‘Hello?’
‘Jenna. It’s Joe. Callie’s uncle. I hope you don’t mind me calling; I got your number from Tom.’
I glance at Nathan but he’s engrossed in one of the paintings. ‘Not at all. Is everything OK?’
‘Not really.’ His sigh comes down the phone so hard I can almost feel a puff of air against my ear. ‘Callie’s birthday has really set Amanda back and Tom’s really struggling. He tries to put a brave face on all the time but after the first birthday without her, and Sophie not being here too, it’s pushed them over the edge. Amanda wouldn’t get out of bed at all yesterday, or today.’
‘I’m so sorry. Is there anything I can do? I’d still like to help you find Sophie, if I can.’
‘You could help by spending some time with Amanda?’
His voice is quiet, drowned out by the squeaking of the tea trolley as it is pushed past me and I turn to face the wall, pressing the heel of my hand against my right ear.
‘It will give Tom a break. I help as often as I can but I’m on the road for the next few days. It worries me sick to see him so stressed, it’s not good for his heart. It helped them both that you were there for Callie’s birthday, I know it did. You’re not family but there’s a bond.’
‘I’ll do what I can. I’ll give Tom a ring and see when they’re free. I’ve got something for Amanda anyway.’
‘Like they ever have plans! They’re both at home now. I’ve just spoken to Tom.’
‘Oh. Right.’
‘Sorry, you’re probably busy?’ Joe asks, and I hesitate but how can I refuse them? The family of my heart.
‘No, I could go now,’ I reply.
‘You’re a star. Thanks so much.’
I disconnect the call and swing around. Nathan is standing directly behind me.
‘Who was that?’ he asks, and I can’t instantly think of an answer as I wonder how long he’s been there. What he’s overheard. Did I say Tom and Amanda or Callie or was it only Joe who mentioned them?
‘Cat got your tongue?’ Nathan says and he smiles.
But as he repeats exactly the same phrase from my dream last night sharp, jagged images spring to the forefront of my mind eclipsing my ability to answer; bruised face, missing money, feeling trapped. Nathan continues to stare at me, waiting for me to speak, and my whole body grows cold. He can’t be the person Callie was scared of, can he? He was so tender when he made love to me, it doesn’t seem possible.
‘Jenna? Are you OK?’
‘I’m so sorry. I have to go.’
‘Was it something I said?’
‘No, no. It’s just a… it’s a… It’s a friend. In need.’
‘Is it the person who sent you flowers?’
‘No. It’s…’ I trail off, unsure how to explain myself. ‘It’s an emergency.’
‘I’ll drive you,’ he says.
‘It’s a long way…’
‘I insist.’ He sounds pleasant but I think there’s an icy undertone to his voice, the same as in my dream, or am I just imagining it?
We step out into the bright sunshine. Standing at the crossing I glance sidewards at Nathan – did he hurt Callie? The beep-beep-beep of the green man tells me it is safe. But as Nathan grips my elbow, guiding me across the road, safe is the last thing I feel, and I wonder how I’m going to get away.
41
‘Thanks for the offer of a lift, Nathan. But I’m going to get a cab.’ I fight to keep my voice bright and breezy as I flag down a passing taxi. ‘I’ll call you later.’
‘But what about…’ he begins but I’m already climbing into the back seat and slamming the door behind me. As we pull away I swivel my head to look out of the back window, and the shock on Nathan’s face is palpable.
Forty-five minutes later I arrive at Tom’s. His face is pale as he opens the door but he hugs me hello and asks how I am.
‘I’m fine. How’s Amanda?’ I keep my voice low as I step into the hallway.
Every line on his face is etched with worry. ‘She’s getting worse. I don’t know what to do.’
‘Why don’t you have a break? Go for a walk. I’ll stay with her.’
He seems torn as he glances towards the stairs. ‘A walk would be nice, but…’
‘She’ll be fine, I promise. She probably won’t even notice you’ve gone.’
‘Thanks. I won’t be too long.’
He is slipping on his shoes as I pad upstairs; I’m not sure if Amanda is awake. I stick my head around their bedroom door trying not to recoil from the sour smell of sweat and despair.
