Between the Lies

by Michelle Adams

  ‘I’m not taking that.’

  ‘So what are you going to do?’ he almost shouts before getting himself under control. A moment of frustration. ‘Leave this place? That’s what you told your mother, isn’t it?’ He sneers, almost as though it’s a dare. ‘And go where? With whom? You’re not ready to leave this house, Chloe. You cannot be alone this soon after surgery. Now come on. It’s high time we made a start.’

  ‘OK,’ I say. He hands me the tablet, the glass of water, waits for me to comply. I place the tablet on my tongue, then, as I bring the glass up to my lips, move it to the side against my teeth, manage not to swallow it as I take a small sip of water.

  ‘I’m pleased you’ve finally seen sense, Chloe. We can soon have you back on track. It really is so much better if you can’t remember either of them.’

  ‘Dad,’ I say, just as he is sitting down, making himself comfortable. While he isn’t looking, I take the tablet from my mouth, push it between the cushions of the settee. ‘Could you do me a favour before we start?’

  ‘What is it?’ he asks as he looks up.

  ‘I’m cold. I left my jumper on the bed. Would you get it for me before we begin?’ I rub at my scarred leg. ‘I’d go myself but my leg is sore today.’ He smiles, pats me on the head, his hand cold and damp.

  When I hear the creak of his footsteps on the stairs, I stand up from the couch, grab the lawyer’s letter from the mantelpiece and move towards the hallway. I take whatever money is left in a small bowl on the table, a few coins, then slip through the front door, under the dripping arch of wisteria, and run up the driveway as fast as I can. Within a minute or so I’m out through the gate, on my way to Rusperford. I reach into my pocket, pull out the beer mat with Guy’s number on it. He told me to call if I needed help, and I’ve never needed it more than now.

  TWENTY-SIX

  I wait outside the village shop, hiding in the shadow of a hedge. The rain is pouring down, my hair soaked through, the dressing coming unstuck from my head. It’s about fifteen minutes before I hear the slowing of a car, see it pull up alongside the kerb, the tyres sending streams of water rushing over the pavement. The windows are misted over, the bonnet steaming as heat rises from it.

  At first I’m not sure whether it’s Guy or not, so I wait, watch from behind the sparse privet hedge as a shape stretches towards the passenger window. I’ve already seen my father drive past once, cruising along slowly, searching for me. But as a hand slaps against the glass to clear a porthole in the mist, I see Guy’s familiar dark hair. At first he hesitates, and it is only when I step out from the shadow of the hedge and into the downpour that he leans over, opens the door.

  ‘I wasn’t sure if it was you,’ he says as I duck into the car, hood pulled tight over my head. ‘Have you been waiting long?’ He pushes at his sleeve to glance at his watch. ‘I got here as soon as I could.’

  ‘No, it’s fine.’ I have so much I want to ask Guy about: the medication my father tried to give me, the therapy techniques he’s been using. But although I’m the one who called him for help, I’m not sure I trust him enough to just blurt it all out; there’s still the possibility that he might turn around and take me back to my father, like he did when I turned up in the hospital.

  ‘Look at you, you’re soaked. Let me help you out of that.’ I turn to face him, notice that his cheeks are pink from the cold, his hair drying into a mass of wayward curls. He helps me pull my coat out from underneath my body before tossing it over to the back seat. I reach around for my seat belt as he sits back, his eyes on my face, taking in my frozen features. I wish he would get going. ‘You look better,’ he says eventually. He flicks on his turn signal and pulls out. My sense of relief is massive. We are on our way at last.

  We leave Rusperford behind, moving into the stark winter landscape of southern England. The trees are all bare, skeletons of what they were in the summer, branches gnarled and intertwined like nests of spindly fingers. The hedgerows aren’t much better, damp and brown, naked in parts. The landscape feels like me somehow: empty, ripped bare of its vitality and life. It’s just surviving, waiting for a new season to come and bear fruit. It will be months before the first shoots of spring make an appearance.

