The House Swap

by Rebecca Fleet

  He smiles, but rubs a hand over his eyes, half flopping back on to the bed. ‘I don’t know,’ he says. ‘I’m pretty knackered. Been driving for the past hour, and it’s felt like a long day. Besides, I can think of things I’d rather do than sit in the pub …’ He reaches for me, sliding his hand up underneath my top, his fingers stroking a gentle path of exploration over my skin and reaching the base of my bra. His eyes are dark and shining, inviting me to agree.

  I’m tempted, but I can’t quite shake that sense of needing to be somewhere else, if only for a short while. It’s only now he’s here that I realize how oppressive these four walls have been. The air is thick with the day’s torpor, and I want this to be perfect; I want to look him in the face and tell him I love him, shout it out into the open air. I’m flooded with the power of these words and what they mean. I’ve never felt like this before – the world suffused with light and colour, the sharp brightness of possibility.

  I leap up from the bed and pull on my shoes and coat. ‘I’ll drive,’ I say. ‘You don’t need to do anything. Just sit back and let me take you.’

  He stands up and comes over to me, and I can tell that, whatever this is that has gripped me, it’s infectious. Excitement is shifting behind his eyes and he’s looking at me as if he’s never seen me before. ‘OK,’ he says, ‘if you say so. Whatever you want, baby.’ He pulls me towards him and kisses me hard. His lips on mine, his tongue in my mouth. ‘Not for too long, though,’ he warns me, ‘and when we come back, I expect you to behave, right? Can’t have you thinking you’re in charge.’

  ‘You’re the boss,’ I tell him, and we’re both smiling, unable to resist these games we play. I grab the car keys from his top pocket as we walk quickly down the corridor and out into the car park.

  ‘You sure about this?’ he asks, as I scramble into the driving seat.

  ‘Yes,’ I say quickly. ‘It’s fine.’ As I start up the engine, I suddenly remember the bottle of wine I’ve drunk. I hesitate. I don’t want to tell you I’ve been drinking – don’t want you to think that anything is clouding my judgement or my decisions. My head feels completely clear; in fact, it feels like I haven’t thought this clearly in years. And the roads will be practically empty at this time of night, especially here.

  Uncertainty is twitching at the back of my mind, but I push it aside. I’m filled again with that sense of power, the knowledge that everything is finally coming together and nothing can stop it. I switch the headlights on, and the road coiling ahead away from the hotel is illuminated in pale yellow. Shadows are shifting on the horizon, the blowsy branches of trees swaying darkly in the faint wind. I steer the car out on to the road, and there’s a rush of air through the open crack at the top of the window, setting the hairs on my arms on edge.

  ‘We’ll go to that town we passed on the way,’ I say. ‘There’s bound to be something open there. OK?’

  Carl laughs, leaning his head back against the headrest. ‘I don’t have a say in this, remember?’ he says. ‘I’m putty in your hands.’ He stretches out his hand and cups my knee, pushing the fabric of my skirt up towards my thigh. ‘This is crazy,’ he says wryly. ‘Driving out into the middle of nowhere when I could be fucking your brains out right now.’

  The words send another jolt of electricity through me – savage, dirty, a fierce pulse of need – and for an instant the road ahead blurs. I shake my head slightly, tighten my hands on the wheel. Out of the corner of my eye, I see the needle on the speedometer quivering, and I pull the car back. Shouldn’t go too fast. There’s a strange, itchy feeling spreading through my bones, telling me I’m not entirely in control.

  ‘Don’t,’ I say. I hear the breathlessness in my voice and I find myself gasping, sucking in a sharp, cold burst of air.

  He’s watching me. I can feel his eyes on me, travelling over my body. ‘I love how much you like this,’ he says. ‘I don’t just mean the sex. I mean …’ He trails off, turning his face to the window, staring out into the night.

  I know what he means, even if he doesn’t, and all at once I’m willing him to say it, wanting to hear him say he loves me before I have to say it first – and I’m twisting my head to try to catch his gaze, my eyes sliding away from the road ahead. And in another moment I catch a flash of something right at the corner of my vision and I realize there’s a bend looming ahead, tucked away from the streetlights.

