Cross Her Heart

by Sarah Pinborough

  I stare at him, this peacock of a boy who’ll be bald and fat and unfuckable by the time he’s forty. This boy who knows nothing. ‘How dare you! How dare you presume to know my feelings?’

  Red spots rise in his cheeks. He doesn’t know whether to go forward or back.

  ‘She stole the money.’ A soft voice, barely there. Stacey. Sweet, dumb Stacey, defending her man. Julia’s eyes dart back and forth, relishing every moment of this overdue confrontation. There’s a long pause of held breaths, and then I don’t disappoint as all the heat rushes out of me. A blaze of fiery words.

  ‘God, you’re all so fucking stupid!’ I say. ‘You can’t see what’s right in front of you! Lisa never stole any money! Jesus Christ, ten years she worked here and never a penny went missing! Julia stole it! Little miss resting-bitch-face over there. Yes, you! And you know how I know? Lisa saw you at the party. You took twenty quid out of Penny’s wallet and bought her a thank you bottle of wine with it! You want to talk about crazy? Well, that’s crazy!’ I pause for a breath, my whole body shaking, as they stare at me.

  ‘Yes, Lisa did something terrible a long time ago, and no, I’m never going to understand it, or get my head around it, but fuck you for thinking people can’t change. Fuck you for being so quick to believe the worst because you’re too young and too lucky to know what life can make you do, and fuck you all for being so stupid to think that girl’ – my finger stabs at Julia – ‘that woman, because she’s my age if she’s a day – is your friend!’

  I finish my tirade to an applause of silence and wide eyes. Stacey looks about to burst into tears. Toby’s mouth is hanging open but his eyes are gleaming with regret he hadn’t videoed me on his phone. They don’t get it. They’ll never get it. But still, I’m feeling better already, as if I’ve just vomited up bad food, and then I see Julia’s expression. Victorious even as she tries to look distressed. She’s not looking at me. She’s looking over my shoulder. My stomach sinks. Penny’s arrived. Of course she has.

  ‘Perhaps you should go and work from the hotel, Marilyn,’ she says. Her smile is tight. Any other day and I’d be fired, I’m sure of it, but God bless Simon Manning. ‘Feelings seem to be running a little high this morning and I know you have a lot to organise there.’

  I nod. I’m like a scolded child and suddenly I want to cry. All I do is cry these days. I won’t now, though, I’m not giving Julia the satisfaction. I don’t trust myself to speak as I gather my things together. Screw you too, Penny. My eyes blaze into hers and the ten years of trust between us burns to ash.

  ‘One more thing,’ she says, as I head towards the door. I turn. ‘Apologise to Julia. She didn’t deserve that.’

  Now all I want to do is laugh. Or applaud. Julia’s certainly the ringmaster of this little circus. I stare at her and she stares back. Her eyes give nothing away. She looks truly hurt by what I’ve said. She deserves a bloody Oscar.

  ‘I apologise, Julia.’ It’s clear from my tone I’m not sorry at all, but still she darts her eyes sideways in a Princess Diana poor me way, and tentatively smiles.

  ‘Please,’ she says. ‘It’s okay. I know it’s been a difficult time for you.’

  God, she’s good, but I’m not buying it for an instant. My back is stiff as I walk out. Fuck you, Julia, if you think this is over. My hand trembles as I press the button for the lift. If you think that, then you don’t know me at all.

  50

  LISA

  Julia walks to work and back. If the thought hadn’t woken me with a jolt, I’d probably have slept right through the day and maybe round to morning. All those pills they were giving me having a final assault on my system. It was two thirty in the afternoon when I got up, a whole morning lost. I felt brighter though. More together.

  I showered, applied ‘Lily’, gathered my meagre belongings together in case I couldn’t return, and was out of the hostel by three thirty and on the bus ten minutes later. Julia walks to work. She bragged about it on the first day and has said it more than once since. It’s a couple of miles or so but I enjoy it. Julia Katie, Katie Julia. The names beat out the seconds and minutes of my journey and then, despite my sweating palms and palpitating heart, I headed towards PKR and grabbed a coffee in the cafe opposite, sitting in the window and pretending to read a paper. I was sure that at any moment someone would recognise me, or the police would swarm in and arrest me, but there was nothing. Not a single batted eyelid.

