The mobile rang again when they were almost at the checkout.
Tabs loved the supermarket. Always had, since she was a tiny baby, newborn, gazing up from her car seat wedged into the trolley at all the lights. Georgie babbling nonsense to her as they moved through the aisles, in heaven back then, in a daze of wonder.
These days of course Tabs was grabbing everything in sight and talking back, asking for stuff non-stop. All the same Georgie still felt a certain kind of safe in the supermarket, happy even. Couldn’t admit that to anyone, probably, barely to herself, it was almost outrageous. This one was a big place, wide aisles, bright with natural light. Upmarket: once, a year or so ago, she’d gone to one of the cheap ones, she’d heard from some mum in the school about how they were good for this that and the other, German biscuits or ham or prosecco and then Tim had frowned at the stuff in the fridge.
‘Mummy?’ said Tabs, pausing in front of a fridge full of desserts, tarts and pies and cheesecakes. ‘Can we?’ She knew they weren’t supposed to have pudding every day, but she also knew Georgie liked them as much as she did, the two of them conspiratorial at the fridge. Holding out a box of eclairs. A way along the big refrigerated section a slim woman in running gear gave them a sidelong glance.
Better class of person at this one, Tim said. Georgie hid from them, the better class of person. School governors, women in officewear, ladies who lunched. And today, perhaps because it was Sunday, men cruising the aisles following the click of heels: Georgie wondered why she’d never noticed that before. She recognised a woman who took her kids out of the school to go private.
Tim was always talking about doing that: ‘It’s just your insecurity,’ he said, last time they had the conversation. ‘You think they’ll look down on you, the other mothers. Isn’t it?’ Spoken kindly, but it had hurt her. Did she? Tabs was so bright, so shining: she just wanted Tabs to have what she had. A scruffy little school you walk to every day.
Why would they look down on her?
Georgie imagined her dad’s face if she gave in. Bewildered: she remembered him doing homework with her every evening, him beaming when she collected her A level certificates, the praise he heaped on the system that had got her there. It’s why she had gone to work in the school office, when Tim said no to her working for him. And her working there was why he let Georgie keep Tabs in the school – for now.
He talked about funding issues, class sizes, music classes: he would have his way once she was eleven, he’d send her to the convent in Brentwood, or even boarding school. Georgie felt a knot inside her. Till death us do part: and she stopped short in the supermarket as she found herself thinking, It doesn’t have to be like that.
Divorce. It happened. Tentatively she prodded at the thought, it bloomed. What had brought this on? Something. The turbulence of the last week, since. Just her and Tabs. Tabs in any school Georgie wanted. Was that how it worked? She suspected it wasn’t.
They came around the bakery aisle, a row of wicker baskets, the morning smell of fresh bread and there was a young woman in tight jeans, late twenties maybe, something familiar and unfamiliar at the same time. Ponytail, wire basket slung over her arm. Then she was gone.
But you love Tim. The after image of the young woman mocked her. Springy and lithe and fast, no one holding her down, no cumbersome trolley for her. She could see Dad’s face again, bewilderment becoming alarm. Cat’s: he’d done so well. Steady old Tim, who’d built all this up, who’d stuck it out with her, bringing up another man’s child. How could she do it to him? Of course she couldn’t. What was she thinking? And besides.
And then it rang. Her heart jumped in panic, in anticipation, knowing it was going to be Tim and she got the phone out of her pocket looking around to locate Tabs.
But DO you love him? The thought nagged, because she couldn’t make sense of it. What did that mean, love? Looking after someone?
And besides. He’d never allow it.
There she was. Tabs, looking at the packaged buns, tentatively reaching out a hand to squeeze one. Her mother, always after something sweet and comforting.
‘Hello?’ In dread.
Why was she thinking about Tim this way? It was all messed up. Like the ground was shifting.
‘Hello there.’
She knew the voice again straight away: it did something to her insides. Deep and soft. She hurried with her trolley past Tabs, looking for shelter. Into mineral water and squash. No one there. Kept pushing, between the ranked bottles, Tabs hurrying to catch up.
How few words had she heard him say? She could repeat all of them. She was terrified.
She gabbled, ‘You can’t, I can’t —’ She heard him laugh, softly.
