The Lies We Tell

  Hugging herself tight, she wills the tiny life inside to be OK. Gulping for air, she pulls herself on all fours, desperately trying to gather her strength. Ignoring how her hip throbs with pain, she stares at the scabbed earth before her which is boiling with slick-winged ants readying for flight.

  ‘No,’ Jude declares. ‘She’s wrong.’

  Unable to decipher the meaning of Jude’s words Katy watches, dumbly, as James strides towards his mum and push her backwards with the heel of his palm. Clambering back onto her feet, Jude takes a faltering step to regain her balance before he pushes her again, harder this time, then raises his fist.

  ‘What did you say?’ he cries.

  ‘You heard me,’ Jude gasps, struggling to right herself. ‘Dave. He’s alive. Because there was another girl on the heath that day who saw the fire and fetched help. And before she did she saw him, but when help came he’d gone. Not burned, thank God. I never should have – ’ Suddenly, she lets slip a clipped laugh. ‘Just gone. I always wondered … There was a break-in not long after we left and they only took his stuff which Mum had stacked in the garage, you see. Then when I saw Ruth recently she confirmed it.’

  Jude stares her son straight in the eye as if daring him to strike her, which, a moment later, he does. Spinning to her left, she falls backwards onto the ground where she lies, barely moving, her body crumpled against the base of a tall headstone worn smooth by time into the anonymous shape of a human thigh. Crimson fingers of blood reach down one cheek from a gash just above her left eye. Her face is waxen and her breath is coming in shallow gulps.

  ‘Stop it,’ Katy cries, stumbling to her feet.

  But all of a sudden her body feels light. As if the boulder that’s pinned her to that moment all these years has rolled away. She braces her arms then lunges with all her strength at James as he stands gazing at Jude, whose battered face tilts to one side revealing blood smeared on the plinth against which she is lying. The papers spewing from her opening bag. Estate agents’ details depicting Michael’s flat.

  Katy’s unexpected broadside takes him by surprise and he loses his balance. Gauging the distance she’ll need to cover to get back to the gate, Katy knows she’ll not out-run him. So she steps out of his reach then turns to face him down.

  ‘Maybe you could track him down,’ she challenges, every fibre of her being now braced for his response.

  ‘Maybe I could,’ he retorts. ‘If I had some money. And your family has money, right? I mean, think about it. First your dad, then your mum paid off Siobhan to get her to leave town, and now he’s dead she still has enough to live in a penthouse apartment that must cost a pretty penny or two? I’m sure that between you, you could see me right. Sorry about the cat, by the way.’

  Swiftly lunging forwards, James swings out his arm and catches Katy low and hard in the solar plexus. Then he laughs. ‘It was a spur of a moment kind of thing.’

  Poor old Monty, is all Katy can think as she crumples downwards. But as her head hits the stony ground she is aware only of something else. A familiar somersaulting sensation in her stomach that stops, abruptly, as a shaft of pain sears her lower abdomen. Its epicentre is just at the point where the baby now sits.

  ‘Not nice, is it – ’ Jude’s voice is cracked and breathy. ‘Someone else taking control of your life?’

  As she clutches her belly Katy hears a low, guttural moan. Though it’s come from nearby the sound seems barely human. No, shrieks the voice inside her. Don’t let this happen. Keep with me. Be strong. Clenching her thighs, she wills the child inside to still be OK. Thinks for a beat, too, that the moan comes from her. Until she opens her eyes and sees, as if in slow motion, James’ legs buckle and fold. The next moment he is on his side on the ground. Groaning like a wounded animal. His body fish-tailing in the dust.

  Only then does she notice the feet of someone standing over him; male by the size of them, she sluggishly reasons as it takes her a moment or two to recognise the ankle before her bearing a familiar tattoo. Slowly, Katy raises her eyes to meet Michael’s. In one hand he is holding a heavy branch, in the other he clutches James’ knife.

  ‘All I could find at short notice.’ He frowns at the figure on the ground. ‘And you, whoever you are, had better stay down there if you know what’s good for you, OK?’

