The Breakdown

by B. A. Paris

  ‘Thanks,’ I say, taking the mug from him. ‘Did you manage to sleep?’

  ‘Yes, like a log. I’m sorry I couldn’t wait up for you. How was your journey back?’

  ‘Fine. Lots of thunder and lightning, though. And rain.’

  ‘Well, at least the sun is back out this morning.’ He nudges me gently. ‘Move over.’ Careful not to spill my tea, I make way for him and he climbs in beside me. He lifts his arm and I settle back into him, my head on his shoulder. ‘A woman has been found dead not far from here,’ he says, so softly that I almost don’t hear him. ‘I just heard it on the news.’

  ‘That’s awful.’ I put my mug on the bedside table and turn to look at him. ‘When you say not far from here, where do you mean? In Browbury?’

  He brushes a strand of hair from my forehead, his fingers soft on my skin. ‘No, nearer than that, somewhere along the road that goes through the woods between here and Castle Wells.’

  ‘Which road?’

  ‘You know, Blackwater Lane.’ He bends to kiss me but I pull away from him.

  ‘Stop it, Matthew.’ I look at him, my heart fluttering behind my ribs like a bird trapped in a cage, waiting for him to smile, to tell me that he knows I came back that way last night and is just teasing. But he only frowns.

  ‘I know. It’s horrible, isn’t it?’

  I stare at him. ‘Are you serious?’

  ‘Yes.’ He looks genuinely puzzled. ‘I wouldn’t make something like that up.’

  ‘But…’ I feel suddenly sick. ‘How did she die? Did they give any details?’

  He shakes his head. ‘No, just that she was in her car.’

  I turn away from him so that he can’t see my face. It can’t be the same woman, I tell myself, it can’t be.

  ‘I have to get up,’ I say as his arms come round me again. ‘I need to go shopping.’

  ‘What for?’

  ‘Susie’s present. I still haven’t got her anything and it’s her party tonight.’ I swing my legs from the bed and stand up.

  ‘There’s no hurry, is there?’ he protests. But I’ve already gone, taking my phone with me.

  In the bathroom, I lock the door and turn on the shower, wanting to drown out the voice in my head telling me that the woman who’s been found dead is the one that I passed in my car last night. Feeling horribly shaky, I sit down on the edge of the bath and bring up the Internet, looking for news. It’s Breaking News on the BBC but there are no details. All it says is that a woman has been found dead in her car near Browbury in Sussex. Found dead. Does that mean she committed suicide? The thought is appalling.

  My mind races, trying to work it out. If it is the same woman, maybe she hadn’t broken down, maybe she had stopped in the lay-by on purpose, because it was isolated, so that she wouldn’t be disturbed. It would explain why she hadn’t flashed her lights, why she hadn’t asked for my help – why, when she’d looked back at me through the window, she hadn’t made any sign for me to stop, as she surely would have if she’d broken down. My stomach churns with unease. Now, with the sun streaming in through the bathroom window, it seems incredible that I hadn’t gone to check on her. If I had, things might have ended differently. She might have told me she was fine, she might have pretended that she’d broken down and that someone was coming to help her. But if she had, I would have offered to wait until they arrived. And if she had insisted I leave, I would have become suspicious, I would have got her to talk to me – and she might still be alive. And wasn’t I meant to have told someone about her? But distracted by Rachel’s text and the present I was meant to have bought for Susie, I’d forgotten all about the woman in the car.

  ‘Are you going to be long in there, sweetheart?’ Matthew’s voice comes through the bathroom door.

  ‘I’ll be out in a minute!’ I call over the sound of the water running wastefully down the drain.

  ‘I’ll make a start on breakfast, then.’

  I strip off my pyjamas and get into the shower. The water is hot but not hot enough to wash away the burning guilt I feel. I scrub my body fiercely, trying not to think about the woman unscrewing a bottle of pills and shaking them into her hand, lifting them to her mouth and swallowing them down with water. What horrors had she endured to make her want to take her life? As she was dying, was there a point when she began to regret what she had done? Hating where my thoughts are going I turn off the water and get out of the shower. The sudden silence is unsettling so I locate the radio on my phone, hoping to hear someone belting out a song full of hope and cheer, anything to stop me from thinking about the woman in the car.

