My Sister and Other Liars

by Ruth Dugdall

  Leaving the unit is never quick, what with girls being told to put on scarves and hats, and there is an excitement in the air that could turn to hysteria because we don’t know what’s coming, whether it’s good or bad. Last time was before Christmas; we went into Felixstowe to see the lights being turned on, but the trip went sour. Christmas has too many memories, and even Fiona and Joelle, who come from relatively happy homes, felt melancholy. Mina was saddest, though. She watched all the kids with their parents, and then she disappeared. We found her in the back of a toyshop, clutching a brown bear, weeping.

  But this trip is to a small café on the sea road, named ‘Simpsons’ after Wallis, the American socialite responsible for Edward VIII’s abdication. A good role model, wasn’t she, the woman who pronounced ‘a woman can never be too rich or too thin’.

  Sian must have spoken with the manager because the sign is switched to CLOSED, but we walk right in, bringing a gust of cold air and the threat of snow.

  ‘Okay, ladies,’ she chirps, battling against our stony silence, the various expressions of anger and terror and mild panic. ‘Look through the menu and order what you want. Let’s say everyone must order within the next five minutes, okay?’ She checks her watch.

  Next to me, Pearl studies the menu, biting the cuffs of her baggy jumper, eyes wide with anxiety, her rainbow-striped bobble hat pulled firmly on her head. I touch her arm so she looks at me, and smile.

  ‘It’s all right,’ I whisper, though I’m also tense. But I want Pearl’s recovery more than I want my own. She, after all, is an innocent. I scan the list, and try to work out what has the least fat, the least calories. Nothing with bread. A jacket potato may be okay, but not with cheese. Stodgy winter food, not a salad on offer.

  Sian looks at her watch.

  ‘Three minutes left.’

  If she didn’t time us, we’d stare at the menu all day. The soup is homemade, and it doesn’t say ‘cream of’. It’s my best option.

  ‘Tomato soup for me, please,’ I say, and Pearl looks relieved and nods in agreement, but Sian gives me a withering look.

  ‘No you don’t, Sam. If you don’t choose something sensible, I’ll pick for you. That goes for you too, Pearl.’

  ‘Be my guest.’ I lean back and put the menu on the table. Since when has soup not been sensible?

  ‘Okay. Same as me, then. Ciabatta with bacon and mozzarella.’ She’s punishing me for not deciding quickly enough. Bitch.

  I look away, out of the window, just as a woman is walking past. She pauses to re-adjust her shopping bags, all announcing various sales. She’s pregnant, heavily so, and even on this brittle day her coat hangs open and she looks roasting. She catches a breath, looks up and sees me. I assume she’s staring because of my bony narrow face, the tube strapped to my cheek, or maybe she knows who I am from the press coverage. But then she smiles. And it’s a warm smile, understanding and wise.

  She’s about Jena’s age, about thirty, and in that smile I can see her life. The nursery she’s just decorated, the trips to the hospital for check-ups, a visit to see the maternity ward. Her husband, coming home with a takeaway because it’s what she fancies, the baby moving inside her.

  I smile back, and I don’t feel envy. Once again, I feel the sensation of hope.

  The feeling has faded by the time I take my usual chair across from Clive, later that day, in his office. My stomach is bloated from the ciabatta, and I know that if I let it, the guilt of eating will force me to purge. So I think about the pregnant woman who smiled, and block out Ana’s voice, which tells me I’m pathetic and weak, a fat pig. That I don’t deserve to survive.

  ‘You look tense, Sam.’

  ‘I’m trying to be calm,’ I say, clutching hard to the feeling of hope. ‘I want to be normal, or I did earlier. I had this feeling, like a wave lifted my thoughts up.’

  I try not to think about the board, who will decide my fate, about Mum, and her funeral, fast approaching. Of her cold body, waiting in the morgue. A funeral and a judgement, both on the first day in February. How can I bear it?

  ‘Close your eyes,’ he says, and I do, even though my eyes move around the sockets and I can feel my eyelids twitching. ‘Tell me when you felt that wave of hope before. Maybe as a child, or a younger teen? Go back, and locate a moment of peace or optimism in this painful story.’

