First Date: An absolutely jaw-dropping psychological thriller

by Sue Watson

‘Don’t say that, please… I just feel deeply, always have. That’s why it was difficult with Helen. Once I fall for someone, it’s forever.’

  ‘I get that, you’re committed and I love that in a partner. But you’re too much.’

  ‘I know, I know, I am. You’re not the first person to say that to me, but please don’t…’

  ‘I can’t do this, Alex.’ I hear my voice, and find it hard to believe. ‘I really love you, but what happened tonight…’

  ‘No, no please.’ He starts to cry and I feel so helpless.

  ‘Alex, I just think we need some time. I need space.’

  He reaches out to me with both arms, and I find myself being held as he cries. I’m unable and unwilling to comfort him. I’m just numb.

  ‘I know I expect a lot from a partner. I think I need help, Hannah. I used to watch him hitting her, he used to bang her head against walls. I can still hear that thud; it makes me want to puke.’

  ‘What? Who are you talking about? I don’t understand. Alex?’

  ‘I can’t forgive myself, all those years she suffered, and I never did a thing.’

  ‘Your mum?’

  He nods. ‘I’ve never told anyone… Me and my sister used to hide in the wardrobe when he started. Mum always told us to go there. I was very young; at first, I didn’t understand. But even as a little child, I could hear her screams, and later, my sister would bathe her wounds. Dad would act like nothing happened. He was a coward, and so am I.’

  I didn’t know any of this, I didn’t even know he had a sister.

  ‘God, I regret what happened tonight, you’ve no idea. But when I saw him going towards you, I saw my mum, and all the times I didn’t save her.’

  ‘I had no idea. You said your mum died when you were nine.’

  He nods. ‘Mum died of cancer.’ He pauses. ‘But he’s still around. I don’t speak to him, I’ve never forgiven him for what he did. My sister is a better person than me, she was able to move on, but I’m still so angry. She visits him now – and I don’t see her either. It was a lifetime ago, but if I saw him, I’d kill him.’

  I look at him, and the look on his face causes a shiver to run down my spine.

  ‘Alex, don’t say that.’

  ‘I just want you to understand why tonight… happened. I feel terrible, I don’t know what to do, Hannah.’

  ‘We should contact the police, tell them what happened. You need help, Alex.’

  He nods, and turns to me. ‘Will you help me, Hannah?’

  He could have said anything else and I would have just walked away, but asking for my help is something that gets to the very core of me. I have always wanted to do the job I do because I want to help people. I can never turn down someone who’s suffering – and right now, Alex is suffering. What he did tonight was appalling, he lashed out without thinking, he was out of control, but he was urged on by the anger and pain of his childhood. He must have felt so helpless watching his father attack his mother, and he carries that and the guilt with him now, it explains why he is what he is. And apart from the pieces of him that reacted tonight and caused someone to be seriously hurt, I love who he is. And I don’t know if I will ever be able to walk away.

  ‘Will you stay tonight?’ he asks, his voice still croaky with tears. ‘I can’t be alone.’

  I nod. ‘Yes, but we need to talk. I suddenly feel like I did when I found out about Helen. I’m seeing you from a different perspective. You have to tell me everything before we can even think about moving on, or staying together.’

  ‘But I have, you know everything about me now.’

  ‘I didn’t know about your childhood, or why you’re so overprotective of the people you love. We all find it hard to let go, but you held onto the idea of Helen coming back for a year, and even now I wonder.’

  ‘I’ve told you, I’d never want her back now, I have you.’

  I sigh. ‘Stop the lying. I told you we can’t move on if you keep lying to me. The phone call I overheard. You were arranging to meet her, weren’t you?’

  He starts to laugh. At first it’s a small laugh, then it gets bigger, more out of control. He bangs his head on the steering wheel, and I realise Alex isn’t laughing any more. He’s crying.

  I sit and wait for this to end. It’s a panic attack, mild hysteria, I’ve seen it before with some of the kids I’ve worked with, you just have to hug them or leave them to work through it.

  Eventually, he stops crying, and I touch his arm.

  ‘You okay?’

  He shakes his head and laughs, tears still streaming down his face. ‘I’ll probably never be okay, but if you leave me, Hannah, I don’t know what I’ll do.’