‘Amanda?’ I whisper. It’s hard to see in the gloom and I tiptoe across the room towards the shape huddled in the bed. The duvet rises and falls as she gently snores, and I leave as quietly as I can. At the top of the stairs I hesitate. The spare room is to my right. The door is ajar. I can see the boxes containing Callie’s things, and I glance downstairs. Tom could be gone for ages. Amanda is asleep. There’d be no harm in taking a quick look would there?
I try to open the first box as quietly as I can but the cardboard flaps scrape against each other and I pause every few seconds, listening out for Amanda. The first box is full of clothes and I press down into the softness but I can’t feel anything else and so I try another box. I lift out a tangle of wires and underneath there’s an iPad. I open the magnetic case but the screen remains dark and I find the right lead and plug it into a socket. The battery symbol flashes red, but within a few minutes it shows it is charging and as it switches on I feel a rush of excitement as I press open Safari, but I’m not connected to the Internet and I have to create a hotspot from my phone before I can try again. Callie’s search history is empty and, disappointed, I try her emails instead. Scrolling down I notice nothing of interest. Recipes Amanda has sent her, YouTube funny cat videos forwarded from Sara at work. I flick through her apps. Words with Friends, Air Hockey, Tetris. I press my finger against the icon for Evernote. There’s a file for gardening. Notes on shrubs. And a folder marked ‘flights’. I open this one and there’s a weblink to a page of prices for two one-way tickets to Spain. Callie must have helped Sophie and her boyfriend with their travel arrangements, but I wonder why the tickets are one way when Tom and Amanda seem to expect Sophie to return any day. There’s another file and this one contains links to an application for a payday loan but before I can read any more there’s a movement from Amanda’s bedroom. I unplug the iPad and quietly place everything back where I had found it before slipping out of the room and tapping on Amanda’s door.
She is lying on her back staring up at nothing. Her hands rest on top of the covers and her wrists look like twigs poking out of her sleeves; one wrong move and they’ll snap.
‘How are you, Amanda?’
‘Tired,’ she whispers although she’s only just woken.
‘I’ve got something for you. Can I open the curtains?’
Her head barely moves but I think she nods. I skirt around the bedstead, and I part the curtains before cracking open the window. A warm honey glow fills the room. Already, it’s less stuffy.
The mattress sags and squeaks as I perch on the edge of the bed. Amanda props herself up with a pillow while I pull open my bag and take out the painting.
Her hands shake and it takes her an age to take off the tissue paper. When the picture is unwrapped I’m shocked to see anguish streak her face as she stares at the picture, seeing more in the scene than I ever could.
‘I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to upset you.’
‘You haven’t. It was very kind of you to think of me.’
‘I bought it from an amateur art exhibition today. It reminded me of the ones you painted.’
‘We loved the beach. All of us. I was used to foreign holidays growing up. Guaranteed sunshine but Tom and I couldn’t provide that for the girls. We went back to Owl Lodge Caravan Park at Newley-On-Sea, year after year, and the girls adored it. Even when rain splattered on the caravan roof so loudly I had to stuff cotton wool in their ears j
ust so they could get to sleep. Callie and Sophie had a pink bucket just like this one.’ She traces the swirls the brush has made in the paint with her finger.
‘Good memories to have.’
‘I didn’t realise how lucky I was.’ Amanda bursts into tears.
I stand and contort my body so I am leaning over hugging her, and my T-shirt becomes damp with her grief. I hold her as her body shakes, ignoring the pins and needles in my hand, the aching in my back, until Tom comes home.
It’s been such a long day and I’m exhausted, but as I push open the communal door that leads to my flat I instinctively feel something is wrong. There’s a sickly-sweet scent in the air. At first I put it down to nerves – after the experience with Neil yesterday I’m bound to feel apprehensive – but as I step inside I see them. Lilies and roses scattered over the stairs. The flowers I’d left in Nathan’s car. The wicker basket they’d been delivered in is lying in pieces, broken and twisted, as though it has been stamped on. As I stand staring at it there is a rush of blood to my head and I wobble on my feet. I place one hand against the wall to steady myself. The door crashes shut behind me and my stomach constricts into a hard knot of fear. Reaching behind me I pull the door open again and let it slam shut as though I have left, and then I crouch in the shadows to the side of the staircase waiting for footsteps to pound down the stairs. I stay hidden, keeping myself as small as possible as the minutes tick by until cramp forces me to my feet. I don’t think there’s anyone here.
