The Lies We Tell

  ‘You know, you really are a very, very naughty girl,’ he said, slipping his hand between her legs then leaning forward to take her in his mouth.

  ‘Ssh,’ Jude whispered, holding a finger to her lips. ‘Don’t tell mum.’

  Chapter 22

  West Sussex – July 2013

  An alternating pattern of red brick, white-washed and pebble dash Fifties semis line either side of Hill Rise as it gently climbs the low hill behind the coaching inn. At its highest point, where it turns sharply to the right, on a tiny patch of green is a single swing and a wooden bench. It is a wind-swept vantage point for viewing on a clear morning the distant line where air meets land and sea. Though today the peak is busy with children kicking footballs or pedalling bikes.

  As Katy drives along Hill Rise she wonders what she’s looking for. Why it even matters what the house looks like. Somehow, she thinks, knowing where Jude used to live will help her understand.

  Outside house after house, men tinker with cars or dab paint at flaking window frames while women in sun tops tend flowerbeds or direct their lobster skin towards the open sky. Then, spotting a stooped figure walking along the road towards her, she pulls to one side and winds down the window. The elderly woman is carrying two string bags filled with shopping, the weight from which is pulling her shoulders down. As she walks towards her, slowly, her head is bowed, her gaze fixed on the ground.

  ‘Excuse me,’ Katy calls. ‘I wonder if you can help. I’m looking for the Davies’s house, where Siobhan Davies used to live?’ Drawing level, the woman stops and stares. Her expression seems wary. ‘I’m a friend of her daughter, Jude,’ Katy adds casually. ‘We were at school together. Before she moved away.’

  ‘Well in that case –’ she replies, her face softened by the fine detail of Katy’s enquiry. ‘ – you need number 42. Can’t miss it, it’s an utter mess. There’s a broken down Mini in the driveway, has been for years. I don’t know how many times he’s been asked to move it, but he couldn’t care less. If you ask me he was the death of his nan.’

  ‘Thanks,’ Katy calls, but the woman has already turned away.

  She stops outside number 48 where she leaves the car before casually walking on a few houses further. Number 42 is located at what to a casual observer might pass as the run down end of the street, though it is a close run thing. One of the upstairs windows is boarded up, broken at some point but never mended. Stained curtains hang lank at salt-smeared windows. A white splash from a passing seagull has striped the smoked glass front door.

  Katy hesitates. Behind the washed up carcass of a Mini Cooper now mouldering in the driveway looms the dark interior of a wooden, lean-to garage with its doors thrown wide. Siobhan may be dead, but she still has relations living in the house. Perhaps she can still return home with some fragment of information which can help. Her right fist tightens around the car keys which, instinctively, she has kept hold of rather than put away into her bag.

  The touch of metal against her palm is comforting, strengthening her nerve as she steps onto the drive and draws level with the Mini.

  ‘Hello?’ she calls into the darkness beyond.

  Silence.

  Even the movement she glimpsed in her peripheral vision a moment before has gone. Like time has stopped, she thinks. Though the dog howl of the seagulls now circling overhead prove this is no freeze frame. Nervously, she glances around her then calls out again. A little louder, this time. Shading her eyes from the sun’s glare, as she squints into the blackness.

  ‘What?’ a male voice bounces back. Abrupt. Hostile.

  Before she can reply, a figure steps into the sunlight. Katy hesitates, derailed from her mission by the raw physicality of his presence and an angry expression made more intense by the brutal line of his buzz cut hair. The army-green boiler suit he is wearing is unbuttoned to the waist revealing a toned chest streaked with oil. With a scowl, the man takes another step forward. Now close enough to register the finer detail of his face, she finds the pale wetness of his eye is unnerving.

  ‘What are you doing here?’

  The stranger’s emphasis on the ‘you’ takes Katy by surprise as she searches his face for any indication that she might be able to diffuse the situation with gentle reasoning. It’s almost as if he knows her. ‘I’m so sorry,’ she says lightly, trying not to acknowledge the gathering thought that she’s seen him somewhere before. ‘I must have got the wrong address.’

