The Friend Who Lied

by Rachel Amphlett

  My fingers tighten on the steering wheel.

  Escape. That’s what it was all about. That’s what I’d told the police every time they asked. The five of us together again, for the last time.

  Escaping the reality of our miserable fucking lives.

  I look away from the house, concentrate on the road in front of me, and accelerate past.

  Why didn’t Lisa know I’d been taken in for questioning?

  Hadn’t Hayley or David told her?

  Did they know?

  I reach across to my bag and tug a paper tissue out, braking at the end of the road to let a stream of traffic pass.

  I blow my nose and then toss the tissue onto the passenger seat.

  The persistent tick-tick of the indicator beats a pattern into my memory. It’s like a stopwatch, except it’s counting down.

  Counting down to the inevitable end.

  ‘Shit.’

  A loud blast from the horn on the car behind me sends me skywards out of my seat, rocketing my heartbeat.

  I hold up my hand in apology, and accelerate into the gap that’s appeared into the traffic, avoiding the glares from the other drivers.

  One of them, a woman, shakes her head as I jostle into position, and I bite my lip.

  I take a convoluted route back to the two-bedroom end of terrace I rent on the outskirts of town. I don’t know what I’m going to do.

  The police couldn’t find me at home when they first rang the doorbell because I’d been upstairs, throwing up in the bathroom.

  Moments later, they’d hammered on the door and when I’d answered, DC Angela Forbes glared at me before introducing herself and then marching me to their car, passing a gloating neighbour by the name of Mrs Dawson.

  I was stupid.

  I panicked, that’s all. When Forbes began to question me in the interview room at the police station, I froze.

  She was patient, going over the details she’d gleaned from my original statement taken at the Accident and Emergency department following Simon’s death with an intimacy that was both frustrating and frightening. I was his ex-fiancée, she said, as if that made her more suspicious.

  All the time, I tried to second-guess her.

  What if I gave a wrong answer? What was the wrong answer? What was the right answer?

  If I’d simply focused, given her the basic facts like I’d rehearsed in my mind, it would have been all right. I’d have been in and out of the police station in a matter of minutes. Not the hours I ended up being held.

  Exhausted, I park the car two streets away from my house and take a shortcut along an alleyway behind a row of cinderblock garages that have somehow survived since the sixties. I emerge next to a high wooden panelled gate, insert a key into a relatively new padlock and slip back the bolt before peering through the gap.

  Not only is my own back garden deserted, but Mrs Dawson is nowhere to be seen either.

  I lock the gate, jog to the back door and hurry inside.

  There’s something going off in the kitchen bin, that much is certain but by the time I empty the refrigerator, take the rubbish outside and then wipe down the worktops, I’ve convinced myself I’m back in control.

  Until I see the photographs lined up along the top shelf above the microwave.

  18

  Lisa

  On the television screen, the forty-something woman wearing a bright-red suit jacket over a white blouse mouths soundlessly, her words replaced with the soft snores emanating from my dad.

  He’s exhausted; his fishing expedition started at four o’clock this morning and was fruitless, much to Mum’s amusement.

  While he sleeps, she lets slip that she’s sick of cooking brown trout and wishes he’d take up a different hobby in his retirement.

  We have quiche instead when he wakes up.

  I pick at my food, shaken by Bec’s visit and thankful that Mum and Dad don’t ask too many questions about my appetite.

  I don’t want to lie to them, not after everything I’ve put them through.

  We’re finishing up when the doorbell rings, silencing our conversation.

  ‘I’ll get it,’ says Mum, pushing back her chair. She disappears out into the hallway.

  I put down my knife and fork, glad that the meal is over and I don’t have to pretend anymore. I can’t face the food.

  Dad wrinkles his nose as I pass my plate to him, gathering up the crockery and cutlery before tipping the scraps into the plastic food bin ready to go out the next morning. He shoves the plates into the dishwasher and is drying his hands on a blue fluffy towel when Mum appears at the doorway with a well-dressed man in his forties who I don’t recognise.

