The Pact_A gripping psychological thriller with heart-stopping suspense

by S. E. Lynes

  Tu es, you are.

  Il/elle/on est… Honest, guvnor, we weren’t doin’ nothin’.

  Got a French test tomorrow morning. J’ai un examen de français demain matin. Squeak. Trainers on lino, or an animal… a mouse? A cough… dry cough… a walkie-talkie?

  Nous sommes, we are.

  Vous êtes, you (posh) or you (lot) are.

  Ils/elles sont, they (men)/they (women) are. Unless they’re mixed and then they’re men again. Begin again, Michael Finnegan. He grew whiskers on his chinnegan…

  Lying on the seabed, a bed for the C… C word is rude… C u next Tuesday… The water is thick with plants. They wave at me like Dementors in Harry Potter… Mum? Mummy? Emily? Auntie Bridge?

  Cough, cough. Throat-clearing or walkie-talkie? No radios at the bottom of the sea. Can’t get a dry cough under water, can you? Walk the walk, talk the talk. When I was one, I’d just begun, the day I went to sea… Ó Maidrín rua, rua, rua, rua… Daddy used to sing. Daddy made me try tea for the first time, put some sugar in, stir it up. There you go, my little red fox, get that down your neck, put the hairs on your chest…

  I make you cups of tea, you make me cups of tea, tea says I’m sorry, I love you, you look tired, let me do something nice to make you smile, the kettle crackles with calcium, the water here is hard… This kettle’s buggered, Rosie. Hey, Rosie, what do you fancy for dinner? Poached or scrambled? I’ve got oven chips… Pass me a carrot, lovey, there’s a doll…

  I love you.

  I love you more.

  Wrong. I love you more.

  It’s complicated, Mum. We are complicated. I didn’t mean to be secretive. I love you more than anyone else in this world. I’m sorry for what I’ve done. I know it’s bad, whatever it is. I can feel it. It is very, very bad.

  Nineteen

  Toni

  A week later, once the show had finished its run, I emailed Emily and invited her over to the flat to chat to us in more detail. It was a Saturday afternoon in early May; Bridget was at rehearsals for that evening’s gig at the White Cross pub. When Emily pulled up outside in her bright red Mini convertible, you ran out and jumped into the car and directed her round to the car park at the back. I could hear the two of you laughing as you approached the back door together and that reassured me a little. I know, I know, you would have told me I was mad or embarrassing or mental – your favourite phrase when it comes to me – but one day you’ll be a mother and you’ll realise it’s not easy letting your children out into the world, especially now with the internet and all that it has brought to our lives.

  Once in the kitchen, you invited Emily to sit at the table and made us a pot of tea.

  ‘What a helpful daughter you have, Mrs Flint,’ Emily said.

  ‘Yes,’ I said. ‘She is. Thank you for saying so.’

  You are helpful, Rosie. I don’t tell you that enough.

  Once you’d come to the table and poured the tea, Emily chatted to us some more about the agency. A lot of what she said she’d already told us in the theatre, and of course we’d looked online, but it was good to hear it all again in the calm environment of home.

  ‘So far I only have nine actors on the books,’ she said. ‘But I have a house in Suffolk, and I plan to run residential workshops in the school holidays with my business partner. I’m doing the rounds of the youth theatres currently. My idea is that I would be a kind of stepping stone to a larger agent. I’m offering a contract that is non-binding so that, should they find someone bigger, they can fly off like birds. Hopefully by then they’ll have had some experience and coaching in a safe and nurturing environment.’ She smiled, her eyes almost closing at the edges.

  ‘It sounds great,’ you said.

  ‘Little Red got such rave reviews,’ Emily chatted on, ‘as I’m sure you know. It’s been featured in the Richmond and Twickenham Times, and the Richmond Magazine. Heady heights!’ She chuckled.

  ‘It’s been on Facebook too,’ you said.

  ‘I saw that,’ I said. I suppose I was keen to join in.

  ‘And Twitter,’ Emily chipped in.

  ‘I don’t do Twitter,’ I said. ‘I’m not really one for all that stuff.’

  ‘Me neither, Mrs Flint, but it’s the world we live in now, isn’t it? One has to move with the times.’

