Who Did You Tell?

by Lesley Kara

  ‘Astrid, are you bringing those clothes down?’

  The sound of Mum’s voice makes me start. I can hardly breathe.

  ‘Just coming.’

  I stuff it into one of my socks and ball it up, tuck it right at the back of my drawer. I need to get it out of here as soon as I can. Mum searches my room sometimes – she pretends she’s looking for dirty mugs, but we both know what she’s really looking for.

  I think of all the people who’ve had access to my coat today. It’s been hanging up in Josh’s dad’s house all afternoon, but why would Richard Carter slip a bottle of vodka into my pocket? It doesn’t make sense.

  Unless it was Jeremy. He’s had ample opportunity to do it, both at the house and just now, in the car. He could have dropped it in when he was leaning over me to sort the seatbelt out. But why would he do that? He wouldn’t, surely. All he wants me to do is come clean with Josh and Richard. To tell them I’m an alcoholic.

  I took my coat off in the Oxfam shop this morning, gave it to Pam when I was trying that leather jacket on. But Pam’s hardly likely to have done it, and she’d have noticed if Rosie had, wouldn’t she? It was folded over her arm the whole time and, anyway, it couldn’t have been Rosie. She might just as well have the Twelve Steps etched into her soul like letters in a stick of rock.

  The fact is, it could have been anyone. I was pickpocketed once, in broad daylight. Didn’t feel a thing. And it must be a lot easier to put something into a pocket than take it out.

  I take one last look at my closed drawer and imagine myself unscrewing that little silver cap later tonight. Slugging back 50ml of Swedish pure-grain vodka. My mouth waters. Whoever did this knows exactly what they’re doing.

  I pick the paper off the floor from where I’ve dropped it and go to put it in the bin. Looks like it’s a promotional flyer for a local business.

  Oh no. Please, no. I stare at the printed words till they swim before my eyes: ‘P. Hollingford & Sons, Funeral Directors.’ And then the slogan in large black letters. ‘It’s never too early to start planning your own funeral.’

  34

  All the time I’m eating supper with Mum, or pretending to, pushing the food around on my plate and hiding as much as I can under the mashed potato, I’m thinking of the words on that flyer. And I’m picturing the vodka wrapped up in my sock and wondering what would happen if I just had a couple of sips. If ever I needed some Dutch courage, it’s now.

  I can’t help thinking of how, not so long ago, I nearly bought a bottle myself. But I didn’t, did I? I found the strength to say no, just as I’ll find the strength to get rid of the one upstairs. I’ll do it after supper. Tell Mum I’m going out to get some chocolate.

  A horrible thought drops into my head. Sly and swift, it pierces through the incessant mind-chatter like an arrow heading straight for its target. What if it was there all along, nestled in the lining of my pocket, just waiting to be discovered? I haven’t worn my coat for a couple of weeks, haven’t needed to. It’s been hanging up in the porch all this time.

  The porch. Oh my God! That girl could have dropped it in when she came round. I look at Mum, squashing peas against the back of her fork with quiet determination, oblivious of the turmoil churning in my mind. She could have found it at any time. It’s a miracle she didn’t.

  It takes me ages to get out of the house. Mum’s got a migraine coming on and by the time I’ve cleared the supper things away and taken a cup of tea up to her it’s already getting on for half past eight. Then the bloody phone rings and it’s my Great-aunt Dorothy wanting a chat. I tell her Mum isn’t feeling too good, but that doesn’t stop her bending my ear for almost forty-five minutes. Still, at least Mum can’t quiz me about where I’m going. She’s taken a couple of her Sumatriptan tablets and, by the sound of her breathing just now when I put my ear to her door, she’s already fast asleep.

  It’s not raining any more, but the streets are still wet and it’s almost dark. The bottle is back in my pocket. It’s still wrapped up in the sock but my fingers won’t leave the little bundle alone. I can feel the shape of it through the cotton. I think of that flyer in my bedroom and the hairs on the back of my neck stand up. ‘It’s never too late to start planning your own funeral.’