  My eyes snap back and my body floods with adrenaline. I know that I’m going to have to turn fast, and my hands tug at the wheel, swinging the car sharply to the left – calculating in a split second that I’m going to veer on to the pavement but that I’ll be able to stop before we hit the side of the road. It’s going to be OK. But Carl is sitting up in his seat and I hear him shouting something I can’t quite decipher, and as he does so I see her, walking fast along the pavement with her head ducked down and her hands in her pockets, her dark hair and her green scarf blowing together behind her in the wind, and with a sickening lurch of instinct I realize that she’s too close, that there is no way I am going to be able to get out of her way.

  I’m slamming the brakes on, and the sound of my screaming is filling the car, and I hear and feel the impact in the same moment – the sudden speed and force of it, the way she smashes against the windscreen and slides down instantly, the bright spatter of red that splashes across my field of vision. The car has jerked to a halt and we’re sitting in complete silence and stillness, but it’s too late.

  My hands are shaking crazily and there’s an ache shooting up the entire length of my spine. My eyes are fixed on the wheel. I can’t raise my head. ‘Jesus Christ,’ I hear myself say. ‘Fucking hell.’ It doesn’t sound like my voice at all.

  ‘We have to get out,’ he says, and I drag my gaze over to him and see that he’s bleeding, his hand cut sharply by glass from the fractured windscreen. ‘It might – she might—’

  I’m unfastening my seatbelt, opening the door with hands still shaking so much I can barely wrap them around the handle. As soon as I see her I know there’s no hope, but I drop to my knees anyway and bend forward, forcing myself to look. Her arm is unnaturally twisted, flung across the length of her body. The right side of her face has caved into a bloody mass, lacerated almost to the bone. She’s young. Sixteen, seventeen. A dark line of mascara is pooling down the untouched side of her face and her green silk scarf is streaked with red. The impact has knocked her scarlet high-heeled shoes off her bare feet. She’s completely still. Her eyes are half open. Every detail comes in flashes – brutal snapshots, fired one after the other, then snatched away.

  He’s checking her pulse, bending his head. I don’t have to ask.

  For a few moments, we’re crouching there together in silence in the dark. My mind is blank and buzzing. ‘What do we do?’ I ask. ‘What the hell do we do?’

  His face is white, drained. ‘I don’t know,’ he says. ‘I suppose we have to call the police.’

  I nod slowly, fighting for breath. Now, my thoughts are working at a hundred miles an hour, cycling frantically through what is going to happen. I’ve gone out driving in the dark, several units over the limit, miles away from my family, with another man. And now this girl – this girl with the green scarf and the long, dark hair and the make-up that she probably applied carefully in her bedroom only hours before – is dead. I’ve killed her. I’ve killed her.

  ‘Caro,’ he’s saying, and his tone is harsh and almost angry. ‘You need to go.’

  I raise my eyes to his. ‘What are you talking about?’ I whisper.

  ‘You need,’ he says, ‘to get the fuck away from here, as soon as you can. I will call the police. I will deal with this. Do you understand?’ When I don’t reply, he draws in breath sharply. ‘This car is hired in my name,’ he says. ‘The hotel room is booked in my name. There’s nothing to connect you with this. There’s no reason for you to be involved.’

  ‘What are you talking about?’ I’m almost screaming, and suddenly tears are pouring down m
y face. I’m choking, vomit rising bitterly in my throat. ‘I can’t do that,’ I gulp. ‘I’m responsible for this. I can’t just—’

  ‘For fuck’s sake, Caro!’ he shouts. We’re both standing now, surreally facing each other, the girl lying there at our feet, the road deserted, the wind whistling coldly between us. ‘You’re not stupid,’ he bites out. ‘You know how this is going to go for you. You’ve been drinking. I knew it, and like an idiot, I still let you get in the car. You’re not going to get off. You’ll go to prison, maybe for years. You’ve got your son. You’ve got a life. I’ve got fuck all. And I’m sober. It was an accident. It makes sense!’ he shouts, and his voice is roughly edged with hysteria. Standing before me with his fists clenched, he looks incredibly young. ‘You know it does, so don’t try and martyr yourself. Just get out of here. Please.’

