Seven Lies

by Elizabeth Kay

  And so I needed a different plan.

  * * *

  That afternoon, I found myself scrolling again through her recent uploads—photographs, newspaper pieces, and tweets, too—and discovered a new image, posted only that morning. It showed a row of tap shoes, and the caption said: Final rehearsal—here we go! I went onto the website of the dance company and discovered that their show was taking place just a few hours later in a church hall in the city center. They weren’t selling tickets in advance—first come, first served—and would instead be accepting donations for a mental health charity on arrival.

  I decided to go. I wanted to see her.

  I arrived promptly at seven o’clock. The woman holding the collection bucket at the door asked if I’d watched one of their shows before, and when I said no, she asked if I knew a member of the cast.

  Without thinking, I responded, “Valerie.”

  “Sands?” she said. “Valerie Sands?”

  I nodded.

  “She’s been such a wonderful addition to the team,” said the woman. “We’re so thrilled to have her. She hadn’t danced since she was a teenager, but she’s picked it all up again so quickly. She’ll shine tonight, I’m sure. You’ll be very proud.”

  I smiled and nodded again and gratefully accepted a bright pink program. Valerie was listed as one of six dancers performing in the opening sequence.

  I stepped into the body of the church and was amazed by its size: the ceiling, so incredibly high and decorated so ornately; the thick wooden pews; the stage hidden behind thick green curtains. The benches were full—children sitting on laps and teenagers packed tightly together—and so I went to stand near the front beside a few other stragglers. A crowd began to form behind me: families and friends and loved ones.

  Then the lights fell and the curtains opened, and I saw her step onto the stage. She was one of three women with three men behind, all of them in loose black trousers and tight black tops. They looked ordinary, boring, until the song started. The speaker beside me began to vibrate, and they became instantly magnificent. They were moving so fast—their bodies sharp, punctuating the music—and the sound from their feet was aggressive and bold. The energy made me feel more alive and I was completely absorbed until she looked toward the front of the stage. She was searching for someone. She found me instead.

  She stumbled, just briefly, before righting herself. She caught up quickly, but it felt good to have upset her rhythm. I liked that, for once, she was surprised by me.

  I snuck out at the end of the song, and I liked, too, that she knew what it felt like to be thrown off balance.

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  It was a Saturday morning and I was on my way to visit my mother. I had been tempted to stay in bed, but she knew to expect me—or, at least, she had known; she may well have forgotten.

  The weather was warm, too rich and too humid for long lie-ins and cozy mornings. It had been over eighty degrees for the last three weeks with no rain in almost a month. The grass across the city had shriveled to yellow straw and even the early mornings felt sticky and oppressive. It was the sort of weather for ice cream in the park and sitting in the shade and visits to the lido and late alfresco dinners in the rolling heat of a long evening. It was not the sort of weather for train journeys and windowless nursing homes and the tight bonds of familial duty.

  The train was busy. We were still at Waterloo and not due to leave for a few more minutes. I was sitting by the sliding doors on a row of four seats, all backed against the window. The seats opposite were occupied by a young family: a mother, a father, and their two young daughters. They had rucksacks on their laps, and I wondered if they were going to the seaside or to the countryside, where the temperature was a little cooler and the air a little less thick.

  Behind them, another train was readying itself to depart. The guard leaned out, scanned the platform, and blew his whistle. The other train groaned and began to move and my stomach lurched, as though we, too, were moving. I sat back and closed my eyes.

  I’d be back in the city by the afternoon and my role as the dutiful daughter would be complete for another week.

  When I opened my eyes, we were at Vauxhall.

  “You need to stop it,” said a woman, standing on the lip of the train, facing outward, her hands stretched to the sides, holding the door frame and blocking the entrance. I couldn’t see her face, but I could tell that she was near tears from the shake in her voice. “Do not get on this train.”

  “Ah, lady, come on now,” said a man on the platform. “What’s the matter with you?”

  She inhaled and her chest rose, and I could see that she was frightened but trying hard not to show it. “Excuse me!” she shouted toward the guard on the platform. He was facing away from her, speaking into a walkie-talkie. “This man is stalking me. Excuse me?” He didn’t turn around.

  “I can get on whatever the fuck train I want to,” the man continued.

  “Not this one. You’ve been following me and shouting obscenities and I’m not having it anymore.” She looped the strap of her handbag over her head so that it hung across her chest. Her sweater was bright pink—it made her look younger, more vulnerable—and her denim shorts revealed toned, tanned thighs.

  I caught the eye of the woman sitting opposite. Her husband wrapped his arms around the shoulders of their two young daughters as we silently discussed whether we ought to get involved.

  “Oh, fuck you!” shouted the man.

  “Ah, that’s enough, now,” said the father opposite, his voice measured and calm. “Just give it two minutes, mate. There’s a train right behind this one. No fuss, yeah?”

  The man stood still on the platform, as though considering the request. “Fuck you all,” he said eventually, and stormed down the platform.