  As the world around her starts to fold in on itself, darkening from the edges, inwards, Katy hears from someone close by – maybe her – emit a low, guttural groan.

  Tossing away his make-shift club, Michael steps towards her then stops, abruptly. There is a sharp intake of breath. ‘Oh Christ, Katy. Lie still, OK?’ he begins reaching into his pocket for his mobile phone. ‘Breath slowly to stay calm,’ he murmurs, once the ambulance is on its way. Barely able to nod she is too stunned to speak as he squats by her side and softly strokes her head. ‘Don’t try to get up – the operator said it will just make the bleeding worse.’

  Only as she becomes aware of the wetness between her legs, she understands the words he’s just fired into his phone. ‘My fiancé’s just been attacked and it looks like she’s having a miscarriage,’ he said. ‘Send someone, quickly.’ And then, a single sob. ‘As soon as you can, please.’

  Chapter 37

  West Hampstead – September 2013

  Rain drums the pane of the open window with a sound like children’s heels, the force of it forming small puddles along the wooden sill. In the world outside, the parched city slowly lifts its head; opening itself up to embrace the deluge while tall buildings kiss the sky.

  Katy raises the sash further. Oblivious to the downpour now clumping her hair, she leans outside. Her gaze ranges across the rooftops of north London towards the distant patch of green marking the start of the heath. Her bare arms shine slick with wet, but she doesn’t care. For change is coming and the summer has broken. It’s five to eleven. Almost five weeks to the hour since the confrontation in the cemetery. Thirty five days since Jude and James’ arrest. The day she and Michael have agreed for him to come to the new flat with the last of her stuff.

  There were phone calls. Maybe a nurse had lent Jude a phone during her stay in hospital. Pleading her innocence, of course. Urging Katy to meet one more time.

  But instead, Katy told the police about Jude’s calls. How, due to their frequency they felt little short of malicious. This and her behaviour while in custody led to Jude’s application for bail being turned down. She will stand trial soon for blackmail, fraud and encouraging and assisting James who, facing charges for possession of stolen goods, burglary and assault, is also now being held on remand thanks to a past conviction for grievous bodily harm.

  At last, the fear is gone.

  Whether Katy sees Jude again or not, she no longer cares. Certainties provide little consolation; uncertainties even less. Neither change the way she now feels. Numb, at last, to Jude’s influence. Distanced but also, in her pity for her, reconciled. Which is how, staring at the envelope of the letter she received in the post earlier that morning from HM Prison East Sutton Park, she finds the strength not to wonder at Jude’s message within but, instead, to tear it into halves, then quarters, then eighths before tossing it into the bin.

  Katy turns back to face the interior of the flat where she’s been staying since moving out from Michael’s. It belongs to Spike, though he’s in little need of it these days, as he rarely – if ever – comes to London during the summer months. Staying here was Michael’s suggestion. Just like spending some time apart was his idea, too, though she supposes she’d have suggested it if he hadn’t.

  The anxious hours they spent in hospital, the awkward explanation to Diane then its replay via a lousy Skype link to Andrew had drawn so heavily on her emotional reserves she’d little strength left to focus clearly on what should happen next between her and Michael. Which is how, as days passed, the situation had drifted.

  Temporarily, she’d moved into Diane’s spare bedroom. Then, when Michael had suggested that maybe some time apart would be good f
or both of them, rather than get to grips with how she felt and what she really wanted she’d dully acquiesced. Convinced there’d be no post New York-style reconciliation this time around. Maybe he was right, she’d concluded miserably. Because what he really seemed to be suggesting was that their relationship had run its course.

  Now Katy stares at the cardboard boxes of her belongings that line the far side of the sitting room wall. There seems little point in unpacking them all, given how few of her clothes still fit her these days. Spike says she can stay here as long as she needs to, which she hopes won’t be long. For now, though, it’s a welcome base from which to gather herself and start moving forward – which she must do, for both their sakes.

