I want 2 tell Emily, or myb get her 2 fnd out smhw. She shd no, D xxxx
Ur selfish and evil messing up ppls lives, I thought I ws ur best frind so y do u want 2 tell Emily? If u tell I wont spk to u EVER agn Bex
The blood thunders in my temples.
If u want b my frend, jst dnt tlk 2 any1 else, or I wl CUT myslf Bex
Don’t hurt urslf, love DD x
That’s the final text. I frown. Who is Bex? What did she (or he) not want Dee Dee to tell me? Was this about some drug deal? I don’t see how it can be, unless Rose has somehow found the phone and hidden it so as not to implicate Martin . . . but Martin didn’t know about the drug dealing until just before he died.
‘Emily, tea’s made!’ Rose calls out. Downstairs in the hallway she is humming to herself, completely unaware of what I’ve discovered.
With trembling hands I open the email then the FaceTime apps. Nothing. I turn to the photos. I can see at a glance that there are pictures here from our holiday. There’s the selfie Dee Dee took of me and her again. But there’s also a series of videos. The start points are all closeups of Dee Dee’s face, except one towards the very end of the final row. The two figures in the frame are blurry, entwined. I peer closer. Are they kissing?
I forget Rose downstairs or the bedroom around me and press play.
The film starts. The two figures are kissing. They pull apart and my brain registers in slow motion what my eyes have just seen.
Jed and Rose.
‘Please don’t go,’ on-screen Rose is pleading. ‘Just one more time.’
‘I want to but . . .’ Jed holds her away from him. She is wearing a sheer black slip, her breasts clearly visible underneath. ‘God, you’re fucking gorgeous.’
The video ends abruptly.
I stare at the final image on the screen, my sister a blur with her hands in the air.
‘What are you doing?’ Rose’s voice from across the room makes me jump.
I turn, scrambling to my feet. Dee Dee’s phone, still in my hands, is ripped out of the charger.
Rose’s eyes widen as she sees it.
‘You . . .’ My voice sounds strange, hoarse, to my ears. ‘You. . . and Jed. . .’
I see the acknowledgement in Rose’s eyes.
‘I did it for you,’ she says quietly. ‘I’ve always done everything for you.’
‘What?’ There’s a long silence as we stare at each other.
‘Emily, you need to—’
‘No. Wait. How can you . . . you and Jed . . . how can you have slept with my fiancé? How can that have been for me?’
Rose sits down on her bed. She pats the mattress beside her, just as she used to years ago when I had a problem I needed to share as a teenager.
I stay where I am.
Rose sighs. ‘Okay, the truth is that Jed was drawn to me. We had a few nights together in the early days of your relationship, then he pulled away, for your sake,’ she says matter-of-factly. ‘I let him go, for your sake.’
The room is silent. I am frozen. The bed that Mum and Dad slept in, that I remember coming to when I was ill or on cold mornings, resting my feet against Mum’s legs, my head on her chest . . . and then Rose, thinner and harder than Mum, no substitute for the hugs and cuddles I still sometimes wanted, but always there, always offering help, always in my corner.
I stare at her. I can see no contrition in her eyes.
‘Jed told me back in March, just after you moved in together, that he wanted to marry you, to look after you as I had done for so many years, that part of his reason was to help me, to let me be free of all the responsib—’
‘Wait,’ I butt in, unable to stop myself. ‘You’re talking as if I’m a child. Neither of you need to “look after” me or “take responsibility”.’
Rose shakes her head. ‘You don’t understand, Emily. I sacrificed Jed for you, because I wanted you to have him, just as I gave up my late teens and twenties to look after you and—’
‘I didn’t ask you to give up anything. You can’t have an affair with my boyfriend and make out you were doing me a good turn. How many times did it happen? When did it start?’
‘The first time was in March, just before you moved in together,’ Rose confesses, her cheeks flushing pink. ‘Jed came around to pick you up, but you were doing a parents’ evening and you’d forgotten to tell him you’d be late. I had to get out of the shower to answer the door and I guess my robe slipped off my shoulder and I saw him looking at the bare skin and I offered him a drink while he waited for you to get back . . .’
