by Harriet Tyce
I’m mute, a jangling sound in my ears. I know Nicole is trying to be kind, to be helpful, but I won’t bring my defenses down just like that. I don’t dare, not after everything that’s happened. I take a deep breath, calm myself. Smile.
“I’m sure it’ll all work out,” I say. Nicole smiles back, and we walk together the rest of the way to school.
“You look nice,” Robin says and hugs me. My doubts about the brightness of my lipstick fall away. I draw Robin close for a moment then pull away, keeping my hands on her shoulders.
“How was it?” I say.
Robin rolls her eyes. “Awful. But I did really well in the comprehension test.”
“I’m sorry, I totally forgot to say good luck.”
“It’s OK. I’m not too bothered. Though it’s good to do well.”
“How did it go down with the others?” I take Robin’s hand and we walk away from school, my lipstick a shield against any dirty looks and mutters.
Robin laughs. “We’re not meant to share our marks. But Daisy stole my paper when I got it back. When she saw what I got she went bright red and burst into tears.”
“Oh no, why? Had she done badly?”
“Not at all. She got seventy-six percent this time. But her mom wants her to get over eighty percent each time.”
I shake my head at this. “Nuts. I don’t understand it. Did she actually talk to you?”
“No. I overheard her talking to Pippa. They’re still ignoring me.”
At that moment the bus pulls up and we climb onto it, the conversation ending. It’s time to focus on the weekend ahead.
25
There’s a lasagna bubbling golden in the oven, its aroma enticing. With the lights dimmed, in the twilight, the house looks almost inviting. We’ve come a long way. Robin is actually happy—the combination of her favorite dinner and the weekend stretching ahead.
I chop up the salad, the knife cutting clean through the tomatoes and the cucumber. I revel in the calm. It’s lovely that, for once, Robin isn’t miserable. We’re about to sit down for food when there’s a knock at the door.
Robin sprints to answer it. I’m expecting her to come back, but there’s no sound. I suddenly panic—has someone grabbed her? Has she been overpowered at the door in a home invasion? I dash through to the front before stopping. Andrew is standing in the doorway holding Robin tight. She’s clutching him around his middle—it looks like she might never let him go. They don’t notice me.
I pull myself together.
“I didn’t expect to see you,” I say with some effort. I want to start screaming. As soon as Andrew hears me, he jumps like a cat, letting go of Robin.
“Come in, Dad. Come and have supper. Mom’s made lasagna. There’s loads. Why didn’t you tell me you were coming? I’ve missed you so much,” Robin says, pulling him inside before I can say anything else.
Robin talks nonstop all the way through the meal, Andrew’s contribution only a few noises of encouragement as Robin fills him in on every detail of the last few weeks. The owl, the ostracism, all the hurts and slights she’s suffered. The maggots. There are shafts of light, though; she likes the teachers, the art department. But overall, it’s a litany of woe. I swallow down my lasagna with difficulty, shifting the lumps in my throat with constant sips of wine, water. I’m trying not to get drunk, afraid that I’ll break, start screaming abuse at Andrew and never stop.
“Mom hates it too,” Robin says. “The moms are all horrible.”
“It’ll all get better soon,” Andrew says, his first full sentence for some time. He’s leaning in my general direction, but his glance slides past my ear, over my shoulder.
“Mom says if it doesn’t, I can leave at the end of term,” Robin says.
“I don’t think that’s the best attitude,” Andrew says. “What happened to my little fighter? Remember that time you were being bullied in elementary school and you stood up to him and told him to leave you alone? You need to channel some of that here.”
My fingers have curled into fists under the table, fingernails jabbing sharp into the palms of my hands. I am not going to start yelling. It’s not fair on Robin.
“Dad,” Robin says. “It’s horrible.”
“I bet you can turn it around,” he says. “You’re brilliant at making friends. Don’t give up. That’s not the way to do it.”
I can’t look at him. I want to thump him, sitting there at my table, eating my food, when it’s his fucking fault we’re here.
