The Secrets We Keep

by Jonathan Harvey

  ‘Thought it was quiet,’ she bleats.

  Gerard is heading for the way out from this concrete courtyard. He spits back at me, ‘Get a piece to me ASAP, Owen!’

  ‘It’s Sunday!’

  ‘It’s NEWS!’ And he is gone.

  ‘I wanna go Nando’s,’ Florence says. And Minty nods. She looks to Dylan and shouts a polite thank you, and the pair of them walk off, leaving me here like a spare part. I look back up to Dylan.

  ‘You look like a drowned rat!’

  ‘I feel like I’ve wet myself!’

  He chuckles. He looks so warm and toasty up there.

  ‘I couldn’t use your computer, could I?’

  He smirks. ‘I’ll buzz you up! We can get you out of those wet clothes!’

  I laugh and head for the main door. A buzzer sounds and the door clicks on. I realize as I push my way in I don’t know how to find him once I’m in there.

  His voice calls me up. Warm, excited, as if this has been planned for ages and finally the moment has arrived. When I get a few floors up he’s standing there with his study door open. It’s an old door, the walls either side red brick. Although the staircase was thoroughly Sixties, I’m obviously stepping into an original part of the building, stepping over the threshold from new to old. He grips my shoulder and pats my back with his other hand and draws me into the room. An electric fire is burning, the walls are covered in bookshelves, a messy desk sits at one side of the room, a battered old sofa at the other. He goes to another door and opens it. Inside are some shelves with a few clothes on. He tells me he sometimes goes running from here and keeps his kit here, and offers it to me. I’m so sodden I think, why not? He pulls out some sweatpants and a T-shirt and hands them to me.

  ‘Come on. We can dry your clothes out. Don’t think you’ll be too embarrassed to be seen in these.’ And as I look for somewhere to change he adds, ‘Not that anyone can see.’ And emits a warm throaty chuckle. ‘Brew?’

  I nod and scamper to the fire. I kick off my trainers, then hurriedly peel off my jeans and jacket. Then my shirt. I fold them over a couple of hardback chairs and slide them in front of the fire. I hear the low burbling of a kettle, the clink of mugs and spoons. He’s saying nothing. Over the fire there is a mirror. I see him looking at me. Our eyes meet and I smile nervously. I drag my undies down and although I am naked in front of him I’m not embarrassed for some reason. This is not like me. He looks away. I quickly pull on the pants and top. And realize I’m becoming hard. I tuck my cock into the band of the pants to cover it. Why? Why now?

  ‘No-one can see. Pretty much on my own here on a Sunday,’ he reiterates. I slide on the parquet flooring to the sofa and sit and grab a cushion to hug. But I know he was looking. And I know what he has seen. I’m shaking.

  I must have misread something here. He’s my mum’s best friend’s husband.

  He can’t have been looking like I think he was looking.

  I misinterpret things too much.

  He asks me if I take sugar.

  Natalie

  Miriam Joseph is very particular about how she likes her house cleaned. So much so, she has a clip folder with umpteen sheets in, which she calls the cleaning schedule. There is a spreadsheet of tasks for each room and I have to tick them off and date them as I work my way through them to show they’ve been done. Some tasks fall into the weekly column and some eight-weekly. And it doesn’t stop there. Each task is listed and then has a column next to it called ‘instructions and tools’. For instance in the bathroom, a weekly task is ‘Bath, taps, surround’. The instructions here read: ‘Bathroom sponge, Cif bath cleaner spray, rub, rinse with shower head’.

  Who knew cleaning a bath could be so complicated?

  ‘I know it probably seems quite anal,’ she said when she first showed me round her mini-palace, ‘but experience has taught me it’s best to be clear about what exactly I want.’

  ‘You’re the boss!’ I replied jovially, and that seemed to encourage her.

  She has a bright pink streak in her hair. God knows why. It smacks of saying Look at me, I’m quirky!, which doesn’t seem to fit her personality. I wonder if she has a dyeing schedule that she hands to her colourist, outlining the precise way she wants her locks coloured.

  The dog, Snowy, is not always here, she informs me. She shares him with her partner. That’s where he is today. But next time she is going to take me on a walk with him. No doubt she has a detailed instruction leaflet about that as well.

