Untold Story

by Monica Ali

  He braced himself for the impact, as if by steeling his chest and arms, he would be ready for a ton of metal smashing into him at eighty miles an hour.

  The speed the car was going, it got up so much wind it nearly whipped him around when it swerved right and passed.

  “Fucker,” he yelled after it. “You fuck . . .” He stopped. That was Lydia’s Sport Trac.

  She’d tried to kill him.

  She was on to him.

  He closed his eyes and crossed himself.

  What did this mean? He tried to think, with his heart still jumping out of his shirt. What did it mean? It meant one thing, clearly. He was going to have to speed this whole thing up.

  Chapter Twenty-five

  On Monday evening Lydia went to Esther’s for dinner and on the drive back across town to home she tried to focus on how great tomorrow was going to be. She’d asked for another day off but she’d go into work in the afternoon and present Esther with the money she’d raised from selling the bracelet. The valuer was supposed to be back tomorrow, and she assumed she’d be getting a check on the spot.

  Over dinner, Esther had told her that she’d secured more funding from the ASPCA. It wouldn’t be available for another few weeks, but all they had to do was make it through.

  “I know we’re having tea at Amber’s tomorrow,” Esther had said, “but I wanted to do something for your birthday too. I’m not sure that you know how much I appreciate all that you do.”

  Esther wasn’t one for hugging, so Lydia didn’t inflict that on her.

  Yesterday evening she’d been so whacked out, she’d been thinking all sorts of things. Why would she leave this place? Why would she put herself on the rack again? What she’d found in this place was some peace. And she had found some friends.

  “John Grabowski,” she said aloud, “you’ve got a lot to answer for.”

  There was something she hadn’t worked out yet about his presence here. Was it a total coincidence? Was she supposed to believe that? She had tried.

  She stopped at a red light and drummed her fingers on the steering wheel.

  She had to believe it, or else she would drive herself mad. Raise all of the demons that she thought she had slain.

  Once again she ran over it. He’d shown no sign of recognizing her. He hadn’t been following her, she’d checked so carefully. She had followed him.

  The light turned green. She sat there. Something still wasn’t right. There had to be something she’d missed. She put the car in drive and moved off. They’d met on Wednesday and he hadn’t tried to come near her since.

  Not since. But what about before? That was the first time she’d seen him, but what if it wasn’t the first time he’d seen her?

  How long had he been in town? Mrs. Jackson had come into Amber’s store and invited her to meet him. That was a whole week earlier. If he’d seen her before, he’d already have all the pictures he’d need.

  What was he waiting for? Why was he toying with her?

  She gripped the steering wheel as her stomach lurched. This could not be allowed to happen. She would not let him, he had no right. No-right-no-right-no-right. The words jammed in her brain.

  It wasn’t a raccoon in the oleander outside Carson’s house.

  Damn him. Damn John Grabowski. What gave him the right?

  The town peeled past her on either side. There was nothing and no one on the road as it spooled out ahead and all she could think of was John Grabowski and how much she hated him.

  Out of nowhere he stepped onto the road. Lydia didn’t hesitate. She put her foot down on the gas. He would take her life if he could. He would take it and he wouldn’t have a single regret. She slammed her foot to the floor. He was running, but she’d get him, he wouldn’t get away. At the last moment she swerved to avoid him and by the time she reached home the sweat that had drenched her ran ice-cold down her back.

  She stood in the shower and soaped her face, neck, arms, hands, chest, thighs, shins, feet. Her sanity had slipped through her fingers more easily than this bar of soap. It wasn’t Grabowski who was torturing her. She was torturing herself. This roller coaster of doubts and emotions—she’d chosen to get on it, and if she didn’t like it, then she should choose to step right off again. Hadn’t she learned that by now? That was the hardest lesson. It was no good blaming others. It was no good lashing out. She’d had to leave everything and everyone just to discover that you were the only person responsible for your own peace of mind.

  When she got out of the shower there was someone ringing the doorbell. It was after ten thirty. Nobody came around at this time.