‘Calm down,’ he said, sounding amused. She stopped, obedient. Like a dog, like a puppy ill-trained. ‘It’s OK, Georgie.’
She swallowed: she didn’t know he knew her name somehow and yet of course he did. He sent the flowers. His voice was very soft, it was kind. She didn’t dare say anything, in the silence she could feel herself straining towards his kindness, his approval.
‘I shouldn’t have sent that message,’ she blurted. ‘You shouldn’t be contacting me.’ Mark. She didn’t know if she said his name, whispered it. She should just say, leave me alone or – but she still strained, for his kindness.
Why was she like this? She’d always been like this. Mum exasperated, at the stove, I’m busy. Needy little Georgie.
There was a sigh, not impatient. ‘OK,’ he said. Reasonable. ‘I understand. Really, I do. I just thought —’ and now he sounded – what? Bewildered, regretful, sad, even. ‘I got the wrong idea.’ Stiff now. ‘I apologise.’
And like the dog again, Pavlov, she began to apologise herself.
‘No,’ she said desperately, ‘No, I’m sorry, it was—’ because of course, it was her fault, too and she didn’t want him to feel bad, that was the last thing she wanted, and then she was laughing, and he was laughing.
She was laughing because she was afraid. Because she didn’t know what the way out was.
Someone walked past the end of the aisle, a blur against the light coming in through the big windows. Walked back. Georgie looked for Tabs and there she was, standing still for once, holding on to the trolley, alert. Georgie took a step away, just one step. Her hand shielding the phone.
‘I’d like to see you again,’ he said gently. ‘Is that wrong?’
‘Well, why didn’t you—’ she blurted, wrongfooted. Why didn’t you answer the message? No, she couldn’t say that. It had been a mistake to send it, she had been glad he didn’t answer. It didn’t sound wrong, but it was. A silence, that she filled with apologies, in her head.
And then he said, ‘Yesterday? My phone died.’ Sorrowful. ‘I didn’t see the message till it was late.’
‘I’m sorry,’ she said, holding her voice firm, ‘but can’t you see it’s impossible?’
It was as if he hadn’t heard. ‘I thought I’d just rather talk to you,’ he said, still gentle. ‘I mean all this, messages and all that. So much easier, face to face.’ A rueful laugh. ‘Well, you know what I mean.’ She hesitated but it was too late. ‘Where are you?’ he said, his voice lower, confiding, intimate. ‘Are you at home?’ She turned, looking around, she has temporarily forgotten. Where? The rows of plastic bottles, the striplighting.
‘In the supermarket,’ she said, faintly. Looked up and there was the woman in jeans, stock still at the end of the aisle, a couple of feet away. The woman with her ponytail and her basket, a salad box, a Diet Coke. Looking at her, head on one side as if wondering.
Georgie didn’t know what it was she was feeling, something rushing, rushing in her veins.
Terror: it was terror. Of something she couldn’t see. And then she turned to see her trolley and no Tabs. Where was she? Where? ‘I’ve got to go,’ she said into the phone, her breath evaporating, and hung up, began to run and almost tripped over her. Tabs. Tabs had been there all along, squatting at the foot of the little
bottles of squash she always wanted for lunchboxes. Why hadn’t she seen her?
Georgie leaned down and gathered her up under the arms, feeling her heart pound, letting the warm weight of Tabs soothe her until she wriggled free, ‘Come on, darling,’ she said, her voice strained as she pushed towards the checkout in a kind of desperation to be out and done, as if he hadn’t been on the phone but was in there. And only then, arriving at the row of tills, realised she still hadn’t bought anything for Tim’s supper when she’s about to unload. Losing it.
Go back. Walking past the sushi, the tuna steaks, she got a chicken, potatoes, garlic, parsley, lemons. She made herself walk slowly, Tabs trotting beside her. Green beans and carrots: she wanted comforting things. Things from her childhood in South London and Mum at the stove.
The supermarket was too bright, suddenly. It wasn’t a safe place, after all, was it? They were all watching her. The girl with the ponytail was watching her.
