The Lies You Told

by Harriet Tyce

  “How did that make you feel?” Edward says.

  “Horrible. I’d thought we had something special.”

  There’s a pause while Edward goes through his papers. I’m furiously noting this all down. I can see by the upward tilt of Barbara’s head that she considers this evidence important, and I want to be thorough in my transcription.

  He starts up again. “Did you see him again that summer?”

  For the first time, Freya actually starts crying, a couple of sobs escaping from her before she puts her hand over her mouth. She rubs at her eyes with the back of her other hand. Now she looks closer to the schoolgirl she really is. Though it isn’t making the jury members look any more sympathetic. They’re shuffling in their chairs, and one woman checks her watch.

  The court usher gives Freya another glass of water and she drinks from it. The judge asks if she is all right to continue or if she needs a short break.

  “It’s OK,” she says. “I can keep going.” She lifts her chin. “I did see him again. It was in August. I’d been staying at my dad’s house in Surrey, but I was getting bored and he was never there. So I decided to go back to my mum’s. I just left early one morning because his stupid girlfriend was there again and I don’t like her. I got the train back into London,

  but instead of getting the tube home, I decided to go back to his flat, see if maybe I could see him. I’d ordered him a book, a special copy of Fanny Hill, and I wanted to give it to him.

  I thought maybe he would like me again if I gave him a present.”

  “I see,” Edward says. “So when you went to his flat, what time was it?”

  “About nine.”

  “You weren’t expected at home?”

  “No. I hadn’t told my mum. I just went straight to Jeremy’s.”

  “What did you do when you got there?” Edward prompts.

  “I was going to ring on the bell, but I felt too nervous. So I sat on a wall opposite his flat and I waited to see if he came out.”

  “And did anyone come out?”

  I look up at Freya and feel a chill as I watch the girl’s face. For a moment it’s entirely bleak. Slowly she turns to Edward.

  “Yes. Jeremy came out.”

  “Was he alone or was he with someone else?”

  Freya looks straight at Jeremy. “He was with someone else. A girl. I don’t know who she was.” I glance at him but, as ever, his head is lowered.

  “What were they doing?”

  “He was saying goodbye to her. She looked like she had stayed the night—he was in a dressing gown. He kissed her for ages and then she left.” There’s an expression almost of triumph on her face, swiftly replaced by sadness.

  “And what did you do?”

  “I kept my head down. As soon as he shut the door, I ran over and pushed the book through his letter box, then I left.”

  “You still wanted to give him a present, even after you had seen him kissing someone else?”

  “I thought it might make him feel guilty,” Freya says, deep sadness in her voice.

  “Was it soon after this that you told anyone about what had happened between you and the defendant?”

  “Yes. I told my mum, but she said I was making it up. Then I called the police myself. That’s when it all kicked off.” She gestures around her at the courtroom before her head droops, as if she’s overwhelmed at the thought.

  37

  Court adjourns shortly after. Freya’s testimony for the prosecution has been concluded.

  Barbara is all set for cross-examination. She repeats her instructions to me to double-check the files of printouts. Jeremy seems calm now that the evidence has been laid out. He leaves almost as soon as we are all dismissed from court. I say my goodbyes and leave, too. I want to ask him about the rumors he’s heard from Robin’s school, but it’s not the time.

  Nicole hasn’t texted again, so I make my way up to north London as fast as I can, the tensions of the courtroom giving way to tension about Daisy, about Julia, about Robin.

  I reach Nicole’s house and she comes to the door. I hear the sound of children’s laughter upstairs. At least Robin is happy, not thinking too much about Daisy or what might be happening. There’s a smell of cooking, fragrant and enticing. The house is warm, curtains drawn against the autumn dusk, and when Nicole moves forward to give me a hug, I’m drawn into the embrace of her home.

  Nicole is flushed from cooking, a slight smell of fried onion in her hair. When she moves away from me, it’s clear how much pressure she’s under. Her jumper is stained and her hair hasn’t been brushed for some time.

