What You Did

by Claire McGowan

  ‘Sweetheart.’ She swallowed, and he saw her throat move underneath the bruises. ‘There’s something I have to tell you.’

  Chapter Fifteen

  I was leaving big damp footprints on the grey landing carpet, hastily tying the silk robe Mike had bought me for Christmas. ‘She’s here? In the house?’

  ‘Should I not have let her in? It’s raining.’

  It occurred to me again how ridiculous this whole thing was. How could I ask Bill to lock our friend outside in the rain? ‘Of course. It’s fine.’ A lurch of fear went through me. The last time she’d been in my house, look what had happened. Everything smashed and broken.

  He followed me down and melted into the kitchen. ‘I’m here if you need me. Should I bring tea or something?’

  ‘No. No, it’s fine.’ I didn’t want to be reminded of the hundreds, thousands of times Karen and I had drunk tea together, all the way through from university to this house. She even had her own mug, a lumpy one Cassie had made in nursery school and insisted belonged to ‘Auntie Karen’. I paused with my hand on the living room door. I wasn’t sure I could do this. But I had to.

  Karen was sitting in semi-darkness, and it took me a moment to spot her in the living room on the grey marl sofa. I’d been so pleased when the room was finished, adding the final touches of duck-egg blue cushions and throws and ornaments. Just looking into it usually gave me a feeling of happiness, of peace. Not tonight. I fumbled for a lamp and she appeared to me. She looked terrible. Hair unbrushed – and I hadn’t realised how much grey there was in it – face crumpled, dressed in a baggy grey sweatshirt. Her hands were rammed between her thighs. ‘I . . . Ali.’

  I sat down opposite her on the matching sofa, laying my own hands on my legs, pulling the dressing gown over me. ‘Are you alright?’ My voice sounded stiff.

  ‘I . . . not really.’ She struggled with the answer. ‘I – Ali, I never meant for this to happen.’

  ‘Which bit?’ How cold I was. ‘Karen, Christ – I don’t even know what to say. What’s going on? Should you even be here?’ I was pretty sure we weren’t meant to be talking.

  She looked down at her feet, which were in Converse, leaving tracks of mud on the carpet. ‘Probably not. But I had to. I didn’t make it up.’ Her voice was small. ‘It really happened, Ali. Look at my – look at me.’ She pulled her collar aside so I could see the bruises on her neck, thumb prints clear as ink. ‘I know you don’t want to believe it. I didn’t want to either. That’s why I think I – I think I froze at first, I was so shocked, and then it was. Too late.’

  ‘But you’d had sex with him hours before. Literally hours.’ My voice was hard and brittle. ‘Hadn’t you?’

  Karen paled even more. ‘He told you that?’

  ‘Yeah, he told me that’s why you came early, so you could fuck him while I was away.’ I didn’t recognise myself speaking. ‘Christ, why? After all this time? Why now?’

  Karen paused. ‘He said it was only one time?’

  There is a certain feeling when the worst happens, and the bottom falls out of your world, and you somehow pick yourself up from that and stabilise, adjust. There is another feeling when you suddenly find out this is not the worst, not by a long way. ‘Wh-what?’ I could hardly push the words out of my mouth. ‘It wasn’t?’ My mind scrolled back through the years. University? When Jake was born, and Karen used to stay with us a lot, desperate to get away from her houseshare? When Cassie was born? Weddings, christenings, parties. All of them suddenly covered in a greasy film.

  She said, in a flat voice: ‘I slept with Mike the first night I met him.’

  ‘But that was . . .’ That stupid photo Callum had. ‘That was the night he met me!’ All this time I’d treasured the memory. Oh yes, Mike and I met on the first night of university, inseparable ever since. The next day we’d gone for a walk over Magdalen Bridge in the cold October sunshine, both of us in blue and yellow college scarves, talking about all the nothings of our lives the way you do when you’re eighteen, and after that we were just a thing. Ali and Mike. We had our ups and downs, sure, but somehow we kept going, as all our peers hooked up and broke up and moved systematically between each other’s beds. But that first night, after I’d gone to bed, still a virgin and the worse for wear on four peach schnapps and lime, Mike and Karen had. Done that. I shook my head in disbelief, as if trying to clear water from my eyes. ‘I don’t believe you.’

