Page 84 of Broken Country

“No,” he says. “No, no, no. She wouldn’t do that to me.” The pain in his voice, the doubt, it is heartbreaking.

“You know she would. When did your mother ever care about anyone other than herself?”

There is a long silence. And then Gabriel looks at me, eyes like ice. “All those stories you told me about Bobby. That was your guilt, wasn’t it? You’d kept him from me all these years, and you thought you’d throw me a few snippets to make yourself feel better.”

Rage explodes within me. The last bit of stored anger breaking free. A wild, wild woman screaming in her field of sheep. “Frank is in prison because yoursonmurdered his brother. He took the fall so Leo didn’t have to. Soyoudidn’t have to watch your son stand up and testify in court. Soyouwouldn’t have him taken away. And, yes, it’s because he got to be Bobby’s father and you didn’t. And, yes, he felt guilty about it, especially after Bobby died. But where were you when I needed you? Where were you when I was asked to leave school, pregnant and unmarried at seventeen? Frank took on me and another man’s baby without a second thought. Because he loved me. And Frank”—I’m crying hard now—“was the best father to Bobby. Better than you could ever have been.”

I sink to my knees, bury my face in my hands.

After the shooting, we tried our best—Gabriel, Frank, and me—to convince Leo it was an accident. We knew he never meant to shoot Jimmy, we told him. Hadn’t he just been trying to protect his father? Any son would have done the same.

Even so, Leo became more and more depressed as the months went by and the trial drew near. In the end, Frank went to visit him at Meadowlands, knowing it was a risk in a village full of gossips as it meant breaking his bail conditions, but he did it anyway.

“What’s the point of me doing all of this, if the guilt still poisons him?” Frank had said. “I’m going to make him understand, once and for all, that he’s just an unlucky kid who got tangled up in an adult mess that was way beyond his comprehension.”

“I’m sorry,” I mumble at Gabriel from behind my hands, I cannot bring myself to look at him. The rage has left, I am ashamed. “I’m an awful person. I do terrible things. No wonder you hate me. I hate myself.”

I sense Gabriel kneeling down on the damp grass, feel his hands on mine, gently lifting them from my face.

The way he is looking at me, this stare that has everything in it, grief and sadness and passion and loss, innocence and anger and a light slowly fading. A lie that has been at the center of everything. A lie that has always been too big for absolution. And yet, what I read in Gabriel’s eyes is not blame or hate, as I expect, but love.

We are embracing—holding on to each other really—while the sky slowly darkens around us and sheep mewl and chunter and birds swoop to their nests, in the place Bobby, our son, most loved to be.

Before

I know I am pregnant even before I miss my period. It is not because my breasts are tender or the feeling of nausea when I wake up, or any of the other telltale signs I have been reading about furtively in the library. I just know.

The last time we made love—how it hurts to remember—was in the middle of the night when I stayed with Gabriel in Oxford. It was that magical semiconscious intimacy, our bodies taking over before our minds could catch up, reaching for each other in a dream. Afterward, I couldn’t remember if my diaphragm was in. Later, at home, I realize it wasn’t—the diaphragm is sitting smugly in its case—but by then I am far too heartbroken to care. Gabriel and I are over and all I want, all I can think about, is finding my way back to him.

As each day passes without my period arriving and with new, incontrovertible evidence—my breasts swollen and mapped with blue veins, the constant need to urinate, an intolerance for aromas I have always liked: frying bacon, coffee, even perfume—I know I must tell my parents. But, somehow, I can’t find the words.

I think about Gabriel almost constantly. I pick up the phone to call him a hundred times, two hundred. But he hasn’t been in touch since we broke up and I fear there is only one reason for that—he is in love with Louisa. Without realizing it, I gave him the ending he wanted.

What would Gabriel make of my pregnancy? He’s honorable, I do know that. He might offer to marry me. But would I want to marry him, knowing he loved someone else?

At night I write letters to him, pouring out my regret and sadness. How sorry I am for the things I said. How I wish I could take them back. How desperately I miss him. Also, there’s something you should know…

I think I might be pregnant.

No matter how many times I write that sentence, the words always look too shocking, too final. Every time, I rip the letter into tiny pieces.

After two weeks of indecision, I walk over to Meadowlands, knocking on the front door before I can change my mind.

I am expecting Gabriel home for the Christmas holidays, but it’s Tessa who answers, and she looks startled to see me. “Beth. What can I do for you?”

“I was hoping to talk to Gabriel.”

“He’s not here, I’m afraid.”

“Oh,” I reply, and a lump forms in my throat as I try to work out what to do next. I hadn’t thought about the possibility that Gabriel might not be home.

My breathing quickens and Tessa must notice because she says suddenly, “Why don’t you come in, Beth.” She turns and heads inside, and I follow her automatically.

In the little pink sitting room where Gabriel and I once lay head to toe on the velvet sofa drinking wine, Tessa motions to the armchairs in front of the fire. “Sit.”

I perch awkwardly and wait as she pauses to examine me.

“When will Gabriel be here?” I manage to ask, breaking the silence.

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