The Truth About You

by Susan Lewis

  At that his eyes narrowed, but he apparently decided not to voice whatever he’d drawn breath for, and simply watched her survey the cluttered yard with its scavenging ducks and chickens, towering hay bales, and rusting bits of old farm machinery. Behind a row of rundown stables a couple of horses stood in a field, while the countryside beyond stretched out to the horizon in a lazy patchwork of shimmering greens. It was certainly peaceful around here, she was thinking, and secluded, though she guessed the new estate she’d passed just now was probably only a short walk away.

  ‘You should go in,’ he told her.

  She turned to him in surprise. ‘What about you?’

  ‘Kirsten thought it would be best if you two talked alone, at least at first, so I’m going to exercise Julia’s horses.’

  Lainey’s heart jarred. She’d forgotten he could ride, since the last time she’d seen him on horseback was during a holiday in the Camargue, before Zav was born. Apparently these days it was a pastime, perhaps even a passion, he shared with his elder daughter. She couldn’t help wondering how Tierney would feel about it, but quickly pushed the thought away. That was something she’d have to deal with later.

  ‘Is there anyone else inside?’ she asked.

  He shook his head.

  Lainey glanced at the cottage. ‘Actually, I’m not sure I want to speak to her alone.’

  ‘It’ll be fine,’ he assured her. ‘You’re always great with people, and she’s looking forward to meeting you.’

  If that were true, she could only wish she felt the same. ‘Aren’t you at least going to show me in, and make the introductions?’ she said rather desperately.

  ‘You don’t need me to do that. All you have to do is go along the hall into the kitchen. She’s waiting for you there.’

  ‘So she’s not in bed?’

  ‘No, but she hasn’t regained full strength yet, so please try to bear that in mind.’

  Not liking how protective he was sounding, she turned back to the car.

  ‘What are you doing?’ he protested. ‘Lainey, for God’s sake, you can’t come all this way only to . . .’

  ‘My phone,’ she explained, retrieving it from the charger.

  Sounding less tense, he said, ‘I’m afraid you won’t get a reception.’

  ‘I’d still like to have it with me. How long will you be gone?’

  ‘Half an hour, I guess. Look, I know this isn’t easy for you, it isn’t for her either, but I promise, you’ll like her. There’s nothing not to like, and by the time you leave you’ll be saying the same.’

  It was on the tip of her tongue to ask if he’d be leaving with her, but she decided to save it until she knew whether Julia was coming back tomorrow or Wednesday.

  After watching him trudge off to the stables, she made her way to the cottage and in through the open front door. The entry hall was narrow and shadowy, with a vivid, childlike mural of farmyard scenes covering one wall and a wooden staircase running up the other. The place smelt both musty and fresh, as though lemons had been squeezed over old clothes. With so little light it was hard to tell how clean it was, but the sense of age and need for refurbishment was plain in the scuffed panels of the floorboards and scratched paintwork on the doors.

  She couldn’t quite gauge how she was feeling now, apart from apprehensive, and out of place, as she followed the hall into a misty pool of light that, when her eyes adjusted, turned out to be illuminating a spacious kitchen. With its heavy oak beams, large battered table and flagstone floor it was certainly a homely space, though there didn’t appear to be much in the way of modern units, or even appliances. Plenty of dried herbs and copper pots hanging from the ceiling, though, and the fridge was covered in drawings, photos and magnets. She noticed a saucepan on the range, presumably containing the soup, and two bowls next to it with a ladle resting on the top.

  ‘Do come in.’

  She spun round, but could see no one in the dimly lit enclave where a vast inglenook fireplace was surrounded by several armchairs. Beneath the window to one side was a desk, and she noticed Tom’s laptop straight away. It appeared as at home here as he did.

  Catching a movement, she waited and watched as a woman in jeans and a pale blue kaftan stepped into the light. Her breath became shallow as she realised she was looking at Kirsten Bonner, seeming almost ethereal in the misty bands of sunlight that engulfed her. As she passed out of the rays Lainey could see her blotched and swollen face, a travesty of what it had once been, and a wave of pity surged through her. Kirsten had been so beautiful, so slender and fair. Now she was bloated, covered in sores, and beneath the turquoise silk scarf wrapped around her head she was presumably without hair.

