The Girlfriend

by Sarah Naughton

  “Ah, but you should if we’re going to date.” He sips his drink, peering over the glass at me archly.

  I laugh again. “I don’t date guys with kids.”

  “Why not?”

  “Too complicated.”

  He drinks again before he answers, and when he puts his glass down, the flippancy has gone. “Life’s complicated. If you think it’s simple, you’re not really living.”

  “Good night.” I get up.

  “Wait.” He puts his hand on my arm as I pass him. “I’m sorry. My head always goes when I’m about to see them. I just keep thinking about how bad it’ll be when I have to say goodbye.”

  I sit down on the stool next to him. He’s put on weight since he bought that shirt. It strains across his stomach. I imagine what his skin would feel like beneath the cotton. Warm and slightly tacky, downy blond hair running from his navel to his groin. “What are their names?”

  “Josh and Alfie. And I’m Daniel.”

  “I’m Mags.” I shake his hand. “And my brother’s in a coma.”

  3.

  Jody

  They’ve contacted your next of kin. Your sister, Mary. I wonder why it’s not your parents. We never spoke about them. We never spoke about mine either. Didn’t want anything to cast a shadow over our happiness. I try to imagine what she will look like. Dark, like you. Slim. Black eyelashes even longer than yours. She’ll speak softly like you do. She’ll hold my hand and look into my eyes and she’ll just know. That I’m The One for you, that you’re The One for me. That whatever happens, I’ll stay by your side. I’ll be with you while you learn to walk and talk again. Through the tears and the despair, and then the first stirrings of hope. I don’t care if you’re very changed or even if you’ve forgotten me. I’ll learn to love the you you become.

  My heart clenches when you make a little gurgling noise. As if you’ve read my mind.

  I lean in to kiss your earlobe, and my tears fall into the clump of hair they didn’t shave off for the operation. They nestle there, like the pearls on the dress I was wearing the day we first met. Do you remember? Is that part of your mind still whole? Maybe you’ve forgotten. We can remember it together.

  • • •

  I moved in at the end of the summer. The café job they lined up for me had gone badly. The manager was a bully. I used to spend my lunchtimes crying in the bathroom, and then I just stopped going in. I lay in the rooming house for hours, unable to eat or sleep.

  Then Tabby told me about St. Jerome’s. She sorted it all out for me, came and picked me up on a Sunday afternoon.

  She wouldn’t tell me much, just that the place was a deconsecrated church, owned by a Christian charity that let out the flats at piecemeal rent to vulnerable people—asylum seekers, people with mental health issues or family problems, former foster home kids like me.

  As the car pulled up in the little patch of pavement by the grass, I saw you. You must have been on your way out. You’d paused to watch the kids playing in the playground. It wasn’t love at first sight, but it was close.

  We were on the same floor. At the time, it seemed like a happy coincidence; now, I know it was fate. You smiled later when we passed on the stairwell.

  When you go into a church, you don’t realize how high it is. All that dusty air, just drifting in the huge, empty space above the pews. They fit four floors in there; we were at the top, looking out across the shops and takeout food places to the green parks beyond. Each flat was unique: a mishmash of funny angles and sloping roofs, a gargoyle on the balcony, a column rising through the living room like a huge tree trunk. Some floors cut a stained-glass window in half, so you might have the angel Gabriel’s face, and the flat downstairs would have his open hands.

  I’ve always had an imagination, and a night in a deconsecrated church should have left me paralyzed with terror, especially as it was so quiet compared with the rooming house, where there was always shouting or doors banging. But as midnight came around, I could hear music. A smooth woman’s voice singing the blues. It was coming from your flat. It lulled me to sleep.

  Tabby was good, coming in every day to make sure I was settling in, that my prescriptions were all up-to-date, that I’d filled in all the benefit forms, that I had enough food.

  During the day, I pottered around the flat, laying out all my special things, drawing, occasionally popping out to the main street where there were three thrift shops, one with just books. I bought a whole set of romance novels and read one every evening. Your music was my lullaby at night.

