The Other Passenger

by Louise Candlish

  Delilah, I thought, rolling my eyes. Writing a screenplay. Though I’d suggested a house sitter, it had certainly not been my idea to offer the house to the daughter of a wealthy friend of Clare’s. My first choice would have been Regan, who was now sharing a single room in South Croydon with a friend of a friend who worked nightshifts at the hospital, hot-bedding, basically. But I still hadn’t revealed that I lived in a house designed to accommodate a large family and their staff, and so had dithered over the proposal and, instead, a local rich kid moved from her parents’ luxury crib in Greenwich to ours, a few miles downstream. In any case, it was becoming clearer by the day that Clare made the decisions about ‘our’ house, not me.

  ‘Not quite the starving writer in the freezing garret,’ I said. ‘What hardships is she going to draw on in her writing? Dickens worked in a shoe-blacking factory, didn’t he?’

  Clare ignored this. ‘I’m happy to support creative endeavour in this small way,’ she said, directing her words at Dad. ‘It’s so hard to keep afloat unless you’re really successful. We have friends who used to be actors, but they couldn’t afford to keep going after a couple of years. They were just racking up debts and never actually earning anything.’

  At the mention of Kit and Melia, nerves flared across the surface of me.

  ‘I get the feeling they’re both really talented, as well,’ Clare added. ‘It’s a real shame.’

  ‘Would I have seen them in anything?’ Dad asked.

  I found my voice. ‘No, they weren’t on TV. She was in a couple of plays. One even had a short run in the West End, I think.’

  ‘She works with me,’ Clare told him. ‘She’s excellent, when she turns up.’

  I picked up the carafe of rosé by its neck and began refilling our glasses. ‘She doesn’t turn up?’

  ‘Well.’ Clare pulled a face. ‘She’s not the worst I’ve come across, but she has more than the average number of sick days. We used to troop in with a broken leg, didn’t we? But that gen is just a lot more precious. Anyway, Tony, they’ve just got married and because of all these debts they can’t even afford to go on a honeymoon.’

  This led, as I’d expected, to a comparison between the Maldives getaways of today’s romantics and the out-of-season B&Bs in Margate of Dad’s prime. Clare and I had a great photograph of him and Mum in the sixties at the haunted snail ride in the Dreamland amusement park. If we split up, I would need to make sure I took that picture.

  If we split up. I reached for my water glass and felt the icy liquid wash through my gullet.

  ‘You should have lent these actors your house for their honeymoon,’ Dad suggested.

  ‘They’d be far too proud to accept,’ Clare said. ‘Anyway, I’m not sure I trust them. We’d get back and find they’d sold the contents. Or the house itself! Property fraud is a massive problem, you know.’

  ‘Oh, come on, they’re not thieves.’ I thought of the picture Kit had sent me that morning of a river police launch sitting alongside the river bus like an escort:

  Water rats had a brush with the fuzz this morning. Just a drill, but almost gave me a heart attack!

  Time for a bit of clean living? You’d save money.

  Drop in the ocean, mate.

  This last came with a water wave emoji, followed by a money bags emoji. Finally, before he signed off, he sent a crying face. It was impressive, when you thought about it, that he hadn’t borrowed to fund a honeymoon. For the first time, he and Melia had deprived themselves of something they actually had a right to expect. (I was lucky Clare hadn’t extended her champagne largesse to the offer of a holiday share.)

  ‘You sure you want someone like that working for you?’ Dad was saying to Clare, laughing.

  ‘She just said she’s excellent,’ I snapped, to his surprise. ‘She is,’ Clare agreed. ‘She’s one of the most persuasive people I’ve ever met. She’s obviously persuaded you, Jamie – look how you’re defending her.’

  ‘Because she’s our friend,’ I said. ‘We just took part in her wedding.’

  As Clare stared at me, a memory surfaced from that dinner at the Ropers’ flat, back when it all started, when Melia said I’d be a good actor: I can always tell when he’s lying, Clare said.

  There was a sudden itch on my neck and, scratching, I felt the hard lump of an insect bite. I excused myself to go inside and fetch something for it.

