by A J Waines
PC Atkins takes a step forward, but it’s PC Dean who speaks. ‘Well – had you come in on a train or were you catching one?’
‘Oh, I see. No. I dropped into the station to…’ She hesitates, the silence taking all the air out of the room and running on for what feels like ages. ‘…to, er…check the trains to Waterloo – I’ve had a number of auditions in London and I needed to know the times…’
I let out a breath, unaware that I’ve been holding it.
‘And you didn’t recognise him?’
‘No.’
‘Did you stop to chat to each other?’
‘No. I don’t know him.’
‘You’ve not had any contact with Mr Jacobson…’ PC Dean glances down at his notebook, ‘since you met him at the party in December?’
‘No,’ she says, shaking her head.
They seem satisfied for now. He nods at PC Atkins and they wrap things up after that.
As soon as their footsteps have reached the front gate, I turn on her.
‘Why the hell didn’t you tell me you’d seen Carl the day before?’
‘Because nothing happened…and we didn’t need an alibi for then, did we?’ Beth swings her weight to one hip with an exasperated sigh.
‘But someone saw you together. Your name has been linked with his. What were you doing?’
‘I knew which train Carl was catching from London that day and I wanted to be there…to meet him and give him a surprise,’ she says with a pout. ‘It was the one and only time I did it,’ she adds, as if that makes it any better.
‘What happened? Did you hug him? Kiss him, what?’
‘Nothing. He wasn’t too pleased, as it happens. He basically told me off, said it was a really bad idea to be seen in public together.’
‘And you obviously were seen…by a work colleague of his, and managed to get yourselves caught on CCTV.’ I’m furious by now. ‘How ironic! My stage-struck daughter finally gets caught on the one camera we want her to avoid!’
She folds her arms aggressively. ‘You’re the one who killed him!’
I rock back as though she’s struck me. ‘How dare you make out this is my fault. I thought you were being raped! I was being a good mother. I was protecting you!’
Beth storms off into the kitchen. She flings open a cupboard and rips open a fresh packet of cream crackers.
I go after her. ‘Don’t open those yet, there’s a packet of Ryvita’s to finish.’
‘They’re soft,’ she shouts, her mouth full.
‘Someone’s got to eat them – you can’t just waste them.’
Beth’s mantra is always ‘want it now’. She has no sense of deferred gratification, of curbing indulgences in order to save money.
‘By the way, just so you’re prepared,’ I say, ‘Peter and I were discussing the wedding and he told me that Amelia now suspects Carl was having an affair.’
She shoots round. ‘When did he say that?’
I avoid looking at her, keeping my eyes on the half-eaten cracker she’s holding in her hand. ‘Recently.’
‘Why…what makes her think that?’
‘She didn’t tell Peter the reason.’ She drops a cracker onto the worktop and turns away. ‘And you’re going to have to start looking happy about this wedding, my girl. It’s got to the stage where everyone’s asking what’s wrong with you.’
She sighs heavily, her shoulders drooping, staring into the sink. ‘You’re so controlling all the time. I have to do this, I have to do that. So many rules, so many decisions you seem to make for me.’
I jerk my chin back in shock at her audacity. ‘Oh, like making you go to an expensive drama college and bleeding me dry? Oh, no, wait a minute, that was your idea.’ I put my finger to my lips in a mock thinking gesture. ‘Like having an affair when most girls would be bowled over by the chance to marry someone like Peter? Oh, no, hang on, that was your choice.’
She keeps her back to me, her arms gripping the rim of the draining board.
‘I feel claustrophobic here, trapped, I can’t breathe anymore.’ With that, she turns on her heels and storms out.
When I return home later that evening Beth’s bedroom door is closed and all is quiet. My sense of respite is short-lived, however. As I get ready for bed, I notice a flannel and towel are missing from the bathroom. My chest pounding, I realise her toothbrush isn’t there, either. I gently ease open the door to her room and that’s when it hits me. She’s gone.
