by T. M. Logan
‘Sure.’
‘Lucy?’
‘Yeah?’
‘Put your phone down a minute, I want to ask you something.’
She sighed and put her phone in her lap. ‘What?’
‘Have the boys – I mean Jake and Ethan – ever talked to you about taking one of the hire cars out for a drive, without the adults knowing?’
She gave me an exaggerated shrug. ‘Don’t know. Don’t think so.’
‘You sure?’
‘They’re both too young to drive, aren’t they? Jake’s not even sixteen yet.’
We looked at each other, both aware that this was a dodge rather than an answer.
‘So they’ve never mentioned it to you?’
She looked up and over my shoulder. ‘They talk about a lot of stuff, all kinds of things, boasting with each other. Why are you asking me this?’
‘Just something I was wondering about.’
She picked her phone up again and began scrolling. ‘Right.’
‘There’s something else as well.’
She sighed. ‘Is it about drinking wine again, because I haven’t—’
‘I found something in the bathroom next door, in the bin. The bathroom that you and your brother use.’
‘In the bin?’
‘Yes.’
She looked up from her phone again, frowning. ‘Because that’s not weird at all, going through our bin – perfectly normal behaviour.’
‘I wasn’t going through it, I was retrieving one of his T-shirts that got ripped.’
‘So what did you find in there?’
I reached into my pocket and took out what I’d found. ‘Do you know what this is?’
She glanced at the short stick of white plastic that I was holding. Blinked once, twice. Looked away again.
‘Yeah. We did it in biology.’
‘And?’
‘It’s one of those test things. A pregnancy test.’
‘Correct. Do you know how they work?’
‘Not exactly.’ She shifted uncomfortably in her chair. ‘You have to wee on it or something?’
‘Right again. It detects the presence of a hormone called hCG, which is secreted after a fertilised egg attaches to the wall of a woman’s uterus.’ I turned it over to show her the two parallel blue lines behind the clear plastic window. ‘Two lines means pregnant.’
‘I know that.’
I thought for a moment about how to phrase the next question.
‘And do you know,’ I said slowly, ‘how it got there? Into your bathroom?’
‘Not a clue. Someone else must have put it there.’
I leaned forward, smiling at her. Trying to soften my expression. ‘Is there something you want to tell me? It’s OK if you are, we can talk about—’
‘I’m not!’ she said forcefully, crossing her arms.
‘You’re not what?’
‘Pregnant. The test isn’t mine. And if it had been mine, I wouldn’t have been stupid enough to dump it in my own bathroom bin where anyone might find it and start asking questions. Where Daniel might find it.’
I felt a little of the weight lift from my shoulders. ‘You’re sure?’
‘Trust me, Mum – I’d be way more sneaky about it than that. You’d never know.’
54
Jennifer
Behind a locked door in the downstairs bathroom, Jennifer wiped her eyes and blew her nose before taking another tissue to repair the damage to her eyeliner. She stared at the face in the mirror for a moment, hands grasping the granite worktop, taking ten deep breaths as she’d been taught to do. In through the nose, out through the mouth.
Calm. Clear. Do what needs to be done.
She went into the kitchen and found a cloth under the sink, took a small bottle of water from the fridge. She checked through the entrance hall window for anyone out on the front driveway then, satisfied it was deserted, she took the keys from a hook by the front door and walked down the sweeping stone staircase that curved out onto the drive. Their hire car, a Ford Fiesta, was the cheapest one they could get that would still fit two lanky teenage boys in the back – just about – and all of their luggage.
Jennifer walked a slow circle around the car, running her eye over the paintwork, the bumpers, the trim. There were a couple of new scrapes on the paintwork, low down near the offside rear tyre. They’d not been there when they’d picked the car up from the airport four days previously. She squatted down, examining them more closely and touching an index finger to the metal. Parallel scratches in the bodywork, probably from a low wall or a boulder by the side of the road. But not deep. Not too hard to hide.
