This Stolen Life

by This Stolen Life (retail) (epub)

  Nate glanced up. ‘Hmm… yeah. We don’t want the coals to go out.’

  In the kitchen, he passed Nate’s girlfriend Cara and a couple of her friends. They had finished chopping up bits for salad and were divvying up a bottle of red wine between them. Cara waved to him.

  ‘Sahan. Come join us.’ One of the other girls, Bex, waggled an empty glass at him.

  He couldn’t stand wine. ‘Can’t.’ He grinned. ‘I’ve got to get the umbrella over the barbecue. I told you it would rain,’ he said pointedly to Cara.

  ‘It always rains at barbecues,’ Cara shouted after him. ‘It’s traditional.’

  Sahan picked up his waterproof coat and the golfing umbrella that someone had ‘liberated’ from somewhere. He pulled his coat on as he went through the kitchen, grabbed two beers off the counter, flipped his hood up and dived back out into the drizzle.

  The raindrops grew bigger and hissed onto the barbecue, releasing plumes of steam. He fumbled with the catch and got the umbrella up.

  ‘Perfect timing.’ Nate grabbed the tongs and flipped the burgers over with a flourish. The air smelled of rain, smoke and cooking meat. Sahan had to angle the umbrella away from himself in order to keep the barbecue dry.

  The rain pattered against his face, despite the hood on his waterproof. He shook his head. ‘This is ridiculous.’ He looked down at the meat on the grill, which was blackened in places, still dull red in others. He knew that it would taste disgusting. The salad would taste of nothing. The meat would be mostly smoke and charring. The only way he was going to get through this was to get drunk. Which was fine for today, but would be hell on a plate tomorrow.

  He wanted to go home. Where it rained properly in fat drops that submerged everything and made plants grow. Not this mean-spirited, spit-in-your-face rain. Where the sun made a proper effort. When you never, ever, EVER got so cold that you could feel your bones ache.

  He must have made a noise because Nate looked up. ‘You okay?’

  ‘Just… thinking.’

  ‘Sure?’

  ‘I’m fine. Although I think that I could do with another beer,’ he said.

  A few minutes later the rain stopped. Sahan folded up the umbrella and leaned against the side of the house, drinking his beer.

  ‘Hey,’ Cara’s friend Bex came out and leaned on the wall right next to him. Bex was, as far as he could tell, a nice person. She had brown hair, currently tied into childish plaits, and a freckled nose. Once upon a time, he might have found her cute. She was wearing an oversized cardigan, which had slipped off on one side to show a vest strap and a few inches of bare shoulder. Flesh exposed for effect. Sahan tried to shift away from her.

  ‘So, how’s the barbecue doing?’ she said, making a show of craning her head to look, even though she could see Nate’s handiwork at least as well as he could.

  ‘I wouldn’t trust anything that comes off that grill,’ said Sahan.

  ‘Yeah, well then you’d have to survive eating salad,’ said Nate. ‘And you know who made that.’ He raised his eyebrows at Bex.

  ‘Even I can’t poison a salad, Nate,’ she replied, laughing.

  Sahan tried to laugh too, but couldn’t. Nate threw a swift glance his way. Sahan ignored it.

  ‘How’s the play coming along?’ Nate asked Bex.

  Bex did lighting at the drama club. Sahan tried to listen to her chatting, but his jaws had clamped together and his pulse was in his ears. Bex somehow managed to edge even closer to him, so that her too-slippery-to-stay-on cardigan brushed his arm, making him jump. Acid rose in his throat.

  ‘I… uh… just remembered I told my parents I’d call them before they go to bed. With the time difference and all… I don’t want them to wait up.’ Sahan peeled away from the wall. ‘I’ll be back in two seconds.’ He managed to fake a smile before he dived back into the house.

  He ran past the girls in the kitchen. In the safety of his room, he got the nausea under control. Not for the first time, he cursed Tamsin. He hadn’t been like this before. He had been normal when he’d arrived in England to start his engineering degree. A little scared, a little naive, but mostly… normal.