  ‘And then what?’ I force out. The tears are still streaming down my face, and they feel cold now, the wetness collecting damply on my skin.

  ‘Then nothing,’ he says. There’s a moment of silence. ‘This is it,’ he says. ‘It’s over. It’s time to say goodbye and walk away.’

  The words hang between us, draining the energy out of the air. The dark landscape shifts and sways around me, and for a moment I think I’m going to faint. ‘You don’t mean that,’ I whisper. ‘We have to do this together. We can’t do it without each other. We can’t just—’

  ‘Yes, we can,’ he interrupts. With horror, I hear the determination in his voice – the steely edge to it, the warning that there is no point in arguing. ‘This is the only thing to do,’ he says. ‘It was always going to happen. And now it needs to happen more than ever. I mean it. No calls, no texts. You need to keep completely away from this. From me.’

  ‘I love you,’ I say, and it’s not how this was meant to be – the sourness still in my throat, the shocking, hot scent of blood in the air, my body shuddering with trauma. ‘I love you.’

  ‘Caro,’ he says quietly. For the first time, there’s a tenderness trembling in his voice. ‘I don’t think you should say that. There’s … there’s no point.’ He frowns minutely, passes a hand across his forehead. ‘I don’t know,’ he says. ‘I think I love you, too. But that’s partly why this has to happen. And I’m not going to change my mind.’

  It filters in slowly. A strange, dreamlike sense of calm descends. I realize I can’t fight this. Everything has ground to a halt around us. My eyes flick to the road again. She’s lying there, the blood still pooling from her head and soaking into the granite. I’m half waiting for her to raise her head, open her eyes. But it doesn’t happen and my tears have stopped and I’m quivering with shock and nausea, and taking the first step away from her.

  I look up straight into his eyes and I see the pain cross his face, raw and visceral. I can barely believe this is all happening. Before I know it, I’m raising my face to his and his lips are on mine. I close my eyes. He’s kissing me slowly and gently, and I know that it’s the last time.

  When it’s over, I feel a bizarre lift of hope, the senseless thought that I must still be able to turn this all around, find some magic words that could bring the girl back to her feet and catapult us back into the future I’d planned, the one that was so close I could almost touch it. But there’s nothing that can change this, and I’m turning and walking down the dark, empty road, every step echoing in my head.

  When I reach the next bend, I look back. He’s facing away from me, and I see the screen of his phone shining as he raises it to his ear. I try to think about the words he will be saying. Think about how it will be for him when they arrive: the blunt inquisition, the looks of disgust and suspicion and reproach. I can’t get my head around it. I’m still walking, one foot after the other. The nearest train station is five miles away. It will take me over an hour. And when I get there, there’s no place to go but home.

  Still walking. I’m on my own. I don’t yet know how it will be. I don’t know about the dozens of messages I’ll send and receive no reply to, about the dreams that will shake me from my sleep, about the sense of helplessness and guilt that will pulse through me so hard and so relentlessly it feels impossible to survive. But I know that some things burn their way into you and scar you from the inside out. No recovery, no escape. The only way out is going to be to bury these memories so deep underground they are almost impossible to access. Find some way of pretending to start again. And with a jolt of sick surprise, I realize this will be possible. That it’s almost frighteningly easy. Already, it feels as if the last ten minutes have belonged to some other life. That woman back there in the car – already, she’s disappeared. It wasn’t me. It wasn’t me. I’ve left her there with him, and she’s gone for good.

  ‘Would she kill for you?’ The boy is staring at me, trying to understand. These words are ones he knows, but they have never been arranged in quite this formation – and I can tell from the gravity of his gaze that he realizes they mean more than the sum of their parts. We are both quiet and still, enclosed in our little bubble. His hands clasped neatly in his lap around the hamster. The slow sweep of his eyelashes as he blinks. The faint scratch of the carpet bristles on my legs as I kneel in front of him. These tiny things are filling the room, leaving no space to breathe.