  She could make up a dozen stories to blame Grabowski for this—what?—this relapse. They were just stories in her head. Was she getting some sick kick out of them? All she’d seen, with her own eyes, was him going about his own business. And then she’d nearly run him down.

  He had come over to confront her about it. The doorbell rang again. She didn’t know what she could say. And it would serve her right to have to deal with him now.

  She opened the door in her dressing gown.

  “I know it’s late,” said Carson. “But can I come in? We need to talk.”

  She opened a bottle of red wine and got the glasses and sat down on the sofa, expecting him to sit next to her. He sat down opposite.

  “I’ve been thinking about what happened the other day. We seemed to tie ourselves up in knots.”

  He smiled at her. It was a smile that was full of regret, as if this was all over, as if he’d come to say good-bye.

  “Couldn’t we forget about it?” said Lydia. “Just carry on?”

  He leaned forward in his chair, and for a confused and aching moment she thought he was going to get up and come to her, but he just bowed his head and let it hang. When he lifted it again he said, “I know I said I wouldn’t ask you anything, but I have to. I want you to talk to me.”

  She studied his face, as if she had to memorize it. The lines on his forehead, the mole on the right side of his jaw, the chapping on his lips. His eyes sought hers.

  “We always talk,” she said.

  “You know what I mean.” He held her gaze and there was a sad light in his dark eyes, and she knew exactly what it meant.

  Still, she would try to hold on. “Don’t do this,” she said. “We were fine as we were.”

  “Stop pushing me away, Lydia. I don’t know the first thing about you and every time I try to talk to you, you act like it’s all over.”

  “Isn’t it?” she said.

  He shook his head. “There you go again. What is it that you’re hiding? What dark secret do you have that you can’t share with me?”

  “I’m sorry,” she said. She bit her lip. She thought about the blood coursing down her foot. She imagined it running down her arm, down her body, let it flow.

  “That’s it?” he said. “You’re sorry? What kind of answer is that? Are you a bigamist? Are you working for the FBI? Did you kill someone? What? Aren’t you making this so much more difficult than it needs to be? What can you have done that means that I’m not allowed to know anything about you at all?”

  “You know quite a lot about me,” she said. “You know that I . . .”

  He cut her off. “Lydia, stop it. Stop fucking with my head.” He stood up, and she knew that was it, that he was going to leave. He came and sat down next to her.

  “I say I’d do anything for you, and you tear into me. How am I supposed to take that? More or less, you call me a lying son of a bitch. Is that how you really feel?”

  “No,” she said. The word came out enveloped in misery.

  He put his arm around her shoulder and pulled her into him and kissed her softly on the cheek. “I’m not expecting you to spill your guts to me now. I know you better than that. What I’m asking is, do you think we’re going somewhere with this, and if we are, will you believe me that I might just be able to understand whatever it is that you find so difficult to say?”

  All she
had to say was, yes. All she had to say was, I’ll try. But she cared too much about him to tell him something that could never be. “Please don’t do this,” she said.

  He pulled away from her. He slumped his head back against the sofa, as if she had finally defeated him. For a long minute he didn’t move and she watched him and listened to the blood pounding in her ears.

  “Okay,” he said at last. “Okay. There’s a couple of things I need you to know. One is that I love you. You may not want to hear that. The other is that I’ll be there if you ever change your mind.”

  As soon as she woke the next morning, Lydia went to the bedroom window to look out on the new day. It was early. The pale yellow sun was skeined in a light haze, the dew lay milky on the grass, the surface of the pool ruffled and flattened, the maple leaves danced in the breeze. On the lawn, a rabbit stood on his hind legs and quivered, ears pricked, head swiveling, checking for dangers from every direction. Lydia leaned her forehead against the windowpane and her breath steamed up the glass.

  Today was her birthday. In real life, it wouldn’t be her birthday for another couple of months. In real life she’d be turning forty-six, instead of forty-five.

  What real life? This was her real life.

