The Whispers

by Perks, Heidi

  While Grace appeared balanced and unnervingly calm, Anna’s behaviour had been a little more erratic over the last three months. Certainly more than Catherine had seen before. One minute she would be frantically speaking to her ten to the dozen about a plethora of different topics and the next she’d be quite sombre, leaving Catherine unable to get a word out of her.

  The girls had one thing in common, though, and that was their refusal to open up about Heather. Catherine had tried talking to both of them on a number of occasions, separately and together, and they would always clam up.

  This was why she had sat Grace in front of a therapist, although Catherine had not been allowed to sit in. After three sessions, Grace told her she didn’t want to go back. Catherine had at least got the woman to admit that Grace wouldn’t budge with her one iota, and that in her opinion, Grace appeared indifferent to the tragedy that had shaken the rest of the town.

  Grace’s indifference made no sense. That’s why Catherine was pulling her daughter’s bedroom apart. She wanted more insight into what was going on inside her head. She would never admit this to Henry, but there was something about Grace that frightened her. But then there was something about her husband that sometimes frightened her too, the way she couldn’t do anything without running it by him first.

  Her hands felt for the shoebox at the far side of the bed. She pulled it out and slowly lifted its lid to peer inside. There was the diary, once locked with a padlock and clasp that now hung uselessly from the catch. Catherine sat on the floor, her back pressed against the bed, the book resting on her lap for a moment as her fingers softly tapped its cover. She didn’t want to look but at the same time she needed to.

  Eventually she opened it and gazed at the dates and then the words and pictures underneath. She flicked through its pages, the black ink drawings that made her shudder: girls holding hands, their eyes made of circles that were black holes, red biro scrawled over their heads with such force that it had ripped through the paper. Catherine could feel her daughter’s rage as if Grace were standing next to her, shaking her.

  She didn’t want to keep looking but she couldn’t stop herself, the dates rolling on, each drawing as intense as the one before, until she reached the last few pages. The most recent entries were ten weeks ago. After that there was nothing except for blank pieces of paper.

  There was something eerily calm about these final drawings, Catherine thought: the cliff face, the blue tape depicted so clearly she could imagine it flapping in the breeze. Even the body on the beach looked more rested than dead.

  Catherine’s hands shook as the book slid out of her grasp and hit the floor. What was she going to do?

  But as she sat there, her thoughts whirring about incoherently, she realised that Gracie had seemed so much happier and calmer lately. Maybe this was because she and Anna were so close again. Maybe Grace’s diary entries were just her way of getting her emotions out and making sense of the tragedy. She had never been one to talk about her feelings. Maybe this was a good thing, Catherine told herself. It was Grace’s therapy. And who was she to argue over how anyone chose to heal?

  Catherine pushed the box underneath the bed again, out of sight, where she hoped she would never have to see it again. If she admitted it to herself she would say she was too afraid to address her daughter’s behaviour, for fear of what it might turn up.

  But then she also couldn’t deny that the weeks and the months, and even the years that followed had brought back a happier Gracie, and surely that was all a mother ever wanted for her child?

  Chapter Nineteen

  Grace

  Grace notices that Anna isn’t at school pick-up this afternoon. She has the luxury of asking a friend to do the job for her and, unsurprisingly, it was is Nancy she’d chosen again. For three months she has had to watch Anna cavorting with her new friends, abandoning her in the school playground, leaving her out of invites, lying to her about why she can’t come to see her when really Grace knows that she has chosen the others over her.

  This is what she cannot get past. After everything she has done for Anna. It is the unfairness of it.

  Grace climbs out of the car when she realises she has been sitting so long that she is now late to pick up Matilda. The other class mothers are already ambling down the path, and she avoids their gazes as she rushes past them. They will be gossiping, trying to figure out where Anna has been and what she has been doing. How long before they all find out she was visiting Grace’s own mother?

