Life Ruins

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Life Ruins Page 24

by Danuta Kot


  And . . .

  Her heart started beating fast and her spirits leaped like an instant candy flip. His car was there, right where they’d parked before. He was here, waiting for her! Her eyes flooded with tears of relief and she forgot the pain in her feet as she ran towards the side road. ‘Jared! What happened? Where . . .’

  And then she saw the smashed windscreen and the cut tyres. All the elation dropped away, like she’d been punched in the gut. The car wasn’t here because Jared had come back. It was here because he’d never left.

  For the second time in almost as many days, she found the tears pouring down her face, her nose filling up with snot, but she was fucked if she was going to stand here and cry like, like some big loser who . . .

  She wiped the tears away angrily, swatting her face with her fingers again and again, but they wouldn’t stop so in the end she just ignored them. Jared might not be here but his car was. The car might tell her what had happened, and it might give her what she needed – some shelter and some food.

  The car doors were locked. She wiped her face again and reached in through the broken windscreen to open the passenger side, then slipped into the seat. It was no warmer, but it was more comfortable. She could put something over the windscreen to keep out the cold and she might be able to sleep. As far as she could tell, Jared’s stuff was still in the back of the car so there’d be a sleeping bag to climb into. Then, hardly daring to hope, she felt under the front seat and there it was, her bag.

  Her phone was gone – well, Jared had taken that, she’d talked to him on it, but her purse was still there. She opened it and found her money intact. Whoever had trashed the car hadn’t bothered taking anything. So why had they done it? Was Jared here when it happened? And where was he now?

  A horrible sense of familiarity was starting to grow inside her. Her memory took her back to Bridlington, to the street lights wavering through the mist, to the sound of breaking glass and laughter, and her own car in the side road with its windows smashed and the tyres cut.

  And Paige. Gone.

  Like Jared.

  Have a good time last night, then, Bex?

  Not really. You?

  Yeah. Smashing, weren’t it, Tez?

  Jared’s car, which had seemed like a haven with its familiar contents and that smell she was beginning to associate with him – a mixture of smoke, spices, the outdoors – was suddenly a trap.

  Moving quickly and looking round all the time, she opened the back. She needed a sleeping bag, a blanket, anything, but someone had been there before her. All Jared’s neat bundles had been pulled apart. Whoever searched the car hadn’t taken her bag with her money and cards. They weren’t looking for money. They were looking for something else.

  There was nothing she could do here. She bundled a blanket under her arm and limped back across the field towards Kay’s. She had to rest for a while, get something to eat, try and think, and the only possible place for her to do any of that was the cottage. There was nowhere else to go. There had to be a way to break in.

  She moved round the cottage again, and this time she saw that one sash window was open, just slightly. She tried it; it moved and, after a bit of a struggle, came up. Collecting her stuff, she climbed over the sill and closed the window behind her.

  Half an hour later, she was feeling better. She’d made herself a cheese and ketchup sandwich and was curled up in Kay’s big chair, wrapped in Jared’s blanket. It was almost possible to forget about the fire in this room, apart from the smell of smoke. She’d pulled the chair round so if anyone looked in, they’d just see the high back, not her, asleep, because she was going to be asleep, any minute now.

  The light was fading. She took a last look around the room, and she saw it.

  Her phone. She sat up abruptly, the drowsiness vanishing. Her phone was on Kay’s desk, plugged into Kay’s laptop.

  Jared. He was the only person who could have left it here.

  Relief overwhelmed her. Jared was OK. He’d been here, and he’d left her phone, left it charging from Kay’s laptop. She pressed the start button, and the screen lit up. And . . . yes, there was a message.

  --K whatsit

  She grinned, the fatigue falling away like magic. Jared. He’d gone to that Kettle place. Of course he had. Her car was there; the video had been made there. Kettlewhatsit was where they were going to find answers, so Kettlewhatsit was where she was going too. She texted back on my way, then stopped.

