The Great Escape Read online

  ‘So glad you could come,’ says Monica, the hostess, beckoning her in beneath a voluptuous swathe of lilac hanging over the cottage door. ‘Isn’t Barney with you?’

  Although Monica has never met Barney, all the women around here seem adept at remembering not only everyone’s children’s names, but the names of their partners too. Sadie can’t understand how they can store so much information. ‘He’d loved to have come but he’s working today,’ Sadie fibs.

  ‘He works on Saturdays?’

  ‘Sometimes, at home,’ Sadie says, which is the truth. ‘Just to catch up, you know.’

  ‘That’s a shame,’ Monica says, looking genuinely crestfallen. ‘Anyway, come on in. Party’s in full swing already.’

  It sounds like it, too, with a blend of chattering toddlers, the odd crying baby and a dozen or so women all talking at once in Monica’s overwhelmingly floral living room. Actually, Sadie didn’t even ask Barney to come. He’d accompanied her to one parent-and-baby get-together in Hissingham church hall a couple of months ago, but it was impossible to even try to mingle when, whichever way Sadie turned, she could still see her husband, pressed to the flaking pale pink wall with terror flashing in his eyes. ‘How long does this go on for?’ he asked, grabbing her arm while she politely took a biscuit from an offered plate.

  ‘Only about sixteen hours,’ she joked, hoping he’d crack a smile and at least try to relax. But his jaw clenched even harder and she detected a faint lick of sweat on his upper lip.

  ‘Oh, your babies are so cute!’ a small, neat woman exclaims as Sadie manoeuvres the buggy containing her snoozing children to a far corner of Monica’s living room.

  ‘Thanks,’ she says with a swell of pride.

  ‘They’re just like you, aren’t they? Same colouring, face shape and that lovely dark hair …’ Dylan and Milo wake up simultaneously and Sadie smiles, relieved that she’s managed to kit them out to a reasonable standard – not too matchy-matchy, but in a vaguely coordinated selection of blues and greens which, she hopes, gives the impression she’s some kind of alpha-mother. She’s even managed to find all four soft leather shoes.

  ‘Oh,’ Sadie says, as Monica swoops past with the birthday baby in her arms, ‘this is a present for Eva.’ She snatches the present from beneath the buggy, which Monica accepts with thanks, placing it on an enormous pile on the oak dresser.

  Freeing her babies, and lifting them down onto a circular rug littered with various multicoloured wire-and-bead contraptions, Sadie scans the room for somewhere to station herself. She glimpses her reflection in a large gilt-framed mirror. Although her hair is bleating for a cut, at least she’s wearing lipstick. It’s slightly askew, but it’s on, and that’s the main thing.

  ‘So you’re the one with the twins,’ says a blonde-bobbed woman, beckoning Sadie to squish onto the rose-patterned sofa beside her.

  ‘Yes, that’s right.’ She smiles brightly, keeping a close eye to ensure that Milo and Dylan aren’t attacked by the other babies on the rug.

  ‘I’ve seen you around. You moved here a few months ago, didn’t you?’

  ‘Yes, that’s right, it’s been six months now.’

  ‘I’m Polly, and this is Justine,’ she says, introducing the redhead next to her, who offers Sadie a dazed smile over the baby clamped to her breast.

  ‘I’m Sadie …’

  ‘So you moved with new babies?’ Polly says. ‘That was brave of you.’

  ‘Well, we didn’t plan it that way,’ Sadie explains. ‘We’d been trying to sell our London flat for ages but it didn’t shift, then it finally did, and after having the babies I probably wasn’t thinking straight, so …’

  ‘You mean you don’t like it here?’ Justine asks with a small frown.

  ‘No! No, I love it,’ Sadie declares. ‘It’s so, er … peaceful and pleasant and everything. And it’s safe, much safer than where we lived – in fact we were burgled when I was pregnant and that set us thinking that we should move somewhere small and quiet and er …’ Hell, she’s broken her rule already, babbling on when all these women want is a bit of light chit-chat. Sadie glances at the table laden with chocolate brownies and cupcakes and her stomach rumbles ominously.

  ‘It’s much better for children out here,’ Justine remarks. ‘There’s such a strong sense of community.’

  ‘Oh, yes, I can see that …’

  ‘Especially if you’re planning a big family,’ chips in Polly, whom Sadie has realised is mother to three of the children in the room, which seems almost unimaginable. ‘It’s wonderful how everyone helps each other out.’

