The Alibi Girl

by C. J. Skuse

  ‘Hey Brave Lady Betsy!’ The shop doors are open for a delivery of garden furniture and Mr Zhang calls out to me from his crouched position stacking shelves with bleach. He smiles so widely and it’s unusual for his face to do so. Ask any customer – they do not get the same welcome from Mr Zhang as Betsy Warre. ‘How are you?’

  ‘I’m good today, thank you, Mr Zhang. A little tired, you know.’

  ‘Ah all the chemical shit, yes?’ He’s staring at my nose.

  ‘Yes,’ I smile meekly. ‘I tripped yesterday. I felt a bit faint after my chemo session and tripped down the steps at the hospital.’

  ‘Oh my fuck,’ he cries. ‘Bloody steps. Sit down, I do your shopping?’

  ‘No, honestly I’m fine. Just need to remember to get some tissues. Keeps bleeding. I’m really fine, Mr Zhang, thank you. I like to keep moving if I can.’

  ‘Okay then Brave Lady, okay, you move, you move.’

  ‘How about yourself and your wife? Are you keeping well?’

  ‘Oh yes, very well.’ He tells me about his wife’s operation and how much of her cancer they cut out. He accompanies me around the whole store, carrying my basket because my ‘weak chemo arms’ can’t possibly manage it and affords me four free cans of Whiskas and an extra kitchen roll with pink flowers on it. ‘I served your husband the other day. You not feeling good then?’

  ‘No, but I’m much better now. He’s not my husband actually. He’s my… dad.’

  ‘Your dad?’ He laughs. ‘Oh my fuck, I thought he your husband. He young!’

  ‘He looks young, yeah. Good genes.’

  ‘You not look like him. You black hair, he blonde.’

  ‘I was adopted.’

  ‘Ahhhhh, I see. You not come out of him.’

  ‘No, I didn’t come out of him.’

  He has some brand new axes on special offer behind the counter and we share a joke about axe murderers as he’s ringing through my purchases. ‘You tell your husband that he needs to do your shopping more often. Let you rest and get your strength.’

  ‘I will, Mr Zhang. Thank you.’

  ‘Bye now, Betsy, you take good care of yourself.’

  Feeling strengthened by Mr Zhang’s compassion I decide to head back to the flat, feed the cats, and then go to the police and tell them about The Three Little Pigs. It doesn’t have to be Scants. Why on earth didn’t I think of it before? The police don’t know me in this town. Yeah, that’s what I’ll do. I’ll explain everything.

  But when I get back, something feels off kilter. I step into the main hallway and immediately my senses are heightened. The light bulb’s gone. I use my phone light to guide me towards my pigeonhole – no post today. There’s a smell I don’t recognise. An aftershave. Not Kaden’s aftershave, I’d remember it. And the junkies upstairs don’t have money for aftershave. I get inside my flat and the cats all start meowing for me. Their litter trays stink. And the smell is there too. Stronger. Like someone’s just left.

  I switch on all the lights and check the rooms – nothing and no one. Paranoia again. I let out the cats who want to go, feeding the ones inside who don’t.

  ‘Alright, let’s sort you out first,’ I say, and it takes me a good hour but by the time I’m done, they’re all fed and watered and clean. But I do a lot of bending over. Bending down to put the bowls by the door. Bending down in my room for The Duchess who likes to sleep in the airing cupboard. Scraping out the litter trays into bin liners. And before I know what’s happening, my nose is bleeding like a tap.

  ‘Oh my god.’

  There’s so much blood. It gets everywhere. It’s on my bedroom carpet, in the bathroom, the sofa. My chest clenches. It won’t stop. And I’m back on the beach, aged ten, crying and panicking and coiling ragged toilet roll around my little hand.

  ‘It’s only a nosebleed,’ I sing-song, dashing about the flat looking for clean tea towels but realising all too soon that I have no clean tea towels or bath towels and so I’m wadding toilet paper again because that’s all I know how to do. I want to be sick. I watch the blood bloom on the tissue again and again where it won’t stop.

  The bin stinks so I wrap a good thick coil of kitchen paper around my hand and stuff it against my nose, taking the bag through the patio doors and up the steps and round to the bin sheds. Of course, that’s when I hear the roar of the motorbike as a headlight sweeps onto the gravel parking area. I couldn’t have timed it more perfectly if I tried – it’s him. Kaden. I momentarily forget how to breathe.

