Free Close My Eyes by Sophie McKenzie Page B

of
sympathy. ‘Maybe it would help to look at the certificates and stuff again. Maybe you need to see them all once more to let it go.’
    I think about this on the way home. Hen’s right, maybe it would help to see all the official documents. The trouble is, I have no idea where Art put everything. Despite my search, I
didn’t find anything in his office.
    It takes me ages to get home. My bus crawls along Seven Sisters Road – there has obviously been some kind of accident and all the cars are stopping to have a gawp. Once I’m back, I
check out the obvious places – the cupboards in the hall and the bedroom and, of course, Art’s office, though I already know there’s nothing about Beth in there unless it’s
in that locked cupboard.
    I find nothing.
    Art walks in at ten that evening. I can hear him on his iPhone as he trudges up the stairs. ‘But is that volume or value, Dan? We gotta be clear.’
    Art ends his call as he enters our bedroom. There are dark shadows under his eyes and his shirt is creased. He looks exhausted, but happy. I lie back against the pillow and watch him cross the
room.
    ‘Hey,’ he says, sitting down on the bed beside me.
    ‘Hey.’ I ask about his day and Art talks for a while about the meeting at 10 Downing Street.
    ‘. . . and then the PM came in. He’s much shorter than he looks on TV and he’s
definitely
had botox or whatever. No lines on his forehead at
all
. He made a
special point of thanking me for being there. Sandrine and I got the policy wonks to talk about their Work Incentives programme, especially the stuff about increasing productivity through
demonstrating ethical decision-making. The PM couldn’t believe the Loxley Benson figures.’ Art grins. ‘He
listened
, Gen, he really did.’
    ‘Sounds brilliant,’ I say. I mean it, but at the same time my mind is running obsessively over everything I’ve been thinking about all day. I wait for him to stop talking, then
I take a deep breath. ‘Art?’
    He looks up. ‘What?’
    I meet his gaze. ‘I’m really honestly not saying I believe anything that mad woman said yesterday, but like I told you, it did bring everything up again. It . . . it made me want to
see Beth’s death certificate, but I don’t know where it, where anything is . . .’
    ‘Gen . . .’ Art shakes his head, his body visibly tensing. ‘What’s the point in going over all this again? You’re just torturing yourself.’
    I shrug. ‘Sometimes I need to go back to go forward.’
    Art shoots me a tired smile. ‘You’re crazy,’ he says affectionately.
    ‘Sure, I’m crazy.’ I try to smile too. ‘So where are all the papers from back then?’
    I’m so expecting him to tell me that they’ve been lost or that he can’t remember, that it comes as a complete shock when Art swings his legs off the bed and stands to face me,
a look of weary concern on his face.
    ‘They’re in the locked cupboard in my office,’ he says. ‘I put them there because I don’t like looking at them. I’ll get them now.’
    And before I can respond, he’s walked out.
    I sit on the bed, my stomach in knots. Am I being cruel to Art over this? I think back to that first week after the stillbirth . . . I can’t remember much at all. Just a few random
snatches of conversation. I do remember Art talking about the funeral – he wanted a cremation, but insisted it should be a joint decision. At the time it seemed like the most insignificant
detail in the world. But now it means there is no body to dig up. No proof of death.
    I shiver. I’m being morbid.
    Upstairs the floorboards creak violently as Art walks around his office. I lie back on the pillows.
    We scattered Beth’s ashes the following April. I’d been seeing a therapist, at Art and Hen’s suggestion, for several months and felt like I was starting to emerge from the dark
sea of my grief, tipping my face at last to the spring sunshine. Of course what I didn’t realize then is that grief,