“Well, that’s not the worst thing. You should see what Grandma did to Mom’s old room,” Robin says, clearly not ready to stop complaining. I protest, trying to stop it, but it’s too late, Robin is leading Andrew out of the kitchen and up the stairs. I sit with my head bowed, picking at the skin around my nails, picturing the scene as Andrew looks at the destruction Lydia has wrought. Will he feel sympathy? Or will he view it without surprise, this confirmation that I’m fundamentally unlovable, rejected both by my mother and by him.
After a while I hear their footsteps coming back down the stairs. Robin first, light on the treads. And Andrew’s. Heavy, slow. Will he even come back into the kitchen or is he going to leave right now?
But he comes through to the kitchen, stands in the doorway. Robin’s not with him. I look up at him, and for the first time in months, he actually makes eye contact with me. We hold our gaze for a few long seconds, and I’m not sure, but there’s a spark of something, a connection that’s made, or renewed.
“I’m taking Robin with me for the weekend. I’m staying in a hotel; it’s a twin room. I’m sure you could do with a break. I’ll take her into school on Monday, see the place. You can pick her up in the afternoon,” he says. The connection is broken.
“What if I don’t want you to do that?”
“Then let’s ask Robin what she wants, shall we? Do you want to tell her she can’t spend time with me?”
I take a deep breath. He’s got me.
“How can I possibly trust you, that you’ll take her in to school? How do I know that you’re not going to take her back to the U.S. instead?”
He looks at me with surprise. “Why would I do that?”
“I don’t know what you’re capable of anymore. I don’t even know who you are.” I can’t be arsed dancing round it. “What the fuck are you doing here, Andrew?”
“I wanted to see Robin. Of course. And I wanted to see…”
“What? What did you want to see?”
“I wanted to see that you were doing OK without me,” he says. “And you are.”
We look at each other. The text I sent lies heavy between us, unmentioned, as is so much else. I can’t do this any more. “Why the fuck would you care? You forced this on me in the first place. Fuck you, Andrew. Just get out. I never want to see you again.”
He stands for a moment, looking at the floor, before going to find Robin. I hear his footsteps as he climbs the stairs, his voice in the distance. She’ll be packing her weekend clothes, her uniform. Any minute now she’ll come and ask for my help. She can never find everything she needs. I’m ready for her call, but it never comes. I sit in the kitchen and wait until Robin comes in to say goodbye, her farewell distracted, so excited is she at the prospect of a weekend with her dad that she’s practically bouncing with each step. Andrew leaves without coming in to see me again, Robin skipping at his heels. The rest of the weekend is dark.
26
It’s the first day of the trial. I wash the weekend off me and dress in my black suit. At least I don’t have to deal with the school run. I think about whether I should call the school, make sure that Andrew has actually delivered her there rather than doing a run for it with her, but I control myself. They’ll let me know soon enough if she hasn’t arrived. If he ever moves back to the UK, I’ll have to get used to this.
Once through Security, I see Barbara in the robing room and hand her the work I’ve done.
“As suspected, no evidence of communication between the cl
ient and the complainant at all,” I say. “And there’s some more examples of her making stuff up to try and impress her friends. I’m making a list. Lies she told.”
“Excellent,” Barbara says. “Good work. Is there much more to go?”
“One more file. That’s it.”
We stand next to each other before the mirror, adjusting our bands and pulling on our wigs. Barbara has twenty-five years on me, easily, and it shows, but not too much. Well-preserved, I think. The main sign of Barbara’s age is the puckering of small vertical lines round her mouth, evidence of a lifetime spent smoking. She smells of cigarettes now, the aroma of old smoke strong, layers on layers over years—the woman kippered in it.
Barbara’s wig is yellowed at the front, too. Unlike mine, which is still box-fresh, white and evidently barely worn. Barbara looks askance at it in the mirror—I catch her eye.
