The Last Day I Saw Her

by Lucy Lawrie

  I wasn’t well, that was all. The room was darkening to black.

  ‘I think I’m going to be sick.’

  She pursed her lips and reached into a cupboard for a grey cardboard basin.

  ‘Sorry,’ I said, when the nausea had passed. ‘I should go. I just came here for a stroll along memory lane.’

  Mrs Potts eyed me thoughtfully, perhaps wondering what part of that stroll had involved quite so much mud.

  ‘Could I?’ I nodded towards the wash basin.

  ‘Oh, yes, yes. You get yourself sorted out, dear.’

  ‘I shouldn’t have come,’ I said, wiping the mud off my face. ‘It was an impulse thing.’

  Mrs Potts’s face, which I could see reflected in the mirror, was all calmness and understanding.

  ‘It’s your old school, Janey. You’re always welcome here.’

  ‘My friend Hattie. You might remember her. Hattie Marlowe. The thing is, I’ve been trying to get in touch with her again. I just can’t seem to get any news of her.’

  I tried to make my voice light and casual, as though getting the mud out from behind my fingernails was my main priority and definitely not tracking down a lost girl. But my heart was beating fast. It was just possible that Mrs Potts had access to alumnae records, perhaps just one click away, on the computer on her desk.

  ‘I remember Hattie very well. Such a lovely girl. And what about you? What’ve you been up to? You went off to . . . let me see, was it one of the music schools?’

  ‘Er, no,’ I said quickly. ‘It didn’t really work out. I trained as a legal secretary. I did that for quite a few years and I enjoyed it a lot. But now I’ve got a little boy. Pip. He’s two.’

  Ever so gently, she smiled.

  ‘Well now. How about that. Things have a way of working out at the end of the day.’

  Something wrenched inside me. If I let her go on like this I’d start crying again.

  I dried my hands carefully on a scratchy blue paper towel and turned round to face her. ‘Well, I’d really better go. I feel a lot better now. Honestly.’

  As I was heading towards the door, she touched my arm.

  ‘Do you know, a friend of mine is looking to buy a new flat.’

  What was she on about?

  ‘She went to view one the other day, in a very smart apartment block not far from here. She said it was very nice. What was it called again?’ She tutted softly. ‘Oh yes, Sutcliffe Heights. I’m sure it was that. Sutcliffe Heights.’

  She shot me a meaningful look.

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Yes. You’ll see the for sale sign up if you pass it. I’d say it was definitely worth a viewing, if you were looking for somebody. I mean, something. If you were looking for a new flat.’

  ‘Oh,’ I murmured.

  ‘Anyway, dear. It was lovely to see you. Do take care. And come back and visit when you’re feeling better. We’ll get a couple of girls to take you on a proper tour. That would be fun, wouldn’t it?’

  I turned and enfolded her in a hug, gratitude transcending my awkwardness for a second. Then I hurried away before the spell could be broken.

  23

  Janey

  Sutcliffe Heights. It was the penthouse that was for sale.

  A woman opened the door. Petite, with neat curves swathed in black trousers and tunic, big eyes with dark lashes. A pointy chin like a little girl’s.

  The dark-toffee highlights threw me for a moment. And the nose looked different: the little bump near the top was gone.

  ‘Hat – Hattie? Hattie.’ The words teetered between a question and a statement.

  She blinked. She had traces of crows’ feet, just soft ones, which lifted in the moment that her eyes widened. Stepping forward, she held out her arms. She’d always been a toucher.

  ‘Holy moly. Just give me a heart attack, why don’t you? Janey Johnston! Janey-Janey-Johnston! Come here right now!’ She squealed as I stepped into her embrace.

  She released me, then took hold of my hand and dragged me inside, across a vast expanse of dark wood flooring into the living room. I felt tall, ungainly, walking behind her. Curves? Since when had Hattie had curves? But then again, I hadn’t seen her since we were twelve, our bodies straight up and down.

  ‘What the hell have you been up to, Janey-Janey-Johnston? Come right in here. I’m not letting you move from this couch’ – she pushed me down into it and plonked herself next to me – ‘until you tell me everything.’

  I gave a nervous laugh. ‘You’re not an easy girl to track down, you know.’

  She blinked, still smiling.