She poured water from the bottle into a patch of earth in the flowerbed, dabbed the cloth in the wet mud, and smeared some dirt over the scratches – just enough to disguise the new marks. It had to be carefully done, so it just looked like the regular dirt you might get from driving around the French countryside.
Superficial stuff could be covered like that, well enough to fool the rental company inspection when they returned the car in three days’ time. We don’t want to get hit with a hefty repair bill, do we? Such a rip-off, anyway. They tried to charge you hundreds of euros for even the tiniest dent. Anything deeper would need a trip to a garage before they returned the car on Saturday.
Luckily, it looked like these scratches were covered pretty well. She stood up and admired her handiwork, looking at the smudges of dirt and adding some more near the front wheel, so the marks were more consistent. When it dried, it would disguise the marks well enough.
With that done, she took the key fob from her pocket and unlocked the doors. Opening the driver’s side door, she pulled the seat forward, back to where she usually had it. Then she locked the Fiesta again and went back inside.
55
It was my turn to do the dishes after dinner. I was glad of the distraction, the chance to be away from the others for a little while, away from making polite conversation, away from having to pretend that everything was normal.
Away from Sean.
I filled the sink and began scrubbing at pots and pans, the water so hot it almost scalded my hands and arms. My emotions were a mess of hurt and confusion and despair that things could ever be put right again. As hard as I tried, I couldn’t get the image of Izzy out of my mind – the image of her as she walked up into the clearing in the woods, summoned by a message from my husband’s phone. The more I thought about it, the clearer it became that Izzy was the one – it had been her all along. She was the only single one among us. Her home town connection with Sean had finally turned into something more intimate, more dangerous. More destructive.
Our conversation on her first day here came back with a sick, deadening realisation that she had virtually admitted it to me.
‘He’s married, isn’t he?’
‘I couldn’t possibly comment.’
‘Does his wife know?’
‘I think she might have her . . . suspicions.’
How could I have been so blind?
I had vowed to find answers, to find the source of Sean’s betrayal. And now I knew. I knew more than I had ever wanted to know.
Only one question remained.
What am I going to do about it?
But I already knew the answer to that one.
Sean appeared beside me at the sink, tea towel in hand. I could smell beer on his breath, on him, surrounding him like an invisible cloud. Something else too, something stronger. Tequila. I felt myself stiffen.
‘Need a hand?’ he said.
I didn’t look at him.
‘If you want.’
He picked up one of the frying pans dripping on the rack and began to dry it. His movements were slow, exaggerated, like he was concentrating hard on not dropping anything.
‘Daniel’s tucked up in bed reading his book,’ he said. ‘Going to turn out his light in ten minutes.’
‘Good.’
There was a lengthy silence while I scrubbe
d violently at fragments of pasta stuck to the bottom of a pan. I wanted to throw my anger at him, wind it up and hurl it at him with all the strength I could muster.
Why her? What does she have that I don’t? What the hell are you thinking?
How could you do this to me? To the kids?
With one of my best friends?
He put the frying pan away and carefully picked up another from the rack.
‘Are you OK, Kate?’
‘Do you care?’
A pause.
‘Yes,’ he said softly. ‘Of course I care.’
‘I’m fine.’
He looked away.
‘I’m sorry,’ he said quietly.
I stopped scrubbing.
‘For what?’
‘That we argued.’
I stared into the soapy water in the sink.
Tell him. Tell him you know. Confront him now.
‘What else are you sorry for?’
‘Well now, let me see.’ The joviality was forced. ‘How long have you got?’
I turned to glare at him in time to see a half-hearted smile die on his lips.
‘Seriously? You’re trying to make jokes?’
His smile vanished completely.
‘Sorry, Kate. Sorry.’
I plunged the last of the pots into the sink, water splashing over the side and onto my feet, and resumed scrubbing even more vigorously than before.
‘How’s your phone, by the way?’
He shifted beside me, as if sensing a trap.
