The Memory: A Gripping Psychological Thriller With a Heart-Stopping Twist

by Lucy Dawson

  Tim pauses, surprised, then carries on raking at the embers. ‘Because I’m his son and I’ve asked him for help? You’d do that for Rosie, wouldn’t you?’

  I don’t answer.

  ‘Exactly. I’m very aware this is my mistake. I asked Dad to help me – that’s all – not see an opportunity and grab it with both hands.’ He glances up at me and stops. ‘You’re crying?’

  ‘No, it’s the fire.’ I point at it, then stop and pick a small piece of ash from my mouth, trying to sidestep the smoke again.

  He returns to his furious jabbing. His hands are clenched tightly around the stick and I can see the rage just bubbling away under the surface. ‘I’ve allowed him right where he likes to be, back in control of everything.’

  ‘But this isn’t really about you and your dad, though, is it?’ I try to keep my voice even. ‘You just took quarter of a million pounds out of our joint savings account without telling me and effectively set fire to it. The money that came from selling my parents’ house, which was one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to do.’

  He throws the stick on the ashes, straightens to a stand and turns to face me. ‘I know and it doesn’t sound enough to say sorry. It isn’t enough. If I could go back, and undo it – I would. I’ve made a terrible mistake.’

  ‘The thing is…’ My earlier energetic anger is already being replaced with a slowly hardening, icy calm. ‘I pay all of the bills, I manage everything. You must have dug out the blue box file, got the savings folder, found the sheet of paper with our customer ID number – and the other one I’ve written the password on – then transferred it all into our joint account. Given that the bank stopped a transaction when I tried to buy Rosie a coat online last week, but they didn’t contact me to say a quarter of a million quid had just landed in our account, you must have moved it out again bloody quickly, so it didn’t even really register on the system. Not long enough for alarm bells to ring anyway. That’s pretty premeditated, wouldn’t you say? Not exactly something you accidentally do in the heat of the moment?’

  Tim clears his throat. ‘No, you’re right. It wasn’t an accident. I meant to do it.’

  ‘But you know how I feel about Harry. That I would have said absolutely no way to this “deal”, yet you went ahead anyway and gave him that money deliberately and purposefully.’

  He rubs the back of his neck as if it’s tight and aching. ‘I know you don’t mean to, but you’re starting to sound a bit patronising. I was worried that the way you feel about Harry would prevent you from seeing the opportunity we had. That’s why I didn’t say anything.’

  ‘Oh come on! You’re not seriously trying to make out you were protecting me in some way, by not telling me? That’s scraping the barrel a bit, isn’t it? And patronising? Really? You want to have a go at me right now?’

  ‘Of course not!’ Tim looks down at the ground. ‘I know you’re angry but the land HAS doubled in value – Harry was right. He didn’t know his company was going to go bust because of this fire.’

  ‘That’s what he’s told you.’

  Tim jerks his head up. ‘No, that’s not fair. He’s my friend. If he had the money he’d give it to me – he doesn’t, so he can’t.’

  ‘He’s your friend?’ I turn to face him. ‘You actually just said that? What are you – five? I don’t care about Harry and his excuses as to why the money has gone. Just tell me why you took all of our money – my money, really, if we’re being honest – in the first place? Was it really just so that you didn’t have to go back to your old job, but could carry on trying to make acting work after this six months trial is up?’

  He looks at me, astonished. ‘You know I’m not that selfish.’ He kicks the stick back on the smouldering pile as it rolls off. ‘It’s like you said, you manage everything: it’s your job that pays the bills, your job that the new mortgage was going to be based on—’

  ‘So all of this is my fault for earning more than you?’

  ‘No!’ He looks genuinely surprised at that too. ‘I wanted to contribute something. That’s all. We would have been able to buy a house outright for cash. But I also can’t lie – it felt exhilarating when Harry called and told me we doubled our money. I felt brave.’

  Before I can stop myself, I exclaim in frustration, and Tim looks at me sadly.

  ‘Yeah, you’re right – it sounds pathetic, doesn’t it? But it’s true. I can’t explain it, sometimes my life just feels so small – so constrictive. I wanted some bigger experiences.’

