The Liberation of Alice Love

by Abby McDonald

  ***

  “The problem is, she has a point.” Alice curled up with her phone later that afternoon, slightly woozy from the Veuve Clicquot Vivienne had insisted on buying. Contracts were probably best left alone in this state.

  “Excuses, excuses,” Ella replied in a singsong voice. Alice could hear her munching on some crisps. “I won’t play devil’s advocate for you.”

  “I’m not making excuses!” Alice insisted. “It’s not as if I’m toiling away, unappreciated. I’m successful, and well paid.”

  “And bored out of your mind.”

  “I have independence,” Alice continued. “And even if I tried to make it as an agent somewhere else, then I’d be starting from scratch as a trainee, or even an intern. I’m too old to move backward like that, not if I want to buy a place of my own. It’s too much of a risk.”

  Ella sighed. “There’s really nothing I can say, is there? You’re set on being safe and dull and stable for the rest of your life.”

  “Yes,” Alice replied, defiant. “You don’t understand. I don’t have the luxury of wafting around like Cassie and Flora. They assume someone’s going to be there to pick up the pieces, but I can’t do that. I’m on my own, so why ruin everything on some foolish whim?”

  The more Alice thought about it, the more she convinced herself this was for the best. Embarking on a radical career change at her age? It was ludicrous. Better by far that she focus on taking the next sensible step she’d always planned: buying a flat of her own. So, as the next days drifted past in a blur of subclauses and residual payment exemptions, Alice swallowed her disappointment and turned her attentions instead to estate agent brochures and home-décor magazines, dreaming of the one thing that would make her steady wage worthwhile. A home all of her own.

  ***

  “Miss Love?”

  “Yes, hi.” Alice bobbed up from the row of scratchy blue seats. After two long afternoons there filing paperwork about her stolen card, she felt like the bank was a second home to her now, full of familiar leaflet stands and a row of tired assistants behind the glass partition. This time, however, she was actually there by choice, not necessity.

  A graying man stuck out his hand, coughing slightly. “Mr. Weatherton, I’ll be your adviser. If you’ll just come back here…”

  Alice shook his damp palm and trotted after him, clutching her neat binder of statements and payroll records. She was starting to feel excited about venturing onto the property ladder. Scared, yes—after all, it was only her entire life savings she was putting on the line—but confident too. This was what adults did, wasn’t it? Put down roots, made a home. And finally, she’d be able to pick the color of her paint and the style of her curtains without some onerous landlord watching her every move.

  Mr. Weatherton ushered her into a cluttered office and gestured for her to sit. “Now, you’re thinking about loan options?” He peered at some papers.

  “A mortgage, yes. Your HomePlus variable package.” Alice pulled out the thick wedge of application forms.

  He looked up, frowning. “I’m sorry, I, uh, think we have our wires crossed. I thought you wanted to talk about extending your overdraft, or some kind of loan arrangement.”

  “No…” Alice shook her head slowly. “It’s a mortgage I need. See, I’ve already filled in most of the application.” She passed him the papers, marked with pencil, just to be on the safe side. “I just need you to complete the rest. Do you need a minute to find the right file?” she asked, watching him flip through the folder.

  Mr. Weatherton looked awkward. “There seems to have been some misunderstanding. I’m not sure who you’ve spoken with, but we have very clear borrower guidelines, and, uh, given the recent change in your credit rating, and lack of funds with the bank…” He cleared his throat. “Well, I’m afraid you just don’t qualify.”

  Alice looked at him, speechless.

  “See, it states quite clearly in the literature that all agreement is based on your reliability as a borrower.” He helpfully slid her application back to her, as Alice scanned her own leaflets, trying to follow what he was saying. “Our credit checks show the, uh, worrying state of your current finances, so the best you can hope for is a high-rate loan.” Mr. Weatherton glanced down at his file. “Also, I see here that you’ve emptied your savings account with us. Ms. Love, I shouldn’t need to tell you that you’ll have to show some proof of your ability to pay a deposit before we can even begin to work a mortgage agreement. It’s all laid out in the subclauses…”

  Alice stopped listening. All she could hear was her blood, thundering loudly in her ears, and those few, terrible words.

