Page 40 of The Soulmate

I put my drink down on the table. ‘Which woman, baby?’

‘The one that was on the cliff before the police came.’

She reaches blindly for a chip, dunking it in sauce and lifting it to her mouth without looking up from her drawing. Freya, on the other hand, immediately looks up.

I glance at Gabe as I try to activate my brain. We’ve never had this conversation with the girls. I’d thought it was still a few years off. I’d planned to thoroughly research the best ways to talk to kids about suicide, maybe even consult a psychologist first. Trust kids to interfere with best-laid plans.

‘Well . . .’

‘Did she jump off the cliff?’ Asha asks, looking up. She raises her eyebrows, her expression simultaneously curious and uninterested, as if it is something she’d been meaning to ask about but isn’t of much importance either way.

‘I heard Nana and Papa saying she jumped. And you and Daddy did too.’

Gabe puts down his wine. ‘It was an accident, baby girl. She walked too close to the edge, and she fell. That’s why Mummy and Daddy tell you not to go anywhere near the cliff.’

It is classic Gabe: the perfect response. He says nothing to alarm her while also reinforcing the importance of staying away from The Drop. Even now, it makes me fall in love with him a little bit more.

‘Did she get dead?’ Asha asks.

Both girls stare at us. Even Gabe falters for a second. Eventually he answers the only way he can.

‘Yes,’ Gabe says finally. ‘She did.’

Asha nods wisely. ‘Her family must be very sad.’

‘Yes,’ Gabe says. ‘I imagine they are.’

Asha appears to think about this. Gabe and I don’t look at each other.

‘Where is the lady now?’ she asks.

Her gaze moves back to the rainbow she is drawing. I want to ask her about it. Offer to help. Anything other than answer these questions for my beautiful little girl.

‘She’s in heaven,’ Gabe says.

Asha looks at me then. Her expression is slightly different now. Less wise. All I see is her small round face. The vulnerability of it. I want to take her in my arms and block her ears, so she never has to try to understand any of this stuff.

‘With my mum?’

I take a breath in, hold it, then slowly let it go. And I do her the respect of looking her in the eye when I answer. ‘Yes, baby. With your mum.’

36

PIPPA

THEN

‘Ihave to tell you something,’ Gabe said.

I pulled two glasses out of the cabinet, set them on the kitchen counter and looked at him expectantly. It didn’t occur to me to be worried, even though, on reflection, the words ‘I have to tell you something’ rarely precede anything good. On hearing them, my heart rate didn’t speed up. I didn’t have the faintest idea what was coming.

It was just that things had been so damn good. Three weeks earlier we’d moved into our stunning new dream home – a four-bedroom renovated Edwardian house with a swimming pool and a rich green lawn. Freya was a delight: a busy but thriving almost two-year-old. We’d just put her to sleep in her big girl bed. We’d even been talking about trying for another baby.

‘I’m so sorry.’

I thought it must have something to do with money. The house had been so expensive. We’d taken out a mortgage that was a challenge to the risk-averse side of me, but Gabe was so confident that we could afford it. I remember feeling a flash of annoyance at myself. Why had I listened to him? Why hadn’t I suggested something smaller and cheaper? Perhaps it was because his boss, Max Cameron, seemed to believe that he could do no wrong? It was hard to imagine that he had anything other than complete job security.

But it wasn’t the house.