Your Guilty Lies (ARC)

by Ruth Heald

  I phone Amy.

  ‘How’s the house?’ she asks excitedly, before I get the chance to speak.

  ‘It’s not the one we thought it was,’ I say. ‘It’s so run-down…’

  ‘Really? Well I’m sure you’ll fix that in no time, you’re so organised.’ She sounds distracted, as if she wants to get me off the phone.

  ‘Amy – has Jake moved in?’

  ‘Yeah, he’s unpacking now. Why?’

  ‘I just thought I might come back.’

  ‘Don’t be so silly. I know you’re nervous about moving out, but really, how can you reject a multimillion-pound house to come back here?’

  ‘Seriously, it’s not in a fit state to live in. It’s not the house we thought it was.’

  Amy pauses and I hear voices in the background. ‘I know you’re having your doubts about moving in with Ian,’ she says. ‘But just give it a go.’ Someone interrupts the call, and she says she’ll be there in a sec. ‘Listen, I have to go and show Jake round. Call me if you need anything. You’ll be fine. Just stay chilled. Love you. Bye.’

  ‘Amy, I—’

  But she’s already hung up.

  I try Ian again. It’s still a few days before he’s due to move into the house with me. I could stay at his place. I’d go there now but I don’t have the address. His mother has dementia and visitors upset her, so we’ve always met at my flat or gone for weekends away.

  If I can’t get hold of Ian then I need to find somewhere to stay tonight. I hate Ian for putting me in this position.

  I’m going to have to ring Mum. She’s only an hour on the Tube from here. If she can put me up overnight, then maybe I can fix things with Ian in the morning. Maybe this is all some kind of mistake.

  I take a deep breath and pick up my phone.

  ‘Hello? Katie?’ She sounds irritated, as if I’m interrupting, and I can hear the faint hum of voices in the background, which I assume are from the television.

  ‘Hi Mum. Umm… I’m at the new house.’

  ‘What’s it like?’

  I might as well just spit it out. ‘I can’t live here, Mum.’

  ‘What do you mean, you can’t live there?’

  ‘It’s so run-down—’

  ‘What? Worse than that grotty flat you’ve just come from?’

  I wince. ‘Much worse.’

  ‘Katie – it’s a huge house in a lovely street. You told me that yourself.’

  ‘Mum. It’s not liveable.’ I don’t know how to get through to her.

  ‘But didn’t you see it before you moved in?’

  I frown, embarrassed. How can I explain that Amy and I had looked at the wrong property on Rightmove? ‘No, I—’

  ‘It can’t be that bad,’ she says, with growing impatience.

  ‘I can’t live here.’

  I want her to offer to let me stay with her, but instead I hear her sigh. I grit my teeth.

  ‘Can I come and stay with you? Just for tonight?’

  ‘What’s Ian going to do? Can’t you stay wherever he is?’ I hear the criticism in her voice. I feel my tears starting to fall and I wipe them away, embarrassed.

  ‘He’s away at the moment,’ I lie.

  ‘Well, I’m not at home either. So you’ll have to find somewhere else. You’re thirty-six. Not a child. You need to grow up before you become a mother yourself.’

  ‘Mum—’ My voice breaks.

  I hear the low rumble of a man’s voice in the room with her, but I can’t make out what he’s saying.

  ‘I have to go, dear. Good luck.’

  Four

  I stare into my coffee. What the hell am I going to do now? I’m furious with Ian. He’d probably think nothing of booking a hotel in my situation. He doesn’t understand that most people don’t have enough money to just splash out on luxuries whenever they feel like it. I don’t have enough money for a night at a B&B, let alone a hotel. My finances have always been so carefully balanced. So I’m on my own. Homeless.

  I think back to the run-down house. Would it really be so bad to stay there? I’d have to sleep on the floor, unless by some miracle the upstairs is furnished. I think of the dead rodent I saw in one of the rooms, flies circling. I only looked downstairs. I’ve no idea what else I might find in the rest of the house.

  ‘Are you alright?’ The woman on the next table offers me a tissue.

  I nod, embarrassed, remembering I’m not alone in the coffee shop. ‘I’m fine,’ I mumble. I take the tissue and dab my eyes. ‘Thanks.’