  He’s got black hair peppered with grey that’s reflected by his eye colour, his gaze roaming the kitchen until he sets eyes on me at the end of the table.

  Mum follows in his wake and clears her throat to get Dad’s attention, but the man beats her to the introductions.

  ‘Detective Sergeant Alan Mortlock. I was hoping I could have a few words with Lisa.’

  The detective holds out his warrant card to my dad, who takes it from him and inspects it with an air of authority I haven’t seen in him since he quit work. He turns the card over in his hands, taking his time before handing it back and folding his arms over his chest. ‘She’s meant to be recuperating.’

  ‘I realise that, Mr Ashton, but I’m in the middle of an investigation and I need to clarify a few things with your daughter. If we could have a few moments alone?’

  Alone?

  The nurse’s words back at the hospital ring in my ears, about having someone present next time I spoke with the police, and my heart rate skips. I clear my throat, trying to alleviate the dryness that chokes my words.

  ‘What do you want to speak to me about?’

  The detective’s gaze turns to me. He doesn’t smile, but he gestures towards the hallway.

  ‘Do you think we could chat in private? Perhaps the living room?’

  I nod. It’s evident I don’t have a choice.

  Dad leads the way, giving a running commentary like an estate agent as he shows the policeman across the hallway and into the living room.

  As I follow, I notice there’s a second man in the hallway. He’s younger than Mortlock, with pale blond hair cut severely close to his scalp. His suit is immaculate.

  He doesn’t smile, but waits until I shuffle past and then follows me into the room. He stands next to the window, hands crossed in front of his crotch like he’s a secret service agent in an action film or something.

  Mortlock removes his coat and folds it in his lap as he sits in Dad’s armchair before he peers over his shoulder to where Dad is hovering next to the door.

  Dad takes the hint.

  DS Alan Mortlock wants to talk to me. Alone.

  The door to the living room closes behind Dad, and Mortlock turns back to me.

  ‘What do you want?’

  He holds up a hand. ‘Hang on.’

  He goes on to recite a formal caution, the words terrifying me.

  ‘Am I under arrest?’

  The younger detective manages a small smile before it disappears, packed away again under a modicum of authority that doesn’t quite gel.

  ‘No,’ says Mortlock. ‘That’s the wording we have to use before we speak to you.’

  ‘I’ve already spoken to the police.’

  ‘I’m aware of that. I apologise for DC Forbes upsetting you. She can be quite enthusiastic about her work.’

  ‘Aggressive and rude, more like. If I’ve already spoken to DC Forbes, why are you here?’

  Mortlock lowers his gaze to his clasped hands. ‘Simon’s body was released for organ donation immediately by the attending Home Office pathologist who declared him deceased because he’d hit his head. There wasn’t any doubt over the cause of death at the time. After reading the initial report, DC Forbes decided to pursue her own enquiries before alerting me.’

  So, that’s it. Forbes has been
poking her nose in without her boss’s knowledge.

  I pull up the blanket that I discarded earlier, snuggling into it as if I can create a barrier between me and the man in front of me. I’m embarrassed they’re here, now, while I’m in yoga pants and an old sweatshirt, vulnerable. ‘Why did she arrest Bec?’

  ‘I’m afraid I can’t comment about an ongoing investigation,’ says Mortlock. ‘Have you spoken to your friends? The ones who were in the escape room with you?’

  ‘Yes. Bec was here yesterday. Hayley and David visited me at the hospital.’

  ‘Then you’re aware that we’re treating Simon Granger’s death as suspicious.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Again, I can’t elaborate. How long had you known him for?’

  ‘Since we were at grammar school together.’

  ‘Was he a boyfriend of yours?’

  I wrinkle my nose. I don’t like personal questions from strangers, not after all the sessions with the various transplant doctors and surgeons over the past year. I’m tired of being under a microscope.