  ‘… a woman has been found dead in her car in Blackwater Lane in the early hours of the morning. Her death is being treated as suspicious. No further details have been given for the moment but the police are advising people living in the area to be vigilant.’

  Shock takes my breath away. ‘Her death is being treated as suspicious’ – The words resonate around the bathroom. Isn’t that what the police say when someone has been murdered? I feel suddenly frightened. I was there, in the same spot. Had the killer been there too, lurking in the bushes, waiting for the opportunity to kill someone? The thought that it could have been me, that I could have been the one to be murdered makes me suddenly dizzy. I grope for the towel rail, forcing myself to take deep breaths. I must have been mad to have gone that way last night.

  In the bedroom, I dress quickly in a black-cotton dress, pulling it from a pile of clothes left on the chair. Downstairs, the smell of grilled sausages turns my stomach before I’ve even opened the kitchen door.

  ‘I thought we’d celebrate the start of your holidays with a slap-up breakfast,’ Matthew says. He looks so happy that I force a smile onto my face, not wanting to spoil it for him.

  ‘Lovely.’ I want to tell him about last night, I want to tell him that I could have been murdered, I want to share my horror with him because it seems too big a thing to keep to myself. But if I tell him that I came back through the woods, especially after he specifically told me not to, he’ll be furious. It won’t matter that I’m here, sitting in the kitchen unharmed, not lying murdered in my car. He’ll feel like I do, scared at what could have happened, appalled that I put myself in danger.

  ‘So what time are you going shopping?’ he asks. He’s wearing a grey T-shirt and thin cotton shorts and, at any other time, I’d be thinking how lucky I was that he was mine. But I can barely look his way. It feels as if my secret is burnt on my skin.

  ‘As soon as I’ve finished breakfast.’ I look through the window to the back garden, trying to concentrate on how lovely it looks but my mind keeps tripping over last night, over the memory of me driving away. She had been alive at that point, the woman in the car.

  ‘Is Rachel going with you?’ Matthew interrupts my thoughts.

  ‘No.’ Suddenly, it seems like the best idea in the world because maybe I could tell her about last night, share the devastation I feel. ‘Actually, that’s a good idea. I’ll phone and ask her.’

  ‘Don’t be long,’ he says, ‘it’s almost ready.’

  ‘I’ll only be a minute.’

  I go into the hall, take the house phone – we can only get mobile reception upstairs in our house - and dial Rachel’s number. It takes her a while to answer and when she does her voice is heavy with sleep.

  ‘I’ve woken you,’ I say, feeling bad, suddenly remembering she only got back from her trip to New York yesterday.

  ‘It feels like the middle of the night,’ she says grumpily. ‘What time is it?’

  ‘Nine-thirty.’

  ‘So it is the middle of the night. Did you get my text?’

  The question throws me and I pause, a headache building behind my eyes. ‘Yes, but I haven’t bought anything for Susie yet.’

  ‘Oh.’

  ‘I’ve been really busy,’ I say quickly, remembering that for some reason Rachel thinks we’re buying something together. ‘I thought I’d wait until today in case we changed our minds
about what to get her,’ I add, hoping to prompt her into revealing what we’d decided.

  ‘Why would we? Everybody agreed yours was the best idea. Plus the party’s tonight, Cass!’

  The word ‘everybody’ throws me. ‘Well, you never know,’ I say evasively. ‘I don’t suppose you want to come with me, do you?’

  ‘I’d love to but I’m so jet-lagged…’

  ‘Not even if I buy you lunch?’

  There’s a pause. ‘At Costello’s?’

  ‘Done. Let’s meet in the café in Fentons at eleven, then I can buy you a coffee as well.’

  I hear her yawning and then a rustle. ‘Can I think about it?’

  ‘No, you can’t,’ I tell her firmly. ‘Come on, out of bed. I’ll see you there.’

  I hang up feeling a little lighter, pushing Susie’s present from my mind. After the news this morning, it feels a small worry in comparison.

  I go back to the kitchen and sit down at the table.

