by Pip Drysdale
But I didn’t sit down. Instead, I went to the bathroom and brushed my teeth.
And as I squeezed toothpaste onto my brush, I heard him through the thin wall: opening and closing the fridge door; shuffling around the cutlery drawers in search of a teaspoon. As I ran the tap and brushed my teeth I imagined him pouring the hot water. The sound of metal on ceramic as he stirred.
I went back through to the sitting room.
‘So?’ he asked, eyebrows raised as he walked towards me. ‘Tell me.’
‘How did you even find me?’ I asked.
‘Driver’s licence, remember?’ he replied. ‘Bolton Gardens is pretty memorable.’
I took a deep breath, put my mug on the table, crossed my hands in my lap and looked at him. ‘You remember how that information about Nicolai Stepanovich and The Town Square and Eastbourne got leaked to the press?’ I asked.
‘No. Have totally forgotten.’ He smiled, taking a sip of his tea.
‘Be serious, David,’ I said. ‘I have something to tell you.’ Eyes to him.
‘Okay, well, of course I remember,’ he said. ‘And just so you know, I called that annoying woman in HR the moment I got off the phone with you … I’m really sorry about that. I feel terrible for how I spoke to you that day.’ His eyebrows were raised and his glance cast down. ‘It’s no excuse, but I was very upset. I don’t like being on the back foot.’ He smiled and looked to me. ‘But I know I was being illogical: of course you didn’t know. Nobody did. That’s why it made the papers. It was just fucking unfortunate.’
I sighed. ‘No,’ I said, ‘it wasn’t just unfortunate.’
‘How do you mean?’ he asked, taking another sip. I glanced at my own cup sitting on the table. It was making a wet ring at its base.
‘I found out about the Eastbourne scheme from my ex-boyfriend.’
I could feel him harden again. ‘You mean your fiancé?’ he asked.
‘He’s not my fiancé,’ I said. My sense of humour had evaporated the moment Angus fell. ‘But he’s the one who told me an investor had pulled out, suggested it as an idea for you. He didn’t tell me about the rest of it, obviously. He saved that part for the papers.’
‘What? Why would he do that to you?’ David asked, squinting his eyes with a scepticism I understood. He was warming his hands with his tea but not drinking it.
‘Who knows,’ I said. ‘We didn’t have a great relationship.’
David looked at me, confused. ‘But that’s insane. I can understand leaking it – once you knew about something like that you’d have to do something – but why drag you into it?’
‘I really don’t know,’ I said, reaching for my tea. ‘But that’s what happened.’
David was looking around the room, like the answers were hiding in the bookshelves or in the brightly coloured stitching of the cushions on the sofa.
‘Well, did you ask him?’ he asked.
‘No,’ I said.
‘Maybe you should?’ David said, eyebrows raised.
I took a sip of my tea, then set my cup down.
‘I can’t,’ I said. ‘He died, David. He killed himself.’
‘What?’ David asked, almost spilling his tea. He put his cup next to mine. ‘When?’
‘On Thursday night,’ I said.
‘Jesus, why didn’t you tell me?’ His face was contorted.
‘I don’t know.’ Tears were now rolling down my cheeks.
‘God, I’m so sorry. You poor thing,’ he said, moving towards me. Hugging me.
‘So am I,’ I mumbled. And I was.
I still am.
‘God,’ he said after a few long moments of silence. ‘Suicide.’
‘I know. The police have been asking so many questions, it’s been so stressful.’
‘I bet.’ His arms were warm. Tight.
‘Is there anything I can do?’ he asked, pulling away and looking at me.
‘No,’ I said, ‘but thanks.’
I let him hold me. Sway me. And we sat there in the calm, in the quiet, for a while.
‘Truth or dare,’ he said eventually into the top of my head. There was a gentle mischief in his voice and it was such a relief.
‘Dare,’ I said. I needed the light.
He pulled away from me just a little and I looked up at him. ‘I dare you to come away with me next weekend.’