  It took her an eternity to remember how to breathe, and another few moments until she could manage to speak.

  “What do you mean, ‘emptied my savings account’?”

  Chapter Five

  Mr. Weatherton broke off his lecture on fiscal responsibility and stared at her, surprised. “The Super-Saver account you have with us. The contents were transferred out two days ago.”

  Alice shook her head, almost in a daze. This couldn’t be happening.

  “I never transferred anything,” she stumbled, her voice no louder than a whisper. “There, there were over thirty thousand pounds in that account!”

  He stared at her. The expression on Alice’s face must have been vivid enough to convince him, because suddenly, Mr. Weatherton gulped.

  “You’re…sure?” Their eyes met, a mirror of panic.

  “Oh, yes.” Alice nodded faintly. “It was my deposit, for the flat…” She trailed off, helpless.

  There was silence.

  “Wait here,” he ordered, lurching to his feet. Alice managed to obey him for all of five seconds before leaping up herself, following him across the branch floor.

  “It’s gone?” she exclaimed, her voice picking up volume now. Mr. Weatherton had seized control of somebody’s computer and was frantically clicking through the files. Alice felt dizzy. She gripped hold of the partition wall for support. “It was in my account and someone just…took it? Don’t you have security?” she demanded. “What about all those questions I have to answer just to talk about my balance?!”

  “Please, Ms. Love, if you could just stay calm and wait in my office!” Mr. Weatherton didn’t look particularly calm himself. In fact, a strange vein was bulging on the left side of his forehead.

  “But I don’t understand!” Alice repeated, louder. She was vaguely aware she sounded hysterical, but she was beyond caring. “Shouldn’t you have some kind of alert set up? Especially after my card fraud! How can someone access my account and take that much money without you knowing?”

  The amount flashed into her head, and Alice felt sick all over again. Oh, God. She let out a whimper.

  “Please, Ms. Love, give me a moment here.” Mr. Weatherton hurriedly summoned a pimply assistant and had him guide Alice back, away from the now-nervous-looking customers. She followed him to the small room, numb. She hadn’t checked her account the past few days, but why would she? Nobody logs on every night to make sure someone hasn’t stolen a vast amount of money; besides, the only problem she’d had was with a misplaced card and PIN, and that was over now, Ahmed at the call center had reassured her. Over. How was this even possible?

  “Can I, uh, get you anything?” The boy hovered awkwardly, and even though Alice shook her head, he reappeared a few moments later with a paper cup of cold water.

  She took it silently.

  Thirty two thousand pounds. Thirty two thousand pounds. The words spun around in her head so often, they began to lose all meaning. This wasn’t a shopping spree of lingerie or a shiny new iPod bought using her card. Alice didn’t even know how to picture that kind of money. It was nothing but numbers to her, black print on her mortgage agreement, but to whoever took it—that was money to them now. Real money.

  She wasn’t sure how long she sat there, but eventually Mr. Weatherton returned. Alice looked at him dully as he took a seat and nervous
ly set about reshuffling his papers.

  “Well?” she asked, her earlier outrage fading to a chilled resignation. “Do you know what happened, Mr.—”

  “Call me Rodney.” He pulled at his tie, a sheen of sweat now coating his forehead.

  “Rodney,” she repeated quietly. Apparently they were now bonded by disaster. There was another pause.

  “It, uh, appears that the money was transferred by telephone.” Rodney’s disapproving demeanor was now limp, the expression in his eyes, defeated. It was hardly reassuring, Alice noted, as if from outside herself. “You—I mean, the caller identified themselves as you. They cleared all the usual security checks,” he added quickly, as if that somehow made it less of a monumental failing.

  “But…” Alice tried to reengage her brain. “Where did the money go? You must have some record of that, at least. Can’t you just…cancel the transaction?”

  Rodney exhaled. “They asked for priority handling, for convenience. The transfer cleared this morning.”

  Alice stared. It took them forever to process a simple check deposit, but that kind of money could disappear overnight?

  “So, what…? I mean, what happens now?”