26
Beth
It’s raining when I emerge from the tube station at Sloane Square. I need to save money, so I drag my trolley bag along the King’s Road, but it’s further than I remember and I didn’t think to bring a brolly.
Peter’s apartment is on the second floor and when I let myself in, the place is cold and smells of oranges past their best. I’m about to wheel my bag straight onto the carpet, but manage to think in time and leave it dripping in the hall. The first thing I see in the sitting room is a framed photo of the two of us, on the white marble mantelpiece.
It was taken minutes after we got engaged and there are other snaps behind it, without frames. I look at the stunning girl looking out at me; relaxed and sexy and can’t believe it’s me. Peter had taken me to Paris for the opening night of Mon Ami, le Loup, a play produced by a friend of his and we’d had champagne in the backstage bar afterwards.
I was feeling flamboyant after the performance, chatting to everyone I could find about how incredible the sets were and my opinion of the lighting, the costumes, the twist in the story at the end.
There was a battered upright piano in the corner and someone had lifted the lid and started playing ‘Fly Me to the Moon’. I broke away from the group, spellbound by the music and joined in. It’s one of Mum’s favourites. I knew all the words. The gathering fell to a hush and from that moment on the room belonged to me. It was surreal. I felt like I was the one they’d all come to see, that night.
When the song ended, everyone cheered, then Peter took me to one side.
Before he could speak, I apologised. ‘That was thoughtless,’ I said. ‘I didn’t mean to steal the limelight.’
‘You’re amazing, you know that? No matter what you do, you will always steal the limelight.’
Then he asked me to marry him. Just like that.
The memory is a blur. It happened so fast that I don’t even recall his exact words. All I recall is saying ‘yes’ without a second’s thought, as I fanned my face with a programme left on a nearby chair.
It seems, now, as though it happened to someone else.
Peter’s apartment is in Chelsea’s Mansfield Square, overlooking a small park open to the public, dense with trees and bushes. He gave me the keys soon after we met, inviting me to stay over whenever I had an audition if he was away. I’d done so several times, but somehow this visit feels different – as though I’ve never been here on my own before.
I slide self-consciously onto the edge of the grey leather sofa, trying to imagine what it would be like to own a place like this, to be living a life where these luxurious furnishings and stylish fabrics are the norm. I notice for the first time the white window-shutters on the Juliet balconies. There’s enough plush material in the curtains to make the sail of a ship.
I get up and brush past the figurine of a tall thin woman made of polished black wood, watching me, as she stands elegant and demure on a glass table. This is what the future will look like when I marry Peter. No second-hand clothes, no penny-pinching, no fish and chips eaten out of the wrapper.
I slipped out of the house last night and caught a late train before Mum came home from work. I had to get away. I needed to think and sort my head out, but I did leave a note.
She’s in my face the whole time, grilling me about who I’ve spoken to and complaining that I should be more upbeat about the wedding. She doesn’t seem to recognise the enormity of what we’ve done, forging ahead choosing ribbons and ordering canapés, as if she hasn’t a care in the
world.
I can’t get my head around it.
Nor can I sit at home, jumping out my skin every time the doorbell jangles, bumping into astonished neighbours at the shops who’ve heard about the stray body found in the graveyard. Everyone will be speculating about it, wondering if there’s a maniac on the loose.
I go to the kitchen and I’m about to boil the kettle when I spot a single empty wine glass on the worktop. Tucked under it is a note saying, Wine in the fridge – help yourself, love P x
There’s a pen lying next to it and I pick it up and idly roll it around in my mouth, before I realise it’s not a cheap biro, but an expensive fountain pen. Mum would have a fit. She keeps going on at me about my ‘bad habits’. It’s getting on my nerves. I put the pen down so I can’t be tempted to chew it and open the fridge.
Sure enough, there’s an unopened bottle of Chablis. My favourite.
