Cuckoo by Wendy Perriam Page B

darling.’ He’d apologized fifty times already, and each time diminished him. He wanted to overpower her with his strength, to shower on her anything she asked for. Yet, the only thing she did ask was a kid. And that he couldn’t give her. Not at the moment, not while …
    â€˜You just don’t want a baby, do you, Charles?’ She was twisting her wedding ring round and round on her finger. ‘Why don’t you be honest? It’s so frustrating being messed about by gynaecologists and swallowing dangerous drugs, when you won’t even come near me.’
    â€˜Look, Frances, I’ve had bad news. It’s nothing to do with you and your blasted babies. Don’t you understand?’ There he was, barking at her again, when he wanted to be rational. His head felt like a battleground, with Frances’ voice the endless whine of gun-fire in his ears.
    â€˜How can I understand, when you keep the whole thing secret? I’d like to help, honestly I would. Couldn’t we just lie together? Just for comfort. We don’t have to do anything. It might even help you to relax.’
    â€˜No.’
    She was scrubbing at her lips, almost rubbing off the skin. He longed to take her in his arms and kiss her better, confess the whole damned muddle and have her understand. But if he kissed her, she’d only ask for more. He hated having to produce it on demand. She was already nuzzling at his back. ‘Let’s just touch each other, Charles.’
    He moved away. Let’s just bloody fuck, that’s what she meant. The egg’s ready, I’m ready, and there’s nothing else that matters in the world. He could almost see her cosseting that egg, wrapping it in tissue like the emeralds he brought her back from Bogota. More infinitesimal than a pin-prick, one hundred times smaller than a frog’s egg. That’s what she had told him – Frances always had her facts. And yet the tiny egg had grown into a carbuncle, filling the room, blotting out everything else in her life.
    Two days later, it was dead. It lived only a day like a mayfly, and it had died unfertilized. Frances mourned it as if it were a child already. He could hear her tears sniping through the bedroom. He hated tears. They made him feel guilty and angry and helpless, all at once. If only she realized what a mess he was in himself. There were worse things in the world than not conceiving. He wanted to shake his fist at the whole cock-up of a universe and shout at it, for making everything so difficult for both of them. Instead, he calmed his voice, took a step or two towards her.
    â€˜Look, just relax, darling, give it time.’
    â€˜But I haven’t got that much time, Charles. I’m already old to be a mother, and I’ve only got two more months of Clomid left. Rathbone won’t let me take it any longer, in case of side effects. We’ve wasted this first month completely. I might as well have chucked the tablets down the drain.’
    â€˜Well, let’s concentrate on next month. Things will be different then. I’ll have sorted out my problems and …’
    Charles had still said nothing. He and Frances sat like stiff cardboard cut-outs on each side of the dead marble fireplace, dinner uneaten in the dining-room, coffee cold on the table. Only the clocks made conversation. Charles had the usual papers on his knee, but his eyes were closed. He never sat in silence, wasting time. Frances felt marooned, shut out behind the barrier of his eyelids. She leant across and took his hand.
    â€˜Shall I put the concert on?’ Boulez was conducting Boulez.
    â€˜No thanks.’
    Charles never missed a Boulez concert. He set his life to music, more or less. She was so used to his evenings of quadraphonic Karajan or veteran Toscanini, she felt almost threatened by the hush. He preferred pre-Romantic, or post-Mahler composers, the stern ordered cadences of Buxtehude, Rameau, and the