  Of everything, this is what cuts me to the quick.

  Life feels so small?

  It is so painful to hear, I don’t know how to respond. Instead I just stand there gaping because my mind can’t work fast enough to process what he’s actually just said. And still he doesn’t see it, reaching out a hand.

  ‘Talk to me,’ he says desperately.

  I put my hands in my back pockets.

  ‘Are you going to take Dad’s offer?’

  I can’t answer.

  ‘You don’t want to leave me, do you? Is that what this is about?’ He sounds frightened.

  My voice is thick with tears when eventually I do manage to speak. ‘Your life is not small. You have done something with your life. You have me and you have Rosie. You’re lucky to have a life full stop.’

  ‘That’s not what I meant at all!’ He glances up at the overcast sky in disbelief as if he can’t believe how everything has gone so wrong. ‘Please, Claire. I messed up. I’ve messed up hugely, but of course I love you and Rosie and I know you love me. We’re a family!’ He waits and when I still don’t say anything, he continues. ‘What’s happened to Charlie is horrendous. Surely you can understand, in comparison to that, the money I’ve lost is meaningless?’

  I gasp and step back away from him. Now the words are there. ‘So because I know what it feels like to have someone I love die, but I still have you, I should forgive you anything?’

  ‘No!’ he says urgently. ‘Why are you being like this? I don’t understand! I’m not being manipulative or playing a card here – I’m trying to be honest. I shouldn’t have done this and it’s going to have huge ramifications, but we’ve still got us. We’ve not lost the most important thing. That’s what I mean! Tell me we’ve still got us?’ He pleads, reaching out and pulling my cold hands free to hold them in his.

  ‘You know how difficult it was for me to sell my parents’ house in the first place, how much I didn’t want to.’ I am properly crying now. I can see it in my mind; every familiar corner, the layout of the sitting room, the kitchen, Rosie’s room. If I close my eyes it’s as if the whole house is still out there right now, just as it always has been, waiting for us to walk back into it… not all dismantled, packed up and gone forever.

  ‘Your sister was ready to move on and get her own place. We couldn’t all stay living there together. She wants to start the next bit of her life; meet someone she can settle down with. Maybe have her own children. And that’s how it should be.’

  ‘We could have bought her out.’

  He shakes his head. ‘We talked about this for ages. You decided it was the right thing to do, to get somewhere fresh for us to start a new part of our life; you, me and Rosie. You were worried you wouldn’t cope with Jen not being in the house any more. That it would feel too hard. I deliberately didn’t offer an opinion one way or the other because it had to be your decision. You said it was starting to feel full of ghosts. It had stopped being a comfort. Remember?’

  I nod eventually. ‘But you MUST see how it feels to discover that money is now gone? It was all I had from them.’

  ‘Of course I can. I’ve never regretted doing something so much in my whole life.’ He shrugs helplessly. ‘What more can I say?’

  I pause and shake free so that I can stem the flow of tears with the heels of my hands. ‘So how do I trust you not to do something like this again for kicks, because you want to make your life “bigger”?’

  ‘You just do. I can on
ly say I’m sorry and make amends the best way I can.’

  I feel like I’m in a scene of a programme on TV. It’s a very weird sensation – almost like an out-of-body experience. What would I be saying if I was watching this?

  Walk away! They’re just words! He’s an actor for crying out loud!

  ‘I’ll give up on acting.’ He reads my mind. ‘I’ll move here and do whatever Dad wants – work for free, labouring, I don’t care as long as we stay together.’

  ‘Unless I choose Fox Cottage, apparently. What was all of the shit back in your dad’s office about that?’

  He sighs and turns away, looking out over his parents’ garden. ‘Did you meet her? When you went to look at it?’

  ‘Who – Eve Parkes?’ I watch him carefully. ‘Yes, I did. She was very kind to me. She lost her husband in a car accident.’

  ‘I know. Did you tell her who you were? As in your connection to me and Mum and Dad?’

  ‘No, because you told me not to!’ I can hear the exasperation in my voice.

  He doesn’t say anything for a moment. ‘You remember what happened to me that Christmas?’

  ‘The shooting, you mean?’ I pull an irritating piece of hair off my face that the wind has whipped up.

