The Perfect Girl

RICHARD

I should be fighting my demons by now.

Usually, my emotions when I’m sober consist mostly of a cocktail of anger and desperation, garnished with emptiness, and they feel as if they’re embroidered into every cell of my body, as integral to me as my DNA.

And when I feel like that, alcohol is the only cure I know, the only thing that can wash the misery away. I think of alcohol as being like a slick waiter, clad in black and white, weaving his way through a crowd with a silver tray held aloft, bearing upon it a generous helping of respite, and oblivion, just for me.

Who could refuse?

Not I. Not on a normal day, when all I want is some peace; when I would do whatever it took to escape those emotions. Any choice made on a normal day would be a choice to drink. To have a drink seems necessary, unavoidable. The taste of it might not appeal, but the feeling as it goes down your throat is oh-so-good, a physical numbness that anticipates luxuriantly the imminent longed-for dulling of your mind.

But today, with the baby in my arms, I feel something different. I feel invigorated.

It’s such an unusual feeling for me that I’m careful around it, especially as this would be the most inappropriate moment conceivable to tell Tessa that I’m feeling a bit better.

When somebody arrives from the police station with DNA testing kits and they call for us to come and be swabbed one by one, the others look appalled, so I get to my feet and announce that I’ll be happy to be the first.

The newly arrived officer has a bad shaving cut on his jawline, which I notice as he pulls on blue plastic gloves and scrapes a sponge on a stick around the inside of my cheek. He winces a little as he does it and I feel a tad self-conscious that my breath might be slightly on the rich side.

When I’m done, Tessa goes in, after passing the baby to me like a relay baton, and Grace and I make our way upstairs to wake Katya, who they want to include.

She’s asleep face down in our spare room, and doesn’t take kindly to being woken.

She descends the stairs and enters the dining room with her chin held high and it takes just a minute or two before she re-emerges with an expression of distaste on her face.

She’s just in time to hear Chris say to one of the detectives, ‘I take exception to being asked to take an invasive test without an explanation of why,’ and as the detective begins to talk about ‘routine investigations’ and ‘helping with our inquiry’, Katya exclaims loudly: ‘I am giving mouth swab even though it is not in my contract, because of deep situation.’

Chris is momentarily taken aback, and she takes the opportunity to shoot a few more barbs:

‘People must do right thing. You must do right thing. You are always business talk yadda yadda yadda, and you never put arm around son.’

I look at Lucas. He’s watching them anxiously, and his leg is jiggling up and down.

‘Make test!’ Katya is shouting now, and pointing towards the room where the young officer sits with his pile of plastic-wrapped kits.

A dark cloud passes over Chris’s face and I think that this can only end in tears. What man could lose his wife to violent death and then hear this?

Zoe’s mouth is agape too and I imagine that this shocks her because it’s an outburst the likes of which she probably hasn’t seen before in this new family of hers, where everything seemed to be buried all the time, emotions included.

‘Katya,’ I say to her. I put my hand on her arm because even her stance is confrontational, and, as I do so, the baby leans towards her, arms outstretched. Katya can’t resist this. She turns and takes Grace from me. Behind her, Chris sits back down, a tactical withdrawal that I’m glad to see.

‘We’re very grateful to you, this is a horrible situation,’ I tell her. ‘Please know how much we’re sorry that you have to be part of this.’

‘I want call my agency,’ she says. ‘I have talk to police, I have make mouth swab, and now I wish to leave and stay somewhere else because sadness is making a strong feeling in my heart.’

She presses her fist to her breastbone as if in some kind of salute, and Grace puts a clumsy finger to a tear that’s dropping down Katya’s cheek.

Thinking that she’s probably right, that it’s a good idea if she goes, and that I’ve more or less mastered the basic requirements of the baby so we can do without her, I usher her out of the room, and direct her to the phone, taking the baby back from her as she lifts the receiver.

Behind us, Lucas says: ‘Dad, are we going to take the test?’

I can’t resist a quick look back to see Chris respond with a tight nod.

Crisis averted, my secret satisfaction grows just a little.