The pain has gone. It stopped the moment I stepped into the hospital; as if this white-walled building offers me its own skin.
My mother is sitting next to Jenny. I know she won’t have left Addie on his own; a friend or a nurse must be with him. Amidst the shiny hard equipment she looks so gentle in her cotton skirt and Liberty-print blouse. Her hand hovers over Jenny, as yours often does, unable to touch her.
You go up to Sarah, who’s standing a little distance away – giving Mum time with Jen while still fulfilling her obligation to you to protect Jenny. I’m still not sure if she thinks it’s necessary or if she’s just doing it to make you feel better.
‘Hyman wasn’t there,’ you say to her. ‘And his wife would do whatever the bastard asked.’
Then Mum sees you. ‘Is there any more news on Gracie?’ she asks.
‘Not yet,’ you reply. ‘I was meant to have a meeting with her doctors earlier, but I got called away.’ You don’t say you were called away because Jenny’s heart stopped. You haven’t told Mum about the three weeks.
‘They’ve said they might not have time now today,’ you continue.
‘But surely they could make the time?’ Mum says, as if time was one of her tapestries, minutes stitched onto canvas in flower-coloured yarns.
‘Apparently there’s been some awful coach crash, so it’s all hands to the pumps.’
And for one moment this hospital isn’t all about us. There are others too, God knows how many; all that anguish and anxiety compressed into the bricks and glass walls of this one building. I wonder if it leaks out of the windows and roof; if birds fly a little higher overhead as they pass.
Trying to think this to avoid ugly, awful thoughts.
But I suspect you’re thinking them too.
Will any of the coach casualties die? Will any of them be a match for Jenny? How strange that selfless love can make you morally ugly. Wicked even.
‘I’m sure they’ll have the meeting as soon as they can,’ you say.
She nods.
‘Adam’s in the relatives’ room,’ she tells you.
‘I’ll go and see him in a minute. I’d just like a little time with Jen first.’
I go to the relatives’ room. A fan whirrs the heated air.
Addie is huddled close to Mr Hyman, who has his arm around him, reading him a story.
I go cold.
Jenny is on the other side of the room. ‘He saw Granny G and Adam in the café,’ she says calmly. ‘He offered to look after Adam, so that Granny G could be with me.’
And Mum would never suspect anything. She’s heard me and Addie praise Mr Hyman countless times.
Over the whirr of the fan, I listen to him reading. At his feet is a bunch of flowers.
‘He told his wife he was going to work on a building site,’ I tell Jenny.
‘Poor bloke. Is that all the work he can get?’
‘He lied to his wife, Jen.’
‘Probably to get away from her.’
She looks at me, and must catch my expression because I see exasperation in hers.
‘I’ve told you about the hate-mailer now. The red paint. You can’t still think it’s Silas.’
‘Could there be a connection?’ I ask, more thinking aloud.
‘No. There is no way that he is anything to do with the hate mail. Quite apart from the fact that he’s just not that kind of person, why would he?’
I also think it’s very unlikely that Silas Hyman is the hate-mailer turned stalker. Even if he had a reason for hate mail, which he doesn’t, an Oxford-educated, highly articulate man doesn’t fit with hate mail and red paint. I simply can’t imagine him cutting out words from a newspaper or a magazine and sticking them onto A4. He’s far too subtle and intelligent for that.
But the fire might be nothing at all to do with the hate-mailer. It could be, as you are so certain, simply revenge by Silas Hyman.
‘He tried talking to Addie,’ Jenny says. ‘But Addie couldn’t say anything back. That’s when he started reading him the Percy Jackson story. Perfect choice, isn’t it?’
‘Yes.’
You missed most of Addie’s Percy Jackson phase, but he’s a schoolboy who can vanquish evil monsters against impossible odds. Mr Hyman knows that Adam loves Arthurian legends but knights would be too adult, lacking any childlike vulnerability, for him to relate to them now. They wouldn’t offer him any fantasy escape from what is happening. This is a better choice.
I’m disturbed by how well he knows Addie.
Once I liked his physicality, but now I don’t want his arm around our son, and I want him in smart trousers and a jacket, not shorts and a clinging T-shirt.
Mr Hyman. Silas.
Two names. Two men.
Jenny and I were in the sitting room, the night before her English A-level paper. Jenny was in her pyjamas, her hair still wet from the shower.
‘So do you know what Dryden called Shakespeare?’ I asked her.
She shook her head and water flecked the paper I was holding.
‘A Janus poet,’ I told her. ‘Because…?’
‘He was two-faced?’
‘Wore two faces,’ I corrected as she dangled a slipper on one toe. ‘Janus was also the god of gates and doors, beginnings and endings. January is from Janus, because it’s the month which begins the New Year.’