  The woman smiles warmly and I look at her properly for the first time. She’s as thin as a rake and dressed in a long black skirt, bright pink blouse and sensible black loafers. Her dark hair is scraped back into a ponytail, tied with a bright pink scrunchie with a Hello Kitty motif, even though she must be in her fifties.

  ‘I couldn’t help overhearing. You’re having some house trouble.’

  ‘I’ve just moved in. Across the road.’ I point, even though you can’t really see the house from here, just the driveway with the overflowing bins and the huge hedge.

  ‘Oh…’ she says, staring out the window. ‘The one opposite?’

  ‘Yeah. Behind the hedge. It’s very run-down.’

  ‘Yes, well. I suppose it could do with some care. It hasn’t been looked after.’

  ‘My partner bought it,’ I say. ‘I was supposed to move in today. But it doesn’t even have electricity.’

  ‘You’ve nowhere else you can go?’ she asks, sounding worried.

  ‘Doesn’t look like it,’ I reply, glaring at my phone and thinking about how Mum cut me off.

  ‘How awful for you. I wish there was some way I could help.’

  I look up at her, taking in her kind eyes. It’s so nice of her to be concerned. Maybe this is what it’s like once you get a bit away from central London. People looking out for each other.

  ‘I’ll be fine,’ I say stoically.

  ‘At least it’s warm. I’ve even heard people are sleeping outside in this heatwave.’

  She’s right. A customer at my coffee shop told me he’s sleeping in a tent in his garden because of the balmy nights. Perhaps I should think of this like camping. It can’t be that different. But I still shiver at the thought of being alone in the house.

  ‘I’ve got a torch you can borrow, if you like,’ she continues. ‘If you don’t want to sleep in the dark.’ She digs around in her huge handbag and laughs. ‘I’ve been carrying around this Mary Poppins handbag for years. It’s about time something in it came in useful.’

  I smile at her. ‘Thanks. I’d appreciate that.’

  ‘It’s only a house,’ she says, smiling kindly. ‘Just bricks and mortar. What can a house do to you?’

  ‘There could be squatters,’ I say, remembering the remains of the fire in the driveway.

  ‘No one’s been living there. Believe me, I’d know. I always take my afternoon coffee in this café and I haven’t seen anyone go in or out in months.’

  ‘I suppose I’m just being paranoid,’ I reply, with an embarrassed smile.

  ‘No, not at all. Better safe than sorry. And I’m sure your hormones are all over the place with a little one on the way.’ She glances down towards my stomach.

  I nod. Maybe she’s right.

  ‘I haven’t even been upstairs,’ I admit. ‘I wasn’t brave enough.’

  ‘I could come with you if you like… If you think it would help.’

  ‘Oh no, don’t worry about me.’

  ‘Are you sure? I wouldn’t want anything to happen to you in there. Especially not after I’d reassured you that it would be fine.’ She laughs a tinkling laugh.

  I hesitate.

  ‘I can see you’re thinking about it,’ she says. ‘Let me come in with you. It’ll make you feel better. And it’s not like I’ve got anything better to do.’ She indicates the newspaper lying closed on her table. ‘I’ve finished the paper.’

  ‘OK then,’ I reply. ‘I mean – thank you. I’d apprecia
te that.’

  She holds out her hand. ‘I’m so sorry, I forgot to introduce myself. I’m Paula. I know the area well, so anything you need to know, just ask.’

  ‘Katie,’ I say as I shake her hand.

  * * *

  With Paula beside me and her torch lighting the way, the house feels less daunting. It’s just an empty shell. Lifeless. For a moment I allow myself to imagine making it my own, doing it up to match the others in the street. I could have a good life here, if Ian’s willing to make the house habitable. Otherwise I don’t know what I’ll do. I glance at my phone. He still hasn’t returned my calls.

  We walk through the hallway, and I try the one remaining door downstairs. A musty smell fills my nose as Paula’s torch illuminates a wide fireplace with sooty tiles. When I look closer, the bones of a dead bird lie in the grate. I recoil, thinking of the dead rodent in the other room. What else will I find?