  Rodney exhaled a shaky breath. “Well, uh, we’ll be contacting the recipient branch, to follow up. But it was a numbered account, in the Caribbean…”

  “The Caribbean!” Alice yelped. “And that didn’t flag any warnings?”

  Rodney quivered. “I suppose the assistant thought it was payment for a flat. So many developers are based overseas these days…”

  Alice opened her mouth, but Rodney pressed on. “I understand, you must be feeling stress, but please, Ms. Love, do try to stay calm.” He pulled out a pocket pack of tissues and began to mop his face. Alice couldn’t believe this.

  “But…What…?” she grappled to find sense again. “Is that it? I mean, you can get it back, can’t you?”

  “I…We’ll have to investigate. But it’s not just your savings, your credit score has plummeted,” he explained. “For it to fall so quickly, you would have had to have defaulted payments on other cards or loans in the past few months.”

  She shook her head. This wasn’t happening. “I have one credit card.” Alice fumbled with her purse, laying the small square of plastic out on the desk to prove it. “And I’m never late with payment. Never!” She looked at Rodney pleadingly. “You believe me, don’t you? This isn’t me!”

  He looked back, helpless. “I can’t…I mean, there will be an investigation, and I’m sure…But I can’t say anything right now. It’s out of my hands.”

  “Then whom do I talk to?” Alice demanded, horrified to hear her voice break. She sucked in a breath and tried to stay composed. “Just give me their names, and numbers, and I’ll call. I need to sort this out!”

  “Someone from the head office will be contacting you.” Rodney swallowed. “We’ll see what we can do.”

  ***

  His words taunted her for the rest of the day. Her savings were gone, just vanished into nothing, but she still couldn’t quite process the truth. Alice half expected an apologetic call, explaining that it had just been a clerical error, some terrible mix-up, but none came. By the time she arrived on Julian’s doorstep that evening, her scattered panic had given way to a sharp kind of terror.

  “What am I going to do?”

  He barely had time to usher her into the narrow hallway before Alice found herself retelling the entire sorry mess, words tumbling out of her mouth as if saying them out loud would somehow make it all less absurd. But it didn’t. “They say the account is protected against this kind of thing. I don’t understand—how could it happen?”

  She forced herself to take a breath, staring blankly at Julian under the bright spotlights. Usually, she found his sparse, minimalist flat a refuge, but now it just seemed to mock her with a neatness and order that were far, far from her reach. “The bank won’t get a handle on this for days, and he was saying all these things about credit scores and defaults, and—” She broke down, finally surrendering to the tears that had been building ever since she heard the awful news.

  “Shhh, hey, Aly, it’ll be OK.” Julian enveloped her in a hug. His gray sweater was soft against her face as he gently stroked her hair.

  “I’m sorry.” She pulled away, embarrassed. She never broke down like this. “It’s just…it’s been going round in my head all afternoon. I don’t know what to do.”

  Julian held out a handkerchief. “To start with, blow.”

  Alice took it. She always teased him about his handkerchiefs—using the monogrammed cloths instead of hygienic tissue packs—but now there was something comforting about the cool fabric against her face. She sniffled loudly.

  “It’ll be OK, I promise.” Julian steered her toward the kitchen, already warm and steaming with some delicious buttery smell. Alice sank down at the table while he put the kettle on and began assembling cups and milk. “The bank has to have some kind of insurance policy. You’ll get the money back.”

  “And the rest of it?” Alice felt utterly useless.

  Julian gave her a reassuring hug. “I’ll get a copy of your report. We’ll find out exactly what’s been going on. Now, how about some tea? And I’m trying a new carrot cake, with nutmeg and cardamom. You can be my guinea pig.”

  Alice nodded limply, watching him move around her in a comforting bustle of activity. He was right. There was nothing else she could do right now but drown her sorrows in hot, sweet tea. But even that went against Alice’s every instinct, and as her body gave in to the wave of exhaustion sweeping through her, her mind was already searching for some kind of solution.

  She needed a plan.