‘Absolutely knackered. Won’t even switch on.’
‘That’s a shame, isn’t it? How are you managing without it?’
His eyes flicked up to mine in the dark reflection of the window, then away again.
‘All right.’
‘Still keeping up with your messages?’ My voice was heavy with sarcasm. ‘Keeping on top of things?’
‘It’s no bother,’ he said quietly. ‘I’ll sort it when we get back to England.’
I finished the pots, drained the water and dried my hands.
He took half a step towards me, hands out as if to hug me, but I shook my head.
‘Don’t,’ I said, a note of warning in my voice. ‘Don’t even try.’
‘Kate, I’m—’
‘You’re what?’
He hesitated, seeming to weigh his words. ‘You know I’ve always been a rubbish liar.’
‘You seem to have got a lot better at it recently.’
‘Not really.’
I crossed my arms tightly over my chest. ‘Why don’t you just tell me?’
He seemed about to say something, then thought better of it, his eyes dropping to the floor.
‘There’s nothing to tell.’
‘Liar!’ I spat, louder than I had intended. ‘Why can’t you just tell me? I hate this! Hate it.’
I fled from the kitchen before he could see my tears, before he could say anything else. It was painful just to be near him, to have to talk to him. Instead I went upstairs to our bedroom, sitting on the bed in the air-conditioned cool until my heart had slowed to something near normal, wiping my eyes with a tissue.
This was a special kind of torture. Why wouldn’t he just come out with it, put me out of my misery? Was I going mad? Was I losing it? No. I had evidence. I had seen things, heard things, that could not be denied or explained away, however hard he tried. My head was pounding. I opened my bedside drawer to find some paracetamol, shifting books and chargers and passports to one side, reaching to the back. I always put the tablets out of sight at the back of a drawer in case one of the kids ever—
There, a box of paracetamol. But something was wrong. Out of place. Or, more accurately, absent. I had put it here two days ago, for safekeeping, and now it had disappeared.
The camcorder tape of Sean and Jennifer.
56
I checked again, shifting the drawer’s contents around. No tape. Someone had moved it, taken it. Sean? Pushing the bedroom door shut, I went around to his side of the bed and quickly looked through his drawer, then the lining of his suitcase and the chest of drawers where T-shirts and shorts were neatly stacked, but no mini-DV tape. It was gone.
The sounds of laughter from the pool below floated up to me in the bedroom. I couldn’t hide up here forever. Checking my face quickly in the mirror, I took a deep breath and opened the door to the hall. Daniel’s bedroom door was slightly ajar. I gave it the lightest of taps and pushed it open.
My son lay curled on his side, engrossed in Harry Potter.
‘Was about to turn my light out,’ he said, putting the book down and taking his glasses off.
‘You can have ten more minutes if you want.’
‘It’s all right. I’m quite snoozy anyway.’
I sat down on the edge of his bed and brushed the hair off his forehead.
‘Are you OK after what happened earlier?’ I said. ‘Are those scratches and scrapes hurting?’
I held my arms out and enveloped him in a hug, feeling the warmth of his small chest against me, his sweet little-boy smell, his thin arms tight around me. Wondering how much longer he would let me hug him before he became too embarrassed, too selfconscious to do it any more. Wondering whether he would blame me for what had happened between Sean and me, feeling the heat of tears behind my eyes.
Don’t cry. Don’t upset him.
‘Are you all right, Mummy?’
‘Of course,’ I said, swallowing hard and trying to keep my voice level. ‘Why wouldn’t I be?’
‘And is Daddy all right?’
‘Yes.’
‘Oh.’
‘What makes you say that, Daniel?’
‘Dunno,’ he said, his little chin resting on my shoulder. ‘He seems a bit funny this week.’
‘Funny how?’
‘Just a bit weird.’
I released him from the hug and looked at him properly in the light of the bedside lamp. ‘Funny with Izzy?’
