‘C’mon, Spence, I can always tell when you’re hiding something.’
‘I’m not hiding anything! It was nice, that’s all,’ she said before pausing, then muttering under her breath, ‘and she’s very pretty.’
‘I know she’s pretty, lovely, I’ve met her. Do you like her?’
‘Well, yes, or I wouldn’t have gone climbing and then had drinks in the cafe with her.’
‘No, I mean, do you like like her?’
‘Oh. That. I dunno.’
‘Stop the presses, Spence doesn’t know something! When does that ever happen?’
‘Oh, ha ha.’
‘Are you seeing her again?’
‘We’re going exploring the forest with the kids.’
‘That doesn't count as a date.’
‘It wasn’t supposed to be a date’
‘OK, well, you need to go on an actual date. But let her ask you this time, make her work for it a little bit.’
‘Make her work for what?’ Paige asked innocently
‘You, lovely. She should make an effort to show she wants to spend time with you.’
‘But if she didn’t, why would she agree to go climbing with me today? Or ask me to have coffee with her after?’
‘Just trust me, sweetie, let her make the next move, OK?’
‘OK...’ Paige said, rolling her eyes.
‘Video call! Remember?’
‘Oh, yeah, sorry...’
CHAPTER EIGHT
The Past in the Present
TAYLOR
The PhD students’ workspace was a slightly cluttered conglomeration of desks and furnishings. The three sofas arranged around an oval coffee table were almost always occupied, groups either working together on their projects or just socialising. A bookcase wall partially separated it from the main workspaces. Most of the desks were occupied by students with headphones in, tapping away at their keyboards or staring at the monitors; some thoughtfully, and some with that glazed look in their eyes which indicated they should have stopped for a break hours ago. The room provided hot-desk-style work stations for all PhD students studying under the broad title of Engineering.
Taylor’s preferred desk was pushed up next to one of the windows giving views out across the city. Being on the edge of the hive helped her concentrate while still allowing her to feel connected to other people. So far this term she had hardly spent any time there. Her supervisor kept piling on more and more teaching responsibilities, leaving her with less and less time to focus on her research. This dreary Friday afternoon was a rare exception; a seminar had been cancelled at the last minute, clearing a few hours in her schedule. She had filled up a large travel mug of her favourite coffee, got some snacks, and sat down to work at her favourite desk. However, the words were just not flowing. Academic writing was not like riding a bike; she was rusty. Finding her notes from the last time she’d done any work on her research made her stomach lurch; it had been nearly a month. Sighing, she started reading over them. Her memory of the notes was so vague that it was like someone else had written them. Thankfully, that ‘someone else’ had also left her instructions on what to do next. She silently thanked four-weeks-ago Taylor and began finding the journal articles and books she had made notes on.
The group currently occupying the sofas were laughing loudly on a break from work. She glanced over at them briefly, realising she didn’t even know any of their names. That one might have been called Phil? Or Peter? Something like that. Some of the students in the room had only started their PhDs that September so she excused herself from not knowing their names. But she had worked alongside Phil/Peter for two years now. She sighed and went back to searching for the papers she needed. Some of them weren’t available online, meaning that she would have to go and dig out the physical copies from the library. The sofa group let out another fit of laughter, distracting her from her work once again. She took that as a sign and headed to the library.
A short walk and a flight of stairs later she was standing in front of aisles and aisles of books on meticulously organised library shelves. The paths through the shelves presented themselves to her like the entrance of a maze. She glanced at the scrap of paper in her hand which contained the reference number for each book. It wasn’t a maze, she decided, but a treasure hunt, with a very strange set of clues. Taylor laughed to herself before beginning her search. Sometimes dancing her way around other students browsing the shelves, she successfully managed to collect an armful of books and journals. She carefully navigated to the scanners used to check books out, the stack of books wobbling slightly as she joined the rather long queue. It gave her time for her mind to wander, and for her arms to grow heavier with the weight of the books. She started thinking about climbing with Paige the day before and how it had all just felt so easy. Paige seemed to be the type of person who was quite upfront about things; whenever Taylor had made a mistake Paige had told her, but that made her subsequent praise all the more meaningful. Taylor could feel her walls coming down a little further the more time she spent with the secret agent. ‘Maybe it’s a technique she learnt at MI5,’ Taylor thought, joking to herself.