  ‘Look,’ Paula says.

  I turn and see a piano, the only piece of furniture I’ve seen in the house. The lid is broken and cracked, but I can see the quality of the craftsmanship. I lift the lid gently, a layer of dust coming off in my hand. Underneath the ivory keys are yellow.

  ‘Wow,’ I say, a flutter of pleasure running through my body. ‘How could they have left this here?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ replies Paula. ‘It’s beautiful, isn’t it?’

  I’m glad she appreciates it. Not everyone would.

  I run my fingers over the keys, letting out a familiar melody. It’s so long since I’ve played, and the dusty keys feel heavenly under my fingers. The piano is horribly out of tune, but I close my eyes and imagine how it should sound. For the first time I want this place to be my home.

  When I open my eyes Paula is standing behind me. ‘That was breathtaking.’

  ‘I used to play a lot when I was younger. I’m a bit out of practice.’

  I imagine a future in this house, getting the piano tuned and letting my fingers dance over the keys to my heart’s content. No housemates or neighbours to worry about. I imagine the twins growing up to the sounds of Beethoven and Bach. I could teach them to play themselves.

  I smile at Paula. ‘Do you play too?’ I ask.

  ‘A little,’ she says. ‘I haven’t for years.’

  ‘I’d like to teach my girls when they’re older.’

  ‘Your girls?’

  ‘Oh,’ I say, realising I haven’t told her. ‘I’m having twins.’

  ‘Two girls?’ She turns to me and I catch the whites of her eyes widening in the dark.

  ‘Yes,’ I laugh. ‘It was quite a shock when we found out.’

  ‘It must have been. Can I feel them?’ she asks softly. ‘I’d love to feel them kick. To sense the life in them.’

  I hesitate. I hate the way that my pregnancy has made my body public property, how strangers ask to touch my bump. I want to say no, but Paula is helping me out and I’m not sure she’ll understand my objection.

  ‘OK,’ I say.

  Paula puts the torch down on the piano top and its light disperses into one corner of peeling wallpaper, the rest of the room darkening. I don’t see her hands coming and her sudden touch makes me jump and I step back, banging against the piano, the base keys sounding loudly.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ I mumble.

  ‘Don’t worry,’ she says, as she gently caresses my stomach. ‘I can feel them. How lovely. One’s kicking.’ She must be able to feel something I can’t, because even though I’m concentrating hard I can’t sense either of them moving. Tension runs through my spine.

  She rubs her hands over my belly, over and over, stroking it. A part of me wants to tell her to stop, but it’s too awkward to say anything; I would seem oversensitive. I clasp my hands together, palms sweating. It will be over soon.

  She presses a bit harder, on my pelvis. It feels uncomfortable, but it’s not that different to what the midwife did in my antenatal appointment last week, so it must be OK.

  ‘I can feel a head,’ Paula exclaims in delight.

  ‘Great,’ I whisper, my back against the piano. I move slightly to my left, hoping she’ll take the hint.

  But her hands delve further. ‘There’s the other head,’ she says. ‘Twins.’

  And then her hands leave my body as fast as they arrived.

  I step to the side and reach for the torch. I feel afraid, but I’m not sure why. I have an irrational desire to shine the torch on Paula’s face to see her expression, but I resist. It’s like communication has been lost between us. In the dark she couldn’t have seen my expression either, couldn’t have read the signs that I was uncomfortable.

  I feel a desperate need to get out of the house, into the air. But I still haven’t seen upstairs and the evening is closing in. It won’t be long until I have to sleep here. I look at my phone again. Still nothing from Ian.

  ‘Let’s see the rest of the house,’ I say, scratching at the scar on my upper arm and shining the torch into the hallway.

  On the stairs I hand the torch back to Paula and hold the handrail, treading carefully, with Paula a step behind me. I can only hear the sounds of our breathing and our footsteps as Paula lights up the way ahead of me.

  ‘Watch your step,’ I say, pointing out a loose floorboard. She shines her torch down, stealing light from the staircase ahead, so I have to stop, unsure of what awaits me in the darkness above. I’m glad I’m not on my own. It would be so easy to trip and fall. It would be ages before someone found me. I stroke my bump, promising my twins that I’ll protect them.

