‘Girly nights away really weren’t something I was keen on anyway. I’d absolutely no interest in men and hadn’t, at that stage, really thought much about being attracted to women. But I’d become so fond of you as friends, and I knew I was going to miss you both desperately, so when you asked, this time I thought, why not.’ She ran a hand over her hair, playing for time as she tried to get her story out in a way they’d understand. ‘It was fun at first,’ she continued, ‘fun while we were in the bungalow, the three of us, chatting like we always did, just being friends. But then we came here.’ She looked around the room, her eyes losing focus as they drifted back to that night.
‘We’d had a lot of wine before we left the bungalow, from what I can remember,’ Joanne said. ‘I know I was fairly drunk.’
‘We all were,’ Megan agreed. ‘I wasn’t used to drinking, but when we came in here I sobered up pretty quickly. That gang of students was around us like bees to a honeypot or, should I say, they were around you two. I was edged to the side of the group until, before I knew what was happening, I was staring at their tall broad backs. It was almost as if they’d deliberately closed ranks to keep me out.’
Beth shuffled in her chair. ‘We were only out for a bit of fun, Megan.’
‘Neither of you even noticed I wasn’t with you,’ Megan said quietly, as if Beth hadn’t spoken. ‘I was going to leave and go back to the bungalow but I felt so… hurt and disappointed, I suppose.’ She sipped her water and then nodded towards a corner of the bar. ‘I drifted down there, trying not to look as miserable as I felt. Obviously, I wasn’t doing a very good job of it because a second later there was a man beside me, asking if I was okay.’ Closing her eyes for a moment, she swallowed. ‘He wasn’t bad-looking, pleasant to chat to but not very bright, and he’d absolutely no sense of humour. I watched you both laughing and flirting and I remember feeling suddenly so terribly angry.’
‘With us?’ Beth said, thinking back to that night.
‘With you, with me.’ Megan lifted her hand in a vague gesture of hopelessness. ‘Mostly with myself. For having come along in the first place, and for feeling so damn envious of you both. I watched you flirt and chat with those students, watched as they all but drooled over you both, and I wondered what it must be like to be so admired and swooned over, to be the centre of attention.’
‘Is that why you agreed to go with him?’ Joanne leaned forward and rested her hand on Megan’s arm.
She put her hand on top of it and kept it there as she continued her story. ‘When he said he was leaving, I asked him if he could drop me off on the way but he didn’t have a car with him. He asked me where we were staying and, when I told him, he said he passed by it, if I wanted to walk with him.’ She took her hand back and held it to her trembling mouth for a moment before nodding to their almost-empty glasses. ‘Finish your drinks, we have one more place to go.’ Their startled looks would have amused her had the circumstances been different. But they weren’t. Coming back here, it was worse than Megan expected but, she had to hold it together for a little while longer.
They finished their drinks in silence. Megan was first to stand, pulling on the jacket she’d hung on the back of the chair. With a final look around, she walked towards the exit, hearing her friends behind her, muttering to each other in worried tones. Pushing the door open, Megan stepped out into the night and held it open for them. ‘It’ll all be clear soon. We’re going to walk for a little way, okay?’
‘This is getting seriously weird,’ Beth said, shoving her hands into her coat pockets.
‘It’s not far,’ Megan said. She led the way, keeping to the side of the road. In a few hundred yards, the light from the pub’s brightly lit car park faded and, with the moon obscured by heavy cloud, they walked in almost darkness for a few minutes until a dip in the road ahead allowed them to see the lights of Capel-le-Ferne. The bungalow they’d stayed in that night was the third in the first row of homes they would come to.
‘We’re going to the bungalow,’ Joanne said, catching up with Megan and linking her arm through hers while Beth continued to walk behind.
‘Yes,’ Megan said, the warmth of the body beside her giving her some comfort. It would all be over soon; they’d know the worst about her, and they’d understand. And forgive? She wasn’t sure.
They reached the bungalow a minute later. The gate was shut; one car parked in the driveway indicating someone lived there but the windows were dark and there was no sign of life. Megan stopped. Pulling away from Joanne, she moved to the gate and leaned on it to stare at the unremarkable bungalow, hearing the restless shuffling footsteps of her two friends behind, one of them, Beth she guessed, sighing loudly.