  ‘I wrote to you,’ I went on, hearing a shake in my voice now. ‘At Ramplings, after you left. Time after time.’

  Where did that come from? Sitting there, on her plush sofa, in her beautiful flat, I was horrified to find I wanted to hit and shake her.

  She stretched her hands out on her lap, staring at them. They were small and perfect, the nails painted a clear coral pink.

  ‘Letters? Did I get them? No. And it seems you never got mine, either. That’ll be down to Mother Dearest, no doubt, and her henchmen at Ramplings. I should have known. She did the same thing to James.’ She shook her head and assumed a sad expression for a second or two before her face brightened. ‘But what have you been up to? What are you doing these days? Did you become a horse physiotherapist, like you wanted?’

  A memory flashed into my mind: a wet break spent in a corner of the careers library with Hattie, finding the most outlandish fact sheets we could, and daring each other to ask solemn-faced Miss Hatton to photocopy them. Hattie cracked up when she handed over ‘Sewage Process Plant Operator’ and we both got a disorder mark.

  ‘Er . . .’ I tried to focus my thoughts. ‘No. I trained as a legal secretary. But I’m doing proofreading at the moment.’

  ‘Married?’

  For some reason, I wanted to tell her that I’d almost married someone once, that I’d gone out with Simon, a pale, thin physics PhD student and practising Christian, for nearly five years. We’d even had sex once, befuddled by Cava, on the night he proposed. But he was married to a girl called Ruth now, with three daughters, and twins on the way. Or so he’d said in his last Christmas card.

  ‘No. But I’ve got a little boy. Pip. He’s two years old.’

  ‘Oh!’ she whispered. ‘A little boy. When on earth do you find time to do your proofreading, then?’

  ‘He goes to nursery a few mornings a week. Little Goslings Nursery actually.’

  ‘Awww,’ said Hattie, because it was the nursery where we had met as toddlers, before we could even remember. James had been a Little Goslings child too. There’d been a photo of him in a teddy bear jumper, lined up with his nursery class, on the wall of the Regent’s Crescent kitchen.

  ‘And how’s the family? I was sorry to hear about your dad.’

  ‘Yeah, thanks. Mum’s still in New York. James is an investment banker, drowning in more money than he knows what to do with. He lives in Maidenhead with Simone, his wife. She’s—’

  ‘And what about you?’

  ‘Me? Mostly, I’ve just been toiling away. Building up my business.’

  ‘Oh? What kind of business?’

  ‘Luxury skin clinics,’ she laughed, getting up and heading to the ice-white bank of units that was the kitchen. ‘Want a drink? Tea? Coffee? Vino?’

  ‘Oh, something cold, thanks. Water’s fine.’

  ‘Right-oh.’ She turned on the tap and splashed some into a purple-tinted glass, soaking the granite surround. She kept talking, while she reached into the fridge and poured a glass of white wine for herself. ‘I did loads of things in my twenties, and I was in nursing for a while, but then I fancied something a bit different. So I got myself trained up in medical aesthetics and it just went from there. We started in London and Bristol, but now we’re up here too! We opened one in Stockbridge six months ago. Botox, dermal fillers, acid peels. All that malarkey.’

  I tried not to look too bewi
ldered. This just didn’t sound like Hattie at all.

  ‘Who’s “we”?’ I asked.

  ‘Oh, my business partner Ernie. We were married actually! Hence the name change. Should’ve made him change his name to mine, really. The Marlowe Clinic would’ve sounded a lot better than The Wilson Clinic. Ah well, you live and learn. The divorce was completely amicable, we’re still fabulous as business partners. He runs the London side of things.’

  She slid onto the sofa beside me, folding her legs underneath her, and launched into a long monologue about the Edinburgh clinic: the new leather chairs she’d sourced from Italy, the high-profile clients whose visits were shrouded in secrecy, the clients who were on benefits but came regularly for their injections.

  ‘It sounds great,’ I said. ‘I’ve been wondering what you were up to.’

  ‘Well, here I am.’

  ‘Yes,’ I murmured. ‘Here you are. But you’re moving?’

  ‘Ooh. Yes. I should probably take that sign down now. We concluded missives on this place weeks ago, and I’m moving out on Monday!’

  ‘Where are you going?’