And a smile cracked my face for the first time in a while as I nestled back against him. ‘Where to?’ I asked. Allowing myself to imagine, just for a moment. Because it didn’t matter where – I would most likely be trying to scrape together bail.
‘Paris,’ he said. ‘I have to go anyway, for work. You should come with me. It’ll be fun.’ I could see him trying to make things better for me. But he couldn’t.
‘You have a wife, David,’ I said. My voice was small. ‘In fact, it’s the weekend, shouldn’t you be in the country with her?’
I could feel his chest expand with each inhale as he held me.
‘I told you, we have an understanding,’ he said.
I pulled away and looked up at him through tired eyes. ‘What sort of understanding, David?’ The question I should have asked in that hotel room.
‘Taylor, we haven’t slept together in over three years and she basically lives in our house in Cornwall,’ he said. ‘It’s just that divorce is extremely slow and expensive. But she knows I date. She does too. You can meet her if you want?’
‘No thanks,’ I said, taking a deep breath and looking down. ‘Please don’t lie to me, David.’
‘I’m not. I’ll be officially divorced in two, possibly three, months,’ he said. ‘Can’t we just have a torrid affair in Paris until then?’
I didn’t want to go to Paris. Ever again. Angus and I had left a snail trail of memories throughout that city of lights; the glittery hope I felt back then probably still glimmered from the cracks in the pavement after dark.
‘Can we do that?’ he asked, resting his chin on my head.
‘Okay,’ I said. ‘But can it be somewhere else?’ Images from Jim Morrison’s grave bombarded me: Angus kissing me roughly behind a tomb, pushing me against it, my arms at my sides, moss under my fingernails; the smell of cut grass. The Eurostar: the sound of a small child’s voice singing ‘The wheels on the bus go round and round’ flying at me from the seat behind us, and him whispering in my ear, ‘Darling, touch me.’ His coat flung over his lap, a makeshift blanket, and me unzipping his trousers, doing what he asked … then stillness as the coffee cart came past. And throughout it all, the lyrics continued, ‘The wheels on the bus go round and round’. While the pink sky with its fraudulent cheer smiled back at me from behind foggy windows, never once warning me of what was to come. I blinked hard and tried to blot the memories out.
‘Why? Paris is amazing.’
‘Too many memories,’ I said, my eyes cast down.
‘We’ll make new ones,’ he offered.
I smiled and fell back into his embrace.
monday
Master Sun said: ‘To be victorious in battle and to be acclaimed for one’s skill, is no true skill.’
27 FEBRUARY
I woke up violently that morning: adrenaline pulsing through my veins as heavy rain hit the windows and thick streams of water dripped down from the gutters above. David was asleep behind me, his face in my hair. It was still dark outside and the soft yellow glow of a streetlight was creeping around the edge of the curtains. It was beautiful. My heart was fluttering in my chest and in the warmth and safety of my bed, silent tears streaked my cheeks, their salt landing on my lips. My life was going to change that day, I could feel it.
My night had been spent drifting in and out of sleep, cataloguing the contents of my phone: messages to and from Angus, the call to David, photos, emails I’d sent from my account – none of that was incriminating. And I’d intentionally forwarded Caz’s email from Angus’s computer, his IP address, so they couldn’t tie me to that in any way. But no matter how forensically I ran
through everything in my mind, I couldn’t find peace. Because I just had no idea which way the dominos would fall that day.
She put my phone down on the wooden table. Heavily. The bang echoed through the small room.
‘You can have that back,’ she said. She threw me a quick look and walked to the window. It stretched the length of one of the walls and faced out onto the brown hallway.
I stared at my phone: they’d found something on there, I could feel it in my bones.
Detective Rouhani’s footsteps as she paced back and forth along the window of her dingy office were the only sound in that small room. But I could faintly make out the hum of life continuing downstairs, on the other side of the wall.
My trousers, wet from the rain, were stuck to my legs. My socks were damp. The hard plastic chair was making my bottom numb and a blister was forming on the back of my left foot.
Having gathered her thoughts or grown tired of pacing, Detective Rouhani moved back towards me and the messy desk my phone lay on. I was too scared to reach for it, as if touching it would be an admission of guilt.