  We pull onto the A23, heading south. Traffic roars past us, rain coming at us from all directions. We drive through villages, the rooftops of distant houses just visible over the fences and clouds of spray from the road. ‘How are you feeling about today?’ Guy asks.

  ‘Good,’ I tell him. When I called him from the payphone to ask for his help, I told him not to mention the trip to my father; that he thought it was too soon but that I felt I needed to do it anyway. Guy said he understood. And now I’m here in his car, on the way to my old home. Anxiety grips me as a flashback of the crash comes to me, the similarity of the conditions, the memory of heavy rain and my careless driving. I don’t want to think about the accident right now and everything I possibly did to cause it. ‘But I’m also nervous,’ I continue. ‘I’m anxious about what we might find.’

  ‘Do you think there is a chance your husband will be there?’

  ‘I hope so.’ Guy presses down on the accelerator. ‘But part of me is scared that he will be there too.’

  He seems surprised. ‘Why?’

  ‘Because it only raises more questions. Like why he was prepared to accept my father’s money in order to leave me alone. Why I meant so little to him.’

  As we drive, it’s impossible not to wonder what Guy thinks of all this, this plan to return to home in search of a resurrected husband and a lost life. I’m sure he is used to his patients rambling on about their complicated situations, but I don’t want him to think of me as one of his patients. Because Guy has been on my mind for other reasons as well. I like the way he looks at me, the way he touched me in the hotel, how he made me feel desire. It’s a guilty feeling, but it’s human. I want him to like me, think of me as more than a charitable good deed. It’s the fact that he seems like a full, complete person; I want to be part of something like that, instead of being wrapped in the lies and fakery of my family. It’s not even sexual. Not entirely. Just sitting here with him now is enough; he makes me feel alive for the first time in months.

  I watch him as he drives, the car speeding over the South Downs, a landscape of muted green hues tinged silver by the rain. The angle of his jaw is set low, square and distinct. His eyes are a deep brown, his lashes long and dark. After a while he notices my gaze. ‘Everything’s going to be all right,’ he says, like a dependable old friend.

  We arrive in Brighton, and Guy pulls up by the side of the road, buses and cars sailing past. Seagulls squawk relentlessly overhead, as if they are driven by anger. I crack open the window, breathe in the smell. It’s strange, but I don’t feel as I expected to feel coming here, knowing my house is only a short distance away. I’d expected to feel anger towards my father, resentment like I did while I was in my parents’ house, wondering about all the things I’d lost from my life. But instead all I feel is sadness, an overwhelming sense of pity for the person I used to be. Because I realise that in a small house somewhere nearby I once lived a life consumed by difficulties that left me unable to appreciate what I had. And now with Joshua gone it’s too late to get it back.

  ‘Did you hear me, Chloe?’ Guy asks. He’s speaking to me, but I’m lost in the thoughts of my wasted life. I turn to face him. He’s looking at the screen of his phone. ‘I was saying I’ve had five missed calls from your father in the last twenty minutes. No doubt he’s looking for you.’

  I wonder if I look as nervous as I feel. ‘Are you going to call him back, tell him where I am?’

  He sits back in his seat. He doesn’t look at me during those few agonising moments while he decides what to do. ‘Well, I should.’

  I take a chance. ‘But you’re not going to?’

  ‘If you ask me not to, then no. But Chloe, do you want to explain what’s going on?’

  As we sit there amidst the sound
of the cascading waves and the rumble of busy traffic, I tell him what I believe. What I know. And only as I say it aloud do I realise the extent of it.

  For a moment he is quiet as he processes what I’ve said. Then he turns, looks at me. ‘That’s quite a lot to take in, Chloe, and quite a stretch of the imagination.’

  I can see all manner of thoughts running through his mind: am I crazy, is this going to cost him his job, and is it possible that I’m right?

  ‘Listen, let’s just focus on what we know, see if your husband is here. Try not to think about the things your father has told you, or what he might be doing. I know he has made some mistakes, but I’m sure he’s not trying to modify your memories.’

