‘Nathan Bexley.’
‘…had said was true, that Gina stepped in front of the lorry deliberately. She said Gina was unhappy but wouldn’t tell me why. Then Dad told Mum she should go and lie down. And when I asked him about it he said she always got upset about Auntie Gina at Christmas and it didn’t mean anything. Can’t you ask Uncle Vince?’
‘Dad never talks about Mum. I asked Uncle Ray, he lost it a bit and went on a rant about Bexley, said Mum had no reason to kill herself.’
‘I think Ray’s right. I don’t remember your Mum too well, but she was always smiling. Not depressive like…’
She starts pushing her salad around again.
‘Like Dad?’
‘I’m sorry.’
‘It’s OK.’
‘Even if your mum was unhappy, the jury had all the facts and found this Bexley bloke guilty. You’ve got enough on your plate with Edie. Raking up all this stuff about Auntie Gina isn’t helping you or Uncle Vince.’
‘But what if they’re linked? Mum’s death and Edie’s.’
‘They’re years apart in completely different circumstances.’
‘I know. I just feel there’s something right in front of my face that I’m missing. Could you ask your mum again?’
‘I can’t risk upsetting her. She’s just starting to get better. She’s determined to make it to the funeral, even if Dad has to carry her.’
I imagine my elegant aunt Lola getting a piggy back from Uncle Jake, a black Jimmy Choo pointing each side of his waist. The image makes me laugh. Cassie looks at me as if I’m going mad.
‘What’s so funny?’
‘I don’t know.’
I’m feeling a little light-headed. Cassie looks concerned.
‘I don’t think you’re well, Tess,’ she says. ‘Why don’t you and Uncle Vince come and stay with us for a few days?’
I escaped to Cassie’s last time. Auntie Lola barely left my side. My cousins Ashley and Corinne would try to interest me in their music and magazines and Cassie, who was only about eight at the time, would bring me books and toys to cheer me up. I would love to go to Cassie’s, but Auntie Lola’s in hospital. Cassie’s at work and Ashley and Corrine have long since left home.
‘We can’t, Cassie. We’ve got to do the appeal and then there’s the funeral.’
‘When is it?’
‘End of next week sometime. Becca’s dealing with everything. I can’t face it.’
‘Oh, Tess, we’ll be there on the day. And I know it’s not the same, but I’m always at the other end of the phone.’
‘I’ll be OK, Cass. I’m just so exhausted, it feels like this has been going on forever.’
‘Are you sure you can’t come and stay at ours?’
I shake my head.
‘I’m needed here.’
Cassie leans over and gives me a hug.
‘Well, get some rest. And try to eat something.’
She glances at her watch.
‘I’ve got to get back.’
She calls the waiter over and hands him her credit card.
‘This can go on expenses. Call me if you need anything,’ she says.
She waves as she leaves the restaurant then jogs across the canal bridge.
I stay and finish my wine then decide to walk into the city centre. I should go home and be there for Dad, but there’s only so much cricket and cookery I can cope with. And I need to think. Aunt Lola thought Mum was unhappy. Ray was sure she had everything to live for and Becca didn’t want him to talk about it. I need to know why. But what if Cassie’s right? It’s got nothing to do with Edie’s murder and I’m just causing myself more pain? I need to find Michaela. If anyone knows, she does. I check Facebook on my phone to see if she’s been in touch. She hasn’t, but there’s another message with a phone number next to it:
Hi, Tess, it’s Raquel. Terrible about Edie. What’s with the Laura stuff? You should come and see me. I’m still on Gladstone Road. Call me.
Chapter 26
Edie: December 1993
Aunt Lola sat on the sofa, Tess across her lap, her head flopped on her aunt’s shoulder, her hands in tight fists pulled to her face. She looked like she was sucking her thumb. Even little Tess was too old for it to be comfortable, her legs hung down so that her heels knocked into her aunt’s calves.
