by Nancy Adams
The day Holman crashed through the door of the crackhouse I’d become acquainted with and pulled my atrophied, emaciated body up from the couch, I was probably days from death, the blades of my hips showing through the skin. He carried me all the way to the car and then likewise into the ER, begging me not to die the whole time, the only occasion I’ve ever heard him plead for anything. I remember waking up in hospital to him standing over me, and for the first and only time in my life, I saw tears trickling out of those steely eyes. I’ll never forget it, and I’ll always love him even more for those tears. It was they that were responsible for getting me clean that time—a four-month battle in the Peaks, my longest ever stay there, the crystal firmly taking hold of me by the jugular.
As I was meditating on my history with Holman, my phone went off and I saw a number I didn’t recognize. My first thought was to slide it to red, but I wondered who it could be and my curiosity provoked me into answering the call.
“Who’s this?” I asked.
“It’s me.”
I instantly identified the voice of Kane, the hairs on the back of my neck standing to furious attention.
“What the fuck are you calling me for?” I angrily put to him. “To joke about how you and Terry got me real good? Well, ha-de-fucking-ha! You got me. Now my old man won’t let me move a fucking muscle, and I’m almost back to square one.”
“You had a good night,” he put to me.
“A good night? You fucking drugged me!”
“But when you came up, you forgave us and it was the old you all over again. Like old times. Drugs, booze, bars, clubs, and bitches.”
My heart stopped at this last part.
“Bitches?” I let out. “I can’t remember any girls.”
“Don’t worry, you kept going on about how much you loved some Christian bitch called Sarah.”
“Thank God,” I exclaimed in utter relief. But then the words “Christian bitch” floated up and my relief suffused with fury. I added, “Kane?”
“Yeah?”
“If you ever call or refer to Sarah again as a bitch, either directly or indirectly, I will come around your house and put a bat to you, do you understand?”
“Whoa! First Terry this morning, now me! What the fuck’s happened to you?”
“I want to change, and if you were any friend you’d support me, not drug me. I went for Terry because I realized that neither of you were real friends.”
“But I ain’t Terry,” he put severely. “You jump on me, you better hope to God you jump the fuck off real quick, and if you bring a bat, you better bring a fucking bag too, because they’ll need something to pack all your pieces up into at the end.”
“Fuck you,” I snarled into the phone.
“No, fuck you, brother. Last night was awesome—you’re the one ruining it. We helped relax you. We were your fucking friends. We had a real good night, and you gotta ruin it by threatening us? Something’s changed in you—and not for the better. You’ve lost who you are, and last night you gave us a glimpse of the old Josh, before shutting the lid and turning into this asshole.”
“This is me now,” I growled, my teeth vibrating as I did. “I don’t ever want to see either of you again, you hear me?”
“You gonna leave it like this?”
“Yes. Don’t ever come within a foot of me.”
“Or what, Josh? You gonna fucking attack me?”
“I’ll fucking end you.”
I put the phone down. A terrible rigid anger had worked itself into me, and I punched the wall to release part of the poisonous buildup. The sound of it, and the pain in my knuckles, brought me snapping out of my ferocious mood. I looked at my bedroom door, unsure whether my piece of light vandalism had been noticed. Sensing that it hadn’t, I sat back down on the bed. I must have gotten up at some point during the call. I tried to control my breathing, concentrating on the inhaling and exhaling of my lungs, slowing it down and trying to put my whole mind onto the task in order to be within the here and now, not sailing away upon the raging storm of my infuriated thoughts concerning my two alleged friends.
SARAH
Josh was housebound for the foreseeable future, and it meant that if I wanted to see him, I’d have to go round to his father’s apartment. This scared me a little, and over the phone, Josh explained things.
“There’s some rules,” he stated.
“What do you mean? Do I have to wear a shirt and tie?”
“Ha! Nothing like that. It’s just this thing about your father and mine.”
“Their history, you mean. It’s nothing. They used to be friends, and now they’re not. So what?”
“There’s more to it.”
His tone worried me, and I had to ask him what he meant.
“Look, my father doesn’t know who you are yet,” he replied. “Most of it’s to do with the fact that I don’t really tell my father anything about my life, but part of it is the fact that Holman warned me not to.”
“Why would he do that?”
“Because he says that the history between our fathers is much worse than either of us assume.”
My stomach palpitated and I went cold all over.
“What is it?” I asked in a trembling voice.
“I don’t know. And that’s the truth. Holman won’t tell me, just says that it’s real bad. However, he’s also come up with a plan.”
“What plan?” I asked incredulously.
“A plan to get you in, but under another name.”
“I don’t get it.”
“Holman has found another woman in the city who matches your profile perfectly. Her first name’s Sarah. She lives in the city. And she’s a public defender, so you can still kinda talk about your job if my dad asks you anything.”
“I really still don’t get it. Why would I need someone else’s profile?”
“Because my father may—well, will—have a search put on your name. Holman is helping us. He’s a good guy. When my father asks for your details, Holman will have your photo scanned onto the ID profile of a woman named Sarah Kline. So when Dad asks your name, you say it’s Sarah Kline.”