  The fear returns in one sickening blast. As does the voice in my head. The one that’s telling me to slug back the vodka right now and chuck the empty in a bin. It’ll take the edge off my fear, and what harm could fifty measly millilitres do? It won’t even touch the sides.

  Except that’s the trouble. It’ll just make me crave more.

  I swing from fear to rage to paranoia, flinching at shadows, my eyes darting from side to side as I walk. What was I thinking, coming out alone at night? I could have just tipped the vodka down the sink and got rid of the bottle in the morning, chucked it in a bin on the street somewhere. If anything happens to me, Mum won’t even realize I’m missing till she wakes up, and that won’t be for hours. Sumatriptan always knocks her out.

  I have to get rid of that bottle. If I’m not prepared to go to the police, I have to deal with this my own way. I’m not going to lose my mind over this. I’m not.

  I make my way to the greensward, where there’s less chance of one of Mum’s friends spotting me and reporting back, and, as I do, my fingers work to free the bottle from the sock. Now it’s clasped in my hand, my thumb on the cap. A small grenade. I’m holding it so tightly I’m surprised it doesn’t break. I imagine the small explosion in my pocket, shards of glass digging into my palm, wetness soaking into the lining fabric.

  I’ve passed three litter bins already. What’s wrong with me? Why don’t I just throw it away and go home?

  You know why, Astrid. Because then you won’t have it any more. You’ll have lost your chance to drink it.

  That’s right. As long as it’s still here, in my pocket, I can fantasize about drinking it, kid myself I could get away with it. But the rational part of my brain knows that’s not true. There’s another bin a little further down. I’ll throw it in there.

  Except I don’t. I walk straight past it. This is crazy. How can one tiny bottle exert so much control over me? But it’s not the bottle, is it? It’s me. My addiction. She knows that. That’s why she put it there.

  This time, I do it. I toss it into the next bin I come to, hear the soft little thud as it lands.

  I take a lungful of night air, enjoying the sweet scent of rain-soaked earth and the salty tang of the sea. I’ve done the right thing, even if it did take me this long.

  By the time I get home I’ve made a decision. I won’t live like this any more. Whatever I did when I was drinking, I wasn’t in my right mind. It wasn’t the real me. It changes now. No more lies or prevarication. If I’ve got any kind of future with Josh, he needs to know everything. Mum does too. It’s like Helen said the other day: if I can conquer my demons and face up to my past, what’s left to be scared of? Besides, if I don’t do it soon, my stalker might tell them first.

  What if she’s already told Richard? It would certainly explain why he was acting so weird with me today.

  35

  After yesterday’s rain the sky is a perfect eggshell blue, the clouds little more than white wisps. Not that I’ve seen much of the weather. I’ve spent most of the day pretending to work on the trompe l’œil while Josh and Richard got on with the decorating upstairs. I’ve been rehearsing my speech in my head the whole time.

  Now, at my request, we’re taking the circuitous route back to Flinstead. One last futile attempt at procrastination.

  ‘I was going to suggest this myself,’ Josh says, his right elbow resting casually on the open window. ‘It’s a lovely afternoon for a drive.’

  For a moment or two, I almost change my mind about telling him. It would be so easy to sit here, driving along with the windows down and the warm breeze tickling our skin, chatting and laughing and flirting like we normally do.

  Josh indicates left and turns into a narrow country lane bordered wi
th hedgerows covered in frothy white blossom. I’ve never been down here before; it’s beautiful.

  ‘Let’s open the sunroof,’ he says, and presses a button on the dashboard. As it slides open the sweet smell of hawthorn comes wafting in and with it the promise of summer. A world alive with new possibilities. If only I could stay in this car for ever, cocooned from the harshness of the world, suspended in this moment before everything changes.

  ‘Mum loved this time of year,’ Josh says. ‘Everything coming into bloom.’

  A large green verge is coming up on the left, with a weeping willow spilling over it, the tips of its leaves almost touching the ground. Josh pulls over and parks as close to the trunk as he can get so that we’re partially concealed by the green canopy of the tree.

  He unclicks his seatbelt and shifts position so that he’s looking right at me.