  She has been betrayed by Anna. By Catherine, too. It had taken until today for her mum to call and let her know Anna has been with her for the last few days, and all the while Grace has been frantic with worry. Of course, her mum had protested she didn’t have a clue that Grace would be concerned about her friend. Anna having told her she’d been in contact with her husband was enough to put her mind at ease over that one, apparently.

  ‘Well, he didn’t tell me, Mum,’ Grace had said.

  Her mum hadn’t said as much, but Grace could imagine her thinking, Maybe he didn’t, Grace, but then you are the reason the poor girl had to come here.

  ‘She’s the reason you had to call an ambulance, isn’t she?’ Grace had shouted. ‘She made you ill.’

  ‘Oh no, love, I’m sure it was just coincidental. It wasn’t Anna’s fault—’

  ‘Of course it was. Why can’t you admit that? You had a bloody panic attack because of her.’

  Catherine had been momentarily silent and had then said quietly, ‘Anna stayed with me to make sure I was okay. She insisted she wouldn’t leave me on my own until I was better and I’d seen my doctor.’

  ‘Because quite rightly she felt guilty,’ Grace had hissed. ‘She did this to you and if you can’t see it, you’re bloody stupid.’

  ‘I think we’re missing the point anyway,’ Catherine had said.

  Yes. The point. The point was that Anna was digging up the past, asking questions about a night that Grace took care of her and lied to the police about just so that her best friend didn’t get into trouble.

  She should never have said anything to Anna about it, but how was she to know Anna was going to go this far? She’d just wanted to remind her of what she had done for her, that she knew Anna better than anyone else ever would.

  Grace’s rage continues to simmer as she reaches the classroom and sees her daughter hovering outside with the other kids whose parents are late.

  ‘Sorry,’ she mutters to no one in particular as she holds out a hand for Matilda. ‘Come on, we need to go.’

  Miss Williams gives her a annoyed look, but Grace resists the urge to snap at her. She waltzes her daughter back down the path to where the mums are still congregating, stopping her as she moves to ask her what she knows about Anna’s return.

  All evening Matilda plays her up. Sometimes Grace thinks her daughter knows exactly how to wind her up the wrong way until she gets to the point when she wants to blow. They are similar in many ways. Her daughter is strong minded and persistent. It is Graham who Matilda always manages to wind around her finger, but Grace doesn’t give in like her mother always did with her. Catherine was too soft; even Grace could see she had no boundaries. She isn’t like that with Matilda, even if it means they are often at loggerheads.

  Grace puts her to bed at seven fifteen, switching off the lights twenty minutes later, but still Matilda is calling out from her room that she isn’t tired and demanding that Grace go in to see her. She ignores her. The problem with living in this apartment is that there is nowhere to escape to. However spacious the rooms feel when you walk in, the walls begin to close in on you soon enough.

  It is two o’clock the following afternoon when Grace hears the buzz of her intercom. She takes a step back, shocked, when she sees who is waiting downstairs to be let in. Pressing the buzzer she opens the door to her apartment and leaves it wide as she retreats to the kitchen, waiting for the ping of the lift to signal its arrival on the third floor.

  She hears
the slump of his suitcase on the hallway floor and the door closing before she sees him appear around the corner.

  ‘What are you doing here?’ These are the first words out of Grace’s mouth as she regards her husband. She folds her arms across her chest, stands feet apart, wanting him to know he can’t just turn up in their lives whenever he fancies it.

  Graham’s eyes are heavy with fatigue. He’s never managed to sleep much when he flies. ‘When we spoke last night I was about to tell you I had a flight booked. But you hung up on me.’

  She wonders if he expects an apology, which she is in no mood to give, and yet she is torn, because a part of her wants to feel her husband’s arms around her. Just someone to hold her and tell her everything will be all right.

  But she cannot forgive Graham for the fact he has only been here once in the last three months. So they remain standing in awkward silence until Graham eventually comes over to the breakfast bar and gives her a peck on the cheek. His hand rests lightly on her shoulder and she feels herself stiffen beneath his touch.