  The thought of Tamsin brought with it a combination of disgust and humiliation that made his stomach clench. If he didn’t do something about it, release some of the pressure, it would carry on, building up in his chest until he couldn’t breathe. There were things even beer couldn’t shift. Everything around him felt tainted by Tamsin. The only place that was clean was home, but that was several thousand miles away. Another kick of homesickness to add to the mix. Well, at least that he could do something about. He pulled out his mobile phone, tapped into the cheap calls app and called home.

  The phone rang for a while and went to answerphone. He left a short message to say he’d call back tomorrow and hung up. Were they out? He frowned and thought back to his conversation with them the previous week. Oh yes. There was that charity thing. His little sister, Priyanka, had been grousing about being made to go to it. While Sahan usually went along with what his father wanted, Priyanka seemed hell-bent on arguing about everything. He could picture them now, his father full of ebullient good will because he was in public, Priyanka sniping behind her smile about being forced to go to the event and his mother, always the peacemaker, trying to keep them both happy. He missed them so much it hurt.

  The next best thing would be to call his cousin Yamuna.

  On the other side of Hull, the phone rang in his cousin’s hallway. ‘Gamage residence.’ Yamuna spoke English with a faint East Riding accent, as though she’d lived here all her life. It was one of the things Sahan admired about her. She’d figured out that the thing that stood in her way wasn’t necessarily the colour of her skin, but her accent. She’d said to him ‘learn to speak like you belong and people will forget you don’t’. It was something he was trying his hardest to emulate.

  ‘Yamuna Akki, it’s me, Sahan.’

  ‘Oh, hi Sahan. How’re you? We haven’t heard from you in a while. Are you okay?’

  He felt a stab of guilt. He should have called to see her more often. He hadn’t seen her or the baby in weeks. ‘I’m okay. I was thinking it would be nice to see you guys again. I’ve been really bad at keeping in touch and I thought…’

  ‘Sure. Sure. Why not.’ She sounded distracted. ‘Let me see.’ He could hear her footsteps as she walked across the kitchen in her house. She would be looking at the big calendar where she blocked out dates when Bim was away on business. ‘Why don’t you come for dinner weekend after next?’

  ‘That would be brilliant. Thanks, Akki.’ He drew breath to ask her how everyone was. Little Louie must be nearly four months old now.

  ‘Listen, Sahan. I have to go,’ she said. ‘Can I call you back tomorrow? Maybe in the afternoon?’

  ‘Uh… sure. Of course. If not, I’ll see you in a few days anyway.’

  ‘Yes. Lovely. I’ll see you soon. Have a good rest of the weekend.’

  ‘I will. We’re having a barbecue—’ But she was gone. Odd. She wasn’t normally that brusque. Still, he had his dinner invitation. That was all he needed right now. He leaned his head back against the wall and concentrated on taking deep breaths. A few more minutes to get himself under control and he could go back downstairs. He’d have to stay well away from Bex, though. This was the second time she’d tried to flirt with him.

  * * *

  Yamuna waited up for Bim that evening. It was later than usual, but he had dutifully called Yamuna to say he would be late. She had, just as dutifully, thanked him for letting her know. She had mentioned, briefly, that the girl from Sri Lanka had arrived. It was quiet in the house and, since the girl had sat with Louie until he fell asleep, Yamuna had finished her chores and even had time to drag out some paperwork to look at.

  When Bim arrived, she sat back and rubbed her eyes. Bim shut the door quietly and, leaving his shoes and briefcase neatly by the door, he padded into the kitchen, stretching his neck from side to side as he
went. He walked past, not looking in her direction, so he didn’t notice her.

  Yamuna watched him put the kettle on. She had left a mug out for him, like she always did. She smiled to see his hand stray to the wrong cupboard before he remembered where they kept the tea bags. They’d been in the new house for well over six months now, but he still automatically reached to where he used to keep things in his bachelor days. He had kept everything out on the work surface, ready for when he got home. Yamuna liked things put away. He had never objected. In fact, he rarely objected to anything she wanted. She was quite lucky, really. She sighed.

  Bim startled and turned around. ‘Oh, hello,’ he said. ‘What are you doing up?’

  She went over and took another mug out. ‘Let me.’ She took down the teapot and put in couple of tea bags. ‘How was work?’

