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To tell the truth, I wanted to say thank you for the wakeup call. The news that you’d stood up to him really made me feel something. It made me realise I could leave. I’d been wanting to for a while, and it took me a few weeks to act on that impulse, but having spoken to my therapist I’ve established that it was you who set the ball rolling.
There’s a line break here, and a short time difference. Then the message starts off again in one long paragraph, as though the sender stopped herself mid-flow and then decided to carry on.
Another thing. A few days before I left, Marcus mentioned your ‘conspiracy theory’ to me – that thing about a secret email address. It came after something your parents said. I was with Marcus the following week, after you’d been sent away. He was on the phone to your parents and the conversation got pretty heated. I heard some of it from his end, so he had to tell me what it was all about. At the time I didn’t take you – or any of it – seriously. I’m sorry about that.
Now I have distance though … What you’re saying does ring true. There are a few things I’ve been wondering about Marcus in light of your ideas – and there’s one detail I think I have to let you know about. The night before Marina went missing she and Marcus had a huge fight. I could only overhear short snippets but there was definitely something about him being a traitor. I got the impression that she found something bad in his study – I was too scared to ask what afterwards, but the argument escalated when she mentioned that she’d ‘found out who he really was’. She started screaming at him. Threatening him with something, I’m pretty sure it was something about an email address. I didn’t consider this to be significant at the time as she often made comments of that ilk. But it ties into some of what you said.
There is another pause, as though she has reflected on what she’s written.
Sorry, I’ve probably had too much to drink. You must think this sounds a little crazy. But if it does make sense – then we might be able to piece some of it together. What I’m saying is that if you ever want to meet up and chat, I would be happy to lend you an ear.
Elena
The words are frozen on the screen, and I stare at them for a long, uncomfortable moment. The possibilities whirl around my mind. Then they click together, and it begins to make sense. Marina’s strangely close relationship with her father, the adoring way that she spoke about him – the way she described him as capable of sorting anything out. Perhaps she thought that he would be able to help her expose Montgomery over the photos but – when she confronted him – she was met with the same violent rebuttal that I’d experienced.
But then …
Another stronger, darker, possibility crosses my mind. I think she found something bad in his study … I don’t want to think about it but it’s impossible not to. Perhaps she didn’t seek her father’s advice. Perhaps she suspected his involvement in the first place. Perhaps – despite the lies she’d told herself – she was aware of a more sinister side to him. Perhaps she snuck into his study, like she did with Montgomery. And then what she found … Oh God. I think of the screenshot of me in her underwear. Could that have triggered a miscommunication between Marcus and Marina? Horror seizes me – a cold, dreadful sensation, like someone is tracing a knife along my spine. Those photographs – those awful photographs – on her own father’s computer. Is that what tipped her over the edge?
Without warning my mind rewinds to a memory of my own. Whether it is a real memory, or the memory of a dream, I’m not sure. But it’s vivid. I see her face through the rain, through the fog folding over the windowpanes, behind the glass. I see her pulling up the blind, leaning out. I see her frowning, then laughing, then shaking her head sadly. ‘Kill yourself,’ I tell her. ‘Just do it. No one will miss you. No one will care. Everyone thinks you’re a whore. Even your dad thinks you’re a whore.’
My breath is tight. I squeeze my eyes shut. I squeeze them tighter. I try to block it all out, wipe it all away. The world goes black for a second.
When I open my eyes again I reread Elena’s message:
I would be happy to lend you an ear.
That sentence soothes me. Elena believes me. The public believe me.
I wasn’t there. They fly out quickly – much quicker than I expected – and fall one by one into a heap on the floor. I lean down, pick one up by the corners, and read the first sentence: ‘The first time I saw Marina was in October 2013. The last time I saw her was three months later.’
I strike out the word ‘three’ and replace it with ‘two’. I’m sure of it now. I wasn’t there.
For a long time I thought that Marina had destroyed my personality. I thought that an essential part of me – the part that was individual and self-contained – had disintegrated after I met her. She had eroded my sense of who I was.
But now I’m starting to think that Marina did not destroy my personality – she shaped it. Without her, I might have spent my entire life in the shadows, feeding off the energy of other people, always waiting for someone else to show me how to behave. Marina forced me out of my shell. She drew me to see the discrepancies in my own character. And now, having faced up to those, I have finally become a real person. A person with opinions. A person who wants to voice them. A person like her.
I click off the links. I push the stack of newspapers aside and start to assemble my things.
It is time to go home.
AUTHOR’S NOTE
In January 2019, a Bill was passed by the House of Lords to make upskirting illegal in England and Wales. Until then there had been no specific offence for ‘upskirting’ in England. Cases involving upskirt shots were sketched around definitions of ‘voyeurism’ or ‘outraging public decency’. Voyeurism applied where images were taken of someone in private. Outraging public decency focuses on the idea that the public has been offended (not the harm done to the victim) and so the taking of photos had to be done in public, and usually had to be witnessed by at least two people. In this book, which is set in 2017, Eva reads one headline suggesting that the perpetrators have been charged with voyeurism. In fact, the case would probably have come under ‘outraging public decency’, since universities are not considered private spaces. But you could argue, for one, that they’re not exactly public spaces either.
I’m extremely grateful to Professor Clare McGlynn at Durham University for explaining this to me, and to Gina Martin for her activism. Reading material is widely available online for anyone interested in learning more.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
This book would not exist if Tessa David at PFD hadn’t scooped the first draft out of the slush pile in 2017. I can’t thank you enough for putting up with my many pseudonyms and ill-conceived pranks. Your patience and tenacity are inspiring.
The tireless work of my editor Charlotte Brabbin has made this a much better book. I’m incredibly grateful for your beady eyes, incisive comments and excellent judgement. Also to Jan Currie and the rest of the KillerReads team.
Other thanks to:
Moira and Nick. Unlike Eva’s parents, you are actually supportive and nice. Except for the time you cut off my hair because I was chewing it, Mum, and ‘I didn’t mean to cut that much off’ is not a valid apology. But tuft or no tuft, I wouldn’t have been able to finish (or start) this if it weren’t for both of you. Thanks for being so open-minded about your wayward spawn, and for laughing at my jokes when no one else does. Thanks also for my good looks.
The Saville Gang: Freddy, Rosa, Oscar and the wickedly talented Tainted Doge. Exceptional thanks to OB.
Al Konstam, for being my plus one at all events, even when the host explicitly says you›re not invited. Pete Saban and his warm bed. Everyone who has ever given me a job.
Charlotte and Toby Smyth, who were both given drafts and did not read them. (I figured you›d feel left out if Millie got a mention.)
Millie Smyth, Katy Fallon and Oscar Batterham, who read a number of drafts several times over and gave thoughtful, extensive feedback.
&n
bsp; For anyone struggling with suicidal thoughts, the Samaritans helpline is free on 116 325. There is always another answer. Help can also be found at Rape Crisis (0808 8029999) for those suffering from trauma relating to rape and sexual abuse.
About the Author
L. Smyth was born in Somerset in 1993. As a journalist, she has written for the Financial Times, The Times Literary Supplement, The Daily Telegraph and Prospect. Since 2018 she has worked as a podcast writer. She lives in London.
@Lulu_smyth_
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