Six years apart and we were so different. Growing up, Lillian always wanted control over everything, which meant controlling me, her little sister, too. Who knew why she was the way she was? As far as I could ever tell, she was born that way. Who could tell why I was how I was? Always getting things wrong, always clumsy.
Wet and combed out, Abigail’s hair looked softer and smoother, all the frizz and tangles wetted down. I wanted to gather that smooth hair in my hands. Expertly, the blue-haired girl trimmed the lengths, getting rid of the jagged, messy strands.
‘I can come over if you need. Help with the twins.’
‘I know.’
Lillian turned another page. ‘Work will understand.’
‘I know. It isn’t that.’
‘What then?’ Her fingers were pinching the magazine and I knew I would have to tell her what had happened. It was impossible for me to hide things from her and I still needed her advice; the only person who knew absolutely everything, who even as a child didn’t ever make mistakes but who always, always fixed mine. Fixed them, or hid them; to her, either would do.
The hairdresser placed the blade of her scissors to Abigail’s forehead. My daughter flinched, her head jerking. I half rose from my seat but the hairdresser laid a child-like hand on her shoulder. ‘It’s all right,’ she said. ‘Just keep your head still and your eyes closed.’ The scissors inched their way across Abigail’s forehead. I sat back down.
When the stylist turned on the hairdryer, a sudden shrill noise above the music, under its roar and behind the flicker of Abigail’s hair, I said: ‘Lillian, he called me.’
My sister’s hands went still on the glossy page she wasn’t reading. She knew exactly who I was talking about. My chest went tight as I remembered the fight: the biggest fight Preston and I ever had, me in our back garden, Preston high, raving, so angry he tipped over the garden bench. Our mum was already so sick by then; our dad barely managing to cope. It was Lillian who’d had yet again to help.
Lillian hated that I ever saw Preston after that and still let him share custody of Abigail. She hated that I kept trying to make things work, that I kept on believing we could find a way through the anger, arguments, tantrums and mess. In the end, it only stopped because Lillian put her foot down. After Mum died, she just wouldn’t have it any more. In the end, it all stopped because she kept us apart.
‘Annie.’
I felt myself flush deep red. You know better than that, her tone said. I’d known she would be angry and now, as always, I felt irresponsible and stupid, wreaking havoc on myself yet again. And yet she would never really understand about Preston. We’d met at school, he was two years above me, and Lillian had left home by the time we got together; twenty-four years old while I was still eighteen. By then she was in the middle of her nursing training, had met Fraser and was ready to settle down.
‘He is her father,’ I tried to explain. ‘Whatever happened, that hasn’t changed.’
But Lillian would never understand the way that it felt: as though she’d set too perfect an example to follow. Preston was someone who made more of a mess of things than I did. When I got together with Preston, it felt like a relief.
I couldn’t catch her next words through the roar of the hairdryer. ‘What?’ I said.
She said it louder. ‘You keep on picking at him, like a scab. You never drew that line, Annie, you never let go.’
‘We haven’t spoken in over ten years!’
‘Why can’t you leave it to the police then? They kept everything separate before. You know they’ll already have contacted him.’
I saw DS McCarthy’s clean shoes digging themselves into the carpets of our home. I hated the thought of him involving himself in this. And I could feel some stubborn part of me saying, so what if he called me? It was just like when we were children and I’d feel the temptation to blurt everything out, whatever childish misdemeanour I’d done, an urge to confess that burned like vinegar, so tired of trying to be perfect all the time.
‘He was part of my life. He was so much of Abigail’s.’ But even as I said it, I found myself thinking, but wasn’t that exactly the problem that caused it all?
When my sister looked up from her magazine, her eyes were as cool and determined as they’d been in our childhoods. No matter how my guilt would burn, nothing would hurt as much as Lillian’s sharp fingers, pinching the skin on the back of my arm.
‘It doesn’t matter,’ I said, my voice gone small. ‘It was only a voicemail and I didn’t reply.’
The roar of the hairdryer fell silent. In front of the mirror, Abigail opened her eyes and gazed at her reflection, touching her fingertips to her new fringe. The girl with blue highlights said, ‘There. Do you like it?’
Abigail touched her forehead and nodded: Yes.