  At the top of the stairs the landing is carpeted, dark brown and threadbare in the central thoroughfare and beige and thick at the less well-trodden edges. In the dilapidated bathroom, tiles hang off the walls over the old, grimy bath in 1970s avocado, perched precariously on rotting floorboards.

  We go into three bedrooms; two doubles and a box room. The box room is crammed floor to ceiling with old furniture, dining chairs teetering on top of an old desk by the doorway. The other two rooms are almost empty, save for a mattress in the middle of the floor of one. Paula shines her torch round the room and I take in the big, thick curtains covering the windows and the patterned wallpaper. A stale smell fills the room and I wonder when the windows were last opened. I draw back the heavy, cobwebbed curtains and look out on to the rubbish-strewn driveway and the tall hedges that shield the house from the street beyond. As I struggle with the window latch, I realise they’re painted shut.

  ‘I guess this is where I’m sleeping tonight,’ I say, but I can’t manage to sound cheerful.

  ‘Oh, sweetheart.’ Paula reaches out and touches my arm. ‘Don’t worry. You’ll be fine. When’s your husband getting here?’

  ‘My partner, not my husband,’ I say, not wanting to over-claim my relationship with Ian, who has let me down so badly. ‘He’s coming over in a few days. He’s busy with work at the moment.’

  ‘What does he do?’

  ‘He’s a property developer.’ The irony of my words strikes me and I feel embarrassed, not daring to turn and look at Paula. ‘I don’t think he can have seen the house himself,’ I say quickly, making excuses for him. ‘He can’t have realised the state it’s in.’

  ‘It’s been left to rot,’ Paula says.

  ‘I know.’ I run my hand over the bumpy wallpaper absent-mindedly, feeling the repeating pattern under my fingers.

  ‘I’m so glad the house has you to take care of it,’ Paula says. ‘That’s just what it needs. A fresh start. New life running through it.’ She pats my pregnant belly and I squirm uncomfortably.

  I don’t even know if Ian will do up the house, if we’ll end up living here. Worry knots my stomach.

  ‘Let’s keep going,’ I say. ‘It’s getting dark.’

  We look round the rest of the house quickly, taking in the box room on this floor and then ascending the stairs to the second floor where there are two further small, damp bedrooms, filled with more old furniture. One leads out on to a tiny balcony
with rickety railings and a view over the coffee shop opposite.

  There’s nothing to fear here. Only the dark and the damp.

  We go back downstairs and I walk Paula to the door.

  ‘No rush to give the torch back,’ she says, handing it over.

  ‘Thank you. And thanks for looking round with me. I feel much better now.’ It’s true. Now I feel I can get through the night here.

  We say goodbye and she hugs me unexpectedly, encircling my bump.

  ‘You’ll be fine,’ she says, reassuringly.

  I watch as she walks away, stepping carefully over the brambles. She’s been so kind.

  I feel a light pressure on the skin on the top of my foot exposed by my sandal and glance down. I gasp and draw my foot away as a furry tail slithers away into the undergrowth. Another rat scurries by me. Then another. And another.

  I hurry down the path away from the building, only catching my breath when I’m beyond the hedge and under the comforting amber glow of the streetlight.

  I stare back at the house, still feeling shaky. They say you’re never more than six feet from a rat in London. They’re inside the walls and under the floorboards. But I’ve never seen more than one at a time.

  And these rats weren’t creeping in to seek shelter for the night. They were running in the other direction. Out of the house. They must have been there the entire time we were looking round.

  2

  Another day. Another fight. Do all parents fight the way ours do? It’s hard to tell. I’ve asked friends at school and they all say their parents argue. But I think they mean they just shout, maybe smash a wine glass. On television and in books that sometimes happens: parents argue and something gets broken. But I haven’t read a book or seen a programme where parents attack each other like mine do. I haven’t seen anything where the mum comes out bloody and can hardly stand up afterwards. I suppose it could be one of those things that just isn’t on children’s television, but goes on in every household. On TV, they never show people in the bath or on the toilet. It might be something like that.