Things We Never Say

by Sheila O'Flanagan

  Funny how he hadn’t thought of Dilly in years, yet now, when there were times he couldn’t remember what he’d gone into a room for, he could recall everything about her. Her peaches-and-cream complexion, her soft blue eyes, her mane of golden hair and her luscious, desirable body. When he thought of Dilly, he felt young again, he felt like the carefree Fred he’d been in the days before he’d had to worry about a wife and a family and a business that had been twenty-four-seven before anyone had ever used the expression. Sometimes he wondered how his life would have turned out if he’d treated her better. If he would have been a better person himself. If he wouldn’t have anything at all to regret.

  He grunted. He was being stupid now. Stupid and maudlin and acting like an old man. The past was a different country. He knew that. And as for the present … despite his physical infirmities, he was still a powerful man. He allowed himself a moment of satisfaction with the power that he knew he had. He’d seen it reflected in Lisette’s eyes when she’d caught sight of the will. He’d meant for her to see it. He liked to remind her that he was still very much a part of the family.

  Not that they should need any of his money now, of course. They had jobs of their own, houses of their own, lives of their own. Nevertheless, everyone had gone through hard times over the last few years, and he knew that they weren’t as comfortably off as they might have expected to be by now. But perhaps that was their own fault too. Perhaps the knowledge that he was there in the background had made them take the wrong kind of risks.

  One way or another, though, they still had expectations. They needed to tailor those expectations, thought Fred. He’d been generous to them before, and that generosity wasn’t boundless. Besides, he now had other interests, other obligations to think about.

  He’d call Alex Shannon in the morning and chat to him about it. His solicitor knew him well and would be able to advise him on the best way to go about things. Fred had a lot of faith in Alex. Even so, maybe it wouldn’t work out. If it didn’t, well, he’d rethink his future plans. But if it did, he’d have important decisions to make. It was unfinished business, after all. And Fred didn’t like unfinished business hanging over him.

  PART 3

  THE DISCLOSURE

  Chapter 8

  Abbey Andersen worked late on Fridays, which was always one of the salon’s busiest days. Today had been even busier than most for her – in addition to her regular manicures and extensions, the list of clients wanting nail art was growing all the time. Her last appointment had been identical twin sisters who were throwing a birthday bash and had asked for matching party nails with lots of bling and glitter. The girls were excited about the party and chatted throughout their time with her, commenting enthusiastically on the design she’d devised for them and telling her that she should set up her own website with pictures of all her work. Because, said one, they’d never seen nail art as funky and original as hers, and it was a shame not to share it with everyone.

  She told them that there were plenty of samples of her stuff on the Mariposa site, but if they were OK with it, she’d add their nail work too. The girls agreed happily, gave her a generous tip and told her that they looked forward to seeing it there. Then they headed off, still chattering and giggling. Abbey smiled as they went. She got a tremendous buzz from seeing clients leave the salon happy, and the Benson twins had been fun to work with. They weren’t the first people to have suggested to her that she set up a site either, she reflected as she sent the photo to Selina to add to the gallery. Her own friends had said it to her too. The last time she’d seen Pete, he’d told her that she should leave Mariposa and set up on her own, but then Pete was big into people being entrepreneurial and working for themselves. She usually dismissed all of these suggestions. She was happy to be part of the team at the salon. She was in her comfort zone. Besides, she saw too many stressed-out women trying to fit a little bit of pampering into an over-full day to want to take on stress of her own by working for herself.

  She was tired but content as she changed from her heels into her trainers and began the ten-minute walk from the salon on Powell to the apartment she shared on O’Farrell with her boyfriend, Cobey. Selina had opened two more Mariposa salons since Abbey first started working full-time with her, and the Powell Street branch was now the flagship salon. The interior was bright and airy, with the salon’s signature butterfly motif etched into the frosted-glass doors, and each of the treatment rooms named after a particular species. Although it was constantly busy, the atmosphere was one of complete tranquillity, which made it very popular with people who worked in the city.

  I’m so lucky, thought Abbey, as she admired a chic (but totally unaffordable) jacket in the Saks window display before continuing down the street. I have a job that makes me happy, I work with a great team and my clients are lovely too. I have a cool boyfriend and a nice apartment and I think I’ve finally got to a place in my life where I know what I’m doing. I also have opportunities ahead of me, because even if I don’t want to strike out on my own, the nail business is booming now. More and more people are wanting to express themselves with their nails. And they’re right. Great nails are uplifting.

  Back in the day, when she’d been studying art, Abbey’s mom had declared that great art was spiritually uplifting. Did the fact that she herself was now saying the same thing about nails mean that nail art was every bit as spiritual as oils on canvas? Abbey wondered. Perhaps the next time she saw her mom she’d raise that question with her. Although she already knew what the answer would be. Nevertheless … Abbey adjusted her bag on her shoulder and picked up the pace as she neared the apartment. She’d made the right decision in abandoning the gallery for the salon. No question.