Edie watched from a chair the other side of the room. Since Aunt Lola arrived that morning, Tess hadn’t left her side. She looked like Mum, the pretty heart-shaped face, her voice the mellow tones that sang when excited. Her accent had changed, from years of living in London and working in the civil service, so that she sounded more BBC than Coseley. She was a little shorter and fuller-figured, but still Tess stared when she’d arrived at the door, as if their mother had returned, and she had followed Aunt Lola around, worried she’d disappear again.
But she wasn’t their mother and Edie couldn’t look at her. It was a cruel joke. She loved her aunt and her cousins. She knew it was wrong to wish Mum were here instead of Aunt Lola, to wish her cousins were suffering instead of her. And still every inch of her wanted it, all the time knowing she must be wicked for such a thought to enter her head. Perhaps that’s why God had chosen to punish her.
God hadn’t featured much in their lives until now. The local vicar, Reverend Corby, came to their primary school once a week to speak about sheep and angels or donkeys and crosses, depending on the time of year. But they didn’t go to church. No one was even sure what church the funeral should be held at. Mum and Dad had married in a registry office. Grandpa Len had been a Baptist, Grandma Dot an Anglican. Aunt Lola was sure they’d been baptised but couldn’t remember in which church. Auntie Becca said it was all the same God anyway and St David’s Church of England was Victorian and had a beautiful vaulted ceiling, whereas the Baptists had that hall, which looked like a school gymnasium. Everyone else was too drained to take the matter further.
So the only time Edie met a priest other than the Reverend Corby was the vicar of St David’s, who came to the house to ask about their mother. He offered his condolences and told them of God’s mercy and love and had left believing he offered comfort, when Edie recalled some of Reverend Corby’s other words that didn’t include sheep and donkeys. God’s wrath, cities destroyed, plagues and pestilence sent to punish the wicked. And she was wicked, for wishing her beautiful aunt Lola dead and being angry with Tess for transferring her love to a faulty copy of their mother to find comfort.
Edie had no comfort. Her dad was lost, barely spoke. When she went to him he lifted his arms to her, a reflex action to hold his child, whilst his face never changed. The doctor had come to see him and given him some tablets ‘to make him feel better’.
‘Can I have some?’ Edie asked.
The doctor’s eyes filled with tears when she looked at Edie.
‘No,’ she said. ‘They only work on grown-ups.’
Edie’s face fell. When would she ever feel better, how would she ever feel better?
The front door rattled, the key wriggling back and forth by someone unused to its quirks. Uncle Ray came in. He was always too large for the front room and today seemed to fill the whole space. He came straight to Edie and scooped her up in his arms, hugged her so hard she thought her ribs would break. His eyes were red and his voice hoarse.
‘What are we going to do without her, Edie?’ he said. ‘What are we going to do?’
Edie clasped her hands round his neck, not wanting to let go.
‘That man Bexley,’ he hissed in her ear. ‘Don’t worry. If the police don’t nail him, I’ll find him myself.’
The policewoman had explained that Mum had been hit by a lorry. The driver had been travelling too fast and had drunk too much alcohol. No, they didn’t know what Gina was doing walking along the dual carriageway, but Bexley was still culpable.
‘We’ll be charging him with death by dangerous driving.’
‘It should be murder,’ Uncle Ray had shouted.
Now he wa
s whispering, ‘Don’t worry, we’ll find him, we’ll get him.’
Again and again, Edie pictured the crash in her head, the screech of brakes, the front of the lorry, its cold, hard metal crunching into Mum and her lying there in the sleet, blood seeping from beneath her, turning the grey and white slush bright red.
‘Uncle Ray,’ is all Edie could say. ‘Uncle Ray.’
Because there was no answer to the question: What are we going to do without her?
*
Aunt Lola nudged Tess from her knee and stood up.
‘Can I get anyone anything?’ she asked for the hundredth time. ‘You really need to eat something, girls.’
They shook their heads.
‘I could do with a drink if you’ve got one, Lola.’
‘Tea’s all there is.’
It was the fourth time Uncle Ray had come round since Aunt Lola’s arrival. Each time she’d excused herself and left the room until he’d gone. Tess looked around, unsure whether to follow her, before deciding to join Edie. Uncle Ray sat on the armchair facing the window and pulled them both onto his lap.