She sat on the edge of the table’s ragged wood, her eyes on me. I looked up at her and then picked up my phone.
‘Thanks,’ I said. ‘Did you find anything useful on it?’ No. Please say no.
I braced myself for an unexpected question, something I hadn’t thought of and couldn’t prepare for.
‘Yes,’ she replied, ‘we did.’
Here we go.
My teeth chewed on my inner cheek, I remembered the warmth of David’s breath on my neck, and my heart froze mid-beat.
‘Would you like a cup of tea?’ she asked.
‘No thanks,’ I said. Why was she stalling?
She picked up a notepad that was lying on her desk, then asked as though it was of no consequence: ‘You said you knew about Angus’s drug habit?’
‘Yes, he did coke. But he gave up. Or I thought he’d given up.’ Just tell me what you found on my phone!
Her eyes squinted: ‘We found a large amount of cocaine duct taped to the bottom of his sofa. You didn’t know about that?’
Of course I knew about it. And I was glad they’d finally found it: maybe that meant they’d found his other phone too. I felt my own eyes widen, as though trying to telepathically unsquint hers: ‘No, not at all. I mean, he kept small amounts around, but usually they were only about this big,’ I said, holding up my two forefingers to indicate a small rectangle.
Her eyes returned to her notepad: ‘And do you recognise this phone number?’ she asked, swivelling the pad so I could see it. It was covered in stars and scribbled notes, and at the bottom of the page was a phone number. It had been circled to the point where the paper had started to tear.
I looked at the digits and could honestly say: ‘No.’
‘It belongs to a man called Cameron, or Caz. Have you ever heard that name before?’
They found the phone.
‘I don’t think so,’ I said, ‘not in relation to Angus. I mean, I’ve heard the name Cameron before but I don’t know anybody by that name myself.’
‘Okay,’ she said, looking down again. Scanning.
‘Who is he?’ I asked.
‘A private investigator,’ she said, looking up. ‘We found a number of missed calls from him on another phone in Angus’s flat. It was under a pile of old clothing in a storage cupboard. Do you know anything about that?’
‘No,’ I said.
‘We’ll keep trying to get in touch with him,’ she said. ‘But just so you know, that was how he made the videos. We found the camera in that cupboard too. A two-way mirror. Quite the set-up.’
I swallowed hard and cast my eyes down, imagining a group of policemen all laughing as they watched my tapes.
‘But my phone was helpful?’ I asked. I wanted a solid answer. I needed one.
‘Yes.’ She smiled – but I couldn’t read her smile. I didn’t know if it was self-congratulatory or reassuring. ‘Our analysts assessed it.’ She put down her notepad and picked up a couple of pieces of paper that were stapled together in the corner.
‘Great,’ I said. ‘Can I turn it on?’
Master Sun said: ‘When weak, act strong.’
‘Of course,’ she said. As I fumbled with the on button my mind jumped to Jamie and that fateful encounter. Naked, funny, charming Jamie with his lemon-yellow pillow cases, menthol smoke and The Art of War.
Maybe he’ll represent me.
‘The thing with iPhones is you can track them.’
Shit.
‘And, as I am sure you are aware, yours …’ She took a deep breath and looked down at the stapled report in her hands. ‘Yours turned up at the yoga studio at 6.38pm. It stayed at yoga. And when it left, a bit after 8pm, it went to East London. Just like you said.’
‘Of course,’ I replied, ‘but did you find anything on there to help you with your investigation?’ I said it quickly. Like there was never any doubt in my mind as to the result.
I left it in my locker. Thank God I left it in my locker.
‘So, that corroborates your story,’ she said. But she was watching me. Like she was confused, or didn’t quite believe the evidence – I couldn’t tell which. It felt as though she was trying to put her finger on something but didn’t know what, the way I’d done for so many months with Angus.
‘What I don’t understand is: if you were frightened of Angus, if he had a temper and you were considering pressing domestic-violence charges, why didn’t you revoke his “Find My Friends” permissions? He could have found you whenever he wanted to.’