  ‘Well, I’m not sure we’ll have any more,’ Sadie says with a grin.

  ‘Oh!’ Polly frowns at her, then a flicker of understanding crosses her face and she adds, ‘Of course, if it was difficult for you the first time …’

  ‘No, it’s lovely, and I’m really happy and everything,’ Sadie explains, ‘but, you know, managing the two of them is probably enough to be going …’

  ‘I mean conceiving,’ Polly murmurs. ‘If you’ve been through all that, you probably won’t want to again with all the drugs and expense and the stress of it.’

  Sadie blinks at her. What is it about having twins that makes everyone assume they were conceived by IVF? Sadie is tempted to have a T-shirt printed saying WE DIDN’T HAVE ANY BOTHER CONCEIVING. IT WAS RIDICULOUSLY SIMPLE – IN FACT IT HAPPENED THE FIRST TIME WE TRIED!

  ‘No, that part was easy,’ Sadie says lightly. ‘We didn’t have IVF.’

  ‘Oh, didn’t you? I’m sorry, I just assumed …’

  ‘It’s okay,’ Sadie says, feeling bad now for making Polly uncomfortable. ‘What I mean is, we’re not in any hurry for another.’

  ‘Don’t rely on breastfeeding as contraception then,’ Justine remarks. ‘That’s how we got Benjamin …’

  ‘Oh, I’m not,’ Sadie says quickly.

  ‘I got a coil after that,’ she adds.

  ‘Me too,’ Polly says eagerly. ‘It’s fantastic.’

  Sadie falls silent, not sure she has anything to add to this new, startling line of conversation that doesn’t feel quite right at a child’s first birthday party. Anyway, contraception is hardly an issue at the moment. Since Sadie was around six months pregnant, the very prospect of sex has been as appealing as having a foot amputated – which makes it nearly a year since she and Barney last did it. God, she realises, we’re heading for our first no-sex anniversary.

  As Milo starts to cry, Sadie rescues him from the rug and holds him on her lap. ‘He thinks it’s an ice lolly,’ Polly chuckles, indicating her toddler who’s sitting nearby, gnawing at a yellow disc.

  ‘What is it?’ Sadie asks.

  ‘Frozen banana. It’s great for teething, soothes the gums …’

  ‘And he really thinks it’s a proper lolly from a shop?’ Sadie marvels. Out of the corner of her eye, she can see Monica starting to unwrap the presents, showing each one to baby Eva in turn.

  ‘I wouldn’t give Alfie an ice lolly from a shop,’ Polly exclaims, as if Sadie has just suggested feeding him frozen Red Bull. ‘I make them at home with fresh juice.’

  ‘Of course, that’s what I meant …’ she says feebly. Monica is opening Sadie’s present now, and says a brief ‘Ahhh’ to the garish giraffe before dumping it on a teetering pile of already opened gifts.

  ‘Have you ever frozen a banana?’ Polly asks.

  ‘Er, no, but I’ll definitely try it,’ Sadie says, seized by an urge to leave the overheated room and almost grateful when Dylan emits a howl from the rug.

  ‘Oh dear. Your boys are a bit unsettled, aren’t they?’

  ‘Yes, I think they’re a bit hot …’ She gathers him up, holding both babies who are now wailing heartily.

  ‘They make quite a racket, the two of them!’

  Sadie nods. ‘They certainly do. In fact I think we’d better go.’

  ‘Maybe you could just give them a little push back and forth around the garden?’

 
‘No, I really think we should head home.’ Trying not to seem too eager, Sadie tries, unsuccessfully, to soothe the boys. Strapping them into the buggy, she says a collective goodbye and makes for the front door, trying to stroll rather than charge towards it, and filling her lungs with crisp spring air once she steps outside. She needs to talk to Hannah or Lou, someone who really knows her and won’t start going on about their ‘fantastic’ coil or imply that she and Barney should get on with the business of baby production.

  Sadie tries Hannah first, who thankfully picks up. ‘Sadie? How’s it going?’

  ‘Good, fine … whereabouts are you?’

  ‘Just out shopping in the West End with Daisy,’ Hannah replies, and the hubbub of voices and traffic, then a siren wailing, almost makes Sadie faint with desire.

  ‘What are you looking for?’

  ‘We’re just trying to find something for Daisy to wear to the wedding …’

  How cosy, Sadie thinks – reassuring, too, to be reminded that babies grow up, and that at some point it’s feasible to take them to the shops. To the West End, even.