Megan turned. ‘I haven’t gone crazy, honestly. It seemed easier, to bring you back here to tell you something I should have told you both a long time ago, something I need to tell you now.’ She saw their puzzled expressions and hoped they wouldn’t turn to disgust. She wished she could change her mind, even now, to forget about it. But she remembered Trudy’s look of disappointment. She was right, it had to end.
14
‘That night,’ Megan said slowly, her voice soft and low, her eyes on the ground between them, ‘we were chatting as we walked along. Once, when I stumbled, he caught my arm to steady me and then, when we lost the light from the car park, he held my hand for a few feet. Only for a few feet, but it felt… nice.’ Megan gulped. ‘When we got here, I asked him to come in–’
‘What?’ Beth interrupted her. ‘You said he’d dragged you inside.’
‘Please, let me tell it.’ Megan looked up to see Beth shrug. ‘I asked him inside,’ she repeated, laying heavy emphasis on the I, wanting to make it absolutely clear. ‘I pushed my breasts against his arm and asked him to come inside.’ She wrapped her arms around herself, not so much for comfort as to stop herself falling apart. ‘I suppose I was lucky he didn’t laugh,’ she said, her voice laced with bitterness. ‘But he did smile. He smiled, and said he wasn’t interested, that he was a married man and didn’t cheat on his wife. And he walked away. She took a deep shaky breath. ‘He walked away and I went inside alone.’
‘And then he came back?’ Joanne asked.
Megan looked at Joanne’s puzzled face. She was such an honest woman, what was she going to make of her lies? ‘No, he didn’t come back. I went inside and took a bottle of whiskey from the cabinet in the lounge, poured myself a glass and downed it. When it was finished, I poured another. After that–’
‘He came back then?’
Megan shook her head and continued in a harsh grating whisper. ‘He didn’t come back. He never came back. I’d almost begged him to fuck me, but I was so ugly, so undesirable, that even when I handed it to him on a plate, he wasn’t interested.’ Panting, she swallowed and said quietly, ‘I didn’t know I was capable of such anger. I felt rejected by everyone, by you, by that sad creep I’d thrown myself at. After the whiskey, I started to cry, becoming hysterical and the anger…’ She squeezed her eyes shut, her mouth twisting in a terrible grimace.
It was a few seconds before she spoke again, her voice thick with emotion. ‘It was as if the anger had consumed me. I became this growling snarling animal, pulling at my clothes, tearing my dress. I hit myself, dug my nails into my skin and tried to scratch my ugly face off. I was screaming as I threw myself against the walls and banged my head on the floor. Absolute and utter self-loathing. I was eaten up by it and then, when I was at my worst, you came home.’ She took a shuddering breath. ‘You came home and jumped to the wrong conclusion.’
‘What?’ Beth said, moving closer until Megan could smell her perfume. ‘Wait a minute! Are you telling us that you weren’t raped?’
‘No,’ Joanne said, softly. ‘You were, you’re just trying to block it out or something.’
‘I wasn’t raped,’ Megan said firmly, each word loud and clear. ‘If I hadn’t been so drunk and so full of that dreadful anger, I would have told you, but then…’ She let her brea
th out in a long slow sigh filled with regret. ‘Then… you were both hovering around me, being so kind, so attentive, so nice to me. For a moment, I was the centre of attention. Ugly undesirable me. And, I loved it.’ She waited for a comment and, when none came, she said, ‘I lapped it all up and then, well, then it was too late to tell you the truth.’
‘Bloody hell!’ Beth shouted, the words bitten out with such anger that spittle landed on Megan’s cheek. ‘I don’t believe this! All these years, you’ve let us think you’d been raped, and now you’re telling us it was all a big lie.’ Beth gave Megan one last glare before turning away and walking to the far side of the road to stand visibly shaking in the semi-darkness. Megan could hear Beth muttering to herself.
Even in the dim light that filtered across from the bungalows on either side, Megan could see Joanne had grown pale. ‘I’m sorry,’ Megan said, knowing what an empty useless word it was, but it was all she had.
