by Ruth Mancini
So I told her, from the beginning. I told her the whole story, while Tim and Zara and Annalise listened too. Annalise got up from time to time to move things around on the stove.
“The bastard. I knew something wasn’t right that night,” Shelley said. “And I knew he was up to no good, walking into your flat and acting like he owned the place. Kicking us all out.”
I put down my wine glass and looked up at her. “You remember that? Only, you know, I don’t even know if Helena believes me anymore. She did, when I first told her. But now she’s met Catherine and Sky, she’s heard their side of things and they’ve convinced her that I was the one who kicked you all out. Because I wanted to sleep with Martin.”
Shelley shook her head. “Oh no. No way. You were completely wasted. You were legless. I mean, we were all pretty drunk, but you... you could barely stand. You kept falling over. In fact, you fell over, into the punch bowl, more than once. I remember you lying on the floor, looking a right mess. I thought you were going to throw up.”
I was astonished. “You’ve got a good memory, Shelley. It was a long time ago. I wasn’t sure if you’d remember.”
“I remember, alright,” said Shelley. “You want to know why?”
“Why?”
“I didn’t want to tell you at the time, because you were friends with Catherine and I didn’t want to make waves. But he threatened me that night.”
I gasped. “Martin?”
Shelley nodded. “When he told us all to leave. Ordered us, I should say. I told him that I was going to look after you. That I was a nurse and that I was worried you were going to be sick, and that I wanted to stay with you. He said, ‘What kind of a nurse lets someone get into that state?’ He told me I was pathetic and that I was to blame for the mess you were in, and that if I didn’t get the fuck out, he’d report me to the NMC for misconduct, for bringing the profession into disrepute...”
I was so shocked, I was speechless. “He said that?”
“Misconduct?” Tim sneered. “That’s ridiculous. How could he report you for letting someone get drunk?
Shelley put her face in her hands. I looked at Tim and back at Shelley again.
Shelley took a deep breath. “He said that it was obvious we’d been taking drugs.”
“Drugs? What kind of drugs?” asked Tim.
“We weren’t taking drugs...” I started to object. I stopped in my tracks and looked at Shelley. “Were we?”
“No! I mean, I don’t know...” Shelley looked distressed. “I didn’t see any. And the thought didn’t even cross my mind until he suggested it. But when he said it, I was petrified. Nurses can get struck off for that sort of thing, whether it’s in work time or out. I knew that if he reported me I’d be in serious trouble. He wouldn’t have to prove a thing. And so I did what he asked and left.
“When I saw you the next day and you seemed okay, I just decided, you know, no harm done. I didn’t want to cause any trouble. It was only later that I actually found out that Gavin snorted cocaine, and did other stuff too – they were all doing it. That’s why I finished with him; I didn’t want to be involved in any of that. So, yes. They were probably doing drugs in your flat, not that Martin had any way of knowing that, one way or the other. He was obviously just trying to get rid of us so that he could.... and I did then wonder about you, Lizzie. The state you were in that night. You were so much more out of it than anyone else. I’d never seen anyone quite that bad on a few glasses of punch. Looking back, what with you not remembering anything and all, I realised that they may have spiked your drink. They were idiots, the lot of them. I’m so sorry that I brought them into your home.”
I sat and listened to her with my mouth open. I couldn’t believe what I was hearing.
“I really didn’t want to leave you.” Shelley persisted. “I didn’t want to go, honestly. I was scared of Martin, that’s the truth. But when I saw you at the hospital the next day – the day that Uncle Silbert died – you seemed okay. I asked you if you were alright, and you said you were.”
“I was too ashamed to tell anyone,” I said. “I thought I’d betrayed Catherine. I didn’t remember anything. I didn’t know what had happened.”
“It looks like we know what happened,” said Tim. “It looks as though you were drugged.”
“I’m so sorry, Lizzie,” said Shelley. “I should never have left you alone with him. I thought he was genuinely angry with me, that he was going to take care of you. At least, I think I did. But deep down I knew something wasn’t right. What happened to you – it’s all my fault for being such a coward.”