  ‘Yes. It was Eve’s daughter Isobel that I shielded.’ He looks at me and waits. ‘You know? When everyone went crazy and told me I was a hero for jumping in front of her and Dad responded by packing me back off to the other end of the country? That’s why I don’t want to go and live in their house. It’s too close for comfort. I wasn’t even supposed to be there. Dad made me do a taster class with Paul Jones that Saturday because he couldn’t think of anything else to do with me.’

  I hesitate and see Tim as a little boy as he’s been described to me before: huddled on the floor positioned in front of a small girl, his arm bravely round her as they are shot at, and as always, the image both tears at my heart and rips out my stomach with fear at the thought of that happening to my child.

  ‘I’m not saying it wasn’t a truly horrible experience, Tim… but you haven’t kept in touch, have you?’

  ‘No, I haven’t seen Eve or Isobel for years.’

  ‘Then I’m not really sure I get the problem in buying a house from them? She’s still alive, the daughter?’

  He gives me a strange look. ‘Yes. Why do you ask?’

  ‘I didn’t see her, that’s all, Eve was making out like she was there in the house and she wasn’t. It was a bit weird… but anyway.’ I hold up my hands, determined not to become distracted. ‘If I can be expected to sell Mum and Dad’s house, shouldn’t you also be able to move into the house of someone you used to know? After all, they’re just buildings, according to you?’

  ‘Fair point,’ he admits. ‘But honestly? No, I don’t want to come back and live here.’ He gestures back at the imposing house behind us. ‘Of course I don’t! I can’t think of anything I want to do less than come and live this near to my parents and all that entails, where everyone knows everything about me, in the back end of beyond and where I’ve got no chance whatsoever of getting to auditions, but I’ll do it, because I accept I’ve completely ballsed up. The only thing I really care about is keeping the three of us together. You know you and Rosie are everything to me, so if you think buying Fox Cottage is how we make the best of this situation, then fine. I’ll do it. But yes, I’d much rather we – you – chose one of the other houses.’

  ‘Eve’s house has the most potential,’ I say truthfully.

  He gestures his hands widely. ‘OK then, whatever you think. Like you said, it’s just a house. But you should probably know I also had a thing with Isobel Parkes.’

  ‘Well, I understand your reluctance a little more now,’ I respond, ‘but that was a long time ago too, wasn’t it?’

  ‘Yes.’ He looks suddenly exhausted. ‘I was involved with her the summer before I went off to university. It was nothing major, but I’m telling you in the interests of total honesty… and you’re right, I’ll live anywhere you want me to, if it means we all stay together.’

  We both look back in the direction of the house at the sound of a car pulling up on the gravel and Badger barking. Rosie appears seconds later, running around the corner and across the lawns towards us, a huge smile plastered over her face, her bunches bobbing up and down, as she clutches a large, plush unicorn.

  ‘Mummy! Daddy!’ she calls, delighted to find us together. ‘Look what Granny bought me!’

  ‘Wow! Lucky girl! Let’s see?’ I hold my arms out and smile brightly although I want to cry again. She doesn’t deserve any of this. She is a happy little girl, with friends and a life she loves.

  How could I possibly tell her that all has to change?

  ‘I’m so sorry – I know how late it is with you now, but I just needed to talk to someone.’ I huddle on the windowsill, shivering in Tony and Susannah’s guest bedroom overlooking the garden where Rosie is throwing a ball for Badger, who is gamefully trotting to collect it for her. ‘Hello? Jen? Can you still hear me?’

  ‘I’m still here.’

  ‘I’m sorry, the reception is shocking. It’s all the hills.’

  ‘Stop apologising. It’s fine and I’m GLAD you called me. I’d have been really pissed off if you hadn’t. I’m sorry I’m a couple of drinks up though, I’ll try and concentrate. I’m back at home now and on water, by the way. So,’ she clears her throat, ‘that Tim did that in the first place and then they got you to view those houses without telling you the real reason why? It’s all beyond messed up.’

  ‘It was to ensure I genuinely chose the one I liked best, apparently.’ I feel wired with the adrenaline of acute stress in a way I’ve not felt for many, many years. It’s unpleasantly familiar.