  ‘It’s true, Ali. I mean, God, way more off than on, but it’s been years now. If he said it was just once, he was lying.’

  I gripped the edge of the sofa. ‘When I was having Benj. When I had to stay in hospital that week.’ Karen had come down, helping to look after Cassie, then just five.

  She just nodded.

  ‘When my dad died?’ Mike had been so sweet to me then, rubbing my back as I cried myself to sleep for ten nights in a row, holding the fort at home while I went north to help my mother clear out the house.

  ‘Yes. Ali – you realise it hurts my case. If we had a previous . . . relationship. I’m telling you so you know I’m not lying that he hurt me.’

  ‘But you lied all those other times!’

  She looked at her feet. ‘I didn’t lie. I just . . . never told you. Jesus, Ali, what would I have said? I love you. You’re my best friend. But him and me – it’s like some drug you can’t quit. When I saw him on Saturday . . .’

  ‘I don’t believe you! You’re lying!’

  ‘Why would I lie?’

  ‘I don’t know!’ To hurt me, I was thinking. To take everything I had and crush it. ‘Why would he do – what you’re saying, if it was going on for years? It doesn’t make sense.’

  She paused. ‘We’d ended it. That day.’

  ‘He said he ended it.’ Or rather, he’d said she’d come on to him, moment of weakness, never again etc. And how easily I’d believed him.

  Karen stared at the ground. ‘Ali, I don’t know. Clearly, he lies sometimes. And anyway, just because we – I still didn’t want it later on. He still forced me. That’s still – Ali, I shouldn’t have to tell you this. You know what rape is.’

  I bit down hard on my lip. ‘How did you know it was him? You were drunk. All of you were so drunk. And it was dark out there.’

  ‘I . . . Ali, for God’s sake. Who else was there? No one got into the garden. The police already checked.’

  ‘There was Callum. There was . . . Bill . . .’ And there was the problem. If it had to be someone, then it had to be either my husband or these friends of ours.

  ‘Cal had passed out, you know that. He was hammered, and we’d smoked all that weed. And Bill had gone to bed ages before, and – I think I’d know the difference in six foot four and five foot nine, Al.’ Her usual tone had crept through, even in all this. Karen the wise and cool, showing me the ropes. Teaching me about real life. ‘Anyway, I know him. His jumper. His smell . . . I know him, Ali. Even if I was drunk. I’d have thought you, of all people, would know that shouldn’t matter.’

  ‘Maybe he didn’t know. Maybe he thought you’d say yes – if you had so many times before.’ I was clutching at straws now and I knew it. I’d lost this fight, lost it comprehensively, and now I was throwing punches, trying to hurt her maybe. As if she hadn’t been hurt enough. I’d seen that, hadn’t I, the bruises? She hadn’t made it up? But he couldn’t have. He couldn’t have. I was looking for a way for this all to fit, for Mike not to be a rapist and Karen not a liar. Maybe that didn’t exist.

  She pulled on her collar again. ‘He knew. And even if he hadn’t, I was way too drunk to consent. Again, Ali, I know you’re not thinking straight, but hear what you’re saying. You. I was drunk and maybe I wanted it because we slept together before? Come on.’

  ‘You’re saying you slept together for years! Twenty-five years, behind my back!’ It burst out of me. ‘What the hell?’ Did I even believe her? Mike had said just one time.

  ‘I know.’ She looked at the floor again. ‘I should say sorry, I know
that. And I am sorry for hurting you. God, I’d never want to hurt you, not ever. You’re . . . But there was just this thing, between us, this terrible dark thing that I couldn’t stop. We’d try but it . . . it always came back. Sooner or later. From the moment we met, that’s how it was, and I watched him with you all these years, and I didn’t say anything because I loved you too.’

  ‘Not enough not to sleep with my husband.’ I was crying now, tears falling on to my already damp robe, and Karen was screwing up her face, wiping the back of her hand over her eyes.

  ‘I know. I know. There’s nothing I can say. But none of that means this didn’t happen. Believe me, I wish it hadn’t.’ Her voice broke. ‘I don’t feel safe anywhere. Not in bed, not in an interview room. I can’t sleep or eat or even lie down and I . . . I don’t know if I ever will again. He took that.’