  And he is standing here, on the gravel, inches away from me. I force myself calm by deep breathing as I drop the bag into the bin and close the lid.

  ‘Oh, hiya,’ he says, taking off his helmet. ‘Popped out for some fish and chips. Fancied a pig out tonight. Been a looooooong day.’

  I make to leave but I at least acknowledge his greeting with a ‘Oh, right,’ and a misplaced giggle so I’m not being rude.

  ‘What’s happened to you?’ he asks, squinting in the brightness of the headlight.

  ‘Oh. I’ve got a nosebleed,’ I say as I’m overtaken by a sudden sweat all over my back and head.

  ‘Shit, looks pretty bad.’ He dismounts the bike and comes closer. I can’t smell perfume on him. It’s too dark to see any love bites.

  ‘Does it?’

  ‘Yeah, that tissue’s pretty red.’

  ‘Oh god. It’s alright, I’ll be alright.’ I can’t breathe by this point. ‘I don’t actually want to talk about it cos I feel a bit woozy.’

  ‘Alright, alright,’ he says and before I know what is happening he’s behind me, holding me. ‘Come on, let’s get you inside. Lean on me.’

  And so I do lean on him as he coils my arm around his neck and manoeuvres me round to the front of the building, unlocks the door and helps me inside. He plonks his bike helmet on the coffee table and grabs a fresh wad of kitchen roll.

  ‘Sit on the edge there and pinch that part of your nose for me. That’s it.’

  ‘It hurts.’

  ‘You need to stay there for a good ten minutes or more if you can. Until it stops.’

  ‘I can’t breathe.’

  ‘Breathe through your mouth. Relax, that’s right. Look, you don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to but – was it him who did this? The one you’re afraid of?’

  ‘What? No, I just get nosebleeds sometimes, that’s all.’ He doesn’t believe me but he doesn’t press me on it. It’s enough for him to suspect more but not confirm it.

  He checks around the room. ‘Where’s Emily?’ I don’t know what to say. So I let him guess. ‘Has he taken her? Your ex?’

  I bow my head and give a little half nod.

  ‘Right, I’m calling the police…’

  ‘No, wait,’ I say. He has his phone out and the numbers ready to dial. ‘I said he could take her. I took her from him in the first place. He won custody. Fair and square. It’s my fault.’ I fake-sob into his shoulder. No love bites, I notice. Maybe he wasn’t with her after all? Why did he say it’s been a ‘looooong day’? He left work early. He strokes my hair and I let out an involuntary whelp which I pretend is a sob.

  ‘God, I’m so sorry, Joanne. I’m so sorry.’

  ‘Oh I’ve dripped on your trousers,’ I sniff, pulling back.

  ‘It’s alright,’ he says, placing a gloved hand on my arm and he smiles with such a sparkle I can’t concentrate on being mad at him. ‘Have you got any frozen peas?’

  ‘No. I don’t really eat veg.’

  ‘We need to get an ice pack on it, really. You got any ice? Anything cold?’

  ‘I’ve got some katsu curry chicken breasts in the freezer. It’s a box though.’

  ‘I’m gonna go out and grab my fish and whack it in my oven, and then I’ll see what I’ve got in mine.’

  ‘Oh, I’ll be alright.’

  ‘You’re not alright. It’s bleeding through that tissue. I won’t be long.’

  So I sit there, on the edge of the sofa, waiting. Face throbbing, che
eks burning with shame. Mouth all dry.

  And then I spot it, flashing inside his helmet on the coffee table. His phone. He’s had an email. From someone called Cynthia Currie.

  My heart sinks. Kaden and Cynthia sitting in a tree, K-I-S-S-I-N-G.

  But the email seems to be about a job.

  Re: December job in Liverpool of any interest?

  But I can’t read any more of Cynthia’s message because the message flashes off.

  And then I remember the morning I had the meltdown. And he took me to Full of Beans and bought me a milkshake. And I saw him punch the code in on his phone.

  Three, lots of noughts, then three again. I listen for footsteps on the stairs.

  I don’t think anymore. I reach for it and punch in the number. His home screen flashes up. Unlocked. Accessible. Here goes everything. He has several emails, all about possible jobs. Nothing untoward. Nothing questionable. Cynthia’s his boss! Oh, the relief. I click back to the Home screen and my finger hovers over Photos.