  ***

  Julian set about using his accountant contacts to fast-track a copy of her credit report while Alice began poring over every fraud guide she could find. Work the next day was a blur, nothing but a vague memory of phone calls and conversations she forgot the minute she put the phone down, but the moment Vivienne waltzed off to dinner, she dashed home; meeting Julian at her flat to assemble every piece of paperwork she would need for her claims.

  “Bank statements, credit card bills, utilities…” Alice laid out the papers on her coffee table, next to the bottle of wine and homemade chocolate torte Julian had brought as comfort food. “What am I missing?”

  “Just this.” Julian came into her sitting room, bearing a corkscrew and thick sheaf of pages from her printer. “Miss Alice Love’s credit report, fresh off the presses.”

  “Pass me that.” She reached up. Julian held out the wine opener. “No, the other one.”

  “Not so fast.” He collapsed heavily on the sofa. “I should look first, find out what we’re dealing with. Some of the statements I see at work are all over the place.”

  “Fill me with confidence, why don’t you.” Alice took a large slice of cake, but her stomach was twisted too tightly with nerves. She picked at it, anxious. “Well? The bank said there had to be something going on for my score to have slipped so low.”

  Rodney had been flustered, yes, but on that he was certain. With a rating like hers, she’d be lucky to even get a tiny overdraft, let alone a hundred-thousand-pound mortgage. Somebody had taken another loan out in her name, and nobody had known the difference. Alice felt another surge of terror. There could be thousands more pounds of debt out there.

  “Hmm…” Julian frowned, flipping through the pages.

  “Is that a good ‘hmm’ or a bad ‘hmm’?” Alice watched him carefully, but the seconds ticked by without any further comment. “Please, Jules. I’m dying here!”

  He looked up. “Don’t panic,” he started, voice cautious.

  She panicked.

  “What? What does that mean?” Alice snatched the list from his hands. The very long list. She held her breath as she scanned the details. Names of banks and credit card companies jumped out at her: not just major ones, but firms with names like CreditLoans4U and BadCreditPlus. There were loans, and
credit cards, and unauthorized overdrafts stretching back almost two months.

  “How much is it?” She gazed at the dense print, aghast. All of this, in her name!

  “We’ll start contacting the companies right away,” Julian told her in a low, soothing voice. “And inform them what’s happened. The sooner we get the process going, the better.”

  “But how much is it?” The numbers were blurring in front of her eyes.

  Julian sighed. “As far as I can tell, around sixty thousand pounds. So far.”

  Alice felt her mouth drop open.

  “I…You can’t…I don’t…!”

  “Like I said, we’ll straighten this out,” Julian told her, a reassuring hand on her arm. Alice struggled to listen, blood pounding in her ears. “I’ll find someone at my firm, or maybe Stefan knows something. But you should be prepared for it to take a while.”

  Alice could only whimper: “I think I need that corkscrew now.”

  ***

  “You know, I’m surprised they haven’t started chasing you yet,” Julian said thoughtfully, after Alice had numbed her panic with two glasses of wine and they’d broken down the worst of the fraud. “Although it’s all pretty recent. Most of these only have one or two missed payments.”

  She shivered. “I still can’t believe I didn’t know it was happening.”

  Of everything, Alice wondered if her ignorance was the worst. All this time, she’d taken these ordinary things for granted: she opened a bank account, she paid her bills, she filed away her statements every month in the big black file marked “banking.” But now it turned out it wasn’t safe or secure at all. The most boring parts of her life were wide open for anyone to just stroll in and take—everything.

  Julian looked at his phone, restless. “We should probably wrap this up. Yasmin will be over at my flat soon, with the first of her stuff.”

  Alice stopped. “She’s moving in?” Her problems faded, just for a moment, as she looked at Julian in surprise. “When did this happen? I mean”—she recovered—“congratulations. You didn’t say.”

  Julian seemed flustered. He ran one hand over the crown of his head, from his neck to his forehead, flattening his hair in an awkward clump. “It wasn’t exactly planned. We were talking, and she said how she never saw me, and I said something about her living on the other side of the city, and then the next thing I knew…” He gave a small shrug. “It’ll be good, I think. Got to try it sometime, right?”