  I bristled. The implication was that I hadn’t, I suppose. But I do have Facebook, don’t I, though I haven’t got a profile picture, nor do I ever post anything, and I only went on so I could be Facebook friends with you and keep an eye out. I know your friends have every social-media gadget or website or app or whatever they’re called under the sun, but I still think it was reasonable to limit you to one. Facebook is more than enough to keep up with your friends, make arrangements and so forth. I know your friends got Facebook when they were twelve and I know you had to wait until you were fourteen. But that’s just it – you were only fourteen, your life open wide to anyone who wanted to look. You’re still only fifteen now, and I’ve read so much about teenagers and the internet and mental health. I can believe it! I can’t imagine what it’s like having to look at all the pictures of a party you weren’t invited to. We never had to cope with that when I was young. If you didn’t make the cut, it was tough but that was it, although I hope to God you never go to the kind of parties I went to. Nothing that went on there would be worthy of Instagram. Unless you want to show people pictures of smashed windows, police hammering on the door, some skank shooting up in the corner. Worse.

  Something else occurs to me now, talking to you like this. I wonder if another reason for me not letting you have these things was that I couldn’t see the point. I can’t think of a single thing in my life that I would want to put up there and say, here, look at this. Apart from pictures of you – which you wouldn’t let me post up or stick up, however you say it – what would I have to share? Updates from West Middlesex Hospital records department? Not exactly a thrill a minute, is it? For all that I personally find people’s medical issues fascinating, I understand that so-and-so’s liver failure or whojamaflip’s skin condition would leave most people cold. Maybe if I posted the bottle-inserted-in-the-rectum shots I’d get a following – but I’d soon be Instasnapping my P45 if I did that, so let’s not go there.

  ‘You’ve gone off on one, Mum,’ you would say to me now if you were awake, if I were talking to you for real.

  But I hate social media, and that’s why, when Emily stood up to go and held up her cheap black plastic phone, I thought we’d get along just fine.

  ‘This thing can’t do your Twittergrams and your Snapfaces and what have you,’ she said, ‘but it’s good enough for phone calls and the old texting, and that’s all I need when I’m out and about.’

  I held up what your auntie calls my vintage Samsung. ‘I’ve not quite joined the Apple revolution either, Emily, as you can see.’

  She chuckled. ‘Technology is the apple of temptation,’ she said. ‘Question is, who took the first bite, eh? Was it Adam or was it Steve?’

  I laughed – what was she on? Did that even make sense? ‘Buggered if I know.’

  She limped over to the back door, wincing a little as she went, and paused there a moment.

  ‘More of a person-to-person person myself,’ she said as she grasped the door handle. ‘Sorry, too many persons in one sentence there. Don’t take it personally.’ She chuckled again, and this time you chuckled too – I think for the same reasons as me. She just comes out with the funniest things without meaning to.

  ‘Thank you for your time, Emily,’ I said. ‘We’ll be in touch.’

  * * *

  ‘Oh, Mum, she is so nice,’ you said when you came back into the kitchen after waving her off. You had your arms around me, your nose against my neck. ‘I know she’s only the same age as Auntie Bridge, but she seems more like a granny, don’t you think? Person-to-person person.’ You laughed. ‘Classic. And she knows someone who does headshots for, like, two hundred pounds. That’s really cheap, she said, and
she said she can take me. I can pay. I’ve got, like, two hundred pounds in my post-office account.’

  ‘I haven’t said yes yet,’ I protested, but you didn’t need to know about acting to hear that my conviction was failing.

  ‘I don’t mind paying for a headshot, Mummy. Honest.’

  ‘I said we’ll see.’

  I didn’t want to take your cash, my darling. But at the same time I think there’s something to be said for putting your money where your mouth is, and that’s exactly what you’d done, offering up your savings like that. Determined, that’s what you were. I’m hoping your determination will pull both of us through now, my love; that it will help us face what we must face.

  I hope you’ll appreciate how difficult it was for me, letting Emily into our lives that day. I hope you can acknowledge that I never said how worried I was. And I was, my love. I was terrified. I just want to say that for the record. Even if Emily was the real deal, I knew you were throwing yourself into a world fraught with danger and disappointment. I wondered if it was because you idolised your auntie Bridge so much or whether it was just in the genes. Your dad was a real extrovert too, you know, never needed asking twice to pick up his guitar.