  ‘Is that what you really think?’ I ask. He swallows hard as he looks away, and I’m not remotely convinced that he believes what he has just said. ‘You’re sure he’s trying to help me, even if I feel he isn’t?’

  ‘What else would he be doing? He’s your father. He loves you. Nobody who loves you would try to hurt you.’

  Is that true? Is love binary like that? Or is there a scale that tips between joy and disappointment, altruism and selfishness?

  ‘I just don’t know any more. I’m so confused by it all. My mind feels like a mess.’ We sit for a moment in silence, both of us unsure what to say, and I wonder if he is regretting getting involved. ‘I don’t mean anything by it when I speak like that, Guy. It’s just so hard not to be angry with him.’

  ‘I understand. But try to look at it from his perspective. He knew that your old life was very difficult, and then you woke up and couldn’t remember a thing. He hoped for something better for you, that’s all. Perhaps he hoped for somebody better for you as well.’ He senses my frown. ‘You had left him, Chloe. Remember? You were planning to create a new life. Maybe your father was just trying to help with what he thought you wanted.’

  I think back to my dream, the memory of waking up alone. Hadn’t I allowed myself the idea of being with somebody else? The idea of a partner who wanted the same things as I did? Why now, on the other side of death, do I struggle to imagine what only months before I thought was the answer to my prayers?

  The windows are steaming over again. Guy uses his sleeve to clear a patch of condensation, peers towards the grey haze of a non-existent horizon. In the near-distance I can hear the waves breaking against a shingle shore, the call of the gulls. I suddenly recall the mornings when they would wake me at first light with their petulant conversation. Memories of an empty bed, of watching Joshua search for his father, just metres away from here. Home. If only I had another chance, what would I do? Stay and make it work, or search for something better? For somebody better, as Guy put it? I just don’t know any more.

  Guy turns to me, and his hand finds a place on my knee. ‘It’s only a matter of time before you start to remember more about the life you used to live, which in turn will give you the freedom to move on with your future. One way or another.’

  It’s easy to profess morality when you’re happy, Chloe. And I know you scoffed at the idea, but I always thought of myself as a moral person. Sure, I know I’ve made mistakes, but I’ve paid for them. Oh, how I’ve paid. And while you might laugh at that now, you knew it once. You knew that I was worth something to you, and that our life together meant something to you as well.

  But you just don’t have a clue, do you? You follow your routine of waking, working, swimming, and complaining about how marriage is so damn hard, but you have no idea what I’m going through. What it means to be alone. To want to get back to the life you used to share with the woman you love. All I want is to get you back, Chloe. Do I even exist in your world any more?

  I’ve been there for you. I’ve loved you when nobody else would. When you cried about the mess of your life, I wiped your eyes. There’s nobody for me but you, Chloe. You’re everything to me. I don’t think you realise that you have made me like this. Do you? You told me it would be forever, and I believed the things you said. Now you want to take that away from me. You want to leave. How could you even think that? How do you fucking dare?

  So I’m sorry, but I can’t do this. I can’t stay away from you. I won’t stay away from you. We are made for each other, Chloe. I love you. Why can’t you see it? You. Me. Joshua. Perfect.

  I will not let you make this mistake, finish what we have. I will not let you end us. And if you try again to kill this life we share, I promise you, Chloe, with everything I have, that I will kill you first.

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  We wait for the buzz of the pedestrian crossing and then fight our way through the crowds of shoppers leaving the Sainsbury’s Local. Seeing the place triggers a memory of picking up bread and milk, painkillers if and when Andrew had a rough night. Yes, I remember that. We edge into the mouth of a narrow side street, ripe with the smell of meatball sandwiches coming from a nearby deli. People rush along around us as we negotiate the uneven surface of the road, the tarmac formed like a dirty patchwork quilt. The paintwork on the surrounding buildings is dry and flaking, colours faded. In places whole chunks of plaster have come away from the walls, exposing the bricks beneath.

