Granny Morag always believed that ‘the system’ would come to its senses and would see the truth, would see I’m innocent and let me out. So, in her will, she had left me beach hut number 492.
Mum’s eyes are intently watching me, although I do not know what sort of reaction she expects. ‘Your father has been painting it twice a year, he changes the locks and keeps an eye on the place,’ Mum says as I continue to caress my keys. ‘He’s kept it nice for you.’
‘Bless Granny Morag,’ I say. ‘Just bless her.’
Mum smiles. A sad, wistful thought is clearly clouding her mind, and I suddenly feel how difficult and harrowing it must have been for her to live without her mother all these years.
‘Do you miss her?’ I ask.
‘Every day. You get so used to someone being there, and I suppose you take for granted the time you have because you forget to say the things you want to say until it’s too late. I miss her wit and her sharp eye. I miss her grumpiness in cold, damp weather and her false teeth in a glass beside her bed. I miss—’ Mum comes out of her reverie and, blinking quickly, realises she is talking to me. ‘But you get used to living without people, don’t you? If you don’t it will eat you up whole. You find a way to put them to one side and carry on.’
‘If you say so,’ I reply and run my fingers along the jagged edges of the keys. I feel like putting them in my mouth to find out what freedom tastes like.
‘Well, the beach hut is your responsibility now,’ she says rather ominously.
‘Could you make that sound any more threatening?’ I say to her. ‘You sound like the Big Luv during a bollocking.’
Her mouth tightens and colour creeps up her neck into her cheeks at my language. ‘What is the Big Luv?’ she asks tersely.
‘The Governor, the main governor. It’s rhyming slang – Guv to Luv.’
The tension in her mouth increases, her colour, usually a pinky-red, is now red and high. She obviously doesn’t like being compared to someone from prison.
‘I just don’t want you letting down your gran’s memory by allowing her beach hut to fall into disrepair. Or wasting your father’s hard work. Your gran believed in you right until the end. Don’t dishonour her.’
‘You think she was silly to believe in me, don’t you?’ I say, despite my decision three seconds ago to stay silent.
‘Misguided,’ my mother says. My mother thinks me capable of murder. It’s incredible that she can. I’m innocent. I wish they would believe that. I didn’t do it. How could I?
I loved him. Right till the end. Even when I was scared of him, and he acted like he hated me, I could not stop loving him.
‘Thanks for the keys,’ I tell my mother. ‘I’ll go and have a look at it in the next few days. I’ll make Granny Morag proud.’
Her silence as she leaves the room says it all: ‘You couldn’t do that even if you tried.’
‘I’m going to prove to you that I am innocent,’ I tell her even though she has gone to hide upstairs. ‘Do you know how? I’m going to find Serena Gorringe, and I’m going to make her confess that it was her, not me. I’m going to make her confess that, after the accident, she went back and she murdered him.’
serena
‘Can I tell people that the policeman put handcuffs on you?’ Conrad asks on the way to school on Monday morning.
All weekend he has been questioning me about the incident and questioning Vee, just to make double-triple sure that I hadn’t forgotten that the policeman actually did put the cuffs on me. The novelty has worn off for me, and for Vee, but for the two who were not there it has been a non-stop source of amusement.
‘No, sweetheart, because it’s not the truth.’
‘But no one will know,’ he protests. ‘Please, Mum. I’ll tell them the truth later, but can I say it just for a little bit?’
‘Con, you know the difference between lying and telling the truth, and you know which one is right and which one is wrong, don’t you?’
‘Do you, hypocrite?’ asks my conscience.
‘Yeeesss,’ Con replies.
‘Which one do you think is the best thing for you to do?’
‘Hypocrite, hypocrite, hypocrite.’
I know he is sticking out his lower lip in indignation. ‘Tell the truth,’ he says.
‘Always tell the truth,’ I say. ‘Because you’re a good boy.’
‘Does that mean you’re a bad girl?’
‘OK, Mum.’