‘Maybe.’ He shrugged. ‘I don’t think he likes Jake.’
‘Why not?’
‘He keeps asking what we’ve been doing when we go out adventuring, says I don’t have to play with them if I don’t want to.’
‘Daddy just wants you to be safe, that’s all. Jake’s a bit of a daredevil, isn’t he?’
‘Hmm.’ He yawned. ‘What are we doing tomorrow?’
‘Something nice.’ I kissed him on the forehead. ‘Night, Daniel. Love you.’
Lucy wasn’t in her room. Only her phone was there, plugged in to charge, winking and flashing in the darkness with more of the constant stream of updates from friends at home. The battery had died completely during our evening meal and I had been secretly glad to see her untethered from it for a little while, to have a conversation with her and not constantly feel I was trying – and failing – to compete for attention with the iPhone in her hand.
Back in the kitchen I refilled my wine glass and made my way down the stone steps to the pool, the evening air still hot and almost unbearably humid. Russ lay sprawled on a lounger, two inches of ash on the cigarette smouldering between his drooping fingers. Sean sat next to him, beer in hand, by a table clustered with glasses and bowls of snacks, empty bottles of wine and beer and a half-empty bottle of tequila. I could tell, in my peripheral vision, that he was turned towards me, trying to look at me. Trying to catch my eye.
I sipped my wine and kept my eyes on the swimming pool, where Lucy and Rowan plus Alistair, Jake and Ethan were throwing a volleyball between them, shooting for little goal nets perched at each end. Underwater lights set deep in the walls gave the water an ethereal, shimmering glow against the darkness of the night, mosaic tiles portraying three dolphins standing out bright and colourful on the floor of the pool, the water above them perfectly clear.
‘Are you coming in, Kate?’ Alistair gestured at me, his beard glistening with droplets of water. ‘We need a sixth for water polo.’
‘Not tonight,’ I said, as cheerfully as I co
uld manage. ‘Maybe another time.’
‘That is a shame,’ he said with an exaggerated grin. ‘How about you, Sean?’
My husband shook his head.
‘Think I’ve had one too many beers. I’d probably sink.’
‘Nonsense,’ Alistair shouted, his voice bright with alcohol. ‘An invigorating, restorative dip is exactly what the doctor ordered at this stage of the evening’s proceedings.’
‘Reckon I’ll just watch, thanks.’
‘It’s also the perfect cooling therapy for the Mediterranean heat.’
Sean shook his head and sat back on the lounger.
‘I’ll take your word for it, pal.’
Lucy slapped the pool’s surface with her palm, splashing water towards him.
‘Come on, Dad,’ she said. ‘I need you to be on my team.’
‘Well . . .’
‘Pleeeease?’ she said. ‘You’ve already got your swimming shorts on.’
Sean sighed, took a long slug of his beer and put it down by the side of the pool. Pulling his shirt over his head, he kicked off his flip-flops and stepped unsteadily into the pool with a heavy splash.
‘Excellent,’ Alistair said, raising the ball above his head. ‘Let the game commence!’
57
I sat back on the lounger, watching them splash and play and laugh in the sparkling water of the infinity pool, the ball thrown back and forth as if none of them had a care in the world. Just an evening swim, an escape from the cloying heat, a refreshing dip in between drinks, Sean standing in the deep end, trying to catch my eye, trying to give me his smile, that smile, the one that had made my stomach do somersaults back when we first met. His charming, twinkling smile that felt as though we were sharing a private joke just between the two of us. A secret club that no one else could join.
Not any more, though. Now his smile just made me feel a plunging heartbreak so deep, so dark, that I couldn’t see the bottom. I knew, as surely as I’d ever known anything, that he had been on the point of confessing in the kitchen half an hour ago. He was about to tell me everything but had pulled back at the last moment. Why? Why waste time? Why not just get it over with? Perhaps he didn’t want to do it while we were away, in front of all our friends. That was it; he wanted to be on home turf, on familiar ground.