  Then one day, you spoke to me.

  It was a Monday afternoon. It had been raining heavily, and my new book (The Firefighter’s Secret Heartbreak) had turned pulpy in the grocery bag on the way home. I was wearing a dress from the thrift shop, gray silk with little pearl beads around the neckline, and the hem was sopping wet where it hung down below my raincoat. It slapped against my legs as I ran toward St. Jerome’s. You were going in ahead of me, and you stopped and held the security door.

  “So much for our Indian summer,” you said with a smile that made one of your cheeks dimple.

  I told you that my book had been ruined, and you showed me how the blue dye of the grocery bag had stained your loaf of bread. You told me your name, and I told you mine. Abe and Jody. Jody and Abe.

  As we walked up the stairs together, I said that I had just moved into flat 12, and you said it was nice to have a new neighbor, as the flat had been empty since the last occupant died. That frightened me, and you must have noticed, because you laughed and said, “Oh, don’t worry. He didn’t die in the flat! He was staggering around in the road, drunk, and got hit by a car.”

  “Poor man.”

  “He was seventy-eight. Not a bad run for a raging alcoholic. Hope I make it that far.”

  “You will,” I said, then blushed furiously, because I meant that you looked so young and fit and full of life, with your bright-brown eyes and quick smile.

  “Lovely dress,” you said as I unbuttoned my coat. “It looks like the rain.”

  And then you said goodbye and went into your flat. I stood outside mine for ages afterward, thinking, What a beautiful thing to say.

  Wednesday, November 9

  4.

  Mags

  I wake at four and can’t get back to sleep, so I get up and turn on my laptop, sitting in the faux leather club chair by the window that looks out over Hyde Park. Even at this time, the traffic on Park Lane is nose to tail, though the double glazing ensures the room is blanketed in an unnatural hush. The night sky reflects the glow of the city’s lights, making it seem neither night nor day.

  In Vegas the sun will have gone down over the desert. All the heat and dust will be vanishing straight up into the clear night sky. I would be opening my first bottle of beer, licking the dribbles of icy perspiration off my fingers.

  There are a couple of emails from angry clients. I knock off the usual pat reassurances, ending with a line about my brother to make them feel guilty. As if they’re capable of an emotion other than greed.

  Then I log in to my social media: an invitation to a gallery opening, angry posts about the latest gun rampage, my timeline clogged with endless Happy Birthday, Stu!s for an ex-boyfriend’s thirtieth. I don’t know why we’re still “friends”: we slept with each other for three months max, and then I finished it. He cried.

  I sigh and switch off my laptop.

  The police are coming here at ten. Six hours to kill. I can’t even turn on the news in case it wakes Daniel, who, like me, didn’t sleep a wink for the whole ten-hour flight. As I sit, staring down at the brake lights of the cars, I begin to feel irrationally annoyed that he is still here, spread-eagled on my bed, my sheets in a tight twist beneath him.

  In the end, I run myself a bath.

  Catching sight of myself in the steamed mirror, I wonder why he was even interest
ed. My hair’s lank and dull, my lips are pinched, and my tanned skin has become sallow. The loss of appetite has sucked the flesh from my stomach, and my hipbones protrude, making me look rickety and frail, ninety instead of thirty.

  The noise of the gushing water must have woken him, because a moment after I get in, he enters without knocking.

  “Hey. How’s your head?”

  “Do you mind?” I say.

  He blinks at me. “I’ve, er, seen it all before. Last night. If you remember.”

  “I’m washing,” I say coldly.

  “Sorry.” He backs out of the door and closes it softly.

  When I come out, he is dressed. We gather our things in silence.

  “Why are you being like this?” he says finally.

  “Like what?”

  “I thought we had a good time last night.”

  “We did. But it’s not last night anymore, and I’ve got to speak to the police about my dying brother.”

  “Of course. I’m sorry.”

  I stand stiffly as he tries to embrace me.