‘The truth’s better, anyway,’ says Vee who is supposedly in another world, listening to her iPod and reading a Judy Blume book. ‘You can tell everyone that your mum was speeding and then it turned into a high-speed chase with the police. Because that’s basically what happened.’
‘Wow,’ Conrad says. ‘Thanks, Vee.’
‘Yeah, thanks, Vee,’ I say through gritted teeth. ‘Thank you very much.’
Conrad receives his usual hero’s welcome when I walk him to the gates. I do this every morning I drop him off. No matter how late or how harassed I am, I always walk him to the gates and then drop to one knee, give him a hug and a kiss and tell him I love him, then kiss him again on the forehead. I know the day is coming when he won’t throw his arms around me, and say, ‘I love you, Mum’ before running off to join his friends who have abandoned their games to come hang around the gates, waiting for him. The countdown is on to the day when he’ll be mortified to have me even walk him to the school gates, so now, when I still can, when he doesn’t care that all his mates watch him tell me he loves me every morning, I do it. I hang on to my baby, I wear his words and his touch like the precious coat of diamonds they are.
As usual, I walk away from Con feeling like I did on his first day at nursery – very close to rushing back through the gates, grabbing him and running away while calling over my shoulder, ‘Sorry, I made a mistake, he shouldn’t be at nursery, I’m not ready yet.’
Vee is still plugged into her world of music when I return to the car. She has her feet up on the dashboard, her book has been discarded face down on my seat while she sings with her eyes closed and her head thrown back. I stand at my driver’s door and watch her, watch the curve of her throat contract and expand as she sings, watch her lips work their magic around the sounds she makes. Although she is the image of me at that age, she is striking in a way I never was. And here, in her own private universe, sheltered and protected from the world, she is all the more radiant. Really rather beautiful. But I would think that, I’m her mother.
As soon as I open the door, she snaps out of it – she takes down her feet, snatches up her book, and fixes on her seat-belt – almost as if the interlude did not happen.
‘You should just drop him off in the car at the gates, you know, Mum,’ she tells me when I start the ignition. ‘It’s not like he hasn’t got any friends who he can stay with until the bell goes.’
‘I know,’ I say happily.
‘You baby him all the time,’ she says.
‘I know.’
As I navigate through the streets towards her school, I am on the verge of asking her if her recent near-permanent good mood and round-the-clock singing is boy-related. My eyes slide over to glance at her, working out if it is a good idea or not.
She reaches up to scratch her earlobe while concentrating hard on the book. This is not the time. I need to do it at home, where she has nowhere to run and no excuse to remove herself from me with the question unanswered.
I don’t turn off the engine as Verity unloads herself from the car. ‘Have a good day,’ I say to her.
‘You too,’ she says. Unlike Conrad, she doesn’t have a gang of people waiting for her to arrive: Verity, like me at that age, has a limited number of friends and she doesn’t seem to mind. I may not be allowed to walk her to the gates, but I always wait and watch for her to walk through them and hold my breath, praying that there is someone there for her to stand with and talk to until the bell. Zephie, one of her friends, approaches her and I breathe out. It’s OK, she
’s safe, she won’t be on her own, she won’t be an easy target for bullies and others. I won’t spend the drive to work and the rest of the morning worrying about what happened after I drove away. She has left behind her iPod and her book on her seat and I reach across to put them away in the glovebox as usual.
When I was twelve I read every Judy Blume I could get my hands on. It wouldn’t occur to Vee to ask me if I’d read them – I’m just not that hip in her mind. I turn the book over to see the front, to see which one in the host of books she’s reading. Forever. I stare at the cover for a long, long time, not allowing myself to panic. I will not panic until there is reason to panic. I shelve it in the glovebox with the silver iPod and put my seat-belt back on, adjust my driving glasses and set off for work.
So what if my daughter is reading a book about teenage love and sex? It doesn’t mean she is actually doing anything. I read that book, I read a lot of other books.
