The Truth

by Naomi Joy

  Emelia. This is unexpected. I can’t be long.

  *

  Heather’s razor-sharp cheekbones and broad, flared nostrils appear in her office lobby fifteen minutes later. Her strong, lean frame is wrapped in a brown furry jacket, thick tights pulled over sturdy legs, a black skirt completing her look.

  ‘Hi,’ she says, stopping there, unsure what to make of my impromptu visit.

  ‘Thanks for meeting me,’ I reply, reaching in to give her an angular half-hug; a kiss felt too familiar, a handshake too corporate.

  Her face is pitched off-centre as she gathers her reluctant arm from pressing against my back.

  ‘There’s a place across the road,’ she says flatly, and we head out into the cool, our feet pounding the pavement in off-beat rhythms.

  ‘How’s your day going?’ I ask, a puff of fog escaping with my question.

  ‘Busy,’ she replies: one word.

  ‘Thanks for making the time,’ I say, attempting to get our meeting off to a good start.

  We enter the warmth of the coffee shop and Heather grabs a double-shot latte, extra-hot, and a flapjack from the till. I opt for a hot chocolate: calorific, warming, exactly what I need. We sit at a rickety table for two next to the window, a steady stream of office workers passing by.

  ‘So,’ Heather says, ‘to what do I owe the pleasure?’ She puts her cup to her lips and sips.

  I’ve thought of a cover story – obviously – but I worry my slightly frazzled demeanour might scupper its authenticity. The bruise above my eyebrow throbs, covered in beige rainbows of concealer.

  ‘Well,’ I begin, forcing a casual smile, ‘I wanted to talk to you about Anthony’s fortieth.’

  ‘Is this really what you dragged me out of work to discuss?’ Heather pulls a chunk from her flapjack with confident fingers and shoves it, unimpressed, into her mouth.

  ‘Well, yes, it’s just, there’s not really any time to waste, is there? And I thought – who better than to help me plan something incredible than Anthony’s dearest friend?’

  She runs over my proposition in her mind, half of her flattered to be my first port of call, to consider her Anthony’s closest confidante, the other half desperately aggrieved that she’s not sitting in my shoes, our roles reversed.

  ‘You need to get some real problems, Emelia.’

  If only you knew, I think, but I keep my lips straight and my expression blank.

  ‘How can I help?’ she asks.

  I take a sip of my hot chocolate, the warmth spreading through me, and already I feel better, glad to have convinced Heather to stay and talk.

  ‘Well, I was thinking,’ I start. ‘What did Anthony do for his thirtieth? Perhaps it might help to get some background intel on milestone birthdays and go from there.’

  Heather stretches her eyes upwards, the cogs whirring back to times gone by.

  ‘I think he missed most of his thirtieth,’ she muses, crumbs falling from fingers to floor. ‘His girlfriend at the time got blind drunk and punched a bouncer down a flight of stairs. Or something like that, anyway.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘She was a bit of an anomaly, that girl, much feistier than his usual type. I think she had some anger issues, manic depression too, or something like that, I remember him telling us her meds were all out of whack that night.’

  ‘His twenty-first?’ I press, digging deeper, waiting for Heather to say something I can latch on to.

  ‘That was just a night out I think – maybe we went for dinner before? I can’t really remember.’

  ‘Who was he with at the time? Maybe I could get in touch with her, ask what they did, or what she gave him as a gift? I had a thought that I could recreate all his best birthdays, from childhood, till now.’

  Heather looks at me a little off. ‘Well, I wouldn’t recommend getting in touch with that girl because that girl was Cindy and, well, I’m pretty sure Cindy’s dead.’

  My breath catches in my throat.

  ‘Really?’

  Heather picks up her phone from the table and jabs her index finger at the screen. When she stumbles across what she’s looking for – Cindy’s old Facebook page – she turns the screen to me, greasy fingerprints smearing the façade, the horrifying truth sitting below.

  Gone but not forgotten.

  ‘See,’ Heather says. ‘Suicide. Not long after she and Anthony broke up.’ My hands turn cold. ‘Doesn’t surprise me, to be honest,’ she adds cruelly, a hint of satisfaction behind her eyes.

