‘What?’ Harriet felt a spiralling sense of alarm – similar to those awful times during a trial when her own witness began revealing new evidence on the stand that they hadn’t run past her earlier. Like a train wreck happening before her eyes, knowing the fault for the crash would be all down to her, but that she was now powerless to stop it.
‘In his bedroom. She broke in. I was smoking in the trees behind his house. I watched her go in through the window. Thought she was breaking in to change her exam paper actually.’
‘What are you talking about, Clementine?’
‘I saw Jon coming down the path to the front door too, not long after, so I put a stick in the window runner so she couldn’t get back out. I was really pissed off with her.’
‘Clementine, you mustn’t repeat this. He would never have had an affair with a student. Never. This is ridiculous – to even be talking about it.’ Harriet stood and closed her laptop. ‘You mustn’t speak of it again.’ Harriet’s heart was clattering.
She moved around the table, avoiding Clementine’s glare. How was she supposed to get to sleep now? It was well past midnight. Her trainer was coming at 6 a.m. to start a new workout program. And she needed to be on form tomorrow to get on top of the Hensen trial. Curse Clementine and her ridiculous drunken talk. The sooner she returned to Prague, the better. She walked out of the lounge room and looked down at the gnome, a garish, creepy looking dwarf with a crooked smile.
‘And get rid of that thing. Theft is a crime, Clementine. Return it or I’ll report you.’
‘Geez Mum, that’d look good in the papers. Leading QC’s daughter arrested for shenanigans with butt-naked garden gnome.’
Harriet continued walking towards her bedroom, the sound of Clementine’s raucous laughter reverberating down the hallway, bouncing off the walls and into her head like a violent storm.
Twenty-Five
Marlee
Marlee plucked idly at the strings of her guitar as she sat propped up against her bedrest. The boredom was making her fidget and itch, as if she had a rash. She couldn’t concentrate on her work files either. She really wanted to go for a run. She looked down at her fingers and began playing random chords. She was rusty, but somewhere deep in her brain the synapses were connecting and guiding her fingers to form a tune. She’d given up guitar after high school, but her father had found the old instrument, out of tune and with a broken string, when he’d cleaned out the attic a few months earlier. It had sat for more than twenty years, forlorn and dusty, between boxes of her mother’s clothes, an emblem of better times.
She was fine to get up and walk around now – go back to work even. There had been no further bleeding in the last couple of days, but she wasn’t taking any chances with Ned’s health. She had decided she would go to the reunion dinner tomorrow, though. She could sit down and take it easy at the restaurant, not that it would have been her first choice of social occasion, but for some reason the idea held a strange appeal. The other day she’d run into a few of her old school mates around town and they’d persuaded her to come. The memory of her school days felt like an old movie she’d watched once and wasn’t sure she’d take the time to watch again. But her old friends had been so insistent and now that she was pregnant, she kept having recurring thoughts about her mother and what she would have wanted Marlee to do. It was annoying that she couldn’t drink though. Rehashing the experience with alcohol might have made it passably fun but who knows how these things went when you were sober?
She longed for a drink. For that first tiny rush of release when her frontal lobes let down their guard and her inhibitions escaped, swallowed by the wine.
Today was another rest day though. No exercise. And definitely no alcohol. Nothing to dim Ned’s chances at growing into a real, fully formed human baby. The thought calmed her.
The apartment buzzer made her jump. She got off the bed slowly, looking briefly in the mirror at her crushed harem pants and tight white t-shirt, firm against the swell of her tender breasts. Her red curls tumbled, restless and messy over her shoulders. She knew how they felt.
She hurried down the stairs and pressed the intercom button, making the video camera spring into life. There was Ben, standing with his back to the door. He turned and looked into the screen.
‘Marlee?’
‘Yes.’
‘Can I come up for a minute?’
‘Why?’
He looked surprised, as if he hadn’t expected to be questioned. As if he was sifting through appropriate responses for why he would be visiting a two-night-stand who might be pregnant with his baby and was currently using up her almost non-existent sick leave at his expense.
‘I wanted to see you.’
‘Why?’