  Whatever it was, the thing that made me thaw, that made me change my mind and bite my lip against all that frightened me was this: when you’d joined that theatre group, I’d seen the confidence you’d had when you were little start to come back. I’d seen you grow. And so I fought against myself. I swallowed down my own feelings on the matter as best I could. Like when I’ve arranged flowers in a vase or straightened a picture on a wall or lit the last candle on a birthday cake and I stand back and catch my breath, not daring to move for a moment in case the flowers droop, the picture slips, the candle goes out. So it was with you, my darling. You were blossoming before my very eyes, and at that fragile sight of you, my lungs filled with fresh air.

  So when you kissed my cheek and said, ‘Please, Mummy? Please can I sign with Emily?’ I thought: this is our turning point. This is us moving from afterwards to beyond.

  ‘Yes,’ I said. ‘All right. Yes.’

  Twenty

  Bridget

  Bridget gets home to find Toni waiting for her in the kitchen. She looks up, as if startled, her eyes wide. There is a mug of tea beside her, the top filmed with grey.

  ‘Emily has a photographer,’ she says without saying hello. ‘For this headshot thing, you know? She said she’d take Rosie.’ She bites at her ring finger, which is already red, the nail chewed to the quick. ‘What do you think?’

  ‘OK.’ Bridget fills the kettle, biding her time while she figures out what her sister is asking her for. Not that she would ever ask. ‘Has she said how much it’ll be?’ is what comes to her. Perhaps this is about money.

  ‘She said it would be cheap. Two hundred there or thereabouts.’

  Bridget pulls a mug from the cupboard and drops a teabag into it. ‘Stop biting your nail,’ she says over her shoulder. ‘You’ll make it sore.’

  ‘Doesn’t your friend Saph take photos?’

  Ah.

  ‘Sure,’ Bridget says, turning to face her sister. ‘I can ask her. If you prefer that.’

  Tones withdraws her hand from her mouth and frowns. ‘I think I’d be more comfortable with someone we know. Am I being weird?’

  ‘No weirder than usual.’ Bridget points to Toni’s mug and then to Toni: tea? Toni shakes her head: no thanks. ‘In fact,’ Bridget continues, ‘Saph owes me anyway for installing her antivirus the other week. I’ll give her a ring, maybe take Rosie next Saturday morning.’

  ‘I can take her.’

  She has that look in her eye, that I-don’t-need-your-help-even-though-I’ve-just-asked-for-it look, so Bridget leaves it there. Experience has taught her that this is by far the best option.

  ‘Sure,’ she says. ‘Do you want her number?’

  ‘Oh… would you mind calling her, as she’s your friend?’

  ‘Course not.’

  * * *

  The following Saturday, Bridget walks her sister and niece out to the car. She leans in at the passenger window while Toni gets into the driver’s seat.

  ‘So Pope’s Lane’s just off Twickenham Green, yeah?’

  ‘I know where Pope’s Lane is,’ says Toni. ‘Stop fussing. It’s literally round the corner.’

  ‘I’ve just thought,’ Bridget says to Rosie, who has climbed into the back seat. ‘You know it’s Saph from the band, don’t you? Sapphire?’

  ‘I know.’ For some reason, Rosie blushes beetroot – Bridget can see even from outside the car. Why would she go bright red about that? Teenagers are strange sometimes. ‘We don’t know any other Saphs, do we?’

  Bridget rests her hand on the roof and peers in so she can see them both better. Toni has started the engine but is fussing now with the fan settings, trying to clear the windscreen.

  ‘Her parents were mad for Sapphire & Steel,’ Bridget says to her niece. ‘That’s why they called her Sapphire. Tell her I told you that.’

  Rosie presses her face between the front seats. She will stay there until the last possible moment, when she has to put on her seat belt. Toni would make her wear two if she could.

  ‘What the hell’s Sapphire & Steel?’ Rosie asks. God, these kids could make you feel like you were a hundred years old sometimes.

  ‘Put your seat belt on and don’t swear,’ Toni says. ‘It’s a crap show from the seventies.’

  ‘Joanna Lumley was in it,’ Bridget chips in. ‘You know, Patsy from Ab Fab?’

  ‘From those DVDs?’ Rosie says.

  ‘The sensible daughter and her crazy mum,’ Bridget says, rolling her eyes towards Toni and winking.

  Rosie’s face brightens. ‘So was Patsy, like, famous? I mean, Joanna Lumley? I mean, like, before?’