  It’s a revelation, a curtain drawn swiftly up from a dark stage as the lights snap on. The sudden ruthless clarity of it hurts me. I understand why I’m here, and why I have asked them to come. It makes sense now. When someone is responsible for your misery, you want to hurt them. You want to do to them exactly what has been done to you. That’s justice. Not the sterile courtroom she evaded, with its inadequate pronouncements and punishments. Something deeper, more primal than that. If an animal lunges at you in the wild, you don’t stop to think. You fight back. This woman ripped my life to shreds with her carelessness. She strolled away from what she had done without looking back. You take from me, I take from you.

  I’m rising to my feet and going to the balcony window, unlocking the catch and stepping outside. Air rushes up coldly into my lungs. I’m looking at the swarming cars and the street, three floors below, and I can feel the force of gravity – almost see it – wrenching the whole world down. And when I hear the sound of footsteps I’m not surprised that he’s there, sidling up beside me, drawn to this force, his head tilted very slightly to one side. His eyes are wide and steady, gazing up at me. Every second expands and stretches. I take a small step towards him. This next part will need to be quick. A jolt of time, swift and instantaneous, changing everything.

  My hands are millimetres away from his shoulders when he moves. He doesn’t quite understand, but he’s backing away, into the safety of the room, and I’m alone on the balcony with the wind in my face, and the tears have come so fast that I’m choking with surprise and I can hardly breathe, because of course I can’t do it. Because I’m playing at being someone I’m not and can never be. Because even the thought is ridiculous. Because there are no answers here or anywhere else, and the idea of taking life away revolts me as much as it always has, and the enormity of the knowledge that there’s nothing I can ever do to fix what has been broken is slamming into me hard and fast without compromise, and for the first time.

  Away

  Caroline, May 2015

  I STAY AT the bathroom window for some minutes after you’ve gone inside – staring at the windows of your house, trying to make out some flicker of movement behind the glass. I think about you crossing the living room, making yourself a drink, settling down on the sofa. Amber next to you, sliding her legs on to your lap as she lies down and asks you how your week has been. Or perhaps you’re leaving the conversation for later and you’re upstairs together, not talking at all.

  I realize that I’m shivering. My skin is speckled with goosebumps and when I glance behind me I see that the bathwater looks cold and clouded, congealed suds of foam floating on its surface. Mechanically, I drain it and pull my clothes back on. In the bathroom mirror, my reflection evaluates me. My m
ake-up has started to run, and I can feel my foundation getting oily. I move my hand up to rub it away but even this small action feels too complicated and, in the end, I let my arm fall back limply down by my side.

  The woman’s voice is replaying in my head – the soft evenness of her tone, her dispassionate final words. A voice down the line, hundreds of miles away, coming to me from my own home. She is there and I am here, with you disturbingly, electrically close … and suddenly it seems that everything is in the wrong place. I don’t want her there, and I don’t want to be here. I want to go home. Right now. In the back of my mind, a thought half stirs, an ugly, unexpressed fear. I’m thinking of Eddie and, although I know that he’s with my mother and that he’s safe, I still don’t like the idea of this woman being so close to him, not now that I know what I know.

  The thought gives me the surge of energy I need. I fling open the bathroom door and hurry through to the bedroom, pulling my suitcase out from underneath the bed. At random, I start snatching up my clothes, bundling them haphazardly inside. I’ll tell Francis that we just have to leave. That there’s been some kind of emergency and we need to get back. My head is fuzzy and I can’t work out the details, but I’ll think of something. I’m still snatching up handfuls of our possessions when I hear the doorbell ring downstairs.

  I stand motionless, listening, and then Francis’s voice floats up to me. ‘Can you get that, Caro? I’m cooking.’

  I look round at the half-packed room. I’ll see who is there, then come back and finish it off. I run downstairs, glimpsing the figure through the opaque glass: female and slight, long hair falling over her shoulders. As I pull the door open I see that it’s Amber. She looks as if she hasn’t slept in days, her eyes sunken into their sockets and the surrounding skin bruised violet with exhaustion.