I frown, trying to remember the evening she’s talking about. I did come home one night, exhausted, not really in the mood for dinner with Jed, but guilty that I was late. He was waiting in the living room, sipping at a white wine, and brushed away my apologies, saying how wonderful it was that I did something so worthwhile as a job, unlike Zoe who had managed to run the business he’d bought her into the ground.
I don’t remember Rose from that evening at all; she must have gone upstairs before I came back.
‘You had sex with him? In this room?’
Rose nods, her face suddenly radiant. ‘It was wonderful,’ she breathes. ‘He’s an amazing lover, so powerful . . .’
I feel sick. ‘And what about afterwards?’
‘Not for ages.’ Rose grimaces. ‘I felt terrible. I knew it was wrong, that he had chosen you. But the heart wants what the heart wants and there were a few times when we just couldn’t help ourselves.’ She pauses. ‘You see the thing was that I knew it was wrong, but it felt so right. It gave me a new lease of life . . . it still does, even though it’s been over for a long time. I can’t explain it, but I feel better about myself than I have done in years.’
I stare at her, unsure whether to believe her, uncertain whether it matters either way. Why did I never pick up on any chemistry between them? And yet, it kind of explains the new glow Rose developed around that time, the way she lost weight and smartened up, all the new dresses hanging in the wardrobe. And then I remember Martin’s revelation from before Christmas. ‘So Jed was the married man you had the affair with?’
‘I think affair is putting it too strongly. It wasn’t a proper sneaking-around relationship, just a few disconnected episodes. Seriously, Emily, we couldn’t help ourselves . . .’ she half-smiles and the sick feeling inside me gives way to a pulsing fury ‘. . . it was like we turned into animals, and it wasn’t really anyone’s fault. Jed just couldn’t keep away, he told me I was amazing, an amazing person.’ Rose looks down at the carpet.
I clench my jaw. ‘Did it happen in Corsica?’
Rose gives a swift nod. ‘Yes. Once. But that was the very last time. Jed said it had to be, that we couldn’t keep doing what we were doing, it was wrong and . . . and sooner or later someone would find out. I’m not sure if we would have been able to stop, though I swear we both meant to . . . but then Dee Dee died and . . .’ She sighs. ‘Honestly, Emily, I never wanted to take him away from you, I just wanted him to want me.’ Her voice cracks. ‘You’ve got no idea what it meant to me, such a handsome, powerful man hungry for me. He was like the perfect version of Brian . . . what I thought Brian was when I met him.’
‘Brian?’ I think of the harassed-looking man who dropped off the big bunch of arum lilies on Rose’s birthday. ‘So you’ve secretly being going out with this Brian as well?’
‘No.’ Rose frowns. ‘Well, we see each other from time to time, but it’s nothing serious. And Jed wasn’t serious either – at least, not a serious threat to you. Anyway, you didn’t really want him, did you?’
‘Don’t try and fucking justify it.’ Fury fills me. Before I know what I’m doing I’m across the room, facing Rose down. She shrinks away. I can’t believe it. My own sister.
Dee Dee’s phone is clammy in my hand. And, suddenly, the whole horrific picture falls into place.
‘Dee Dee saw!’ I gasp. ‘Dee Dee found out.’
‘Yes,’ Rose admits. ‘The silly gir
l saw us upstairs at your engagement party. She must have come up to use the bathroom. She can’t have seen much, but probably enough to make her a bit confused. I saw her walking away and I wanted to make sure she was clear that there was nothing going on between me and her father. So . . . I debated telling Jed but I thought it would freak him out too much and then I thought about having a word with Dee Dee myself. But I knew I couldn’t compete with you in getting “down with the youth” so I decided it was best to pretend to be one myself.’
I hold up the phone. My hand is shaking. ‘You’re “Bex”?’
‘I made friends with her, convinced her she must have misunderstood what she’d seen. Of course when Jed came to my room on our holiday and she saw us together it was impossible to pretend any longer.’ Rose sighs. ‘I couldn’t believe it when I found the phone and saw she’d filmed our kiss, not that I think she meant to, but still . . .’ Her eyes grow soft, almost dreamy.