‘And look how well things turned out for you,’ snipes my conscience.
It’s all going to be fine. I’m going to have that ‘boyfriends’ chat with her and it’ll all be fine.
‘Of course it will,’ says my conscience. ‘Because history never, ever repeats itself, does it?’
I drive to work with my heart in my throat, trying not to think that when evil comes a-knocking on your life, it very rarely looks as horrible as it is.
serena
February, 1986
I couldn’t understand why he didn’t like me any more.
Since that first touch in the classroom, he stayed away from me. He was still tutoring me twice a week after school, but he always sat on the other side of the desk and didn’t even look at me for too long, let alone anything else.
I thought he liked me. I thought I was special to him. The way he used to talk to me, to look at me as an adult, an equal, made me feel special. But he’d been acting as though I was just another student to him. I had to call him by his surname again, I had to listen or pretend to listen, and I had to sit near him remembering the touch of his hand on my face, knowing I’d never feel it again. Because he didn’t like me. I didn’t understand what I’d done wrong, what had changed.
Every school day started with me feeling sick as I wondered if he was going to show me again that he liked me. At home, I would lie on my bed, staring at his handwriting in my exercise book, wondering if he had ever written my name over and over and over, like I did with his name. He had started to mark harder, as well. I’d been getting Bs and A minuses, now the highest mark I got was a B minus. He’d write: ‘You can do better’ at the bottom of each grade and in our tutorials he’d go through my essays, explaining what I had done wrong. Never anything other than schoolwork.
‘How do you get a boy to notice you?’ I asked Medina on the phone during the third week of being ‘just’ his pupil again. I was hunched up on the fourth step of our pattern-carpeted staircase, with my eyes fixed on the living room door while I whispered into the phone. I didn’t want Mum and Dad to hear – they would not be happy to know I was even thinking about boys let alone . . .
‘That depends on what you want them to notice about you,’ Medina replied coyly. She was at university in Oxford now, and I was sure that all sorts of men were running around after her. She’d had her pick of boys when she’d been in school – they were always trying to get her attention, giving her gifts, writing her bad bad poetry, offering to give her lifts. She was a boy magnet and Faye wasn’t, even though they were identical. If I wanted to know how catalysts worked, I’d ask Faye; if I wanted to know how boys worked, Medina was the one.
‘I want to make him like me,’ I whispered.
‘I’m not sure I’m all right with you wanting to make a boy like you. You’ve got exams coming up and you’re my little sister – you’re meant to still be playing with dolls and speaking with a lisp. You’re swottier than Fez, you’re not supposed to be interested in boys.’
‘Please, Mez. I just need to know how to make him like me.’
‘Who is he?’
‘Someone at school.’
‘Hmmm, someone at school.’
‘So? How do I get him to notice me and like me?’
‘The thing is, Sez, and you need to remember this, it’s not about getting him to like you, it’s about whether you like him.’
‘But I know that I like him!’ I wailed as quietly as I could.
‘No, I mean, look, you’ll always meet boys you like and who don’t like you back. That’s natural. Not that it’s happened to me, but moving swiftly along. What you’ve got to be careful of is trying to change yourself to make him like you. If he’s worth your time, then he’ll notice how wonderful you are without you having to do a thing.’
‘But I thought he liked me: he was all nice to me and now he’s just nice to me.’
‘If he’s still being nice to you, what’s the problem?’
‘He was nice nice to me and now he’s just nice to me.’
‘You’re making my head hurt and I’m a girl, I’m supposed to be able to follow complex reasoning, and your reasoning, but I don’t.’
‘Look, just tell me what I have to do and I’ll stop making your head hurt. Do I wear make-up?’
‘Yeah, but not too much. Actually, very little. In fact, nothing at all. You’re beautiful as you are. And anyway, I’d love to see you get make-up past Mum and Dad.’
‘I’ll put it on in the toilets at school and take it off before I come home.’
‘Urgh! I hate that you’ve learnt these things off me.’