  Finally, five o’clock came and within minutes Julia emerged from work. I’d half-hoped to catch a glimpse of Marilyn, to see she was okay, but there was no sign of her. Once Julia had got a few feet ahead, I sauntered out and, keeping my distance, followed her. She didn’t look back once. And so here I am. Still free. Still Lily, and also still terrified Lisa, desperately needing to save her daughter.

  I hide under a tree and study the house. A sixties or early seventies terrace of four small homes in a row, a thin strip of grass – not nearly enough to be considered a garden – in front of each. Early council housing is my conclusion, and judging by the litter a little further along, this street hasn’t been sold off to private owners. Surely she can’t have Ava in there? There can’t be much privacy – neighbours would hear any noise. A cellar, perhaps? Do these houses have cellars? I’m bemused. I’m not sure what I’d expected of Julia; probably something modern and soulless, but also practical and safe. Like the house Ava and I lived in.

  And Katie? Katie of the big house and the piano lessons and the perfectly pleated skirts? Could she live here? Katie could live anywhere, the Charlotte inside me whispers. Katie could do whatever it takes. Katie would pretend she was Charlotte. Games and fantasies and dares. Katie and Charlotte.

  I reach inside my jacket and grip the handle of the knife in the pocket. Youth hostels are so easy, so friendly. A knife from a kitchen drawer gone in a moment while asking for a teaspoon. Charlotte’s old shoplifting skills served me well.

  If she has Ava somewhere else, she’ll have to go out and check on her. She won’t have a partner in crime. Not Katie. That was always my role. My stomach tightens. She has my daughter. I want to peel her face off while she screams. But part of me wants to see her too. I’m sick. I must be.

  I wait, unsure what to do – you can wear as much make-up as you want, but invisible Lisa still has a hold – as gathering storm clouds make the night darker than it should be in summer. Lights go on. Movement behind net curtains. Who the hell has net curtains? I move forward under the overhanging branches, and unable to take any more, sure I’m going to vomit where I stand, I decide this is it – I have to go and confront her.

  Headlights turning into the road stop me. The car slows, pulling up on the kerb, and my breath catches as I shrink back into the gloom, khaki against bark. I know this car. It’s Marilyn’s car. What the hell is she doing here?

  51

  BEFORE

  1989

  ‘It worked perfectly!’ Katie scrambles in through the window to where Charlotte is waiting in the stifling heat of the old house. ‘You’re so clever, Charlotte, you really are. How on earth did you know all that stuff?’

  She shrugs. ‘Read it in one of my ma’s books.’

  ‘Well, it went like a dream.’ She holds out two large slices of chocolate cake. ‘Mummy made it for me to take to Mr Gauci’s house for him and his wife. I’ve got sandwiches too.’

  They sit on the dusty mats and start their feast, Charlotte making sure to chew the thick white bread – no cheap thin doughy slices for Katie’s family – slowly, enjoying the butter and mustard and proper ham.

  ‘You should have seen his face,’ Katie’s eyes shine with the memory, ‘when I told him that if he didn’t go along with letting me out all day, I’d say he’d touched me. He went positively puce.’

  Charlotte doesn’t know what puce is, but it sounds a bit like puke so she figures Katie means green.

  ‘He said no one would believe me, and so I said all the things you’d told me, the detail of what I’d
say he did, and I swear I thought he might cry. I ended up pretty much comforting him. I did explain that no one would ever find out and he was basically getting paid for nothing, so why worry? I told him to take his wife out to lunch. And d’you know what I said after? Oh, Charlotte, you’d have been so proud!’

  ‘What?’ Charlotte says, smiling. Katie’s joy is her joy. Katie is the sunshine. Katie leans in, their faces kissing-close.

  ‘I told him maybe he should try some of the things I’d mentioned on her!’ She bursts into laughter. ‘Oh God, you should have seen it! I thought he might die!’

  Charlotte tries to laugh but her smile is stretched too wide. Tearing at her like the sharpness in her gut. Those were things from the chippy that she’d given to Katie. She’d earned that knowledge not from a trashy novel, but from a small room reeking of hot fat and sweaty men.