  ‘What do you want?’ I said desperately. ‘Why did you come here? I’m sorry that you’re hurt, truly I am, and I wish I could help, but how can I? What am I supposed to do?’

  ‘I came for Jake.’

  Then, I understood what she wanted from me. ‘I can’t . . . even if . . . Karen, it’s not up to us. The police actually saw it happen. He’ll get done for assault.’

  ‘They’re saying attempted murder. You know how long you get for that? A life sentence, could be. He’s only seventeen, Ali, but they could try him as an adult. You could – you could say that’s not what you want. Say he’s not like this, not normally. He’s a good boy, he’s not dangerous. Or that it was an accident, he didn’t mean to hurt Mike. He just slipped.’

  I hesitated. ‘But Karen, you know that’s not true. You were worried yourself. Remember?’ A few years ago, she’d taken Jake to a psychiatrist, concerned about the amount of time he spent in his room, his lack of friends, his sullen manner.

  She recoiled. ‘That’s not fair! It’s a totally different thing. He’s never been violent.’

  ‘Karen, I saw him stab Mike! Right in front of me! He’s still unconscious! And Cassie was there too, and she could have been hurt, she . . . I’m sorry this has happened, God knows I am. I wish none of it was true and we could just reset to Saturday morning. But we can’t. I can’t lie to the police. And if Jake gets out, he might try to hurt Mike again. He needs help, Karen. Let him get it.’

  She just looked at me. I looked back. And I felt the years of our friendship, the foundations of it under me, crumble away to nothing. She spoke so quietly at first I could hardly hear her. ‘I did it for you.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Martha. I helped you.’

  I opened my mouth to say it wasn’t the same at all, that had nothing to do with this, and I realised I was echoing Mike.

  ‘That night, Ali – he was with me. But not the whole time.’

  I stood up. ‘You need to go.’

  Karen nodded. She stood too.

  Bill was hovering in the kitchen, and Karen turned back to give me a look on her way out. I saw in a flash how it must appear to her. Him with the tea towel over his shoulder, the rumble of the dishwasher, the smell of pizza. Me in my dressing gown, naked and still soapy underneath. The domesticity of it all. As if Bill, the one who’d gone with her to the assault centre, the worst moment of her life, had chosen sides. Had chosen me. Karen said nothing as she left, but she didn’t need to. There were no words left.

  Chapter Sixteen

  ‘Will he wake up?’ Benji’s voice quavered as he watched his dad. Mike was grey and still, a terrible looseness in his face that told me he wasn’t simply asleep. Benji was in his school uniform, shirt creased with a smear of bright green marker on the collar. His face needed a scrub. Cassie, on the other hand, looked like she’d touched up her make-up before coming to the hospital. She hadn’t been back to school yet – she’d begged me to let her stay off, and I couldn’t find it in me to force her. Her face was like a doll’s, smooth with foundation, and her hair wafted hairspray as she moved. It was the next day. Time unspooling away from the night it happened, already Tuesday afternoon. I wanted to gather up these broken, fractured days, and run back and dump them in a heap, start again from Saturday. Not go to the meeting with Vix and Julie. Not let everyone get so drunk. Not go to bed when I did.

  ‘He’ll wake up,’ I said, though I wasn’t at all sure. The doctors were being cagey with me, comforting but vague. ‘He hit his head, so he just needs to rest it for a while.’

  ‘Jake did it.’ Benji’s lip was trembling too. ‘Why did he do it?’

  I looked at Cassie; she turned away. I said, ‘Because. He was very angry and upset, and he lashed out. I’m sure he didn’t mean to hurt Daddy.’

  ‘He meant to.’ Cassie’s voice was low and hard. ‘He looked right at me and he did it.’ Benji bit his lip. His eyes were full of tears, glassy and about to fall. ‘Dad threw himself in front of me,’ she told him. ‘He was really brave.’

  ‘Jake wouldn’t have hurt you, darling.’

  She looked at me. ‘He hurt Dad. Did you ever think he’d do that?’

  I thought of Jake, the sweet shy boy who’d come to my house every day after school until he was seven and we moved away. Crying on the day we left, the tears sliding down his nose and landing on the Jammy Dodger I’d given him to try and sweeten the blow. He hadn’t touched it, as if it was a point of principle. Even though I told myself we had to do what was best for our family, I’d found it hard to shake the feeling I’d abandoned Jake. Abandoned Karen. That we’d left a part of the family behind us.