  “Is there any news?”

  “Nothing. Daisy is in a coma, with an aspirant pneumonia—they say that she must have slipped into unconsciousness from the drugs before vomiting and choking on that vomit. She was close to death when Julia saw the state she was in. She’s suffered a loss of oxygen, leading to a hypoxic brain injury and, on top of this, she breathed in some of the sick while she was unconscious and it’s led to an infection in her lungs. The next few days will be critical. They don’t know how she’s going to be when she wakes up, what level of brain function there might be. If she wakes from the coma at all…” Nicole says the last words in a whisper.

  I feel the word reverberate through me. Coma. “I hadn’t realized it was so bad.”

  “It’s not something I could really text,” Nicole says. “I wanted to tell you myself.”

  She draws me through into the living room and sits down on the sofa, patting the space next to her. “I have no idea how it happened, or what Daisy might have taken, but they seem to be suggesting a drug overdose.”

  “Where would she have got drugs from? What kind of drugs?” I can’t stop asking questions.

  “They don’t know yet. They’re running tests. And as for where… Well, that’s why the police were searching Julia’s house.”

  I push on. “How long had she been unconscious?”

  “Pippa didn’t realize anything was wrong—she woke up very early and came straight through to my room. She just thought Daisy was asleep. It was when Julia went in to wake her later that she realized there was a problem, that Daisy wasn’t right. She was unconscious, and there was vomit round her mouth. She wasn’t breathing. I did CPR on her, and the ambulance arrived really quickly and took over. Her brain was starved of oxygen for a period of time—they don’t know how long. It’s really serious.”

  “You said she was unwell during the evening on Friday?”

  “She was… agitated. She said she had a tummy ache and a headache, but I thought she was just in a state.” My new friend looks nervous. “That last maths test hadn’t gone so well, and she was still upset from the really low score she got.”

  “When she got seventy-six percent?”

  Nicole looks at me. “The score Julia thought was low. That one.”

  “Daisy does seem to be under a lot of pressure.”

  “She is,” Nicole says. “I mean, Julia really does love her, but she holds her to incredibly high standards.” She gets up from the sofa, paces around the room a couple of times, stopping in front of the mirror over the mantelpiece and pulling at her hair. “All this stuff we tell them, be your best, not be the best. I’m not sure Julia has got that memo yet.”

  I laugh, though there’s little humor in it. “It is competitive.”

  “Sure.” Nicole sits down next to me on the sofa. “That’s why I called you. I know it must seem odd, because we’ve only just started talking to each other. But you seem far more normal than the others. It’s gone a bit mad. Especially this year, all the pressure to get through to secondary school…”

  We sit in silence for a moment. Despite my concern, I’m a little flattered that Nicole has seen me as a source of normality.

  “I guess we’ve avoided the worst of it, coming in so late on,” I say.

  “Well, that’s one way of looking at it. You’re not exactly seeing any of us at our finest. It all used to be so lovely, b
ut it’s got so fraught…”

  I’d almost forgotten what Jeremy said to me earlier in court, but this comment reminds me. “I heard something. From someone outside school.”

  “Go on?” Nicole says.

  “There was someone who died?”

  Nicole is twisting the ends of her hair. “I’m not really sure…”

  “No, I’m not sure either. And he did say it was all probably gossip, but…”

  Nicole opens her mouth as if to say more, before she’s interrupted by the doorbell. She gets up and rushes to the front door. There’s a murmur of voices. It’s Julia, and I go out into the entrance hall to join them. She’s pale, with dark circles around her eyes. When she sees me, she gives me a half-smile before taking her coat off. “I could murder a drink.”

  We go to the kitchen and Nicole opens a bottle of white wine, dumps three glasses on the table, and sloshes the wine into them noisily.

  “So, how is she?” Nicole asks.

  “The same.” Julia drinks half her glass down in one gulp. “Exactly the same. She’s just lying there all white and tired with a tube down her throat. It doesn’t even look like her.”