‘Marlee, can I just come up? Please?’ He ran his fingers through his hair and stared into the intercom.
She pressed the buzzer then unlocked the door and walked across the room and plonked herself down on the couch. She put her feet up and stared out at the trees, half-bare of their leaves in readiness for the winter. She watched the cold drizzle running down the window pane. She’d always felt sorry for the trees – just when they needed their shaggy green coats the most, they fell off and left them exposed to the harsh, unforgiving elements. She shivered as the knock came at the door.
‘Come in.’ She sat back into the corner and tucked her legs up beneath her.
Ben stood in the middle of the kitchen looking at her. The two days of stubble on his face suited him.
‘Hi,’ said Ben.
‘Hi.’
‘I just wanted to check that you’re alright.’
‘I’m fine.’ She turned back to the window, staring as the wind whipped through the trees. She wasn’t about to come to his rescue. She stopped saving men from themselves years ago.
‘That’s good. That’s… really good.’
‘Do you need some input on the Lekky project?’ she asked.
‘Yes. No… I mean, only when you’re better. That’s not why I’m here.’
‘I’ll be back at work on Monday.’
‘That’s great.’ He looked around at the mess on the kitchen table, the washing on the collapsible line, three bras slung carelessly over the end rails. ‘Could I make us a cup of tea?’
Marlee looked back at him and tilted her head to one side. She wondered where this was going.
‘If you want.’
He picked up the kettle and began to fill it. Then he stopped, his back to her, and spoke again. ‘Marlee, is the baby mine?’
She felt a pang of sadness, overtaking the undercurrent of anger she’d felt towards him since the birthday cake incident. Then she felt a ripple of fear about her future if she told him the truth.
‘Yes.’
He turned around and looked straight at her, holding her eyes, unblinking. ‘Oh.’
And there it was. The bare truth. She didn’t care now though. She could do this on her own. She didn’t need a man to make her life complete, and neither did her baby.
But then Ben was walking towards her. He knelt down in front of her and broke into a huge smile. ‘Wow, that’s amazing.’
She felt the breath go out of her.
‘That’s really amazing,’ he said again slowly.
The couch lifted beneath her a little as she sat up and twisted her legs out from under her then pulled her hair into a roll and placed it against her neck. A weight she didn’t realise had been sitting across her shoulders seemed to trickle away like the drops of rain on the window pane behind her. Her smile was tentative at first. Then she grinned back at him and let out a laugh as unexpected as the sight of her baby’s father kneeling in the middle of her kitchen holding the kettle.
He looked down at the floor, then stood up and placed the kettle carefully back on its base and flicked on the switch to make it boil.
‘I know,’ she said.
He stared at her, a smile threatening at the edge of his mouth. ‘Do you think the baby will be alrigh
t?’
‘Yeah, I think he’ll be fine. It’s his parents I’m worried about.’
Ben paused for a moment and looked thoughtful. ‘Well, I wouldn’t worry about his father. He’s in very good spirits.
Marlee smiled.
‘I’m sorry about what happened with Scarlett and Harriet in my flat. Harriet’s not ready to accept that we’ve grown apart, and I know there’s not much I can do about that, except try to avoid hurting her any more. But I made a mess of that day. I didn’t tell you how I felt.’
‘Well, I’m sure it’s hard for both of you.’
He took a moment before he answered. ‘I loved Harriet. She was so independent, so strong. I admired her intellect. I gave the marriage everything I had. But she never really knew how to love me back. Not properly. She tried, but I don’t think she ever really knew what love looked like. She had… well, she had a difficult upbringing.’
‘Ben, it’s fine. You don’t need to explain.’
‘No, I want you to know. I’m not someone who walks away easily. I tried so hard to get her to trust me. To let down the barriers. But she couldn’t. And it didn’t help that she avoided the difficult conversations I tried to have every couple of years. I think she manages to prevent herself from thinking about things too deeply by working all the time. I suppose I should have known it wasn’t sustainable, but I did love her, very much. Until I realised something had changed a couple of years ago. I realised that I didn’t care anymore if she came home for dinner or not. I’d stopped noticing.’