I smile and reach in. It might just take the edge off. I turn full circle trying to recall where Peter keeps the corkscrew. I come across it not in a drawer, but in a terracotta jar beside the fruit bowl and it makes me wonder who will decide where things go in our kitchen, wherever that might be: London, Kent, Surrey, New York, L.A.?
Will we have a cleaner or will the place be grand enough for a housekeeper? I take a long swig of wine to quell my questions – so many of them we haven’t properly addressed yet.
I refill my glass and take a tour, reacquainting myself with the rooms, getting halfway round before it occurs to me to take off my boots. The carpets throughout are a deep fluffy pile in ‘ivory oyster’ – slightly more grey, I see, in the areas where I’ve just trodden.
I unzip them and senselessly tip-toe into the hall to park them, then resume my inspection, checking out his bookshelves on the way back, noticing all his volumes are lined up according to height, graduating towards the edges.
I potter into his bedroom and the smell, slightly spicy and peppery, takes me straight back to a time we were here in bed together. I remember I ran my finger over a little bump he had on his neck.
‘What’s this?’
‘Insect bite, I think,’ he said. He raised his shoulders. ‘Can you bear my imperfections?’
‘You’re gorgeous,’ I told him and sank into his kiss, blown away by how incredibly lucky I felt to have met him.
It seems a lifetime ago.
I step forward and open his wardrobe. Everything is neat, his suits lined up in blocks of different colours; grey, navy, black. His drawers are the same; T-shirts, boxer shorts, pyjamas folded into well-ordered bands of white, grey, black. Where are the bright colours? I try to recall. Does he ever wear them?
It’s trusting of him to give me free rein of his personal domain I reflect, as I return to the hall. I’m not sure I’d do the same for him. I wouldn’t want him finding old letters in my bedroom, a diary or any of my ropey underwear.
I catch myself in a mirror – I’m such a state and I can’t blame the rain for all of it. My hair is flat and limp and my lips look grey. I browse my way through his belongings in the bathroom, the kitchen, then return to the sitting room.
If I didn’t know Peter, I’d conclude that this is the home of an innocent, solid, trustworthy man. There’s nothing out of place, nothing untidy, but also nothing surprising or particularly interesting. I ponder then on how much I really know him after nine months, taking in his Mahler CDs, books on the rise and fall of the Third Reich, the international history of heraldry and radio-controlled gliders. His collection conjures up a world a million miles away from mine. A world I don’t feel part of in the least.
Suddenly I feel like I’m in the wrong apartment; as if I’ve found my way into the home of a boring old uncle. Will there be a price to pay for this degree of privilege? Will I need to make myself into a different person to fit into this world?
I sit on the sofa and pull my stocking feet under me. Will I be allowed to sit like this when we’re married? Will there be a whole string of new rules I’ll have to learn, about how I must dress, how I must carry myself and appear before guests? Royal weddings spring to mind. Is this what commoners have to face when they marry a future monarch?
I think of Princess Diana and the twelve-year age difference between her and Prince Charles. Bulimia, depression and self-harm found their way into their relationship as a result of their incompatibility and the absence of lasting love between them.
In that moment a great wave of fear washes over me as I see myself losing all the freedom, spontaneity and choices I currently have. I feel as though Beth Kendall is going to be squashed in a closet somewhere and told to keep quiet, while a mechanical imposter takes over.
No. Peter wouldn’t want that.
He loves me for who I am, not who I might become following an intense programme of shaping, elocution and deportment lessons.
On the spur of the moment, I want to hear his voice. I want to connect with him to reassure myself that everything is going to be all right between us. I reach into my bag for my phone before I remember it’s gone AWOL, so I track down the landline, in the bookshelf beside the fireplace and call his mobile.
Seconds later, the voice I hear isn’t his: Sorry…the number you’re calling is not available…please try again later…
He must be out of range. It’s happened before when he’s been in the States. I decide to try his hotel, working out it should be around 6 p.m. in New York.
The receptionist tries to put me through, but there’s no reply. He’s either still in meetings or it’s cocktail hour and he’s in the bar. The twangy American accent asks if I’d like to leave a message, but I decline.
