After Anna - Alex Lake

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I’m sorry. I wish it were different, I really do.’ The officer folded his notebook open. ‘Just for the record,’ he said. ‘What’s your name?’

      ‘Julia Crowne.’

      ‘And what brought you to the park at this time of the morning?’

      ‘I’m looking for my daughter.’

      His hand paused mid-word and he looked at her. ‘That’s your daughter? The little girl who’s missing?’

      ‘Yes,’ Julia said. ‘I couldn’t sleep.’

      He nodded. ‘There are a lot of people looking,’ he said. ‘We’ll find her, Mrs Crowne.’

      He did a good job of reassuring. Julia supposed he’d had plenty of practice. But she didn’t believe him. In between hearing that she was Mrs Crowne, mother of Anna Crowne, and his smile of professional reassurance, there was a gap. It was a fraction of a second, but it was enough for an emotion to cross his face, and it was the worst emotion a mother in her position could witness: it was pity.

      So it’s you who’s going through hell, his expression said. God help you.

      And then it was gone, replaced by that studied reassurance, but she’d seen it. The same thing had happened once before so she knew what she was looking for. The first time she’d been pregnant she and Brian had gone to a gynaecologist for the first scan. A nervous first-timer, she’d pressed for it as early as possible, and they’d gone at eleven weeks.

      Well, the doctor, a woman in her fifties who smelled vaguely of cigarette smoke, had said, the baby is due on February 3rd.

      No, Julia replied, it’s mid-January. I got pregnant on April 24th. I was ovulating then.

      Foetal development is uniform in the first twelve weeks, the doctor said, so we can tell the age from the size, give or take a few days on either side. So we can predict the due date accurately. You probably got pregnant some other day. You can get pregnant at any time in the cycle. It’s less likely, but possible.

      She was wrong. Julia knew exactly what the age of the foetus was, because it had taken over a year for her to get pregnant and she had been monitoring the dates of her ovulation and ensuring that they had sex around those dates, and then she noted it all down. On this occasion, she had left on a work trip the week after she had ovulated, so she knew precisely the day she had got pregnant.

      She explained this to the doctor, and for a second the mask slipped and she saw concern on the doctor’s face, the kind of puzzled concern that meant something was wrong, and then the professional countenance reasserted itself.

      Let’s plan for Feb 3rd, she said, and if baby comes early, then so much the better.

      From then on, she had a bad feeling about her pregnancy. Two weeks later, she miscarried.

      And now she had the same bad feeling again.

       v.

      It was light when she pulled up outside the house. The parking space she’d left was taken by a red Toyota Matrix. Her mother-in-law, Dr Edna Crowne, eminent cardiologist (retired), St Hugh’s College, Oxford alumna, self-elected family matriarch and all round pain in the backside, was visiting.

      Edna would never admit it – possibly not even to herself – but Brian was a disappointment to her. Edna viewed herself as one of the great and good of the country, and, by extension (since England was self-evidently the greatest country on earth), of the human race. People like Edna were superior in intellect, class, and judgement. They knew better than other people about … well, about everything. Public policy, legal affairs, moral issues: Edna’s opinion was the final word.

      It was also the final word on matters such as, how to bring up a child, and, specifically, her grandchild. Edna saw no distinction in terms of decision-making authority between a mother and a grandmother. She had as much claim on Anna as Julia, and much more than Brian had. This was why Anna was at a private school in the first place: Julia hadn’t ever considered it until Edna raised it at Anna’s third birthday party.

      We should think about what schools (Julia had noted the plural) Anna should attend, Edna mentioned, a slice of sticky pink birthday cake untouched on the paper plate in front of her.

      The local one, Julia replied.

      Edna gave a thin smile. What about private education? It’s so much more – effective.

      It would set her apart from her local friends, Julia said.

      That’s rather the point, Edna replied. It puts her on a different path.

      I don’t know, Julia said. I need to think about it.

       But you do agree private education is better, don’t you? There’s a reason why the professions – at the higher levels, of course – are filled with people who went to good schools and universities.

      Not all the good schools are private, Julia said. I went to state school and I’m a lawyer.

       In a small town. Which is a fine achievement, but it’s hardly one of the magic circle firms. You see my point?

      Julia mainly wanted to punch her, but she nodded. I suppose. But anyway, we can’t afford it.

      Edna had been waiting for this. I’ll pay, she said. I want the best for my granddaughter.

      And so Julia had ended up going along with it. It was hard to argue against logic that ran thus: good parents give their children the best they can afford; Edna will pay for private education, which is better for the child, therefore you should send her to private school. Edna made it seem as though sending her elsewhere was wilful neglect.

      Julia wanted to point out that an expensive education – a Jesuit boarding school in Lancashire and then Warwick University – hadn’t put Brian on a path to a magic circle law firm. He was a junior school teacher, which, as far as most people were concerned, was a fine thing to be, but it did not fit with Edna’s view of success. Edna didn’t say so, but she thought her son was soft and lacking in ambition, and she didn’t intend for her granddaughter to inherit the same vices.

      For Anna was the only one she had left. Amelie and Colin, the children of Simon and Laura, lived in Portland, Oregon, where Laura had grown up. Simon was older than Brian, and had left the UK with his family the year after Jim Crowne had disappeared. They didn’t hear much from him, apart from an occasional email to Brian.

      It was another thing in the family that wasn’t talked about. Julia didn’t think she had ever heard Edna say Simon’s name. She knew from Brian that Laura and Edna did not get on, and that Edna blamed Laura for Simon moving away; a defeat which must have hurt Edna deeply, not only – or even mainly – because her son was gone, but because she lost. And with Simon gone that left Edna with Julia, Brian, and Anna.

      Not that Edna liked Julia. As far as his mother was concerned Brian had married badly. This was not speculation on Julia’s part. She knew because Edna had told her in a prenuptial attempt to stop the wedding taking place.

       You won’t be happy. You think he’s like you, but he’s not.

      We love each other, Edna, whatever our backgrounds. He doesn’t need some horsey girl with a boarding school education and BBC English. Meaning: he doesn’t need someone like you.

      Oh, I’d prefer it if he married someone like that, darling, I really would. But that’s not what I’m talking about now. This is not about what he needs, darling. It’s what you need. He won’t be enough for you.

      At the time, Julia had thought she was saying it because she thought it might prove effective, rather than because she believed it; now, she realized that Edna was right.

      And Edna knew something about unsuitable

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