Slowly. Quietly. I creep up the staircase, craning my neck, looking for the shift of a shadow, the shuffling of feet and, although there’s nothing, my fear builds and builds until I reach the top of the stairs – and then I know.
My front door is cracked open.
Someone is in my flat.
42
Clapping my hand over my mouth I hold myself perfectly still, ears straining for the sound of movement inside. There’s nothing to hear except faint laughter from the flat above, the low hum of their TV, and I think about running upstairs but they’ve only just moved in and I haven’t met them yet, besides I can’t hear any noise coming from inside my flat.
Stretching out my arm, my fingertips lightly press on the door, and ever so gently I push. The hinges squeak and I drop my hand. Random images rush at me. A figure hiding behind the door; under my bed; in my wardrobe. I can’t bring myself to go inside. Stepping backwards I press my spine against the wall half-expecting someone to charge towards me. I don’t take my eyes off the door as I retreat downstairs, and once I am outside I sink to the kerb, dropping my head between my knees, waiting for the feeling of weightlessness to pass. When it does and I feel able to speak, I pull my mobile out of my bag. There’s a text from Nathan and my breath stalls in my lungs as I read
‘Hope your friend is ok. I’ve left your bouquet on your step x’
A sense of unease slithers in the pit of my stomach as again I feel like I am being watched, and I look over both shoulders before I start to punch out numbers on my phone. ‘Nine.’ ‘Nine’. I hesitate, my finger hovering over the keypad. The flowers might prove Nathan has been here but it doesn’t necessarily mean he has been in my flat. That anyone has been in my flat. Did I lock my door when I left? Did I close it even? Sifting through my clouded mind doubt swallows me whole. I can’t be sure. Think, Jenna.
Closing my eyes I picture my keys in my hand and I have a really strong feeling I pulled the door closed behind me. ‘We don’t go on feelings, Miss McCauley.’ The way I’d been dismissed at the station still smarts and I don’t want to call the police unless I’m sure someone has broken into the flat, and I’m not sure. I’m not sure at all. What now?
I’m still sitting on the kerb when Sam arrives, my teeth chattering, but I don’t feel cold. He screeches to a halt on the double yellows.
‘Jen.’ Slamming his car door he reaches me in three strides, and as I stand I wobble, and he pulls me to his chest. The wool from his jumper is itchy against my cheek but I don’t pull away.
‘Are the police upstairs?’ he asks.
‘I haven’t called them.’
‘Why not? Holding my upper arms he steps back so he can scrutinise my face and I hope he doesn’t see the guilt in my eyes and guess that I’ve slept with someone else.
‘I’m not sure if I shut the door when I left. I had a lot on my mind.’ I eventually confess. ‘It’s my biopsy tomorrow. I’m not thinking straight. I don’t want to waste police time.’ I chew my bottom lip not wanting to tell him I’d visited the police station days before and am worried they won’t believe me again. The things I keep hidden are beginning to outbalance the truths I tell – the scales are tipping, weighted with deceit.
He glances up at the window of the flat. ‘I’ll go and check. You wait here.’
Sam disappears through the communal door and it takes seconds for me to follow, tiptoeing behind him, but as he reaches the top of the stairs I stage whisper: ‘Sam!’
He turns.
‘Perhaps we should call the police. There could be someone inside.’
Emotions slide across his face. ‘I won’t let anyone hurt you,’ he says and he steps through the door before I can reply it’s him I’m worried about, not me.
A gasp escapes me as I follow Sam through my door. Glancing to my right I can see the lounge is in disarray. Books pulled from the shelves, cushions on the floor.