Just as well, I conclude, as I’m not feeling particularly bright and breezy. I’d only worry him, as if my cutting him off with barely a word hasn’t done that already. Thank goodness Mum is able to act as a go-between. I’m sure she’s been conjuring up all manner of excuses as to why I’m not able to speak to him.
Almost as soon as I put down the phone, it rings, making me jump. I’m on the verge of picking up until I see the number on the handset; it’s Mum calling from home. She must have read my note. I let it ring and she doesn’t leave a message.
The building seems noticeably quiet after that and I shiver. I return to the kitchen and flip on the heating, but even when the radiators have warmed up, it doesn’t seem to eradicate the chill I feel. I’m left with a sense of distinct isolation in this space that’s beautiful, but not mine.
I notice Peter’s spare iPad on the bureau and log in. He’s not the least bit bothered about sharing his passwords, so I punch it in and wait as it loads.
I haven’t spoken to friends in almost three weeks and I’m starting to feel like I’ve been shipped off to a desert island. Mum says I’m the queen of over-sharing and I miss posting stupid poses on Instagram, online videos of experimental hair-dos or studded nail art and Tina’s latest range of shopping bags.
I log in to all my social media accounts, lining up the tabs across the top of the screen, one after another, then start scrolling through recent posts to see what has passed me by. Maria’s knock-out Jimmy Choos, Giles at a stag night, Laura’s invitation to her birthday party, which has now passed, Tina’s suggestive twerk-dance video. It’s completely banal, but nevertheless it’s the familiar and multi-coloured tapestry of my life. I miss the silly chat, the instant messages that make me feel I belong. Lately, I barely feel as if I even exist.
I flip on the TV and catch a playback episode of Catastrophe. As I finish my glass of wine, I make a decision: tomorrow I’m going to splash out on a new phone. Grandad slipped me a twenty-pound note when I last saw him and I couldn’t bring myself to refuse. I must reconnect with everyone before the wedding or else I’ll go stir-crazy. Mum says I should hold off because we’re skint, but I can’t wait until Peter bails me out. Surely, by now, I can trust myself not to blurt out the truth to anyone?
27
Rachel
As soon as I wake, I remember that Beth isn�
�t here. Her note was short and to the point: Gone to London. Back whenever, B x. At least she signed it with a kiss. It means she doesn’t totally hate me.
As I mindlessly pull on yesterday’s jeans, all I can think of is that she must have run to someone else by now. I should have known. She’s too much of a people person to carry this almighty burden by herself. She’s bound to have let someone in on her dark secret, perhaps told Maria, Tina, Laura or even Peter. I must prepare myself for the worst.
I boil the kettle for black coffee going through the motions, but I can’t eat a thing. My stomach is acting as though I ate a dodgy curry last night, even though I only managed half a grapefruit. I’ve lost even more weight in the past few weeks. Gilly, at work, said I am looking like a lolly stick.
By 10 a.m., I breathe again. If Beth has confided in someone, the police haven’t been told about it or they would have been on the doorstep again, by now.
I apply cherry lipstick and put on my cheery face ready for a shift at the pub that will see me through to late afternoon. After that, I’ll go to talk to Russell again at his grave. I’ve been going less often since we defiled Judy Welsh’s final resting place, and I miss that sense of connection with him more than ever.
I flick the net curtain aside in my bedroom to check whether it’s stopped raining, then let it go. That’s the second time I’ve seen a figure standing beside the garages at the far side. Hidden under an umbrella. I can’t tell if it’s a man or woman, but they seem smartly dressed in a long raincoat and dark trousers.
I wait a few seconds then slowly slide the curtain to one side again, but they’re walking away.
At the top of the stairs, I grab the banister as a swirl of vertigo threatens to take me down faster than my legs will carry me. It comes with the thought that when Beth is married and gone for good, this is how the house will be; bleak and barren, with only me rattling around in it.