  ‘Well, that’s a real bugger. I’d found this fabulous double upper in Eglinton Crescent, but the sale’s fallen through. So, ha! You’re going to love this! Guess where I’ll be staying till I find something?’

  ‘Where?’ Surely not.

  ‘Only the Regent’s Crescent house! Woo-hooo!’ She made a ghostly sound and wiggled her fingers. ‘Oh, it’s a bit of a bind but it saves me having to rent somewhere. Mum’s keen on the idea, because she’s coming back from the States later in the year. She’s involved in planning a big retrospective thingy for what would have been Dad’s seventieth. She wants me to oversee some work that’s getting done, decorating the hall and so on. It’s a mess. Nobody’s been looking after it since Mrs Patel died and the last tenants left.’

  I sat back, stunned.

  ‘I’m going there on Monday to pick up a spare set of keys for the workmen.’

  Drawing in a silent, deep breath, I let my gaze drift across to the big picture window, and its view over to the Pentland Hills in the distance. The tops were dusted with white and I suddenly wished I was up there walking, breathing the sharp clean air.

  ‘I know,’ she gushed. ‘Fab view, isn’t it?’

  I gave the most cheerful smile I could muster. The last twenty minutes had shown that this wasn’t my Hattie. My Hattie, the one I’d been longing for all these years, was only a ghost in my imagination. I was glad that the woman I’d found seemed happy and healthy, but as the conversation had progressed, I’d been preparing myself for the faux-friendly parting of ways and disingenuous promises to keep in touch: ‘Bye, it was so lovely to catch up. Let’s meet up for a coffee soon.’

  But now, some long-forgotten version of myself stepped up in my mind, and stood stoutly, arms crossed, between me and that casual goodbye. Because the sleek, elegant woman beside me had once been my Hattie, with her socks fallen down and her ponytail hanging askew, and there was no way she was going back into that appalling house by herself.

  ‘If you really must go there, I’m coming with you.’ And for once, I spoke in a voice that brooked no argument.

  Hattie

  Janey is back. I knew it would happen one day, and now it has. Although it hardly seems real, that she was here just this afternoon sitting on my sofa, in her trailing skirt and moss-green cardigan, working the ends of her sleeves with her fingers. Nervous fingers. She always had nervous fingers.

  And excavating me. With those stubborn grey eyes. Trying to work out what I’d turned into.

  It seems that she’s a single mother, and a lapsed legal secretary. She looked pretty gloomy about it, to have lost her career, so I tried to lighten her up by talking about the clinic.

  The thing is this. If I let Janey in again, what else will come in along with her?

  I can feel it now, as I lie here. I felt it the moment I saw her, a staticky feeling at the tips of my fingers. A zing through my brain.

  She wants to come to Regent’s Crescent. I said yes, because it was hard to resist. But I don’t want to see her kid, this Pip she talks about. She can come with me on Monday and we can have a cup of tea, and laugh about the teachers at St Katherine’s, or whatever. But then, that’s it. It’ll be a little bright spot, a little sweet spot, and then everything will go back to how it was before.

  Time for a glass of wine. I’ll put on some music. One of those chill-out albums. As banal as possible! I need to do my nails again before tomorrow, and top up the gradual tan. Nobody wants a beautician who doesn’t look the part, but it never ends. It’s like painting the Forth Bloody Bridge, I swear it. As soon as you’ve got everything looking presentable, something else starts peeling or flaking or just generally looking crap and you have to start all over again.

  24

  Janey

  How strange that the flat should radiate home so much more when Murray stepped in the door. I’d worked hard to make it comfortable for me and Pip, with nice food in the cupboards, deep carpets and pale-cream walls that softened the light. But still, a certain uneasiness lingered in the shadowy corners of the rooms, and in the way Pip’s small voice and mine seemed to disappear into the high-ceilinged spaces above us if the TV wasn’t on. When Murray came in – throwing his coat across the hall table, asking if the kettle was on – he dispelled that unease as though the lights had come up on a cosy sitcom.

  ‘Doughnuts!’ he exclaimed, when he saw the box on the kitchen table. Pip had chosen them in Greggs that morning, his fingertips held lightly to his chin as he contemplated the cakes in the glass cabinet for a full five minutes. ‘How did you know they were my favourite? And all six for me? Fantastic.’ Murray reached out both hands to grab the lot.