  He’s waiting, watching me though. Expecting an answer.

  ‘Only for a while.’

  ‘How long?’

  ‘About a year. Then we split up.’

  ‘When? While you were still at grammar school?’

  ‘Yes. When we were doing our A-levels.’

  ‘You went to the same university as well? By choice?’

  ‘Both of us wanted to study there, and we ended up being offered places at the same time.’

  ‘Interesting.’ He glances over at his colleague, who’s scratching a ballpoint pen across a black notebook, his brow furrowed in concentration.

  The silence spins out, and I realise Mortlock’s waiting for me to talk. I read somewhere it’s a classic interviewing technique.

  I don’t give him the satisfaction.

  Eventually, he nods as if confident the junior detective has caught up, and then turns his attention back to me.

  ‘Were you aware of any grievances between Simon and your other friends?’

  ‘I wouldn’t call them grievances, no. He could be a pain in the arse sometimes.’

  That makes him smile. ‘In what way?’

  I shrug, then wince as the movement pulls my stitches. ‘He liked to wind up people. I can’t imagine that it’d be serious enough for anyone to want to kill him though.’

  ‘What do you recall? That day you all went to the escape room. It was your birthday, wasn’t it?’

  I tell him the ragged details I can remember. I blush as I describe taking the painkillers. Having two police officers hanging on my every word makes me feel self-conscious.

  When I finish, Mortlock leans back in the armchair, his eyes never leaving mine.

  Finally, he gives a slight nod and then stands, gesturing to the other detective who puts away his notebook before turning back to me.

  ‘All right, that’s all the questions I have for now. Thank you – we’ll see ourselves out.’

  When the door to the living room closes, I hear Mum and Dad speaking with Mortlock in the hallway, their voices convivial, helpful.

  I sink back into the soft cushions and let out a breath I didn’t realise I’d been holding and try to fight down a rising sense of panic that is taking hold.

  I need to find out what happened to Simon.

  I need to find out if one of my friends is a killer.

  19

  Bec

  I rub at heavy eyelids, and it takes me a moment to wonder why I’m sitting upright.

  The room is in darkness.

  Thick curtains cover the windows, but through the crack in the material appears a light-grey hue as weak sunlight attempts to break the night’s stranglehold.

  A solitary blackbird sings beyond the glass, a multi-note chirp that used to fill me with joy.

  Now it reminds me that I have to face another day.

  I’ve got my bearings now. Since moving in, I’ve added cheap or second-hand furniture to the meagre belongings I’d brought from Simon’s place when we’d split up.

  I fell asleep in the overstuffed armchair I bought in a charity shop, and now I stare at the threads I picked from the arms last night and wonder if it’d be simpler to throw it away.

  I wince as I uncurl my legs, cramp seizing my calf muscles.

  My toe catches the wineglass, the soft chink of cheap crystal on exposed floorboards reaching me a split second before I remember I didn’t finish the Pinot Noir.

  I groan as I lean forward and contemplate the puddle of red that pools next to my feet, and then gasp as I realise it will reach the discarded photographs unless I move.

  Galvanised into action, I sweep the photos from the floor and lob them onto a low table already piled high with magazines before hauling myself upright and heading to the kitchen.

  Moments later, I return with paper kitchen towel and a tea towel soaked in water and wipe up the spilt wine, grateful at least that the glass didn’t shatter but wrinkling my nose at the smell.

  I pad out to the kitchen, throw away the sodden paper towel and chuck the cloth in the washing machine, before I switch on the kettle.

  I change my mind as it starts to boil and pour a pint of water from the filter jug instead, finishing half in four deep gulps. I drink the rest, and stand, panting, staring at the mobile phone next to the microwave.

  It’s dead, despite being plugged in. In my stupor last night, I’d forgotten to flick the switch on the socket.