  On my way was fine, but how was she going to get there? Jared’s car was wrecked, her car was up there already and it would take her— she couldn’t do it, couldn’t walk all that way, not now, not when she hadn’t slept and had been travelling all day.

  Kay’s car. She could borrow Kay’s car. Kay wouldn’t mind.

  With a bit of luck, she wouldn’t even know.

  So where were the keys? Kay had always kept her keys on a board just inside the front door when they lived in Leeds. First place thieves would look, Matt used to say.

  Then they won’t smash the house up searching for them, Kay would respond.

  Holding her breath, Becca went to the front door, and there it was – a board with a row of keys neatly dangling from it. Good old Kay. You could tell her a hundred times, but she’d never listen. The car keys were there.

  It was time to go. All she wanted to do was find Jared. She hurried back to the living room, scooped up her bag, the keys and her phone in one armful, and then dropped everything. The keys skittered off under one of the small tables that Kay always seemed to scatter round rooms.

  She crawled under it. Where were they? There was a photo frame up against the skirting. It had smashed, and the photo was on the floor. That was when she remembered what Jared had said, before the phone cut out. I think I know who the girl is from the caravan site, and just before he got cut off, he said, your friend’s house.

  The photograph. Jared had been here. This might be what he meant.

  She turned it over.

  A girl with dark hair and olive skin looked back at her, smiling cautiously at the camera. Who was this? No one Becca had ever seen . . . except she had.

  Her first times at the drop-in – had she seen this girl there? Was this the girl who used to come in with Paige? Was this who Jared meant, the caravan-site girl – not Paige, but this girl? Jared had sounded so sure, but would he be? Really? She studied the photograph intently. One of Kay’s foster-kids, one she’d never met. In the photograph, Matt looked thin, his smile was tired – he was already ill when this was taken, so . . . when? A year ago? No, more like two years. She stuffed the photo into her bag – she didn’t want to think about it now.

  She didn’t want to think about it ever.

  Her hand closed over the keys. She picked them up, grabbed her bag and her phone and went outside into the rain and the cold. The garage wasn’t locked, though the door was stiff and she had to dump all her stuff on the wet ground and wrestle with the handle.

  Kay’s car was a small V W. Becca had never driven it, but if she could drive Jared’s car, she could drive a tiny thing like this. She got behind the wheel, and after a bit of a struggle finding reverse – something crunched against the wall when she shot forward unexpectedly – she got it out of the garage and onto the road.

  It was dark and she couldn’t stop herself thinking about her last drive to meet Jared, the car coming up behind her, its headlights menacing her in the rear-view mirror, getting closer, dazzling her, speeding up as she speeded up, until . . .

  Each time a car appeared behind her, she had to fight an impulse to put her foot down and push the VW to its limits.

  There was one now. She watched the lights loom larger, then had to correct suddenly as the road curved. The other car stayed behind her and she felt herself growing tense. Then she saw the sign to Goldsborough. Should she take it, let them know where she was going? The other car was sitting on her tail.

  Without signalling, she turned right, and the other car shot
past the junction, its horn blaring, and vanished into the darkness.

  Just another wanker, after all.

  She drove slowly along the narrow road that led to the headland. Where would Jared be? Now she was here, her certainty was fading. He hadn’t replied to her text.

  Someone else could have left the phone. Jared had been near the cottage when they talked. Someone else could have left the message to bring her here.

  She drove past the field she’d been forced into by the black car just a few nights ago, and on past the farm house. There was a car park, she could remember that, and they’d left her car up along a rough path, sort of hidden behind an old, derelict building.

  There was no sign of anyone.

  She drove into the car park and stopped, reaching into her bag for her phone, but before she could find it, in her headlights she saw a familiar figure running along the path to the car park entrance.

  Jared.

  She dumped her bag and scrambled out of the door.

  ‘I thought it must be you,’ he said.

  ‘Where were you? Are you all right? What happened?’