“Why would your father search my name?” I inquired worriedly.
“Because he’s suspicious of anyone that comes to his home. Anyone. He’s a very powerful man, and very powerful men are suspicious. It’s one of the main reasons they survive and stay powerful.”
“But he has nothing to find on me.”
“He does: your surname.”
“But what could Daddy have done to make my name so hated by your father?”
“Like I said, I have no idea. Holman would never spill the beans on it. He’ll help us, but he won’t cross my father in any other way.”
“My word, Josh!” I gasped. “Are you saying that to come to your home, I have to lie about who I am?”
“Yes. But it’s only a small lie; it hurts no one. Plus, we get to see each other and… well… I don’t know how to say this.”
“Then just say it.”
I heard him inhale deeply on the other end.
“Holman told me,” he began, “that if Dad knew that your father was Roy Dillinger, he would insist on me breaking it off with you. He would insist to the point of throwing me out of his house if we continued.”
My heart dropped at the thought of this. The faint impression of a knife cutting through us both came to my mind, and I shuddered. Barely two months ago, I didn’t even know Josh; now I couldn’t imagine my life without him. I closed my eyes and thought of my mother. I wondered what she would think of me being dishonest in order to be with Josh. Somewhere from the farthest part of my soul an echo resounded. It wasn’t a voice or even a sound, but the simple whisper of a feeling.
I opened my eyes and said, “Okay, I’ll lie.”
“Thank you, Sarah.” He sighed with relief, and I instantly sensed that he knew just how hard it was for me to be deceptive.
“Are you free today?” I inquired. “I may as well
be introduced to your father at the earliest convenience.”
“Ah! There’s good news on that score. He’s away for the next week in New York sealing some deal. I thought you could get acquainted with the place first and the way it works. It’s not like anywhere… well, normal!”
And he wasn’t wrong. Later that day after physiotherapy, I arrived at his apartment in a taxi, as required, his father likely to have the CCTV checked for the registration of the car I arrived in. He was apparently very thorough. When I reached the lobby, I thought I was entering a five-star hotel rather than an apartment block. The whole building was actually owned by Andrew Kelly, as well as most of the surrounding ones, and had the Kelly insignia behind the reception desk, Kelly written in gold letters with two dollar symbols for the Ls, as in KE$$Y. I gave my name—well, Sarah Kline’s anyway—to someone there and was shortly greeted by a rather rotund-looking guy. I don’t like to be mean, but I have to say that his facial features looked all squashed up, with no expression on his pink Plasticine face, even when he spoke. His name was given as Holmes, and he would take me up to Master Kelly, who was awaiting me.
In the elevator Holmes said nothing, and I wasn’t even sure he was breathing, so stiff did he appear. At the top, the doors opened and I was met by two very well-built men who X-rayed the contents of my purse. They were very polite and never actually manhandled the contents of the bag, even apologizing for the inconvenience. However, when one of them leaned forward to hand it back to me, his suit jacket opened slightly and I saw the flash of a pistol.
After this strange episode, the front door was opened onto a hall of incredible dimensions. The walls were covered in large ceramic tiles, coated in patterns of what looked like Arabic design, a white background with light- and dark-blue-lined stars interwoven into a tessellated pattern. Directly ahead was a wide staircase with an intricately carved mahogany banister, at the bottoms of which two carved eagles were perched as though surveying all that entered. The floor was covered in soft ruby-red carpet and was the softest my feet had touched for such a long time as I sunk into its thick plush. I took my shoes off so that I could feel the mushy, thick carpet between my toes. Closing my eyes, I stood there wriggling my feet in it, Holmes looking at me the whole time, his face unchanged. It all reminded me of the carpets I had run around on as a child, when my father had covered the floors of his own homes in a similarly opulent manner.
“Master Kelly is in the lounge, madam,” Holmes pronounced. “If you’d like to follow me.”
He walked on and I strolled languorously after him, feeling my feet crunch into the carpet with each step. We left the beautiful hallway and made it along a corridor filled with rows of vases on stands, each one obviously worth an utter fortune and many with oriental designs on them. I remembered skipping along such chambers in my youth, even knocking over and smashing a few priceless vases during my time as a spoiled child. Ambling through this place was like entering my past, a dreamworld where my childhood appeared to be played out again. Even the apartment’s sweet aroma, the light fragrances, brought back innumerable memories from those early years of luxury.
When Holmes opened the door to the lounge, I was startled to find that it was a huge room at the corner of the apartment and appeared surrounded by a panorama of the city itself, the whole outer wall made of a single sheet of curved glass. Again the thick red carpet delicately held my feet as celestial clouds must for angels. Seeing Josh on the couch, I glided over to him.
“Miss Kline, sir,” Holmes announced as I approached.
Josh looked away from the huge television he’d been watching and instantly grinned at my sight. He got up and opened his arms to receive me. Traipsing toward him with delight, I threw myself into him and we kissed tenderly on the lips.
“I’ll leave you to it, sir,” Holmes said from behind us.
“Yes, you do that,” Josh said to him, and the guy went off, closing the door behind him.