“Shelley, no!” I protested. “Don’t let him guilt-trip you too! Don’t let him claim another victim. He bullied you and he threatened you. I, of all people, know what he’s like.”
Annalise shook her head. “I think you should report him to the police. There’s no time limit for reporting a rape. He sounds like a nasty piece of work. He’s a danger to the public.”
“Who would believe me?” I asked.
“Us,” said Tim, Zara, Shelley and Annalise in unison.
The support felt incredible, after all these months of defending myself to everyone around me. I felt tears welling up in my eyes. I was like a leaky tap, I thought. Until someone went in and fixed the leak, I was just going to keep on dripping.
“You’ve got a witness,” said Annalise.
“Two,” said Zara. “I was there too.”
I shook my head. “But neither of you were actually in the room when it happened.”
“I saw how you were the next day, though,” said Zara. “You were in bits.”
“There’s rarely, if ever, any witness to a rape,” Annalise said. “That’s why it’s so hard to prove. It always just comes down to one person’s word against the other’s. But the police and the CPS are taking complaints of rape much more seriously these days, and evidence of how Martin was on the night from Shelley, along with evidence of recent complaint – that’s what it’s called when you tell someone straight after – from Zara... that’ll go a long way to supporting your account.”
I looked at her. “I’m really grateful for your advice. I just don’t know what he’d do if I got him arrested for raping me. He’d be bound to get bail after all this time, and then what would he do? He’d want blood. I don’t know how my daughter would take it. She doesn’t want to believe any of this about him. If it caused a rift between us – me and her – it would be worse than living with what he did.”
I absent-mindedly twisted the stem of my wine glass with my thumb and forefinger. The glass toppled over and spilled red wine over the lovely white tablecloth. Annalise and I both jumped up.
“I’m so sorry!” I said. “I’m such an idiot.”
“Don’t be silly,” Annalise smiled, “It’s just a bit of wine. It will come out.” She dabbed at it with a wet tea towel and sprayed something onto it before sitting back down again.
“Ah,” smiled Tim, looking at me fondly and trying to lighten the tone. “I feel better now. It wouldn’t be a proper evening with Lizzie unless something got spilled or broken.”
I patted his hand. “I’m glad I haven’t disappointed you, Tim.”
“Gavin could be a witness, too,” said Shelley, suddenly. “He was there when Martin threatened me. He wanted to clock him one, but I was worried about them having a fight in your flat and breaking stuff. Plus Gavin was drunk and Martin was sober – it was pretty obvious who was going to come off worse. I had to practically drag Gavin away.”
“Do you know him still?” asked Zara.
“No,” admitted Shelley. “But he’s on Facebook. It would be easy enough to get in touch.”
“He probably won’t remember,” I said. “It was probably just some stupid drunken argument to him. And if they were taking drugs, if one of his friends spiked my drink, he’s never going to admit that.”
“I suppose,” Shelley agreed.
“You know, I’m going to have to think about this. But
thank you,” I added, looking at each of them in turn. “You don’t know how much it means to me to have friends who are on my side.”
“Right. Well, there’s no rush, is there? And in the meantime, dinner’s ready,” said Annalise.
The food was delicious. We ate slow roasted lamb with rosemary and garlic and creamy mashed potatoes and a selection of vegetables, which were all home grown. The twins – Joni (which her parents pronounced Johnny) and Harri – came in from the garden and joined us, and I couldn’t help but notice what a happy little family they all made. I watched the girls closely and listened with pleasure as they bantered with their father throughout the meal, with occasional input from their mother. I couldn’t help but think, with a pang of regret, that this would have been my life, if I’d loved Tim; I might have lived here in this lovely old Georgian house in Shoreditch, with Tim and our children, and the garden full of vegetables. Of course, I knew that it was just the apparent simplicity of their lives that I envied in this moment – their obvious freedom from the worry and the strain that I’d been living these last few months. It wasn’t that I really regretted the path that I had chosen, and I was truly happy for Tim. No-one could have been more deserving of a good, contented life full of laughter and love.