  ‘Keep looking,’ I insist, momentarily forgetting my cover story. ‘Who was next?’

  ‘Pamela,’ Heather says, though her voice is less certain than before. ‘Wow,’ she adds, something cold running through her, too. She reads the text on Pamela’s public page.

  Rest in peace. Heaven has another angel.

  ‘Another one?’ I ask, baffled. ‘Who was next?’ I push, leaning in.

  Heather shifts uncomfortably and she puts her phone away, returning it to her bag. ‘I don’t think we should be looking at this stuff. Anthony wouldn’t like it.’

  We sit in silence for a moment, both coming to terms with the fact that two of Anthony’s exes are dead.

  ‘It’s odd, isn’t it?’ I ask after a while.

  ‘What are you trying to say?’ she replies, reluctant to follow my train of thought though I know she’s already there. Still, I stutter. Two dead bodies probably aren’t insurmountable for Heather – she could live with that, a couple of dead girls in Anthony’s wake. Not many, just a taste, a phase.

  ‘I don’t know,’ I whisper.

  ‘I mean,’ she says, her tone shifting, more upbeat now. ‘He definitely has a type.’

  ‘Dying?’ I ask.

  ‘I guess you could put it that way – depressed, suicidal, they’ve all had issues…’

  We sit in frosty silence for a moment, Heather stopping short of pointing out mine.

  She continues. ‘So, I suppose you’re out of luck for ex-girlfriend intel as to birthdays or whatever.’

  ‘I guess I am,’ I reply, one thing on my mind: get home, log into my laptop, find out everything there is to know about Anthony’s relationship history.

  *

  The front door clicks shut behind me and my gaze falls to the console table in the hallway. I move closer, running my fingertips over the chink that’s appeared on the edge of the metal rim. I touch my fingers to my head, the memory of crashing against it flooding back to me in vivid pictures.

  I notice a thick envelope on the doormat and bend to pick it up. My name is written in looping letters across the front. I recognise the writing: it’s from the same author who’d left the note under my bed, the one telling me to run.

  I open it, nervous, my grip unsteady, and read the first line.

  Time’s running out.

  I pull the edge of the note taut, neat squiggles and looping letters stretching across the page.

  I’m trying to help you,

  Trying to save you,

  My feet are rooted to the spot, but my body trembles, my fingers vibrating as I try to hold it still.

  But you don’t listen!

  My breath comes quickly now and I can feel the beat of my heart as it pulses against my eyes, veins bulbous, hardening with the pressure.

  Run, Emelia.

  I can’t run. Not any more.

  If I can’t convince you, maybe these girls can…

  I pull the rest of the paper from the envelope.

  Autopsy report. The body is that of a white female with multiple lacerations.

  My eyes scan wildly over the rest, though the document is heavily redacted. I rush to the next report.

  Toxicology examination. The deceased is a twenty-eight year old white female who was found unresponsive in her home by her boyfriend. Emergency services attended, but the victim could not be resuscitated.

  There are more.

  Victim died of a self-inflicted gun-shot wound. Victim died of natural causes brought a
bout by her eating disorder. Victim died of massive blunt force trauma to the head—

  I stop reading, I drop the reports.

  My immediate reaction is to run. This is so much worse than I thought, not only is he trying to kill me: He’s done it before, goodness knows how many times. I stifle a scream, I cup my sleeve to my mouth, moistening as I pant against it. Think, think, be clever.

  I can’t just run. It’s not as simple as that.

  He wants me to run.

  Then he’d have an excuse to kill me right away.

  First things first – I call my dad, iPhone wobbling in my hand as the line connects and his safe, familiar voice whistles down the line. I pull my jumper long, bunching it into my palms. I imagine the landline at home, the chipped black plastic handset heating against his ear. He’ll know what to do. We exchange small talk for a while and I tap my foot as he spews irrelevant thoughts on the cars he plans to test-drive this weekend. ‘One’s racy – but expensive. Another has excellent storage space and a lovely exterior. But the one I have my eye on is a three door hot hatch with a solid chassis and brilliant engine.’ My dad’s obsessed with cars but, unfortunately, all he can afford is a second-hand Toyota which sits nestled amongst the over-flowing boxes of my parents’ life detritus in their garage. Dad’s greatest hobby is to go back to the dealership he used to work at and pootle about in the latest models, role playing with whichever poor soul has had to take him out that he’s considering buying one of them.