  *

  A day or two later, about half an hour into our daily walk through the pine woods, Clare startled me by announcing, abruptly, ‘I know, Jamie.’

  Under my sweat, I froze.

  ‘I thought I could wait till after the holiday to deal with it, but I can’t. That’s what I was thinking about when we argued on the drive down to Winchester.’

  ‘Deal with what?’ My words were lost in a cowardly gulp.

  Her face had flushed deeply and I felt mine do the same. ‘I know you asked me to butt out, but I just wanted to touch base to make sure the advice I was giving you was along the same lines as hers.’

  It took me a few seconds to realize she was talking about the career coach. I could have hooted with relief. ‘Oh, you mean Vicky.’

  ‘Yes, of course Vicky.’ Her voice rose in accusation. ‘I know you haven’t been back since the first session.’

  ‘Not yet.’ Though clearly in a hole, I at least had a foothold in it and was not about to be cracked on the head with a spade and buried alive.

  ‘When were you going to? I booked those sessions months ago. It’s September now!’ With a sharp crackling underfoot, she drew to a halt. ‘And why pretend you were doing them, when you weren’t? I don’t understand. What were you doing instead?’

  Hoping she might make a better suggestion than I could, I played for time.

  ‘Let me guess: drinking with Kit? You were, weren’t you? Trust him to cover for you. For fuck’s sake, Jamie, you’re going to be fifty in less than two years and every month you let it slide, it’s going to be harder getting back into the workplace.’

  ‘I’m already in the workplace,’ I said, stonily. ‘I’m on my feet nine hours a day. And the reason I pretended is because I’m well aware that you care way more about it than I do. Why do you care so much? If it’s not about finances, then what? You’re ashamed to have a partner doing a menial job, is that it?’

  Clare’s brow knitted, her gaze as aggrieved as I’d ever seen it. ‘I think that’s a bit reductive.’

  ‘Reductive? Expand it then? Tell me how I can be more than I am. Please, I’d love to know!’

  There was a tremor in her hands as she gripped them together, presumably to stop herself from slapping me. ‘After everything I’ve done to try and help you, you have no right to make out that I’m the one at fault.’ She strode off ahead, sick of the sight of me, and I didn’t blame her.

  Trudging on alone, I disgraced myself further by brooding not on her, but on Melia. I was missing her with a ferocity I hadn’t anticipated. The wedding had been no delusion and the thought of her in renewed intimacy with Kit made my chest ache. I was, I supposed, grieving: whatever she’d said at the register office, I didn’t believe for a moment that we would resume our affair. No, I had to make a virtue of our parting and concentrate on shaping up in Clare’s estimation.

  I got back to the house first and told Dad Clare had decided to drop into the neighbouring village, where the boulangerie sold stacks of the fresh galettes we all loved. She arrived an hour later bearing exactly this treat and I wondered if she’d read my mind.

  (If so, what else had she seen while she was at it?)

  ‘Sorry about earlier,’ I said, helping with preparations in the cool stone-flagged kitchen. ‘I was out of order.’

  She busied herself making tea. ‘You should have at least told me you didn’t want to do the course. I could have transferred it to one of the team at work. Melia, maybe.’ As the tea brewed, she gave me a long, impaling look. ‘What’s going on with you, Jamie?’

  ‘What do you mean?’
<
br />   ‘I’m asking you. Ever since you’ve been friends with Kit and that group on the boat, something’s been off.’

  I tore off an edge of galette and chewed. ‘There’s nothing off. You met them at the wedding, you saw they’re just regular people. Steve’s a bit of an arsehole, sure.’

  ‘I liked him,’ she said, more in the spirit of contradiction than truth, it seemed to me, but at least she removed her gaze. ‘He seems like a straightforward guy. Maybe the dynamic will change, now Kit’s married,’ she added, lifting the teapot and gesturing that I should bring the plates.

  She said nothing more on the subject. But several times over the course of the rest of the trip, I imagined her thinking, You lied to me, Jamie.

  Why should I believe another word you say?