Needless to say, the twins were both tall and dark-haired like their parents and I marvelled at their identical looks. I’d never seen identical twins before and I was fascinated at the way they stayed so close together, at all times, as if they had continued to grow up in a small space together for the fourteen years after they’d left their mother’s womb. I was introduced to them as they sat down at the table and so could remember easily which one was Joni and which one was Harri, but once the meal was over and they started moving round the kitchen and helping with the dishes, I quickly lost track of who was who.
“Joni, cover that first, please,” Annalise called out to the girl nearest the fridge. She turned to the girl standing next to her. “Harri, can you get her the foil from the drawer?”
I looked from one girl to the other in confusion as they then moved across the room, trying to remember who had been wearing what.
I offered to wash the dishes while Annalise dried and Zara and Shelley chased a football round the garden with Tim and the girls.
“How do you tell them apart?” I asked.
“You just know,” she said. “Well, we do, Tim and I. Our parents still can’t tell the difference and it frustrates the hell out of them. Especially as they always want their hair cut exactly the same. Though there are differences, if you look closely. Joni’s nose is slightly straighter than Harri’s, and Harri has a tiny mole on her left ear.”
“They’re lovely,” I commented, looking out of the window. “You must be very proud. They’re so clever, and funny too.”
“Thank you,” Annalise smiled.
“So what are their names short for?” I asked. “Is Harri really Harriet?”
“No,” she laughed. “They’re just Joni and Harri.”
“Really?”
Annalise put down the tea towel and stacked a pile of plates, which she then lifted into the cupboard. “We were told we were expecting boys, twin boys, and so we picked their names. We were good to go. They were Johnny and Harry.” She smiled. “You know what it’s like in the beginning, when you’re first expecting? You call them silly names, like ‘George and Geoffrey’ and ‘The Beans’, but from the twenty-week scan onwards, they were real little people. And as soon as we could, we called them by their names. When they arrived, and they were girls after all, their names were so entrenched that we couldn’t imagine calling them anything else. So we decided to stick with what we’d got.”
I laughed. “Well, it suits them.”
“That’s what we thought, too.”
I put the last of the cutlery into the drainer and squeezed out the dishcloth. I looked up at Annalise. “Thank you so much,” I told her. “Not just for the dinner. I’ve been feeling a bit under attack lately and you don’t know how good it feels to have someone on your side.”
“I am on your side,” Annalise said.
“But you don’t know me,” I said. “At least, you didn’t, before tonight. You don’t owe me anything. You didn’t have to be so supportive.”
Annalise looked at me. “I believe you, Lizzie. I believe that he raped you. That’s the thing. If you do choose to report it, I’d come with you to give a statement.”
I took off the Marigold gloves I was wearing and tipped the dirty water out of the bowl and into the sink. I watched it as it swirled down the plughole and considered how nice it would be to do that to Martin, to just swish him away into the sewers, along with the rats.
I looked at Annalise. “Really?”
“Really. I heard the whole story from a pretty independent angle. I think you could convince a jury. You’d be good in the witness box.”
I sighed. “You haven’t met Martin. He’s pretty good at manipulating people. I can see him now. He’d have the jury eating out of his hands.”
“Well, that might be true. And I’m not saying that it will be easy. But you’d have help.” She nodded out of the window.
I sighed. “I’m not sure how good a witness Zara would make. You know? She’d been through a lot at that time. They’d probably just say she was mentally unstable. It wouldn’t be fair to put her through that. And, besides, it was such a long time ago. They’ll just say I’m out to get him, won’t they, because I don’t want him seeing my daughter? They’d make me out to be some vengeful, crazy, possessive mother.”
Annalise shrugged. “That would be their case. But you’re telling the truth, and that counts for a lot. You’d be believed, I think. And Shelley would confirm that you were too wasted that night to give the necessary consent.”
I sighed. “I don’t know. I’m scared. Not of facing him, but of losing my daughter. She’s so involved with Sky, so open to what he has to tell her, and I can understand why. She doesn’t want to believe all this about her father. And imagine what it would do to her, having it all brought up in court, the horrible way that she came into this world.”
Annalise nodded. “I understand. I can see what you’re saying. But it makes my blood boil that he’s got away with it.”