  ‘What about you?’ Hannah asks.

  ‘I’ve just been to a party.’

  ‘Really? Like, a lunch party or something?’

  ‘Er, yeah, sort of.’

  ‘That sounds nice …’

  And you sound distant, Sadie thinks, as if your mind’s on something else – which it is, of course, because you and Daisy are browsing in some chi-chi little shops in … actually, Sadie can’t think what part of London has chi-chi shops anymore, and she only left six months ago.

  ‘I’ll ring you some other time,’ she murmurs.

  ‘Yeah, okay. Sorry, Sadie, it’s just … tricky right now …’

  ‘Are you okay? You sound a bit hassled …’

  ‘No, look, I’ll have to go now, sorry, sorry …’ And she’s gone.

  Sadie tries Lou, but both her landline and mobile go to voicemail. She’s probably at work. Sadie hasn’t got her head around Lou’s shift pattern yet, but she seems to virtually live at that soft play centre these days.

  Of course, both of her friends are busy right now, as most people are on Saturdays. They’re working, shopping, living their lives, and although she can’t quite identify what it is she’s missing, Sadie suspects that freezing bananas to make pretend ice-lollies probably won’t fill the gap. She’s been kidding herself that she can pull this off – fit in with these women who bake brownies all day, and be a proper mother to Milo and Dylan. Even Barney is slipping away from her, and who can really blame him when her sense of humour and sex drive seem to have completely disappeared? A lump forms in Sadie’s throat as she marches home, knowing she can never tell anyone about the horrible, claustrophobic mess she’s found herself in.

  THIRTEEN

  The day isn’t turning out quite the way Hannah had imagined. All the way into the West End, Daisy was stonily quiet, as if mentally preparing herself for extensive dental drilling work. And now, as they hoof along a packed Oxford Street, surrounded by eye-popping stores crammed with everything a ten-year-old girl could possibly desire, she still hasn’t perked up. ‘See anything you like?’ Hannah asks, instantly overwhelmed by a sea of pastel lace and excitable teenagers in New Look.

  Daisy shakes her head. ‘Nah.’ Hannah casts a glance around the vast floor. Perhaps there’s just an overabundance of … stuff. If she’s finding it all too much, maybe Daisy is too. It can’t be easy picking, say, a top, when there’s something like eight thousand to choose from.

  Daisy wanders away from Hannah to flick through a rail of sludge-coloured trousers. Like Hannah, Daisy isn’t really a dress sort of girl; she prefers a complicated layering system that involves long tops, short tops, leggings, shorts and opaque tights, often with a drapey cardi flung nonchalantly over the top. With her tall, willowy frame, it usually works pretty well. Whenever her mother takes her shopping, Daisy always returns with bagfuls of uninspiring-looking items that look fantastic when she puts them on. Maybe, Hannah wonders, it’s her that’s putting Daisy off. As Ryan reminded her the other night, Hannah doesn’t enjoy shopping. She practically exists in jeans and vest tops; practical clothes for cycling or painting, although she hasn’t painted much lately. Anyway, she thinks now, picking up trousers Daisy’s knocked off the rail, isn’t shopping a classic mother-daughter activity? Daisy is probably missing her mum, especially since Hannah doesn’t seem to know what to do. While mums and daughters all around her are bonding over sequined tops and asymmetrical dresses, Hannah is loitering awkwardly like an alien whose first, baffling experience of earth involves being dropped into the chaos of New Look on a Saturday afternoon.

  ‘How about this?’ she asks, holding up a stripey top with an ostentatious bow on the front.

  Daisy cringes. ‘No thanks.’

  ‘Or this?’ Hannah indicates a denim mini-skirt. Daisy shakes her head and moves swiftly on, as if Hannah’s offered her a peach twinset.

  In hot pursuit, but trying to appear calm, Hannah begins to feel redundant and foolish. She thinks about Sadie, in the country, nipping off to lunch parties with her babies in tow. She’d know how to handle Daisy. She’d have chosen her something – Sadie knows instinctively what goes with what – and by now they’d be giggling away in a café, a cluster of carrier bags at their feet. Someone biffs Hannah in the ribs with a rucksack, sending her staggering sideways into a rack of handbags adorned with gleaming buckles and chains and, in one case, a plastic lizard. She loses sight of Daisy, her heart racing until she pops into view again. Daisy’s sour expression suggests that she’s being dragged down the poultry aisle of a supermarket, not being given the run of a fashion emporium.