Swiftly she steered the trolley to the checkouts, looking straight ahead now, Tabs sensing something, running to sit obediently to wait in the window beyond the row of tills. The light behind her made her look small: it bleached out the figures, the rows of parked cars beyond the window, like an old photograph.
Unloading the contents of the trolley, Georgie worked fast, piling everything up hastily, not speaking, not making eye contact. The checkout girl wasn’t a girl but an older woman in the company overalls, thick grey hair, many rings on her fingers, and within seconds was gauging Georgie. Quick glances, as she passed the stuff over the scanner. Silence attracted attention. Sitting there all day what is there to do but judge people? By their shopping, their chat, their silence. Neurotic, standoffish, bad mother, alcoholic. But she didn’t dare say anything, not even, Nice day.
At the other side of the checkout Georgie piled things into the bags they’d brought, careless.
He’d go away, wouldn’t he? His voice was still there, persistent. But his tone had been innocent, reasonable, what had he done? What had he actually done? He’d sent her flowers. Her heart told a different story, racing, on and on, in time with Tabs’ fast swinging legs.
There was something else. It wasn’t just flowers and a soft voice, her body knew something different. The soft black space between climbing out of the taxi and waking up the next morning in the hotel bed. The family room, the main road roaring outside.
She didn’t pause for Tabs, just pushed on past and she hopped off the seat and ran to keep up. Obedient still, knowing something was up and it was as if the little movement jolted something in Georgie’s head, and she knew. Where she’d seen the girl with the ponytail before.
Lydia’s best friend, Tim’s secretary’s best friend, and she had been watching Georgie as she whispered into the phone. She had been listening. You can’t.
She wouldn’t even have needed to hear the words, would she? Just to see Georgie’s face, her whole body, curled around the phone. Guilty.
You can’t. I can’t.
Guilty.
The phone rang again as they skirted the forest in the car, on the way home. The church came into view, grey against the trees all suddenly bright with autumn colour.
The phone was lying face up on the passenger seat beside her and Georgie dared a glance at it. Cat. Georgie pulled in to the layby beside the church and stopped.
Cat launched straight into it. She was fired up.
‘They’re saying she was working as a prostitute,’ she said, her voice ragged. ‘I won’t have that. I won’t have it.’
‘A – a what?’ Georgie didn’t dare repeat the word, Tabs was quiet in the back, the engine ticking down. Georgie sat very still, staring into the haze of green under the trees. Light falling down through it as she thought of what Cat had said. Holly, sitting on the bathroom floor with her knees up, knowing what Georgie was feeling.
Someone was walking, far off. Sunday afternoon she supposed dully, it’s what people did. Though she never saw anyone walking here.
‘Just because she was living on her own in Soho?’ she asked. Incredulous.
Cat exhaled angrily. ‘Apparently it’s because she let the killer in. They’re saying he was a client. She had plenty of nice knickers and a vibrator and that’s all it takes.’ A furious edge to her voice. ‘I’m going to talk to the police again. I know what had been going on in her life, and they’re just guessing.’
There was noise in the background, someone shouting. A man: it would be Harry. ‘You can’t,’ said Georgie quietly. ‘You’re not well enough, Cat. You can’t – let me talk to Harry.’ Looking quickly round to monitor Tabs, but she was asleep, head tilted back, mouth a little open.
‘I—’ Cat began to protest but then suddenly the fight went out of her. ‘All right.’ Flat and low. ‘All right, I’ll get him.’
Her hand must have gone over the receiver because everything was muffled. Georgie rested her head against the cool glass of the window. The figure in the woods was walking, steady, calm. The lights fell down between the trees, the hummocky mossy ground. It felt like the weirdest time and place to be talking about this stuff.
‘Georgie?’ Harry sounded like he was at the end of his tether. Pain translated as anger: he’d always been that way: Tim was so different, so quiet, so reasonable in every situation Georgie had used to wonder how Cat managed it, but she did. ‘She can’t go to London and talk to the police,’ he said, savage. ‘Her chemo starts tomorrow. The kids are desperate as it is.’
How would Tim be, if she was ill? With a dull sensation of dread, Georgie knew how he would be.
‘OK,’ she said quickly. With no clue of how she could do it. ‘I’ll persuade her.’ Silence, just Harry’s uneven breathing. ‘OK?’