I smiled. “Mine too. He gets away with everything. But, I guess nobody said that life was fair.”
Tim stepped in from the garden and sank into a chair, breathing heavily.
“Are you okay?” I asked.
“I think I’ve strained a muscle,” Tim said, patting his stomach. “I think I needed to stretch them a bit first.”
“I think you stretched those ‘muscles’ quite enough during dinner,” said Annalise. “Tomorrow, you’re having nothing but porridge and fruit.”
She stepped out into the garden.
“So,” said Tim. “What’s the plan?”
“The plan?”
“The psycho,” said Tim. “What are you going to do about him?”
“I don’t know,” I admitted. “I know Annalise is right, that I probably should report him. But I’m scared about Helena, about the effect on her. She won’t thank me for it. She won’t understand.”
“Even if she hears from Shelley that someone spiked your drinks?”
I sighed. “I don’t know. I honestly don’t know if that will make a difference. Truth is, she thinks it was all a misunderstanding. Crossed wires, between me and Martin. That I didn’t make it clear enough, basically, that I didn’t like him in that way, and that somehow he gained the wrong impression. That’s what she wants to believe.”
Tim looked at me and gave me a half smile. I could see that he cared, but as a friend, this time. It was no longer personal, because he no longer loved me in that way. “So, what are we going to do about him, then?” he asked. “Want me to snuff him out?”
I laughed. “That’s not going to help, I’m afraid. I don’t think there’s any doubt that if Martin was murdered I’d be in the frame from the outset.
I practically am already. Sky, Catherine, Helena – they all think I’ve pretty much lost the plot as far as Martin is concerned.” I finished my wine and covered the top with my hand when Tim tried to fill it again. “You know, I never thought I’d hear myself say this, because it’s not something I’m very good at, but I think I’m going to have to just wait and see what happens, play this one by ear. Helena has her next competition in two weeks’ time. It’s here in London, in Camden. We’ll see if he turns up.”
“Well, if you want me to be waiting outside with a sawn-off shotgun, you only have to ask,” said Tim. “I’ve always fancied myself as a member of the London Mafia. Maybe now’s the time to look into that.”
“Thank you,” I smiled. “I don’t deserve you, you and your lovely wife. I’ve been a neglectful friend.”
“You can always rely on me,” said Tim. “You know that. I’ve never stopped caring about you. I never will. If there’s anything I can do to help you, just pick up the phone. I’d be happy to help give that smug bastard what’s coming to him.”
13
Helena’s exam results arrived the day of the competition. Unsurprisingly, my stomach was in knots all day and Oli twice asked me if I was okay. I was glad to be at work, though, and to have a reason to think about something other than Martin and whether he was going to make a second appearance that evening. In the morning, I distracted myself with some interesting research about neuropsychology and the effects of acquired injury on the brain. In the afternoon, Oli asked me to help him out in clinic, where we stood shoulder to shoulder, looking on a lighted screen at the results of a number of brain scans conducted that week. I felt humbled by what I saw and the results that I recorded on the computer later. I realised that, no matter what happened that evening, nothing could be as bad for me as it was for these patients and their families, whose lives had been altered beyond recognition – often by a single, shocking accident – and for whom nothing would ever be the same again.
Helena had passed her exams with flying colours, which was pretty much what I’d expected, but I was delighted nonetheless. She phoned me mid-morning to tell me her good news, and that she was meeting friends from her course for a celebratory lunch before heading up to Camden early to meet Sky. Zara and I caught the bus early too, and arrived almost an hour before Helena. It was a stiflingly hot day; we bought cold pasta salad from Sainsbury’s and sat outside on a wall in the sunshine, our faces concealed by newspapers like two movie detectives, watching carefully for any sign of my nemesis and occasionally erupting with nervous laughter at the sleuths we’d become. But, nothing. No Martin. I allowed myself to relax a little as we moved inside and the competition started. As the evening wore on, with still no sign of him, I started to wonder if I’d perhaps made too much of his presence on the last occasion and, as I watched him offering support and encouragement to my daughter, whether I’d been a little too hard on Sky.