A knock at the door. The handle is turning and, Jenni, you are here, thin and wiry like a greyhound, filling my room with your eyes.
‘Welcome back,’ you say.
‘Thanks,’ I mutter. ‘Thanks. I made it. Got through it.’
My words hang in the air between us. I hesitate, then I continue.
‘I just want to apologise, Jenni. For the way I behaved about you working here.’
Your plum nail-varnished fingers stroke my arm. Your cow eyes soften as you step towards me.
‘I know you didn’t mean it. You weren’t well.’
I smell your scent of honey and patchouli oil. I smell your fragility. Your vulnerability.
‘It must have been very difficult for you, Jenni.’
You shake your head and your glossy hair ripples like the surface of the sea in a soft summer breeze.
‘What was difficult was worrying about you,’ you say slowly. Very deep and resonant.
I exhale slowly and completely.
‘And thanks so much, Jenni.’ My breathing goes wrong. I am not sure whether I am inhaling or exhaling, or receiving oxygen by osmosis. ‘For everything you’ve done while I’ve been in hospital,’ I gush, words tripping over one another in their rush to escape.
You are twirling a silver skull ring around on your finger, looking at me with those eyes.
‘It’s been my pleasure,’ you say, deeper this time.
Inhale, open that ribcage. Exhale, push, push, push. I put my arm around skeletal shoulders and say, ‘What about a sandwich together across the road at lunchtime?’
Weaving through the day. Patient after patient. Getting used to listening again. I had forgotten how much patience it takes. No coffee break. Longing for lunchtime, just like I used to.
Jenni, you are waiting for me in the foyer in your favourite suede coat that Craig bought you last year. Stepping out of the surgery, linking arms with me, laughing with me like you used to. Shoulders clenched to make room for the couple who are sitting next to us, surrounded by the hiss of the cappuccino machine. I order smoked salmon on rye. You order egg mayo on brown.
‘How’s Craig?’ I ask.
After so long, still your face clouds, still your chocolate brown eyes darken. You don’t reply.
I survive an afternoon of baby clinic. Chubby dimpled babies with skin like silk. Long-limbed scraggy ones. Over-anxious mothers asking me complicated questions about metabolism, about the weight and height centile charts.
When my shift is over I lock the nurses’ station and make my way to the car park. I am relieving my mother of school pick-up. She’s been so busy for so long, she needs a break.
I park my Volvo with difficulty in the cramped parking area of the C of E school my children attend, and walk, head high, heels clicking towards the school gate. School-gate pick-up. Inane conversation and small talk. Jostling for position. Boasting. I’ve always left it to my mother, never wanting to work that hard. But she is tired and the children are my responsibility. You can do this, Carly. You can do this. My mother says they are all very nice. She talks about them incessantly. But to me they are still the school-gate mafia. Women who haven’t succeeded at their careers, proving themselves to society by entering the realms of perfect motherhood. Star charts, and home-cooked suppers. Every single conversation, every song they sing, every game they play with their children, educational, competitive. Legoland mothers. Thorpe Park and Chessington World of Adventures don’t get a look in. I hear their braying voices everywhere in Stansfield; in the surgery waiting room, in the supermarket. Women for women like me to keep away from.
A group of them are standing to the right of me. I ignore them and watch the headmistress through the classroom window, reading everyone a story before they go home. The children sit cross-legged in a semi-circle in front of her, wide eyed and listening, except for two boys at the back who are having a fist fight and giggling. The yummy mummies’ voices are undulating past me. I expect they’re talking about their children, about the results of their last spelling test or their advanced reading age or something. But no. The hot topic is internet dating, and whether they’d prefer a blind date with Matt Damon, Hugh Jackman or Matthew McConaughey.
‘What about Harry Stiles?’ one of them giggles.
‘Jeremy Paxman?’
‘Boris Johnson?’
They all burst out laughing like a bunch of hormonal teenagers.
Perhaps I should edge across and suggest Benedict Cumberbatch or Martin Freeman.