‘OK,’ he said. ‘OK.’
Then Cat was back, snatching the phone from Harry.
‘Look—’
‘I’ll go,’ Georgie said, before she could start. ‘I’ll tell them what I know – how she was with us, what she said in our last conversation, everything I can remember. And I’ll pass on what you know too, until they can confirm it with you. OK?’
Haltingly Cat told her. Began by cataloguing the boyfriends but gave up, there had been too many, she lost track, sounding weary. ‘She always ended up getting dumped.’
‘It was never she dumped them?’ Georgie was taken aback.
‘She was a softie underneath it,’ said Cat and Georgie thought of Holly in the bathroom, the morning after. Over breakfast in the hotel’s stuffy dining room, when she had thought she wasn’t being watched. Her face going from animated to lifeless. Older, sadder. ‘She was a romantic even,’ said Cat quietly, thinking of something else. ‘Believed in happy ever after, love, all that. It’s what kept her going.’
‘The most recent one – what happened to him? I mean – could it be—’
Cat sighed. ‘He’s gone. It hadn’t been a big deal, then he just got a job in New York and left. Two weeks ago he just left, and she was out on the street. That was why she was in an Airbnb. It was that or move in with her mum.’
‘So when she came along with her suitcase – she’d just split up?’
‘Yes—’ said Cat, then stopped.
‘But—’ Georgie hesitated. ‘She didn’t seem down.’
Cat went on, slowly. ‘She called me Friday. I can’t stop thinking about that. I only spoke to her Friday. She was – happy.’
‘Me too,’ said Georgie. ‘That’s when I spoke to her. She did sound happy. I can tell them that. What did she say to you? Did she tell you why? Was there someone new?’
‘I’m not sure,’ said Cat and suddenly her voice was odd, as if something had just occurred to her. ‘I actually – I can’t think straight at the moment.’
‘You’re shattered,’ said Georgie. ‘You get on with the chemo, I’ll go to London.’ With no clue of how she was going to work that, but – but. ‘I’ll find out what they’re saying at the police station. Whatever it takes. But if there’s anything. Anything you remem
ber.’
‘Maybe she’d just been drinking, maybe – I don’t know,’ said Cat but her voice was still distant. There was a pause and then Cat said, ‘Are you going to be all right?’
‘Me?’ Georgie was taken aback.
‘Tim’s away, didn’t you say that? And there was that thing with the car. The dent.’
‘I’m fine,’ said Georgie, thinking, that dent. ‘Tim’s back tonight but—’
But then there was a racket somewhere behind Cat, a door banging and raised voices arguing. ‘Got to get on,’ said Cat quickly. ‘Sunday dinner.’ A breath. ‘You take care.’ And she was gone.
Parked up beside the road Georgie looked out over the tombstones in the afternoon light. He’d stopped, whoever he was, silhouetted against the hazy downlight through the trees. Quite relaxed. He’d got a small backpack on and his thumbs were hooked through the straps. They looked at each other, although neither’s face could be distinguishable, he was too far, she would be just an oval through a car window.
The sound of Cat’s voice, distant, echoed in her head. The sound of her not saying something. You take care. It was what Holly had said, more or less. Holly’s last words to her.
Georgie started the car, indicating carefully, and pulled out into the traffic. As she reached the green bend she looked back, in her rearview mirror and whether she had been looking for him or not, she saw him. Emerging from the trees to stand beside the road, a tall man, lean, a little stooped he was so tall. He watched her disappear.
Chapter Nineteen
Frank was on his knees in the curtained corridor that led from the cloaks to the back yard. He was searching for the boxes he’d lugged in here Friday evening.
Searching wasn’t quite the right word. They weren’t there.
It had got cold. Eddie must have had the boxes. He couldn’t have lifted them on his own, though. Frank had had enough of a job of it.
He was on his own in the club, for the moment. Sunday evenings they barely opened anyway, just a couple of hours, for the ravers to wind down, the alcoholics to pretend they were social drinkers, mellowing out. No one had said who’d be on the cloaks, no one had said anything. Eerily silent, was how it was today. He stood up, brushed at his knees.
A Secret Life Page 18