I stare at her in horror. ‘You kept the phone so you’d have the texts safe – and the video as . . . as a memento of you and Jed?’
Rose nods again.
My stomach lurches, bile rising into my throat. ‘So it wasn’t Lish or Cameron. You killed her, just to stop her telling me about you and Jed.’
Rose looks up, her expression hardening as it meets mine. ‘Kill her? No, of course I didn’t kill her.’
‘I don’t believe you,’ I say.
Rose’s mouth gapes as I head for the door. ‘You think I’m capable of murder?’ She looks horrified.
‘You’re capable of sleeping with my fiancé,’ I counter. ‘I don’t know what else you’d do. I don’t know who you are any more.’
‘Emily, I’m—’
‘Shut up.’ My heart thuds, fast and painful, in my chest. Sickened, I push past her into my room. I grab my bag.
‘Where are you going?’ Rose is on the landing.
‘I need to tell Jed what you’ve done to Dee Dee,’ I say. ‘I need to call the police.’
‘No, Emily.’ Rose’s lip trembles. ‘I didn’t touch her, I just told her that I was really Bex, and that she’d regret it if she said anything to you about me and Jed kissing, that she was too young to understand that it really wasn’t something to be talking about. I kept her phone after she died because you all thought it was missing anyway and I saw that Dee Dee had retrieved all the stuff I’d deleted and there was Jed and me on the film and I couldn’t bear to get rid of it all over again, especially once I realized it . . . him and me . . . was never going to happen again . . . but it had to be a secret. Anyway, that doesn’t matter. What counts is that I tried to make sure you’d never know. Don’t you see? I was trying to protect you.’
I push past her again and walk to the stairs, my eyes blurring with tears. I don’t know any longer what is true and what isn’t or how to work it out. Everything that I thought was certain has been thrown into the air.
‘I didn’t hurt Dee Dee,’ Rose says. ‘You’ll see the truth on her phone. And when you do, if you have any scrap of humanity in your soul, if you care about any of us you will let this go.’
Ignoring her, I hurry down the stairs.
Rose’s voice echoes after me. ‘I sacrificed everything for you, Emily, and never asked for a thing in return. I gave up a career, a love life, I even gave up Jed. I have suffered for you. Lost everything.’
I reach the front door. I turn. I look up at her. ‘I didn’t know you felt like that,’ I say, trying to keep my voice steady. ‘But Dee Dee still died. And someone has to pay.’
I shut the door, but I can still hear Rose storming down the stairs.
‘I haven’t breathed a word about Dee Dee for his sake. I’m just asking you to do the same. Please, Emily.’ Her voice fades as I reach the pavement.
I dart inside my car and slam shut the door so I can’t hear her any more. Without looking around, I quickly put a couple of streets between us, then I park. I am tempted just to go straight to the police, tell them what I know. But maybe I should look at Dee Dee’s phone first, to see what Rose was saying.
I switch it on. Whatever it tells me, somebody is guilty.
Somebody should pay.
August 2014
I can’t believe it. I can’t take it in. My friend Bex wasn’t real. She was Rose, Emily’s sister who I saw with Daddy. She came into my room in the villa here after Emily went and she told me that she had been pretending to be Bex with a fake photo and made-up stories and now the pretending needed to stop. She said that it was really important I didn’t tell Emily I saw her kissing Daddy. And I didn’t know what to say so I just looked at the bed and Rose sat beside me and said though she didn’t have her own children she looked after Emily when she was my age and that there were things you think you understand when you’re thirteen that you don’t really.