Eventually she got to the front of the queue and started scanning her items out one by one. Just as she re-loaded the books into her arms she felt her phone vibrate in her pocket. She secretly hoped it was Paige, but acquiesced it was more likely to be Dylan or one of her parents. She would have to wait to check it until she had made it back to the workspace.
She dumped the books on her desk with a thud; the noise loud enough to make those in the room look up. She held her hand up apologetically and mouthed the word ‘sorry’, turned red, and sat down. Hiding behind her computer monitor she took her phone out to check her text. Now her face turned white, and then grey, as she read the message.
‘You can’t keep ignoring me like this, it’s cruel. It’s been three years and I miss you. I’m doing better now I promise, I’m sorry for all the things I said. If you ever loved me, call me xxx.’
It was Daniella, her ex. Suddenly the walls in the study room felt several feet closer and closing in, and her breathing became rapid. Taylor pulled at the collar of her T-shirt and tried to swallow, but her mouth and throat felt like sandpaper. Another text came through while she was still staring at the screen.
‘No call then, huh? You stupid bitch, I was too good for you anyway.’
Leaving her phone at her desk, she quickly got up and left the room. It took all of her self control to just walk fast, instead of run and run until she had put as much distance as she could between her and those memories. She trotted down a couple of flights of stairs, not acknowledging the people who greeted her on the way down. Eventually she made it out the main doors, but didn’t stop there. She found herself walking, then running, in the vague direction of the Journalism building with no idea why. But she kept going.
It was late afternoon so by the time she got to the cafe in the Silverton building it was fairly empty. Taylor bought herself a bottle of water, not able to speak to the woman on the till or even look her in the eye. Once sat down in the corner she tried to concentrate on her breathing to get it to slow down. Memories kept crowbarring their way into her head. A flash of blue lights as she stood outside A&E. Staying overnight on the ward, dozens of times. The threats Daniella made, to do Taylor or herself harm if she couldn’t control every aspect of their lives. How she’d faked a serious illness to manipulate Taylor into staying, and isolated her from her friends and family.
‘Lor?’ Dylan said softly. He’d called out to her from across the foyer but she hadn’t responded, just carried on playing with the lid of the water bottle and staring into space. He now stood directly in front of her. She looked up and saw him, but was unable to form any words.
‘C’mon, let’s get you home,’ He said, helping her to her feet. He looked around on the floor for her bag but couldn’t see anything.
‘Lor, where -?’
‘In the PhD room,’ she said
robotically.
‘OK, we’ll go get it, then go home?’ Dylan said gently. She just nodded.
The taxi dropped them off outside Taylor’s door. She had tried to insist on driving but Dylan had joked that he wanted to live. Dylan thanked the taxi driver and paid him, then started rummaging through Taylor’s bag for her keys.
‘It always amazes me how much girls carry in their bags,’ Dylan said to himself.
‘Hmmm?’
‘Nothing. Here we go!’ Dylan opened the door and ushered Taylor inside ahead of him. ‘OK, you? Sit there’ he said, pointing to the sofa, ‘I’ll go make us a drink.’ He fussed around Taylor a little bit first, putting a blanket over her and making sure she had the television remote and her phone handy in case she wanted them. Taylor took the phone and put it on the other side of the coffee table, face down. She could hear the kettle begin to bubble away as Dylan moved swiftly around the kitchen. Her mind wandered back to the memories from those years spent with her ex, and she shivered. It was a long time ago, but the wounds were still fresh, not helped by being ripped open by the occasional text or un-answered call from her.