‘Go and wait outside,’ his voice is tense, but although I don’t follow him as he pads down the hallway, I can’t step away either. My stomach is a tight, hard, knot and my feet are rooted to the floor. Sam disappears into each room before returning to me.
‘There’s no one here but we need to call the police.’
Pushing past him I rush into the bedroom. ‘Don’t touch anything, Jenna,’ he cries but it’s too late. Stepping over drawers that have been pulled from the chest, contents spilled like paint, I drop to my knees in front of the open doors of my wardrobe and pick up the carved wooden box, upended and empty.
‘Jenna?’
I hear Sam but I don’t speak. I can’t speak. I frantically rifle through the mess, locating everything that’s lost, placing the items, one by one, back into the box but they’re all sullied now. A stranger has touched them, and I swallow the acid that has risen in my throat. There’s the pair of lemon newborn baby socks, the cream floppy rabbit with ears that crinkle, the tiny Babygro imprinted with a curled and sleeping hedgehog. At first I can’t find it, the scan picture, and although the image is scorched onto my heart panic wells until my fingers brush against the shiny paper and I pick up the print of the life that never got to live.
‘You kept everything?’ Sam murmurs and I feel a punch of raw emotion, deep in my stomach, and I fold into myself, my head on my knees.
All the things we’ve never properly talked about hang in the air like mist. I want to tell him how sorry I am that I lost our baby when my heart gave up trying but my apologies are stuck in my throat, along with my tears and my shame. Sam holds me as I rock, his thumb rhythmically stroking the back of my neck, and my stain of regret spreads.
It felt a little awkward, fetching Sam blankets and a pillow as though he is a guest. As though this was never his home, but I’m grateful to not be alone tonight. I lie in bed listening to the rain pitter-patter against the window. Staring so long at the street lamp outside the orange blurs and blends into the charcoal sky. I close my eyes. It’s my six-month check-up tomorrow and I need to get some rest.
The toilet chain flushes and water whooshes through the pipes under the floorboard. The creaking tread of Sam’s footsteps as he pads down the hallway are comforting, but instead of coming into the bedroom and spooning behind me, the lounge door creaks open and the sofa springs squeak as he lies down.
He doesn’t settle. The sofa creaks and groans under his weight and I wonder whether he’ll come and get into bed with me. I wonder whether I want him to.
Since the breakin, anxiety has pulsed through me in short
, sharp bursts. I haven’t called the police. Despite the mess, my paperwork strewn everywhere, my bills, my sketch books, nothing has been taken, and I can’t face trying to explain everything, given that it’s all so muddled in my head. Sam had been silent as he picked up the photos of Callie that had been pulled from the kitchen walls as he helped me tidy up, but I had seen the look of disbelief on his face as he’d examined the torn pieces of my mind map. I’d noticed the slight shake of his head as he studied my random thoughts. Would he still think it’s all in my head if I hadn’t rushed over to the fridge when we walked into the kitchen and stood in front of the door so he couldn’t see what I saw? The magnetic letters had been rearranged into two words: ‘Stop Digging’.
43
‘It’s nothing.’ My hand flutters to my face, fingertips gently touching the swollen skin beneath my eye. ‘I fell down the stairs at home.’ It’s been a long morning explaining myself, fielding off concerned questions and sympathetic smiles, but I can hardly tell the truth, can I? I was honest with you. Too honest and look where that’s got me.
I’m longing to be alone and I watch the hands on the clock tick; seconds turning into minutes, minutes into hours until at last it’s lunchtime.
‘I’m nipping out,’ I call as I race towards the door, craving some fresh air. Some time alone. Space to think.
The wind is icy and I lower my head, pushing against it as I cross the car park. There’s a light smattering of rain and I think how exposed I’ll be if I sit in the park and I think about popping in to see my parents even though I’ve promised you I won’t see them. I won’t see anyone. Not without you there.
I’m lost in thought, hardly seeing the drab, grey pavement as I hurry, when I see them. Shoes. Shiny black brogues. Your shoes. I raise my head and you’re sitting on the wall. Briefcase at your feet.
The Gift Page 18