  “I wish you’d let me see her,” Nicole says.

  “I know how much it’s going to distress you,” Julia says. “I’m just trying to protect you.” She takes another drink, tops up her glass. “And they don’t want too many visitors. It’s disruptive. I mean, it is Intensive Care…”

  Nicole pats her on the arm. “It’s so awful,” she says. “You’re dealing so well with it.”

  “What choice do I have? Paul came in to see her today. He was really upset.”

  “Was it OK? Seeing him, I mean?” Nicole asks.

  Julia pinches her lips together, shakes her head. “He was as much of a selfish shit as ever. He had a real go at me, said I hadn’t been looking after her properly, that he was going to go for custody as soon as she was well enough to go home.”

  “What did you say?” Nicole asks.

  “That it wasn’t the time or the place. The only important thing was that Daisy pulled through safely.”

  “Did he agree?”

  Julia drinks again, lowers her glass. “He told me to stop being such a fucking hypocrite. That I was playing the perfect-mother role again and it made him sick because I was very far indeed from being a perfect mother.” She puts her face in her hands, her shoulders starting to shake. Nicole rushes over to her and pulls her into an embrace where Julia stays quiet for some moments, then the only sound to emerge is a muffled sob. I watch them, full of sympathy for Julia. She might well be awful, but it’s such a horrible situation it’s impossible not to feel sorry for her.

  “He’s such a bastard,” Nicole mutters into her friend’s hair. The thought of Andrew comes into my mind, how unkind he’s been to me, and my sympathy for Julia grows even more.

  A timer goes off on the oven. Nicole releases Julia and goes to turn it off before pulling out a huge fish pie bubbling with a golden cheese crust. My mouth waters.

  “I thought we might need something comforting tonight.”

  Julia goes over and gives her a hug. “You really are amazing,” she says. “You’re such a huge support, Nicole. You too, Sadie.” She turns to look at me. There’s genuine emotion behind the Botox. “We didn’t get off on the right foot, but I know I can count on you.”

  “And Robin’s been so wonderful with Pippa,” Nicole says. “It’s been such a comfort to hear them laughing upstairs. She’s been brilliant at distracting her.”

  “I wish I could be so easily distracted,” Julia murmurs. I try not to be offended.

  The girls come downstairs and Nicole serves up spoonfuls of pie. We all sit around the kitchen table. I eat hungrily—it feels like hours since lunch in the canteen with Jeremy—and Robin and Pippa do too, but Nicole and Julia both push the food around their plates with their forks.

  “Daisy would have eaten the whole thing by now,” Julia says with a sigh.

  “Such a big appetite,” Nicole agrees.

  “Not that big,” Julia says, the sigh replaced with something sharper. “Not like Pippa here—she’s on seconds already.”

  “Pippa…” Nicole says, “you know you should ask before you help yourself to more.” She takes the plate away from her daughter, even though Pippa is still halfway through a mouthful.

  “Sorry,” the girl mumbles, starting to blush.

  “That’s OK, darling. Just remember, though, you really don’t need to eat so much.”

  Robin looks over at me as if to check that it’s all right for her to keep eating, and I nod at her before reaching for the serving spoon and giving myself another helping, too.

  “Oh, I do envy you, not caring about what you eat,” Julia says, and I blink. “I wish I could let go of some of this control. But, you know, even in a time of such huge stress, I just can’t let myself shovel food down like that.”

  I have a forkful of food held nearly to my lips. I catch Nicole’s eye before I lower the fork slowly.

  “Oh, Julia, you’re so brave,” Nicole says. “You’re just marvelous. I would be in pieces by now.”

  I murmur in agreement, pick up my plate and Robin’s, pile them on the side by the dishwasher.

  “We’d better go,” I say. “I don’t want to impose any more. And I do need to do some work.”

  “Very happy to have Robin tomorrow,” Nicole says. “Any time.”