‘I don’t have to be that informed, Mum, really.’
‘But it’s interesting, isn’t it?’
She smiled at me. ‘I can see why it should be,’ she said. ‘And why you went to Cambridge and I’ll be lucky to scrape into anywhere.’
I watch Silas’s Janus face, so close to Adam’s.
I remember again Maisie’s words at the prize-giving: ‘That man should never have been allowed near our children.’
And I want him to get away from my children. Get away!
Then Mum comes in. She’s again, somehow, forced colour into her cheeks and energy into her voice, that magic smile appearing on her face.
‘Have you had a good story, Addie?’ She turns to Silas Hyman. ‘Thank you for giving me time with my granddaughter.’
‘Of course. It was great to be with Addie.’ He gets up. ‘I’d better be going now.’
Adam looks as if he’ll follow.
‘Daddy will be here in a minute,’ Mum says. ‘So let’s wait here for him, shall we?’
Silas picks up the bunch of flowers and leaves the room. I follow him. The flowers are yellow roses – mean buds that will never open, plastic-wrapped and scentless. He must have got them from the hospital shop because he didn’t have them when Jenny and I followed him earlier.
He presses the button on the door of the ICU ward. A pretty blonde nurse comes to answer it. I see her notice his attractiveness. Or maybe it’s just his vigorous health, which stands out in this place.
The nurse opens the door and explains to him that flowers aren’t allowed because they are an infection risk. There’s a flirtatious tone to her voice but flirting isn’t an infection risk, is it? However inappropriate it seems.
‘For you then,’ he says, smiling at her. She takes the flowers and lets him into ICU.
A smile and flowers.
That simple.
I follow him.
To be fair to the pretty nurse, she’s accompanying him all the time, making him wait while she puts the flowers in the nurses’ station, away from the patients. But are all nurses so cautious?
He follows her towards the section that has Jenny’s bed.
Through the glass wall I see you sitting next to her; Sarah a little distance away.
Silas Hyman doesn’t recognise her. The pretty nurse has to point.
‘That’s Jennifer Covey, there,’ she says.
He no longer looks healthy or handsome, but pale as if he’s about to vomit, his forehead sweaty; stricken by what he sees.
I think I hear him whisper, ‘Oh God.’
He turns away and shakes his head at the nurse. He isn’t going closer.
Or is he pretending this is the first time he’s seen her since the fire? A brilliant performance so that nobody will suspect him of being the person who tampered with her oxygen tube?
Perhaps he feels watched.
Through the glass wall, you see him turning away. You hurry out after him. The ICU doors close behind him and you follow.
You catch up with him in the corridor, your anger skidding on the slippery linoleum and bouncing off the walls.
‘What the hell are you doing here?’
‘I saw Adam and his grandmother earlier and-’
‘Your wife said you were at a building site.’
For a moment he is speechless; caught out.
‘A load of crap, wasn’t it? Like your alibi. Lying bastard!’
Yelling now, sound tumbling through the open door of the relatives’ room where Adam is waiting for you.
He and my mother come out, but you don’t see them, rage-focused on Silas Hyman.
‘Who lied for you about my son?’
‘What do you mean?’
My mother tries to be appeasing. ‘Someone lied and said they saw Addie starting the fire,’ she tells him.
‘But that’s ridiculous,’ Mr Hyman says. ‘For goodness sake, of all people to accuse.’ He turns to Adam. ‘I know you wouldn’t do that, Sir Covey.’
He bends towards Adam, perhaps to stroke his hair or give him a hug.
‘Keep away from him!’ you roar, moving towards him, going to hit him.
And then Adam is standing between you and he’s pushing you away from Silas Hyman; protective of him; furious with you. All his strength in those small hands as he pushes you away.
I see the terrible hurt on your face.
It’s the first time you’ve seen Adam since the fire.
Silas turns and walks away.
Mum takes Adam’s hand in hers. ‘Come on, sweetheart, time to go home.’ She leads him away.
‘Go after him!’ I say to you. ‘You’ve got to tell him you know he didn’t start the fire.’
Silas Hyman said that straight away. ‘I know you wouldn’t do that, Sir Covey.’
But you turn away.
You think that he must know you think he’s innocent. I hope to God that he does.
You return to Jenny’s bedside. Sarah doesn’t know what has just happened in the corridor.
‘Can you stay here?’ you ask.
Something in your voice sounds a warning and she doesn’t automatically agree.
‘Why?’
‘Hyman told his wife he was on a building site,’ you say. ‘But all the time the bastard was right here, with Adam.’
‘Is Addie OK?’
‘Yeah.’
You hesitate a moment, but don’t confide in Sarah about Addie pushing you away.