  In return Graham pulls back. ‘Have you nothing to say?’ he asks, as he rubs a hand across his bleary eyes. He seems colder with her than usual, though possibly it’s because she isn’t giving him the reaction he was hoping for.

  ‘I thought you weren’t coming back until the twenty-third.’

  She watches him closely. For someone who has travelled for over thirteen hours to see her, he certainly doesn’t look remotely happy. Already they have not got off to a good start, and she doesn’t like the feeling of apprehension it is giving her. Usually Graham would be all over her, apologising for one thing or another, but today he isn’t.

  She is about to say something more, maybe soften her initial reaction to his arrival, when he shakes his head and says, ‘You never change, Grace, do you?’

  She lets out a short laugh. He has no concept of reality, no idea that he deserves a cold shoulder when he has treated her so badly. Did he actually think he could waltz into the apartment and count on her to open her arms and welcome him back when he has made no effort with her or Matilda?

  ‘I wasn’t expecting you,’ she says, and knows she is making it sound like it’s a bad thing, but she cannot help the tone in her voice. And yet at the same time she wants to scratch out the last five minutes and start again. For Graham to have at least walked in with a bunch of flowers and an apology so that they can re-set, because then at last she’d have someone in Clearwater who is on her side.

  Grace’s mind is busy working through how they can move past this faulty start, whether she is able to relent yet again and put aside the fact he chooses to prioritise his work over her when he says, ‘There’s a reason I’m back earlier.’

  ‘Oh?’

  He pulls out a stool and sits beside her. ‘Grace, we need to talk.’

  ‘Right.’ Her tone is stiff, she can hear it herself, but she thinks she knows what’s coming. His eyes have no life in them any more, they have lost something and she cannot put it all down to an overnight flight. It makes her nervous.

  ‘You must know this isn’t working, Grace,’ he continues. ‘We aren’t working.’

  Her heart pounds.

  ‘I can’t go on like this any more,’ he tells her.

  ‘Then what are you going to do about it?’ she finds herself saying, not particularly wanting to hear his answer. She quickly adds, ‘Are you going to move back to the UK? To be with us?’

  ‘Grace,’ he laughs sadly, shaking his head, ‘I moved my job to Singapore to be nearer to you. You know that.’ When she doesn’t answer he says, ‘You upped and left Australia without telling me what you were planning. You took Matilda to live in another country without telling me. No sane person makes that kind of decision.’

  ‘I told you I was moving,’ she says.

  ‘With two weeks’ notice. The house was already packed up. You left me to sort out its rental. You’d planned it all and I wasn’t a part of those plans, but as always I went along with it because—’ He breaks off.

  ‘Because why, Graham?’ she goads.

  ‘You know why,’ he says, as if he has the weight of the entire world on his shoulders. ‘Because it’s too hard to keep fighting you, Grace. I can’t do it any more. I want a divorce.’

  She recoils from him, trying to make sense of what she is feeling. Should she have seen this coming beforehand? Over the months, the years even. Maybe, but in truth, she never expected Graham to leave her. If anything, if she ever thought about it, it was always the other way round. Graham was supposed to be devoted to her and yet here he is, doing exactly that.

  God, she actually wants to beg him not to do this, she realises. But how can she let him see her like that? She was always the one with the upper hand in their relationship; he was always telling her how lucky he was to have her.

  ‘Is there someone else?’ she asks. There must be. There can be no other reason. The thought that Graham has met another woman makes her want to throw up.

  ‘No.’ He shakes his head. ‘There is no one else.’ He reaches out a hand towards her but she pulls away.

  ‘Don’t touch me,’ she snaps. She will not let him see how raw she is feeling.