  She looks at her work suit hanging from the door frame still wrapped in its plastic, adjusted and dry cleaned. She’s due back on Monday following a combination of sick days and holiday leave. Sally-Anne has found someone else to replace Miriam, of course. But luckily for Katy, the role will be filled just for eighteen months by a woman from Janssens’ New York office who wants to be in London only for the duration of her husband’s temporary reassignment from a US city bank to its UK headquarters near St Pauls. If all goes well, the promotion could still be Katy’s next time.

  A distant church bell chimes the hour. He’s late. But as she glances at her watch to confirm it she hears a tentative knock on the inside front door. He has a key, she knows, but will not use it unless invited. So she steps onto the landing. Shoots a quick look through the peephole, just to be sure. Then she opens the door.

  ‘Hi.’ With a tentative smile, Michael puts down the boxes he has carried up four flights of stairs then shakes himself free of the holdall slung over one shoulder.

  ‘You’re soaking,’ Katy exclaims, padding into the bathroom to find a towel.

  ‘Sorry,’ he replies, stepping back onto the door mat where he slips off his jacket and trainers and towels the excess from his face and hair.

  ‘Go straight in,’ she calls from the kitchen where she fills a kettle to make tea. How horribly formal, she thinks with a grimace as she pops a builder’s tea bag into a mug for him and a herbal sachet into her own. A sad marker of how far things have come. ‘Make yourself comfortable.’ At this, she winces. ‘I’ll be right in.’

  He is leaning out of the window when she enters the room with the drinks a few minutes later, as she just had done. Only the rain has stopped now and the low cloud looks as if it might soon stir. She hands him his tea then takes a seat on the sofa, cradling hers in cupped hands. He stares at her directly for the first time, appraises her for a moment, then almost smiles.

  ‘You’re looking good,’ he offers. ‘Both of you, I mean.’

  Looking down across the swollen shape of her, the thickening ankles she can now only see when her legs are raised at a certain angle, she frowns. ‘You are joking.’ She blows out her cheeks to emphasise her point. ‘About me, at least. I’m becoming a human whale. Sprog though, well, you’re right … ’ She casts a quick glance towards the print out from the twenty week scan that sits on the shelf above the fireplace. ‘… he is perfect.’

  But Michael frowns. ‘Seriously, I mean it – you’re glowing.’

  Katy’s face burns. ‘Today is nine years since my dad died, you know,’ she blurts suddenly, regretting it as soon as the words are out. But it is too late. Michael looks crestfallen and the air between them has cooled.

  ‘Really, I didn’t know that,’ he murmurs, taking an awkward sip from his mug.

  Conscious now of the set of house keys in her pocket – Michael’s house keys which she will shortly be returning to him for the final time – Katy’s throat tightens.

  What am I doing, she wonders. How did I let things get to this? It is the anniversary of her dad’s death, and she has been thinking of this a lot this morning. How long ago all of that business now seems. How time passes and the world moves on. And the anniversary is simply that. A calendar date that marks the further passing of time.

  A day, today, which in future will also be the day she and Michael split.

  The poke inside her belly, just below her rib, is as forceful as it is unexpected. So sudden, too, that it makes her almost gasp. He’ll be a handful, this one, she thinks. And he’ll certainly keep them – her – on their toes.

  Michael leans forward, eager and alive with expectation. ‘Is it the baby kicking?’

  ‘It was,’ she sighs, her face softening as she pats the seat beside her. ‘Come see.’

  They sit together, side by side, her hand on his as she directs him to the point where she guesses the foot will next strike. For it is the baby’s foot, she’s sure of it, and the kicks almost always come in twos and threes. They sit quietly for nearly a minute, almost unmoving, breathing as one. And then it happens – less powerful this time, but unmistakable – and when they look at each other next she wonders whether it’s her imagination or are his eyes a little shinier than usual?

  ‘How have you been?’ she asks him, softly. The question makes his shoulders dip.

  ‘I’ve a new job starting soon,’ he answers. ‘You remember that headhunter I told you about? Well, you’re looking at the soon to be senior creative partner at Octagon.’

  ‘Well done you,’ she exclaims. Noticing a fleck of something trapped in his hair, she reaches out without thinking to remove it.