  ‘A mistake, you say. But you’re looking for the Davies’s house, yes?’ he says, tugging a rag from his pocket which he uses to wipe his greasy hands. The dirty piece of cloth is part of the front panel of a T-shirt on which a pyramid-shaped logo comprising three capital letter As and a drawing of interlocked hands is visible. Distracted for a moment by her inability to place just where she has seen this moniker before, all she can do is nod. ‘Well in that case, Kat,’ he continues with a fleeting smile, reaching out as if to take her by the arm. ‘You’d better step inside.’

  But before he can get a firm hold Katy stumbles backwards. She spins around on her heels then lunges forwards – every fibre in her being attuned to achieving the single goal of getting back to her car.

  Waving the fob of the key as she gets close enough in a desperate attempt to release the central locking. Wrenching open the driver’s door and throwing herself inside. Tumbling into her seat then fumbling with the key she misses the ignition on her first try and scratches the base of the dashboard. On her second attempt, comes the engine’s reassuring purr.

  Blind to the fact that he’s not moved from the driveway, Katy locks herself in then kicks down onto the accelerator jerking the car forwards.

  The roar of the engine makes people tending their front gardens look her way, but from their expressions they are clearly used to such goings at number 42. Only as she passes the driveway does she look back towards him and as their eyes meet time seems to slow. He is standing on the pavement, hand on hips, watching. Then, like an old movie played out at half speed, he raises his right arm towards her and starts to wave and appears still to be waving as she looks one last time before the rounds a corner and the house disappears from view.

  Katy drives on for a few miles with no clear idea of where to go until she reaches a roundabout and sees a sign for London and, in the opposite direction, the sea.

  Without pausing to think, she takes the latter and quickly finds herself on a B road lined with tatty warehouses and dusty yards crammed with agricultural and marine equipment. After a mile or so more the buildings become more widely-spaced, punctuated on one side by sporadic outbreaks of grey salt marsh. On the other, parallel to the tarmac are railway tracks which once served the coastal branch line east of Portsmouth but are now covered in nettles and bramble. A short distance further, a huddle of signs announce a caravan park on the outskirts of a village that feels like the end of the line.

  The seaweed tang of the salt air makes her nostrils flare as she climbs from the car in the visitor’s car park. Spotting a sign behind a cluster of recycling bins in the far corner, she follows the arrow pointing towards the sea front.

  A few minutes later she is standing by a concrete wall staring at a slab of glistening blue which might have passed for Mediterranean if it wasn’t for the uneven wall of giant concrete slabs stretching as far as the eye can see in either direction. And the beach itself which is a steep slope of mottled pebbles, clumps of weed and gobbets of tar which levels to a thin strip of grey where sand meets sea. A barren landscape, but one that’s temporarily lifted by a colourful patchwork of beach towels, wind breaks and sun tents secured with boulders arranged in Stone Age piles.

  Barefoot children with pink faces stumble up banks of stones that bear their weight as reliably as quicksand. Adults are littered like broken soldiers across the uneven terrain.

  Hoisting herself up onto the waist-high wall, Katy clambers over then drops down onto the beach. Slowly, she makes her way towards the remains of a wooden breakwater then clamber
s up to sit on top and stare out to sea. Her eyes feel scooped out and raw, like she’s been crying. Her lungs ache, as if exhausted in defeat. Closing her eyes, she focuses on her breathing – inhaling deeply, then exhaling long and hard. In a few minutes her head starts to clear.

  Who is he and what does he want, she wonders, baffled by the thought that the man she’s just fled from is the same man who abused her on her doorstep back in London a few days earlier. And what’s he got to do with Siobhan? She thinks of Jude, cursing her for crashing back into her life, and the trouble she’s still able to cause. Following her. Intimidating her mum. Poisoning the past.

  Though that’s not right, is it? For the past has never been pure, just tainted. Shadowed by the cruelty of her so-called friend and her own inaction. What was it Jude had said? I’m not the one who ran away.

  But that’s not right, either. She did run, yes, but she tried to help, too. Showed remarkable courage, in fact, or so the doctors at the hospital said – the ones she’d seen over the months after for recurrent bouts of nausea and vomiting, eczema and panic attacks. Everyone tried to reassure her that her anxiety about what happened would fade, with time. But they didn’t know, did they? Not really. They weren’t there, so how could they? Because the truth was buried so deep she could barely remember and dared not to try.

