‘Coffee?’ she asked. ‘I’m sorry I don’t have any hot chocolate or marshmallows to go in it, but I do have coconut milk instead of cow’s milk if you’d prefer that?’
‘What makes you say that?’ I asked, spooked that she knew what drink I actually wanted without me having to tell her.
‘I don’t know,’ she curved the corner of her lip in a knowing smile, ‘something about you suggests that’s the sort of thing you’d like.’
‘Did Scott moan about me drinking that?’ I asked.
‘Honestly, no. You simply look like that’s the sort of thing you like.’ Her smile spread across her face until it became a grin. ‘I’m sorry I can’t offer you that, but what about a chai latte?’
‘Made from scratch?’ I asked.
‘No, from a packet. But we can both pretend I made it from scratch and that I even milked a coconut if you so wish?’
‘No, a coffee will do me,’ I say.
‘Coffee it is. Strong, touch of milk, one sugar?’
‘Yes, how did you … don’t tell me, I look the type?’
She grinned again and nodded. ‘Make yourself at home.’
Alone in her room, I felt shy about sitting down – it was too pristine, minimalist and perfect to be cluttered up by me. She had stripped floorboards, a huge cream rug with fibres the width of my little finger. On opposite sides of the room sat two bespoke-looking leather sofas. Dominating the room, though, the item that drew your attention to it the second you walked in, was the huge painting that hung on the wall above the fireplace. It was at odds with the modern pieces in the room, despite its chrome, bevellededge frame.
I walked towards the painting, drawn to it by its composition and the need it instantly instilled in me to continually scan its brushstrokes for a new piece of information, a different element I may have missed.
The setting of the painting was a deserted beach. Not anywhere I had been because the background also had palm trees, thin brown stems topped with fat green leaves that dipped towards the sea. The water was a pale cerulean, slightly darker than the sky. Standing in the water was a slender woman wearing a white dress that flowed down her body in fluid lines until it disappeared into the water that surrounded the woman’s calves. The woman’s hands were crammed with blood-red rose petals as if she was in the process of scattering the petals on the sea, while a few had already escaped and rested on the water’s surface. Behind the woman, on the beach of beige, white and grey-black pebbles were more blood-red rose petals, covering the beach like a crimson path. I leaned closer, scrutinising them, noting how each rose petal had been individually painted into the image, and how every single one of them looked velvety, pliable, luscious. Before I could stop myself, my fingers were reaching for the beach, wanting to stroke the petals that covered the pebbles. My body sagged a little in disappointment that they were not what they looked like. Instead of being strokeable, they were stiff, hardened puddles of paint. In the corner of the painting was an artist’s squiggle, not a name I could decipher enough to see if I recognised it. But at the bottom of the centre, painted in the sea in one shade lighter than the water, were the words: ‘Have You Heard The Story Of The Rose Petal Beach?’.
My eyes moved from the words, to the petal-bedecked beach, to the woman’s face. What she looked like was mostly hidden by swathes and swathes of long, curly black hair but she reminded me of Mirabelle. The way she stood and held herself – confident but relaxed. The smooth dark brown of her skin, the shape of her neck as it was turned away from the painter as she looked deeper into the scene, searching for someone who was out of sight.
‘Everyone does that,’ Mirabelle said as she returned to the room. ‘I say everyone, I mean, most people do that. They can’t help themselves touching the rose petals. They look divine, don’t they?’
Guiltily, sheepishly, I took my hand away from the picture. ‘Sorry,’ I said as she handed me a duck-egg-blue mug, so wide and large it was almost like a soup bowl with a handle. The warmth of the coffee, the sweetness of the sugar wafted out to me a comfort that I didn’t even realise I needed. ‘Thanks.’
‘Don’t be sorry,’ she said, holding onto her mug, my mug’s twin, with both hands. ‘I’m not surprised, it’s a gorgeous painting.’
‘Did you do it?’
‘Me? No! I told the artist the story and this is what she came up with.’