  *

  On the ferry home, there was an odd moment. A crowd had gathered on the narrow rear deck, their chorus of urgent cries audible through the open doors. Dad was in the loo, Clare plugged into an audiobook, so I joined the gathering alone, fearing there must be a man overboard. And I admit to a certain excitement, in spite of the risk to this poor person’s life. I imagined myself at the heart of the fray, making the crucial suggestion that saved a soul, or at least succeeding in calming a hysterical spouse – something to make me the hero of the hour. But when I eased through the throng to the front, it turned out someone had spotted a dolphin, evidently now vanished. As far as the eye could see, the sea was gentle, silver-skinned, scarred only by our own wake.

  No word of a lie, it was at exactly this moment, as I stood regarding the water, that a text arrived from Melia:

  Are you back yet? Fuck, I’ve missed you.

  The speed of my reply surprised me, though possibly not her:

  Same.

  I know you must be confused. I’ll explain when we’re together.

  I could see the dots moving.

  I love you.

  Quite some PS. Perhaps I gave it too little thought before responding:

  Same.

  Tomorrow?

  Yes, tomorrow.

  ‘That’s how boats capsize,’ Dad said, when I rejoined Clare and him and recounted my misapprehension about a man having gone overboard. ‘People attracted by the rumour that someone else is in danger, they end up creating it for themselves.’

  He had no idea.

  20

  September 2019

  This sounds crass, but when I think about that reunion with Melia, I prefer to think about the sex, not the words. I think of her skin glued to mine, the warm, wet squeeze inside her, the scrape of toenail on shinbone. Hair with a complicated new fragrance – dark and earthy, like the forest – covering my face, fingers gripping my neck, baby-pink nails as hard as almonds.

  There are some words I will replay:

  ‘I’ve married one man and fallen in love with another.’

  I wish I could think of a brilliant metaphor to express the irony, the theatre, of our situation, but I can’t. I do remember telling her I loved her too and repeating it like a prayer. (There’s a simile for you, anyway.)

  The encounter took place in a converted factory unit, with soaring ceilings, exposed brickwork and polished concrete floor. Though it was a mild evening, we’d huddled in bed as if freezing, our brains deceived by all those cold materials.

  There was a break in my voice as I asked her about the text: ‘So you love me, do you?’

  And smooth honey in her reply: ‘I thought you already knew that.’

  ‘Getting married to another man might be considered a bit of a red herring.’ I twisted the cheap wedding band on her finger; though it was a little loose, she claimed to have no intention of getting it adjusted.

  ‘You should see my sister’s,’ she said, wistfully. ‘It’s a massive diamond. Must have cost, I don’t know, twenty grand.’

  ‘She’ll probably be mugged and have her finger broken for it,’ I said, eager to amuse her. ‘So you have no qualms about breaking your vows, do you?’

  Now I’d amused her. Her laughter was soft, a puppy bark of approval. ‘You obviously weren’t listening at the register office, were you? We said nothing in our vows about being faithful.’

  ‘Didn’t you?’

  ‘No. Let’s hope Clare didn’t notice, either.’

  I told her about the arguments in France, the exposure of my dishonesty, and we agreed to take greater pains than ever to keep our secrets.

  ‘It would definitely have come out, if she knew,’ Melia said. ‘She sent me some photos from the wedding, actually. Sweet of her.’

  ‘She took quite a few, I remember.’ I reached for my phone. ‘Did you know I took one?’

  ‘One? Wow. I hope it was worth the effort.’ She examined the image, a smile on her lips. ‘That’s from when we were dancing, Elodie and me. I’d forgotten about that.’

  ‘It was kind of magical, actually. You were like, I don’t know, pixies or something.’

  ‘Pixies?’ She giggled. ‘Don’t they have weird pointy ears?’

  ‘Fairies, then. Sprites.’

  Holding on to the phone, she said, ‘Tell me your iTunes password.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘I want to download a song for you.’

  I watched her, her delicate profile, the gleam in her eye. Minutes passed, during which I understood that I was not only in love, but also addicted, a different kind of brain disorder altogether. ‘How many songs are you downloading there?’

  ‘I got you a whole album. Well, you got it yourself, technically.’