Carly. You can do this. You can do this.
~ Jenni ~
Carly, you are back. Back home from hospital. Back at work. Subdued and a lot thinner, your once creamy breasts shrunk to the size of mine. Back and well enough to come to the annual surgery shindig, a disco boat party on the river that runs through Stansfield. I asked why they have it in the winter when it’s cold. It’s cheaper, apparently, so that everyone from the surgery can be invited. An annual ritual. No-shows unacceptable.
I’m standing in the saloon of the boat, which smells damp and musty, sipping cheap champagne and feeling chilly. The champagne is so sweet that it coats my teeth, ready to damage them. Two sips and I abandon it. Across the shoulders of one of our new GPs, who is eulogising about a recent computer upgrade he is suggesting for our surgery, I watch you, Carly, I watch you with Rob. The young doctor’s words merge together, faraway and irrelevant, as Rob leans across to whisper something in your ear. You giggle, teeth together. Girlish. Pretty. Rob is seemingly engrossed with you, but from time to time he glances across at me.
The boat’s engine increases in volume as we are steered towards the middle of the river, water rippling and swirling beneath the bow thruster. It is already dark, with only a slither of moon. As I look through the boat saloon’s large picture window I see the streetlights along the bank piercing through shrouded shades of black. The river forms the darkest part of the landscape, but here and there it is studded by reflections, from the fairy lights decked around the windows of the boat, from the streetlights, and the diminutive moon – here and there it is jewelled.
I make my excuses to move away from the talk of ram and megabytes and move closer to the window. The sound of the water lapping at the bow of the boat as the engine thrusts us forwards is more relaxing than the strident voice of the overconfident new surgery member. The disco begins, bass thumping out and drowning everything. The sound of the water. The sound of the over-earnest doctor. Dominated by the pump and grind of the music, I head for the bar.
The queue for a drink is building. A sea of my surgery colleagues pushing and chatting around me. The barman, a young lad with a nose ring and an elaborate tattoo on his neck, has difficulty coping on his own. The beer pumps are stiff and slow.
A tap on my shoulder. Hot breath in my ear.
‘I’ll tell you what, let us get this. You go and get a table.’
Rob. I’d know his voice anywhere. I turn around to see him hand in hand with you, Carly, grinning at me with his eyes.
‘What would you like?’ he asks.
‘Sparkling mineral water, please.’
‘On the heavy stuff then?’ he says and laughs.
Rob can laugh all he likes. At least I’m not like his wife. I go and find a table at the edge of the dance floor and sit and watch a few people start to dance. After twenty minutes or so, laden with a round, you both join me. The music too loud to make conversation easy, we sit awhile, sipping our drinks, watching more and more people joining in the dancing. Abba. The Jackson Five. Stevie Wonder. The O’Jays. I watch you, Carly. Necking your red wine. Abba starts up again. ‘Dancing Queen’. Your favourite. You stand up.
‘Come on, Rob.’
You walk to the dance floor hand in hand; you are sylph-like after your illness, gyrating your hips as you walk. As soon as you arrive at an empty space on the dance floor, the music changes to a slow number. He puts his arms around you and pulls you towards him. You are moulded together, gently swaying unti
l the music changes to the Freak, when you both leave the dance floor and weave your way back to the table. As soon as you arrive you reach for your glass and drain it, without sitting down.
‘I’ll get another round. Same again, Jenni?’ you ask.
‘It’s my turn.’
‘No, I insist. You’ve been so helpful while I’ve been away.’
A light, nonchalant statement – as if you’ve been on holiday.
‘Well, thank you, then. A small white wine this time, please,’ I reply.
‘Rob?’ you ask.
‘No, thanks.’
You frown in annoyance.
‘What kind of a doctor doesn’t want to drink at his office party?’ you ask, fixing your head on one side and widening your eyes.
So you don’t want to get pissed alone. That never used to bother you. Does this mean that your behaviour is improving?
‘A doctor with a lot to do tomorrow,’ Rob replies firmly to your question.
