Last Seen Alive

by Claire Douglas

  The other two bedrooms are bigger and there is a traditional study with a leather-topped desk. I pad into the room. Bookshelves line the walls, although they are half empty; a few dog-eared romance novels, a classic-car manual and an encyclopaedia. I count three more stuffed animals: a ferret, a fox and a sad-looking rodent that looks a bit like a rat but could equally be some kind of mole.

  At the end of the corridor, in the circular turret, is the master bedroom. It’s the largest room by far, with an en-suite bathroom and a separate dressing room. ‘Wow, this is bigger than our whole flat.’ I stand and gawp at it in amazement – at the floor-to-ceiling windows, the four-poster bed with floating white muslin, the roll-top bath. There is another head and shoulders shot of Tara, black and white, her expression more serious this time. I go to the window and gaze out at the beach below. I can’t see another soul. It’s idyllic.

  ‘I didn’t expect it to be so modern, so opulent,’ I say as Jamie comes to stand next to me. ‘I thought it would be a quaint cottage or something.’

  ‘Don’t you like it?’ Jamie looks astonished that I might not.

  ‘No, it’s not that. It’s amazing. Like properly amazing, the sort of house you’d see in a film. It must cost millions. It’s just … it doesn’t seem a fair swap.’

  He shrugs and puts his arm around me. ‘It’s what they wanted, remember. It was their idea.’

  ‘I know …’

  He sighs. ‘God, Libs, this is a stroke of luck.’ I face him, noticing the bags under his eyes, his grey complexion, and push down my uneasiness. The Cornish air will be good for him. And for me. I touch my stomach self-consciously and Jamie notices. ‘We need this,’ he says. ‘You need this. After what happened at school and then the miscarriage …’

  Tears spring into my eyes and I blink them away. I can’t think about it. I’ve come here to help me forget. To heal. ‘Yes.’ My voice is thick. ‘It’s a beautiful place. We’re very lucky.’

  ‘We’d better keep it tidy.’ He pulls a face and I can hear the amusement in his voice. It’s a standing joke between us, our mutual messiness, and we take great enjoyment out of accusing the other of being the worst.

  I glance at Jamie; he still dresses like a student in his faded jeans, ripped at the knee. ‘We should have taken our shoes off,’ I say, looking pointedly at his scruffy Converse. ‘And we’re going to have to keep Ziggy’s paws clean. We should’ve bought those dog socks we saw in that pet shop.’ I giggle at the thought of Ziggy in fluffy socks. He’d never forgive us.

  Jamie laughs, loud and heartily. It echoes around the house. I haven’t heard that sound enough in the last few months and it makes my heart soar. ‘Do you know what we need to do?’ he says, a mischievous twinkle in his eyes as he grabs my hand.

  ‘No, what?’

  He inclines his head towards the bed. ‘We’re going to have to christen it.’

  I raise an eyebrow. ‘Really? What, now?’

  ‘No time like the present.’ He sweeps me up effortlessly – he is nearly a foot taller than I am – and carries me to the bed. We tumble onto the soft cotton sheets, our limbs entwined, and he starts kissing my neck in the way he knows I love. I wrap my legs around him, pressing my body to his, feeling more contented, happy, than I have in months.

  We spend ages in bed, taking our time, exploring each other’s bodies, just like we used to in the early days, before we got married, before things became complicated. Before his family’s interference and Hannah’s quiet, unnerving presence in our lives. Afterwards I snuggle up against Jamie’s shoulder. It feels unnatural to have to lie on my left side, to avoid leaning on my cast. It feels so heavy and cumbersome. Less than two weeks, I remind myself.

  I’m content for a while watching the sun going down, creating shadows across the lawn. Then I spring up from the bed, covering myself with a sheet, conscious that the windows have no curtains.

  ‘Where are you going?’ Jamie murmurs, gathering the feathered duvet around his armpits.

  ‘To nose through Tara’s wardrobe,’ I say, raising my eyebrow playfully.

  ‘Libs! You can’t do that.’

  ‘Oh, come on. Surely you’re intrigued? Don’t you want to know more about Philip and Tara Heywood?’