  I closed my eyes, drunk with contentment as, at last, she played the track they’d danced to by the water and began kissing me with fresh urgency. ‘Did you ever feel for Clare . . . you know, this? At the beginning. What we feel.’

  ‘No,’ I said, as much because she demanded to hear it as because it was true. Though it was true, it really was.

  When the song played a second time, I made out the line I’d only half-heard that Saturday in August by the river:

  I’d like to hold her head underwater.

  21

  27 December 2019

  At the next table, a man settles with a lurid green smoothie, speaking very loudly to the empty seat opposite: ‘Tell them that’s fine, but I would need to know by four at the latest, yeah?’

  I spy the AirPods and realize he’s not deranged. Meanwhile, DC Merchison’s fingers play with his notepad, thumbing its edges like a pack of cards he’s about to shuffle. I will the pages to fall open on something that might help me – reassure me. This is the problem with the police: they defend information as fiercely as they seek it.

  I need to get real here. If this goes on much longer, I’ll admit defeat and phone a lawyer, but for now I take comfort in the fact that the note-taking is hardly extensive, judging by what I can see; they obviously think most of what I’ve said is irrelevant.

  ‘So you continued the relationship with Mrs Roper after your holiday?’ Merchison says.

  ‘Yes.’ She was the one who got married, I consider saying, but there is no point, because Clare was – is – no less a victim than Kit. We are equals, Melia and I. This is something I’ve come to trust in. We’re not identically unscrupulous, but we align. Our respective moral gaps fit together like a smooth-running zip.

  The guy at the next table suddenly adjusts his seat and the scraping of chair legs on marble seems to travel through my legs and into my pelvis. Perhaps experiencing the same discomfort, Merchison straightens and places his palms on his thighs. Freed of his fiddling, the pages of his book drop apart and I see, under the heading ‘C. ROPER’ and a reference number of some sort, another name in capitals. ‘SARAH MILLER’, it looks like.

  ‘Who’s Sarah Miller?’ I blurt, before I can stop myself.

  Looking down, he sees his mistake and angles the pad so the notes are no longer visible to me. By his side, Parry frowns, but says nothing.

  ‘She’s a witness in a different investigation. Not relevant here.’

 
; He brings just the right edge of dismissal to convince most people, but I feel I understand him well enough by now to sense danger.

  If Sarah Miller is part of this investigation, then it’s not hard to guess who she might be. She’s the loose cannon whose projectile is coming my way. The other passenger.

  And I’ve seen her name before, I’m certain of it.

  ‘Can I suggest a theory?’ I say. Because suddenly, chillingly, I know it is not enough that every word I’ve uttered is the truth. These days, the truth comes in inverted commas, as owned and defined by the listener as by the speaker. Unless these two detectives believe my story, it might just as well be fiction.

  Merchison rotates a shoulder, grimaces at the evident discomfort of it, and urges me on: ‘Sure, let’s hear it.’

  ‘I think Kit’s disappearance might be to do with drugs.’

  They go rigid, soldiers on parade, and I know my timing is perfect. After all my objections and denials, my self-indulgent account of infidelity, I’m suddenly the one offering something, something I hope they’ll think about when they’re driving back to the station. Something they’ll tell their supervisor when they’re reporting on their progress and awaiting a steer.

  ‘I’ve maybe played it down, but he’s got a serious cocaine habit, probably other drugs as well, and it must be costing him. I’ve been with him a few times when he’s left to meet his dealer.’

  ‘Where?’ Parry says. Merchison starts to take notes.

  ‘They have a regular spot on the river path, a blackspot where there aren’t any cameras.’

  ‘Where is this blackspot?’

  ‘Near the Hope and Anchor. You sometimes see homeless people there, or dodgy types, it’s not the nicest stretch. Anyway, my point is he might have owed money, got into some sort of dispute. For all I know, he could have been dealing himself.’

  I stop speaking and assess their reactions. They’re not smacking their heads and exclaiming, ‘Of course!’, but they’re not scorning me either. They’re mulling the basics, checking the logic.

  ‘This has just occurred to you, has it?’ Parry says, his tone dubious.