by Cathy Glass
He watched her as she wrote, her long neck with its trailing plait curved gracefully forwards like a beautiful swan reaching over the edge of a riverbank to drink. ‘You know,’ he said after a moment, ‘despite us working together for nearly three years, I sometimes feel I don’t know you at all. It’s like the first day you walked in with a big notice saying “Keep out. Private. Trespassers will be prosecuted”. ’
She looked up and smiled questioningly.
He shrugged. ‘Oh, I don’t mean your rebuffs. I’m game for that. But there’s something else, something I can’t quite put my finger on. A sort of detachment, I suppose. A closed area …’ He paused, searching for the right word. ‘Oh, I don’t know, but whatever it is, it makes you all the more appealing. Though I do wonder if anyone will ever get that close to you.’
Aisha gave a small dismissive laugh and, dropping the letter in the ‘out tray’, stood. ‘The lure of the illusive woman?’ she teased. ‘You know I like to keep my private life separate, David. I always have done.’
‘No, it’s more than that,’ he began again; then shrugged and let it go. ‘Anyway, when you change your mind about dinner, which you will one day, I’ll be waiting.’ He winked and headed towards the door.
‘Thanks again for the flowers,’ she called after him. ‘They’re very much appreciated.’
‘So are you! You’re welcome. Enjoy!’
Aisha watched the door close behind him and then glanced at her watch. She would have to get a move on if she was going to stop off at the supermarket on the way home. She liked to make a special dessert when either of the children brought a friend home for tea. Chocolate gateaux or pavlova – Sarah loved meringue. Picking up the flowers and her briefcase, Aisha unhooked her coat from the stand and went out through the main office, calling goodbyes as she went. At least it wasn’t far to home which was one of the reasons why she had accepted the position. She and the children left the house together in the morning and she could be back by five thirty when necessary.
Going down the steps at the rear of the building, she crossed the staff car park and flicked the central locking system on her car. She smiled to herself as she got in and laid the flowers on the passenger seat. How many bouquets was that now? She’d lost count, and all the little gifts David had left on her desk, or recently, more boldly, presented to her in person. The first had been a potted plant for the windowsill in her office with a note saying he hoped he wasn’t being presumptuous. It must have been over a year ago. That had been followed with chocolates and perfume and then the huge bouquets tied with ribbon. And while initially Aisha had felt uncomfortable accepting the gifts, feeling she was in his debt, it had become a little harmless fun, where David joked he would eventually capture the heart of his boss and they would run off together into the sunset. He was her deputy, and she was the assistant claims manager at Medway Life Assurance Company.
Aisha turned on the heater in the car and pulled to the exit. Sam Griffiths, the sales director, tooted his horn as he drew up behind her and then gave a little wave. She waved back. They got on well. In fact she got on with most of the staff in the small and friendly office. It was a subsidiary of an American company and the directors liked their managers squeaky clean; and for them widowhood equalled dignity, with no skeletons in the cupboard. Aisha suspected the occasional wearing of her sari helped the company’s political correctness. She made a point of wearing it if anyone from the New York head office paid a visit, and it hadn’t gone unnoticed.
Making the detour via the shops, Aisha continued home and parked on the drive. As she got out, she paused to admire the front garden, for even in winter it had colour, with the carefully chosen evergreen shrubs and heathers. She and her father had worked on it all the previous summer, and like the house it now bore her stamp and no trace of Mark. Going in, she found James sprawled on the sofa, as usual, deaf to everything except the music coming from his MP3 player. Aisha ruffled his hair as she went by and he grinned, languidly raising one hand to acknowledge her. There was no sign of Sarah; she would be upstairs with her friend, poring over teenage magazines or trying out new hairstyles.
Aisha set the kettle to boil for a cup of tea and then arranged David’s flowers in a vase. She vaguely wondered what he was doing at this moment. He had a teenage son living with him so perhaps his evening routine wasn’t so very different from hers: preparing the evening meal, tiding, trying to initiate conversation; parents of teenagers who were needed, but not required. Sarah and James’s generation were free spirits, she thought, unrestrained by tradition or the need to be seen to do the right thing.
Aisha glanced at the wall clock – it was nearly six o’clock. She would start the spaghetti bolognese just as soon as she’d paid her evening visit – the visit she made at six o’clock every evening.
Taking the key from under the tea towels in the kitchen drawer, Aisha silently unlocked the interconnecting door to the garage and went in. There was no need to lock it from the inside; the children knew not to disturb her at this time.
She stood for a moment, allowing her eyes to adjust – the only light came from the two candles on the floor, near the centre of the garage. The shadow on the wall opposite danced in the draft from the closing door, like a cave painting of a giant wildebeest on the run. Six o’clock, exactly the right time. She knew because the radio had been on. The six o’clock news coming from Magic, ringing in her ears and drowning out the sound of crunching metal and breaking glass. She stood silently as the shadow sleeked around the walls, then settled, the handlebars sticking out like the antlers of a beast ready to charge. It was the shadow of Mark’s motorbike, the bike returned to her by the police, now balanced on its stand in the centre of the garage, just like the evening she had first seen it. It wasn’t complete, of course, the fenders and headlamps were missing, severed in the crash and swept up with the other debris. The framework was bent in places and the previously immaculate paint work had ugly gashes down both sides. But she’d had it collected from the police compound and kept it, and it had stood here for nearly five years, as a testament, a monument, lest she ever forget.
Aisha walked slowly to the centre of the garage as the shadow of the bike distorted and flickered around walls. Stopping at the side of the bike, she ran her hand over the length of the leather seat, just as Mark had done. Propped at the end of the seat was the framed photograph, partially illuminated by the candlelight. Aisha picked up the photograph and breathed on the glass, then rubbed it hard with the sleeve of her cardigan. The couple in love smiled back, assured and unrepentant. She breathed and rubbed again, then returned it to its position so that it looked out over the garage and kept watch. The candles had burned low and needed replacing; she replaced them every evening from a box kept full on the workbench beneath his tools. The garage was exactly as it had been on that fateful night – a shrine, a cenotaph, an acknowledgement to what she had done and that she was very sorry.
Aisha remained quiet for a few minutes, looking around, taking in the scene and remembering. But tonight, instead of fetching new candles from the box, she squatted down on her haunches and pinched out the last of the flames. The garage fell into darkness.
Memories pale, bitterness loses its edge, pain and humiliation fade. At some point we have to cloak the past in experience and move on, wiser, to the future. Aisha won’t be replacing the candles tonight or ever again, for she has decided that five years is long enough to repent and be sorry. Tomorrow she will make arrangements to have the garage completely cleared – of the bike, his tools, the photograph, and everything. Then possibly the closed part of her that David had recognized might begin to open, and she might, just might, accept his dinner invitation. Her father had been right – an eclipse doesn’t last forever – and there could and would be an even brighter future with a lifetime of tomorrows, just as soon as she told the inspector what really happened that night.
Acknowledgements
Many thanks to my editors – Clare and
Rochelle; my agent – Andrew Lownie; Carole and all the team at HarperCollins.
Also by Cathy Glass
Damaged
Hidden
Cut
The Saddest Girl in the World
Happy Kids
The Girl in the Mirror
I Miss Mummy
Mummy Told Me Not to Tell
My Dad’s a Policeman (a Quick Reads novel)
Copyright
This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.
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© Cathy Glass 2011
Cathy Glass asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
ISBN 978-0-00-729928-7
EPub Edition © 2011 ISBN: 9780007436644
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
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