  ‘Oh! You have a partner!’ I say, overcome with excitement, my subtext being, So maybe you weren’t shagging my husband . . . She surveys me oddly. Why would it be so exciting that someone was in a relationship? A nod. Then I say, ‘How long you been together?’

  ‘Three years,’ she says, and she sees the smile straighten at my lips. So she’s met someone since Danny went. Great. I almost snarl at her, Well, come on. Show me your lousy home! Dust, wipe, vac, what else? It can’t be that hard, Miriam!

  The one thing I have been amazed by is how trusting people are once you claim to be a cleaner. Miriam asks for no references, she just takes my word that this is what I do, and by my second visit she is happy for me to be in her house alone while she goes off to run errands. I had wanted to rifle through her drawers to see if I could find any clues to her relationship with Danny, but I am so worried about falling behind with the cleaning schedule that I just go full steam ahead. I look on it as a masterclass in how to clean. I now know how to make a set of wooden slatted blinds look brand new, and how to get the best out of a draining board. These are great life skills. I might start making my place look semi-decent! Her living room is wannabe bohemian, all stripped floorboards and Ikea bookshelves. Her books display an interest in modern art, some classics, and the books that Lucy and Dylan talk about but I never get round to reading. Interestingly, she has everything that Jeanette Winterson appears to have ever written.

  I remember Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit from when it was on TV.

  I’m pretty sure this Winterson woman is a lesbian. What if Miriam is too? I really hope she is, because then nothing would ever have gone on between her and Danny.

  I have a quick peek in the drawers of a sideboard as I’m cleaning. Nothing untoward in the first one, but I’m not sure exactly what it is I’m looking for.

  Oh God. Please let her be a dyke.

  We could be friends then. We could be . . .

  But I’m getting ahead of myself. Why would I want to be friends with someone who has a cleaning schedule?

  Oh. Odd. And intriguing. And a link that Miriam is connected to us. In the next drawer are a pile of old tabloid newspapers from years back. Our club Milk was front-page news at the time because a teenage girl died on our premises after taking ecstasy. Why has Miriam got all these? Admittedly it was a massive story at the time, as the girl was white and middle-class and her parents were never off the news trying to highlight how bad drugs were and how kids should just say no. It spelt the beginning of the end for our venue in London, and motivated our move up North. But then beneath those I find more clippings from over the years about other drugs-related deaths. Maybe Miriam is keeping them for some research for work or something. But why would a graphic designer be interested in drug-fuelled deaths? But the Tiffany Keith case was significant to us in so many ways. And there she is. Smiling back at me in her school uniform.

  What an odd thing to keep hidden away, I tell myself. And why?

  It was also odd the other day when the doorbell rang and the delivery guy kept grinning and saying, ‘Nat?’ and I was like, ‘Yes, that is the name on the parcel.’ And it turned out to be Gripper.

  But I can’t think about that now. I am a woman on a mission. I am doing what the police have failed to do over the years and I am trying to track down my husband. What if he is here? Upstairs in a bedroom and she hasn’t told me? Or hiding out in the loft? Or the cellar. What if he can see me now? I dart around the ground floor of her house, listening for signs o
f life. What if she has a shed at the bottom of the garden? What if she’s keeping him locked up in there? I slide across the kitchen floor and unlock the back door. The cold air hits me like a wake-up call. He is, he’s out there, I just know it. I hurry into the garden. No shed.

  Who the hell doesn’t have a shed in their garden? I thought everyone had one in their garden. I thought it was the law!

  Miriam Joseph’s garden is a bit on the small side. There’s room to swing more than a cat, if cat-swinging is your thing, but it’s only about as long as two tall people lying end to end. And it’s as wide as the house. I realize I am pacing the lawn. This turf looks new. What if he is being held captive in a secret underground chamber and . . .

  A man comes out into the next garden. A pensioner with a sun hat on.

  ‘Morning!’ he chirrups.

  ‘When was this grass laid? Do you know? This turf. Looks new.’

  OK, so I am now behaving like a mad woman. Though he seems to take my urgency in his stride. He leans on the fence dividing his garden from Miriam’s, and strokes his chin.