  ‘Why didn’t you call? Don’t you check your voicemail? What—?’

  ‘I didn’t know where—’

  The flurry of questions faded into silence. ‘I left a voicemail,’ Jared said. ‘To call me when you were on the road past Goldsborough.’

  ‘I sent a text.’

  ‘Yeah. I . . . Oh, shit, what the hell. Becca.’ He held out his arms and she stepped into the warmth as he wrapped his waterproof round both of them. ‘Come on,’ he said. ‘The tent’s all set up.’

  Just then, she felt certain of where they were going.

  Chapter 54

  Kay was discharged the next morning, but by the time all the formalities had been completed, it was almost eleven. Shaun had come back to the hospital later the previous day, unasked, carrying a large bag. He’d bought her a change of clothes – Some stuff of Sylvia’s. I hope that’s OK – and a hairbrush and toiletries, including some shower gel and body lotion. He might be a bit domineering, but he was thoughtful, she’d give him that. And she’d accepted his offer of a lift – it would be ridiculous of her to make the NHS supply an ambulance when she had the offer of transport.

  Her throat was still sore and the smell of smoke seemed to be lodged in her sinuses, but she felt a thousand times better. When she’d looked at herself in the mirror the day before, an old lady had looked back. Now, she saw a more familiar face. A bit of lipstick would have helped, but otherwise she was fine.

  Once she had all her discharge formalities complete, she called Shaun.

  ‘Kay! I’d just about given you up for lost. How are you?’

  ‘Fine, no damage done. I’m ready to go home.’

  ‘Then I’ll be with you soon.’

  She wasn’t used to this level of care and protectiveness. Matt had always operated on the assumption she could look after herself. At the moment, she was rather enjoying Shaun’s attention, but she suspected she might find it a bit claustrophobic after a while. Matt had never crowded her. He just let her get on with things.

  But she had to admit to herself that it was nice to see Shaun as he breezed in, carrying the freshness of the outside into the sterile atmosphere of the hospital. She liked his confidence, his air of get up and go. He looked at her and smiled. ‘You look a lot better, Kay. Right, where to? Have you decided where you want to stay?’

  ‘I’d like to go home.’

  ‘You can’t stay in the cottage, Kay. Trust me on this one.’

  ‘I know. But I need to go there. I want to see it. And I have to collect some things, then go to the vet’s to pick Milo up – I called them, someone left him there the night of the fire.’

  ‘Who did that? The fire service?’

  ‘I don’t know. I’m just glad someone took care of him.’ She didn’t tell him she’d been haunted by the image of going back to the cottage and finding Milo, abandoned, lying in a small white heap in the garden.

  ‘And then . . .? You’ve got somewhere to stay?’

  ‘I’ve booked myself into a B & B in Scarborough that’s run by a friend of mine. She knows me, she knows Milo. I can pick up my car at the cottage and drive myself to Scarborough. Then you won’t have Milo shedding hairs all over yours.’ She raised her hand to silence him as he started to object. ‘You did very well, Shaun, but your face – don’t ever become a politician. They’d be onto you at once.’

  He gave a reluctant grin. ‘I admit it. I’m not the number-one fan of dogs.’

  She pulled on the fleece he’d brought for her. ‘Right. I’m ready when you are.’

  It was good to be out of the overheated hospital. The day was grey and chilly but she relished the wind that blew spatters of rain in her face. ‘You’ve been a real help, Shaun. Thank you.’

  ‘Glad I could help.’ He spoke a bit gruffly, as if being thanked embarrassed him. ‘Here’s the car.’ He held the door open for her. It was a deep-blue Audi, powerful and expensive. Kay sank into the softness of the leather-smelling interior and prepared to enjoy the journey.

  It took a bit of time to get out of the centre of York, but once they were on the moors, Shaun put his foot down and the car accelerated smoothly. She was barely aware of the speed. Secretly, deep down, she was a bit of a petrolhead, something she’d never admitted to Matt. A car like this, a top-of-the-range Audi, was something he’d never have aspired to – It’s just a machine for getting you around, Kay. But she longed to get her hands on the wheel. ‘Beautiful car,’ she said.