You walk towards him, lean down and kiss him. A slow languorous kiss that I do not enjoy watching. Is this how you used to kiss Craig? When you have released him you turn around slowly to smile at me. A ghost of a smile. Then you scoop up our glasses, and sashay to the bar.
Alone at last. Rob switches chairs and comes to sit next to me. He leans his head towards mine, so close I can almost taste his breath.
‘How’s it going?’ I ask.
‘Not too bad, but she’s very fragile.’
She looks as indelicate as ever to me.
‘In what way?’ I ask.
He raises his green eyes to the sky.
‘Every way you can think of.’
‘So a slow dance with me would tip her over the edge?’
He doesn’t like that. His body stiffens as if he has been electrocuted. His green eyes darken.
‘Obviously. Yes.’
‘I was only joking.’
‘It’s not funny.’
‘Another time then?’ I say, running my hand through my hair and holding my eyes in his.
And I see an expression I have never seen before. A stony, frozen glimpse of fear. There for a second and gone. There but not there.
He turns his eyes away from mine and fixes them on you, Carly, as you move towards the bar. The earlier rush has died down now and you are soon being served.
The music pounds in my ears and starts to give me a headache as I watch you. You walk back, fingers stretched around our drinks. Rob is dashing towards you to help you, relieving you of his pint. Even though you are thin, you still have curves. In your eyes. In your smile. The curves and warmth that men have always liked. I don’t like thinking about your attractiveness. I don’t like thinking about Craig.
You put a small glass of Chardonnay in front of me.
I smile weakly.
‘Thanks.’
You sit down and start to guzzle your own larger glass. Rob sits on the other side of the table now, the other side of you, as far away from me as possible. I sip my wine slowly, looking out of the window, ignoring you both, ignoring the dancing, watching the riverbank slip by through the window. I finish my wine, stand up and stagger forward haltingly, as if I wish to go somewhere, but cannot. I hold my hand to my head. Rob shoots up from his seat.
‘What’s the matter?’ he asks.
‘I feel faint.’
‘Sit down. Put your head between your legs.’
I do as he says. He is leaning over me, arm on my back. The damp smell of the boat’s flooring rises, astringent in my nostrils. The stench is so strong. This boat must have been flooded at some point. Flooded and left to rot.
‘I feel sick,’ I mumble, ‘I need to go to the bathroom.’
Retching as I walk, I hobble towards the bathroom, waving you both away, insisting you do not join me. When I enter I dive into a cubicle and lock the door. I put my fingers down my throat and vomit. I lie on the cubicle floor, arm sticking out beneath the raised door and close my eyes.
Time passes, drifting in and out of sleep, until someone is pulling my arm, someone is rattling the toilet door. You, Carly. And Rob. I hear your intermingled voices.
‘Please, Jenni, wake up.’
‘You need to get up and open the door.’
‘I feel dreadful. I can’t move. I can’t focus,’ I reply.
‘Please try, Jenni,’ Rob begs.
Slowly, slowly, I pull myself to standing. I fumble with the door lock. It opens and I collapse into Rob’s arms. Carly, you are standing next to him, eyes sharp with concern.
‘Please, Carly, go and find the skipper. Use your charm to get him to speed the boat up a bit. We need to get Jenni ashore as quickly as possible,’ Rob says.
You dash out of the bathroom to do as Rob has asked – you will be gone a while, finding the crew and talking to them. I cling on to Rob as if I will never let go. He guides me up the stairs to the deck. It is cold and I haven’t got my coat with me. Rob covers my shoulders with his jacket and holds me tightly against him to keep me warm. We stand clamped together for a while, the breeze from the river whipping across our faces. He is constantly squinting into the distance looking for you, Carly, but you still haven’t found your way back to us. When he sees you he will take his arms away from me as quickly as if I am scalding him. But for the time being you aren’t here, and I have your man to myself.
‘Hopefully the fresh air up here will do you good,’ he says.