  There could be another woman on there. Evidence of their romance. Them on holiday on some beach kissing under a waterfall. Rosy-cheeked bed selfies. The pain in my chest overtakes the throb in my nose. Still no footsteps on the stairs.

  I need to look. Win, lose or draw, I need to know. So I click on the app.

  My Albums. Cover photo is the sunset, looking out towards the Lakes.

  WhatsApp. Photos of himself, posing before a mirror. Full abs. One from above. Sparkling eyes. There’s one of him holding his winky so it’s all strangled and red.

  I can’t catch my breath. ‘Oh my god.’

  I don’t want to venture any further inside these photos but I have to know. What he does, who he talks to, what kind of messages he sends. I go into WhatsApp. Lots of messages to lots of different women. Pictures of the winky again. Pictures from them too. I click out, beginning to feel sick. He’s into sexting.

  I go back to Photos. They tell me the Locations he’s visited in the past year. The gym. The park. A service station on the M6. Spain last summer. Lots of London.

  Screenshots. Personal training invoices. I haven’t got time to go through them.

  Then I hear him coming down the main stairs. I click on the main Camera Roll.

  And a tessellation of little images comes up. Long shots. Close ups. Zooms. All pictures of a young woman.

  All pictures of me.

  10

  Thursday, 31st October – HALLOWEEN

  Even the doughnut man Johnny notices my good mood this morning.

  ‘Hey, Charlotte. You’re looking chipper today.’ Then he frowns. ‘What’s happened to your face?’

  ‘Oh I tripped over a cat on the steps. It’s no biggy.’ My Maybelline foundation has done its best but the bruising’s come out now so the ‘I just get nosebleeds’ conceit won’t wash with anyone.

  ‘You ought to get that seen to. The usual, is it?’

  ‘I’ll be alright. It doesn’t hurt so much today.’ Nothing does. ‘I was going to settle for a bottle of water, Johnny, but go on then, you’ve tempted me.’

  ‘I’ll put a fresh batch on for you,’ he winks, lowering the basket into the fryer. There’s no sign of the strange man – it’s like he was never here. The sun is warm already and it feels wonderful on my aching face. ‘So what’s with all the smiles today then? Any particular reason?’

  ‘Not really,’ I lie. ‘Well, we sold my last novel Master of None to Thailand and Vietnam. So that was great news.’

  ‘Amazing! Well done you. How many countries is that now?’

  ‘Oh I forget,’ I laugh. ‘Around fifty-odd. I think. Thereabouts.’

  ‘Quite the international superstar, aren’t you?’ he grins, flicking the doughnuts over in the basket. ‘I had a look for your books on Amazon actually.’

  ‘Oh did you?’

  ‘Yeah. Couldn’t find them.’

  I frown. ‘That’s strange.’

  ‘Or Book Depository. Waterstones had never heard of you.’

  ‘My publisher might have taken them off for the time being – they’re all getting new covers.’

  ‘Ah, I see.’

  ‘I make most of my money abroad anyway. I’m really big in Russia. And Bahrain.’ They’re the first two places I can think of.

  ‘Ah, right,’ he says and I can’t tell if I’ve convinced him or not. ‘So why all the smiles today then? Got a big date tonight?’

  ‘Oh no, nothing like that,’ I smile. ‘I don’t get the chance. Always too busy writing. No, I’m just happy today. It’s lovely and sunny. All’s good.’

  He flips the basket out onto the kitchen roll. ‘Thought I might have competition,’ he winks at me again, ripping a bag down from the string. I can tell he’s only flirting harmlessly, like he does to all women who stop at his van. But as I’m walking away, flicking my scarf over my shoulder, it occurs that I must be more attractive than I think. I have TWO men lusting after me – Johnny the doughnut man and Kaden Cotterill, the hunk from upstairs.

  Two men after me. Who’d have thought?

  Today I’m officially In Love. And it feels fantastic. I had a wonderful evening with Kaden, after I’d found the pictures of me on his phone. I mean, at first I was confused and disturbed and when he came back downstairs with the peas I was crying and when he found out why he got angry because I’d been looking through his phone. Then it all came out – how he’d got this enormous crush on me and couldn’t find the words. And he knew I’d had ‘a tough time with Emily’s dad’ and he didn’t think I was ready for another relationship.