  ‘You manage to mask your shock better than most,’ Kirsten told her, her voice not much more than a rasping whisper.

  Lainey had no time to respond.

  ‘I told Tom you were lost, not involved in an accident, but he seemed intent on worrying. Would you care for a drink of something? He went to the supermarket this morning, so there’s lemonade and juice in the fridge. You can have tea if you prefer, but I’m afraid you’ll have to make it yourself.’

  ‘I don’t need anything, thank you,’ Lainey replied. ‘But maybe I could get something for you?’

  Ignoring the offer, Kirsten pulled out a chair and sat at the table, gesturing for Lainey to do the same.

  Once they were opposite each other, Lainey found herself under almost intimidating scrutiny. The piercing grey eyes, that appeared so much more alive than the sallow skin of Kirsten’s face, swept over her with a frankness that was close to offensive. It wasn’t possible to tell what the woman was thinking, but Lainey wasn’t feeling any of the welcome Tom had led her to believe she’d receive.

  ‘I wonder,’ Kirsten began, ‘if you have any idea how often I’ve imagined this day.’

  Since this was far from the opening Lainey had expected, she felt her mouth turn dry as she tried to think what to say.

  ‘You don’t have a clue,’ Kirsten declared. ‘You’ve never given me a single thought over the years, and why would you when you had what you wanted? For me never a day has passed that I haven’t resented every single bone in your body, to the point I often wished you dead.’

  Lainey could hardly believe what she was hearing. Since Tom hadn’t prepared her for anything like this, she wasn’t remotely ready to deal with it.

  ‘That’s an irony, isn’t it?’ Kirsten continued. ‘Me wishing you dead, and now I’m the one who’s most likely going to ship out early. No, don’t look at me like that, I’ve got cancer; cancer kills people and this is the second time it’s come for me. I suppose it’s what I get for thinking so many evil thoughts about someone who probably doesn’t even know what an evil thought is.’

  Finding her voice, Lainey said, ‘I don’t understand why you’re . . .’

  ‘No, of course you don’t understand. How could you, when even now you still have no idea what you took from me back then? No one knew. I never told a soul, apart from my sister – and Tom.’ As her eyes glittered the challenge, Lainey felt the shock ripple through her.

  ‘Are you saying that Tom’s always known you have a child together?’ she asked hoarsely.

  Kirsten smiled, and the beauty of it was almost an insult to her inflamed, puffy face. ‘You’re really afraid of the answer to that, aren’t you?’ she said.

  Lainey couldn’t deny it.

  ‘Ever since finding out about Julia you’ve been wondering if Tom and I have been together for as long as you’ve been with him, only in secret of course. You’ve tormented yourself with the fear of it; you’ve imagined him leading a double life, being as happy with our daughter as he is with you and yours, possibly even happier. It’s been tearing you apart, making you want to lash out in ways you’ve probably never thought yourself capable of. In fact, I’m sure you’ve wished me dead a thousand times. Maybe I should blame you for the way I am.’

  As Lainey stared at her, she was wondering if Tom had
any idea just how bitter this woman was. Surely he’d never have let her walk into this if he had.

  ‘God, I’ve envied you,’ Kirsten told her bluntly. ‘I still do, because nothing’s ever been difficult for you, has it? Having Peter Winlock as a father, your glamorous mother . . . They made sure their little angel never wanted for anything. You were spoiled rotten from the day you were born, never had to work for anything, or wonder how you fitted into the world . . .’

  ‘You don’t know anything about me,’ Lainey broke in defensively.

  Seeming not to have heard, Kirsten said, ‘Incidentally, I was impressed when I read about the way you cared for your mother at the end. It wasn’t what I’d have expected of someone who’s much more used to taking than giving.’ Her eyes bored into Lainey’s, seeming to demand a response.

  ‘If that’s what you want to think of me, then go right ahead,’ Lainey told her, her mother’s fire sparking in her eyes.