‘Ben, I’m not asking you to commit to me. I really don’t even know what I want from you. And the situation’s not ideal, with us working together.’
‘I don’t care about that, Marlee. I don’t regret a moment of the time I’ve spent with you. Working with you is the best part of my day.’ He smiled at her. ‘And I hope you’ll think about taking me on. I’m really capable you know. I can cook and clean and plenty of other things to. And despite what Scarlett might tell you, I’m not a bad dad, either.’ He looked straight into her eyes, then opened the drawer under the kettle. ‘And I make excellent cups of tea.’
She let out her breath. ‘Well that’s a relief. I hate bad cups of tea.’
‘Empires have been built and lost over good tea. Tell me where the pot is and leave me to it.’
‘It’s tea bags around here.’
Ben sighed as he began opening drawers, hunting for the bags. ‘I can see we’re going to have to work hard at this relationship.’
Marlee smiled and felt the warm burn of tears pressing against her eyes again as she got up and walked past Ben towards the pantry. Hormones. It must be the hormones. Or the odd sensation of being cared for. But she liked it. She turned towards him offering two small teabags and he grasped her hand and bent forward and pulled her gently towards him, and in his kiss she felt desire, but also something warm and strong and kind. Something that felt like home.
Twenty-Six
Marleen
25 November 1993
Mr Brownley sat back from the piece of music he was marking, pencil poised like a dart. ‘Come in, Marleen.’
Marleen avoided looking at him and went to the row of guitars lined up at the back of the music room and picked hers up off the stand. She sat down across from him in the chair, brushing her tunic down over her knees and flicking the colourful cape out from under her.
‘Happy Birthday.’
‘Thank you, Sir.’ Marleen tugged at the piece of floral fabric that still sat bunched up under her thighs and balanced her guitar across her lap.
‘It must be good to have the weight of all those exams off your shoulders.’
‘Yes, it is.’
‘You’ve done a wonderful job this year as Head Girl. I’ve been meaning to congratulate you.’
‘Thank you, Sir.’ She glanced at him and the plummeting sensation returned. He was so nice, so gorgeous. How was she going to warn him?
‘Did you want to play “Days and Nights” through together and see how we go with it? Might be nice just to make it a fun lesson to wrap up the year.’
‘Okay.’ She watched his biceps as his arm curled around the guitar and his blond, slightly messy hair flopped down as he placed his fingers to form a D chord. Marleen started to pluck the opening chords, then strummed along with him, closing her eyes. She stopped playing and moved the capo along, then began tuning the guitar. ‘Sorry… just give me a sec.’
‘Sure.’ He smiled at her and Marleen felt her palms getting sweaty. She knew if Tessa followed through with what she’d told Emma and Linda Perkins, things could go really badly for him. And for the school if anyone found out. He was such a great guy. He didn’t deserve it. Tessa might have been his best music student and her friend, but she was also a bit crazy. Marleen reminded herself that as Head Girl she didn’t have the luxury of standing by when she knew things were going to get out of control. Ms Sharp, the headmistress, was relying on her to make sure the school’s reputation was kept unblemished. Frequently in their weekly meetings, she’d remind Marleen of her expectations. ‘You’re part of my team, Marleen. You are my eyes and ears. I cannot run a successful school without knowing what the girls are thinking and doing. You have been chosen for this position because I like and trust you and equally because the girls like and trust you.’
Marleen knew she should just say something to him now. But what? ‘I’ve heard Tessa might be waiting inside your cottage with some new lacy underwear because she’s not leaving school a virgin and you’re the one.’ Yeah, right. Tessa would tear strips off her. Not that Tessa had told Marleen about her seduction plan directly. She wasn’t that dumb. But she’d told the others and Emma had told Marleen, sort of under duress, when she’d edged her way into their huddled conversation outside the library. She’d made them tell her. And now she was landed with the knowledge. If it went ahead and word of it got out – which she knew these things did when people were desperate for the gory details – Mr Brownley would get the sack. Or worse – Tessa’s father would do something terrible to him. He might have been an influential property developer, but he was also a traditional Italian father with a scary reputation.