  ‘How does that look?’ Matthew asks, swooping a plate of sausages, bacon and eggs in front of me.

  It looks like I could never eat it but I smile enthusiastically. ‘Great! Thanks.’

  He sits down next to me and picks up his knife and fork. ‘How’s Rachel?’

  ‘Fine. She’s going to come with me.’ I look at my plate, wondering how I’m going to do it justice. I take a couple of mouthfuls but my stomach rebels so I push the rest around for a bit, then give up. ‘I’m really sorry,’ I say, putting my knife and fork down. ‘I’m still full after the meal last night.’

  He reaches over with his fork and spears a sausage. ‘It’s a shame to let it go to waste,’ he says, grinning.

  ‘Help yourself.’

  His blue eyes hold my gaze, not letting it shift away. ‘Are you OK? You seem a bit quiet.’

  I blink quickly a couple of times, sending the tears that are threatening my eyes back to where they came from. ‘I can’t stop thinking about that woman,’ I say. It’s such a relief to be able to talk about it that my words come out in a rush. ‘They said on the radio that the police are treating her death as suspicious.’

  He takes a bite of sausage. ‘That means she was murdered, then.’

  ‘Does it?’ I ask, even though I know that it does.

  ‘That’s usually what they say until all the forensics have been done. God, how awful. I just don’t understand why she would put herself at risk, taking that road at night. I know she couldn’t have known that she’d be murdered, but still.’

  ‘Maybe she broke down,’ I say, clenching my hands together under the table.

  ‘Well, she must have. Why else would anyone stop along such a deserted road? Poor thing, she must have been terrified. There’s no phone signal in the woods so she must have been praying that someone would come along to help her – and look what happened when they did.’

  I draw in my breath, a silent gasp of shock. It’s as if a bucket of ice-cold water has been thrown over me, waking me up, making me face up to the enormity of what I did. I had told myself that she had already phoned for help – yet I knew there was no signal in the woods. Why had I done that? Because I’d forgotten? Or because it had allowed me to leave with a clear conscience? Well, my conscience isn’t clear now. I had left her to her fate, I had left her to be murdered.

  I push my chair back. ‘I’d better go,’ I tell him, busily picking up our empty mugs, praying he doesn’t ask me if I’m OK again. ‘I don’t want to keep Rachel waiting.’

  ‘Why, what time are you meeting her?’

  ‘Eleven. But you know how busy the town is on Saturdays.’

  ‘Did I hear that you’re having lunch with her?’

  ‘Yes.’ I give him a quick kiss on the cheek, wanting to be gone. ‘I’ll see you later.’

  I fetch my bag and take the car keys from the hall table. Matthew follows me to the door, a piece of toast in his hand.

  ‘I don’t suppose you could pick up my jacket from the cleaner’s, could you? That way I can wear it tonight.’

  ‘Sure, have you got the ticket?’

  ‘Yes, hang on.’ He fetches his wallet and hands me a pink ticket. ‘It’s paid for.’

  I slip it into my bag and open the front door. Sunlight streams into the hall.

  ‘Take care,’ he calls as I get into the car.

  ‘I will. Love you.’

  ‘I love you more!’

  *

  The road into Browbury is already heavy with traffic. I tap the steering wheel nervously. In my haste to get away from the house, I hadn’t thought about how it would feel to be in the car again, sitting in the same seat I’d been in when I saw the woman in the car. In an attempt to distract myself, I try to remember the present I’d suggested for Susie. She works in the same company as Rachel, in the Admin section. When Rachel said that everybody had agreed to my suggestion, I’m guessing she was referring to their group of friends from work. The last time we’d met up with them had been around a month ago and I remember Rachel talking about Susie’s fortieth birthday party, taking advantage of the fact that she hadn’t been able to join us that night. Was it then that I’d come up with an idea for a present?

