The hive, p.8
The Hive, page 8
‘Can we talk? I mean, we should talk.’
‘I don’t think I have much of a choice since you’re already standing here, Char–lotte.’
He was drunk and angry, his jaw tightening as he stretched out my name.
‘I don’t want to argue. We should be happy about this. Celebrating. We’re going to be parents to two beautiful healthy children. Doesn’t that mean anything to you?’
‘Should it?’
His body was as taut as his words, the ripples of muscles moving beneath his cream T-shirt as he straightened in his seat.
‘Do you want me to apologise? Fine, I’m sorry this isn’t the right time. I’m sorry we’re having two babies instead of one, and I’m sorry that I’m happy I’m pregnant. OK, I’m truly happy. But I’m not sorry about loving you. This is only happening because of how much we love each other. Linc, look at me.’ I took his free hand and held it against the soft podge of my stomach. ‘Our babies were made in love. Can’t you see that? Can’t you feel all our love?’
‘You don’t understand, Charlotte.’ Linc snatched his hand from me. ‘None of this is as it looks. I’ve made promises. I can’t just break them. Not for you, not for anyone. I made a promise.’
‘To who? And what sort of promise could mean you wouldn’t want to be here for your children, our children?’ I paused. ‘Is it Heidi?’ I continued as Linc scrunched up his features in disdain.
‘You don’t know what you’re talking about. I told you, she’s my nutritionist.’
‘Come off it, Linc. You like her, I know you do. I saw you smiling at your phone, instead of being there for me and the babies growing inside me. Your babies.’
‘You mean the babies you forced me into having? The ones I never asked for.’
‘I didn’t force you into anything. I thought you loved me?’
‘Charlotte, I do. It’s complicated. There’s stuff you don’t know. Stuff I can’t tell you. Jesus, God forbid you exercise your choices, then maybe this whole thing can go away.’
I tasted hot bile. ‘You mean have an abortion?’ A quick flash of memory confronts me. Trix’s avocado-coloured bathroom, red between my legs and the pain and hollowness that followed once it was over. ‘I’m not killing our babies. I would never hurt them. I won’t do it.’
His eyes traced my body.
‘Then there’s nothing more to say. I guess we’ll just have to live with the consequences.’
‘And I guess you’ll have to live without us.’ I turned on my heel, heading for the bedroom so I could pack up my things. It was time to go home.
CHAPTER TWELVE
THE HIVE — Lincoln Jackson has intimate dinner with buxom babe Heidi Dolak while girlfriend Charlotte Goodwin hasn’t been photographed in public for months
littlejally — Oh no mate looks like u’ve been caught @lincolnjackson
steelreel — @thehive let the man cheat in peace lmao
thehive — @steelreel just doing our job!
misskabe — @charlottegoodwin men like this don’t deserve women like you, u’ll be stronger after you leave him and know your self-worth stay strong
hanrone — wow another celebrity cheating on his girlfriend . . . yawn
titan213 — @lincolnjackson good choice @heididolak is my dream woman
anngnes — this is what happens when women only date men for their money they become interchangeable #thehive
pop_peach — @anngnes why are you blaming the woman when it’s the man that’s cheated?
anngnes — @pop_peach oh please @charlottegoodwin knew what she was getting herself into dating a celebrity she’s lucky she’s lasted this long
pop_peach — wow bitter much????? @anngnes
taran14 — just look at @heididolak how could @lincolnjackson resist
charlottegoodwin — I wasn’t going to comment but I feel as if I have to speak up @heididolak is @lincolnjackson nutritionist and nothing more! @thehive Please stop spreading lies
nicoleknoxx — @charlottegoodwin way to stick by ur man when he’s taking other women to dinner loool
vinnierichrich — U want privacy so ur celebrity boyfriend can cheat on you? That seems reasonable @charlottegoodwin if you’d kindly change your name to doormat that’d be great #thehive
‘I
S IT ME OR DOES Lincoln have a death wish or something?’ The Irish tone of Poppy’s voice rang in my ears as I continued poring through the comments under The Hive’s post.