  She put on her black one-piece, picked up a towel from the bathroom, and went down to the pool.

  She swam for almost an hour and all the time that she was immersed she felt no pain, as if it was rinsed from her body and soul, as though it had dissolved in the water, drained away.

  Afterward, she fed Rufus and then made scrambled eggs and toast. She poured the juice and the coffee and sat down at the breakfast bar. She sat and looked at the plate. She pushed it away and covered her face with her hands, as if someone might see her cry.

  It was inevitable, what had happened with Carson. It was only ever make-believe that she could share her life with him, with anyone. What she wished was that there had been a way of going back and doing it over without hurting him. That was impossible too.

  She had to pick up the pieces now and carry on. The life that she’d made was a life worth living and it was up to her to do that. She had a place to live, her work, her friends, who accepted her for who she was. For who she wasn’t. For who she was now.

  These last few days she had seesawed. It was the old, old pattern returning. But it was up to her. No one was pushing her into it. She alone was responsible. It made her shudder, the fantasy that she’d briefly entertained, of going to live in Washington and insinuating herself back into her old social circles, staging a comeback, slowly revealing herself like some tawdry striptease act.

  An image inserted itself into her brain: Grabowski’s face in the headlights, one arm thrown up in terror, his mouth opened in a soundless scream. She had been out of her head, as if it wasn’t her who was driving, pure paranoia taking over the wheel. He hadn’t hunted her down. That was impossible. It was a coincidence that he was here and there was no way, under these circumstances, that he had recognized her. Even so, it was natural that his being here made her uncomfortable. She could have dealt with that maturely, accepted that it was unfortunate but that she’d have to leave town for a short while to stop herself worrying. Instead, she’d turned the whole thing into a drama.

  Should she go away somewhere today, come back when Grabowski had gone? There were things she had to do today, and it would be awful to miss the party Amber had organized for her. Perhaps she should go tomorrow.

  What would Lawrence advise? He was always full of wise words. Wise words and kindness. What would he say?

  He had told her a story about when he was waiting to meet her in that bay in Brazil, walking on a jetty and coming across a paparazzo he recognized from days of old. When a small child holds a cushion over his face, he said, they believe themselves invisible. They have not yet developed what is known as a theory of mind. They are not able to project themselves into the mind of the other person, and look out, as it were, from their point of view. We adults, he said, sometimes do the opposite. I believed, for a few moments at least, that because I had recognized him, he must have recognized me. In other words, what I was doing was projecting a great deal too much.

  Lydia removed her hands from her face. In her previous life she had felt conspiracy all around her. Constant spying and constant betrayals. She had even believed she would be killed.

  She was a danger to herself. That was closer to the truth.

  If she had ever been the victim, the target of conspiracy, she was no longer. The world did not revolve around her. She wasn’t the center of the universe.

  She got up and cleared the plate of food that she had not touched.

  This morning was not going to be spent wallowing. She would go into the city and sell her bracelet and take the check to Esther. The biggest birthday present she could give herself would be to stop thinking about nothing but herself. She wondered what Carson was doing. This afternoon she would take Zeus and Topper and go for a long walk in the woods. She scraped the plate into the garbage and ran water over it. Out the window she watched the rabbit nibbling at the grass.

  She picked up her car keys from the kitchen counter. She checked her cell to see if Carson had sent a text. Then she pulled open the knife drawer. Ten knives all in a row. She ran her finger along from one blade to the next. She counted them up the line and then she counted them down. As she turned, she used her hip to bang the drawer closed.

  The jewelry store was inlaid with polished wood and bloused silk, like the inside of a casket. The air was stiff with the ticking of clocks. While Lydia waited for the valuer to come out from his office, she perused the lines of silver and gold necklaces, all laid to rest on yards of pale purple silk.

  “A beautiful day, a beautiful woman. What more can a man ask for?”

  “Hello,” said Lydia. “I’ve got a beautiful bracelet for you.”