‘I need to find out who Hyman got to lie about Adam,’ you say. ‘I need to do that for him.’
But what Addie needs from you is to be with him. For you to make a testudo for him. It makes me so sad you don’t know this.
‘Finding out who this witness is – and the arsonist – should be my job,’ Sarah says. ‘I’m a police officer; it’s what I do.’
‘I thought Baker had made you take compassionate leave?’
‘He has.’ She pauses a moment. ‘OK, we know there were only two members of staff, apart from Jenny, who weren’t at sports day – a reception teacher and a secretary. We need to speak to both of them, but especially the secretary because it’s her job to buzz people in and out of the school.’
‘I’ll go now,’ you say, standing up.
She puts a hand on your arm.
‘He’s my son.’
‘Exactly. And what if she recognises you? Do you think that’ll help if she is involved in this?’
You are silenced and frustrated by her logic.
‘The most useful thing for you to do is to stay here and guard Jenny,’ she continues, and I’m not sure if she really thinks Jen needs guarding with so many medical staff around, or if she sees you as a loose cannon and wants to tether you at Jenny’s bedside.
‘Here’s how it’s going to work,’ she says, using one of your expressions – or perhaps it was hers first, which you adopted as you grew up. ‘I will share everything with you, brief you, update you on everything.’
I don’t think you believe her. You’ve had years of her only giving you small pieces of information, no more than was allowed to the press, and only hints at the bigger and more dramatic picture. Such a rule-abiding police officer; such a frustrating older sister.
‘You think the arsonist is Silas Hyman, with an accomplice who lied about Adam, and we’ll come back to him, but we also have to look at the hate-mailer.’
She waits for you to argue. Like me, she heard your categorical denial of the hate-mailer being responsible to DI Baker and maybe, like me, guessed it was because if it was him you’d feel it was your fault.
But you don’t contradict her. For Addie’s sake you want the truth so will keep an open mind; your love for Adam so much fiercer than your terror of being to blame.
‘The hate-mailer has a track record for aggression in the form of malicious mail,’ Sarah goes on. ‘And a motive for arson, which was to hurt Jenny for some reason.’
And he attacked her with red paint, I silently add. Just a few weeks ago.
‘Because hate mail is a crime under the Malicious Communications Act,’ Sarah goes on, ‘it can be fully investigated by the police.’
‘They didn’t get far last time,’ you say.
‘DI Baker’s asked for a much wider investigation.’
‘You think he’ll still do that?’
‘My colleagues won’t give him a choice. They’ll want to do something to help our family, whether they believe Adam guilty or not. There’ll be a lot more welly in the investigation than last time: looking at CCTV footage; wider DNA testing. The works.’
‘And Hyman?’
‘With the arson investigation closed, there’s no reason for the police to investigate him further.’
‘But you will?’
She hesitates a moment.
‘Every interview I do now is illegal,’ she says. ‘So we have to weigh up very carefully what we want to achieve because I’ll be treading on thin ice and it will give way; it’s just a question of how much I can find out before it does.’
‘You’re saying you won’t talk to him?’
‘No. I’m saying I need to be well informed before I do. Before I talk to anyone – including Silas Hyman – I need to read the witness statements and interviews taken straight after the fire. We need to be armed with as much information as possible before going after any suspects.’
I’m stunned by how many rules Sarah will be breaking.
‘Silas Hyman was Addie’s form teacher, wasn’t he?’ Sarah asks. ‘Aren’t they very close?’
‘Adam wouldn’t set fire to anything, however much he loves someone,’ you say.
I hear the word ‘loves’ crying out.
I remember the terrible hurt on your face as he pushed you away from Silas Hyman and only now see that you’re jealous.
That’s why you thought he had an unnatural hold over Addie; why you loathed him, even before the fire. No wonder you resented working bloody hard to pay the fees so that another man could be with your son all day. No wonder you weren’t upset when he was fired.
But I didn’t see it.
I’m so sorry.
‘Did you come into contact with Silas Hyman before the prize-giving?’ Sarah asks. ‘Is there anything else that makes you so hostile towards him?’
‘Isn’t what I told you enough?’
She doesn’t reply.
And I’d do anything to be able to tell Sarah that the man Silas Hyman pretends to be is a fraud. That the man Adam loves, if he does love him, doesn’t exist.
I again think of him as a Janus – not only two-faced like that god but also, like him, the beginning and the ending. Because if Silas Hyman started this horror then he’ll also be there at its conclusion.
The clicking of high heels, an incongruous sound in ICU. I turn to see Dr Bailstrom in her red shoes – maybe she wears them as a warning device for patients and their relatives.
A meeting with my doctors has been arranged in an hour’s time.