  I didn’t mean to drink so much. I couldn’t sleep.

  I tried, but the nightmares woke me up. When I checked my watch, it was only one o’clock in the morning, but I knew it was pointless lying there in the dark, so I got up and came downstairs.

  The phone is flat because I played games on it for two hours straight while I worked my way through the first half of the red. I didn’t go on social media – I haven’t used it in years, so I’ve never put the apps on my phone. I stared at the screen and played game after game of Solitaire and then when I grew bored with that, switched to Sudoku.

  None of it worked.

  The photographs taunted me, teased me, beckoned until I slid the phone aside and picked up the first of the three silver frames.

  We’d swapped places by the time this photograph was taken. I was wearing Hayley’s reindeer antlers and she was the one behind the camera.

  Greg was holding up his fingers behind Lisa’s head and laughing – she’d moaned about not having any antlers of her own to wear, and he’d obliged.

  I run my thumb over his face.

  Behind him, David’s expression is hard to read. He’s glancing sideways at Lisa, his mouth tight. I didn’t realise he wasn’t smiling at the time.

  Trust Hayley to take a photograph when someone wasn’t ready for the camera.

  Four of us were eighteen in this image; David had had his birthday a couple of months before, then Lisa in November.

  Already, a rivalry had begun between the three boys as each of them jostled for position within our group. Simon always won.

  It helped, I think, that Simon and Lisa split up months before starting university.

  I didn’t know any of them before then. Although five of us lived in the same city, we grew up in different suburbs, or – in David’s case – one of the outlying villages, and apart from Simon and Lisa, attended different schools.

  Hayley and I ended up sharing a house with two others near the campus, Simon and Lisa both stayed at their respective parents’ houses in order to save money, which left Greg and David in the halls of residence.

  It makes Simon’s death harder to bear.

  We’re local, and people will talk.

  I push the photograph aside and pick up another – our graduation day, five years ago.

  God, we look happy.

  Five years, and yet it could have been a lifetime ago.

  I remember the exhilaration being tinged with a sense of dread. Since I was five years old, I’d
been part of the academic system. Seventeen years of study and organised structure.

  The future was terrifying.

  Suddenly it didn’t matter what your grades were, what the best TV show was, which celebrity we’d like to shag.

  It was all about employment prospects (dismal), careers, future mortgages – being an adult.

  Greg isn’t in the photograph.

  We hadn’t seen him for over two years by then.

  No one had.

  No one talked about it. That’s what we’d agreed.

  Simon and I got together properly two years ago. We hadn’t seen each other for a while, and it had been Lisa who’d suggested we all catch up “for old times’ sake”. We’d arrived at the restaurant near the marina before anyone else.

  He’d bought me a drink and we had wandered out to the deck to watch the sailing boats come in before sunset, the air around us full of conversation and laughter as people eased into the weekend.

  Lisa was delighted when she found out Simon and I had spent the rest of that weekend together, claiming full responsibility with a knowing smile. It made it all the more unforgivable when I discovered for myself what she hadn’t told me about him.

  What he was really like.

  I don’t know if we’re ever going to get past that now.

  I drop the photograph to the table and scramble from the armchair, then pull back the curtains to reveal a mediocre morning sky, all grey clouds and drizzle.

  The living room is musty, cloying, and I need a bath.

  I find my tablet computer in the bedroom, find a music playlist I love in the hope it will silence the thoughts going around in my head, and cross to the bathroom.

  As I run a generous portion of bath soak into the churning water, I stagger. I’m still exhausted, too tired, too anxious.

  Steam rises from the surface of the water as I lean over and twist the taps, the cold one refusing to close properly so that a steady drip-drip beats a rhythm that echoes off the tiles.

  I can’t stop it – the memory of Greg’s face that night resurfaces, and I shiver.

  Why the hell did David think an escape room was a good way to celebrate Lisa’s birthday, when we can’t even escape our past?