‘Are you really nineteen?’ I asked.
She rolled her eyes in a way that reminded me so much of Harriet. ‘What did you wanna talk to me about?’
‘Why didn’t you tell me that Emma was pregnant?’
Moments passed. Daisy was looking at the baby, bouncing him on her knee gently.
‘His name’s Michael. Isn’t that a great name?’
‘Don’t fuck me around. Why didn’t you tell me?’
‘Hey, mind your fucking language, OK?’ She raised her eyebrows at me. ‘Well, honestly? I didn’t tell you because it was none of your damn business. It’s hers. Anyway, it doesn’t matter, cos she got rid of it.’
I noticed that she had cleaned the house. The empty food containers were gone and it smelt fresher. It was nice that she made the effort for children.
‘When did she get rid of it?’
‘Few weeks before she died. I don’t think many people knew. Me, maybe a few of her girlfriends, and Kyle, possibly Matt. She would never have told her parents, she said her dad would literally kill someone.’
‘Whose was it?’
She shrugged.
‘Daisy—’
‘What? So what that I’m not entirely comfortable talking about my friend’s business with some guy I don’t even know!’
‘You knew me well enough to fuck me.’
If she hadn’t been holding Michael I guessed she would have stood up and gone for me. She looked the sort. I like a healthy amount of aggression in a girl, and Daisy came across as the sort of person who had never taken a milligram of bullshit in her life.
‘I knew you well enough to know you were lonely with money to throw away. So go fuck yourself with a serrated edge, yeah?’
‘You think that because you’ve got your fucking nephew here you can pull off this bullshit?’ I took a step forwards. ‘I don’t know at what point I gave the impression I’m the sort of guy you can fuck around, but trust me, you have ten seconds to tell me who the father was, or—’
‘Or what?’ she snapped.
‘Or you’ll get to know me much better. One, two, three—’
‘I don’t know.’
‘Four—’
‘She didn’t know!’
Michael started crying and she took him off her knees and propped him up against the back of the sofa.
‘Really?’ I said.
‘She didn’t know. She said it was probably Kyle’s, but it could have been Matt’s. I mean, she only slept with him as a one-time thing, she said they were both wasted, but it could have been.’ She looked me up and down. ‘You want to back the hell off now?’
I did as she said, and sat down.
‘I’m a trained kick-boxer, you know.’
‘That would have been’ – I smirked – ‘useful.’
‘Yeah, well, Kyle was a black-belt in nothing and I saw him floor you, remember? I could have totally made you my bitch.’
‘Do you know anything else?’
‘Not really. That’s the whole story from beginning to end. She got pregnant and then got rid of it. I mean, she was sixteen, what else was she going to do? It’s no life for anybody at that age.’
I had worked out that Clare must have been in her early twenties when she’d had Emma; twenty-one or twenty-two. That had seemed young to me at the time. I wasn’t even thirty and I still felt too young to cope with anything adult. It was debatable whether any of us felt grown up, I thought. I suspected we all just became better at faking it.
‘Did she ever talk to you about her parents?’ I asked.
‘She was scared shitless of her dad, but only in the way that every little rich girl is scared of their dad. She was always worried about him finding out about the things she was into, drinking, coke… sex. You know. I always used to tell her that it was a good thing her dad gave a shit.’
‘Her mum?’
‘She…’
Michael was staring at me.
Daisy ran her fingers through his fine patches of hair, smiling.
‘Hey, Mikey, that’s Nic,’ she said. ‘Say hi!’
I wasn’t sure what to do, so I waved.
‘Sweet, but I was kinda talking to him,’ she said, laughing at me. ‘Um, her mum… It was weird. She hated her. I mean, not just the usual way that people moaned about their parents, Ems really hated her.’
Every time this was reiterated to me I felt a rush of sympathy for Clare. It couldn’t have been easy for Emma, dealing with the way her mother was, but all the same I couldn’t help but think that maybe Clare’s heart had been in the right place.
‘What did she used to say?’
Daisy played with her hair and shrugged. ‘Well… she just hated her. I didn’t know much about her, Ems said she was a model and a dance teacher or whatever. Ballet? Is that right?’
I nodded.
‘I couldn’t even tell you anything specific, I just remember whenever she talked about her mum she was like, “I hate her. I fucking hate her.” I used to tell her she probably didn’t mean that but she was quite stubborn, she would always say, “No, I mean it. I hate her.”’
I stayed silent and let Daisy stay with the monologue.
‘Maybe she found it hard to live up to? I mean, a model. Must be harsh, you must feel like a right skank next to her. I couldn’t deal with it, all your boyfriends checking out your mum and stuff!’ She laughed. ‘I’d find it harsh, anyway.’
‘Is that all you can remember?’
‘You know how it is, you don’t remember random conversations very well. Ooh…’
‘What?’
‘Ems said her mum did hit her once, like properly hard, there was a mark and everything. They were having a fight and she just freaked out, hit her right around the face. I didn’t think it was that big a deal. I mean, my parents gave me a slap load of times, but it was a big thing to Ems, I think. Don’t think she was used to it.’