Lillian carefully folded her magazine closed. Only now did I see that her hands were trembling. ‘Please don’t contact him, Annie, all right? For Abigail’s sake and your own. We shut the door on all that, we agreed. She has a wonderful family now: you and Robert and Laurie and Sam. Please stop trying to unravel it all.’
Lillian was right, of course she was. Don’t contact him – how hard could that be? As Lillian took Abigail up to the counter to pay, I made myself a promise. Even if he rang again, I wouldn’t answer, I would delete his voicemails without even listening. I would put the whole thing out of my mind.
I think I wanted something to cement my decision. Afterwards, once Lillian had left us, instead of taking Abigail straight back to the car, I made her follow me into the store I’d spotted next door. I had a desperate urge to buy her something here and now, something I would pay for and something I would know for sure she would want. It was as though I needed to bind her to me, as though drawing that line required me to bring her this close.
‘Where are we going?’ she said as she followed me in through the stiff glass doors, the handles greasy with all the hands that had grasped them before.
‘Just come with me.’
Inside, the clothes shop was bigger than I’d expected, stretching back with row upon row of outfits. They had a sale on: bright red markers were sticking up from the racks and coat hangers hung askew with their items tangled. She followed me down a narrow aisle, her hands hidden in the pockets of my coat, her shoulders bumping against the rails. ‘You’ve already bought a load of clothes for me. I won’t need any more.’
I gestured to the racks and shelves full of fashion. ‘I just want you to pick one thing and let me buy it for you. I want to do this for you, please. It’s my way of saying … of saying …’
Well, what was I trying to say? You’re mine, I’m a good mother to you, I promise from now on I’ll do this right?
She ran a hand down a rail of outfits, the skin around her nails raw. ‘But the rest of what you ordered will be arriving soon, the coat and everything. And there isn’t anything else I need.’
‘I know that, Abigail, but can’t you just pick something that you want?’
I didn’t shout, I didn’t, but when she reached out, I knew how impossible I’d made it for her. She didn’t want anything, she had made that clear, so now she was doing it only to please me and only for my sake would she pick anything at all. Her hand closed on whatever was nearest her: it wasn’t a choice, only a stubborn, rebellious submission. She pulled it sharply from the display, sending a pile of necklaces clattering to the floor and held it out to me.
Without another word, I carried it to the cash desk and fumbled in my bag, my wallet thick with all the notes I’d wanted to spend on her.
I set her choice down. ‘Just this, please.’
A pink plastic bangle, price: £2.49.
Chapter 10
Friday 7th June:
Day 12
JESS
Mum declared the whole outing a success.
On Friday when I got home from school, they were all there – Dad in the kitchen boiling pasta and Auntie Anne helping Mum set out serviettes and plates in the
dining room. Mum had put out flowers, a centrepiece for the table. A huge beautiful bunch.
‘What is this?’ I asked. ‘What’s going on?’
‘Well,’ said Mum, admiring her handiwork. ‘I just thought we should celebrate.’
I found Abigail across the hall, watching TV in the living room with Uncle Robert and the twins. I stopped in the doorway. Her new hair. It was sleek and glossy now, one side tucked neatly behind her ear. It was when she turned to see me that I noticed the fringe. Just like mine. Mum was right, I decided. A total success.
She was sitting on the floor, Sam and Laurie watching her from the sofa. I got the sense Uncle Robert was holding them back, like they might otherwise go clambering all over her. Or like they’d already climbed on her and she’d elbowed them off.
I took a cushion from the couch and slipped down beside her. Like slipping into a waiting space, familiar and warm, feeling the perfect connection between us. I remembered our games of Do-you-trust-me? Hovering together, our breaths in time. Falling backwards into each other’s arms. Leaning out into space from the climbing frame, arms clasped, suspended in time, half flying. In that game, it would feel like I became her. Like through some brilliant magic I was in her body and she was in mine. It was how I knew she’d always catch me. Six, seven, eight – every few months we’d play that game. Like checking we still could.
‘I’ve been waiting for you to get home,’ she said to me now.
I pushed away thoughts of what Lena had said, the fact that my best friend and I had barely spoken since. Sitting here, with Abigail, how could anything else matter? Here with Abigail, I didn’t need anyone else.
