Twenty Years to the Day

It's twenty years to the day.

Ruth opens her eyes. August 20th. Beside her Mike shifts in sleep. He
says, "no". But the tone of his voice is kind. The clock says 9.34.
Nobody is up yet, Ruth can tell. She knows the sounds of the house. It
is probably luxury to be allowed to sleep in this long. Ruth tries to
remember when it changed, when the children stopped waking early but
it's a fog of memory. In those days a full night's sleep and a lie in
seemed an impossibility.

Mike laughs next to her. She turns to see if he is awake and somehow
reading her thoughts. He isn't though. It's typical of Mike to laugh in
his sleep. She looks at his face and he is smiling.

"What's up?" he'd said to her the day before, catching her sitting at
the kitchen table staring at lavender alive with bees. She made herself
smile at him.

"Nothing," She reached out and put her hand flat on his belly.
"nothing,". He came and stood close beside her, hand on the back of her
neck.

"Sure?" She leant her head against him but couldn't say.

"I should cut the lavender if I want to keep it," she said, "but I
can't bear to." They stayed like that for several minutes,
silent.

"I love you," he said.

Remembering this, Ruth knows she is lucky. She looks at his smiling
face sleeping. She is loved. Do you have to deserve luck? She thinks so
but then she wouldn't have got it, if that is true. Mike wouldn't have
come along and settled into step beside her. Calm, decided, he chose
her. They talked through whole nights about everything. About almost
everything. Announced they would be married, he did. Didn't ask
exactly.

Mike stirs again and half opens his eyes. A waking smile then. He
stretches out his arm for her to take her place against him, head on
his chest, arm around him. He pulls her in close to him, kisses her
hair.
"Morning, baby" he says.

Every year at this time she thinks she will tell him. The week before
the 20th gathers like bad weather and she begins to brood. She always
planned to tell him. But the first few years were so busy and
exhausting. The children one after another, close together. Draining
her. He never questioned how she wanted children so quickly. On the
honeymoon had said "Let's make babies". Nick born nine months after the
wedding, followed by his sister fourteen months later. Ruth felt
complete then. She didn't tell anyone that. It sounded corny but she
felt she had made amends. The exhaustion, she welcomed, the broken
nights, she felt it was her job. An atonement.

Their family was neatly finished. A pleasing square. Four of them. They
fitted in cars and round fast food tables. The things that came in
fours from supermarkets suited them. Yoghurts bonded in their pots
could be split suitably. She felt part of a solved puzzle. Until four
years ago. With their teenagers gaining independence they were suddenly
able to do things together. They went out for walks, they sat in pubs.
Ruth was breathless with it, the passion came again in a great bow wave
and she felt like she had fallen in love all over again. They couldn't
get enough of each other. Went to bed early and laughed like
kids.

And then she didn't come on. At first told herself it was the changes
of the thirties but when after a week there was no sign she bought a
test from the chemist. Sat with the white plastic stick in her hand
until Mike came home and they watched the result together. A blue line.
She wept, reminded. But oddly, Mike looked overjoyed.

"A baby!" he'd said. Like it was inevitable. She knew it didn't have to
be but his face encouraged her.

"I'm old," she said, "too old,"

"Rubbish," he told her. "only 34, that's not too old, some women are
only just starting then."

Ruth feels Mike's rhythmical breathing. He has gone back into sleep.
Lying there in his arms in her familiar place she remembers how he held
her when she started to bleed and how he stayed with her as her body
let go of his child. He wept. She was surprised how badly he took it
and felt she had let him down. There was talk of depression. He became
distant for a time. And she felt the guilt of it, the failure. She knew
why it had happened. And in amongst that there had been the smallest
note of relief.

Twenty years to the day. She remembers the smell of the ward. Her
mother holding her hand, the weeping. She would advise her own child in
the same way. Her parents were good and wise, they said they would
support whatever decision she made. And it had been the right one. If
she had chosen to go ahead with it, her life wouldn't have been like
this. She would not have met Mike at college. She made the choice. She
chose this life that day.

But she has never told Mike. In all the secrets they have shared, she
has kept this one. And she has paid for it. She never could tell him
that she deserved to lose his child, his baby. He would know she was
right about that, wouldn't he. He wouldn't forgive her.

So each year will come with its day. She will watch her living children
grow and know they are bracketed by the lost ones. The one she chose to
lose and the one she lost to pay for that. Two ghost children will
always be at the table. Two sacrifices for this life she has. And every
year she will think she will tell him.

She kisses his chest, he stirs. Somewhere in the house a door opens and
the day begins.