‘Eddie,’ I say quietly. He’s still talking to his son. ‘Eddie. Your mum’s here.’
He swings round and I feel his body switch to high alert. There’s a febrile pause as he works out what to do. For a second he starts to move away, to intercept her before she gets to me, but then he stops. He stops, stands firm and takes hold of my hand. With his other, he holds Alex close to his side, a thumb moving across the soft cotton of Alex’s miniature dungarees.
I look up at him. His temple is pulsing. His neck is strained, and I know he wants very much to bolt, to waylay her. But he stays. He holds my hand more tightly than ever. We are a couple , he’s telling her, and I love him for it. I’m not just me anymore. I’m us.
Carole is looking only at her son. As she approaches, the man, Felix, drops back. He smiles warmly at me, but it’s not enough to make me believe that this will be OK. Over his shoulder, my parents are watching. Jo is watching. Alan is watching. In fact, everyone is watching, although most of them are pretending not to be watching.
‘Hello, Eddie darling,’ she says, arriving in front of us. She seems only at this moment to realize that Felix isn’t with her. She glances back nervously, but he doesn’t move, and she seems to decide to stay put. ‘I thought I’d come and see Alex on his special day.’
Eddie holds my hand yet tighter. It’s beginning to hurt.
‘Hey, Mum,’ he says. Cheerful and relaxed, as if everything’s OK. And I think, You are so kind. You’ve done this for years. Made her feel safe, no matter what’s happening inside you. You are an extraordinary man.
‘Alex!’ he whispers. ‘Alex, your grandma’s here! ’
Alex is getting hungry: he keeps diving towards Eddie’s chest, even though he’s not going to find much milk there. ‘Would you like a cuddle?’ Eddie asks his mother. ‘I think he’s going to want feeding soon, but you may get a few minutes of peace.’
Carole doesn’t look at me, but she smiles and opens her arms. Carefully, gently, Eddie hands her our baby. He waits until she’s got him; then he kisses his son on the top of his head.
He steps back and takes my hand again. Carole breaks into a smile I never imagined seeing on her face, the face that sat at the edge of my mind for so many years. ‘Hello, my darling,’ she whispers. Her eyes fill with tears, and I realize that Eddie’s lovely ocean eyes are hers. ‘Hello, my lovely boy. Oh, Granny loves you, Alex. Oh, she does!’
Eddie reaches out to squash one of Alex’s chubby little feet. Then he glances sideways at me and squeezes my hand.
‘Mum,’ he says levelly. ‘Mum, I want you to meet Sarah. The mother of my son.’
There’s a long pause, during which Carole Wallace murmurs at Alex, as he begins to wriggle down her chest. Eddie drops my hand and puts his arm around me. Carole doesn’t look up. ‘Aren’t you a good boy,’ she murmurs at Alex. ‘Aren’t you such a good little boy.’
‘Mum.’
Then slowly, uncertainly, Carole Wallace looks at me. She looks at me, across my son’s head, across two decades of pain that I can only now, as a mother, begin truly to comprehend. And for a second – a lightning crack of a second – she smiles. ‘Thank you for my grandson,’ she says. Her voice trembles. ‘Thank you, Sarah, for this little boy.’
She kisses Alex and then moves away from us, back to the safety of Felix, and conversation resumes. The wind has slowed; the sun is warmer. People are taking off jackets and jumpers. The cow parsley sways violently as a child burrows through its stems, and a tiny shower of butterflies flickers over the wild grass that surrounds us all, screening us off from the past, from the stories that we told ourselves for so many years.
I slide my arm around Eddie’s waist, and I feel him smile.