  Dad’s shed comes to mind straight away. It was a place of darkness and quiet, somewhere I felt able to slow down.

  ‘Tell me about it, Sam. Talk to me, about how it felt.’

  When I arrived back home from the hospital I needed silence and peace badly, and went outside, meaning to go straight to the shed, but the sun made me pause. I lifted my face to the sun, breathing deeply, letting its rays warm me and take the edge from the coldness I’d started to feel in my fingertips. Then I noticed Mrs Read, in her jungle-like backyard, leaning over the fence.

  ‘Good afternoon, Samantha,’ she called, primly. ‘Can I ask how Jena is faring?’

  Mum would hate me talking to her, even though it seemed like she was just being kind. Both of my parents regarded Mrs Read as crazy, someone best avoided.

  ‘She’s doing better.’ It was all I could think to say, though it wasn’t true, not given she was back on Eastern Ward and having fits.

  Mrs Read moved so she was pressed against the fence posts, but separated by Chloe’s garden. Despite the twenty-foot distance, I could feel the intensity of her gaze.

  ‘I’m glad. The ambulance was quick, I’ll say that. And how are you? You’re looking very thin. I hope you’re eating?’

  And then I saw that in her hand was a pencil. She was noting something down, in a small book she was holding. Mum and Dad were right, she was crazy. She was enjoying our pain; we were just entertainment to her.

  ‘It’s none of your business how I am, you old witch!’

  I made a hasty exit towards the shed, losing myself inside its darkness to forget her prying eyes following me.

  Dad was still there, in his shed. His computer was booted up, and he was peering at the screen. On the floor was overflowing rubbish from the waste bin, what looked like over-exposed pictures, images ruined by too much light.

  ‘How is she?’ was what he wanted to know, and I wondered again why he hadn’t come with us. Why he only went on his own, in the evenings.

  ‘A mess. They don’t know what to do with her, so they’re running tests. And she hates being on Eastern Ward.’ I let the air fill with silence, as we both had nothing to add to this. ‘Mrs Read’s in her garden again. It looks like she’s making notes on us.’

  Dad narrowed his eyes, and frowned gravely. ‘Don’t even speak to that woman. She’s a lunatic.’

  I saw then what he was doing on his computer screen. He had scanned in my picture of Monica and was photoshopping it with light and shade, making her look even more glamorous.

  ‘Why are you doing that?’

  He stopped moving the mouse, looking surprised at my tone. When he spoke next, he sounded defensive. ‘I just thought I could help her, seeing as she’s a friend of yours. Send it through to Andy, see if he has any work for her with the entertainment team.’

  I didn’t understand why he was finding Monica work, when he should have come with us to the hospital. I dug my hands into my jeans and watched as he made the image an attachment; moments later, the computer told him it had been sent.

  ‘Why hasn’t Andy visited Jena?’

  Dad stilled, his mouth working before the words came. ‘We’ve been through this, Sam.’

  ‘But what you said doesn’t make sense. That he might not be able to cope with it. I mean, he’s her boss; he’s known Jena for years.’ It was there, on the tip of my tongue: Because Jena loves him.

  ‘Well, he’s a busy man.’ Dad looked at me, full in the face. ‘And men aren’t as strong as women. We can’t cope with emotional things like you can.’

  ‘That’s a pathetic reason.’

  ‘Yes,’ he said. And I saw th
en that he might cry. ‘It is.’

  I was angry, with Andy, with Dad. He was right: men are pathetic. The only way Douglas Campbell would be brought to justice was if I did it myself. I needed more images for my Black Magic box, enough to push Jena into remembering, enough so she could make a positive identification. Even better, if I could find something tangible, like the raincoat. I needed him to be convicted.

  I ignored Dad, didn’t care what he thought, as I busied myself with my latest snaps, pegging the wet pictures on the clothes line, next to the other photos I’d taken that week: Andy outside of Sonia’s house; Rob on the bench, eating a bag of chips; a queue outside Our Plaice. Pictures that should mean something to Jena, enough to kick-start her stalled memory.