  By some miracle, I find a parking space in the street not far from Fenton’s department store and make my way to the tea room on the fifth floor. It’s crowded but Rachel is already there, easily visible in a bright yellow sundress, her dark head of curls bent over her mobile. Two cups of coffee sit on the table in front of her and I feel a sudden rush of gratitude for the way she always looks out for me. Five years older, she’s the sister I never had. Our mothers had been friends and because her mother worked long hours to support the two of them – having been abandoned by her husband not long after Rachel was born – Rachel had spent a large part of her childhood at our house, to such an extent that my parents affectionately referred to her as their second daughter. When she’d left school at sixteen to begin working so her mother would be able to work less, she’d made a point of coming over for dinner once a week. She was especially close to Dad and had mourned him almost as much as I had when he died, knocked down by a car outside our house. And when Mum had become ill and couldn’t be left alone, she would sit with her once a week so that I could go shopping.

  ‘Thirsty?’ I try to joke, nodding at the two cups on the table. But my words sound fake. I feel conspicuous, as if everyone somehow knows that I saw the murdered woman last night and did nothing to help her.

  She jumps up and gives me a hug. ‘There was such a queue that I decided to go ahead and order,’ she says. ‘I knew you wouldn’t be long.’

  ‘Sorry, the traffic was bad. Thanks for coming, I really appreciate it.’

  Her eyes dance. ‘You know I’ll do anything for lunch at Costello’s.’

  I sit down opposite her and take a welcome sip of coffee.

  ‘Did you have a wild time last night?’

  I smile and a tiny bit of pressure lifts. ‘Not wild, but it was good fun.’

  ‘Was gorgeous John there?’

  ‘Of course he was. All the teachers were.’

  She grins. ‘I should have dropped in.’

  ‘He’s far too young for you,’ I say, laughing. ‘Anyway, he has a girlfriend.’

  ‘And to think that you could have had him.’ She sighs, and I shake my head in mock despair, because she’s never quite got over the fact that I chose Matthew over John.

  After Mum died, Rachel had been brilliant. Determined to get me out of the house, she began taking me out with her. Most of her friends were people she worked with, or knew from her yoga class, and when I first met them, they would ask me where I worked. After a couple of months of telling them that I’d given up my job as a teacher to look after Mum, someone asked why I wasn’t going back to work now that I could. And suddenly, I wanted to, more than anything. I was no longer content to sit at home day after day, enjoying a freedom I hadn’t experienced in years. I wanted a life, the life of a 33-year-old woman.

 
I was lucky. A shortage of teachers in our area meant I was sent on a refresher course before being offered a job at a school in Castle Wells, teaching History to Year 9 students. I enjoyed being back in work and when John, the resident heart-throb of both teachers and students, asked me out, it was ridiculously flattering. If he hadn’t been a colleague, I would probably have accepted. But I refused, which made him ask me out even more. He was so persistent that I was glad when I eventually met Matthew.

  I take another sip of coffee. ‘How was America?’

  ‘Exhausting. Too many meetings, too much food.’ She takes a flat package from her bag and pushes it across the table.

  ‘My tea towel!’ I say, taking it out and unfolding it. This time, there’s a map of New York on the front. Last time, it was the Statue of Liberty. It’s a joke between us – whenever Rachel goes away, on a business trip or on holiday, she always brings back two identical tea towels, one for me and one for her. ‘Thank you, you have the same one, I hope?’

  ‘Of course.’ Her face suddenly becomes serious. ‘Did you hear about the woman who was found dead in her car last night, on that road that goes through the woods between here and Castle Wells?’

  I swallow quickly, fold the tea towel in half, then in quarters and bend to put it in my bag. ‘Yes, Matthew told me, it was on the news,’ I say, my head beneath the table.

  She waits until I’m sitting straight again, then gives a shudder. ‘It’s horrible, isn’t it? The police think she broke down.’

  ‘Do they?’

  ‘Yeah.’ She pulls a face. ‘How awful – imagine breaking down in the middle of a storm, in the middle of nowhere. I don’t even want to think about it.’

  It takes everything I’ve got not to blurt out that I was there, that I saw the woman in the car. But something stops me. This place is too crowded and Rachel is already emotionally invested in the story. I’m afraid she’ll judge me, be horrified that I did nothing to help. ‘Me neither,’ I say.

  ‘You sometimes use that road, don’t you? You didn’t take it last night, did you?’

  ‘No, I’d never take that road, not when I’m by myself.’ I feel my skin reddening and I’m sure she’ll know that I’ve just lied.