  “I’m Gunther. I don’t want your bracelet. I want to take you out for dinner.”

  Lydia laughed and slipped the bracelet off her wrist. Gunther appeared to be wearing his pajama top. His hand shook with some kind of palsy as he took the piece from her. The liver spots that spread across his face ran up over his bald head. There was a skittish gleam in his eyes.

  “What?” said Gunther expansively. “You don’t like my outfit? Hannah,” he said to the woman behind the watch counter, “she don’t like my outfit. Tell her she should see how I scrub up.”

  “Don’t mind him,” said Hannah. “He’s only fooling. Gunther, quit fooling around.”

  Gunther pulled an eyeglass from his pocket. He winked at Lydia. “Feminist,” he said. “Can’t get no sense outta her.”

  He laid the bracelet on a piece of green felt, turned a lamp to shine on it, and leaned over with the eyeglass.

  “You sure you want to sell?”

  Lydia nodded. “Yes, please. I’d like you to buy it, if you can.”

  “Sure you wouldn’t rather run away with me?” He plucked at his pajama top. “Don’t let this pull the wool over your eyes. Rich ones are the eccentric ones. Regular Howard Hughes you’re lookin’ at, right here.” He wheezed an old man’s laugh.

  “Gunther,” said Hannah. “Cut it out.”

  “All right, all right,” he grumbled. He turned the bracelet over and examined how the garnets had been set. “Know what’s wrong with the world these days? Everyone’s so darn serious.”

  It was, as Gunther had said, a beautiful day. Lydia put the car windows down and Rufus stood on the passenger seat with his front paws up and his coat glossed back in the wind. The check was in her purse, and the sun on her face was fine. If she kept her mind on what was good in her life, if she put one foot in front of the other instead of whirling around so much she didn’t know which direction she was heading, there’d be peace at the end of this solitary winding road that she had taken. She had to try to stop thinking about Carson. The car made an ominous noise, a rattling in the engine. She listened intently but it had gone, as suddenly as it ha
d come, and perhaps it had only been another figment of her imagination.

  “Hey, Hank,” said Lydia. “Esther around somewhere?”

  “Hello there, Lydia,” he said. “How are you?”

  “I’m great,” said Lydia. “How are you?” She should know better than to try to rush the preliminaries with Hank. There were certain rituals, certain dignities, to be scrupulously observed.

  “I’m doing great too,” said Hank. “Thank you for asking.” He wore his shorts down to his knees, socks with his sandals, and Lydia had never seen his shirt untucked no matter how hot the weather.

  “I can’t seem to find Esther.” She didn’t want to hurry him, but she was excited about handing over the check, nearly nine thousand dollars, made out directly to Kensington Canine Sanctuary.

  “Oh, Esther went out for lunch,” said Hank. “Say, I hear it’s your birthday, Lydia. I didn’t get you a present, only heard about it today. But happy birthday, anyway. And may this day bring you whatever your heart desires.” He bowed at the waist.

  “Thank you, Hank. That’s lovely. Do you know where she went?” Esther never went out for lunch. She brought chicken rice salad in a plastic box every day.

  “Afraid I don’t,” he said. “Heard you were taking the day off.”

  “I’ve got a . . . surprise for Esther,” she said. “Something I’d like to give her. What time did she leave?”

  Hank consulted his watch. “About an hour ago, should be back soon. Went with the English fella she was showing around this morning.”

  “What did he look like?”

  “Oh,” said Hank, raising a hand in slow motion, “about this high, gray hair . . . Hey, Lydia, you off now?” He called after her, “Good news, he’s interested in making a big donation.”

  This was real. This was happening. Sniffing around Amber and then her workplace. Grabowski was going to let the world know that he had found her. She had to be out of this town forever within the next hour. Her hand was shaking so much she could hardly get the key in the ignition. When she finally managed it, the engine turned over once and died. Damn it. Goddamn it. She thumped her hand on the horn. She tried again and then again. “For fuck’s sake,” she shouted. “This is not happening.”