by KL Slater
‘I’ll get you back for this,’ she muttered, too low for anyone else to hear. ‘I’ll fucking teach you not to mess with me.’
And then she was gone, leaving the glass door shuddering behind her.
32
Three Years Earlier
The Teacher
Harriet dodged the delicate china cup, full of tea, that flew past her and shattered on the wall behind.
‘Tea is supposed to be hot,’ her mother screamed. ‘HOT. Not tepid. You know I hate tepid anything, you stupid bitch.’
Harriet turned and watched for a second or two as the dark brown liquid streamed down the cream wall like dirty tears.
‘When will she be here? When will you get off your useless backside and do something?’
‘Mother, I’ve told you—’
‘I don’t want to hear it.’ The old woman cupped her hands over her ears. ‘I don’t want to hear you or see you. I never wanted you.’
Harriet turned and walked out of the bedroom without uttering a word, closing the door quietly behind her.
Her mother continued to scream insults as Harriet walked calmly back downstairs humming ‘Annie’s Song’ and thinking about John Denver’s lovely, kind face. She could still hear the obscenities back in the lounge with the door closed and her earplugs in.
It was all so unnecessary.
Harriet sat down in front of the antique writing desk and took some deep breaths. As she felt the wave of pain rising, she closed her eyes against it, trying to form a barricade against the disappointing person that she was.
She smoothed her hands over the desk’s fine oak planes, still glowing with quality after all these years. This wonderful piece of furniture had belonged to her father. The desk was the only tangible thing left of him, her mother had made sure of that.
Harriet had vivid memories of hiding behind the couch, clutching moth-eaten Ted and watching her mother stuff bag after black bin bag full of her father’s suits, shirts and shoes. Then she’d been made to help drag them out into the back yard, where they’d sat for months on end, disintegrating in the inclement weather.
But when Harriet sat there at her father’s desk, she almost felt part of him again. Lately, she’d felt a thread of steel growing within her, dissolving the pain of her mother’s disappointment. Silently guiding her, giving her hope.
Tonight though, Harriet felt an unwelcome prickling in her chest.
Harriet liked to call herself a teacher but she hadn’t gone on to higher education in the end. She’d left college to become a trainee teaching assistant – ‘a teacher’s lackey’, her mother called it.
She was so much more capable than most of the trained teachers at St Saviour’s, but because she hadn’t got a piece of paper from a university to validate her, her skills counted for virtually nothing.
Life would have been different if her father had been alive. She should have gone to university to study and her father would have supported that.
He’d tripped on an uneven paving stone and stumbled under the wheels of a red London bus on Oxford Street when Harriet was just five years old. The age all her children in her class were now.
Her mother had never liked London, and after the death of Harriet’s father, she couldn’t get away from the city quickly enough.
They’d made the move to Nottingham within months, her mother snapping up a creaky old Victorian villa on a dreary back street in Lenton, an area she selected solely because it appeared in the Domesday Book in the late eleventh century.
A village back then, Lenton had been quite well-to-do at one time, but over the years the nearby houses had slowly been converted into bedsits and now they found themselves surrounded by students at every turn. But Mother steadfastly refused to move out of the area and into something smaller and more manageable.
‘I’ll leave this house when they carry me out in a box and not a moment before,’ she liked to taunt Harriet.
Harriet sat up straighter and twisted the ornate brass handle in front of her, gently pulling the front flap of the desk down. A dozen tiny compartments and drawers faced out, intricate and pleasing to the eye. The desk reminded her of the human psyche. Deceptively simple on the outside but once you peeled the outer layer away, all manner of complexities were revealed inside.
Harriet remembered only too well how it felt to be a young child experiencing the rawness of tragedy whilst trying to cope with the tumultuous change that often followed it. The only way to get through it was to develop an invisible sheath of armour that would stop you hurting ever again. The trick was to develop it at a young enough age for it to be effective.
She slid open a long, narrow drawer and extracted a key. When her mother took her bath, Harriet would climb to the third floor of the creaking old house and continue her preparations on the room. She would make sure everything was just perfect for when their guest arrived. She’d come to realise it was the only way to placate her mother.
In the meantime, Harriet had an important telephone call to make.
33
Three Years Earlier
DIARY ENTRY
6th September
TIMELINE
Arrival at watch point: 14.30 p.m.
* * *
14.35 p.m.House observed for ten minutes. Zero movement.
* * *
14.45 p.m.Enter back yard.
* * *
14.48 p.m.Enter property.
* * *
14.52 a.m.Commence full sweep of property. Locate required items.
* * *
15.12 p.m.Exit property.
* * *
Departure from watch point: 15.16 p.m.
* * *
GENERAL OBSERVATIONS
Property is in disarray.
No landline/internet connection.
No security alarm or additional locks fitted. No window locks.
Awaiting further instruction.
34
Three Years Earlier
Toni
After Bryony stormed out of the office so dramatically, I had to try and steel myself, pushing the unsettling incident aside so I could get through the rest of the afternoon.
At three o’clock, Dale called me through to his office.