  She sees us to the front door. As she hugs me goodbye, she leans close. “I keep saying it, but please don’t mind what Julia says. She’s under so much stress. It’s very hard.”

  “I can’t even imagine.”

  The thought of Daisy lying unconscious in hospital is not far from my mind. I hold Robin’s hand tightly all the way home.

  38

  There’s no news the next morning, either. Situation still the same, Nicole texts. Robin welcome as ever tonight.

  I send a quick reply thanking her for the update. Thinking back to the conversation with Jeremy the previous day, I do an internet search—Ashams girl dies. Nothing other than hits that relate in a positive way to the school for the first few pages on Google. No negative information, no mention of a dead girl, just story after story about their bursary scheme and philanthropic work in the local community, and multiple articles about their stellar academic results. I keep plowing through but Robin comes in and I have to get ready to leave with her.

  “Are you sure you want to go to their house again?” I ask her on the way in to school.

  “Yes, I like them,” Robin says. “It’s OK, Mom, I promise.”

  I don’t argue. I can’t, really, given that I’ve got no after-school alternative arranged.

  “When this trial is over,” I say as we reach the school gates, “I promise we’ll sort things out properly. I’ll find you an afternoon nanny if I have court. I’ll get it all arranged.”

  “Maybe Dad will have moved here by then,” Robin says casually. I blink.

  “Is he thinking about that?”

  “I’m not sure. He said something when he was over. I don’t know. Anyway, don’t worry. I like Pippa and Nicole,” Robin says, and kisses me goodbye.

  I see Nicole in the distance but she’s glued to her phone and doesn’t look up, so I make my way to the tube, grateful not to have to chat. I’m thinking about what Robin has said about Andrew, that he might move back. It’s not a problem I want to deal with right now—I like him being out of sight, out of mind. I know I’m going to have to deal with it all sometime. Just not now.

  The tube journey works its usual magic of compartmentalizing my concern about Daisy, replacing those tensions with concerns about the trial and how Barbara’s cross-examination will proceed. By the time the tube is going under the Thames, I’ve put Daisy and Julia and Nicole right into the back of my mind. Now I’m flicking through my files in my head. I know I’ve gone through all the messages thoroughly, and there is definitely no sign of the Viber app that Freya men
tioned yesterday in court, but I’m still worried that I might have missed something. I can’t think what, though. There’s no trace of the alleged relationship between Freya and Jeremy, either on the laptop Freya was using for her messaging and social media, or on the basic Nokia.

  The missing iPad, Viber—it does all feel too pat, as Barbara said. Freya can say what she likes about it, but with no evidence to back it up, it’s worthless. It’s threadbare, the prosecution case. Even though Freya came over better than I anticipated, the jury still did not look convinced.

  The train pulls into Elephant and Castle, and I make my way to court.

  After fifteen minutes of Barbara’s cross-examination of Freya, the jury look even less convinced. I keep a close eye on them throughout, looking away only to write down the salient details of the answers that Barbara elicits. Zora is scribbling away behind me as well, ensuring we have a complete note of the evidence.

  It’s not so much about what Freya says in reply, but more the narrative that Barbara creates through her questions. I can see why Barbara is so highly sought after as an advocate. Her tone is sympathetic, non-judgmental. She sets Freya at her ease. It’s clear Freya has had a difficult time with her family—yes. It’s hard when parents divorce—yes. Freya was resentful toward her mother for throwing her father out when she discovered his affair—yes. Freya thought her mother should have given him another chance—yes. Freya found it tricky living with her mother sometimes—yes. But having said that, it wasn’t easy living with her father, either—no.

  The girl is on guard, fingers clenched tight over the edge of the witness box, but as Barbara takes her far away from questions to do with Jeremy, Freya seems to be relaxing a little, some emotion breaking through the carapace of make-up she’s again plastered on.

  She must have felt very alone sometimes—yes.

  She found it hard to get attention—yes.

  She resented it when her mother spent time with other people instead of with her. A long pause. Yes.