“So you do have a butler,” I put to Josh, our arms still gently wrapped around each other’s waists.
“I guess you could call B that.”
“B? He said his name was Holmes.”
“I prefer to call him B after beetle, because that’s what he’s always reminded me of. A scuttling bug.”
“Josh!” I exclaimed. “That’s terrible.”
“He’s on a six-figure salary, what the fuck does he care what I call him!”
I frowned at him, but his soft grin got the better of me and a smile broke out on my own face.
“What size swimsuit are you?” he suddenly asked, looking me up and down.
“What?” I replied, not understanding where he was going with this.
Again, that pearly toothed grin.
“I usually have a swim at this time,” he informed me. “If your legs are up to it, you can join me. I notice you haven’t brought your crutches.”
“No, for the past few days I’ve felt that I don't need them, so I left them at home today.”
“Then you should be game for a swim. My father often has lady guests, so he’s got a whole host of women’s swimsuits in various sizes.”
“I’d love to join you for a swim,” I replied.
“Then it’s settled,” he announced and offered me his arm, which I gleefully took. “We’ll fetch you something to wear and go for a swim.”
Josh led me through the house, my eyes darting from one luxurious sight to another. Paintings, vases, beautiful artistry in every aspect of the place. I was overwhelmed with a distinct feeling of déjà vu, my mind flittering back to memories of old—running with friends through aisles of grandeur that I took for granted while it was no more than the natural background of my life, but which, I must admit, I missed terribly when we moved away to more humble living standards. As we sauntered toward the room with the swimsuits, my mind continually waltzed through a daydream of the past. It was, however, when we reached the bedroom containing the walk-in closet that this waltz began to take on a darker tone.
Josh opened the door to the room and led me inside, my arm still clasped within his. Softly untangling ourselves, he left me standing in the center, at the foot of a bed, while he parted two large sliding doors that revealed a grotto of women’s clothing. I gasped as I spied a wardrobe whose interior was larger than many lounges I’d seen in the course of my life, lined with racks and racks of differing clothes.
“The swimsuits are at the back,” he commented as he disappeared inside. “So I’ll fetch them out for you to see.”
But as he dissolved within the mass of clothing, I began to feel strange as my eyes lost themselves in the multicolored clutter of cloth. A new memory struck me, not so exhilarating or peaceful as the others. I felt a slight change in the room, as though it had suddenly been transported somewhere else. On the carpet near my feet I saw a puddle of red wine. Looking over at one of the walls, I saw a scatter of scarlet across its surface, green, broken glass at its foot. Then I heard murmuring from inside the closet and knew straight away that it wasn’t Josh. It was the past screaming out. Two people were arguing deep within the closet, a male and a female, and I knew who they were. This was where they always came to argue. It was my mother and father.
A sudden clap emanated from within the closet, and I saw my mother emerge, mascara running down her face in inky streaks. She looked furious, her eyes bulging and her mouth welded together in an enraged grimace. I’d never seen her like this before, so covered in hate. Having appeared, she stood like an animal leaving its den for the first time that day, apprehensively glancing about herself. Her tear-shredded eyes found me, and her fury suffused in a gentle second. She smiled, swooped forward, and lifted me up into her arms, hugging me so tightly that I thought she’d crush my rib cage. It was as she hugged me that my father gingerly came out after her, rubbing his cheek, an abashed expression on his scarlet face.
“Here they are,” Josh said, suddenly throwing me out of my daydream.
I peered at his smiling, fa
ce and a look of worry instantly cascaded down his features.
“You okay?” he asked.
“I don’t know” was all I could mumble.
“You’re trembling. Come and sit down on the bed.”
He tenderly took my hand and ushered me to said bed, sitting me down at its end.
“I think I just had a flashback,” I muttered as he discarded the swimsuits and sat down next to me. “I saw my mother,” I went on. “She came walking out of that closet.”
“You saw your mom come out of the closet?” he asked, giving it a quick glance as he did.
“It wasn’t exactly your closet. It was one we had back at our old home. It was more a memory than a hallucination.”
“Did she say anything?”
“She hugged me,” I whispered sadly and felt the tears well in my eyes. “But she didn’t say anything.”
“She just walked out the closet and hugged you?”
“I was little. She lifted me up. Then my father came out. They’d been arguing in there. They always went to the closet to argue, but I must have heard them this time. There was a smashed bottle as well. Something bad had happened, something terribly bad that had upset my mother a lot.”
“What do you think it was?”
I closed my eyes and pleaded for the memory to raise itself up again and give me added clarity. But it refused to come back to life, and I got nothing.
“They were arguing, but I didn’t hear their words” was all I could give him.
We sat silently for a moment, my eyes immersed within the endless closet, a part of me expecting my mother to appear for a second time. But she didn’t, and a wave of melancholia spread through me. As if sensing this, Josh reached his long arm around me and brought my body into his side. My natural reaction was to rest my head gently on his shoulder.
“Anyway,” he began, “I got you some suits to try. They’re your size—I still remember from the dress! So let’s forget about the past for the moment and go downstairs and have a swim in the present.”