  ‘Listen, Dad, I didn’t just call for a catch up,’ I say, interjecting, taking control. ‘I need your help, but you have to promise me that you won’t tell anyone. Not even Mum.’

  ‘Right-o,’ he replies, his favourite word, and I can tell he isn’t sure where I’m going with this request. ‘What’s the matter?’

  I imagine his whiskery eyebrows knotting in concern, his back hunching as he curls over the phone.

  ‘I think I’ve made a terrible mistake marrying Anthony.’

  A beat of silence. ‘What?’

  I don’t want to tell my dad exactly what’s going on in case I’m compromised in some way. Who knows, Anthony could have bugged the phone, he could have cameras in here, watching me, listening. I shoot a glance up to the corners of the bedroom, relieved to see they’re clear.

  ‘I know it sounds crazy, but I have evidence of something terrible… I need your help.’

  ‘Right-o,’ he says again, more jittery this time, then I hear him move, the receiver playing back his breathing at different volumes, and I imagine him turning towards Mum, mouthing at him from the other end of the lounge. ‘Who is it?’

  ‘What do you know about detecting medication in food?’ I ask, getting straight to the point. ‘If I sent you some could you give it to someone in toxicology at work?’

  I need to gather evidence. My dad’s a nurse now and he works at one of the biggest hospitals in the country so I figure that he can help, but he doesn’t say anything right away and I worry then that I have done the wrong thing by telling him.

  ‘Ems,’ he says, a quiver in his reply. ‘Anthony called your mum and me after you had that fall last week at the London site.’

  I shift my position, shuffling my weight from left to right. Now it’s my turn to be nervous about what I’m about to hear.

  ‘The doctor you saw afterwards prescribed some strong painkillers. He said at the time, because you’ve been using all sorts of pain relief for a while, that it could increase feelings of paranoia, anxiety, or depression, even.’

  I want to drop the phone through the floor and stamp on it. He’s got to my parents already.

  ‘Emelia?’ My mum’s reedy voice crackles down the line and I feel a knife slide into my back as Dad betrays my wishes. ‘If you ever need to talk you know where we are.’

  I don’t reply, my breathing heavy. I’m talking to you right now, I want to say. This is it, this is the cry for help.

  She carries on. ‘But I know that Anthony just wants the best for you. He has done so much for all of us. Remember that.’

  I think of the new kitchen Anthony had installed in their home not too long ago. I bet they’re hoping he’ll work his way round the rest of it till the entire place is done up. They couldn’t possibly jeopardise that.

  I press the red cancel button and hang up the call, a series of dial tones sounding out as it disconnects.

  Funny how those closest to you can be so easily manipulated.

  I am on my own.

  Anthony saw this coming, this stupid, ill-conceived next move that I’d taken too quickly, too rashly.

  Fuck.

  He’s pitting me against myself. I have a heart defect, I’m on lots of medication, it’s easy for him to tamper with it, or to give me pills that aren’t good for me. It’s not unusual for me to be in pain, or to faint, or to visit the doctor. I’m on strong painkillers that, sure, could cause a few symptoms of paranoia – not that they are – and any doctor would dismiss me, would simply change my dose. The problem is, I need those painkillers. I can read my own autopsy report already: Victim died of natural causes due to her life-limiting heart defect.

  I move then, quickly, determined, acting again on impulse, panicking. I quell the sickness that rises in my stomach as I lurch from the bedroom through to the kitchen. I fling open the fridge – perfectly ordered, everything in straight, neat lines – and remove small amounts from the foodstuffs that I know he reserves for me. I can’t take much because I’ll have to take a risk and hide what I find in the freezer until I’m ready to move it somewhere safe. I remove a Brussel sprout first, then cut away a small chunk of goat’s cheese that I’d spent an hour repeating after lunch recently. I add them both to an airtight freezer bag. I throw in a single cherry tomato and a hunk of cucumber from other items in the fridge that I’m not so sure are infected but might be. I open the freezer and remove a tub of low-calorie, dairy-free ice-cream that Anthony buys in bulk.