  He grinned. ‘My baby. I promised myself one treat when I retired. It was going to be a round the world trip, but when Sylvia died . . . well, I got the car instead.’

  ‘Yes. Your plans change, don’t they.’ She would never have isolated herself on the coast if she’d known it would be without Matt. But that was the way life went.

  She yawned again. ‘Sorry. There’s something about hospitals . . .’

  ‘Do you fancy a coffee?’

  ‘I’d rather get back as soon as possible.’ She didn’t want to leave Milo any longer than necessary.

  ‘No, I meant I’ve got some. In the car. I thought we might need it.’

  Kay loved the idea of coffee, but she didn’t want to be making loo stops across the moors. ‘Later?’

  ‘When we get to Whitby,’ he agreed.

  They drove in silence, and more quickly than she would have thought possible, they were pulling into the side of the road outside the cottage.

  All the other thoughts were pushed out of her head as Kay looked at her home. At first glance, there was no obvious damage, but then she saw the boarded-up door and the ruined upstairs window. ‘How do I get in?’

  ‘I had a look round when I picked up your bag. The door’s intact round the back. Was your key in your bag?’

  Kay nodded, and climbed slowly out of the car. She had never felt settled at the cottage, but it had been her home for over a year and now it was close to derelict. The tasks ahead were starting to weigh on her – the cottage would have to be repaired, cleaned, redecorated. All her stuff – what could be retrieved and what was damaged beyond saving?

  And the implications of arson had other consequences. Would her insurance company pay out, or would she have to wait for a court case, or a full police investigation? Was her home covered? She had no idea. The house was her most valuable asset – all her money was tied up in it. If she lost it . . .

  She followed Shaun to the back of the house and let herself in. The acrid smell of smoke hit her in the face, taking her straight back to that night, trapped in the room, the fire outside the door, the window impassable. She had to step back outside and take a few deep breaths to calm herself down.

  ‘Steady.’ Shaun’s hand touched her elbow, offering support if she needed it.

  ‘I’m OK.’ It was just the shock of first seeing it.

  ‘It’s not too bad downstairs. In the front room you wouldn�
�t really know, apart from the smell.’ Shaun was being determinedly cheerful.

  Kay followed him through, looking round. The kitchen was more or less untouched, and she lingered, putting off the moment when she would have to see the full extent of the damage. She noticed a plate and cutlery in the sink that she hadn’t left. Someone had been there. Someone had made themselves a sandwich. She checked the bin. Someone had been eating bread and cheese. And tomato sauce.

  Becca. Becca loved cheese and ketchup sandwiches. She must have come back here – Kay remembered Becca at the hospital, something about her having left her phone and her bag . . . her memories of that night were still dark and confused. But Becca must have come back here to collect her things.

  ‘Is everything all right?’ Shaun called from the front room.

  ‘Yes. I’m just checking.’ She braced herself, and went through.

  Everything stank of smoke. The door to the stairs and the wall around it were black with soot. The room was in disarray, as if people had stormed through it – which they probably had. Everything was familiar and everything was strange. Her laptop was still on the desk, her comfortable chair was – actually, it was in a different place, moved, so the high back was to the window. She had a sudden vision of Becca curled up in it, asleep, a plate smeared with tomato sauce on the floor beside her.

  The stairs were impassable. All her stuff was up there, and even if she could get through, her clothes would carry the smell of the fire and be unwearable. For tonight, her friend Maggie would supply her. In the end, she packed her laptop and charger into her bag, grabbed some tins of food for Milo, his lead and his blanket, and she was done.

  ‘Is that everything?’ Shaun said.

  ‘I just want to talk to the vet.’ She made the call, following Shaun out of the door as she did so. Milo was fine, it seemed, and could be collected any time up to six.

 

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