‘What about a short skirt?’
‘No!’ she almost screeched. ‘Stay well away from them. And the same with flashing cleavage. You’re giving him the idea that you want to go further than . . . well, just further. And you’re still young, you’re not ready for all that. And don’t even think about customising your uniform – Mum and Dad would hit the roof. Even I didn’t do that.’
‘You haven’t told me anything,’ I complained.
‘That’s because you’re perfect as you are. Stop being in such a rush, all of that will come in its own time. Sez, honestly, you’re perfect. And if he can’t see it, then he’s not worth it. I promise there’ll be someone better out there.’
It wasn’t often that I ignored the advice of my older sisters. I might fight with them, ‘borrow’ their clothes without asking, but I’d always listen to their advice. In this instance Mez was dead wrong: he was definitely worth it and there was no one else out there for me. There never would be.
February, 1986
I started to wear lip gloss. It was the best I could do. I didn’t get pocket money and I’d have to save up a lot of lunch money and bus fares to be able to afford make-up, so I had searched Faye and Medina’s room and found some lip gloss and mascara. The mascara was dry and the brush was caked in black cement-like gunk so I had to throw it away, but the lip gloss was brand new and only slightly tinted, so Mum and Dad didn’t even notice. Neither did he.
I thought I saw his gaze linger on my mouth but it was just my imagination. The whole thing was my imagination. I was being silly, anyway, because he was a teacher after all. And I was a pupil and he would never do anything like that. Especially not with someone like me. Maybe Mary Lachmere, because she was popular and pretty and she’d been told off so many times for shortening her uniform but she didn’t care. She even wore jewellery – earrings and rings – and put them on as soon as she finished the numerous hours of detention she got for wearing them. She just didn’t care. She was the sort of girl he would like if he ever decided to do something like that with a pupil. Not me. I really was swottier than Faye. That’s why Mum and Dad were so keen on the after-school lessons – anything to ensure I got as many A grades as possible in my O’Levels. He might even like De-De O’Brien. She was really pretty but clever with it and her family had loads of money so if they got married, they’d probably live in a house that her parents bought.
‘Who would?’ Sir asked.
/>
I stared at him, wondering what he was asking.
‘Who, if they got married, would live in a house bought by their parents?’ he asked.
Oh no, I’d done it again. I’d said what I was mulling over out loud. In front of the person I was mulling about. In front of him. I stared at him, wide-eyed and scared. I had no idea what to say. The truth wasn’t likely to come out of my mouth and I really didn’t like to lie. Not even to save myself from major embarrassment.
‘You’re not concentrating on History at all, are you?’ he asked gently.
I stared at the book in front of me, ashamed to be caught.
‘Oh my, look at the time!’ he suddenly exclaimed. ‘I’m not surprised you’re not concentrating – it’s way, way past your home time. Your parents will have my guts for garters! Right, come on, pack up, and I’ll drop you home. Don’t tell anyone because it’s not really allowed, but if I don’t make sure you get home safely and soon, there’ll be even more trouble.’
My heart started to pound forcefully in my chest, like a hammer trying to bang nails into a steel surface. I was going to be in his car. Alone. He could kiss me and no one would see. I knew he wouldn’t, but he could. If he wanted to.
Across the dark school car park, we walked side by side with Sir carrying my books and my bag. He even opened the door for me. In the car, on the drive home, I kept pretending . . . I kept pretending that we were boyfriend and girlfriend, that he was taking me home after we’d been to the cinema to see an eighteen film and we were going to go to his house and we were going to kiss and everything. I hated to admit it to anyone, but I wasn’t entirely sure what ‘everything’ was. We’d had sex education lessons in school when I was about thirteen, but I couldn’t work out where all the bits on the diagrams were now. That picture of the man’s thing looked weird as a cross-section, I couldn’t imagine it as a whole thing. And the pictures of the woman’s bits were just as strange with the man’s bits in it and not in it. I couldn’t work out how they got together.