  Once more, Katy tries to recall the precise chronology of events and apportioning of actions, screwing up her eyes with the effort of it. Once more she fails. What did I do, she wonders, miserably, exhaling slowly as she opens her eyes. Because I know, just like I know I jumped into the canal that day, no matter what anyone else told me. I know, like I’ve always known, that it wasn’t me. I’m not the one who ran away.

  ‘scuse me, love – you got the time?’

  Katy has to shade her eyes with her hand as she turns to answer a woman around her own age wearing an ankle-length wet suit. It’s almost midday and as she tells her so she realises she can’t got back to Spike’s for lunch, not now. The thought of making small talk, the pretence that everything’s OK, is far worse than what Michael will say.

  Pulling free her mobile, she gazes at the screen. She should call him, of course, to let him know but cannot face it. Instead, she will compose a text. Still holding the mobile, she stares at the water line where the wetsuited woman is now standing, ankle-deep. Tell him something’s come up, she thinks. But a new message from Andrew, by text this time, kills the idea before the lie can take shape. The hospital is discharging Diane early, he tells her curtly. He can’t get hold of Joyce, so Katy must be at Parkview by teatime for her return.

  Too soon, she thinks. Just four hours then her mum will be alone. Not enough time for her to track them down, though she senses once Diane is discharged it won’t be long before Jude finds her. Not enough time for her to think of what to tell Michael, either. Without pausing to consider the implications of either decision more closely, she charges back to the car to retrace her route back home.

  Chapter 23

  Guildford – April 1989

  The girls were drinking double espressos, sticky and black. A bitter taste that’s worth it for the buzz, Jude always joked. As she did again that day, sitting side by side at a window table in Deb’s Kitchen overlooking the new shopping precinct, though the content of her cup was untouched.

  Kat reached towards a white ramekin that sat at the table’s centre beside a matching vase containing a single, candy-pink gerbera. Dipping her fingers inside she selected a rock-like crystal of brown sugar, popped it into her mouth to temper the coffee’s acrid kick, then began to crunch. Her left hand was cradled in her lap. With the teaspoon now held in her right hand, she drew shapes in the soft pile of the tablecloth.

  An idle gesture, meaningless and without malice, and yet despite that it made Jude want to scream. Or maybe that was more to do with the fact that it was the last week of term. Almost the Easter holidays. And over a month since she had last seen Andrew.

  What with his refusal to respond to the messages she’d left for him at college and Kat’s whinging – about Andrew’s growing aloofness, her parents’ marriage, the forthcoming exams – she couldn’t think of anyone she’d less like to be sitting with in a cafe not drinking coffee. Yet, in a curious way, being with Kat made her feel closer to him. Andrew. Jude sighed. Could the hollow ache inside her, this desperate sense of neediness, be love?

  Through the window opposite, she could see the red brick facade of the new shopping centre. Though unfinished inside, the precinct’s exterior was complete. Featureless and pristine, its dull functionality depressed her. The building was due for completion the following autumn. Where would she be then, she wondered? Pray to God, no longer living with Siobhan.

  ‘What plans, then, for the Easter holidays?’ she asked eventually. Dully. Just to kill time.

  Kat grimaced. ‘Revision, mostly. Though now Dad’s back he’s trying to persuade Mum we should all go on a family break – a long weekend somewhere – our last chance before Andrew starts his exams. Did I tell you he’s bought a round the world ticket and says he’ll set off the day after his last A-level?’

  He’d mentioned it, of course, but then he’d said a lot of things. Moving to London with the band as soon as his A levels were over. Studying sociology, not accountancy as Charles had hoped. Getting a flat where she could crash whenever she liked.

  ‘No, you didn’t,’ Jude answered, tightly. ‘How nice.’

  ‘I know – he’s planning to start in Sydney then work his way back via Thailand, Hong Kong, India …’

  ‘I meant the family break.’ Jude felt queasy. Perhaps she should have had some breakfast.