‘Mr B, I wanted…’ she stopped and closed her eyes, wondered how to phrase it. When she opened them he was still looking at her. ‘I wondered if I could get a copy of that song you were telling me about last week. The Beatles song, “Eight Days a Week”.’
‘Sure. I’ve got it at home. I’ll bring it up tomorrow for you.’
‘Right. Thanks.’
She couldn’t betray Tessa. What sort of friend would that make her? Not that they were close. But Marleen tried to be a friend to every girl in the school, no matter how hard that girl might make it. And Tessa was nearly eighteen. She was entitled to make her own decisions about her love life. She was leaving school this week. It wouldn’t be that bad if she went through with it, not really. But a whisper of doubt was hissing at Marleen’s conscience.
Then the words were out of her mouth before she knew they were coming. ‘Mr B, what would happen if it was found out that a teacher had a fling with one of his students?’
Mr Brownley drew back, his honeyed features clouding into a frown. ‘I wouldn’t do that.’
‘I know. But if you did?’
‘Well, it depends on the circumstances. But I could go to jail.’
‘No! Really? Even if they agreed to it and everything?’
‘It’s against the law, Marleen.’ He sat up straighter in his chair and put his guitar down against the wall. Then he began rubbing one hand against the back of the other. ‘Marleen, I hope I haven’t given you the wrong impression. If I have, I’m really sorry.’
‘What? No! I’m not saying anything like that!’
‘Oh, good.’
‘It was just hypothetical.’
He reddened and coughed into his hand. ‘Right, well that’s a relief.’
They sat for a moment in stilted silence, the ticking of the
wall clock like an unexploded bomb. Then Mr Brownley picked up his guitar again and they began playing. Marlee made tons of mistakes, as the thoughts whizzed through her head. She couldn’t let Tessa wreck his life. She’d tried to find her after lunch, but they didn’t share any of the same classes and after the school bell rang, she wasn’t near the lockers or in the boarding house common room or her bedroom. Marleen had to meet Mr Brownley for her guitar lesson without having spoken to Tessa about it. Was Tessa at his house already? Or maybe she’d sneak out of the boarding house later. But the girls had said it might happen after school.
‘Let’s wrap it up there, Marleen. Thanks for being such a great student this year. I really hope you get into the course you want at uni.’
‘Thanks, I should be okay, I think. I’ve put architecture first, then engineering. I like the idea of designing something.’
‘You’ll be a star.’ He smiled at her as she clicked the guitar case shut.
Outside the music centre she walked down the path, then paused and turned around. A large sycamore tree obscured her from the vision of anyone else coming out of the building. She waited, jiggling her foot impatiently as she listened to the hum of traffic along Ellery Way. After a few minutes he came out and walked to the left, taking the path towards the staff cottages. His was the last of them, furthest from the school, completely secluded. She’d been sent there once on an errand with another girl, to deliver something to him for Ms Sharp. What if Tessa was on the way to his cottage? Or there already?
She put her guitar case down carefully and stood, thinking quickly. She could just find an excuse, go after him, and if Tessa heard her voice and she was already in his cottage, she could duck out the back and he’d be none the wiser. Everyone would avoid embarrassment. Then afterwards she’d have a word with Tessa about why she needed to wait until after graduation. Tessa would just have to persuade her parents to let her spend a few days in Hobart after they graduated, then it would all be above board. She’d be a free agent and he’d be free to do whatever he wanted with her. Which was probably quite a lot. There was something simmering and sexual about Tessa. Even the girls could see it. And Mr Brownley was so good-looking and nice. Even Marleen couldn’t deny it, and she was frequently accused of having her head in the clouds when it came to cute boys. It was obvious. Tessa and Mr B were bound to get together at some stage. Marleen didn’t want to think about that bit too much. She was a virgin herself. She’d been so busy with school captain duties and study this year she hadn’t had time to think about anything more than a kiss with Liam Trudeaux after the school formal. She knew most of the other girls weren’t as focussed on school as she was though. But their casual flings didn’t interest Marleen. She was going to wait for love. And today, she was going to make Tessa wait too.
Good Little Liars Page 21