Find My Friends. I’d gone to a party in Dalston when Angus and I had just started dating. He wasn’t a fan of East London – said he needed vaccinations to go there – and was worried about me going to the party alone. But because it was too new a relationship for him to simply tell me I wasn’t allowed to go – that would come later – he’d added me on Find My Friends instead. And he’d watched my blue dot make its way home as he sat at a business dinner. He’d made sure I was safe.
I’d thought it was sweet and caring. But Charlotte, upon hearing of it, insisted it was ‘creepy as all hell’ and made me delete the app immediately. Which I’d done. Not that I’d ever mentioned that to Angus. And he’d never asked.
‘Oh, I don’t have that app anymore,’ I said. ‘I deleted it.’
‘Deleting the app doesn’t stop someone you’ve given permission to from watching where you go,’ she said.
That’s how he knew I’d broken into his flat while he was away – that was probably partially what pissed him off so much. And that was what he meant by: ‘Did you really think you could outsmart me?’ on the night he died; he thought I’d left my phone in the yoga locker on purpose to throw him off the scent. It was how he knew I was in my apartment, not his, watching the DVD; how he was waiting for me with my purple notebook in his lap when I rushed to his apartment to pack. He wasn’t reading my mind at all. He was just watching my little blue dot.
‘We also spoke to the studio receptionist who was on duty on the evening in question,’ she said, breaking my daisy chain of thought.
I felt my heart pick up speed.
‘Really?’ I asked, suddenly filled with dread. ‘And?’
Silence.
‘He corroborated your story too. Said you’d “worked hard”, those were his words, said you were sweaty.’
Hair damp with fear beneath that cap. She picked up the notepad again and I watched her eyes scan through it.
Then she looked up at me. ‘Can you think of anyone, anyone at all, who might have wanted to harm Angus? Anyone else who might have had access to his flat?’
I let my eyes wander around the room, frowned a little and shook my head. ‘No,’ I said. ‘Besides, I was thinking about it after Saturday, and for someone to get in, they would need more than a key to his apartment – and you could totally pick that lock – they would also need access to the building. But they change the downstairs c
ode all the time and anyone who comes in through the front entrance would have to sign in with the doorman, so there would be a record of it. Maybe he really did just jump.’
She looked at me, mildly impressed. ‘Maybe.’ But I could tell from the tone in her voice and the look in her eyes that she wasn’t convinced.
‘It just doesn’t add up,’ she said. ‘We know someone else was there, given what the neighbour saw and the light on the CCTV footage … but who?’
‘Well, what about Stepanovich? If it really was Angus who told the papers, maybe Stepanovich found out and hired someone? Someone who could figure out how to get in through coded entrances without a code. I mean, he must have been kind of pissed, right?’
‘We’re not sure. But we need to rule out the simplest solutions first,’ she said. Matter-of-fact.
Then her eyes returned once more to her notebook. And then she looked up, met my gaze and said: ‘Anyway, thanks for coming in, and let me know if anything else occurs to you.’
Then she stood up and it was time to leave.
‘Sure,’ I said, as I followed her to the door.
My head was light and we moved in silence. She opened the door and let me out.
And then she closed it behind me.
And I walked down that brown hallway for the sixth time that week, past its diamond wallpaper, past the sign that said ‘Incident Room’, past the young policeman at the front desk who’d clearly told on me, and through the heavy front doors. I stepped out into the chilly London air. A red bus flashed by.
And I breathed in.
friday
Master Sun said: ‘War is a grave affair of state; it is a place of life and death, a road to survival and extinction, a matter to be pondered carefully.’
10 MARCH
I watched the houses blur by: washing lines, lives, deception. We were getting to the edge of London; it was early afternoon and the sky was electric blue. Spring was coming: the daffodils were already sprouting in Green Park. My face reflected faintly in the window, and beside it I could see David’s. Soon there would be greenery. Then the darkness of the Chunnel. Then there would be light. French greenery. Grey rooftops. And finally, Paris. I knew what was coming, and I squeezed David’s hand.