  ‘I’m so glad I’ve met you, Astrid.’

  I clench my fingers into the palms of my hands. Every second that passes without him knowing the truth feels like an even worse betrayal of his trust. Maybe I should do it right now, in the car, before he says anything else.

  But there’s really only one place to come clean with him, and that’s where it all started. Down on the beach. Whatever happens next, the sand and the sea will still be there. The tide will still turn.

  He leans in to kiss me and, of course, I kiss him back. How can I not?

  When the kiss finally comes to an end, Josh refastens his seatbelt, checks his wing mirror and pulls out on to the lane.

  ‘Shall we stop off at the Old Schooner before I drop you back home?’ My heart turns over. ‘It’s a hundred times nicer than the Flinstead Arms,’ he says. ‘And it’s got a beautiful garden.’

  I know I should respond, but I can’t. Even if I could think of what to say, I doubt I’d be able to speak, my mouth is so dry. All I can see is a tall glass of lager. I imagine it sliding down the back of my throat, crisp and cold, slaking my thirst.

  ‘I … er … Actually, I think I’d rather just buy a can of Coke and go and sit on the beach. Do you mind?’

  ‘Of course not.’ He goes quiet for a while, then says: ‘I make it a point never to drink more than half a pint when I’m driving. If that’s what you were worrying about.’

  ‘It wasn’t, no.’ How I wish I could live up to this image he has of me. ‘I just need some sea air after being indoors all day.’

  ‘You are happy to do the painting, aren’t you? I hope you didn’t feel like you had to say yes. Dad can be a bit – how shall I put it? – persuasive.’

  ‘I love doing the painting.’

  His shoulders relax. We’re heading towards the beach now. In a few minutes we’ll stop at the shop for a couple of Cokes and then we’ll be there and I’ll have to tell him. Plunge straight in and get it over with. The truth and all its repercussions.

  ‘I’ve got something to tell you.’

  We’re sitting on the sand, our backs against the sea wall. Josh does that crooked little smile I’ve grown to love and pulls me closer. ‘Should I be worried?’

  The smile fades when I don’t respond. ‘Astrid, what’s wrong?’

  A Jack Russell on one of those extendable leads comes up to us and puts his paws on my knees. I fondle his soft ears and gaze into his eager brown eyes. If only the owner wasn’t hurrying straight towards us, her face one big, indulgent smile, I could have told this little dog the whole story and Josh could simply have listened. But now we’re smiling too, saying hello and chatting about the weather.

  At last, it’s just the two of us again, and Josh is looking at me with questioning eyes.

  ‘I haven’t been entirely honest with you,’ I say. Understatement of the year.

  Something in Josh changes. He doesn’t say anything and he doesn’t move. But the energy between us shifts.

  ‘There is someone back in London. I knew it.’

  ‘No. There’s no one else, I swear.’

  ‘What was his name?’

  I breathe out. ‘This isn’t about him.’

  ‘What was his name?’

  ‘Simon. His name was Simon.’

  ‘Are you still in touch with him?’

  ‘I told you, this isn’t about him.’

  ‘You haven’t answered my question,’ he says.

  ‘No. I’m not still in touch with him.’ I stare at the sea. It’s unusually still and calm today. Eerily so. It looks like a painting. ‘Simon’s dead. He … he killed himself.’

  ‘Shit.’ Josh runs his hands through his hair. ‘I’m so, so sorry.’

  ‘Simon and I, we … we used to drink. A lot.’

  The silence tingles between us. ‘I started drinking heavily when I was fifteen.’ I knead the palm of my right hand with my left thumb, really gouging into it. ‘I’d like to say there was a reason, one key event that started it all off, but there wasn’t. I was a difficult teenager. It just kind of … crept up on me.’

  I wait for Josh to say something, to ask another question, but that’s not the way this is going to happen. Of course it isn’t. It was never going to be a normal conversation.

  ‘I was stupid and selfish and I let people down. My parents, my friends. I let myself down. Over and over again.’

  Somewhere in the distance a siren wails.