  I exhaled. Backing down to a small woman in denim shorts and a pink top? Well, that would be emasculating, a sign of weakness. Whereas walking away from another man—slightly older, slightly broader—was just common sense.

  Charles had been intimidated by strong women. He would dismiss his female colleagues over dinner, labeling them overly emotional or, in the same breath, too good-natured. He felt threatened by the success of the female partners who had happy children and great marriages and impressive careers. Or maybe that’s simply what I wanted to see. I added his every failing to a list and counted the many ways in which he didn’t deserve a woman like Marnie.

  The woman in pink pressed the button and the doors slid closed in front of her.

  “Thank you,” she said, turning to face the father with his young daughters. “Thank you for getting involved.”

  She turned and stepped toward the empty seat beside me.

  I knew her.

  I recognized her immediately.

  I’d know that face anywhere.

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  She was so familiar. I recognized her dark hair, slicked back, and the tattoos on her left wrist and thumb matched those in her photographs. She looked different up close: much sharper, more remarkable. I’d seen her stand that way before, too, her weight through one side, her hip jutting to the left, and she had the same black leather bag that she’d worn at the funeral. But it was more than that: more than just the way she looked and stood and the things that she owned. I felt as though I knew how her mind worked, the way she constructed a thought.

  “I know you,” I said.

  “You do,” she replied. “Although you weren’t meant to see me. But then I couldn’t have anticipated all that commotion with that weird man. I feel a little shaken, actually. He was awful, wasn’t he? That’s the second time he’s followed me. And it’s never nice being followed by a stranger, I suppose.”

  She raised an eyebrow and then she laughed.

  I was astounded by her confidence; she was so self-assured, so unafraid. I should have felt frightened. I know that.
It should have been unnerving to have her confirm that she’d been pursuing me—likely for months—with nothing but the worst intentions. And yet, in that moment, I felt reassured. I had been correct. I had been followed. I was right.

  “You weren’t quite as subtle as you think,” I replied. “I’ve seen you. More than once, in fact.”

  “Oh, really?” she replied. “Damn. That’s so disappointing.” I hadn’t noticed it before, but there was something very pretty about her features, her face.

  “What do you want?” I asked.

  “I want to know where you go every Saturday,” she replied. “Do you mind if I sit down?”

  I shook my head, because I didn’t want her there beside me, acting as though we were friends, as though this was anything other than the mess that it actually was.

  “Yes,” I replied. “I do mind.”

  “Oh, don’t be like that,” she said.

  “You’ve just intimated that you’ve been following me and you want to sit down beside me and have—what, a chat? No. I’m not interested.”

  “You’re so dramatic,” she said. “I hadn’t expected that. I thought you’d be very measured, sort of indifferent, but you’re just leaking emotions, aren’t you? Which is strange because it isn’t really such a revelation, is it?” she continued. “If you knew that I was following you.”

  I hated that. I hated the implication that I was being hysterical when I desperately wanted to be the absolute opposite: calm, composed, controlled.

  She sat down beside me regardless. Her arm nudged mine. I stayed still so that the bobbled fabric of her jumper nestled soft against my bare skin. I felt this anger prickling within me, and I knew that I needed to ignore it and be cautious, to be calculated rather than ruthless.

  She sighed and ran her fingers through her hair.

  I wanted to slap her even though I know that violence is never the answer, because everything about her—her smirk, her pink jumper, her mettle—was infuriating. She had accused me of murder, not once, but twice. She had accused me of killing my own husband. And when Marnie was finally beginning to find a path through her grief, it was this woman—sitting there beside me—who tore it away, suspending our way forward.

  “You should get off at the next stop,” I said.

  “But then I won’t know where you’re going,” she said, and she pulled one of her feet onto the cushioned seat to retie her laces.

  “You could just ask me,” I replied. “It isn’t interesting. And frankly, if your investigation has led you here, then it’s definitely time to stop. I’m on my way to visit my mother. I see her every weekend and I’m always on this train.”

  “Where does she live?”

  “The end of the line.”

  “Can I have her address?” She smiled at me conspiratorially, as though we were in this together. She put her foot back onto the floor and then started to lift and lower her heel repeatedly, so that her leg bobbed up and down, the tanned flesh of her thigh trembling.

  “She’s in a residential home,” I said. “Dementia.”

  I suppose I needed to seem honest, as though I had nothing to hide. I was willingly giving her the information that she wanted to make myself seem innocent.

  “I’m so sorry,” said Valerie. “That’s a real shame.”

  “Why?” I asked bluntly. “Because she won’t be able to tell you anything?”

  She looked shocked. “No,” she insisted. “What an awful thing to say. That isn’t it at all.”

  “Right,” I said. I didn’t know if she was telling the truth. It didn’t really matter.

  She looked over her shoulder, out the windows, at the hedgerows sliding past, a blur of green. “You think I’m a monster,” she said. “I’m not. I just know that there’s something else here that still needs uncovering. So I have to keep going. It isn’t going to get any better, I’m afraid.”