And in my head I was thinking that what I did understand was that everyone had been lying to everyone else. But I didn’t say anything. So Rose leaned in and said all softly that if I told Emily, Emily would just hate me EVEN MORE. I looked up then because I was surprised Rose was saying Emily hated me AT ALL because Emily is always so nice and Rose said that just today Emily was saying how fat I looked and how embarrassing it was for Jed to have such a fat child. And Rose said that if I told Emily then ‘all hell would break loose’ and Mum and Daddy would resent me more than they do and I still didn’t say anything but I couldn’t stop tears itching in my eyes. And Rose saw and said she understood how hard it was but it was obvious that Daddy found me irritating and Mum had complained I was withdrawn, then she said if I talked to Mum she would be upset ‘and you don’t want to upset your mother, do you?’ and if Daddy knew what I’d seen he would hate me for ruining things with Emily. So Rose went on that I needed to think about other people and not be selfish and that I needed to keep the secret.
Then she gave me my phone which I’d lost a bit earlier and she said SHE had taken it and she’d deleted our texts and my film of her and Daddy and that if I promised not to say anything I could have it back. She asked if I would promise and I said nothing so she asked again and I nodded though I still hadn’t looked up properly because my eyes were still all prickly with tears. And she asked a third time and this time I looked up and I whispered ‘yes’ and Rose said ‘good girl’ and she left.
Once she went I thought I would cry but in fact I didn’t, I just lay in the dark on my pillow with my phone and I got back the texts and the film of Rose and Daddy because Rose had just put them in the trash and it was easy to get them back and I needed to see they were real but in the end what was the point because I looked at all the texts from Bex who WASN’T real and WASN’T really my friend though I thought she was my ONLY friend, and I remembered all the giggling and pointing and picking on me from everyone at school and how that would start again soon in just a week or so when we were back from holiday and the new term started.
And I thought about Emily and how nice she’d been before, then what Rose said about what she really thought of me. And I wondered for a minute if Rose was making it up, then I remembered hearing Daddy say yesterday to Emily in one of his loud supposed-to-be-funny whispers that maybe I broke the strap on my sandals because I was too heavy for them and how she laughed and then, this afternoon, when I was taking pictures of her and me up at that citad-thingy place where you can see the sea I said I should take a second photo because I looked so terrible in the first one and Emily agreed and I realize that she thinks I’m fat and stupid, just like everyone else. And anyway, in the end Mummy’s right:
Emily took Daddy away from us.
And that’s when everything started to go wrong.
I went over to the window where outside everything is hot and dark and I knew I didn’t want to go back to school and I knew I couldn’t explain to anyone why and that’s when I decided.
So I tore the top off the headache powders and scrunched it up and put it down the loo and got a glass then I went along the corridor to Lish’s room where he was
asleep and I found his bag under the bed and I got out the packet he took before with the crystals that he said were ‘f-word lethal’ and I tipped a teeny tiny bit, less than a quarter of a teaspoon, of the crystals into the headache powders Emily gave me then I put the crystals packet back exactly where I found it in Lish’s bag so Lish wouldn’t know and get mad, then I picked up my glass and came back in here. I put in some water from my bottle and mixed in the headache powders that contained the teeny bit of crystals and sat on the bed.
So here is the drink and I am going to have it now. I don’t know what it will do, maybe just give me stomach cramps and I’ll be sick.
Or maybe it will be enough and in the morning they’ll find me.
Then the pain will stop.
Then it will all be over.
Then they’ll all be sorry.
March 2015
Two months to the day since Martin’s funeral I take the recording to Zoe and Jed. Why have I waited so long? Partly because I wanted to spare them the knowledge that their daughter died so pointlessly, in so much anguish. Partly because it can’t change anything.
And partly because of the deep guilt I feel that I was so blind to Dee Dee’s unhappiness, that among all the adults who failed her, I have to count myself.
Rose, of course, is totally against them seeing the recordings. But I don’t care what Rose thinks. I haven’t spoken to her for weeks. Straight after I’d watched Dee Dee’s diaries I took all my things from the house and stored them in Laura and Jamie’s attic, directly above their tiny spare room where I’m still sleeping. I know I’m in the way here, with the new baby due soon, but I keep to myself as much as possible and babysit for them twice a week, so for the time being it’s okay. They don’t know what I’ve found out. The only person I’ve told is Dan and it’s him, as much as anything, who persuades me at last that Dee Dee’s parents deserve to know how she died.