  ‘It’s hard to think otherwise when as far as I can tell you’ve had it all for as long as I’ve known you, or at least known of your existence. The ideal wealthy family, a wonderful husband, two perfect children, your looks, your health, more friends than you know how to keep up with. In case it interests you, I had to work hard for my success, short as it was. I didn’t have parents who could throw open doors for me, push me through and make all the right introductions. In my world there was no one there when things didn’t go so well, apart from my gran who was deaf, and my sister, Rosa. Our parents died when I was thirteen, but I guess I at least have the satisfaction of knowing that I made something of myself through my own efforts, even if it didn’t last for as long as I’d have liked.’

  Lainey was trying to assimilate this new image of a younger Kirsten, who she’d always assumed had come from a similar background to her own.

  ‘Of course, it would have lasted if Tom hadn’t met you and got you pregnant,’ Kirsten pressed on. ‘We’d have been together then, the way we should have, bringing up our child, perhaps having more, while continuing with our careers. That’s what would have happened if you’d been anyone other than Peter Winlock’s daughter. But unfortunately that’s who you are, and because Daddy’s girl always gets everything she wants, there was never any doubt that she was going to get Tom Hollingsworth too. So he divorced his wife, married you, and spent the next sixteen years pretending to love you . . .’

  ‘I don’t have to listen to any more of this,’ Lainey told her, getting to her feet.

  ‘Sit down,’ Kirsten barked.

  Staying where she was, Lainey said, ‘I realise now why you didn’t want Tom here while we talked. He wouldn’t let you get away with what you’re saying, because none of it’s true and if you knew anything about me . . .’

  ‘I know you’d like it not to be true,’ Kirsten smiled, ‘but the problem is you don’t believe he loves you either, do you? No, don’t bother to deny it . . .’

  ‘Why are you doing this?’ Lainey broke in angrily. ‘What on earth do you think you’re going to gain from so much . . . resentment and malice?’

  ‘I don’t suppose I’ll gain anything, apart from a brief sense of satisfaction. I say brief, by the way, not because I could be on the final leg of my journey, but because payback is rarely as sweet as we expect it to be. For instance, I can’t say I’m experiencing much in the way of gratification right now, though I thought, before you came here, that I would.’ She threw out a hand, as if to show she could accept she was wrong. ‘Do tell me,’ she pressed on, ‘how it feels to realise you’ve been despised for years? I know it won’t change anything, we can’t have the time over, but it must be a whole new experience for you, who’s always been so adored and . . .’

  ‘As I said,’ Lainey cut in sharply, ‘you know nothing about me, and now I’m going to find Tom, because if we’re to continue this I think he needs to be here.’

  ‘Hiding behind him?’

  Lainey’s face tightened.

  ‘Why don’t you have the courage to let me finish?’ Kirsten demanded.

  ‘To finish what? Making me feel that I’m the cause of all your misery? Whatever happened between you and Tom sixteen years ago, what you expected of it, what he promised, even, is never going to change the fact that he married me. If he’d wanted you no one would have stood in his way . . .’

  ‘Apart from your father.’

  ‘No, not my father, because indulgent as he was, he’d never have wanted Tom to marry me if he’d thought he was in love with somebody else. And contrary to what most people seemed to think, he wouldn’t have blocked Tom’s career either, because my father simply isn’t like that. So tell me, do you think Tom was in love with you back then? Perhaps you think he still is.’

  ‘I don’t think, I know . . . that he isn’t, and probably never was. But what I do know is that for years I’ve believed he knew about Julia and deliberately shut her out of his life. And the reason he did that was because you and your father made him.’

  ‘I repeat, my father and I never forced him into anything. We didn’t even know that Tom had had a relationship with you, much less that your child might be his. As for Tom, he swore to me that when he asked you if the baby was his you told him it wasn’t.’

  Kirsten’s chin came up as she took her time to consider that. ‘When I was pregnant I told him what he wanted to hear,’ she said in the end. ‘He was terrified I was going to spoil things between you two, and believe me, I was tempted to. The problem was, I could tell that even if I were able to prove the child I was carrying was his, it wouldn’t make a difference. He didn’t want me, he wanted you and all you and your father could offer.’