Now I noticed the bracelet she was wearing: an odd, cheap-looking thing. I pointed. ‘Is that new?’
Abigail looked down at the plastic band on her wrist as if she’d only just remembered it was there. Her face seemed thinner than the first time I’d seen her, not so puffy. It felt so strange that this was only our second meeting since she’d come home. My whole week had been so full of her.
She nodded. ‘We got it yesterday.’
‘You and your mum?’
‘Yes. She wanted to buy me something special.’
She rotated it, the light catching on its glossy surface. There was no clasp or catch. An unbroken circle.
‘Like a present?’
Abigail frowned. ‘I don’t know. I don’t think so.’
‘Well,’ I lied, ‘it’s nice.’
It was a Disney film they were watching, a really old one, Beauty and the Beast. Where they’d found it, I had no idea. I’d thought Mum had thrown out those old DVDs years ago. The animation was cruder than I’d remembered, but the colours hadn’t faded and the songs were as familiar as ever. I stretched one leg out and bent the other to fold my arms on my knee. The teapot and candlestick danced round the castle kitchen while the twins watched with their wide blue eyes.
I thought of Mum and Auntie Anne, laying the table so carefully next door, preparing a feast, a ceremony. I thought about how for a whole week I hadn’t been allowed to see her, my mum and aunt fussing over what was best, when they should have just asked me and I’d have told them: what’s best is when me and Abigail are together.
Now Uncle Robert leaned forward from the couch, slowly, as if not to disturb. To be honest, I’d almost forgotten he and the twins were there. ‘Abigail,’ he said. ‘Your mum and I were thinking we could redecorate your room.’
Actually, I thought, that would have been Mum’s idea. But of course Auntie Anne would have agreed.
‘Some new wallpaper, or paint maybe,’ he went on. ‘What do you think?’ He meant well, he always did.
Abigail glanced up at him. ‘I don’t mind. But you honestly don’t have to.’ It sounded like she was saying, I’m not sure why you’d bother.
I felt it again, that shifting between us, that shadow of something in the way. ‘We should do it up,’ I said, touching my shoulder to hers. ‘It could be one of our projects, you remember?’ Sticky tape, cardboard, crepe paper, glue. We’d made everything from dolls’ houses to theatres. ‘We’ll get new cushions, we’ll put up posters. I think I know just what you’d like.’ Just the thought of it gave me shivers of excitement.
On screen, plates and soup spoons joined the dance. She still hadn’t replied. ‘Abigail, don’t you want to?’ I bumped her elbow.
She nodded then, her shiny hair swinging. Yes, and I exhaled with a wave of relief. I hadn’t realized I’d been holding my breath.
I leaned right in to my cousin. ‘All right then,’ I declared. ‘We will.’
Uncle Robert sat back on the couch, cracking his knuckles. Be our guest, sang the candlestick. Be our guest! Abigail shifted her position, curled her own leg up. Same as me. Matching. We sat like that, side-by-side, mirror images of each other, until dinner was ready and Mum called us through.
In the dining room, eight plates were laid out with clean, upturned faces, each set of cutlery aligned, eight glasses set twinkling clean. Our dining room had never looked so pretty. Mum stood at the head of the big table, directing the rest of us: Abigail to sit here, the twins to sit there. With our table extended, there was room for everyone. She pointed me to the seat opposite Abigail. Then my aunt and uncle on one side of us, Sam and Laurie on the other. Mum next to the twins at the head of the table and Dad, furthest from her, at the foot.
When Dad carried the food through, it smelled great. Pasta made with Mum’s best sauce, garlic bread, a fancy salad. It looked like a feast when he set it all down. Uncle Robert stood to help dish up, and Mum was there overseeing it all. I noticed she’d even put placemats down, the ones we usually used only at Christmas. A proper special occasion then.
We passed the filled up plates round the table, plenty for everyone. ‘Ow!’ said Laurie as I set down his. I think Sam had kicked him under the table.
‘Here,’ said Dad to the twins. ‘Here’s your bread.’
‘Lillian,’ Auntie Anne said, ‘this looks delicious.’
‘It’s an old recipe,’ she said, ‘but I believe Abigail used to like it.’
‘No salad,’ said Sam to my uncle. ‘I don’t want the leaves.’