“I only had a few years in the crown court before I left,” I say. “I didn’t get much use out of it.”
“We’ll make sure it gets properly broken in,” Barbara says. “You’ve done excellent work on this so far. I’ll make sure you’re sorted out.”
Ready, we walk out of the robing room together, black gowns swooping behind us. Jeremy is waiting in the front hall of the court building, his expression hunted. He’s in a dark jacket and white shirt, all ready for the dock. He looks less comfortable in it than he did in the tweed jacket, a little as if he’s borrowed his father’s clothes for the big occasion.
“I think that chap’s a journalist,” he says, gesturing behind him at a man in an ill-fitting suit. “I recognize him—he was hanging around my flat last week.”
Barbara looks over, shrugs. “Most likely,” she says. “This is bound to attract some media attention. We’ve discussed it already.”
Jeremy clearly has more to say on the subject, but his lips tighten.
“Zora should be here any minute,” Barbara says. “Then we’ll find a conference room, talk you through what’s going to happen. I’m going to get a coffee right now. Do you want anything?”
Both Jeremy and I shake our heads, and as Barbara leaves for the canteen, we move together to the back of the entrance hall. He keeps looking over his shoulder, evidently on edge.
“We should find a conference room, if there’s one free,” I say. “I can text Barbara where we are.”
We walk down a long wood-paneled corridor, trying doors. We’re about halfway along when there’s a loud screech.
“Sir, sir! Look, he’s here!”
It’s a group of teenage girls, their makeup thickly applied, eyebrows stenciled on with heavy hands. I look at their fake tans and blink, aware suddenly of how pale and pasty I look. The girls flock around him, touching him on the arm, chirruping in turn.
“Sir, we’ve come to support you, sir. We don’t want to see you going to prison, sir. We’re here to show everyone what a great teacher you are, sir, how much we like you.”
Jeremy looks like a trapped animal. He catches my eye and he’s so clearly desperate to be rescued that I nearly laugh, though I’m well aware of how serious the situation is. I know what his bail conditions are. Apart from anything else, he’s not meant to have contact with any pupils from Freya’s old school. OK, technically, he hasn’t sought them out, but they’re definitely doing their best to make as much bodily contact with him as they can. If the prosecution sees him in this situation, it could make his bail position problematic to say the least.
There’s an empty conference room just behind me. I gesture to Jeremy, beckoning him in, and when he doesn’t move, I wade into the throng and take hold of him by the arm, dragging him into the room, whereupon I slam the door shut and wedge a chair against it so that no one can get in.
He stays standing next to the table, gray with fear. I face him and put my hand on his arm again, but more gently this time. He inhales once, twice, then moves close in toward me, slumping his head down on my shoulder. I’m hesitant, stiff for a moment before I put one arm round him and pat him on the back. His breathing calms. Eventually he moves away.
“Sorry,” he says. “Sorry. That really freaked me out.”
“It’s OK,” I say. “I understand. That was pretty full-on.” I smile, pat his hand. Turning away, I pull my phone out of my bag, about to text Barbara to explain, when she rings me.
I catch her up quickly, and within a matter of minutes, someone tries to open the door, the chair I’ve propped in the way crashing to the floor. I move hurriedly to clear the path and Barbara comes in. She rolls her eyes at me but makes no other comment about the girls outside.
When we have sat down at the conference table, Barbara clears her throat, starts talking.
She tells Jeremy what he can expect on the first day in court, where he’ll sit, how little sway they will have over jury selection. Given his father is a judge, it’s most likely he knows all this, I think, but he looks as if he’s calming down as Barbara talks to him, color returning slowly to his cheeks.
“Will either of your parents be attending court?” Barbara asks.
“Yes,” Jeremy says with a distinct lack of enthusiasm. “My mother will be here for the duration, I expect. She’ll get here any minute. My father will turn up when we know what time we’re starting. He didn’t want to spend hours waiting, and they find it difficult to be in the same place as each other.” Jeremy pauses. “They’re both being very supportive, though,” he continues, as if to counter any criticism.