  She keyed in the code to the entrance door and then walked up the stairs to the first-floor apartment. She still got an extra thrill every time she let herself in. She loved living with Cobey, a tall, lanky tour guide she’d met at a party six months earlier. They’d clicked straight away, the first time that had ever happened to her with a boyfriend. It usually took her time to allow someone into her life, and even then she liked to keep a certain distance between them. Which was why, according to Vanessa and Solí, her closest friends, she’d never had a long-term relationship. Abbey thought her friends were overanalysing when they talked about commitment. She was perfectly able to commit. It was about finding the right person to commit to, being confident that they felt the same way, being sure that you weren’t giving too much of yourself away.

  From the get-go she’d been confident with Cobey. And so, when after only three weeks he’d asked if she wanted to move in with him, she’d surprised everyone who knew her by saying yes. Moving in with him made her feel as though she’d finally grown up. She wasn’t sure that her mom – when she eventually got around to telling her – would entirely agree, but given that she wasn’t a major part of Abbey’s life any more, it didn’t really matter what she thought. The important thing was that she herself was happy. She hummed under her breath as she unlocked the apartment door. It was impossible not to be happy with Cobey in her life.

  The moment she opened the door to the apartment, she knew something was different. Nothing seemed out of place, yet as she walked into the living room, she looked around warily, as though someone else might be there.

  Then she saw the pink Post-it note stuck to the enormous larder fridge that took up most of the tiny galley kitchen. Abbey dropped her bag on the sofa and walked over to it. She read it where it was, still attached to the fridge, and then she tore it from the fridge door and read it again.

  Babes, Cobey had written in his looping script. I’ve got a job on a cruise liner. Easier for me to do it this way. I’m not good on goodbyes. Was fun. Cx

  She turned the note over, wondering if she was missing something. Cobey hadn’t said anything to her about applying for a job on a cruise liner. He hadn’t even said that he was thinking about leaving the tour company where he worked. He was supposed to be setting up
a tourist business of his own! She’d helped him design a website, for heaven’s sake. So what the hell … She read the note again with increasing disbelief. He was having a laugh. He had to be.

  Holding the note in her shaking hand, she walked into the bedroom. The bed was still unmade (on Fridays Cobey left the apartment later than her), and his half-empty bottle of water was on the shelf on his side. The magazine he’d been reading the previous night was beside it. She picked it up, replaced it, then opened the wardrobe doors. She stared at the empty hangers, then closed her eyes, waited a moment and looked again. The hangers were still empty. The shelves were still bare. All Cobey’s clothes were gone. She reread the note one more time. She felt sick. And she still didn’t quite believe it.

  She sat on the edge of the bed and took out her cell phone. She scrolled to Cobey’s number and dialled it.

  ‘Hi, this is Cobey. I’ll get back to you.’

  She’d always teased him about his voicemail message. It was too short and too abrupt, she told him. But he pointed out that it got the job done.

  ‘Cobey,’ she said, trying hard to keep her voice steady. ‘What the hell is going on? Where is this job? For how long? When … when are you coming back?’ Although even as she spoke, her eyes were drawn back to his words. He wasn’t good on goodbyes. And the note sounded pretty final to her.

  Despite the fact that she knew she was wasting her time, she got up and searched the apartment for anything he might have left behind. Anything that would give her a clue as to why he’d walked out without talking to her first. Because regardless of the fact that he’d got a new job and wanted to leave, breaking up with her by Post-it note was unreal. Cowardly. Cruel. She hadn’t thought he was that sort of person. She’d trusted him. Loved him.

  And now she’d been abandoned by him.

  I specialise in that, she thought as she stared unseeingly from the living-room window. I specialise in people walking out and never coming back. Why? What’s the matter with me that the people I love do that? She leaned her head against the window. And she started to cry.

  Later that evening, after leaving another two messages on his voicemail, she opened the Facebook app on her iPad and clicked on Cobey’s page. As she looked at his public profile, she realised that he had de-friended her. She felt a hot rage well up to go along with her misery. The man who had told her over and over that he loved her, the man she’d trusted and believed in, had dumped and de-friended her.

  She clicked on ‘Message’ and began to type.

  I got your horrible note. What’s it all about? Why didn’t you say anything before now? Why didn’t you talk to me? I deserve that much at least! Call me. Or message me. She hesitated for a moment, and then added, Please. I love you. I thought you loved me.

  After hitting send, she sat in front of the TV with the iPad on her lap, constantly refreshing the page in case she missed his reply. By two in the morning, she realised that there wasn’t going to be one. By seven thirty, ten minutes before she had to get up for work, she finally fell asleep.

  She got through the next few days on autopilot, glad that she had to work through the weekend but unable, even moments after finishing a client’s nails, to remember anything about the job she’d just done. Normally when they talked to her she listened attentively – half the job, she often told herself, was being a confidante for the ladies who came to see her. She reckoned she knew more about their lives than they ever realised. She’d never really understood before how it was that some of her clients opened up so much to her, especially those to whom she was a virtual stranger. She’d listened to stories of infidelity and jealousy, of love and betrayal, of highs and of lows, and she’d stored them all away while telling herself that she was too sensible a person to let these things happen to her. But I’m not, she thought now as she applied a coat of red shellac to a businesswoman who was making an important presentation that afternoon and who wanted to look assured and commanding. I moved in with a guy and he dumped me. I’m exactly the same as every other woman who’s been let down. Even worse than lots of them, because he dumped me by sticking a goddam pink note to the fridge! Every time she thought of it, she felt a knot of miserable fury ball up in her stomach.