I had almost reached the point where I didn’t want to know anything else about Clare. The more I found out about her, the harder it became to see the reasons for anything she did.
‘Thanks,’ I said. ‘You want anything?’
She pulled a face and glanced at Michael. ‘Not while he’s here. It would be a bit weird.’
‘No, I mean, for talking to me. A hundred for the info?’
‘Oh? Hell yeah, thanks!’
I liked her. Something about the way she spoke made me laugh. I wouldn’t have hurt her, and I wished that she didn’t think I could.
I stood up, when something occurred to me that made me stop.
‘So, you and Emma were friends?’ I said. ‘But you were sleeping with her boyfriend?’
‘All right, vicar, not when she was alive!’ Daisy shook her head, looking scandalized. ‘Never. Only after… He gave me a place to stay, drugs, whatever. The sex thing, it’s just not that friggin’ sacred to me, that’s all.’
‘All right.’ I didn’t expect she cared much for my opinion of her.
‘So are you gonna come back and visit, or is this adiós?’
I shrugged. ‘Well, I think Mikey likes me.’
Michael gurgled as she picked him up and sat him on her bony knees again.
I handed her some notes and she winked at me.
‘Whatever. You never know. You might come back tomorrow and I’ll have gone to Timbuktu.’
‘Are you going to be all right here?’
‘Yes. Christ on a Boris bike, it’s not that bad. Where do you live? I bet you come from a right swanky borough?’
‘Just a flat in the West End.’
‘Hiding from the hipsters?’ She sniffed. ‘Due respect, but you don’t look trendy enough.’
‘Well, if you’re gone when I come back, I guess I’ll see you when I’m a cat.’
‘Stay the hell off my feeder, bitch.’
28
If it was anyone but Clare, I asked myself while I was sitting in the car, would I tell her? Yes. The answer was obvious. I would have told
any other employer without hesitation that their daughter had been pregnant without their knowledge. It was my job, after all.
None of this made it easier. I wished I didn’t know either of them well enough to predict the effects this information would have.
It took almost half an hour, but eventually I got out of the car, walked up to the house and rang the doorbell.
Nothing.
I crouched and looked through the letterbox.
Lights out.
Nothing.
At least this had made the hardest decision for me. Instead of telling Clare first, I’d tell Pat. I backed away, in case I could see any lights in the upstairs windows, but she wasn’t there.
Relieved, I went back to the car, and heard heavy footfalls against the pavement. Clare was jogging past the houses across the road, looking even thinner in tracksuit bottoms, and I watched her until she spotted me.
I crossed the road again and waited by the house.
It was the first time I had ever seen her without make-up, I realized. That was why she looked so different.
‘Hi,’ she said as she stopped beside me and took out her keys. ‘What’s up?’
‘Is this a good time?’
‘Um… yeah, I guess. Has something happened?’
‘Well, I’m making progress, but… You’re probably going to want to sit down.’
Her fringe was stuck to her forehead and the back of her shirt was damp and painted against her shoulder blades. When she finally managed to unlock the door I noticed that she was shaking.
‘Five miles,’ she said when she followed my eyeline. ‘Stupid, I didn’t take any water with me. So… you want me to sit down?’
‘Well—’
‘I’m fine standing, thanks.’ She took off her trainers and socks in the hallway, and walked into the kitchen to run herself a glass of water. ‘Go for it. Shoot. Really, there’s pretty much nothing you can say that’s going to surprise me now.’
I raised my eyebrows as I came forward, replaying the list of ways in which I thought it would be easier to tell her. But clever phraseology wasn’t going to help.
She downed the first glass of water and poured another, pulling her hair out of its ponytail. ‘Go on. I mean it.’
‘Emma was pregnant.’
I felt as if I hadn’t said it right, as if one of the other phrases I had chosen would have been better, but I repeated it anyway.
‘Emma was pregnant.’
She put the glass of water down and wiped a drop from the rim. ‘Oh.’
‘I’m sorry.’
‘No, right… I asked for it. Um, how long?’
‘What?’
‘How… far along was she?’
‘Oh.’ I swallowed. ‘No, she was pregnant. She had a termination a few weeks before she died. I don’t know how far along she was, I assume less than twenty weeks.’
Her lower lip trembled and her hand was still clasped around the glass of water. ‘How did you find out? I mean, how many people knew?’
I put my bag down, glad that I could still talk about it in a formal way. ‘I found the number of the Royal Free’s Maternity Ward in her diary. A few of her friends knew.’
‘A few?’
‘About three.’
‘A few, and she didn’t tell us?’
I spread my hands. ‘She was just scared. She was only—’
‘Don’t tell me what she was!’ she snapped.
Her hands were still shaking as she pinched the bridge of her nose. If I hadn’t been so close, if I hadn’t wanted to cross the room and hold her, I would have found it a perversely fascinating experiment. I was watching how many emotional blows one person could withstand before the wheels of their mind fell off completely.
‘Whose was it? Was it… Danny’s?’
‘It wasn’t Danny’s. I don’t actually know.’
‘You’re lying.’
‘Honestly, I don’t—’
‘Stop protecting me! She’s not yours to protect me from!’
‘Clare—’
‘Whose was it?’