  ‘She had the whole thing dug up and relaid . . . ooh . . . must be a few years ago now?’

  ‘How many? Three? Five?’

  He looks at me oddly. ‘Sorry, who are you?’

  ‘I’m her cleaner. But I’m really interested in the longevity of different types of grass. I’m . . . I’m actually doing a PhD in it,’ I say, with a shrugging sense of completely false modesty.

  He looks impressed. It’s worked. He settles on five years.

  I hurry back inside.

  Five years ago Miriam Joseph built a chamber under the ground and Danny is living there. Isn’t he? Is he?

  I am now thinking like a madwoman.

  Don’t get ahead of yourself, Natalie.

  I steady myself on her bookshelf and take a deep breath to calm down. Which is when I hear the front door go.

  Miriam has returned from the shops and seems impressed by what I’ve achieved.

  Yes, I’ve managed to hold it all together without screaming at you HOW DO YOU KNOW MY HUSBAND?!?!?! IS HE UNDER YOUR BACK GARDEN?!?!?!??!?!

  ‘You’re quick,’ she says, impressed.

  ‘No beating around the bush with me,’ I say. And then worry this might sound a bit lesbophobic, especially as I still have my feather duster hovering close to the Winterson shelf. And I can’t remember if I’m supposed to use the feather duster for the books. Isn’t that just for high-level dusting, like dado rails and ceiling fans? I’ll have to check my schedule . . .

  ‘Tell you what. Why don’t you take a break, and we can have a coffee and a natter?’ she says, possibly relaxing as she can see this particular cleaner is happy to have a schedule to tick off.

  ‘OK. Why don’t I fix us some coffee, then? About time I found my way around the kitchen.’

  ‘Perfect.’

  Even though this is my second visit, I’ve not yet attacked the kitchen. She asked me to leave it till today, though it looks like she’s already cleaned it prior to my arrival. That’s what I’d probably do if I had a cleaner.

  ‘I’ll just go . . . freshen up. Coffee’s in the fridge!’ she calls through as I hear her stilettoed feet running up the stairs.

  I flip her Philippe Starck kettle on. I used to have one similar, in the Nineties. I get two mugs from the glass-fronted wall unit, then open the fridge.

  What I see inside is like a punch to the guts.

  Finally. I have seen.

  I stand, frozen, staring at it, unable to take my eyes off it. Eventually I hear the footsteps coming down the stairs. I quickly grab a golden packet of coffee out and slide the door shut.

  ‘You’ll need the doobry,’ says Miriam as she glides into the kitchen, ‘the cafetière. Here.’ And she pulls it from another glass-fronted cabinet. I go about making coffee for two on autopilot.

  ‘I don’t take milk, do you?’ she says.

  I shake my head. I do take milk, I just don’t want to have to see the contents of the fridge again. I realize I am nervous now as I go about performing this most simple of tasks. Coffee in cafetière. Water in cafetière. Leave. Plunge. Pour. I feel her eyes on me and try to snap out of it.

  Coffee made, I join her at the kitchen table, where she has fanned a selection of biscuits on a plate because, she tells me, she’s feeling naughty. She wonders if I’m feeling naughty. I shake my head.

  You have jelly beans in a jar in your fridge.

  She’s asking if I’m married. I tell her I’m divorced. Well, Josie Greengrass is, I’ve decided.

  This is too much of a coincidence.

  It completely wipes out any thoughts I have of asking about the Tiffany Keith drugs clippings.

  She’s asking if I have kids. I tell her one of each.

  No-one keeps jelly beans in the fridge except my husband.

  She wants to know their names and ages. Bloody hell, what is this? Twenty questions? I make some up. But then it’s time to turn the tables.

  Why doesn’t she recognize me? Surely she’ll have seen the news reports from when he went missing?

  ‘So, come on. Less of me, more of you.’

  Oh but my haircut. And glasses. Of course she doesn’t recognize me. God! Is she in for a shock. Possibly like the shock I’m feeling now!

  ‘What do you do with yourself, then?’

  Apart from nick other people’s husbands.

  ‘I’m a graphic designer. Freelance. Work from home.’

  You draw pictures. Gosh, now I sit in front of you, you really remind me of Rebekah Brooks. Wow. Someone else I’ve never trusted.

