The Lie(4)

She can’t be serious. She can’t do this.

I manage to grab hold of her arm as she puts Hamish in the front seat and closes the door. The car seat isn’t even there—it’s in the house, the maid was cleaning it after Hamish spilled his milk this afternoon.

“You can’t take him!” I scream at her over the wind and rain.

“Let go of me!” she yelps, trying to pull away. “I’m taking him from you, you bastard.”

“No, listen to me!” I tighten my grip on her arm. Hamish is wailing from inside the car, rain sliding down the window. “You’re not thinking. You’ve had the Scotch. It’s a fucking storm out there and he needs his car seat. Just listen to me!”

“If you don’t let go of me,” she seethes, “I’m going to tell everyone that you hurt me and you’ll never see your son again.” She pulls against me harder, to make a point, my fingers automatically digging into her soft skin. “You can have your divorce, Brigs. But you can’t have him.”

“Miranda, please. Let me get the car seat. I know you’re angry, but please, let me do that! Just let me do that.” We are both soaked to the bone now, and my feet are slowly being buried by mud. I’m feeling buried by my own desperation. “Please, okay? Please.”

She stares at me, so fearful, so enraged. Then she nods, the rains spilling down her face.

I don’t have a plan. But I know I’m not letting her drive away from here, not in her state of hysterics, not in this weather. I look down at Hamish as he’s crying, his face pink in the dim light, nearly obscured by the rain.

“Just give me a second,” I tell him. “Daddy will be right back.”

I turn, running toward the house, wondering if I need to call the cops, if she’ll calm down in the time I get the seat. If—

The sound of the car door opening.

I stop and whirl around.

She’s getting in her side, slamming the door shut.

“No!” I scream. I try to run but slip, falling to the ground. Mud splashes around me. “Miranda, wait!”

The car starts just as I’m getting to my feet, and I don’t feel the cold or the rain or hear the wind or the engine, I just feel horror. Pure, unfiltered, unsaturated horror.

The front wheels spin viciously for a moment before the car reverses back down the driveway.

I start running after her.

I reach the car and slam my hands down on the hood, staring at her through the moving wiper blades. Her face. Her indignity. Her panic. Her disgrace.

His face. Distraught. Confused. The perfect marriage of both of us. The perfect little boy.

Her face. His face.

The wipers wipe them clean.

She puts the car in drive and guns the engine, enough to push the grill into my hips. I quickly leap to the right before I get run over.

I roll over on the ground, out of the way, and struggle to my feet as Miranda whips the car around and speeds off down the street.

“Miranda!” I scream. Panic grips me for one second, freezing me in place, helpless, hopeless.

But I’m not.

I have to go after them.

I run back to the house, grab my mobile, and the keys to the vintage Aston Martin and run back out, jumping into the car.

The fucking piece of shit takes a few times to roll over and I’m looking at the phone wondering if I should call the police. I don’t even know if she’s legally drunk or not, and I don’t want to get her in trouble, but if they can stop her before I can, before she possibly hurts herself and Hamish, then I may just have to. I have to do something.

I know she’s heading to her parents’ house, the Hardings, across the bridge to St. David’s Bay. That’s where she always goes. Maybe I should call her mother. Get them on the lookout. Mrs. Harding will hate me even more for it, but not as much as she will when Miranda tells them what I’ve done.

The car finally turns over. I gun it down the driveway and onto the main road, a winding, twisting artery that leads to the M-8.

“Fuck!” I scream, banging my fist repeatedly on the wheel as my self-hatred chokes me. “Fuck!”

Why did I pick tonight to say anything?

Why did I have to go to London?

Why did I have to choose this?

Why did it have to choose me?

I’m asking myself a million questions, hating myself for letting it go this way, wishing dearly that I had done things differently.

I’m asking myself things I don’t have any answers to other than:

Because I love Natasha.

It always comes down to that terrible truth.

I love her.

So much.

Too much.

Enough to make me throw everything away.

Because I could no longer live the lie.

But the truth doesn’t just hurt, it destroys.