  Dad just stood there, watching, his watery eyes filled with emotion. ‘Excellent work, Sam. You’re such a good girl.’

  He really had no idea what I was up to, trying to track down Jena’s attacker. I thought he was weak and – as he admitted – pathetic, the way he was avoiding what was happening with Jena.

  ‘I don’t want you messing with any of my photos again.’ I wondered how it had happened, that since the attack I’d stopped respecting Dad. I’d never have spoken to him this way before; he was always distant from me and preoccupied with Jena. I’d thought that what I wanted was what she had – that close father–daughter bond – but now that it was possible, I was rejecting it.

  ‘Of course,’ he replied, brokenly.

  Dad sat heavily on the only seat in the room: a low, small stool, under the red glow. He looked like a gnome on a toadstool, with his white beard and his funny bushy brows.

  ‘Where are your own pictures, Dad?’

  He looked down at the floor, where balls of papers had gathered, and I realised he was destroying his images.

  ‘I got rid of them. I’m not as good a photographer as you, Sam.’ He looked up and grimaced. ‘I’ve decided to stop all of it, to stay away from the dark room. I’m no good.’

  Of my parents, he was the quiet one, the harder to read. It was best just to leave him be, to destroy his pictures and abandon his hobby. Dad simply couldn’t handle any more pain.

  ‘It’ll be okay, Dad.’ My voice was too loud in the space, hollow as the words. I knew I couldn’t comfort him, not the way Mum could.

  ‘I hope so, Sam. We’re all trying our best.’ He cleared his throat, and then he opened his arms. ‘I could use a hug.’

  I went to him, and felt how tightly he gripped me, as if afraid to lose me. His lips muffled against my hair, touching my ear.

  ‘How about a kiss for your old man?’

  I kissed his cheek, then laid my head on his shoulder, relaxing into the hug. I looked at my pictures, hanging above us: my secret mission.

  When I finally pulled away, his eyes looked so sad, so clouded with conflict, that I was worried he’d cry again. Before the attack, he never showed much of any emotion. He was always self-contained in a way Mum never was. The depth of his feelings was something I could only sense, as it was all unspoken, though he’d always doted on Jena. It was as if they were in a secret club, the way they’d disappear into this dark room. On my sixteenth birthday, his gift, the camera, had been an invite to join. But fate had robbed me of any pleasure I might have felt in this.

  ‘My beautiful girl,’ he moaned, tears very near the surface. ‘Oh Jena.’

  ‘Dad . . .’ I went to comfort him, but didn’t know how. I tried to hug him again, but this time he pushed me away, his palms slamming painfully against my chest, as if suddenly realising that I wasn’t Jena.

  It hurt that he didn’t love me like he loved her.

  CHAPTER 17

  14 January

  Pearl comes to my room after dinner, this time wearing an orange baseball cap. She perches on the end of my bed, writing on her forearms with a black biro, and talks about the voice in her head that belongs to her best friend, Ana.

  I have that friend too. I know how she talks, the secrets she whispers: Don’t eat that . . . you’re doing really well . . . ignore the doctors . . . they know nothing.

  Pearl is so translucent her skeleton is on show. Her skin is like webbing, strands of her hair fall from her head every time she runs a finger through it, and her breath seems impossibly light. She leaves her hat off now, when we are alone together, and the tender skin on her crown glows like a halo. Sometimes she pulls just one hair and runs it through her teeth, before I gently remind her not to. She told me she pulls hair from her legs and arms, which explains why she looks pre-pubescent – that it feels like a release, the plop of the hair coming out. To me, it sounds like pain she is inflicting on herself, just a variation of the pain of starvation that each one of us is punishing ourselves with.

  She looks admiringly at my wrists, narrow enough for her to see the clear outline of bone.

  ‘You’re so strong, Sam. You’ve resisted food.’

  ‘It’s not strength. It’s sickness.’

  Pearl considers her own forearms, which are covered by silvery threads of old scars. She starts to draw over them with curly writing. ‘Me, being younger. Newer. I see you as . . . thinspiration. Like, a role model. I mean, you have a tube. You only ate half that ciabatta. I saw you hiding the rest, behind the curtain at the window. Sian didn’t notice, but I did.’