Jasmine floated through the air as the girls tittered around me. I’d just woken up from a syrupy dream that somehow managed to exit my subconscious and stick to me in real life. I was shattered, my feet puffy and raw. I wanted to crawl back into bed but after seeing the photos I would never be able to get back to sleep.
‘Say what you want about Michael at least he never had the audacity to embarrass me on the internet. I mean if Charlotte doesn’t kill him, I will. How can you do this to your pregnant girlfriend?’
Trix slid a mug of tea in front of me, as Zaheen rounded the island, sitting next to me on an empty stool.
‘You know, I don’t think Lincoln has a girlfriend.’
I shot her a look.
‘Don’t get me wrong, you have a boyfriend. But that man does not have a girlfriend. He’s as free as a bird.’
‘Zee, you’re not helping.’ Poppy’s hand crept up my shoulder.
‘What she means is, I think you need to talk to Lincoln about boundaries. It’s one thing to cheat but doing it so publicly, it’s dangerous. I’m scared he’ll force you into doing something drastic.’
The room fell silent. I’d been prone to losing my head once or twice in the past. But this wasn’t like before. Linc wasn’t Poppy’s dad. I was going to be a mother. I had changed.
‘You should call him, Char.’ Poppy squeezed my shoulder.
‘Yeah and tear him a new one. God, I hate that man.’ Trix held her midsection.
‘Do you all feel like that?’ I asked, the smell of burning jasmine from the incense itching the back of my throat.
‘Kind of.’ Zaheen shrugged.
‘He’s no good. Just look at what he’s doing to you. Pregnant with twins no less. You’re literally at your most vulnerable, and I’m looking right at you, I can see how scared you are.’
Zaheen was right, I was terrified.
‘You should really call him.’ Poppy’s blue eyes comforted me as I picked up the phone and departed the kitchen.
A bad feeling crawled into the pit of my stomach and fastened me to the ground. On the fourth ring he answered. My words came out in a rush.
‘Do you think this is funny? Why the hell are you going on dinner dates with your nutritionist? I’m five and a half months pregnant for Christ’s sake, Linc! Haven’t you got any respect for me whatsoever? Worst of all, I had to find out about it on The fucking Hive?’ The wrath in my tone pummelled through the phone as I pushed it closer to my ear. I’d had enough.
‘Well, good morning to you too, babe. Look, I didn’t know it was going to end up online. I’m sorry.’
‘Everything you do ends up there. How was this going to be any different? We can’t go on like this. It isn’t healthy. It’s toxic.’
‘If this is about the video of me and Heidi leaving the hotel together last week, then I already told you we had separate rooms. It was innocent.’
It was about the video. It was also about the photos of the pair of them spending an increasing amount of time together. I had spent months trying to justify my leaving Linc’s home and returning to Trix’s. My pride couldn’t take anymore. Leaving was what was best for our unborn babies, and my own peace of mind. It had worked, Linc had calmed down and come round to the idea he was an impending father. He assured me, almost daily, that we were still together and that when the babies arrived, we would be a real family.
‘It’s about everything. You, making me look like a fool. You’ve banned me from doing a pregnancy reveal. Even the three women I love and trust most in this world hate you. Linc, you hate that I’m having these babies. It’s like I disgust you or something. You’re not acting how you should. You’re not treating me right.’
The bigger my stomach grew the less interested Linc became. By the time I had begun showing, Linc started spending all his time at the gym. Or with Heidi. When he did meet up with me it was to defend himself from what he called ‘delusional assumptions’. Despite the photos, videos and comments, which miraculously popped up every few weeks, showing the father of my children with the woman he preferred, doing something social media deemed as cheating on me. Linc didn’t understand that in its own way, spending so much time with Heidi was cheating, and although I couldn’t prove it, we both knew what was really going on.
‘Charlotte, this is insane. You’re hormonal. Why don’t you come round so we can talk about it? I want to be with you. I want to have a family and make this work. Baby, come home.’