  ‘Oh. Yes. Well it won’t be anything exotic -’ Kat backtracked awkwardly, as words tumbled from her lips way too fast. ‘Dad’s been talking about north Wales or south Devon – where we used to go on summer holidays as kids. Just for a few days. He doesn’t want to distract us too much from our revision. Andrew’s start the week before ours, you see – ’

  ‘Ironic, isn’t it, how he’s now so desperate to recreate something that only exists in his own head,’ Jude cut in. The inside of her mouth was bitter with resentment. How dare Charles choose to rekindle interest in his family just as she had found out about his dirty little secret. How pathetic of them to fall for it.

  ‘What do you mean?’ retorted Kat. For once she seemed angry, Jude noted, ready to challenge instead of accept the latest in a growing line of digs and jibes that she’d been tossing her way like small incendiary devices in the weeks since half term.

  ‘You know exactly what I mean,’ Jude pressed on. ‘He’s always been a shit husband and a shit dad and nothing’s going to change that now.’

  Kat sprang to her feet. ‘Who are you to pass judgement on me and my family?’ she cried. ‘Oh sorry, I forgot, the only daughter of a single mum with the world’s worst taste in men. Which makes you amply qualified, of course. I do apologise.’

  ‘I’ll tell you who I …’ Jude’s voice was low and unexpectedly threatening as she too rose to her feet. Stepped towards Kat. Reached out to grasp the arm of her friend. But she didn’t get the chance to finish.

  ‘That’s £1.60, girls,’ trilled the waitress, a middle-aged woman in a black dress and white apron whose wiry hair was pulled back into two grey plaits she’d pinned onto the top of her head German-style. She’d crept up on them unnoticed and now stood staring, expectantly, her lash-less pale grey eyes half-raised.

  Handing over their money in silence, the pair made their way towards the exit in silent single file where, once outside, Jude paused to gulp fresh air. Rubbing her eyes with the heel of her palms, her head started to clear and she began to feel better.

  Opening her eyes, Jude saw Kat was already striding towards the traffic lights, back towards school. She smiled. No, it would have been wrong to tell her about her mum and Charles like this. Today. She would pick her time. Plan something more lingering than a mere tiff as the backdrop to her revelation. Something m
ore considered that would wipe away the smug innocence of her so-called best friend once and for all. To kick her bastard of a father in a place where it would really hurt.

  Jude took her time walking up the high street back to St Mary’s. Outside the Civic Hall, on the narrow strip of grass opposite the box office, stood an empty bench on which she sat for a few minutes. With her face tickled by the watery spring sunshine, her mind drifted until a distant church bell struck a quarter to. She sprang to her feet.

  With just five minutes to get back before the start of afternoon lessons, she’d need to cover the last part of the hill at double speed. And would have done so, too, if she’d not drawn level with an artfully dishevelled figure carrying a guitar who’d been walking a short distance ahead. They stopped at the junction with Rossingdale Road together, and only as she turned to check for traffic did she realise who it was.

  ‘Hello stranger!’

  Spinning round on his heels, Andrew didn’t look pleased to see her. In fact if anything, he seemed annoyed. ‘Hi.’

  ‘Anyone would think you’d been avoiding me,’ Jude pressed on with a cool smile that belied the surge of excitement she felt inside.

  His face knotted into a frown. ‘Well they’d be right.’

  ‘Hey, don’t be like that –’

  ‘I can be however I like,’ he said, stepping off the pavement.

  ‘Andrew? What is it?’ Jude hurried forwards once more to catch him up. He stopped, as did she, in the middle of the road.

  ‘Haven’t you got the message?’ he snapped. ‘I don’t want to see you anymore.’

  Jude’s stomach lurched and her legs felt like they might buckle. ‘What?’

  ‘You heard me.’

  ‘Why?’

  Andrew’s expression darkened. There was something about the way he was looking at her that made her falter. What was wrong, she wondered, taking a defensive step backwards just as a car behind her turned into the street, braked sharply, then honked. Quickly stepping out of its way, she turned back towards Andrew and saw him now stepping up on the pavement the far side of the road. Taking a deep breath, she tried to call out but no words came.