  Pearl’s hero-worshipping horrifies me. Inspirational, to be tubed?

  ‘Don’t tell me that, Pearl. I can’t bear the responsibility.’

  She gazes at me with her large, blank eyes. On her arm she has stencilled I HATE ME.

  CHAPTER 18

  15 January

  Clive is looking smarter when we meet next, though only a tad. He’s had a haircut, though it looks like it was done in the kitchen by his wife, and his beard is neater. He sees me noticing.

  ‘Getting spruced up, for when the officials come up for the meeting. I’ve written up most of our sessions, but I’ll leave the conclusion until as late as possible. They’ve started hassling me; they want to distribute reports so everyone has time to consider before 1 February. But I told them they can’t have it yet.’

  A pop inside, like a balloon meeting a pin. A shrivelled-up sensation of hope being lost. ‘What will happen to me, Clive?’

  Despite the minor makeover, he is looking tired. I see that my story distracts him, and he’s trying to be positive, but really he’s worried about the outcome. He has a deadline, a report to finish, and I’m not doing as well as he’d like.

  ‘There will be three of us: myself and two members sent by the Mental Health Tribunal, who will all have read previous reports on you. They will all know what you’ve done. To be released, Sam, it has to be unanimous. It has to be deemed that your mental illness, your eating disorder, has been managed, and that you pose no further risk to anyone. We need to agree that you won’t commit another crime.’

  He shifts in his seat. Here is the nub of it; he hasn’t asked me about this yet. We haven’t reached that point in the story.

  ‘Before the judgement, you will be invited to speak.’

  Invited to speak. What a euphemism; as if there is a choice. As if I would be speaking now, if I could stay silent. I remind myself that Clive is on my side, so I will talk and help him conclude his report.

  I have to at least try to help myself.

  That night, sleep was elusive; my body’s gnawing demands for food kept me focused on my plan. I didn’t want to be comfortable, well nourished, because that was when the real terror would come. Clinging to pieces of information in my hazy state, having to concentrate, stopped me grieving for the big sister who was lost to me. At around four, the sun curled its fingers around the curtains and I knew there was no point in trying to sleep anymore. Sleep didn’t help either, but plunged me into bad dreams. The only answer was action. It was Wednesday 15 June and I had an exam that morning, but I knew where I needed to be more.

  My talk with Dad in the shed had made some things clearer for me.

  Firstly, none of
the adults around me seemed to want to find Jena’s attacker, and so it was down to me. Secondly, Andy’s failure to visit didn’t make sense, and I needed to face him. I also needed to keep Rob, and Sonia, in my sights, given their link to Douglas. It had only been four days, but things were moving fast with Rob, and I needed to keep it that way. Time was running out, with Douglas’s bail hearing approaching.

  I should have been taking my seat in the school hall, pencil sharpened, bottle of water on the desk, but instead I rapped on the door of 5 The Terraces, and waited.

  ‘Hi, babe.’ Rob opened the door, fiery hair flopping over his eyes, which lit up at the sight of me. He really liked me, I could see that, and any questions he might have had about my sudden interest were being pushed aside. Lucky me. ‘Come in.’

  His face was pink with excitement as he hopped aside to let me enter, pushing the Leica gently into my chest.

  ‘Why d’you always wear this?’

  I had the brief worry that he was on to me, but there was only curiosity on his face. ‘It was a gift on my sixteenth birthday. From my dad.’

  ‘Ah yeah. I remember now; you were always into art. I saw some of your pictures on the corridor at school.’

  He’d been noticing me, even when I was oblivious to it. That day at the shops, he’d said, I know who you are, and I realised that whilst I’d been studying and drawing and wandering blindly around my world, Rob had watched from the sidelines. Now I was noticing him right back.

  There was a pile of stuff blocking the hallway: a sports bag with a bulging zip; plastic bags; a guitar.

  ‘I didn’t know you played the guitar.’

  ‘Badly.’ He looked down at the pile. ‘That’s my life. Doesn’t look much, does it?’