  Selina, who’d spotted Abbey’s pale face and red-rimmed eyes the moment she’d walked into the salon that Monday morning, had asked her if everything was all right, and Abbey had replied that she was a bit tired but that she was fine. Even as she’d said it, she’d realised that she was trotting out the same sort of excuses her friends came up with after a break-up, and she knew that Selina would immediately realise what had happened. But she couldn’t bring herself to tell her yet. She still wasn’t able to say it out loud.

  She left early, her head thumping with one of the migraines that she occasionally suffered from, and let herself into the apartment. She opened the mail box and saw a letter addressed to Cobey inside. She brought it upstairs, unsure of whether she should open it or not. Then she told herself that he was the one that had walked out and he was the one that hadn’t left a forwarding address and that she was entitled to look at his post. Vaguely, at the back of her headache-throbbing mind, she recalled that opening someone else’s mail was a federal offence. But breaking someone’s heart should be an offence too, she thought, and perhaps the letter would give her some idea as to which cruise line Cobey was working for and where he’d actually gone.

  But the letter, when she unfolded it, was nothing to do with Cobey’s career. It was a reminder from the landlord of a notice to quit, in which he was also demanding three months’ overdue rent plus penalties. Abbey looked at it in horror. It wasn’t possible that Cobey owed rental money. She gave him her share of it every month. The apartment, though not outrageous by the city’s standards, wasn’t cheap, and Abbey couldn’t have afforded it on her own, but Cobey had been living by himself before she’d turned up and … and … She squeezed her eyes shut and wished her head would stop pounding. He’d been relaxed about the rental money, not to worry, he had it under control. But when she’d insisted, he’d put his arm around her and told her that they were good together, that they’d always be good together, that he loved her.

  She gritted her teeth at the memory. And then the other memory came to her. The memory of handing him the extra money to pay off his credit card bill so that he could go to the bank with a clean credit history to get a loan for additional website development. She’d asked Vanessa, who worked in a bank, to set up a meeting for him with a local account executive, and he’d been so delighted that he’d taken her for a moonlight boat ride around the bay. The meeting had gone well, he said. Things had been set in motion. Soon Cobey Tours would be a reality.

  How did getting a job on a cruise liner fit in with the great plans he’d had for his own business? With spending evenings messing around on his laptop ‘setting things up’, as he’d put it? With borrowing money from her? How did all those things fit in with him deciding to walk out on her without paying the rent, for which she’d already given him money every month?

  She exhaled slowly. They didn’t. The only thing all those things fitted in with was him taking her for a fool. Which she had been. No question.

  She looked at the landlord’s letter again. She wasn’t sure what she was supposed to do. When she’d moved into the apartment, Cobey hadn’t bothered updating the lease to include her. But now … She swallowed hard. What if she was liable for the rent he hadn’t paid? What if she owed … she looked at the letter again … what if she owed nearly three months plus penalties? That would wipe out the rest of her savings – the savings she’d already raided to help him out! She caught her breath and her head hurt more than ever.

  She couldn’t do anything today, she felt too ill. But tomorrow she would try to contact his other friends, see if they knew what was going on.

  Her phone rang and her heart leapt. But the caller display showed it was Solí. Abbey didn’t have the strength to talk to Solí right now, and so, like the ca
ll she’d received from Vanessa the previous night, she let it go to voicemail while she lay down on the sofa and closed her eyes.

  The following evening, finally feeling able to talk about it, Abbey rang both Solí and Vanessa and told them that Cobey had left her. She also told them about the notice to quit, but couldn’t bring herself to confess to having lent him money. Both girls immediately called around to the apartment, bringing flowers and chocolates and giving her lots of sympathetic hugs.

  ‘I can’t believe it.’ Solí’s dark curls danced around her face as she shook her head in anger. ‘I thought he was a nice guy! Post-it note? That’s crap!’

  Abbey bit her lip as Vanessa put her arms around her and told her that he wasn’t worth her tears.

  ‘I’m not crying,’ she protested weakly, even as an unwanted tear trickled down her cheek. She hated the idea that Cobey had pierced her defences enough to make her cry. ‘At least, I’m crying, but only because I’m so angry with him.’

  ‘You’ve got to move on,’ said Vanessa.

  ‘I know. But first … I want to see Mike. Maybe he knows where Cobey has gone.’

  ‘Is that a good idea?’ Solí looked doubtful. ‘Mike is his best friend. He’s not going to be on your side.’

  ‘I don’t care,’ said Abbey. ‘I’ve got to see him.’

  Vanessa and Solí exchanged glances, but Abbey was utterly determined so they said they’d go with her.

  ‘Thanks,’ said Abbey as she took out her concealer to repair the damage to her eyes. ‘I’m lucky to have you guys.’