  ‘Noooooo!’ shouted Pip, lunging forward.

  Murray’s mobile rang, and he stepped away. Pip grabbed the doughnut box off the table, sending the contents bouncing onto the floor. He reached down and picked up two, clasping them protectively against his chest.

  ‘Gretel! Hi!’ Murray shot me a glance, holding up one finger to silence me. ‘What, the guarantors on Project Ferrera? No. Absolutely not. The heads of terms are quite clear.’

  I had a sudden flash of twelve-year-old Hattie, in fits of giggles over my Ferrero Rocher mistake. It was funny how I still thought of her as the ‘real’ one, despite yesterday’s encounter.

  Pip banged his head off my legs to remind me he was still there, and I crouched down in front of him, feeling sugar crunch under my feet. ‘Want to try one?’ I released one of the squashed doughnuts and took a bite. ‘Mmmmmm. Yummy.’

  But why was I whispering? Why should I play along with the Gretel game and become invisible like some thirty-something Soren Lorensen? Was I so in awe of this Ferrera deal, whatever it was, that I shouldn’t make a noise in my own kitchen? The old Hattie would’ve had something to say about that. So would the old me, for that matter. I gave Pip a little tickle under the ribs.

  He gave a long screech like a rainforest parrot.

  ‘What? Oh, that’s just Brian. He’s just hit the ball into the, er, pond.’

  He frowned and shook his head.

  ‘Yes. He’s not having a great round.’

  He nodded, half-consciously, towards me, as though I was the balding, overweight Brian.

  I pressed my jaw down towards my neck and frowned, trying to re-create Brian’s jowly appearance. Pip copied: a mini-Brian.

  ‘Yup. I’ll be home around eight. Do you want me to pick anything up for dinner? Oh, okay. Samphire.’

  Bitch.

  I took a wooden spoon in both hands and swung it wildly at one of the fallen doughnuts, imitating Brian’s legendary poor swing.

  Murray’s face creased and his voice broke up with the effort of trying not to laugh.

  ‘Yep. Have to go. Bye.’

  He shook his head as he stowed his phone in his pocket, trying to signal that he was above my juvenile antics.

/>   ‘Stay,’ I said, as bold as I’d ever been with him. ‘Don’t go home for eight. Don’t get the flipping samphire.’

  ‘I have to,’ he said. ‘And talking of Gretel, we need to have a word.’

  ‘What?’ I said, leaving Pip to his doughnuts and propelling Murray into the hall with a daring hand on his back.

  ‘We got the keys to the new house yesterday,’ he said. ‘Honestly, you’ll love it. It’s a Victorian villa in Morningside, with a big sunny bedroom for Pip, and a magnificent garden for Trixie.’

  Ah, so the blasted puppy had arrived.

  ‘Pip’s going to love Trixie,’ he went on in deep, confident tones, as though this was so obvious it hardly needed to be stated. ‘She’s so great with kids.’

  I let an awkward silence fall.

  ‘In fact, we’re very keen for Pip to see the house, and we were hoping that he could come to stay for a night. Next Saturday.’

  Every instinct flipped onto red alert. Pip, go and stay by himself in some house in Morningside that I’d never seen before, which might not even have stair gates or socket covers, with some unknown dog rampaging around the magnificent garden?

  Breathe.

  ‘Pip’s too young for sleepovers. He’d get upset without me.’

  ‘Please, Janey. Gretel really wants to be involved. In time,’ he went on, ‘we’d like Pip to think of the Morningside house as a home from home.’

  I thought I might vomit.

  ‘Has Trixie been fully vaccinated?’

  Murray gave me a hard stare. ‘Janey, please be reasonable about this. This house, we’ve bought it with Pip in mind. It’s not as if we’re going to have any other kids.’

  I shrugged. Not my fault if Gretel had never bothered to take time out of her schedule to have children.

  ‘She couldn’t have any, Janey,’ said Murray as though he’d read my mind. ‘She tried with her ex-husband for years but she had some kind of problem.’ He winced, clearly uncomfortable with the way the conversation was steering into gynaecological territory. ‘So just, please. Please don’t be difficult.’