‘Sorry?’ Joanne whispered.
Beth turned and walked back to join her, continuing to glare at Megan. ‘That was why you insisted we didn’t report it to the police. All your crap about wanting to concentrate on your law career, not wanting to be that woman who’d been raped, it was all a load of baloney.’
‘I would never have let it go that far,’ Megan said. ‘If you’d insisted that I had to report it, I’d have had no option but to confess, but you seemed to understand so I knew eventually it would be forgotten about.’
‘Forgotten about?’ Joanne whispered.
Beth turned to Joanne and glared at her. ‘Will you stop parroting what she says, for God’s sake!’
‘I’m just stunned,’ Joanne said, wiping a hand over her eyes.
‘We’re both stunned,’ Beth said, looking back at Megan. ‘How can you have lived with that lie all these years? And why tell us now? Why didn’t you bloody well keep it to yourself? Wouldn’t it have been better?’
Much better. Megan should have borne the burden of living the lie quietly, as she’d always planned to do. But like all good plans, it depended on everyone playing their part. ‘Really, Beth! You broke your promise and told Trudy I’d been raped, remember? I know,’ she held her hands up, ‘you were drunk and you assumed I’d told her. I hadn’t, of course, and never intended to, but your intoxicated, toxic whispers, caught me off-guard and I’d no time to think of the best thing to do.’
Megan sighed heavily. ‘Stupidly, I decided it was easier to continue the lie than to admit the truth. But then Trudy proposed to me. It should have been the happiest moment of my life. The woman I adore, asked me to marry her.’ Megan sniffed, and looked at Beth’s closed, angry face silently pleading with her to understand. ‘She asked me to marry her, and spoke about how honest and pure our relationship was, how much she trusted and respected me. I listened to her words and the lie seemed to jump up and punch me in the gut.’
A car driving by slowed as it passed, the driver peering at them as if unsure whether he should stop. Beth waved at it impatiently, and it kept going. ‘We should go back,’ she said.
‘Wait!’ Megan said, reaching a hand out to her. ‘You have to understand, I had to tell Trudy the truth, I couldn’t marry her until I had. There was a moment when I didn’t think she’d forgive me, that my honesty about that stupid lie had destroyed everything. But she said if I were honest with you two as well, she’d try to put it behind us.’
‘I still can’t believe you made it all up.’ Joanne’s voice was ragged with disbelief.
Tears fell down Megan’s cheeks. ‘I didn’t… or at least I hadn’t planned to. It hadn’t even entered my head, but when you both came in and assumed…’ She turned from them, hanging her head and resting her hands on the rough brick garden wall. ‘Do you know what the worst part is–’
‘You mean there’s something worse than lying about being raped?’ Beth’s voice was scathing.
There was silence for a moment, broken only by the eerie screech of an owl in the distance. Nobody moved for what felt like hours until finally, Megan spoke, her voice trembling. ‘The worst part, is that for a few minutes I was pleased that you thought I’d been raped… that you’d think a man would want me, even in such a violent, brutal way.’
Beth swore softly. ‘What?’
‘Oh, I know now how stupid it was to think that way, but back then I knew nothing.’ There was an edge of desperation in Megan’s voice. ‘I was sexually ignorant. Still a virgin. Totally confused about my sexuality, and convinced I was so unbearably ugly that nobody would ever want to be with me and then, there you were, thinking that this man had wanted me. And for one second, and I know this sounds hard to believe, but it made me feel better about myself, as if I was just like you two with all your men-troubles and woes.’
‘That’s ridiculous!’ Beth snapped. ‘Rape isn’t about desire, it’s about power and control. You know that. You knew it back then, you were never stupid, Megan. Or,’ she sneered, ‘I thought you weren’t, now I’m not so sure. This is all so… warped.’
Megan turned away from Beth’s condemning eyes. This was so much worse than she’d expected. Joanne had stepped away from the light to hover at the edge of the darkness on the other side of the road. ‘Jo?’ Megan begged, desperate for a crumb of understanding.
‘Warped,’ Joanne echoed Beth’s word.