  They make for Zara, where Daisy grudgingly tries on a couple of outfits that don’t fit, then they head to the kids’ section at Primark, which is even more crowded than New Look. ‘I’m gonna try these on,’ she announces, having amassed an armful of clothes.

  ‘Great. I’ll wait by the changing room, okay? In case you want to come out and show me anything.’

  Daisy frowns at her. ‘I’ll be all right.’

  ‘Yes, I know you’ll be fine, I just meant if you wanted, um, a second opinion …’ But Daisy has whipped into the changing room, and all Hannah can do is plonk herself on a small plastic stool and resist the temptation to text Ryan: HAVING TOTALLY CRAP TIME. COMING HOME NOW. She desperately wants to phone Sadie back, but what would she say? Admitting how bleak things really are would mean facing up to the fact that she doesn’t have the faintest idea about how she intends to carry off this stepmother lark.

  Hannah waits patiently on the stool for what feels like a week. She can actually feel herself ageing, her skin shrivelling and her bones beginning to creak. Nearby, a leggy woman in tight jeans is having an altercation with her teenage daughter. ‘You’ve got trousers just like those at home,’ the woman snaps. She’s gripping the handles of a buggy containing a screaming toddler.

  ‘Wanna go,’ he keeps yelling. ‘Wanna go home NOW.’ It’s a sentiment Hannah can sympathise with entirely.

  ‘They’re different, Mum,’ the girl declares. ‘These are a much brighter blue.’

  ‘Yes,’ her mum replies, ‘because the ones at home have been washed.’

  ‘So they’re all faded and that’s why I need new ones …’

  ‘Go on then, try them on …’

  ‘Want Daddy!’ the toddler wails. With a sigh, the woman parks the buggy beside Hannah and sinks down onto the stool next to her.

  ‘How come we mums end up spending so much of our lives sitting outside changing rooms?’ she says with a wry smile.

  ‘I know,’ Hannah says. ‘I think she must be trying on everything at least twice.’ Daisy reappears briefly, grabs a few more items from a nearby rail and struts back into the changing room.

  ‘Pretty, isn’t she?’ the woman observes. ‘Lovely sense of style she’s got.’

  ‘Yes, she has.’ Hannah manages a smile.

  �
�Takes after you,’ the woman says kindly.

  ‘Thanks.’ Hannah falls silent, feeling deeply uncomfortable about taking credit for Daisy’s fashion sense. ‘Actually,’ she adds, ‘I’m not her mum.’

  ‘Oh?’

  ‘No, I’m her …’ Hannah tails off, wondering how to put it. Stepmum still doesn’t feel accurate; she fears she’ll never be remotely qualified to assume such a terrifyingly grown-up job title. ‘I’m sort of … seeing her dad,’ Hannah adds, realising that’s completely wrong too. They’re getting married, for God’s sake. They’ve chosen rings, booked the registry office and bar-cum-restaurant for a small party afterwards, and she’s bought that fat nurse abomination. They’re even planning a honeymoon somewhere down the line, although they have yet to book anything as Petra hasn’t come back to Ryan about when it might be ‘convenient’ to look after her own children. The cello comes first, naturally, taking Petra all over the world to give performances. Hannah imagines it strapped in the aeroplane seat beside her, being asked by a flight attendant whether it wants chicken or fish.

  ‘Oh, hell,’ the woman cries as her toddler breaks free from his buggy restraints and her daughter glides out of the changing room. ‘Right – we’re getting out of here.’

  ‘Can’t I have these trousers?’ the girl bleats.

  ‘I said you’ve got some at home. What d’you think I am, made of money?’ Manhandling her toddler back into his buggy, and starting to march away, the woman flings a quick glance back towards Hannah. ‘Enjoy your day with your, er …’

  ‘Thanks. You too.’ Hannah checks her watch as Daisy finally ambles towards her. ‘Wasn’t there anything you liked?’ she asks, now feeling horribly hot in the stuffy store.

  Daisy shakes her head. ‘Nah. But there is something …’

  ‘Oh, what’s that?’

  Daisy pushes back her hair and meets Hannah’s gaze. ‘You know for the wedding, right?’

  ‘Yes?’ Hannah says eagerly.

  ‘Well,’ Daisy fixes her with a defiant stare, ‘I’d like my ears pierced.’