  I will let it thaw on the countertop, pour out the contents, then insert my bag of evidence at the bottom. I’ll pour the ice-cream back in then shove it to the back of the freezer, behind the other tubs, and pray I can get it out of here before it’s discovered. Eventually, I’ll test it and prove my theory right.

  *

  Anthony is late home this evening, much later than usual, and I squeeze my eyes shut and pretend to be asleep when he opens the bedroom door and quietly calls my name. I don’t respond so he shuts it again, and I hear him in the minutes that follow preparing a late night snack and watching TV. Later, when he climbs into bed beside me, I think I smell alcohol on his clothes and I wonder if he’s been drinking.

  I lie beside him, too nervous to sleep, desperate for the morning to roll round, for the sunshine to bring its light back into my darkening home.

  Blog Entry

  3rd November, 12.40 p.m.

  ‘Have I died and gone to heaven?’ I ask my reflection, my voice thick, my eyes filling with tears.

  Mishti finishes clasping the necklace in place and steps out from behind me into the view of the mirror, her wide eyes smiling back.

  ‘When I saw it, I knew immediately that it was meant for you.’

  I look at the princess-cut emerald that sits on a gold chain around my neck, its cool weight against my sternum, edges catching the light, spinning green in myriad angles. I’m sitting on a throne chair in the personal shopping room at Mishti’s parents’ flagship jewellery store, the room they usually reserve for Saudi Queens and the wives of tech billionaires, but today it’s my turn.

  ‘It’s so beautiful,’ I breathe.

  I think of the engagement necklace Anthony gave me and my shoulders relax. This moment is symbolic. The Roman necklace I once adored has been sat, dulling, in a display cabinet in the flat for weeks now. I haven’t wanted to wear it for obvious reasons: the piece I once saw as my future happiness, a physical embodiment of my love for Anthony had morphed into something sinister. Now it was a marker, a diamond death-stone indica
ting I’d be next.

  How hasn’t he been caught yet? Hasn’t anyone wondered why he’s left so many dead bodies in his relationship wake? Perhaps it’s just that nobody’s connected the dots. Heather knew about Cindy and, even after she told me about Pamela, she wasn’t particularly shocked. He’s obviously managed to play the system to his advantage, one step ahead of those who’d suspect him.

  I shake my head back to the moment and, just like the first time I laid eyes on Mishti, she’s smiling, her own neck adorned with a gigantic amber stone, her ears sparkling with diamonds.

  ‘I must give you something for this,’ I rush to say, holding the jewel in the palm of my hand, its considerable weight indicative of its worth.

  ‘Don’t be ridiculous,’ Mishti counters, wrapping an arm round my shoulders. ‘It’s a gift.’

  ‘But—’

  ‘And if anyone deserves a gift: it’s you. You’ve been going through so much lately. Cheering you up is the least I can do.’

  Mishti pulls a seat close towards me and sits. ‘I’ve been meaning to ask you,’ she says, tone changing, her eyes flitting to the now yellow bruise above my eyebrow. ‘Is everything OK with you and Anthony? Things seemed slightly off when I met him that morning and… I just wanted to check.’

  I look into the mirror, gold rimmed and intricate, and wish I couldn’t see my eyes shift, my smile contort, my eyebrows stretch as I prepare to lie to my wonderful friend who only wants to help me.

  ‘What do you mean?’

  She looks down. ‘You looked scared, Emelia.’

  My fingers tremble in my lap.

  ‘I am scared,’ I reply, a whisper.

  She stands to meet my eye line and gathers my shoulders in a warm hug. ‘Whatever illness you have, I am here for you. There’s strength in friendship and I want you to remember that. If he’s pulling away, if he can’t manage, then I want you to come to me.’

  She’s misinterpreted the situation.

  I bury my head in the curve between her neck and her shoulder and breathe out, moisture pooling beneath my eyelids. The smell of Mishti’s hair fills my nostrils and I savour her touch, my head and heart embroiled in an internal battle of wills over whether to let her in, or freeze her out.