  He shrugs, a lazy smile playing on his lips. ‘Not really.’

  ‘Well, I do.’ I shuffle over to the en-suite dressing room in my makeshift toga. Ziggy follows me and stretches out on the fleecy rug in the middle of the floor.

  The dressing room is about the same size as our bedroom back at home. A floor-length mirror hangs on one wall and a button-backed chair sits next to it. It’s like a changing room in a fancy shop. This isn’t even their main residence, just a holiday home. It makes me wonder what their actual home must be like. I reach up to flick through the clothes: long evening dresses, strappy sun dresses, floaty skirts, tops in silky fabrics. I take a long emerald dress from the hanger and drape it against my body, admiring myself in the mirror, although it’s way too long for me and the extra material pools around my feet. I resemble a little girl trying on her mum’s clothes. Or even a boy, with my short pixie cut. I return the dress and open a drawer of underwear. There are sexy thongs and high-end lacy basques. I recognise one I’d seen on an Agent Provocateur website. All very classy and out of my price range. Nothing tacky here.

  I move to the shoes. They are on narrow metal shelves that pull out from the wall and are in every conceivable style and colour. All designer brands, some of which I’ve never heard of. I think of my tatty ballet pumps that I bought from Top Shop as I cradle a pair of patent red stilettos. Size 7, much too big for my size 4 feet. I put them back despondently.

  ‘I can’t even borrow her shoes,’ I wail as I climb back into the four-poster bed. ‘She’s a giant. Or a supermodel.’

  ‘Or an alien,’ adds Jamie.

  ‘A very beautiful alien,’ I laugh. ‘How the other half live, huh?’

  He pulls me into his arms and says softly against my hair, ‘Well, we’re that other half this week, Libs. So let’s enjoy it.’

  2

  I’d never have considered going on holiday if it hadn’t been for the leaflet that came through the door a few days ago.

  HOUSE SWAP URGENTLY NEEDED

  My wife, Tara, and I are desperately looking for a place to stay for a week, maybe two. Your property would be ideal as we need somewhere close to the hospital asap to be near our precious daughter, who is undergoing a life-saving heart operation. We are willing to swap our beautiful, recently refurbished house in Cornwall with sea views. If you think you can help, please contact Philip Heywood.

  His mobile phone number was written at the bottom of the page.

  I dismissed it at first. I was in a rush to get to work. I’d been off sick for two weeks, ever since the fire and the subsequent miscarriage. My boss, Felicity Ryder, had insisted I take paid leave until after the holidays, but I wanted to go in for the last day of term to see my class and to wish them a good Easter break. I’d begun to care about those children. I felt responsible for their education, worried that the supply teacher hustled in to take over wouldn’t understand their needs like I did. I also missed the school: my classroom walls decorated with the children’s brightly coloured artwork, the camaraderie in the staff room, the shrieks of joy in the playground, gossiping with Cara, the young teaching assistant who worked alongside me, even the smell of disinfectant in the corridor. So I’d stuffed the leaflet in my handbag on my way out the door – and thought no more about it for the next few hours.

  I’d been dismayed to see the evidence of the fire; the school hall had been redecorated and a new floor installed, but the burnt smell still lingered as though seeping through the fresh paint and the newly laid parquet. The dining room, where the fire was thought to have originated, was still out of bounds. When I pressed my face up to the glass doors I could see the blackened hole in the ground where the ovens had been. It was a depressing sight. The children had been told to bring in p
acked lunches until the kitchens were up and running again, and they sat, hunched over hummus, organic vegetables and cartons of juice, in the classrooms instead.

  It was as the parents came to collect their children at the end of the day – congratulating me for my bravery and asking after Celeste – that the idea came to me. Mrs Hunting, Theo’s mum, touched my cast lightly and told me I deserved to get away somewhere. ‘You’ve had such a bad time of it, Ms Elliot,’ she’d said, in the sort of voice you’d use on someone whose close relative had just died. ‘It could have ended so badly. Celeste could have been killed in that fire if it wasn’t for you. It doesn’t bear thinking about.’ I knew she was contemplating her own child too. I touched my stomach automatically, thinking of the one I’d lost.