Taylor reached out and snatched at her phone, opening the texts. There must have been upwards of fifty of them from this year alone. They varied from apologies and platitudes, to begging for her to go back, to outright insults and cruelty. Taylor never replied, but they kept coming. She shook herself and exited the text thread. She could see the preview of her most recent text from Paige; she had checked in that morning to make sure Taylor wasn’t too sore after their climbing session. She smiled slightly just as Dylan walked back into the room.
‘That’s more like it,’ he said, smiling back at her and handing her a mug of hot chocolate. ‘I couldn’t find any marshmallows but I did find... these!’ He withdrew a pack of digestives biscuits from his hoodie pocket and tossed them onto the middle of the sofa, then sat down, positioning himself cross-legged facing Taylor. She couldn’t look at him. She didn’t want to talk about it.
‘So, what - or who - was making you smile so much when I walked in?’ The question threw her - it was not the line of questioning she was expecting.
‘Oh, it’s nothing. I was thinking about climbing last night, that’s all.’
‘You went climbing without me?!’ Dylan said in mock offence.
‘I went with Paige...’ Taylor said, resigning herself to the barrage of questions no doubt forming in Dylan’s mind.
‘Oh, I see... whatever happened to bros before h -’
‘Oi!’
‘Fine. Brothers before hot secret agents doesn’t apply anymore then?’
‘She was just giving me some help with my technique.’
‘Oh, is that what they call it nowadays?’
Taylor grabbed a pillow from behind her and threw it at his head, striking him square in the face and making him nearly spill his hot chocolate all over his lap.
‘Hey! Careful! I’d like the option of having kids one day,’ he said, carefully running his finger around the base of the mug to catch up any stray drips.
‘It was just climbing, and we got a drink and some cake afterwards. Nothing more.’
‘If you say so,’ he said, grinning at his sister. She just scowled at him, before picking up the remote, turning away from him, and turning the television on. Dylan didn’t adjust his position, and instead just carried on staring at his sister. Eventually, she sighed, muted the TV, and turned to him.
‘What?’ she demanded, slightly more viciously than she intended.
‘You know what!’
‘If I block her number, she’ll just find other ways to contact me. There’s no point. At least this way I know where the contact might come from.’
‘That’s true, but, blocking her would at least make it harder for her to get to you. How are you going to move on if she keeps dragging you back to that place?’
Taylor didn’t respond. She hadn’t really thought about moving on before; she’d not had a reason to. Ever since she and Daniella had broken up, she’d not even looked at another woman, not wanting to make herself that vulnerable ever again. Memories of Paige laughing as they ran across the rain-soaked car park filled her mind and warmed her up more than the mug of hot chocolate was doing. Maybe her brother had a point.
‘OK, fine,’ she said, throwing her phone at Dylan. ‘You do it, though. I don’t want to have to look at her face.’
Dylan didn’t say anything but started going through every form of social media Taylor had and blocking Daniella. He blocked her number too. Taylor just hoped it would be enough. She wasn’t sure that her ex would give up that easily - it had been over three years and she was still messaging semi-regularly. Taylor took another sip of her hot chocolate.
‘There,’ Dylan said, handing the phone back to her, ‘all done.’
‘Thank you, Dyl,’ Taylor said sincerely. ‘And thank you for tonight.’
‘Like you haven’t done the same, and much more, for me?’ Dylan asked, turning around so he could sit back on the sofa properly, his gangly legs stretch out in front of him. ‘What’re we watching?’
‘Horror film? That new one... Chainsaw Redemption or something... I’ve got that downloaded’
‘Perfect!’ Dylan said, settling in for the night.
Taylor spent an uneasy night tossing and turning. Dylan had insisted he was too tired to get the bus home and as taxis were so expensive, he might as well stay the night and they could share a taxi in the morning. Taylor was grateful. But he was asleep on the sofa downstairs. Even if he was in the room with her, he would not be able to protect her from the bad dreams terrorising her night.
In the house she shared with her ex, she sat at the computer working on her application for the PhD position. Daniella stood in the doorway, bathed in darkness. She stood far enough back that the light from Taylor’s computer screen only just caught her outline.