  I think my face must have contorted in some way—perhaps she saw the fear that was nestled inside me—because her eyes shifted quickly until they were almost sympathetic.

  “Sorry,” she said. “That sounds a little like a threat, doesn’t it?”

  “Isn’t it?” I asked.

  “No, you’re right,” she said. “It probably is. Do you feel like I’m getting closer?”

  “There’s nothing to get closer—”

  “Stop that,” she said. “You can see it as clearly as I can. There are these little cracks throughout your story. And, somewhere, there’s a wrecking ball that will destroy it completely. I’m going to find it.”

  I shrugged. “You’re wrong,” I said. It didn’t sound convincing.

  “I don’t think you killed your husband, though,” she said. “If that’s any consolation.”

  “It isn’t.”

  “And I am sorry about that, I suppose. It’s tough.”

  “You get used to it,” I replied. “To the shit.”

  “Oh, I hear you,” she said. “Sometimes I’m into my fourth vodka before the edges even begin to soften . . .” She started to twist at the silver ring sitting snug around her thumb. “I’ve just remembered that message,” she said, and she grimaced. “I left you a message. On your answering machine. Anyway, I felt terrible the next morning; I’d drunk far too much. But I meant what I said.”

  “That you’re still investigating us?” I asked. “I’m just glad Marnie deleted hers before listening to any of that nonsense.”

  Valerie tilted her head slightly to one side and her eyes widened, and I knew then that I’d made a mistake.

  “What do you mean?” she asked. “She didn’t listen to it?”

  I shook my head.

  “I thought she’d heard it but ignored it.”

  I didn’t say anything. The family of four got off at Richmond. There was a last-minute kerfuffle—over hats and rucksacks and where was the sunblock—and the mother smiled at us uncomfortably as she hurried her family out of the carriage just before the doors beeped and closed and we pulled away from the platform.

  The air-conditioning grunted and groaned and then whistled to a stop. The train suddenly felt quieter, without the whir of the fan and the hiss of cool air entering the carriage. The temperature began to increase. I stood to open the window, but it was sealed shut. They were all sealed shut.

  “All right, princess,” came a voice behind me, and I turned to see that the man had returned and was sitting opposite us, where the family had been sitting a few moments before.

  I stayed standing but said nothing.

  “What was it you said back there?” His voice was loud, and others in the carriage were stirring, staring, waiting to see how the situation would unfold. I wondered if they’d been listening all along, how much of our altercation they had overheard.

  “Hey!” he shouted. Valerie was peering into her purse. “Weren’t ignoring me earlier, were you?”

  “There are some seats further down,” I said. “Just over there.”

  “I’m not looking for a seat, am I, love? I’m wanting to speak to her.”

  Valerie refused to look up, fiddling instead with wads of old, faded, folded receipts, her empty water bottle, her phone. I should have walked away. I should have let her handle him herself, but there’s this unwritten code between women, and it exists in public places, and more than ever on public transport, that you unite in the presence of threatening men, and so I inevitably—without really thinking about it—stayed there beside her.

  “Look at me!” he shouted, and, instinctively, she did.

  Valerie inhaled and then stood up. “Look,” she said. “I’m just trying to have a nice day out with my girlfriend.” I felt her fingers climbing along my wrist toward my hand. I let her take it. Was she still playing? Was she in control? Or was he? “And we really don’t want any trouble, so what is it exactly that you want?”

&nbs
p; “Well, doesn’t that explain it,” he said, standing up.

  I tensed, but he didn’t move any closer.

  “You’re a dyke.” He laughed. “Why didn’t you say? Suppose I should’ve guessed, what with all the rage and hating.”

  He walked past us, holding his middle finger up behind his head as he disappeared farther down the carriage.

  We watched him go and then sat back down.

  “He’s been stalking me,” she said, very quietly. “We went for a drink once. About a piece I wanted to write. And then I saw him at my show, a dance show. He was watching me from the front of the stage. It really threw me. Anyway, I hope that’s the end of him.”

  “I want you to get off at the next stop,” I said again.

  “I won’t follow you,” she replied.

  “I don’t believe you.”

  She laughed. “I suppose that’s fair.”

  “I want you to stop investigating us now.”

  “I’m not going to do that.”

  “You are,” I replied. “There’s nothing to find, and you’re stalking me now, which is an offense in itself.”

  “I’ll tell the police what I’ve found.”

  “You think they’ll care? About a rainy walk and a noisy apartment? Those things aren’t evidence, Valerie. They’re nothing. You haven’t found anything. You’re wasting your time. There’s something wrong with you.”

  “There’s nothing wrong with me,” she said, and I could see that I’d found something that unsettled her.

  “This isn’t normal.” I was trying not to shout, but the anger inside me was bursting within each capillary, tiny explosions beyond my control, itching and pulsing and desperate to escape. “You’re not normal.”

  “Says you.” Her face was distorted: her jaw clenched, her eyes narrowed, her mouth scowling.

  “What does that mean?” I said. “What are you saying?”