‘My little Swifts, I’m going to have to keep you safe.’
Edie nestled into his lap and stared out of the window. It was frosted with cold, the day outside grey and bleak. Then a flash of pink streaked past. It was Raquel riding a bright new bike.
‘Be careful,’ Mrs McCann called.
Raquel came haring back at an equal pace, the bike flying into the air as she left the pavement for the road. Raquel’s bike was blue and too small for her. Edie wondered where she’d got this new one. Then she looked across the street to the angels and stars twinkling in the houses opposite, and she realised it was Christmas Day.
Chapter 27
Tess: June 2018
I’ve rented five flats in London and lived nine years at the new house on Aspen Drive before that, but to me, our terrace on the Limewoods Estate will always be home.
Twenty-five years has shrunk Gladstone Road and I’m surprised to see a family of four spill out from one door. It seems impossible we ever fitted into one of these tiny two-up two-downs.
Raquel lives next door to our old house. Her neat lawn contrasts with ours, which has been paved over. Crisp packets are tangled in the nettles and green shoots have forced their way through some of the cracks in the slabs of concrete, the remnants of Dad’s planting or just weeds? The door’s red paint is scuffed, so the original green is visible round the keyhole and letter box.
I want to go inside and see what’s left. I want to touch the walls and walk in the back garden, where some trick of time will let me see Mum and Edie again.
If Mum were alive, this might still be our family home. She would have stayed as a vet’s assistant, Dad would be unemployed. We would never have gone to JAGS and Edie would still be around. We wouldn’t know we were poor, just as we wouldn’t know we were happy.
A woman comes to the window and glares at me. I don’t know how long I’ve been standing there. It feels like twenty-five years.
I can’t go into Raquel’s house and walk through a replica of our own. I won’t be able to pretend that it’s a happy reunion. I’ll be searching for Mum and Edie in every corner.
I turn and walk down the street without looking back.
*
‘Tess.’
I turn around. Her hair’s pulled into a loose bun and she looks relaxed in indigo jeans, black ballerina pumps and a marl-grey jumper, with just the slightest pull across her belly. Not like someone off Limewoods. I can’t shake my JAGS education, viewing people as I was viewed. Raquel agreed to rearrange and we’re meeting in this coffee shop on the edge of respectable suburbia.
She rushes over and hugs me.
‘I still can’t believe it, Tess. I was sure Edie’d turn up somewhere, someday.’
Her eyes fill with tears, the same deep-set eyes she always had with that tight button mouth. Faint lines have started creasing the corners of her eyes. We are not children any more. I feel a rush of affection for my childhood friend and wish I’d known someone else had never given up hope of Edie returning, until all hope was wiped out.
A grubby hand is poking over the top of the sofa. It’s followed by a round face smeared with blackcurrant juice.
‘This is my daughter,’ Raquel says.
I’d forgotten she had one. It explains why she insisted on a coffee shop not a pub. She’s about two years old. Raquel picks her up and rests her on her hip. The girl reaches for Raquel’s wet cheeks.
‘Mummy’s sad,’ she says.
‘Yes, Mummy’s sad,’ Raquel says.
I smile at the girl.
‘Hi, I’m Tess,’ I say.
‘Say hello to Tess, Fleur.’
The girl turns and buries her head in Raquel’s neck.
‘I’ll get the drinks, what are you having?’ I ask.
‘A hot chocolate with cream please; Fleur’s already had her juice.’
I order the hot chocolate and a black Americano for myself.
‘How did you find out?’ Raquel asks.
I tell her about the call. The trip to the police station, the dress and necklace. I realise I’ve not spoken to anyone about it before. Raquel sits and listens, she’s easy to talk to, as if we still lived next door and saw each other every day. By the end we’re both in floods of tears and Fleur is, too.
‘Stop, Mummy,’ she says.
‘I’m sorry,’ Raquel says. ‘She’s not used to seeing me upset. Have you got kids?’
‘No.’