  ‘Yeah, because it’s important to be happy in the house they’ve preselected for you to make up for Tim flushing quarter of a million quid down the bog. I know this sounds an odd thing to say,’ Jen says slowly, slurring very slightly, ‘but the whole thing about Tim handing the cash over to Harry – that’s real, right? This isn’t just some mental plan they’ve all come up with, to get you to move to the other end of the country and they’re actually using YOUR money to buy this house?’

  I half laugh. ‘Moving back here is the last thing Tim wants. He’d never do it voluntarily. He’s only ever been able to cope with his parents in small bursts. I’m certain the money is gone. I could ask him to show me his bank statement – and I will at some point – but right now I think it might push me over the edge to see it in black and white: all of my money going into that disgusting man’s account. I hate Harry so much.’

  ‘I just cannot believe Tim would do this.’ I can hear the disbelief in my little sister’s voice. ‘It’s all my fault. If I hadn’t said I wanted to buy my own place—’

  ‘No, no, no,’ I correct her fiercely. ‘It’s not your fault at all. It was his choice to give our money away. I can’t wrap my head around it, Jen. I love my friends, you know I do. I wouldn’t give a single one of them a quarter of a million quid.’

  ‘Yeah – but that’s the weird boarding school thing though, I suppose,’ Jen says slowly and yawns. ‘They’re not just friends, are they? It’s like a fucked-up version of family. I’m with you on Harry – he’s a terrible excuse for a person – but Tim’s lived with him all his life. You’d give it to me, wouldn’t you, if I said I knew I could double the money for you?’

  ‘Not without talking to Tim first.’

  ‘That’s a fair point,’ Jen agrees. ‘He one hundred per cent should not have taken it without asking you. I’ve got to be honest though and say I can see where he’s coming from a bit. Why can’t Judge Tony just give you the £250k no strings attached, instead of forcing you to move to Shropshire just because it’s what they want, so that Tim has to give up on cracking acting? Although let’s be honest, that might not be a bad thing. It’s never going to happen, is it?’ The booze has completely loosened her tongue.

  ‘He’s about
to turn thirty-six. He’s the same age as Eddie Redmayne, seven years younger than Benedict Cumberbatch and eleven years younger than Damian Lewis,’ I repeat Tim’s obsessive holy trinity automatically. ‘The thing is, Jen, I can’t tell him this sort of shit doesn’t happen in real life because it does happen to all of them. So many of his friends – and lots of other “terribly nice boys” he was at school with – are doing exactly what he wants to be doing and they’ve made it look normal. He sees them and thinks “Why not me too? I’ve only got one life…” And never mind the school lot – it’s not just Sam winning bloody Oscars – it’s all of his university friends from that stupid Footlights society too. I can’t so much as switch on the TV without one of them popping up in something.’

  ‘The bastards,’ she says vehemently. ‘I get it – it must screw with his head, being surrounded by people who make it look easy, but to be fair to Sam, he grafted for thirteen years before he got his big break. What’s Tim got on his CV apart from a couple of plays, one of which he walked out on, mid-performance?’

  ‘He couldn’t help that,’ I say quickly. ‘He had an all-out panic attack on stage. Proper post-traumatic stress. He was doing the talking to the ghost bit in Hamlet and he felt like the man who shot him – and then was shot dead himself – was on stage with him, just staring at him.’

  Jen giggles. ‘Sorry – I shouldn’t laugh. It’s not funny. OK, Hamlet probably wasn’t the ideal part for him, but shit happens and fifteen years later is a bit too much of a gap to decide he can make it work as a career after all, don’t you think? Come on! Let’s have a dose of real life here! You wanted to be a ballerina when we were kids. I don’t see you dusting off your tutu and quitting your bloody job, because you’re a GROWN-UP.’

  I fall silent and wonder for a moment if Tim would have been better off with someone taking this approach with him from the start, rather than always listening and encouraging him, as I have. Jen’s got a point. Who says you can achieve anything if you want it badly enough, and that you should never give up on your dreams? That’s just the stuff of shitty memes on Facebook. I never sat dreaming of selling data for a living when I was a little girl. I do it because someone pays me to and I have a daughter to support.