‘Tay-tay, please,’ she whined. Taylor didn’t even look up from her computer. ‘I don’t feel well,’ she said, trying to force Taylor to switch her attention to her. They had fought earlier, with Daniella screaming so loudly the veins in the side of her head stood to attention and spit started flying everywhere. Taylor had used all of her self-control to keep her voice calm and steady, but this only seemed to make Daniella more angry. She started saying more and more outrageous things, trying to get a rise out of Taylor, who was running through Newton’s laws of physics in her head to keep her calm.
‘Maybe I should lock us both in the house and set it on fire, would you react then?!’ she had screamed in Taylor’s face. Taylor had forced herself to walk away; to go to her study and concentrate on her work. She had only been there for about half an hour when Daniella had appeared in the doorway.
The dream skipped forward to a few hours later. It was late at night, and Taylor had done all she could on her application. She very suddenly became aware of how quiet the house was, and dragged herself to her feet to make sure everything was alright. She took a few steps down the stairs, but couldn’t hear the television. A few more steps, but there was no sound coming from the kitchen. Another few steps, but she couldn’t hear a phone call or a radio. The kitchen door was shut, which was unusual, and Taylor felt a massive sense of foreboding. Maybe Daniella actually had been feeling ill; she knew the chronic condition her girlfriend had came in waves, so it didn’t matter that she’d been fine earlier, maybe it had hit her again and she’d had an accident while cooking.
Taylor burst through the door, imagining the worst. But even what she imagined wasn’t as bad as what she saw. Daniella was slumped over on the kitchen table, next to a glass of juice and a bottle Taylor had never seen before, which was unusual: she’d memorised the names and doses of all of the medication Daniella was on. She stepped quickly over to her and shook her, shouting her name. No response. She quickly got her phone and dialled 999, unable to form a coherent sentence for the operator. At the same time, she picked up the bottle on the table. It definitel
y wasn’t one of Daniella’s regular medications. Underneath the name, which wasn’t Daniella’s, there was a warning label in big bold letters.
‘WARNING. May cause dizziness, fainting spells, and vomiting. Do not take unless under strict supervision from a medical professional.’
But this wasn’t her prescription. Her doctors had never mentioned it...
Taylor’s phone suddenly slipped out of her hand. All of those trips to accident and emergency after she had passed out. All those nights taking care of her when she couldn’t sleep because she was vomiting so much. All those family events she had missed because Daniella was ill, and the reprimands she had faced in work when she left site without permission to go and take care of her. Not being able to visit Dylan in rehab. All of that, and she might be doing it to herself....
Taylor picked up Daniella’s phone and used the unconscious woman’s thumbprint to unlock it, guilt and fear rising through her as she thought about what the consequences would be if Daniella woke up at the moment. Taylor was strictly forbidden from looking at Daniella’s phone, but Daniella had full and open access to hers and frequently checked up on her. She started going through the browsing history and came across several dodgy-looking websites that sold black market medication. Taylor threw the phone away from herself as if it burnt her, and started sobbing.
The paramedics arrived and tried to talk to Taylor to find out what was going on, but she couldn’t really explain. She pointed out the bottle to them and explained Daniella might have taken an overdose, before turning around and walking to the other side of the kitchen. She put both hands on the counter to steady herself, as her legs felt like they were made from sand and might crumble at any minute.
Once the paramedics had taken Daniella away, Taylor did the only thing she could think of and called her parents to say she was coming to stay for a while. She forced herself not to think about the shock in their voice from receiving contact from their only daughter, after barely speaking for years. Then she emailed her boss saying she was taking a leave of absence due to a personal family crisis and filled a giant suitcase with everything of hers that she cared about: her jewellery box containing her late grandmother’s bracelet, some old birthday cards, and a blanket her aunt had knitted for her. What room was left she filled with clothes. Her laptop fitted into her work bag, and she tossed that over her shoulder while dragging the suitcase down the hall, no longer caring about scratching the walls or the floor. No longer caring about the home they had bought together, decorated together, loved each other in. But it wasn’t really love, was it? It was control and being controlled. Well, not anymore.
The Face of It Page 8