My decision was final. I wouldn’t budge unless he gave her up. I didn’t care that she was his nutritionist. Heidi was a cancer and the quicker we cut her out, the faster we would heal the rift between us.
‘I’ll come by so we can talk, but I’m not promising anything. You know my family life wasn’t great, Linc, I want better for our children.’
‘Come by around seven. We’ll work this out once and for all, I swear. I love you.’ He hung up and my heart sank.
I loved Linc, but I loved my children more, so I would do whatever I had to do in order to make their journey into the world as smooth as possible.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
I
T WAS A LITTLE AFTER seven when I pulled up in Trix’s A3. My car had been on the fritz for months, but I was so preoccupied with hiding my pregnancy – so much so, I had even been working exclusively from home – that I hadn’t had a chance to fix it. Linc had promised me a new one. Something bigger that the twins and I would be more comfortable in, but it had yet to materialise, and I was too proud to ask.
The house was darker than usual. The overwhelming scent of floor polish drifted in and out of the air. The fumes were so strong, my stomach churned and bile threatened to violently climb up my throat. The cleaner must have been and gone maybe an hour or so ago. Strong chemicals are not good for pregnant women, or so I had read. I had been particularly keen on reading all things baby-related, especially since I was nearing the end of my second trimester and had found out I was having a son and a daughter. Poppy, Zaheen and Trix were in the midst of planning a very private picturesque baby shower, complete with two three-tier cakes, dainty personalised party favours and walls lined with white artificial hydrangeas. The twins were thriving, and I had genuinely never been so happy about becoming a mother. Even the violent morning sickness and the constant backache were joyful reminders that my children were growing inside me. It was strange how much I had changed in such a short period of time. I had gone from a party girl to a soon-to-be mother of two. All I kept thinking was how lucky I was. How lucky Linc and I both were.
Linc had come over one night when I was plagued with hormones and sickness and said everything he was doing was for us. He had stroked my dark hair and caressed my swollen stomach feeling our little angels turn and twist inside me. He had kissed me deeply and for the first time in months we had made love. Passionate, tender love. He had whispered how much I meant to him and thanked me for the perfect lives I was bringing into the world. He had called us a family, his family, and promised no matter what he would protect us. That memory felt so distant, like a dream that once was.
The house was too quiet. The type of silence that promised unexpected sound at any given moment. Linc’s usual pottering was absent, and it was cold. Too cold. Like a window had been left open. Suddenly gripped by fear, I clutched my bump, tightly whispering to my babies that we would call Daddy instead, and head home to Aunty Trix’s for a bubble bath and Indian food. I knew something was wrong. I could feel it.
‘Linc?’ I called out in a shaky voice.
I knew I wouldn’t get a reply but shouted anyway. Maybe I just wanted my presence to be known, or maybe, just maybe, I knew what was about to happen. Either way, it still happened.
‘Lincoln? Babe, are you here?’
I took several steps forward into the living room past the silver tray of decanters, then changed my mind, turned back and headed for the kitchen. The objects looked alien. Pots and pans foreign to my eyes under the blanket of darkness.
I tried the switch, but the lights wouldn’t come on.
I felt like an intruder tiptoeing around in the dark waiting for whatever monster was lurking to jump out and yell ‘Boo!’ I couldn’t figure it out, but all I knew was I wasn’t supposed to be there. Not that night. Not by myself.
I quickly turned on my heels and readied myself to leave but dropped my handbag in the process. I knelt to pick it up, my skin hot as I heard the padding of footsteps from behind me.
‘Linc, is that you? If this is a joke, then it isn’t funny,’ I said, standing upright. It felt kind of stupid speaking into the darkness, but I knew I wasn’t alone. I knew there was someone out there.
Watching.
I felt the earth shatter, realisation kicking in that my worst thought was true.
I wasn’t alone.
‘Who are you? W-what are you doing here?’ I said, grandstanding the shadowy figure as it sliced away from the darkness. My legs felt like jelly, unable to solidify on command. I was paralysed.