  ‘Simon wanted to stop. He started going to AA.’ Now that I’m actually saying the words I feel strangely removed from them. As if this is somebody else’s story. Which in a way it is.

  ‘You have to understand that I’m different now. I haven’t had a drink in over six months.’

  ‘What happened? With you and Simon?’

  A small flare of hope ignites inside me. He isn’t ranting and raving about having been lied to. He’s still right here next to me.

  ‘Simon tried to persuade me to stop too, and I tried, for a while. But I was drinking in secret and he found out. Simon left me.’

  Why does it feel so bad, admitting that? After all the things I’ve done and the people I’ve hurt, why does admitting that Simon left me make me feel so humiliated?

  I tell him the rest. About meeting up with him again, about the beer in my rucksack and the binge back at the squat. I tell him how it ended.

  ‘And that’s not all. Oh, Josh, I did something else once. I … I might have hurt someone when I was trying to steal her bag.’ A wave of nausea rolls through me. ‘I wish I could remember what happened, but I can’t. I just know it was bad.’

  Josh hasn’t moved the whole time I’ve been speaking, but now he shifts his weight forward and crosses his arms over his knees.

  ‘I wish I’d told you right at the beginning. I wanted to, but I didn’t know how. The longer I put it off, the more impossible it seemed.’

  His face is closed, unreadable.

  ‘I almost told you, that day we made lunch together. But then you started telling me about your mum and I …’ I stifle a sob. ‘I just couldn’t …’

  I reach for his hand and hold it in mine. ‘I’m telling you now because I need you to know. I don’t want there to be secrets between us.’

  He withdraws his hand. Slowly, calmly. A deliberate and considered separation that’s a hundred times worse than an angry shrugging-off.

  ‘Say something, please. I can’t bear this silence.’

  But still he won’t speak.

  ‘It’s not as if you’ve been entirely honest with me.’

  Josh’s face is incredulous. Appalled.

  ‘Come again?’

  ‘I know you’ve been sleeping with someone else. In the beach hut. After we’d been there too.’ I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I have to know the truth.

  ‘What the hell are you talking about?’

  ‘The red lipstick on the brandy glass. The bikini. I saw them, Josh. I saw them that day the huts got vandalized.’

  Josh stiffens. The muscles in his jaw are tight where he’s clenching his teeth.

  ‘But it doesn’t matter. We can start again now, can�
�t we? Please say we can start again.’

  I want to reach out and touch him, but the silence stretches between us like a wall. An impenetrable boundary I daren’t cross. It’s like a force field keeping us apart. Instinct tells me that only he can break it and, right now, he can’t. Or won’t. I don’t know how I expected him to react, but this glacial silence is unbearable.

  ‘I love you, Josh.’ There, I’ve said it. I’ve said it out loud. ‘That’s why I’m telling you all this. Because meeting you and your dad and all the rest of it – the painting, the swimming – it’s been the best time I’ve ever had. It’s made me realize what I want from life. What’s important. I’m so sorry I didn’t tell you before, but I was frightened you’d hate me for it.’

  Josh straightens up and blows air through his cheeks. He turns to face me. There’s a coldness to him, as if he’s already cutting off. ‘So what you said about being here to look after your mum, I suppose that was a lie too?’

  I force myself to hold his gaze. Now that I’ve started, I can’t give him half the story. I have to tell him everything. No holds barred.

  ‘Mum paid for me to go into rehab. I had nowhere else to live.’

  ‘So what you’re saying is, she’s been looking after you.’

  I close my eyes and nod. There’s no mistaking that tone.

  ‘I’ve been going to AA. That woman you saw me with, she isn’t Mum’s friend, she’s someone I met there. We’ve been supporting each other. I go every week. I’m making it work, I—’

  ‘Shall I tell you why Dad and I went to Berkshire? What I was doing with my cousins?’

  Something weird has happened to his face, as if his features are set in stone. His eyes darken.

  ‘We were visiting my mum’s grave. We do it every year on the anniversary of her death. I’ve never told you how she died, but maybe now’s the time.’ He takes a deep breath and looks me straight in the eye. ‘She was killed by a drunk driver.’