‘Maybe one day, eh? You with anyone?’
‘No.’
The last thing I want to do is talk about Max, especially after Vilas’s reaction to our relationship.
‘That’s a shame.’
Raquel pulls a tissue from her handbag and blows her nose.
‘I can’t believe it, Tess. That Edie could just disappear. That no one knew anything. Have the police got anywhere? Do they have a suspect?’
‘No, but the Internet does.’
She sticks her tissue in her pocket.
‘Yeah, I’ve seen it. They accepted me into the JAGuars, as well. I joined when I was looking for you. They’re not very careful who they let in, are they? You could sue them for saying those things.’
‘Do only pervs and bitches go online? It feels like it. And they all reckon they’re expert psychological profilers.’
‘They must have dull lives, if they’ve nothing better to do,’ Raquel says.
‘You’re right, screw ’em. I wanted to ask around about Edie but I can’t with all that going on. I found something out. I’m not sure it’s connected with what happened to Edie, but it seems weird. You remember when Mum was killed?’
‘Of course.’
‘It was before any of us had the Internet, but were there any rumours?’
‘What sort of rumours?’
I don’t want to plant ideas, so leave it open.
‘Anything odd?’
Raquel pulls a puzzled look.
‘I thought you’d know, Tess.’
‘Know what?’
‘It’s probably nothing …’
‘Come on, Raquel.’
She pulls at a strand of hair and tucks it behind her ear.
‘It was only a rumour.’
I wait.
‘Are you sure you want to know?’
‘Yes.’
Raquel looks embarrassed.
‘People said that something was going on between your mum and Mr Vickers.’
‘What the fuck? That’s a joke, right?’
Raquel’s made a mistake, my mother and ill-tempered Mr Vickers with his slicked-back hair, oversized glasses and tufty moustache, it’s unthinkable. Old sucking lemons, Ray used to call him. He treated me and Edie like a couple of delinquents. Whatever I was expecting, it wasn’t this.
The coffee shop’s customers start looking round. Raquel’s daughter stares up at me with large, scared eyes. Raquel reaches down an
d scoops her onto her lap.
‘It wasn’t true,’ Raquel says.
‘Of course it wasn’t true.’ Customers are still looking. I lower my voice. ‘Who goes spreading shit like that about?’
Raquel looks as scared as her child and I wonder if her mother was involved in the gossip. I take a breath.
‘I’m sorry. It’s just, she was my mum.’
‘I know,’ Raquel says. ‘I can understand.’
She leans over and squeezes my shoulder.
‘Why would they say that?’
‘I think your mum spent a lot of time with Mr Vickers after his wife left. She was just being kind to him.’
Mum was always a magnet for waifs and strays. People she barely knew would come crying to her about broken hearts and bereavements. And this was her payment. Rumours about Mr Vickers.
I can see Dad may not have been enough for Mum. He was unemployed, uncommunicative and mostly inert on the sofa. If she did look elsewhere, would it have been this horrible man, whose own wife couldn’t stand him? And if he felt anything for her, wouldn’t he at least have pretended to like us?
‘Does he still live on Gladstone Road?’ I ask.
‘No. He left years ago. Not long after you. No idea where he is now. The street’s not like it used to be. I hardly know anyone.’
Did Dad hear the rumours? Did it deepen his depression? The same type of minds constructing lies on JAGuars were at work on Gladstone Road. I can hear them talking in the newsagents, at the hairdressers. I’m not one for gossip but… I couldn’t help noticing that… it wouldn’t surprise me if …
Raquel’s watching me with concern. I try to lift the mood.
‘What’s it like living there now? Your husband’s Gavin, right?’
‘Yes.’
‘How did you meet?’
‘Horticultural college. He was my first proper boyfriend.’
‘Come on, Raq. I remember you having boyfriends at eleven!’
‘You didn’t believe all that, did you?’
‘Of course I did.’
She laughs.
‘Oh my God, that was a joke. None of those lads would give me the time of day. I just used to hang around with them in Roswell Park and claim they were my boyfriends.’
Someone You Know Page 14