‘Just calm down…’
‘Oh, please!’ She laughed at me hysterically. ‘Stop talking like you think you know me! You think that spending half a damn night here makes you special?’
‘I’m saying calm down.’
‘Whose was it?’
‘I don’t—’
‘You think you have the right to decide what’s for my own good? You think you know me that well?’
‘No, I—’
‘You want to know more about me? Fine. Fine!’ She took off the white shirt, threw it down and started taking down the tracksuit bottoms. ‘Take a good look! This is me, right here!’
She turned, so I could see the cuts forming rough train tracks down her biceps and the scars along her hipbones and ribs. She raised her arms, showing her wrists, and screwed her hair up into a ball at the back of her head to display the bruises along her hairline usually hidden by her fringe.
‘These, that’s me! These ones here, that’s me too!’
I stood speechless while she rattled off the list with a trembling voice.
‘So fuck you! Fuck you and everything you think you know! It’s rubbish! You have no idea!’
I took a step back, captivated, a frantic erection pressing against the inside of my jeans, unable to even think about trying to stop her.
‘Look, look!’ Locking on to me with her gaze, she took a knife out of the holder and casually slid the blade across her forearm, with the attitude of someone ripping a plaster off a scab. ‘This is what I like. This is what you don’t fucking understand! This is all me.’
Blood ran off her arm and on to the floor.
I opened my mouth to speak but nothing came out. My stomach clenched with horror.
‘Clare—’
‘So, Nic. How do you like me now?’ She laughed, and did it again.
‘Clare, stop it!’
‘No!’
As I started towards her she pointed the knife at me with a playful glint in her eye. The cuts in her arm looked deep and they were bleeding quite heavily, but she hadn’t acknowledged any pain. As with the mirror, she had learnt to hurt herself without tarnishing her outward beauty.
‘Clare…’ I said, trying to stay calm but knowing this had gone too far. ‘Clare, think about it. I’m warning you, don’t do this.’
‘I said, so how do you like me now, Nic?’
I hesitated, eyes on the knife. Talking to her was useless. She didn’t want someone to talk to her, but I tried one more time anyway, just so that I could tell myself that I had, that I wasn’t just looking for an excuse.
‘Clare, put the knife down.’
‘Make me.’
I stepped forwards and I saw her start a little. When I made to go left she followed me and I grabbed her wrist. She pushed back, shocking me again with how strong she was, but I took hold of her other wrist and felt my hand slide against blood.
‘Yes!’ She was laughing. ‘Like that!’
We whirled around and I tried to keep the knife away from us. She cracked her head into mine and I threw her backwards into the table, gritting my teeth through the pain. Everything went white for a moment. I slammed her wrist against the wood until she dropped the knife.
It fell with a clatter and she was still laughing.
Her blood was all over my shirt, all over my hands. Her body was heaving, sweat from her jog running down the curve between her breasts.
‘Go on,’ she was saying, ‘you want to help, then go on!’
She slapped me and I slapped her back. The cry that came out of her was like nothing I had ever heard. Incensed, I picked her up and forced her back on to the tabletop. She slapped me again, harder. When she resisted I grabbed a fistful of her hair and then we were kissing. I tasted blood on my tongue as I undid my jeans and when we parted her lips were swollen red.
My coat hit the floor and one of the straps of her bra snapped as she
ripped it off her shoulders. She tried to pull away across the table but I dragged her back towards me by her hips and the back of her head hit the table.
I pulled the crotch of her knickers roughly to one side and then I was inside her, and she was so fucking hot, and for a moment she stopped fighting me. She lay there, eyes closed, her chest bouncing with each thrust, gasping, lost…
Suddenly she had opened her eyes and wrapped her legs around my waist, pulling herself up, biting my lip, raking her nails across my back and making me leave bruises on her arms with my grip.
‘Oh fuck, yes, like that… like that…’
She started pulling me closer with her heels, groaning into my neck, and I could feel her body becoming tense in my arms.
My breathing was ragged. I stopped and she slipped off the table.
‘What! No…’
I turned her around, ripped her underwear down and held her bloodied arms behind her. She started crying out, shuddering against my grasp, her face turned sideways against the hard surface as her features tightened and then released.
Her moans were still echoing around the kitchen by the time I came. My legs felt weak and the room blurred in and out of focus in front of my eyes as relief, the likes of which I hadn’t felt for years, flooded my veins. My heartbeat was knocking around my skull.
I let go of her, stepped back and was only vaguely aware of the semen running down the insides of her legs.
The silence seemed wrong now.
It was only when I started to feel everything more keenly, like the scratches across my back, that I realized how much blood there was. It was on my clothes, my hands, imprinted around her wrists, her arms, along her hips…
I did up my jeans and leant against the work surface, finding it hard to stand for myself.
Clare had sat down on the floor with her knees pulled into her chest and her head resting against the table leg. The knife was lying not far behind her, under the table where she had dropped it.
I couldn’t analyse the expression on her face. She was watching something far away.
My first instinct was to apologize, but it would sound ludicrous.
‘You know… people don’t seem to understand it,’ she said.
Thank God she had spoken first.
Something You Are Page 22