  We arrive at the front door to a depressing little building. It’s narrow and old, a typical Brighton townhouse, Georgian in style, and a replica of the others nearby. It’s positioned alongside a back-street bar called West End Nights. A crack runs up one side of the wall. I look up at the dark, inky window above, and then down at the lawyer’s letter in my hand. I realise that I know this broken-down house in desperate need of attention. But time, it seems, has put a degree of space between me and it. It’s like seeing an old friend and not being able to quite believe just how much they’ve changed, or falling out of love and seeing all those flaws you have long since denied. Did I really live here in this dingy, dismal place? I look at Guy for reassurance, and he reaches down, takes my hand. I know I did, but this isn’t what I remember when I think of my home now. I recall a place that had neat flowerpots with rainbow colours planted by the window, and lights inside which made it seem warm and inviting. It was small but we were close to the sea, and because of Andrew’s unstable employment and my decision to work for a charity this was the best we could afford. Still it was a nice home. I made it a nice home, and I liked living here. But this place feels alien to me now.

  No garden exists to pretty up the front; instead there’s just a small path that merges with the road, bordered by a set of double yellow lines. Two vehicles are parked with their hazard lights flashing, making the road near impassable for other cars. A hanging basket at the side of the front door contains the remains of a dead clematis plant, chopping back and forth as it is taken by the wind. A gull circles above us, swoops in close, then soars over the rooftops as it heads back out to sea.

  Guy braces himself against the wall, hands in his pockets. His hair blows about in wayward tufts, tousled and curly in the moist salt air. I knock on the door. Wait. No footsteps, no light. I knock again, hear nothing. Nobody is home.

  ‘Maybe we should come back later,’ I suggest.

  But Guy tucks himself in close to the door, then lets a screwdriver slip from his sleeve. He checks once over his shoulder before fiddling the flat end into position alongside the lock. I hear a car door closing and turn to see one of the parked cars pulling away. When I look back, the front door to my house is gaping wide open.

  ‘You broke in?’ I ask as I peer into the dark corridor beyond.

  Guy smiles, standing back. ‘It’s your home, remember?’

  I step over a few splinters of wood and into the narrow corridor. The door is loose but still functional, so Guy closes it behind us. I move along the shadowy tunnel, the smell of something rotten getting up my nose. Everything about the atmosphere is stale. It’s harder to be back here than I thought, and I can feel my breathing quickening. I hear Guy flicking a switch behind me, but we remain in the dark. It’s as if the place has been tarnished, marked in some way by the things that have happened. It
has become a mausoleum of my life, a testament to everything I have lost.

  ‘I think the electricity is off,’ he says, heading towards the kitchen, which connects via a peninsula of cupboards to the lounge. He opens the door of the fridge and pulls out a mouldy loaf. The scent of sour milk fills the air. ‘Definitely off,’ he says as he drops the bread into a nearby bin, wafting the air with his hand. It must have been there for the best part of three months.

  I am standing with one hand on the back of the tartan sofa, feeling the texture underneath. I must have sat here thousands of times. Yet nothing feels like mine. But when I look down, see one of the scatter cushions lost to the floor, I remember Andrew sleeping here. I used to wake up to find him passed out in this very spot, the image so stark in my mind. The thought that I might never see him again is enough to make me feel sick.

  Guy picks up the phone, listens to the receiver. ‘Still connected.’ He comes up behind me, making me jump as he touches my arm. ‘Are you all right? What is it?’

  ‘This place smells,’ I tell him, unable to admit to the surfacing memories, the odours of blood and vomit, the messes I had to clear up. He smoothes his hands across my shoulders and down my arms in a protective way. For a moment I can feel him behind me, the heat of him, before he moves to open a side window for some air.

  I walk to the rear of the house and turn the key in the back door, opening it wide into a small yard. The wind rushes in through the open space, bringing with it a handful of leaves and an old McDonald’s wrapper. But the fresh air carries with it more than rubbish; there is also the smell of the sea. I recall that day I took the decision to leave, sitting with Joshua, staring at the waves. I realise now that neither in life nor death did I ever manage to protect him. I close the door again, turn the key in the lock.

  ‘There’s nobody here,’ I tell Guy.