  The incident had been all over the newspapers, much to my horror. There was even a picture in the Mail of me playing the guitar, surrounded by kids, fringe in my eyes. It must have been taken when I’d first joined and was the only photograph the school had of me.

  A story about a school fire wouldn’t have made it past the local press if it hadn’t been for the fact that I’d successfully led not just my year group, but Celeste Detonge, the granddaughter of a famous stage actor, to safety. We’d been the only year group in the building that day; Reception and Year One had been on school trips. Cara had started to panic as the smoke filled the school hall where we were practising our assembly, and I’d had to keep calm even though the screech of the alarms made the memories of another time, another fire, slam into me, winding me. But I’d forced down my own terror, instead concentrating on getting the children, and Cara, out of the burning building. Celeste had tripped and fallen and I’d rushed back in to the hall, the smoke clogging my throat, blinding me and making me trip over too. I landed badly but ignored the pain as I scooped her up into my arms and carried her to safety. I don’t think I’m brave. I did what anyone would have done in the circumstances. I’m a teacher, a role that I love, that I live for. Those children are my first priority.

  It was when I was having my arm X-rayed that the bleeding started. I’d been just days away from the twelve-week mark.

  ‘Are you going anywhere nice this Easter?’ Mrs Hunting had asked. ‘You deserve a holiday after what you’ve been through.’ Her sympathetic words made me realise how lovely it would be to get away somewhere. A proper break. Since Jamie had started his own business we had been strapped for cash. We hadn’t been away since our honeymoon, and that had only been a five-day trip to the Isle of Wight. After what happened in Thailand I’d been too fearful to travel abroad, too scared to get on an aeroplane, convinced it would crash. So we’d had the odd long weekend or week away in England instead. It played on my mind on the walk home from school, that enticing line about a beautiful house in Cornwall with sea views. I imagined a little cottage somewhere, maybe in a fishing village like the one in Doc Martin. I thought the sea air would do Jamie good. He worked from home so he could take his laptop. By the time I arrived back at the flat I had convinced myself it was the answer to our prayers.

  I could hear Jamie on the phone in our spare room, which he used as an office. I flicked the kettle on, made a fuss of Ziggy and started on dinner. It was difficult to cook with one arm in a sling, but Florrie, Jamie’s older sister, had kindly made a batch of cottage pies and pasta sauces which I’d frozen. I grabbed a pie from the freezer and heated up the oven. Then, while the pie was cooking, I settled myself at the kitchen table in front of my laptop to google Philip Heywood.

  It took longer than normal, having to type with one hand – it frustrated me how everything took twice as long – but then a list of Philip Heywoods popped up on-screen; a musician in the US, a biologist in Australia, a plastic surgeon in a private clinic in London. I clicked on the private clinic link and a photo came up of a respectable-looking man in his late forties with short, dark hair, greying at the sides, and a moustache. Could that be the same Philip Heywood? A bit more digging and I’d found his Facebook page, although the settings were too restricted to see more than two profile photos. One showed him on a deserted beach with his arm around a younger, very attractive woman with dark hair. His wife? And were they in Cornwall?

  Jamie was still talking so I searched for ‘Philip Heywood + Cornwall’. A photo came up of a local benefit in Truro; Philip was dressed in black tie, his arm around the same woman. She was wearing a strapless floor-length emerald dress, her hair a cloud of dark curls around her head and shoulders. The caption read: ‘Avid supporters of the charity, surgeon Philip Heywood and his wife, Tara’. I studied their photo for a while, their wide smiles, their white teeth, their perfect skin. They looked like a successful, highly regarded couple. When their daughter became ill, they must have considered booking into a hotel, but found there wasn’t one close enough to the hospital. Surely they could be trusted to live in our flat for a week or two if I was in their home?

  I then searched for Philip Heywood and ‘daughter’. A photo filled the screen of Philip, Tara and a girl in her early teens with a beautiful smile, sandy coloured hair and the distinctive features of Down’s syndrome. I skimmed through the article, a small piece on his charity work. I was disappointed to note there was nothing more personal, no insight into his marriage or what type of father he was. All I could glean was that he was a very successful consultant who gave his time generously to various charities. But by the time I had finished reading my mind was made up.