‘I’m sorry you’ve been put in an awkward position today, Toni,’ he said. ‘It won’t happen again.’
‘Has Bryony left? I mean, have you—’ I felt horrified that I might have caused someone to be fired.
‘No, no.’ He smiled. ‘Let’s just say I’ve had words with her and fully explained the ethics that must be adhered to by all staff who are employed by this agency. As you’ve probably noticed by now, Bryony doesn’t take well to being dictated to. She’s damn good at what she does but needs reining in now and then, I’m afraid.’
I nodded but kept quiet.
‘I’m impressed with how you’re throwing yourself into the job.’ Dale smiled. ‘Don’t let this put you off, I want to see you putting all that experience you have under your belt to good use here.’
I smiled my agreement but secretly wondered what Bryony would have to say about that.
‘In your interview, you alluded to the fact you’d had some sort of upheaval in your life. I think you said “circumstances beyond your control”.’ Dale raised his hand. ‘Don’t worry, I’m not fishing. But if ever you need to talk, I’m here. That’s what bosses are for, right?’
I shifted in my seat. ‘Thanks, I appreciate that.’
‘I know you’ve got a young daughter and you’ve just moved into the area, and now, a new job. Sometimes it takes time to settle in but I’m sure your family are supportive.’
It was kind of him to show an interest but I wished he’d just leave it there.
A couple of beats of silence gave me time to breathe.
‘Yes,’ I said. ‘New starts can certainly be challenging.’
He looked at me.
I really didn’t want to have this conversation, but he was being so nice and suppo
rtive that I didn’t want him to think I was ungrateful. Perhaps it was time to get it over with.
‘My husband died two years ago,’ I said evenly. ‘So it’s just me and my daughter, Evie. And my mum, too, I’m close to her.’
‘God, I had no idea, Toni.’ His face crinkled with pity. ‘I’m so sorry.’
‘What can you do but get on with it?’ I said lightly. ‘We’ll survive.’
Our eyes met for a second or two.
‘Well.’ Dale stood up quickly and walked around his desk, laying his hand on my shoulder. I felt the warmth of his fingers radiating through my flimsy blouse and reaching my skin. ‘Don’t forget my offer to talk. Any time.’
‘Thanks, Dale.’ I smiled, inhaling the subtle, musky scent of his aftershave. For a crazy second I had this mad urge to close my eyes and lay my head on his chest. I’d forgotten what it felt like to have someone to lean on, someone to make everything OK. I ached for it.
‘You OK, Toni?’ He took a step back and squinted at me, concerned.
‘Yes, of course.’ I blinked, moving towards the door. ‘Thanks again.’
‘Everything OK in there?’ Jo looked up when I walked past her desk.
‘Fine.’ I smiled. ‘Dale’s a lovely bloke, isn’t he?’
‘Hmm,’ she agreed, quickly engrossed again in her computer monitor.
Back at my desk, I kept glancing at the door. I couldn’t help wondering how bad things would be for me when Bryony returned.
‘Don’t worry about it,’ Jo said, looking up and catching my expression. ‘You’ve done nothing wrong.’
Somehow, it just didn’t feel that way.
Half an hour before the shop closed for the day, Jo made tea and brought it through for us to sit and drink at our desks as we wound up for the day.
‘This is nice. Thanks.’ I cradled the mug, savouring the warmth in my hands. The rest of me felt icy cold, though the heating had been on all afternoon.
‘You look tired out,’ Jo said. ‘You should run a nice hot bath with candles when you get home. Treat yourself.’
‘Chance would be a fine thing,’ I muttered, already imagining the long-gone luxury of an hour or two to myself to get lost in a book, to take a bath without worrying about anything and everything. I looked up to find Jo studying me. I gave her a small smile and brought my mug up to cover my face.
‘Toni, I don’t want to pry but are you a single mum? It’s just that you mentioned something about just moving up here with just your daughter, ’ Jo said tentatively. ‘Don’t get me wrong, I’m not judging. I’ve nothing but respect for single mums.’
‘I am.’ I managed a smile. ‘Not by choice though. My husband, Andrew, he died.’
The last thing I wanted to do was bring it all up again after speaking to Dale.
‘Oh God, I’m so sorry.’ She put down her mug and covered her mouth with her hand. ‘I didn’t mean to intrude, I—’
‘Really, it’s fine,’ I assured her. ‘I wish to God it hadn’t happened, but it did, and the best I can do is try to deal with it every day. I’m not sure I manage it most days though.’
I gave a little laugh but Jo’s face remained serious.
‘I can’t imagine what you’ve gone through.’ She shook her head. ‘What you’re going through, every day. And little Evie – did you say she’s only five?’
‘She just turned five two months ago.’ I nodded, remembering all the tinies – around fifteen of Evie’s nursery friends – wreaking havoc in the ball pool at her birthday party.
Afterwards, Evie said, ‘It was the best birthday ever in the WHOLE universe of the world, Mummy.’
I’d looked at her flushed face and bright eyes and promised myself that, when we moved house, I’d give her even better birthdays with her new friends each year.
I didn’t feel nearly as confident about that now.