  ‘I’m not leaving. Not tonight. Let’s talk some more. Let’s discuss what we can do to make you feel better. First is trust – you need to trust me, but I also need to be able trust you – and we have to have complete honesty between us.’

  ‘Did you really think I was meeting Helen?’

  ‘Yes, I still think that. That you invited her over to your house. I don’t know why. But I wish you’d told me.’

  ‘I wasn’t meeting Helen, I was organising something for you. Come on,’ he says, getting out of the car, ‘let me show you.’

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  I climb out of the car and follow him up the path. The front door is decorated with a beautiful Christmas wreath. It makes me sad to think how we’d put up the tree, planned Christmas. But now I feel like I’m in a parallel universe. We’ve just run away from a bar where Alex hit someone and left him for dead.

  My phone pings; it’s Jas. I have three missed calls from her. I text her back to ask if she’s home yet. It occurs to me that she might still be at the bar and I wonder if she’s aware of the fight, and does she suspect something? There’s so much going on in my head, I really can’t be bothered with Alex’s ‘surprise’, whatever that might be, but he’s hell bent on showing me, and ushering me through the door quite excitedly. It’s like nothing happened, like he didn’t just punch a man to the floor, like all that matters is what happens here, in his home between the two of us. That’s his only reality.

  ‘Come upstairs.’ He’s beckoning me from the bottom step. He’s just opened up to me in the car, laid himself bare, and I’m not sure he has the strength to handle a rejection from me at this point. So I reluctantly follow him upstairs, and he stands on the landing, waiting. ‘Now, I’m going to cover your eyes,’ he says, which makes me feel a little vulnerable. I’ve never felt like this before with Alex, I’ve always trusted him implicitly, but now? I’m not one hundred percent sure, but what can I do?

  ‘You’re not going to throw me in a room and keep me there tied up, are you?’ I say, with a mirthless giggle. I’m not even sure I’m joking.

  ‘Shush, walk this way,’ he says, guiding me forward. As we move, I instinctively open my eyes, but I’m unable to see anything through his hand.

  ‘No peeping,’ he says, as I hear him open the door. I’m so nervous my mouth is dry and I find it hard to swallow. In the silence, I hear him close the door behind us.

  I feel him firmly manoeuvring me to stand on a spot he’s obviously planned, and I wait nervously, unsure I even want to see what the ‘surprise’ is.

  ‘You know you said that you can’t work here because you need a desk, and privacy and a phone and…’ With that, he takes his hands away. I’m standing in what was the spare room and is now a luxurious office space, with two matching desks, looking out onto the back garden. There are two anglepoise lamps, casting a warm, yellowy light onto ‘his and hers’ Apple Mac computers. There are framed black-and-white photos of the two of us on the walls, and a small sofa against the wall opposite the desks, with a coffee table, a coffee machine and a mini fridge.

  ‘Oh!’ I say, because I’m not sure how to feel. I’m glad it’s something so normal, because I was imagining all kinds of weird things – a freshly painted dungeon, a padded cell. No, this is very Alex – and I know it comes with
kindness, I have nothing to fear – but I’m slightly overwhelmed.

  ‘The phone call you heard, “the coast being clear” was me talking to the decorators,’ he says, with a beaming smile. ‘I also had to arrange for the computers and desks to arrive,’ he adds proudly. ‘Now you and I can work from home together – side by side.’

  ‘Oh, it’s… great,’ I say uncertainly. He is so delighted with what he’s done, and he so wants me to be happy I can’t crush him, and I don’t want to seem ungrateful. But he’s missed the point. The main issue I had was that I want to work alone, and I need privacy.

  ‘Oh, and if you’re thinking about when you have to make those confidential calls, don’t worry, you can send me out.’ He smiles. It’s as if he can read my mind.

  ‘Okay,’ I say slowly.

  He wanders over to the coffee table, he seems oblivious to my reaction. Either he isn’t picking up on my lack of excitement – or he doesn’t want to.

  ‘We could live in this space, and never want for anything,’ he’s saying, arms open wide, encompassing his little world, the universe he’s created here for the two of us. ‘Imagine it, Hannah, I could work from home, and you could do a course. I remember you saying on our first date, you’d love to do a Masters in Social Work some day?’

