I was convinced that moving in together would mark a new stage in our relationship, an intensifying of the deep bond we already shared. Unfortunately, I didn’t reckon on Samantha Charlesworth barging in and upsetting the beautiful equilibrium I’d painstakingly created. There were so many times I felt like sticking a knife between that silly, hair-swishing harpy’s shoulder blades; in the circumstances, I think I showed amazing restraint. It was utterly shameless, the way she tried to worm her way into Chloe’s affections, offering her a shoulder to cry on, trying to drive a wedge between us. Just because she didn’t have a best friend of her own – or any friends, for that matter – Sammi thought she would go right ahead and steal mine. Big Mistake.
Chloe’s the closest thing I’ve got to family and I’d die before I’d let her walk out of my life. I cut off all contact with Mum and Dad as soon as I left for university. I don’t even know if they’re still alive; they’ve certainly made no attempt to track me down and I really wouldn’t be that difficult to find. Everyone in my social circle thinks my parents are living the dream in Oz, alongside my imaginary pilot brother. Despite being on the other side of the world, my ‘doting’ parents never forget a single birthday or Christmas and I’ve got a stack of cards and presents to prove it. Chloe doesn’t seem to have noticed how similar my mother’s handwriting is to mine, but then again she’s never been particularly observant.
To be fair, it’s partly my fault Chloe gravitated towards Sammi. I left the door wide open when I allowed myself to be distracted by that arsehole Pete Chambers. Chloe’s always been on the needy side, so when I wasn’t there to pick up the pieces as her flimsy little life started falling apart at the seams, she was forced to look for someone else’s sleeve to snivel into.
I always knew Sammi was going to be a tough adversary. I could tell from the way she carried herself that she was damaged goods (well, they do say it takes one to know one), but she had an inner steel. And there was something in her manner – some knowingness or unwarranted curiosity – that told me she might, just might, recognise me for what I really am. I was prepared to risk that; what I wasn’t prepared to risk was the chance that she might turn Chloe against me. Not when I’d spent twelve long years building the perfect friendship.
I suspected that if she sensed a direct threat from me, Sammi was more likely to dig her heels in than simply roll over, the way most people would. That’s why I had to focus on Chloe instead – and convincing her that Sammi was really a devious, manipulative, housemate-from-hell was going to require a considerable amount of creativity.
People are always surprised to learn that scientists have a creative side. They assume that science is all about facts, but most scientific breakthroughs would never have happened without a hefty dose of imagination. Science relies on flights of fancy and inspired guesswork as much as it does on hard evidence and objective analysis. Look at how I got my revenge on Pete. Pretty ingenious, huh? I heard on the grapevine that he’s applied for a job at a private hospital in Highgate. Good riddance, I say. Seriously, that man doesn’t know how lucky he is. The last man who fucked with me got a dose of Colchicine, blended with his breakfast smoothie. It’s used for treating gout, but in healthy people it causes cramping and severe diarrhoea. Too high a dose can trigger organ failure and eventually death. But don’t worry, I’m not that sadistic, the projectile shitting was good enough for me.
Anyway, I digress. At first, I toyed with Chloe in subtle ways – items disappearing from her room, keys vanishing from her coat pocket, vital work being deleted from her laptop. I knew she wouldn’t think for one nanosecond that straight-as-a-die, member-of-the-hospital-Ethics-Committee Megan might be responsible. The finger of blame would therefore point firmly in Sammi’s direction – and, just to grease the wheels of suspicion, I claimed that weird stuff had been happening to me too.
In the interests of honesty, I should point out that I unfairly blamed Sammi for a couple of things. I realised, some time after the event, that it was actually me who left my bedroom window open, so that my room ended up being decorated with the contents of my in-tray. The night before, I’d been burning a Crabtree & Evelyn candle I bought from a charity shop and when I woke up the next morning, my room smelled like a spinster aunt’s front parlour. Before I left for work, I opened the window to air the room out, and then promptly forgot I’d done so. As for my ASOS dress . . . with hindsight, I do recall taking my pen out of my bag to fill out a dental insurance claim form and then carelessly tossing it down somewhere in my room. It’s funny how these little things slip your mind at the time.
Of course, I was well aware that certain drugs would increase Chloe’s sense of disorientation and paranoia, thereby bringing my scheme to fruition more speedily. I’d actually been working on a way to medicate her by stealth – but then, in a delicious irony, she made things so much easier by asking me if I could get my hands on something to help her sleep. Naturally, I was only too happy to oblige.