Jo looked at me, too polite to ask more questions but obviously wondering. So, for the second time that day, I explained what had happened to Andrew. The accident.
Her face seemed to crumple, although thankfully she didn’t start full-blown crying. I don’t think I could have handled that. I’d have probably joined in.
I hated that, no matter how many times I explained how Andrew’s accident had happened, he sounded incompetent. I felt guilty even thinking that word in relation to Andrew, but it seemed that whatever I told people, and however I said it, it sounded like it was his fault. There was no getting away from the fact that, on paper, he was the one leading the mission that night.
It was something that constantly bothered me but that I’d kept completely to myself. Thankfully, nobody else had been tactless enough to mention it.
Sometimes, in the early hours, I burned inside, wondering how he’d managed to make such a terrible navigational mistake.
But talking about it now to Jo, I just felt empty.
‘I’m sorry, Toni.’ Jo wiped at her eyes with her sleeve. ‘I wasn’t expecting that. You see, I know how you feel. My sister, well, her husband died on active duty, too, a few years ago. She’s been through hell. Actually, she’s still in it.’
‘I’m sorry to hear that, Jo, her suffering sounds familiar.’ I twisted up my mouth in sympathy. I hoped she didn’t want to tell me all about it, I didn’t feel up to it.
‘I do what I can, but it’s hard, you know?’ Jo said, staring towards the window. ‘She lives down south. I manage to get down there a few times a year but most of the time it’s a matter of supporting her as much as I can by phone or Skype. I’m not sure it’s enough, really.’
‘Your sister’s lucky to have you.’
Jo shrugged.
‘I don’t know how much good I do. It almost destroyed her. But she hasn’t got any kids,’ Jo said. ‘You do so well holding down a job, being a mum to Evie. I can’t imagine what that takes.’
She glanced at the clock.
‘Oh well, nearly closing time. I’ll check the back door’s locked and turn everything off, if you can put the shutters down.’ She hesitated. ‘Just one thing. I hope we can be friends and, maybe when we know each other better, I can get to meet Evie and even help you out a bit. I – well, I have nobody. But I have lots of time.’
I felt my face burning. It was so kind of Jo but I didn’t feel ready to let someone I had just met fully into my life yet. Still, her concern had helped a little. Just knowing she had personal experience of something similar made me feel a little more normal.
‘Thanks Jo.’ I smiled. ‘That means a lot.’
* * *
The Friday-night traffic driving home was particularly heavy and the car crawled along in gridlocked queues for several miles. A fat raindrop exploded on the windscreen, followed by another and another. Within minutes, the shower turned into a torrential downpour. The windscreen wipers were unable to cope and suddenly I could barely see the car in front of me.
As the traffic was continuously crawling and then stopping, I had to wind the window down and keep wiping the windscreen with a grimy old cloth I found in the door pocket. The whole of my right-hand side was getting thoroughly soaked.
Thankfully the downpour eased quite quickly, but still, after the day I’d had, it was all too much.
Heat and pressure welled up inside my head and tears began rolling down my cheeks. That rotten feeling I’d hoped was finally behind me, the feeling that everything was going wrong again, well, it was back with a vengeance.
I found myself wondering if things could actually get any worse.
35
Three Years Earlier
Toni
Evie was in a foul mood when I eventually arrived home, a full forty minutes later than usual.
Throughout the journey, I confess I’d kind of hoped that Mum had taken Evie back to her house for a couple of hours after school. A bit of down time alone, to try to get my head straight, would’ve been more than welcome today.
‘I can’t do anything with her,’ Mum whispered behind her hand as we watched
Evie jamming Lego bricks together so hard it was only a matter of time until she nipped her fingers.
‘Calm down, poppet, it’s Friday,’ I said lightly, even though I probably felt as frustrated as she did. ‘That means no more school until Monday.’
‘I don’t want to go anymore,’ Evie scowled, staring down at her bricks. ‘I don’t like it there.’
‘What don’t you like, Evie?’
No response.
‘I can’t help you if you won’t talk to me about it,’ I pressed, feeling my heartbeat speed up a notch. ‘Is someone being unkind to you in class?’
‘I just don’t like it,’ Evie repeated. ‘I hate it. I hate everyone there.’
Mum turned to me. ‘It’s not helped, Toni, you getting this new job.’
‘Mum, please.’
‘Well, it’s true, love. Evie needs some stability at this point. She needs you to be there, not chasing a career all over again.’
‘I wouldn’t call a few part-time hours a week “chasing a career”,’ I snapped. ‘There are bills to pay and I take Evie to school every day, which is more than some mums are able to do.’
‘Yes but their kids haven’t been through what Evie has been through, Toni. You need to—’
‘Mum.’ I cut her dead. ‘Just leave it. Please.’
Mum was so bloody brilliant at telling me what I needed to do, how to run my life, how to raise my daughter. The list went on.
‘Tell you what, why don’t I just take myself off home?’ she said tersely, standing up and snatching her handbag. ‘I know where I’m not wanted. Bye, Evie, darling, Nanny will call you tomorrow.’