  I shift from one leg to the other. ‘Yeah, yeah I would, I’ve talked to Jas about it – but I’d do it while I work, the council might even pay for it.’

  ‘Darling, when we’re married and I become partner at my firm, you won’t need to work. And I’ll pay for any courses you might want to do, we don’t have to rely on the council.’

  ‘But there’d be no point in doing a Masters in Social Work if I wasn’t a social worker – and I love my job, I don’t want to leave.’ I feel slightly panicky at this.

  ‘Okay, whatever,’ he says dismissively. ‘So long as you know this is your sanctuary, I made it for you. I want you to be happy and have everything you need.’ He’s excited, exhilarated even, I’ve never seen him like this. ‘Look, I even had the walls painted in that blush pink you love.’ He runs his hands along the wall.

  ‘It’s lovely,’ I murmur, unable keep up with him. It’s all too much.

  ‘So?’

  I look at him, slightly puzzled.

  ‘So, Hannah, will you move in with me?’

  I don’t answer him, just gaze around the room.

  ‘If you want to totally redecorate, new kitchen, new anything – that’s fine with me. It will be your house too, Hannah. Hannah?’

  I’m listening to him talk. He’s like a salesman, and he’s selling me the dream I’ve always yearned for: a home of my own, with someone who loves me. I think about our first date when we talked about children and dogs and white picket fences. And I believed him, in spite of Jas’s doubts I knew I could trust him, and he’s never wavered. He didn’t go cold, he’s never lost interest, and his passion and plans for our future are as strong as ever. And from the beginning I’ve longed to live with him in this beautiful home, my clothes in the wardrobes, my photographs on the walls. I’ve imagined summers watching roses bloom in the garden, Alex and I together in each other’s arms on long dark wintery nights safe and cosy in this lovely house. I’m still that foster child looking for her forever home, and I really thought I’d found it – but now… I’m not so sure.

  Alex wanders over to the desks, sitting side by side. Two perfect desks. But all I can think is two perfect coffins.

  ‘And that’s not all,’ he’s saying. ‘I have a few other surprises for you. I was going to make them Christmas presents but was too excited to wait.’ He takes my hand and walks me over to the small sofa by the coffee table. On the table is a brochure for what looks like a very upmarket holiday company.

  ‘So, the yellow Labrador is on order, but before we collect him after Christmas – oh his name’s Kevin by the way, I had to give him a name so they can get his shots and everything, apparently vets need a name. I thought Kevin was quite funny.’

  I nod slowly. I’d wanted a girl dog, I wanted to call her Rosie.

  ‘I thought you’d have been more excited, darling. Remember we talked about having a Labrador on our first date?’

  ‘Yes, but I would have liked to go and choose one – when the time’s right.’

  Alex puts his head back a little, in mild surprise. ‘Oh… okay, well, I guess we can cancel Kevin and when you think the time’s right, we can order another one.’

  ‘No – I didn’t mean—’

  ‘So we keep Kevin.’ He beams, all eager again.

  ‘Alex, I don’t know, just stop, this is a lot to take in.’

  ‘But we talked about all this – on our first date, you told me your dreams, and I’m making them come true. Like I said I would.’

  ‘I don’t know any more. I feel slightly overwhelmed, to be honest.’

  ‘Oh, I’m sorry, I’ve done it again, haven’t I? I can’t ever get things right.’ He’s crestfallen, and I feel awful. I look at his puppy-dog eyes, while at the same time remembering the punch, the heavy landing, the blood trickling along the pavement, mixing with the rain.

  ‘I just think I need time to think about what I really want,’ I say quietly.

  ‘Oh.’ The sadness on his face is difficult to bear. He’s obviously been so excited about the home office, and the dog, and as much as I want time to think, I don’t want to ruin it all for him. Maybe he didn’t punch that guy tonight. He said he only pushed him. Perhaps it was just bad luck that he fell and banged his head. And when we left him, he was coming round.