My special prescription was a non-benzodiazepine sedative, which, in the dose I recommended, not only induces a deep sleep, but also impairs thinking and slows down cognitive functioning. The effects only intensified when Chloe, rather rashly, took it upon herself to up the dosage – but who was I to stand in her way? No wonder the silly thing got herself into such a pickle over the Neurosis set; from the sound of it, she was lucky she didn’t get herself fired. To be honest, I think it’s no bad thing that she fell foul of Richard Westlake. She hero-worshipped that man; it made me sick, listening to the fawning things she used to say about him. Suffice to say, I don’t think she has quite such a high opinion of him these days.
I suppose I could’ve stopped there, but frankly, I was having too much fun. In any case, I wanted to teach Chloe a lesson for having the gall to play besties with someone she’d known for all of two seconds, especially after everything I’ve done for her over the past twelve years. Ungrateful bitch. Hence the poor little kitty cat, who nobly sacrificed its life for the greater good. After dispatching the creature (humanely, with a single blow to the head, I should add), I collected some of its blood for the next stage of my plan. Knocked out cold by a double dose of pills, Chloe’s eyelids barely flickered as I daubed her hands with claret, before creating a trail down the stairs with my own bloody handprints. All that remained was to pose the animal’s body for maximum impact and wake Chloe up a short while later by throwing stones at her bedroom window. Then I took up a suitable vantage point behind a neighbour’s 4x4, and waited for the show to begin. And what a show it was. I must confess I was slightly disappointed that Chloe never breathed a word to me about her grisly discovery, as I had been looking forward to dispensing words of reassurance and comfort. I guess she was so disgusted by what she thought she’d done that she couldn’t bear to confide in anyone, not even her best friend.
Then, a few days later, I had a massive stroke of luck when I stumbled across Sammi’s medication while Chloe and I were looking for the photo album; it was an opportunity that was too good to miss. Just for the record, Lurasipine doesn’t exist; I made the name up on the spur of the moment. If Chloe had had the common sense to read the label on Sammi’s pill bottle for herself, she might have realised it contained nothing more than a mild anti-depressant – certainly not the amnesia-inducing anti-psychotic I made it out to be. I knew she wouldn’t, though; that’s always been Chloe’s trouble: she’s far too trusting. She’s highly suggestible too, the way emotional people tend to be. That’s why I was fairly confident that, given a little time, she would eventually reach the wholly inaccurate conclusion that Sammi had tampered with her medication. It’s also the reason Chloe believes she’s a murderer. But she wasn’t the one who pushed Sammi down the stairs. I was.
I didn’t have to plan a thing; Chloe did all the hard work for me. I was asleep when the sound of the squeaky floorboard outside her bedroom door woke me up. Here we go again, I thought to myself. Another one of Chloe’s tedious night terrors. I had half a mind to go back
to sleep and let her get on with it, but I needed the loo and anyway, I thought it might be amusing to see what ridiculous pantomime she’d cast herself in this time. I got out of bed and walked towards the door. Out on the landing, I could hear Chloe moving around and muttering to herself. Then, to my surprise, I heard another voice: Sammi’s. Chloe must have woken her up too.
‘Is that you, Chloe?’ I heard her say. ‘What are you doing out there?’
Slowly and quietly, I opened my bedroom door. There was just enough light on the landing for me to make out two figures. Although their features were indistinct, I could tell straight away which one was Sammi because of her height. She was standing at the top of the stairs, staring at Chloe, whose arms were curiously outstretched like a zombie.
I’ve always had the ability to think on my feet and I acted reflexively, charging out on to the landing, straight past Chloe. Before Sammi had a chance to think, let alone react, I was pushing her in the chest with both hands, as hard as I could. For a split second, our eyes met and, in that moment, I almost felt sorry for her. She let out a high-pitched scream as she toppled backwards, hands clawing the empty air in desperation. There was a dull thud and then silence.
I looked back at Chloe, who was tottering around in confusion, clearly still asleep. All I had to do was tiptoe back to my room, turn on the bedside light and step back out on to the landing, acting as if I’d only just woken up. Chloe’s imagination did the rest.
I’m glad we’ve got the house back to ourselves; we should never have let anyone else in. And there’s no doubt that Chloe now knows what a real best friend is. However, if she shows any signs of straying again, I shall have no hesitation in threatening to reveal what she did to poor Sammi. I mustn’t be too hard on her, though; Chloe’s brought me a lot of happiness over the years, the kind of happiness I didn’t think was possible for a person like me. And more than that, she reminds me of someone, someone who I loved very much. I can see her now, a ghost child waiting patiently on the edge of my memory; a little girl with yellow ribbons in her hair. I keep trying to reach her, but every time I get near, she dissolves to a fuzzy outline, like the sky at the end of a lovely day, when the sun has disappeared and only its aura remains.
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The Housemate Page 24