  ‘It was fine. Busy.’ He leaned against the sink and watched her. ‘You didn’t have to wait up for me, you know.’

  ‘I know.’ She didn’t look up. Before Louie, she had always waited up for him, or tried to. When she was pregnant, he’d come home many an evening to find her asleep at the kitchen table, her notes from work spread out in front of her.

  ‘So, the new servant girl arrived,’ he said.

  Yamuna looked up sharply, frowning. ‘You can’t call her that,’ she said.

  ‘Why not?’ He looked genuinely baffled. It astounded Yamuna how he had managed to live in England for so long and yet remain so clueless about social norms. On the other hand, he would never have had to consider domestic details like servants before.

  ‘That sounds all wrong. People don’t have servants here. She’s a nanny.’ She had considered ‘au pair’ but that didn’t quite fit.

  Bim stared at her, in that thoughtful way of his, for a few seconds. ‘You’ve really thought about this. I’m glad I have you to stop me blundering into things.’

  She didn’t know what to say to this.

  He smiled. ‘The nanny, then. Anyway, she arrived okay, clearly.’

  Yamuna nodded and took the teapot over to the table. He followed her, carrying the two mugs.

  ‘She’s asleep now,’ said Yamuna. ‘She looked exhausted after the flight, poor thing.’ Should she mention that the girl looked different to the photograph the agency had sent? Probably best not. Bim would only ask her how that was relevant to her ability to look after Louie – which, of course, it wasn’t. Instead, she said, ‘She and Louie got on well, which is a relief. She seems good with him. I’ll stay with them for the next couple of days – teach her how we want things done – but I think she’ll be fine. He likes her.’

  They sat together in a silence broken only by the sound of Yamuna pouring tea. She pushed the mug over to him.

  ‘Oh, and Sahan invited himself over for dinner,’ she said. ‘I was going to order some food in from that place in Leeds. They’ll deliver if we pay extra.’

  He nodded. Before Yamuna had arrived, Bim had had no idea that there were Sri Lankan restaurants outside of London. Within a few weeks of starting work, a foodie colleague had mentioned one in Leeds and one in Scarborough to Yamuna. She assumed people must have told Bim about it too, but he simply hadn’t registered it. He seemed to have lived his life in a peculiar bubble – where business was all that mattered and everything else was irrelevant. She and Louie came into the bubble, just, but how long for? What happened when they drifted out of it? She pushed the thoughts back. Not helpful. She had to focus on the here and now, not worry about things that might not even happen.

  ‘How is Sahan?’ Bim seemed to get on with Sahan, which was lucky for Yamuna. Although by no means stupid, Bim himself had never gone to university. He had come over to work as an accounts clerk, but a lucky investment had made him wealthy. He had soon discovered that he had an eye for investment, which had led him to where he was today.

  Sahan, on the other hand, was academically gifted and had been pampered by his parents. She wouldn’t have been surprised if the two men had hated each other on sight, but they hadn’t. They seemed to regard each other with respect and perhaps even affection. All of which meant that keeping an eye on her little cousin was a pretty painless experience for her.

  ‘He’s okay, I think,’ said Yamuna. ‘I hadn’t heard from him in a while. It’s his final year, he must be busy.’ She smiled. ‘He only calls me when he’s homesick and wants some proper food.’

  Bim laughed softly. ‘He’s young. Why would he want to come and spend time with two middle-aged people like us?’ He added, quickly, ‘Well, me, anyway. You’re not so old.’

  She resisted the urge to roll her eyes. ‘Thanks.’ Having Louie had aged her, she knew, but she was still seven years younger than Bim was.

  ‘You look tired,’ he said. He may as well have told her she looked old. Of course she looked tired. Louie didn’t let her sleep. She didn’t expect him to understand; Louie’s cries never seemed to penetrate his sleep.

  ‘I am tired,’ she said. What else was there to say?

  He picked up his mug and stood up. ‘Then let’s go to bed.’

  She nodded and stood up too. He waited while she rinsed out the teapot and they tiptoed upstairs. Yamuna whispered that she would go and check on Louie and went up the next flight of steps. The door to Louie’s room was ajar, even though she’d given Soma a baby monitor, so that she could shut her door and Louie’s.