  “This is a bad time for you,” he says, stepping away. “We probably shouldn’t have—but I’m still glad we did.”

  “Me too,” I say more gently. I’ve been a bitch. Mostly down to dread of what I’m going to have to face today and the start of a raging hangover.

  “Take my number, and let me know how it goes with Abe.”

  “Sure.” I pocket the scrap of cardboard he gives me. It’s the corner of a condom box he ordered from reception along with the bottle of Jack Daniel’s. “Good luck with Jake and…”

  “Josh and Alfie.”

  “Yeah. Hope your wife’s not too much of a cow.”

  He looks at me and raises his eyebrows.

  I laugh despite myself. “Yeah, well, I’ve got a good reason to be.”

  He comes over and kisses me. “You were lovely. It was lovely. I’d like to do it again sometime.” His breath is sour with booze, and his skin still looks patchy from the flight. “When you’ve sorted things out with your brother.”

  “You mean when I’ve turned him off?”

  He has the balls not to look away. Raising his hand to my face, he passes his thumb across my cheek as if to brush away a tear that isn’t there.

  He seems like a decent enough person, for a banker. Although that isn’t hard. For a corporate lawyer, I’m an angel. He slings his jacket over his shoulder and picks up his case.

  “Goodbye, Mags.” He turns at the door. “Is it short for Margaret?”

  I shake my head, hesitate, then say, “Mary Magdalene.”

  He looks at me quizzically, waiting for me to explain. When I don’t, he opens the door.

  “What did your wife leave you for?” I ask suddenly.

  He turns and smiles. “Alfie’s fencing coach.”

  We sit in the breakfast room of the hotel, looking out over a rubbish-strewn side street. The squad car is tucked discreetly behind a four-by-four. There are two of them, a solidly built middle-aged blond woman and a thin, lantern-jawed youth, young enough to be her son. Apparently, it was her who called me to tell me what had happened. I was at home catching up with work emails before I headed to the office. It felt strange, sitting on my sun-drenched balcony in a romper and shades, with a mouth full of blueberry pancake, listening to her talk about induced comas and cranial hemorrhages.

  Now she tells me more, speaking in a soft London accent as the boy takes notes. At first, she gives me the logistics, timings, the distance fallen, the hours on the operating table, then slowly spirals back to the night itself, as if it’s the only way I will be able to bear it.

  “Your brother’s fiancée, Jody Currie, was the only witness to the accident.”

  “So you’re sure it was an accident?”

  At what I considered to be a throwaway comment, I’m surprised to see the boy raise his head and fix his gaze on his boss.

  She pauses before answering. “We’ve got no reason to suspect otherwise.”

  I wait.

  She sips her coffee. It’s a standoff.

  “But?” I say finally.

  “There’s no evidence to suspect foul play: no CCTV footage and no other witnesses.”

  “So why the question mark?”

  I wait for her to fob me off—What question mark?—but to her credit, she doesn’t. “Relationships are private things. Jody and your brother had both lost contact with their parents and were living quite isolated existences. We have to believe her that the relationship was a happy one.”

  “As opposed to a murderous, push-you-down-a-stairwell sort of one?”

  She shrugs. Whatever.

  “So you won’t be investigating further?”

  “Like I said, there’s no evidence of foul play, so there’s no reason not to take her word for what happened.”

  “Which was?”

  “On the night in question, Miss Currie had booked a meal out. She felt that your brother seemed down and wanted to cheer him up.”

  “That must be on CCTV, right?”

  “It’s not police policy to waste resources going through general CCTV footage when we don’t think a crime has been committed. Can I go on?”

  I give a curt nod.

  “They returned to St. Jerome’s, the church where both of them live, at about 8:00 p.m.”

  “Isn’t that a bit early?”