  At least it must have stopped after that. The affair. Not an affair, he’d pleaded. Just the one time. And Karen saying no, it had infiltrated every moment I’d known both of them. Most of my life. Who was lying? The truth of this was for me a double-edged sword. Either the affair was real, in which case he’d lied to me, or she was making it up to hurt me. But why would she damage her own case like this? And if it was real, why would he rape her? I knew intellectually this was not how rape worked, but all the same I couldn’t get my head to accept it.

  I looked at Mike, his slack face with the tube pushing his lips out. Grotesque. He would have hated this. There were so many things I would have asked him. What really happened? I wanted dates, times, details. I wanted to go back to every photo, every memory, and have him tell me which ones I needed to burn and slash. Which ones were spoiled forever by what they’d done. Really, I wanted him to tell me it wasn’t true. Karen was a liar. None of this was real.

  I thought of what Karen had said the night before. Martha. Bringing it up after all these years. The memories gave me a sick feeling in the pit of my stomach. What did she mean, saying that?

  I looked at the clock on the wall. Already five. I had to get the kids home, feed them, soothe them somehow, keep them on the rails. Cassie had her exams. Benji had SATs and football try-outs and God knows what else. It seemed never-ending, the hoops they had to jump through. And another worry was nagging at me – I had to speak to their schools and Mike’s firm. If he got suspended, what did that mean for his salary? The money I brought in barely covered food for the month.

  ‘Come on, guys, we should go.’

  ‘We can’t leave Dad here by himself!’ Benji’s voice was thick with tears.

  ‘He doesn’t know we’re here, sweetheart.’

  ‘You don’t know that. I saw a programme where people were in comas and they could hear voices and they knew you were there and everything.’

  I put my hand on his head, the springy soft hair that was so hard to brush. ‘Maybe he can, darling, you’re right. But he’d want us to go home and have dinner and do homework. You know he would.’

  ‘Mrs Morris. Hello Cassie, Benji.’ It was DC Adam Devine, sounding genial and relaxed. Benji brightened to see him; he thought being a policeman was cool, like in Kindergarten Cop. Catching the bad guys, keeping us safe. But who was the bad guy in this case? Benji’s father?

  Adam met my eyes and a chill went through me – what now? Could there be anything else he had to tell me?
Surely we were at rock bottom now? ‘Cass, will you take Benj to the snack bar?’

  ‘Can I get cake?’ said Benji. Cassie scowled. She felt her brother was getting too fat.

  ‘Of course, baby.’ I fumbled a tenner into Cassie’s hand, pleading with my eyes. Please. Don’t judge me. Cut me some slack.

  DC Devine watched them go, then looked at me.

  ‘What is it?’ My voice was trapped in my throat, fluttering like the birds that sometimes got into our chimney.

  ‘We should sit down.’ He guided me to a rack of chairs at the end of the corridor, upholstered in pale green pleather. I wondered how much bad news had been delivered between these walls. I did as he asked, adopting the same straight-backed ready-for-a-job-interview stance I’d taken while speaking to Karen last night.

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘Jake Rampling’s bail hearing is tomorrow.’

  ‘Will they keep him in?’

  He screwed up his face. ‘It depends. If they think he poses a danger, they might.’

  ‘And if they let him out, and he comes here? If he tries to hurt Mike again?’ It was unthinkable, Jake in jail, but if the alternative was him coming here and stabbing my children’s father, it had to be done. ‘So you came to tell me – what, he might get out?’

  ‘There’s something else you should know. Something that might affect the case.’

  I waited. I had learned, already, to wait for the blows, bracing myself.

  ‘Ms Rampling is claiming . . . she’s stated that Jake is your husband’s son. That Mike is his father.’

  Karen

  The police had helped her find a small flat to stay in while Jake was in custody. A living room with a strip of kitchen and cupboard of a bathroom, a small bedroom. Nicer than many flats she’d lived in when she first had Jake. She wondered where he was now, what kind of cell he was sleeping in. Even though it hurt her like an ache below her heart, to imagine him in there, she also knew she couldn’t bear to have him here. Pitying. Picturing her like that, helpless and hurt and bleeding. She hated it.