  Intercepting her hand with his own, Michael reaches up to pat the front of his head then, locating his target, tugs it free. ‘Paint,’ he smiles, ruefully. ‘I’ve been redecorating the office back home. I cleared everything out and got rid of loads.’

  She nods her approval. ‘White?’

  ‘A blank canvas. Until … I … decide what to do.’

  Katy swallows hard. Her mouth feels dry and the keys in her pocket seem hot against her thigh. Can he really want this? she wonders. Does she?

  Shutting her eyes, she sees her dad’s face. Her mum the age she was when Katy was at school. A younger Jude. It’s her own fault – all of this. If only she had been honest sooner. Trusted him to be on her side. Learned her lesson from the time he spent those months in New York. Why hadn’t she followed through with her plan to confide everything once he’d returned?

  Because back then, she wasn’t being honest with herself. Buried memories. A repressed truth. Whatever the official name for it, there was no way she could open up to Michael if she was lying to herself. And now? At last, now that she’s at peace, she knows for sure that she wants him and to be with him, forever, more than anything she has ever wanted before. Opening her eyes, she fears she might cry.

  What was it Jude said about the worst lies we tell being the lies we tell ourselves? If she doesn’t stop now she’s going to lose him, for good.

  ‘I should have talked to you, I know,’ she says, reaching into her pocket and closing her fingers around the keys. Awkwardly, she dips her gaze. Like peeling the layers of an onion, he’d once said. ‘About everything. Far sooner. But I didn’t, and you don’t know how sorry I now feel for that.’ Michael opens his mouth as if to speak but she holds up a hand to make him wait. ‘Which makes it all the more clear to me now that what I’m about to say must be said and can’t wait.’ Putting down her mug, Katy raises her gaze to meet his. Scans it briefly, eager for any sign of encouragement. Though for the moment his expression is blank. ‘Michael,’ she says, holding up his house keys. ‘Can I keep these?’

  But now he looks confused. ‘Sorry?’

  ‘The keys to … our place.’ Michael frowns. She tries again. ‘Because what we had was good and could be great if both of us want to make it work. And I do, Michael – I really do. Now there’s nothing left to tell.’ At last, he nods. ‘Michael?’

  ‘Keep them,’ he says, his lips softening into a slow smile. ‘You can come back any time, but sooner would be best. For good. If you really mean it and really want to.’

  Leaning towards him, Katy plants a firm kiss on his cheek. ‘How about today?’

  Taking h
er hand, Michael gives it a squeeze.

  ‘Today, then,’ she nods, firmly.

  ‘No point unpacking anything else then.’ Michael casts a glance towards the boxes stacked on the floor the far side of the room.

  Katy smiles. ‘I guess not.’

  ‘Apart from this.’ Michael rises to his feet to retrieve a small carrier bag he left with the other things in the hallway by the front door. Slipping the contents free of the damp plastic, he hands Katy a small parcel loosely-wrapped. ‘It’s from your mum.’

  Diane has folded whatever it is inside brown paper.

  It’s the shape of a slim-line hardback book though as she feels it through the wrapping Katy realises it is something else. Intrigued, she slips off the paper then the inner sleeve of bubble wrap and pops both in the bin on the floor by her side on top of the fragments of Jude’s letter, unopened and unread. She stares at the reverse of a chestnut picture frame. Hinged at the centre, it has space for two photos, side by side.

  Carefully, Katy turns it over to see in one space a tatty Polaroid, its colours diluted by time to a tea-stained patina. An image of a young child whose fine hair shines white in the sun’s glare. If she screws up her eyes just so she can see she is dressed in a simple sundress in a blameless sky blue. On her feet are a pair of strawberry sandals. At the bottom Mum’s left a brief handwritten message: Seize the day!

  Unable to resist a smile, Katy turns the picture back over and refocuses her attention onto her childhood self. Will their baby be like this, she wonders marvelling at the stubborn set of her shoulders. The defiant frown. And looming, shadow-like, somewhere close by but as yet, unseen, the life she would lead. Katy turns towards Michael who, judging by his expression, has been wondering something similar. As they stare at one another for a heartbeat, Katy senses something lifting.