‘Oh, for fuck’s sake,’ Beth said, turning away from them both. ‘I don’t believe any of this! This has to be the craziest thing I’ve ever heard, and I’m a bloody police officer, I’ve heard crazy in many forms.’ When nobody spoke, Beth continued. ‘Do you know what? I don’t want to hear another word of your sob story, Megan. I’m starving. All I’ve had to eat all bloody day are blasted nuts, so I’m heading back for that dinner we were promised and I’m going to get very, very drunk.’ She took a few steps before she stopped and shouted, ‘Come on. I’m damned if I’m walking to the hotel.’
Nothing was said as the three did the short walk back to the car. Megan slid into the driver’s seat, not surprised when the others both sat in the back. In silence, she drove to the hotel.
‘We can go straight in to dinner, unless you want to change?’ Megan said, parking in the same space she’d left earlier.
Beth gave an unamused snort of laughter. ‘Seriously? You really think we’re going to dress up, sit and make casual conversation over dinner after what we’ve just heard?’
Without another word, they walked from the car park.
The hotel’s restaurant was off the foyer. Leading the way, Megan stopped at the door and gave the maître d’ her name.
‘A table for three,’ he said, checking the reservation.
‘Yes,’ Megan said and looked around. Beth was behind her, glaring at her with hard narrowed eyes. It was a look she guessed Beth usually reserved for the thugs she met in the course of her job, one that was both condemning and unforgiving. A glance over her shoulder showed no sign of Joanne.
Megan waited until they were sitting at the table before asking, ‘Is she coming back?’
‘I doubt it,’ Beth said, picking up the menu. ‘You know what she’s like. This has hit her hard. You heard her repeating what you said like a blasted parrot. Shock, is my guess.’
‘And you?’ Megan asked, not bothering to hide the note of desperation in her voice. ‘Do you think you’ll ever be able to forgive me?’ She held her breath as Beth kept her eyes down, focused on a menu Megan was sure she wasn’t reading. ‘Please, Beth.’
That brought Beth’s attention to her but her eyes were cold. ‘Forgive? I don’t know, to be honest. It’s going to take time to understand what you did and all the…’ her mouth twisted in a grimace, ‘…consequences.’
‘I’m so sorry,’ Megan said, wearily. ‘Sorry for misleading you both in the first place, sorry I didn’t bury the secret and keep my mouth shut.’
‘That might have been the wisest course of action, honesty is a dangerous blade to wave about.’
Megan swallowed. A dangerous blade
? Yes, it was proving to be that. She wondered if Joanne would ever speak to her again. Honesty… it was supposed to have been a good thing. How terribly naïve she’d been; she’d waved that damn blade around and lanced the deeply hidden festering boil that was her secret, allowing the poisonous crap to leak out and destroy everyone around her.
Her shoulders slumped as she felt the weight of what she’d done pressing her down. She should have kept her mouth shut. It was all too late. She had to hope for forgiveness from her friends, and from Trudy. Thinking about her fiancée caused Megan a jolt of pain, anguish twisting her face. What if she didn’t? What if her damn stupid, self-indulgent honesty had spoiled everything permanently?
15
Beth watched Megan’s torment, resisting the temptation to offer comfort. Telling the truth had been an unbelievably stupid thing to have done, almost as incredible as her lie all those years ago. Beth still couldn’t quite get her head around that and refused to think of the implications. Her brain had enough to cope with. There’d be time to consider everything later.
When the waiter returned, Beth insisted they order dinner, too hungry to allow Megan’s dramatic revelation delay them any longer. Joanne, she guessed, wouldn’t be joining them. Beth glanced at the menu and ordered the roast lamb, ordering the same for Megan when she looked blankly at the waiter.
‘And a bottle of Chardonnay,’ Beth said, handing the waiter the menu.
They sat silently as they waited for their meal. Megan, Beth supposed, had run out of words to apologise or to justify her actions and since the only words she could think to say were variations on, you stupid fucking idiot, she said nothing.
The wine arrived almost immediately, Beth nodding as the waiter showed her the label, resisting the temptation to tell him to get a move on, save all the palaver and pour the damn stuff. She gulped a mouthful when he’d gone, and then another, emptying the glass and refilling it.
The Three Women Page 9