I giggle. ‘That’s the sort of thing my mother used to say.’ I pause. ‘And she was right. I do feel a bit better already.’
‘Whatever happened, Jenni?’ Rob asks. There is a pause. ‘It’s not like you to have too much to drink.’
‘Carly must have spiked my drink. Don’t you remember, I only had the glass of wine she bought me?’
I turn my face to his and watch his green eyes cloud with fear for the second time today.
~ Carly ~
It is my day off and I am following you, to find out what you’re up to, Jenni, you who have taken the day off sick because apparently I spiked your drink. What am I supposed to have spiked it with? You’re so thin that you can’t take much alcohol. It’s obvious you were pissed.
You take the children to nursery school, parking the car in St Agnes road and walking them around the corner, holding their hands, laughing and chatting, looking like a perfect mother – but I know the truth. You’re a liar, aren’t you, Jenni? You chat awhile to the other mothers after you have dropped the children, stretching your neck back as you laugh.
You drive to St Mary’s church. The river is high today. Grey choppy water nuzzles the church wall. You park well away from the river and the church. I park even further away, tailing you from a distance. You open the gate to the churchyard and meander up its stone path, past yew, cedar and beech. Trees wide-girthed with years. You pull on the heavy church door and it creaks towards you. You sit on the front row of pews, head in your hands. You’re praying. You do not see me for I stand in the shadows by the font, silently choking on stale incense. The heady air within the church presses down from the rafters and stifles me, leaving me fighting for air. I imagine your prayers; self-interested and sycophantic. Prayers for your family, your children, not prayers for the world. At last you stand up, bow to the altar and cross yourself. You walk slowly down the aisle, heels clicking across granite. When you are gone, I step out from the shadows behind the font into the main body of the church. Down the aisle, through an avenue of half-light, into daylight, which hurts my eyes and makes me blink.
You pick the children up from nursery school, less chatting and laughing this time, all the mothers in a hurry to take pasty-faced, pale-eyed children home for lunch, except for you, you are too lazy to cook lunch. You go to that weird café by the bridge; all haloumi cheese, chickpeas and falafel – making your children eat food that kids never like.
Then at the play park – the one by the railway with a helter-skelter slide, you do not watch the children properly. Sitting on the bench by the
exit you stretch your long neck back and raise your head to the sun as Luke falls over and cries and Mark comforts him.
Back home now, I am outside, parked at the end of the side street over the road, watching you, Jenni. Watching you for as long as it takes. I am almost asleep, eyelids and shoulders drooping, mind withdrawing into my body, falling into the delicious sweetness of oblivion when I see movement. Your front door opens. You place your rubbish on the street, ready for the bin men tomorrow, pressing two bin bags against the wall on the pavement at the side of your front door. You see me and wave.
~ Jenni ~
As I put my rubbish out for the bin men tomorrow, I see a car, a brown Volvo estate parked on the side street across the road, a woman in the driver’s seat with an abundance of blonde curls. Is that you, Carly? Have you been following me? I saw someone in the distance that looked a bit like you near the church. And at the Moon Spinner Café. I smile in your general direction and wave, just in case it is you – but I do not wait to see whether you wave back. You do not frighten me, Carly. I don’t really care whether you are following me or not.
Ten minutes later, Rob is here, standing on the doorstep. I step outside and snog him, a real snog like teenagers do, putting my tongue in his mouth. I run my hands across his back and pull him more tightly against me, feeling his erection through my jeans. Overwhelmed by desire, I want him, right here, right now, but I manage to contain myself until we are inside, pulling him into the hallway, still snogging him, as I remove his jacket and tie.
‘I’ve glued the children to a Muppets film,’ I whisper in his ear as I close the door.
We tiptoe up the wooden staircase, mouths conjoined. We force ourselves to separate and creep across the sitting room, past the children who are snuggled together on the sofa wrapped in Luke’s comfort blanket, engrossed. We go to my bedroom, and I lock the door.
Obsession: A shocking psychological thriller where love affairs turn deadly Page 15