We stay holed up in the conference room. Alexandra turns up soon after, directed by Jeremy, and she hugs her son and clings on to his hand. He looks more and more like a schoolboy in a borrowed suit. It’s hard to think of him as predatory at all.
Jeremy’s father is wise not to come in advance—by lunchtime we’re still not in court. Barbara texts him to tell him about the delay, and he replies to say that given there won’t be time now for anything substantive to happen, there’s no point in his coming. Barbara relays the message to Jeremy, who greets the information with a shrug.
“And isn’t that just typical of your father,” Alexandra says, her eyes snapping with anger. Jeremy doesn’t reply.
I keep checking my phone to make sure the school hasn’t been in touch to ask where Robin is, in case Andrew has failed to take her in. Nothing. No news is good news, after all. At least the delay gives us time to get through all necessary discussions—Jeremy and Alexandra are pleased by the discoveries I’ve made in the messages from Freya’s computer. Alexandra goes so far as to mutter well done at me, and Barbara declares herself ready to cross-examine, promising to tear that girl to shreds in the witness box. I imagine how much Freya must be dreading her court appearance, and I suppress a shudder, though I’m increasingly curious to see her in the flesh after spending so much time in her social media. Jeremy’s anxiety doesn’t fade, and a feeling of tension rises during the morning, especially when we have to leave the conference room at lunchtime and we’re mobbed by the teenage girls who have inexplicably been waiting to catch a sight of their idol.
“He’s hardly the Beatles,” Barbara mutters, but she takes hold of his arm and walks him through to the court canteen. The prosecution team fills another table in the room, and Barbara gestures at them in a friendly way, but the two sides do not interact.
By the time we’re finally called into court at half past two I’m ready to throttle Alexandra. She’s one of the most opinionated women I’ve ever had the misfortune to meet, sounding off about everything, from the way that the defense should be won to her disapproval of working mothers. I keep my tongue under tight control, but it’s a relief when we get to leave her in the public gallery while Jeremy is sent into the dock. The judge comes in and tells us that in her view, we’re not going to get very far with proceedings today. She apologizes for the delay, and says that she will ensure that progress is made tomorrow.
“So that’s it?” Jeremy says after we leave court.
“Such a waste of time. And money,” Alexandr
a says. “All those people standing around like that. Something should be done.”
“That’s what years of austerity does,” I say. She shoots me an evil glare.
Barbara holds up her hand. “No need for any unpleasantness. This happens on occasion. More than we’d like to think. But it should get going properly tomorrow.”
We say goodbye to each other, shaking hands. If I’m quick, I’ll be in time to pick up Robin at the end of school before she has to go to after-school club.
The journey up to school is the first time I’ve had to think all day. I’m furious about Andrew, the way he’s just waltzed back in, whisked Robin away again. I’ve been scared all day that he’s taken Robin, that he’s not going to bring her back this time. If I get her back—no, when I get her back—I’m going to get legal advice, file for divorce. I’m going to block him from being able to turn up and take her whenever he likes. This can’t happen again.
Anger builds up in me, hot and strong. School can go fuck itself, too. So what if these women don’t want to know me? I don’t want anything to do with them either. I get off the tube with fire in my belly, rather than the usual slug of dread lodged cold and clammy in my gut. I’ve driven it out, salt on its tail. I’ll wither the lot of them.
But something has changed. Something’s different. I’ve gone expecting a fight. I don’t get it.
“Hi, Sadie,” says one mum.
“Hello,” says another.
A group of them smile at me, actually smile, and wave, their faces open and warm as I pass.
What the fuck? I can’t make sense of it.
“Afternoon,” says a third.
I’m confused. It’s like I’ve ended up in an alternative reality.
“Sadie,” Julia says, walking up to me. “I hoped I’d see you. Do you think we can talk?”
It’s gone from strange to completely incomprehensible, cracks in the space–time continuum.