‘I don’t understand. What are you doing in here?’
The figure just breathed. I took a step back and hit something solid. I turned. There was another figure standing in Linc’s kitchen.
The second figure took two steps forward making me take another hesitant step back, then I watched the figures detach themselves from the shadows and become whole.
I couldn’t make out faces, just piercing black eyes on the taller one and a slither of dark that may or may not have been part of a ski mask.
‘There’s lots of money. Please, I can give it all to you. I just need you to take me to the safe. It’s upstairs in the closet behind the coat rack.’ I pleaded, hoping in vain it would make the slightest difference, but as I felt cold hands wrap around my neck, I knew that it hadn’t.
‘Please, I’m pregnant.’
Strands of my own hair were stroked delicately as I shook uncontrollably.
I clawed at my neck and carefully pushed the weight of my back against the wall as the figure held me.
The grip loosened around my neck. I screamed, but it came out strangled and distorted. I needed air to scream but not enough was filling my lungs.
‘Please, my boyfriend will be back soon. He’s a boxer. You have no idea what he’ll do to you if you hurt me. Just let me go, you can take whatever you want.’
Using a strength I didn’t know I had, I freed myself and bolted, my limbs temporarily unseizing as I whooshed past the bulky figures, bookending the dining table hard as I scrambled for the glass door separating the kitchen from the study. It was the only route I could take but it was locked. I grabbed a nearby candle and smashed through the glass, tripping as footsteps gained pace behind me. My body hurled forward as I struggled against the muscular arms pulling me back, the full force making me fall through the remaining glass at an askew angle.
Spikes of glass fell on top of me as I moaned, light-headed and woozy, half of my body through the door.
Disorientated, I tried to stand. That’s when I looked down and saw the huge shard of glass impelled deeply into the side of my stomach.
No!
‘Help me. Please someone help me!’
I looked up, pleading with the figures, but I was dizzy and there were now more than two. They just stood there unmoving. Watching me.
My left eye had swollen shut from the impact of my fall and I could only see through a little slit. I was in pain, wanting to hold my head, wipe the blood from my mouth, but I couldn’t let go of my stomach.
‘Please,’ I whimpered harder, clutching at the shard of glass as I tried and failed to remove it, splitting the skin on my hands in the process.
Blood sprayed onto the magnolia tiles. I shrieked in agony, my voice loud and rattled, splinters flying away as I stood and took staggered steps towards the figures. They continued to stare at me.
‘For God’s sake, please help me.’
For the briefest of moments, I thought of Linc. He was supposed to be here. He had urged me to come home so we could talk. Around seven, he had said.
I love you, he had said.
‘Please help me.’
I fell to my knees, the room there one moment and vanishing slowly into darkness the next.
Then there was nothing.
*
If it was a dream, then I didn’t want it to be real, and if it was real, then I wanted it to be a dream.
I opened my eyes. My brain was foggy and blurred. I couldn’t make sense of what was happening, even as it happened.
Poppy came into view yelling something to Trix, but I couldn’t make out what she said. My ears felt like I’d been swimming underwater, and I could only partially see through one eye. I placed my right hand to my ear and saw blood seep between my fingertips. I opened my mouth to speak but found I couldn’t. It was like I had bricks on my chest. Poppy looked scared, her blue eyes moving agitatedly back and forth from Trix to Zaheen and then back to me.
Then I remembered where I was. Why were they at Linc’s house?
Poppy said something to me, but it was inaudible. Zaheen was at my side. She had folded towels in her hand which she pressed at my stomach, blood pooling around us as she fought the flow.
Suddenly, the sound came back on. ‘Charlotte, look at me. You have to stay awake. I need you to push. Please, Charlotte, push. Trix, where the hell is the ambulance?’
‘Ten minutes out.’
‘Tell them she doesn’t have ten minutes; she needs help now. Zee, apply more pressure. You have to slow the bleeding otherwise she’ll bleed out.’
‘I’m trying. There’s too much blood. Poppy, I’m scared.’