‘Is the story a well-known one, because I don’t think I’ve heard it?’
Her face relaxed into her customary smile. ‘No, not many people have heard it,’ she said dreamily, her fluid body moving almost weightlessly as she crossed the room and sat on the uncomfortable-looking sofa nearest the window and pulled her feet up underneath her. She was barefoot, and comfortable considering how austere her surroundings. Her eyes never left the painting, which she was regarding with a sense of wonder, contemplation and adoration. ‘It’s something I heard years ago that really spoke to me.’
‘Is that you in the picture?’ I asked her.
‘Yes,’ she replied. ‘Can’t believe you noticed, you’re the first person to do so. I knew the artist so I posed for her.’
‘It really is a beautiful painting,’ I replied. I almost said that it was made all the more striking by having her in it, but that would be inappropriate given who she was. ‘Look, sorry to bother you, but can I use your phone to call Scott?’
‘Of course, of course.’ She held out her phone to me, but didn’t release it straight away to my grasp. ‘I’m glad you got locked out,’ she said, ‘because it’s given me a chance to meet you. Scott talks about you a bit but it’s good to meet you properly.’
‘I’m glad I got to meet you, too,’ I replied, ‘although I wouldn’t say I was happy at all about being locked out.’
‘You’re not at all what I expected.’
‘That’s a good thing?’ I replied.
Her nod was enthusiastic and genuine. ‘Oh, that’s a really, really good thing.’
Mirabelle is sitting on the stairs when I open the front door. She is still in her coat, her phone is in her hand and she does not look like she has stepped into the house, gone upstairs, or even moved the whole time I have been away.
As I shut the door as quietly as possible, she stands, raising herself to her full height so she towers over me. She is statuesque, her demeanour always easy and open.
We stare at each other across the gap of the corridor like two animals thrown into a cage and forced to fight their way out. I examine her again, seeing her clearly now when I didn’t really notice before: her stance is closed and defensive, her mouth a black-brown line of silence, her light-coloured eyes warily watching my every move.
My eyes look past her upstairs, straining to catch even the tiniest sound that tells me they’re safe and she hasn’t harmed them.
‘I haven’t done anything to them,’ she says. ‘I didn’t move from here. And they haven’t stirred since you left.’
When I was tearing home, the terror and desperation to get her away from our children spurring me on, I hadn’t thought of what I was going to say to her. I suppose a part of me thought I’d be ripping her away from the girls’ bedside, where she would be, what – standing over them, pillow in hand – then fighting her, not talking to her. It all seems ludicrous now, seeing that she has simply sat waiting for me to return.
I saw Mirabelle yesterday. Yesterday. She was on her way to the shops, dressed in her midnight-blue tracksuit, white and silver trainers on her feet, her hair wound up in a bun, sunglasses on her face. I’d been struck by the oddness of her walking on the other side of the street to our house, almost as if she was trying to avoid what actually happened – me popping out to bring in the recycling bins and seeing her.
She seemed to see me but instead of coming over to have a chat, she’d hurried along the road, her pace increasing. I’d called to her, asking why she wasn’t in work, and she’d turned, grinned at me, but did not stop. Instead, a point at her bare wrist and a wave were
thrown my way, before she increased her speed again and disappeared around the bend into the next street.
I’d wondered why she hadn’t come over and now I knew: she couldn’t talk to the wife of the man she’d reported to the police.
Did she know they would arrest him last night, in front of the children? Did she know what she would be doing to my life?
Mirabelle, my husband’s accuser, stands perfectly still, as if petrified by this moment. But coiled, too. Ready to fight if she needs to. She’s my mirror image, of course. I’m frozen too, solidified but also ready to defend myself if necessary.
Her gaze shifts to the door a few times and it dawns on me that she is waiting for me to move away before she leaves the third step of my staircase, before she closes the gap between us for long enough for her to leave.
