What’s the matter with you?’
‘Come on, Amanda. She’s right. We can’t talk to Gemma today. But we can work something out. Amanda. Look at me. Talk to me.’
At last she turns to him, also moving the gun. Pointed now at Matthew.
‘She opened her eyes. She’s faking it.’
A pause. Matthew waits.
‘I just want what’s fair. Don’t you see that?’ Amanda tilts her head towards the mother and daughter huddled together on the bed. One utterly still. The other weeping. ‘Look at them. I just want to know what that’s like.’ She pauses again. ‘To be everything to someone.’ Her tone is darker. Determined. ‘I’ve got nothing else now. Only the baby. I just need to talk to Gemma. Make her listen.’
Matthew’s mind is whirling, trying to figure out what the hell Amanda means about Gemma’s baby. He needs to distract her. Turn her away from Gemma.
‘Look. I can understand why you’re so upset. About the job. After all you’ve done for the university.’
‘You know about that?’ Amanda lets out a little huff.
‘Must be devastating.’
‘I gave my whole life to that place.’
‘Yes. Yes, you did.’
‘It’s ridiculous. You don’t need a degree to do a good job.’ She pauses, that chin twitch again. ‘And half of the students take drugs. They don’t throw them out.’ Her tone’s more distant, as if she’s talking to herself. Still he needs her to look at him, not Gemma.
‘So what happened with Sam, Amanda?’
She narrows her eyes and for a beat Matthew regrets the question.
‘Why don’t we move outside? Just you and me. And we can talk about what happened with Sam. I want to listen. I want to understand.’ Matthew pauses as Amanda stares at Gemma, wrapped in her mother’s arms on the bed. ‘Whatever’s happened, it’s not Gemma’s fault.’
‘He spun her the very same story, you know.’
‘Sam?’
‘Yes. I waited for him.’ Her face changes again. ‘I waited for him and look what happened. I get nothing and she gets a baby.’ She turns the gun towards Gemma again. ‘You need to wake her up. We need to talk. That baby needs me.’
Matthew’s just trying to calculate the risk. The distance between him and Amanda across the room. If he dives, can he disarm her? Or will it trigger the shot?
But Rachel’s standing up. She turns to step between Amanda and the bed. ‘You can’t seriously think that anyone would ever let you near a baby?’
‘No, Rachel.’ He puts up his arm, but Rachel’s eyes are wide and defiant.
‘You stay away from my daughter.’
And then Rachel suddenly lurches towards Amanda herself and all options are gone. Matthew dives too. There’s the thunder of the gun firing. A huge punch to his chest. He can’t tell where he is any more. On the ground? Is he on the ground?
His eyes are open but he can see only blackness.
There’s screaming. ‘You did this. You all did this.’ He can’t tell whose voice.
A second shot.
He blinks and blinks but still cannot see properly. Just a blur of more shapes in the room. More loud voices.
And somehow he’s in another room too. So many young and frightened faces in their gowns and their mortar boards, all staring at him.
Ice cream. Ice cream.
And then it is their hall at home and Amelie is running down the stairs. Daddy, Daddy. You need to get up.
But he can’t get up.
He can feel all the air and the blood seeping from his insides. But he can’t see. He can’t make Amelie hear him.
And he can’t get up.
EPILOGUE
THE MOTHER
I regret the suit. Too hot. But they never get the forecast right, do they?
At least the baby looks cool. Gorgeous, actually.
I lean in to offer a finger and she grasps it in that endearing and utterly centred way, focusing her eyes with great concentration as if my finger’s the most exciting thing she’s seen all day. She clings tighter, tighter and then her expression starts to change and I realise what’s really going on here.
‘Oh no.’ Gemma’s tone is mortified as she leans in to watch her daughter’s face also. ‘She’s doing a poo. Oh, Sophie, not now. Please – not now.’
The baby, my beautiful granddaughter – pink and plump and perfect in cream silk gown and matching bow in her hair – has decided to celebrate her first visit to church in her own inimitable style. I watch, first the pursing of the lips that to the untrained eye could be a smile, but changing – ah, yes – to that special sort of grimace.