  ‘Anyway,’ Katie waits until she’s swallowed a bit of her sandwich before continuing to speak and Charlotte makes a note not to talk with her own mouth full any more. ‘I did the work in about five minutes, so if Mummy asks when she picks me up, there’s no need for suspicion. The summer hols are ours! Four hours a day, anyway.’

  ‘Will she come to check on you, do you think?’ Charlotte says, worried. It would be shite if Katie’s ma caught her out. She’d lock her up all summer for it, to keep her safe.

  ‘No. She’s seeing the therapist and he told her she has to let me be during the tutor lessons. Death, death, death, worry. That’s all she does. I wouldn’t mind if she was worried about her own – her death I could cope with – it’s all being transferred to me. It’s not fucking fair.’

  That makes Charlotte laugh. Katie has given her surreal and puce. In return, Charlotte has given her fucking and shite.

  ‘You wouldn’t have had to have the extra lessons at all if you didn’t play so soft and simple all the time.’

  ‘Life is easier this way,’ she says with a shrug. ‘Why do you play so tough?’

  ‘I don’t play tough,’ Charlotte grins and Katie smiles back, leaning on her shoulder. After a moment, she sits upright and frowns.

  ‘You’re getting boobs!’ One slim finger pokes Charlotte’s chest.

  ‘Get off!’ She pushes Katie’s hand away, blushing and awkward. She’s tried to hide it under a baggy shirt but her chest is getting bigger. She hates it. Ma said there was no point in getting a training bra because if she got big as fast as they did in Ma’s family then in a couple of months she’d need a proper one.

  Katie looks down at her own slight frame. Not even the hint of anything other than flatness under her shirt. ‘That’s not fair. I’m months older than you. If you get your period before me as well, I’m going to be so annoyed.’

  Charlotte wrinkled her nose. ‘Don’t be disgusting.’ She gets to her feet. She’s itching to do something. She’d taken half of one of her ma’s pills this morning but the haze is wearing off and she wants to rob some booze. She doesn’t want to think about boobs and periods and the things she’d pretended to have read in a book. She wants to run away with Katie and stay like they are forever.

  The curse, that’s what Jean calls it. She’ll be getting the curse soon. You’d better make sure she knows what to use.

  The curse. Getting the curse. It’s hanging over her, she can feel it. Of course she’ll get the curse first. She’s cursed already.

  52

  NOW

  MARILYN

  I bang hard on the door, the muggy heat fuelling my irritation. There’s probably a bell but I can’t be bothered to look. I don’t care what she said in the office, I’m damned well going to have it out with her now. Apologise? Penny can go swivel. I’ve been quietly raging all day about her smug little face, and I’m going to get it out of her about the money even if no one will believe me. I want to know for me.

  No one answers and I bang again.

  ‘I know you’re in there, Julia!’ She doesn’t get off so easily. There are lights on, I can see them behind the awful net curtains – she must surely be renting – so someone’s home. The door opens as thunder rumbles overhead and the first drops of rain fall. She stares at me and neither of us speak.

  ‘Who is it?’ a voice calls from inside. A voice that grates with bitterness and cigarettes. ‘Whatever they’re selling, we’re not buying anything!’

  ‘What are you doing here?’ None of Julia’s usual cockiness. She looks tired, shoes kicked off on the thin carpet but still in her office clothes. Her blouse is untucked, the edges creased and her sleeves are rolled up.

  ‘We need to talk.’

  She glances behind her, up a flight of stairs. A chairlift is at the top and I can also see a pile of creased clothes on the landing. There’s a wheelchair in the hall. ‘It’s for me!’ she calls back. ‘Someone from work to talk about the promotion I might be getting.’

  ‘Promotion? What prom—’

  She puts one finger to her lips, and I find myself falling silent as she nods me inside. I’m thrown by all this. I expected a sleek single girl’s apartment. Small but blandly stylish. I come in from the rain and she closes the door behind me, signalling me into a downstairs room.

  ‘Why would you come here?’ she says quietly. Her cockiness is gone, it’s all defensive aggressive now.

  ‘You live here?’ I ask. The room is too hot, central-heating-on-in-summer hot and there’s a sharp tang in the air it takes me a moment to identify. Stale urine.

  ‘My mother’s house. Yes, I live here. What do you want, Marilyn?’