  ‘Can I have some time to think about moving in?’ I ask. I don’t want to hurt him, so I say, ‘It’s more to do with logistics, and—’

  ‘Yes of course, but I don’t see why logistics come into it. This is closer to where you work than your flat – which, let’s face it, is run-down.’

  I nod, I don’t have the energy to talk about this now. ‘It’s a big decision,’ I say. ‘It’s very late, I have work in the morning, and I’m so exhausted. I just want to sleep.’

  ‘And Kevin?’ His face lights up like a child’s. ‘I never had a dog as a kid, I was so excited about collecting him.’

  ‘Okay, let’s go with Kevin,’ I say, unable to say no to the thought of a lonely puppy not being collected. I know he’s doing this for me, but Alex wants this too, and it’s a small comfort knowing that if I decide not to move in, at least with a new puppy around he’ll have a companion.

  ‘I know you’re tired, darling, but…’ He’s now wafting the brochure and I can’t help but feel slightly panicky at what new ‘surprise’ he has up his sleeve. ‘On our first date, along with the dog and the three kids – we also talked about spending a holiday by the sea in Devon.’

  I’m sitting waiting for this, knowing what the surprise is but not as happy as I should be.

  ‘And this weekend, you and I are going here,’ he announces.

  ‘I can’t just run off to Devon, Alex. I have stuff to do.’

  Ignoring me, he opens up the brochure at a picture of the most beautiful little cottage. It’s a traditional pastel-coloured fisherman’s cottage on the outside, but further pictures show the inside is contemporary, with everything one might need for a romantic winter weekend away. It’s perfect, but right now it doesn’t feel right.

  ‘Don’t worry about food and drink, I’ve made an order from this amazing deli near the cottage. I called them today and they’ll deliver as soon as we arrive on Friday.’

  I’m almost breathless. ‘Alex, I’m sorry, I can’t just take Friday off, it’s our last day before we break for Christmas. It’s a busy time.’

  ‘Don’t worry,’ he says, ‘I think of everything. I called Jas earlier today and told her you need to take Friday off.’

  ‘I don’t… Look, Alex, I’m sorry. I just don’t like surprises. I need to know what I’m doing. Surprises and sudden change freaks me out – it stems from being a child in care – when someone comes into my life and sta
rts telling me I have to move, or go somewhere, I feel like I’m losing control. I know it’s hard for you to understand, it’s just the way I am. I’m grateful, and appreciate your thoughtfulness, but I feel very uncomfortable at what’s happening now.’

  ‘Oh.’ He puts the brochure down on the table, deflated. ‘Sorry. I’m so bloody thoughtless, what an idiot.’

  ‘No, you’re not. You can’t know how I feel about everything.’

  ‘I’m your partner, I should know. I should know everything about you. I’ll cancel our Devon trip first thing tomorrow, I’m so sorry.’

  I sigh deeply. ‘Don’t apologise, you were being kind and thoughtful. It’s just the way I am. Have you paid a deposit?’ I ask.

  ‘Yes, but it doesn’t matter.’

  Now I feel even worse. ‘Let’s sleep on it and talk in the morning, eh?’ I need time to get my head around everything that’s happened tonight. Right now, I’m feeling bombarded and unable to make a decision about anything.

  ‘Yes okay. I’m a bit rubbish, aren’t I?’ he says, his brow furrowed, the earlier exhilaration and hope now crushed.

  ‘No, you’re not, you’re not rubbish at all,’ I say, but deep down I’m beginning to think I don’t know who Alex even is.

  Later, in bed, we hold each other and Alex talks about all the things we can do in Devon.

  ‘Fish and chips, romantic walks along blustery beaches, the cottage, warm and welcoming. Oh, Hannah, all this trouble with Helen, and me doing that stupid thing tonight, I feel like we’ve become disconnected. A long weekend, just the two of us – it’s just what we need right now, please say yes.’

  And in my almost sleep, I can see us hand in hand, skimming stones, wrapped up warm, a bottle of Merlot drunk by a roaring fire. And I know I’m beaten.

  ‘Sounds perfect,’ I whisper, before falling into an exhausted, troubled sleep.

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  This morning, everything felt back to normal with Alex. He was loving and funny and bright. I didn’t want to ruin the mood, but I was keen to know if he still planned to contact the police about what happened last night.