Mirabelle is scared. Of me? Of being here? Or of how plausible her case would be if the police found out she was in her alleged attacker’s house taking care of his children the night he was arrested?
I step aside, her body tenses in response, broadcasting that she is scared of me. Me. I take another step left, away from the door, and she moves right, off the step. We continue to move like that, almost circling each other, keeping our eyes firmly on our opponent, careful not to give the other even the slightest advantage, until I am on the stairs and she is in front of the door.
Without taking her eyes off me, she reaches behind herself and releases the catch on the door.
‘Why did you even answer the phone to me, knowing what you’d done?’ I ask before she escapes.
‘You wouldn’t understand,’ she says.
She’s probably right, I wouldn’t. I don’t. I don’t understand any of this.
I say nothing to her.
The silence in our house is so large, so all-consuming, the click of the door shutting behind her sounds like a bomb going off.
Beatrix
He was nice, I had a nice evening. Will I be reading the book that is Rufus? At one time, maybe, but now? Probably not. Or maybe, I don’t know. He was nice, he made me laugh, I smiled a lot, but the spark just wasn’t there.
Now, don’t be thinking I’m one of those women who has her head in the clouds and doesn’t know a good thing when she dates it. I do. But, well, last page and all that. He walked me to the taxi rank down by the bottom of the Lanes and we stood there awkwardly, not sure if we should kiss or not. He would have kissed me, but I wasn’t sure if it was a good idea. Then the moment passed, so I stood on tiptoes – more for effect than need since I was in these killer heels – and pressed my lips onto his cheek. His arm slid around my waist, holding me close as I kissed him.
‘Am I ditched?’ he asked as I stepped back and he reluctantly took his arm away.
‘Not yet,’ I said because, well, what else am I going to say when he’s standing right there? ‘Sorry, mate, it’s a no-goer, I’m afraid.’ Not my style.
The taxi turns into Providence Close at the end that’s nearest Tami and Scotty’s house. I’m surprised Tami hasn’t called or texted, actually. Usually when I’m on a date she checks in to make sure I’m safe (she’s like my big sister sometimes, honestly). In fact, my phone’s been pretty silent all night. I reach into my bag and rummage around until I find it. I pull it out and the screen is black. A few attempts to turn it on tell me that the battery is flat. Stupid phone is be-janxed. I only charged it this afternoon. But, hey, that’s something, I must have had a better time than I realised if I didn’t even notice my phone wasn’t working. Usually, shamefully some might say, I’m glued to my phone – yes, even in company.
If there are lights on in the Challey house I’ll stop, I decide as the taxi driver slows for the bend. I peer out and see the house is in darkness. I check the LCD clock of the taxi: 22:55. That’s way too early for them all to be asleep. Usually Tami’s up in her office working on her latest project that’s going to transform the image of some small or even large company from ‘very nice looking’ to ‘extremely slick and stylish’, while Scotty’s messing about on his computer somewhere.
I wonder if something’s happened?
The taxi driver continues on his route to my house.
I’m not sure what could have happened on a Thursday evening in Hove that would cause them to go to bed so early, but if something has, I’m sure I’ll find out about it soon enough. Nothing stays secret on the Close for long.
Tami
Fifteen years ago
‘Are you sure?’ Scott said to me.
‘Yes. I wouldn’t have told you if I wasn’t sure, would I?’
‘And you’ve done a test?’
Reaching out, I picked up my cloth bag, delved inside and pulled out the white sticks to show him. ‘Try six tests. And, funnily enough, they all say the same thing.’
He brought the heels of his hands up to his face, pressed them on his eyes. ‘Ah … Man!’ Scott had just watched his dreams of continuing to better himself with an MBA disappear in a cloud of nappies, late-night feeds and Babygros. While watching his future plans disappear he was also wondering if he did in fact love me, if he’d made a mistake about that and how it might be possible to get out of it.