  Jamie didn’t take as much convincing as I’d thought he would. I had my spiel ready: I was on holiday for two weeks anyway, it wouldn’t cost us anything, he deserved a rest, he could take his laptop as I was sure there would be Wi-Fi, I had never been to Cornwall, the Heywoods looked and sounded respectable, their daughter had Down’s syndrome and was obviously seriously ill if she needed a life-saving operation, we’d be doing a good thing … He sat opposite me, his long fingers entwined around a mug of coffee, not saying a word. When I finished he got up to put his mug in the sink, shrugged his shoulders and said, ‘OK. If you sort it all out, then we’ll go.’

  I waited until we’d eaten dinner and Jamie was out walking Ziggy before ringing the mobile number. Philip Heywood had a warm voice with a Yorkshire accent similar to mine. He sounded younger than I’d expected as he enquired which part of the north I was from. I didn’t tell him, just made out I’d moved around a lot. ‘A week in your flat would work out wonderfully,’ he said, and I could hear the relief in his voice. We discussed where we would leave the keys – at the petrol station near his house for him, and with our upstairs neighbour, Evelyn, for us – and promised to ring each other if there were any problems. It was arranged for Saturday, two days later. I put the phone down full of excitement. How could anything go wrong?

  3

  I can see the stars punctuating the black sky through the large windows that take up almost all of one wall. It’s like being in my very own planetarium. I lie in bed and try to spot Orion or the Plough, but I can’t make out any constellations. It reminds me of those postcards that were all the rage when I was about eight, where you had to find a 3D picture hidden in the pattern. I used to give myself a headache trying to pick out the hidden unicorn or woman’s face amongst the rows of triangles and squares.

  I’m still finding it hard to believe we are actually here, in this beautiful house, with a beach at the foot of the garden. A beach. Happiness infuses me at the thought of the week ahead: romantic strolls along the shoreline with Jamie and Ziggy, relaxing in the beautiful garden with the sea views, pottering about the high-tech kitchen that looks as though it should be in an issue of one of those house-and-garden magazines I’m obsessed with buying. Now that it’s quiet I can hear the rush of the sea crashing onto the rocks below. It’s soporific. I haven’t felt this relaxed since before the fire.

  I wonder how the Heywoods are getting on in our flat. Are they disappointed with it? They must be if they are used to living like this. I think of Tara in her elegant clothes having to slum it in our bedro
om with the second-hand pine furniture from Sylvia. Or are they so wrapped up in worry for their daughter that they couldn’t care where they stay, just as long as they are close to the hospital, to her?

  Jamie stretches lazily and says, half-heartedly, ‘We’d better get up.’

  ‘What time is it?’ I shuffle away from him to glance at my watch. ‘Shit. It’s gone eight. What can we make for dinner?’ I think of the fridge downstairs, bursting with food. ‘I’m starving. And we haven’t finished exploring.’ I can’t wait to have a further poke about their house. I’ve never done anything like this before; never stayed in an Airbnb or swapped homes. Even Jamie, who grew up in a leafy, middle-class cul-de-sac with his professional, university-educated parents, seems impressed by what he’s seen so far.

  I swing my legs out of bed, the floorboards warm beneath my feet (they must have underfloor heating). The suitcase is still in the corner of the room where Jamie dumped it earlier, and I rustle around inside it for my dressing gown. I can’t go anywhere without it. Jamie can’t understand why I want to wrap myself up in it at every available opportunity – he doesn’t even possess one. I pull it around me now, snaking my good arm through the sleeve and letting the soft grey velour drape over my sling. It was one of the first things Jamie bought me, when we started going out together four and a half years ago. He’d stayed over in my little bedsit and when he clapped eyes on my threadbare towelling dressing gown with the pocket hanging off he’d taken the piss out of it. Two days later, on a cold Sunday afternoon, he’d surprised me with this one. That’s when I’d truly fallen for him.