Suddenly knowing I was running away again brought it all back. The face that loomed down at me from the electric shop that day in the village was once again prominent in my mind. I checked my handbag for the essentials. I had plenty of cash to keep me going. I would empty more from my account over the next few weeks. I didn’t want to draw attention to myself by withdrawing the hundreds of thousands I had in there which was all the money from the house Rory and I had lived in. I had barely touched it. Living in my father’s beach house and working for most of my life I had never needed it. Ben and I lived a very simple existence. And then my pensions came in and, well, the house sale money just sat there gaining lots of interest. It had been earmarked for a day like today, when I needed to leave, and so as I checked the handbag one last time, I pulled out my driving licence to double check it was still in date. I glanced at my name, the full name I was christened with: Marianne Grace Cartwright. I had never once liked the name Marianne, so formal. I immediately dropped it to Annie when I divorced Rory. I had always liked my middle name, Grace. It was the name I used from time to time. However, I could never go back to using again. I stuffed my licence back into my purse. Then my eye caught something else in my bag. A slim black phone. With curved edges. What sort of ridiculous name was Blackberry anyway? I needed to be as weightless as possible with all the extra baby paraphernalia I would be carting with me, so I took the phone that once belonged to my son and dropped it in the wastepaper bin next to my bed.

63

GRACE

As that final day at Emily’s unravelled it was to be the day my life finally became whole.

Jenny had reached out to grab my hand and I took hold of it.

‘That’s my husband,’ Jenny said with trepidation pointing to the man at the door that had caused so much commotion. I looked at the man who was making his way over to her. Jenny looked at me. ‘You must forgive him, he’s… he’s not well. The bruises, he doesn’t know what he’s doing. I was going to leave because we couldn’t take it any more, me and the kids… my stuff, I had things… I was going to take them to my mum’s for a while.’

Jenny’s husband was grinning and cooing at Mikee, who shied away initially but then after a few seconds, responded with giggles. Then Jenny’s husband turned to her.

‘Hello, love, I’ve been wondering where you’d got to?’ I heard an edge to his voice that resonated deep within me, easy words peppered with malice.

‘Darling,’ Jenny sang. ‘How on earth did you find your way here?’ She placed an arm around her husband. Emily was now at the bench looking intrigued. All the other women had stopped and were staring in the direction of Jenny’s workstation, some of them huddled together whispering.