  And then we kissed. Well I kissed him. On the lips. For eight seconds.

  I’m blushing at the memory. The actual memory.

  He shared his fish and chips with me. And we talked. And he invited me to his Fight Klub class tonight where he’s going to teach me some self-defence moves. And then we watched some ’50s detective thing on TV and kissed again, this time for twenty-two seconds. And it was a little open-mouthed at one point, but no tongues. Then he went back upstairs, which I thought was so romantic. People on TV normally start ripping their clothes off but this felt more respectful. Like old-fashioned courting.

  I barely slept. And I haven’t stopped smiling since I woke up.

  I am a bit worried about ‘It’ because he’s bound to want It. A guy like Kaden, who shares naked pictures of himself online to random women, is going to want a woman who knows what she’s doing. And I know nothing. Well, next to nothing. I know where everything goes. And what needs touching and licking and whatnot. Ugh. Can I really do all that? Now I’m in love, maybe I won’t mind so much.

  When he said those words – ‘I think I’m falling in love with you’ – I felt it in my knees. I’d never understood what people mean by ‘weak at the knees’ until then. I’ve been having little fantasies about him all morning, all fully clothed ones. Holding each other. Strolling round a tourist attraction or a garden centre, picking out hanging baskets. Pushing a trolley together around Lidl and crossing things off our list, in DIY stores picking MDF for our box room shelves. Living together in our own house, him mowing the lawn, me standing there holding open the bin bag. Getting married in the feathered wedding dress Foy designed for me when we were little – I found the original drawing of it folded up inside one of my Beatrix Potters.

  But real, naked intimacy. Making love. Having sex. That would take things to the next level. A more grown-up level. It makes me shudder. We’ll take it slowly. I’ll ask him about it tonight at Fight Klub. Try and get a sense of when exactly he might want to put his winky in my noo-noo. Makes me giggle to think about it.

  My joyful bubble bursts the second I walk into the staff office at The Lalique.

  ‘Genevieve, your face looks like a pepperoni pizza,’ laughs Claire.

  ‘Thanks,’ I say, clocking in.

  Vanda pipes up then. ‘A stag party threw up all over the gents’ toilets last night. We have cordoned it off. You get in there now. And we’re out of
bleach. You’ll just have to scrub and flush many times.’

  I don’t think Vanda has ever once said to me Good morning or Goodbye. She merely barks an order and leaves the room. I don’t mind so much today. All the vomit in the world – and there was a lot of it in that toilet – couldn’t stop me thinking about Kaden. I put a peg on my nose so it’s not so bad.

  After that I’m sent to the Floor 3 to finish off Faith’s rooms because she’s had to dash off to her kid’s emergency dentist’s appointment. But it’s only the last five rooms and it’s so peaceful up there, nobody about. Yes, I’m changing soiled bedsheets and bleaching toilets and wiping hairs from bath tubs with a damp cloth, but in my head, the Flower Duet from Lakme is playing and Kaden and I are walking around the gardens of a stately home. He’s wrapping his zip up Adidas jacket around me when the breeze gets up, and asking where I want to go for lunch: the quaint tea room we passed on the way to Beatrix Potter’s house or the Drive-Thru McDonald’s on the motorway.

  My mind is definitely not on the job. And Vanda can’t wait to call me on it.

  ‘Fuck’s sake, Genevieve, why you not report the mattress burn in Room 37? Now they won’t pay their bill and we’ll get docked our wage.’

  ‘Fuck’s sake, Genevieve, it’s two waters in Room 32, one in Room 33. And why you not put vanity kits in Room 38? How many more times?’

  She sounds like the Grand High Witch when she shouts. I remember Isaac reading The Witches to me and Foy at bedtime once when I was staying. He’d always do the voice so brilliantly. And today I don’t care. Any other day, every word would seep into my skin like acid and burn me all day long but today? It doesn’t matter. Because I have Kaden now. I am bulletproof.

  And as she shouts at me, getting right up in my face, I’m thinking about his body in those WhatsApp pictures. I’m wondering if he sleeps on his back or foetal like I do. Whether he snores. Maybe he sleeps naked. I chuckle to myself.