  Bridget laughs; so does Toni. They exchange a glance. Rosie sits back and clips her seat belt, looking at both of them, perplexed.

  ‘What?’ she says. ‘What’s funny about that?’

  Twenty-One

  Rosie

  On the way to Saph’s you’re like, That was nonsense before, by the way. Auntie Bridge was only teasing. Sapphire & Steel was a show from the eighties, and Saph’s older than your auntie Bridge so she can’t possibly have been named after that Sapphire.

  Maybe it’s Sapphire like the actual jewel?

  Most probably. Actually, the daughter in Ab Fab was called Saffy, wasn’t she? But I don’t know what that was supposed to be short for. Anyway, I think your auntie Bridge’s Saph played drums for The Bangles once, so that’s her claim to fame.

  Who are The Bangles?

  You laugh and shake your head. Never mind.

  Saph is The Promise’s drummer, obvs. She’s a photographer too, and she also makes this leather jewellery with silver on it for shops all over Britain. Until this day, the day of the headshot, I’ve only seen her on stage and said hello to her, but I’ve never talked to her properly. She is so cool even though she is old, and when she opens the door I feel myself go bright red.

  Hey, babe, look at you. Her long grey hair is so straight and shiny the light bounces off it. She tucks a lock behind one ear. The top of her ear is pierced with a silver hoop with a tiny butterfly on it. You ready to look beautiful?

  Me with a cherry face. I wish she would stop looking at me. I’m like, Er, no, I… Not sure.

  Come in, come in, babe. Let’s sort you out.

  You’re all, Hi, Saph. So lovely to see you, it’s been ages. How are you?

  I can tell you want to come in just by your body language; we do loads of work on body language in drama. You’re leaning towards her and that means you like her and you’d like to stay. If you wanted to go you’d be backing away. Maybe you’d have your palms up.

  I’ll see you later, Mum, I say, in a nice voice. But my hands become fists and you tilt your head a bit and back off. I can tell by your smile that I’ve hurt your feelings. Your smile is like one I would do if I took
a hockey ball to the shin and it killed but I didn’t want to admit it. I’m sorry, thinking about that now. You came all the way to the door with me and then I brushed you off.

  All right then. You have this weird, cheerful voice. I’ll be back in, what, an hour, Saph?

  Sure. Saph’s pushing back her shiny hair. No rush, hon. Actually, give us a couple of hours, yeah? She’s safe with me, aren’t you, babe?

  I giggle. My cheeks have gone hot again. So embarrassing.

  I don’t even wait for you to get into the car before I go inside. I don’t wait and I don’t wave you off. I pretend to forget. I can see myself now on Saph’s front step, as if I’m someone else. The way I turn away, the way I step into Saph’s house and let her close the door. The way I leave you behind.

  That was mean, I think. I’m sorry.

  Saph chats to me for, like, twenty-five minutes, without even taking a single picture! She makes me this cool tea. I can’t remember what it’s called but it’s not PG Tips or even Earl Grey. I think it’s called red bush but she says it another way – something like roebuck, like the pub on Richmond Hill. That’s probably so she doesn’t have to go around saying red bush all the time because hello? Rude!

  So how long have you been acting? She’s setting up this umbrella-dome-satellite-dish thing in the corner of the living room. Bridge tells me you’re really talented. Sorry I missed you in Little Red, Bridge said you were amazing. You’re very pretty when you smile, do you know that? You have a really lovely aura and your hair is amazing. I’m so jealous of your hair.

  No way, I’m jealous of your hair! I so don’t say because that would be lame.

  Saph talking to me is like having a spotlight on me. It doesn’t burn my eyes but even so I can’t look at it. I can’t look at Saph. She is too cool. On stage, I’ve seen her wear these hippyish clothes, like she’s wearing today: a pink maxi skirt with silver patterns on and big black biker boots like Auntie Bridge wears and a cream-coloured peasant top with pink and peacock-green embroidery on it and plaited cotton strings at the neck, and on her fingers she wears loads of silver rings, and I wish I could be like her. That’s why I can’t look straight at her – because I want to be her so much. Well, be her but my age version? I don’t want her to look at my clothes – they are so boring. Skinny jeans and a T-shirt. So conventional. When I’m older, I’ll go to second-hand markets and buy cool second-hand stuff and put loads of plants on my windowsills like Saph has and hang loads of different pictures on the walls of all the plays and TV stuff I’ll be in.