I sat with my bag on the floor between my feet, the tests burning a hole in my hand, watching him go through the same process I had done hours earlier: I had watched my next promotion to head of the Corporate Communications department shimmer and disintegrate in my mind’s eye, then had questioned my feelings for him. That had lasted for seconds, a minute at the most, certainly less time than his questioning seemed to last.
‘I thought you were on the Pill,’ Scott eventually said, his accusation buried deep in his tone, but plain in his phrasing.
‘I am. But that’s only ninety-nine per cent effective. Meet the lucky one per cent. I should buy a lottery ticket.’
‘This isn’t funny.’
‘Actually, it is.’ He sat in the only armchair he had in his bedsit, his legs curled up under him, his face chiselled from stone. ‘It’s bloody hysterical. It’s going to get a whole lot funnier if you ask me if I’m sure it’s yours.’
He redirected his line of sight, even though his face remained like stone, telling me I was right, he had wanted to ask.
‘You’re a bastard, you know that?’ I said. ‘I can’t believe I fell for all that talk of love when you’re just a complete bastard.’
Leave, Tami, just leave, I told myself. Get out of here and start to make your plans.
I carefully laid the six white sticks on the edge of the bed, picked up my bag while I stood up and pulled myself together. ‘I’ll see you around,’ I threw at him, knowing I wouldn’t. I wouldn’t see him again. Even if he did try to change the course of this, if he did try to make things right, I wouldn’t want to see him again. ‘Maybe.’
When the front door to his flat clicked shut behind me and wasn’t immediately whipped open again by him asking me to come back, my heart fell. I stood for a few seconds, gathering myself together again. I had to have lunch with my family, I couldn’t go there in a state, I had to strengthen myself against this. I had to ignore the hollow space where my heart should be, concentrate on the future that was growing inside me instead.
In the darkness of the room, I stare out of the window, the unsynchronised breathing of Cora and Anansy the soundtrack of my thoughts. I watch a taxi turn into our road and then move at a snail’s pace up towards Mirabelle’s house. I’m sifting through my life, the mine of my memories, trying to find that imperfect jewel that has been hidden in my past, mostly ignored, but holds the vital clue as to why he is in a police cell and I am in a life that feels a lot like hell.
Fifteen years ago
‘I can’t believe you forgot to get chips for me,’ Sarto said, pouting. The oldest of us three children – a man in his late twenties – and he still had it in him to pout.
‘You can share mine,’ I told him, pushing the splayed open white paper towards him. ‘I’ve said you can share mine.’ Once every
few weeks we had a family lunch where we all pretended that we hadn’t deeply disappointed our parents in different ways – me with the university thing, Genevieve with the eloping to get married in Las Vegas thing, and Sarto with the taking his time to finish medical school thing. Genevieve and I came over (Sarto still lived there), and usually Mum cooked. Today, not long after Genevieve got there, she had said she would take care of the meal. We’d stared at her in amazement that she was going to cook. She, in return, gave us all scathing ‘as if’ looks and went to the chippy. Returning without any chips for Sarto.
‘That’s not the point, though, is it?’ Sarto complained. ‘My sister goes to the shop and comes back with food for everyone except me. What am I supposed to think about that? I’m a man, I should be served, not forgotten.’
I turned my laugh into a cough, knowing that was probably why Genevieve had done it. The things he said often brought out the radical feminist in her: I simply ignored him, which actually bugged him more than trying to get one over on him.
‘Silly me,’ Genevieve simpered. ‘Silly female me. Never mind, next time you should send a man to the chip shop and maybe he’d remember how superior you are to every woman on Earth.’
‘When will you learn, dear sister, I’m not superior to every woman on earth, I’m superior to everyone on earth.’
The doorbell interrupted us. All eyes automatically turned to me, because I was the youngest and answering the door, washing up, doing whatever the others would have me do was my role. I focused on my chips, using a fork and my fingers to scoop them onto the waiting plate. Scott’s reaction to the news I was pregnant was still smarting two hours later, I wasn’t about to let myself be pushed around by this lot, too.