As the plates were handed round, I realized what it looked like. Like one of those spreads in the magazines Mum read. Beautiful Homes or whatever they were called. I imagined all those journalists seeing us now. Maybe Mum had imagined the exact same thing.
‘The hairdresser’s were so good,’ she was saying. ‘So professional and kind.’
Sam’s fork scraped on his plate. ‘Come on, Sam,’ said Uncle Robert, ‘you’re a big boy now.’
‘Ha!’ said Laurie. ‘You’re being a baby.’ I felt the jerk of his leg as Sam kicked him again. I shifted on my chair, suddenly uncomfortable, out of nowhere thinking, they were there when it happened. Tiny witnesses at nine months old.
‘They even gave us the haircut for free.’
Sam pushed his salad leaves to the edge of his plate. Across from me, Abigail twisted a forkful of spaghetti on her spoon. She held her cutlery normally, neatly, no slips. So in all those years she’d had proper food then, not been made to eat like an animal, face first in a dish. Nothing like what they whispered at school. I shoved the ugly images away. ‘We’re going to do up Abigail’s room,’ I said loudly, looking at Mum. ‘I’ve got loads of posters. I’ve got loads of ideas.’
‘That’s wonderful,’ said Auntie Anne. ‘That’s great.’
‘Does anybody want more spaghetti?’ Mum was tilting the serving bowl, though our plates were still full. I took a big mouthful, tomatoey and rich. Dad was wiping his fingers from the bread. Mum added more to her own plate, more than I knew she’d ever eat, then picked up her glass. She looked like she was making a toast. ‘Abigail. On behalf of all of us, can I say—’
Sam’s knife shrieked on his plate. ‘Sam,’ whispered Auntie Anne, ‘that’s enough.’
‘—we’re so thankful you’re here. We’ll do everything we can for you. W
hatever you need. Our family is so happy now and, honestly, Abigail, that’s all we need to focus on. Whatever has happened in the past, however awful it’s been, now it’s over. The past doesn’t matter, Abigail, only what we have now. And look, we’re all here, just look at us, your family—’
Sam scraped his lettuce right onto the table. ‘I told you! I said, I don’t want the leaves!’
He shoved his chair back.
Mum’s glass hung in mid-air. ‘Lillian,’ said Auntie Anne, ‘I’m sorry!’
Someone was meant to tell Sam off, get him to sit up and unfold his arms, but instead a painful silence expanded around us, growing steadily queasier, like altitude sickness, the empty air too thin. Another moment and I felt like my eardrums would burst. Even Dad seemed at a loss what to say.
Then Uncle Robert’s mobile rang.
He pulled the phone from his pocket and looked at the screen. He glanced at my aunt, held out a hand – enough now – to the twins. ‘Excuse me,’ he said to Mum. ‘I’ll be right back.’ He got up and went through into our kitchen. ‘Robert White here,’ I heard, before the door swung shut behind him.
Mum lowered her glass. Auntie Anne got up and quietly pushed my cousin’s chair back in. Sullenly Sam picked the salad leaves back onto his plate. But nobody started eating again.
Instead we waited.
When Uncle Robert came back, he didn’t sit down. He just stood opposite my aunt, holding the back of his chair. He stood looming over us, the ceiling light shining on his bare head and we all sat round, looking up at him, hearts thumping.
‘Robert?’ said my dad. ‘What on earth is it?’
My uncle looked like he didn’t know what to do with himself. I don’t think he meant to announce it at the table, I don’t think he meant to blurt it out to Abigail like that, but the news was so big, and we were all staring up at him, that I don’t think he was able to hold the words in.
‘The police have found him. Cassingham. They’ve brought him in.’
Auntie Anne let go of her fork and it rang against her plate. My uncle had put his hand over his mouth, but I thought it was perfect, us all being together, getting the news as a whole family at once. Because it was good news, the best news; wasn’t it what we’d all been waiting for? I thought we should have streamers, should have champagne to celebrate this. Things seemed to move very slowly then: Mum clasping her hands together, like a victory gesture, her knuckles white, and Uncle Robert carefully sitting back down. The twins looking round at us, trying to make sense of what my uncle’s words meant. Dad seeking out Mum’s eyes, their gazes locking across the table.
Little White Lies Page 8