  ‘But if you didn’t tell him the baby was his, how could you have spent so many years believing he’d turned his back on you?’

  Kirsten treated her to an approving look. ‘Because after Julia was born I wrote him a letter telling him I’d lied, that she was his,’ she confessed, ‘and he never replied. He says now that he didn’t receive the letter, and I suppose, after this time of seeing him with Julia, that I’m coming to believe him. He really doesn’t seem like the kind of man who’d turn his back on his own child. Unless, of course, he was forced to.’ Her tone rang with the challenge.

  Lainey’s jaw tightened. ‘Do you seriously think anyone can force Tom into doing something against his will?’ she cried. ‘If you do, then you really don’t know him.’

  ‘I don’t think it now,’ Kirsten admitted, ‘but I did, for a very long time.’

  Long minutes ticked by, during which neither of them spoke. Lainey watched Kirsten’s eyes as they drifted to a place only she could see. After a while she felt sure she could sense the fight draining from Kirsten, as though the effort of maintaining a position she’d already lost had become too much. Eventually she looked at Lainey and sighed shakily. ‘To be honest, there’s so much I wish I’d done differently,’ she murmured. ‘Things I wish I hadn’t said, or believed, except we’re not supposed to admit to regrets, are we?’

  Hearing the sadness in her voice, Lainey sat down again as she said, ‘I’m getting the impression that you’ve caused yourself more pain than you have anyone else.’

  Kirsten didn’t argue. ‘I hope that’s true, but I can’t deny that I wanted to hurt you today. You see, I’m still jealous of you, perhaps even more than ever, because not only did you get Tom and go on to live as his wife for the last sixteen years, you’ve got your health, your family, your friends, and I . . . Well,’ she threw out an arm, ‘shall we say I’ve made some bad choices and I’m not sure now whether life, or perhaps I should say death, is going to allow me enough time to make up for them.’

  Moved by how desperate she must be feeling, Lainey asked, ‘Is it really that advanced?’

  Kirsten merely shrugged. ‘They’re saying it’s still too early to tell, but with something like this, you have to be prepared for the worst.’ Another silence fell as she gazed down at her hands and let her thoughts go to places she apparently didn’t wa
nt to reveal. After a while she looked at Lainey again. ‘I really didn’t want to like you,’ she said frankly, ‘and the last thing I wanted was your pity, but I don’t think things are going my way on either count.’

  Responding to the first hint of a connection, Lainey said gently, ‘Why don’t you tell me about Julia?’

  Kirsten seemed surprised. ‘Tom hasn’t already done that?’ she asked.

  ‘Not really. I know how old she is, of course, and I guess she likes horses.’

  Using a crooked finger to block a tear, Kirsten said, ‘He’s never mentioned that she . . . well, that she isn’t like most other girls her age?’

  Lainey regarded her curiously.

  ‘She has Down’s,’ Kirsten told her.

  Lainey became very still. Why on earth would Tom have omitted to tell her something so vital, something that would have made such a difference both to her and to Tierney? Surely he wasn’t ashamed? That wouldn’t have been like him at all. ‘I understand now why you feel so protective of her,’ she said.

  ‘And why I didn’t try to push her on him sooner?’

  ‘I don’t think you’re pushing now. I think you’re doing absolutely the right thing in bringing them together. Not only for her sake, but for yours. You need to know that should the worst happen, and obviously we’re hoping it won’t, she’s going to be as loved and cared for as she is now.’

  More tears shone in Kirsten’s eyes. ‘I don’t understand why you’re being nice to me after the way I’ve treated you today. I guess you just feel sorry for me.’

  ‘Of course I do,’ Lainey responded, ‘but not in a patronising way, only as one woman to another, one mother to another. And I don’t blame you for being afraid, because in your shoes anyone would be.’

  Kirsten only looked at her.

  ‘It can’t have been easy,’ Lainey continued, ‘bringing up a special needs child alone, especially when you thought Tom had abandoned you.’

  ‘Actually, she’s not too bad,’ Kirsten assured her. ‘Well, I guess she’s typical of someone with her condition.’