  “Miss Currie thought your brother was tired, as he had been quiet all evening, and she suggested they leave early. Both her and your brother’s flats are on the fourth floor, and she told us that they had almost reached this floor when your brother stated that he wanted to go down to check the door was securely closed. There’s criminal gang activity in the area, and he was concerned that if it wasn’t closed properly, someone might get in. Miss Currie went into your brother’s flat and, after hearing a noise, came out to find him lying at the bottom of the stairwell. It’s her belief that he jumped, due to depression brought about by work pressures.”

  She folds her hands in her lap, her face tactfully averted as she waits for me to process the images that have been flowing through my mind.

  “Her belief? So there was no note?”

  “No.”

  “Couldn’t these criminal gangs you mentioned have gotten in and attacked him?”

  “If that were the case, either Miss Currie or their neighbors on the top floor would have heard something, and aside from the injuries sustained in the fall, there were no other wounds. Also, he had no valuables on his person, as Miss Currie had taken his jacket inside.”

  “Why?” I said.

  “Why what?”

  “Why did she take his jacket?”

  The policewoman smiles. “You’re a lawyer, right?”

  “Yes.”

  “I can see you must be good at your job. Since they were coming into a warm environment from a cold one, he might have taken it off and handed it to her for convenience as he went down to check the door.”

  “But he wasn’t going to check the door, was he? He was going to jump. So why bother taking off the jacket in the first place?”

  “In a police investigation,” she says after a pause, “there are some questions that are vital to help us judge whether a crime has been committed and some that aren’t. I suggest you speak to Miss Currie yourself so that she can give you a clearer picture of what happened that night.”

  They get up, leaving two unfinished cups of bland hotel coffee on the glass table.

  “If you have any concerns, please do get in touch.” As she hands me her card, my fingertips brush hers. They feel unpleasantly soft: the nails are bitten halfway down to the cuticle, and flesh bulges over the top of the remaining sliver of nail. I glance at the card. Her name is Amanda Derbyshire. A constable. Lowest of the low.

 
“Thanks,” I say coldly, shaking her hand and the clammy paw of her underling.

  “I know you deal with criminals a lot yourself, Miss Mackenzie,” she says, turning to leave, “but not every tragedy is a crime. Will you be seeing your brother today?”

  “Yes. I’m going straightaway.”

  “I hope the doctors can give you some good news.”

  I give her a dry smile—we both know these are empty words—and she turns away.

  Sitting by the window sipping my coffee, I watch them get back into their squad car. They are too stupid to realize that the twists and turns of the hotel lobby have led them out directly beside the window they were, until a moment ago, looking straight out of.

  The woman says something, and the boy gives an open-mouthed guffaw, displaying rows of silver fillings. In his hand, he has one of the Danish pastries from the buffet bar, and as he climbs in, eating it, I hear her warn him not to get crumbs in her car.

  To clear my head, I’d swum for an hour in the hotel pool before our meeting, and thanks to that and my burgeoning hangover, I am finally hungry. I’m glad, as I load up my plate with hash browns, that the policewoman isn’t here to see this inappropriate show of gluttony. I should be too grief-stricken to eat, but instead, I pour ketchup over my breakfast, head for a table near a TV, and scroll through the channels for CNN.

  I haven’t been in a British hospital for twenty-two years. In Vegas, someone would be escorting me through the labyrinth of corridors to the ICU, telling me about my brother’s condition as we go, preparing me for what to expect, but here, I must find my own way and will have to wait until the doctor does his rounds to hear my brother’s prognosis.

  He fell twelve meters. It can’t be good.

  I try to imagine what he must have looked like before the accident. He was always slight. Slim-boned, with narrow shoulders. A child’s body even after puberty. I wonder what he does for a living. Did. I wonder how he found me. The picture on the company website would be utterly unrecognizable to anyone who knew me as a child.

  I was shocked to get the Christmas card. Sent to the office, to Mary, so it took ages to arrive at my desk. From Abe, and an address in London. I sent one back—embarrassingly late. From Mags. A line of communication, as fine and tight as a wire. I don’t know if I thought we would become closer as we got older, that we would forgive one another for the things they made us do. I suppose I did. But now it’s too late. There’s nothing to miss.