  I’m so confused that for a moment I don’t know why I am here. ‘The money,’ I say eventually. ‘You’re the thief. Lisa wouldn’t lie about that. I just want to hear it from you.’ I look around. ‘I don’t understand you. The veneers on your teeth. The fillers? You have them, don’t bullshit me. But you live like this.’ I wave my hand around. ‘Why spend money on shit like that? Why steal money to spend on shit like that? Why steal money from Penny only to buy her something with it? I don’t get it!’

  It seems that there are many types of crazy in the world. Richard crazy, Lisa crazy – even though I can’t quite bring myself to believe that – and now Julia crazy.

  ‘Yes, I have veneers. Yes, I have fillers. And before you ask, yes, I have credit-card debts up to my eyes because of it.’ She’s angry. ‘But what do you know about my life? So your husband beats you up and we should all feel sorry for you? More fool you for staying when you could have got out!’

  Her words are barbed and they sting more for the truth in them. I was a fool to stay. To waste so much of my time.

  ‘At least you could get out,’ she continues. ‘Have you tried getting care for someone on the NHS? I’ve been looking after her’ – she stabs a finger up at the ceiling – ‘for pretty much all my adult life. She’s not bad enough for a full-time care home but bad enough to fuck up my life. I pay for someone to come in so I can go to work. I don’t have a car. I don’t have holidays. And it’s hard to get a job when you’re forty and tired and every minute of your sorry life shows on your face.’ Now she’s started she can’t stop. All her containment gone.

  ‘But now she’s dying!’ Her face shines with glee. ‘A year at the most. And then I’ll finally be fucking free. So yes, I’ve spent money trying to look younger. I have a whole youth to reclaim. And yes, I stole the money, and I used it to buy drinks in the pub and cakes for the office. Because I am going to have a better life and I’m going to have friends and people are going to think I’m smart and clever and important. And I’m not going to let you stop me. So fucking sue me or report me or whatever, but it will be your word against mine! And right now, your word means shit!’

  She’s breathing heavily, exhausted with the emotional effort, and I almost laugh because for the last few seconds I’ve barely heard a word she’s said. Her diva moment, the confession I came here for, and it’s like I’m hearing her under water.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ I mutter. ‘I’m going to have to go.’

  �
�What?’ She looks like she’s been slapped.

  ‘I’m sorry I came. You’ve got enough going on. I won’t say a word.’

  ‘That’s it?’ Julia says. ‘You don’t want anything?’

  ‘I really have to go.’

  I leave her standing there, dumbfounded, and as soon as I turn away she dissolves into nothing in my head. My hands tremble as I drag the front door open and suck in rainy air that thankfully doesn’t stink of stale piss. I don’t care about Julia. I care about the person I just saw. I look to my left. She’s hiding but I can see her.

  The net curtains in Julia’s sitting room didn’t quite reach the sides of the windows and somewhere in the middle of Julia’s rant, I’d seen a face, a clown face of running make-up in the rain, under blue hair shaved at the sides, pressed up to the glass. Our eyes met and it vanished. But I’d know her face anywhere.

  Lisa.

  ‘Get in the car,’ I mutter, as I pull up by the tree and lower the window. ‘Now.’

  53

  LISA

  ‘It’s not her.’

  ‘What?’ I can’t focus. I’m trembling. I have been since I got into the car. Marilyn. She’s holding the steering wheel so tightly as she drives, her knuckles are white.

  ‘Julia.’ She glances over at me. ‘She’s not Katie.’

  ‘That’s what you were doing there?’ I stare at her. I can’t stop staring at her as I try to process what she’s saying.

  ‘No, I was there about the money, but I’m presuming it’s what you were doing there.’

  ‘I was … I …’ I don’t know what to say. ‘How do you know?’ I ask.

  ‘It’s definitely not her. Trust me.’

  And I do. I do trust her completely. But inside I crumple. Here, with Marilyn, I’m Lisa again. Tough Lily is only a mask, and Charlotte is so long in the past she’s a stranger. Ava, my beautiful Ava. I was so sure, so sure Julia had her, and now my hope slips like sand between my fingers and I can’t grasp it. I’ve let her down. She hates me. She’s going to die hating me and it’s all my fault.