  ‘Kids?’

  ‘No. Secretly relieved. I’m quite selfish.’

  Try very selfish, Rebekah lookalike with your hair that’s far too long for a woman of your years. You must be my age, if not older. He must be losing his touch.

  ‘I was tidying up in the front room. And I couldn’t help but notice some newspaper clippings.’

  She looks confused, like she has no idea what I’m talking about.

  ‘About that girl who died of a drugs overdose down South. Remember?’

  ‘Oh yes. I collect all sorts. I’ve recently been pitching on a sort of updated Just Say No campaign. Don’t know why they’re not in my office. I didn’t even get the gig.’

  Oh. Well, that makes sense, I suppose. It’s just a coincidence. Even if it’s a pretty freaky coincidence.

  ‘And what does your partner do? Sorry, is it a man?’

  ‘It is. He’s a teacher.’

  And what the hell does he teach?

  ‘Of what?’

  ‘Maths.’

  Liar. Why are you lying to me? I did the books at Milk. Danny was useless. Stop lying.

  ‘But you don’t live together?’

  ‘No, we’re stupidly independent.’

  ‘What’s his name?’

  Out with it. Danny. Danny Bioletti. Or have you come up with some preposterous cover name? Enzo? Enya? Hitler?

  ‘Alex.’

  Alex? He’s calling himself Alex now is he?

  ‘Aww. Have you got a picture? I’d love to see.’

  Come on. Then I can slap you. Hard.

  Excitement bubbles up inside me as she looks surprised then finds her phone and scrolls through it. She turns it to face me and proudly says,

  ‘There he is. It’s not a very good one.’

  ‘No it’s not, he looks black.’ I say before I can stop myself. The man in this tiny picture is very dark-skinned. Too dark-skinned to be Danny. What an awful picture.

  ‘He is black.’ She sounds incredibly offended.

  Shit.

  That’s not Danny.

  That’s someone called Alex.

  He’s a teacher.

  And now she thinks I’m racist.

  How do I get out of this?

  ‘I’m half black,’ I say quickly, hoping this will make her like me more. I see her eyes flit across my features. This is the most ridiculous thing I
have ever said in my life. And I’ve said plenty of other ridiculous things. But this is right up there at the top of the winners’ podium.

  ‘I know I don’t look it,’ I add.

  ‘I’d never have guessed.’

  ‘Yeah, my mum was black.’

  ‘Right.’

  ‘Yeah. Her name was Beauty.’

  ‘That’s nice. From where?’

  ‘Jamaica.’

  And I do actually say it with a slightly Patois twang, hoping this will convince.

  ‘Sorry I said that about . . . I just . . . we got such flack growing up as a mixed-race family. And with me looking white and everything. I sort of thought society felt white people should be with white people and black with black. Awful, I know. Probably some . . . inherent . . . internalized racism.’

  She is trying to take this all in.

  ‘A therapist would have a field day!’ I say. And she nods.

  ‘No, I can see it now,’ she says, giving me a good once-over again. ‘If you’d not said, I wouldn’t be any the wiser. But yeah.’

  All right, love, keep your hair on.

  ‘It’s my features,’ I say, unsure what I really mean.

  What mess have I got myself into now?

  ‘Irie!’ I say and hold my fist up to clink knuckles with her. She looks most alarmed and raises her hand slowly.

  ‘Irie!’ she replies, politely.

  Strangely, very soon after this she decides she has to retreat to her study to work.

  No doubt she will fire me at the end of my shift.

  Just in case she isn’t going to, I run into the living room and tear a sheet of paper from the back of the cleaning folder and quickly write down all the lies I’ve told.

  Josie Greengrass

  Mixed race

  Mum Beauty Jamaica

  Divorced

  Son Ben 21

  Daughter Cate spelt like Cate Blanchette 16

  Professional cleaner

  Loves dogs

  Likes black coffee

  I quickly fold it up and stick it in the back pocket of my jeans. It’s time to do the kitchen.

  I’m just about to have a go at the fridge when Miriam comes down the stairs again.

  ‘I love coffee but it’s so addictive, I just keep wanting more,’ she says, and tops herself up from the cafetière.