  Having the door slightly open meant that Yamuna could pop her head in and check on her sleeping son. He lay flat on his back, arms spread out like he’d been knocked out. Totally relaxed in sleep. Yamuna watched him breathing. This was her boy. She had hoped that she and he would become a unit, a powerful team of two. Bim’s interest could wane now that he had an heir, but it wouldn’t have mattered because she and her baby would have a bond so powerful that it would sustain them both. She had expected to feel an intense connection to this little creature she had grown from her own tissue and bone. Instead, she felt… nothing. Tired, grumpy, sleep deprived, yes. But emotionally, nothing.

  To make things worse, friends and family kept telling her how she must be feeling overwhelmed with love. Too ashamed to tell them the truth, she forced a smile and agreed with them.

  Everyone had a dream of their future buried in their hearts and hers had included marriage and family, a Disney-like fable of true love and motherhood that would make her complete. When her previous relationships had ended, she’d told herself there was plenty of time to meet the right man. Yet she’d got older, passed the full bloom of her youth, and true love had never showed up. She’d had a career she liked, but it wasn’t enough, not really. In the end, when all the men she knew were married, she’d asked her parents to find her a husband. She didn’t mind that Bim was ambivalent towards her, because she was ambivalent towards him. But her baby… surely it was impossible for a normal woman to be ambivalent towards her child. Clearly there was something wrong with her, some deficit of personality that made her unfeeling. She had never been like that before, so maybe it was something that had come on later in life.

  Yamuna sighed and drew back from Louie’s room. As she tiptoed back downstairs to the bed she shared with her husband, she couldn’t help feeling cheated.

  Chapter Four

  Look what you made me do, little bitch.

  Soma woke up with a cry. In her nightmare, she was pinned to the floor by a dark shape. She lay still, rigid with fear, too afraid to open her eyes in case he was still there. The waking day filtered into her mind. Something was pressing down on her face. Something big, but not heavy and stale as she’d feared. She couldn’t smell him. In fact, it smelled nice in this dark place she didn’t recognize. Holding her breath, she listened. There were noises, clinks and gurgles. Somewhere she could hear voices. Recognition of where she was came all at once. In England. The thing on top of her was the duvet. She had somehow got it over her head. Excitement and fear tussled it out, making her feel ill. She opened her eyes and cautiously pushed her head out from under the bedcovers. The
light, which she had left on when she went to sleep, illuminated her tidy little room. It was still cosy and bright and safe. She sat up and hugged her knees.

  My name is Soma. She had to remember she was called Soma now. If she failed to respond to her name, Madam would suspect something. It was important that Madam didn’t suspect anything. The best way to achieve that was to be as quiet and inoffensive as possible. That went with being Soma. She had to do whatever Madam said and do it well.

  Hard work wasn’t a problem. She had been working at the garment factory since she was fifteen. A sudden pang of sorrow for what could have been surprised her. It could have all been so different. Teenaged Jaya had had a plan. She was going to save up her wages from working at the factory. Maybe she could have met someone. Maybe that young security guard who always smiled at her when she clocked in at work?

  She shook her head and the strange lack of weight made her reach up. Her scalp was covered in a thick layer of bristles. Her hair. Her beautiful hair that made her look like the woman in the shampoo commercial. Suddenly, her eyes were full of tears. She could never go back. That man had taken it all away. There had to be a new plan now. And that involved being Soma. Jaya and her ruined life had to be shut away and forgotten. It was the only way.

  She brushed the tears off her face and once again her fingertips touched the places where her hair used to be. No. She would never be the same person again. Maybe, if she tried, she could be someone luckier.

  Sliding out of bed, she looked for another layer to put on. Footsteps came up the stairs. She froze.

  Someone knocked on the door, a smart, impatient rap. Soma hurried to the door, removed the chair from where she’d wedged it, and opened the door. Madam was outside the door, fully dressed. Soma felt a stab of alarm. Was she supposed to have been up and ready?

  ‘I’m going to take Louie out for a few hours,’ said Madam. ‘I wanted to say, you can relax and get to know the place, if you want.’