  June 1997

  Every so often Grace caught a flash of Anna’s purple hoodie and the bright green top that Heather was wearing as they wove off the path a little way ahead of her, and through the trees towards the cliffs. It was dark now, the streetlights far behind them, and the intermittent flash of Anna’s torch had stopped beaming, no doubt another of Heather’s dares to make the night feel more dangerous.

  Grace kept her distance as she twisted through the trees. At one point she could just make out the blue and white of the police tape ahead, marking out the area as unsafe. She and Anna knew well enough how precarious the cliff face was, her mum had drummed it into them over the last few days since the incident. The land could just slide away beneath your feet in an instant.

  She stopped when they did, hiding behind a tree. Up ahead she could hear their muted voices, discussing something: what they were going to do next, no doubt. But then Heather stepped over the tape, pressing her foot to flatten it so Anna could hop over straight after. If Anna was anxious, she wasn’t showing it, staying close on Heather’s heels as they disappeared, momentarily out of sight.

  Grace edged forward until she could make out their figures again. Two silhouettes against the dim moonlit sky beyond. She hated seeing her best friend with someone else. It was the worst kind of betrayal. And though she should be turning back now, making sure she got back to Anna’s house either before Anna did or before Anna’s dad woke up and found them both missing, she couldn’t drag herself away. Something ferocious was brewing inside her.

  ‘Are you in love with Anna?’ Heather had asked her once, about three weeks ago, when she had crept up on Grace sitting on the grass banks outside school waiting for her friend to come out of her history lesson so they could walk home together.

  ‘No. Of course not,’ she had snapped back.

  That was the thing with Heather, she made everything so vulgar. Grace wasn’t in love with Anna, their relationship was so much more than that, but Heather wouldn’t understand it. Girls like her had friends for a season that came and went. Not like Grace and Anna, who would be connected for ever.

  But then sometimes Grace couldn’t understand their friendship either, or at least not in a way that she could easily explain. How do you detail the intricacies that bind you to someone until you know their thoughts as well as you know your own?

  She was closer to Anna than anyone. More so even than to her mum, who nervously fluttered between her and her dad and Anna, as if she needed to be there for them all. Only she flapped her wings far closer to Anna than she did to Grace any more, like a protective mother bird. Then as soon as Henry clicked his fingers, she would scarper his way, pretending to enjoy whatever he wanted to watch on TV, chuckling at his work stories that she likely didn’t care about or understa
nd.

  And Grace didn’t need anyone to point out that her own father barely acknowledged her existence.

  So no, Heather, I am not in love with Anna, I just NEED her! The words reverberated in Grace’s head.

  Heather had laughed at Grace that day on the bank, as if she knew better. And now Grace was having to watch her lead her best friend to the edge of the cliff without so much as a thought for her. And what made it so much worse was that Anna had chosen Heather over her.

  Grace needed to press forward again as they dipped out of sight, but when she saw them once more they were facing away from her, close together, their voices raised now, like they were arguing.

  It wasn’t until they grew louder that Grace began to catch snatches of their conversation: ‘This is ridiculous.’ ‘You’re being so stupid.’ With each accusation their tones of voice got harsher.

  Grace worried that if she didn’t leave now she would soon be seen and then the whole evening would be wasted. She needed to get back to Anna’s house and wake Anna’s dad so he’d realise Anna had gone out.

  But she couldn’t pull away. She was rooted to the spot, unable to tear herself away from the scene unfurling in front of her.

  ‘Fine,’ Anna was yelling. ‘Be like that, if you want.’ She was starting to walk away when Heather reached out for her. In turn, Anna grabbed her arm and all of a sudden Heather lost her footing.

  By reflex, Grace shot up from where she was crouching behind a tree, stumbled forward a step, cracking a twig beneath her trainers. Neither girl looked round, they were too engrossed in their argument as they tussled back and forth, too close to the edge of the cliff for anyone’s liking, and Grace wondered if she needed to forget her plan and stop the girls going further before one of them died.

  The night hadn’t turned out like she’d imagined it would.