Little Sister

by Isabel Ashdown

  “So what happened to the rest of the bottle, then?” Emily demands, and she feels triumphant when she sees the look of doubt cross her husband’s face, and he turns to Jess as though he wants to hear the answer too.

  Jess turns away and cracks the egg against the side of the pan. “God knows,” she replies, too casually. “We probably polished it off over the next few days without realizing it.”

  “When?” Emily shouts, throwing her arms wide. “When did we ‘polish it off’? We weren’t exactly in a celebratory mood during the first few days of New Year! I think I’d remember drinking prosecco while the police scoured the country for my missing child!”

  James steps between them, ever the peacemaker, and then the phone rings again, and they all turn toward the sound, startled, anxiously hopeful once more. They see Chloe pass the doorway to answer it, and they wait, frozen, breathless for news.

  Chloe reappears, holding out the receiver, and Emily snatches it from her as the sound of blood rushes in her ears. “It’s DCI Jacobs,” Chloe murmurs, her expression uneasy.

  “Hello?” Emily says, and she leaves the kitchen and walks along the hall, suddenly terrified that this will be the news they fear the most, the worst possible news.

  “Emily? DCI Jacobs here. We’ve got a brief update for you and James. Two things, actually. First, we’ve had to release Max Fuller on bail—for the time being, we’ve just got the charge of theft. The CCTV cameras picked up him and Chloe on Yarmouth pier, exactly when she said they were there. Judging by the timings, it’s not impossible that they could have stopped off at home on the way past, but in my opinion it’s unlikely. They look pretty relaxed in the video footage, not like two people with something to hide. We’ve nothing further to hold him for at the moment, but of course we’ll keep you fully updated as we continue to investigate him.”

  It’s not a body, Emily thinks, her relief so profound that she fears her legs might give way beneath her. She eases herself down, to sit on the bottom step of the stairs as she tries to regulate her breathing. “You said there were two things?”

  “Yes. The second thing relates to Marta Alvarez—your ex-nanny. We’ve just picked her up for an interview; I’m on my way to the station now. Look, I don’t want you to let your imagination run away with you, Emily, but we’ve followed up on a couple of her previous employers, and it turns out she was sacked from an earlier job on the mainland.”

  Jess and James join her in the hallway, and they stand over her, their expressions questioning. Emily switches the handset to speakerphone.

  “For what?” Emily’s voice is small; she knows what’s coming. “Why was Marta sacked from her last job?”

  There’s a slight pause, as DCI Jacobs carefully chooses her words. “For harming a child in her care.”

  Emily drops the phone and lets her body crumple against the stairs. It’s the Sabbath, she thinks, her mind flitting absurdly. Don’t people know not to phone on the Sabbath?

  * * *

  When Emily first headed back home after graduation, she had intended only to spend the summer there, a well-earned couple of months being mollycoddled by Mum, while she polished her CV and started to consider the prospect of work and life in the “real world.” Back home, the town felt too small, the shopping center in the high street unsophisticated, the cafés and bars too provincial; even Minxies was on its last legs, its striped canopy now faded and tattered. All of these places seemed lackluster and suffocating. And, worse still, their tree-lined street, gently affluent on the outskirts of town, appeared completely unchanged, as though time had simply stood still in that tiny part of the world. Of course, she’d been home many times in the two years since Dad had died, but those had been just short visits, a week or two at most, and this time she was struck by the physical change in her mother, and by the perceptible absence of her father in the house. She supposed Mum’s ways were magnified now that she wasn’t shaded by Dad always taking the limelight, and her carefulness, her timid voice, her unspoken sadness were sometimes more than Emily could bear. She seemed so old, so dismal. Of course, Emily hardly had to lift a finger; Mum was overjoyed to have her daughter back home, to cook for and clean for and love and support—and for many a young person it would have felt like a welcome sanctuary, a place of comfort after three years of frugal student life. But for Emily it was suffocating. Her mother’s faith, ever-present throughout Emily’s childhood, had swelled in fervor since her dad’s death, and the rituals of mealtime grace and Sunday Mass were more tangible than ever. In recent years, Mum had taken on additional church duties. She was in sole charge of the weekly floral arrangements, and to Emily’s horror, she was now the approved catechism teacher at St. Peter’s, meaning she was responsible for the extended religious education of small Catholic children for whom an hour and a half of Mass was deemed insufficient worship on their precious weekend off school.

  “You know we hated it?” Emily said one Sunday afternoon, after her mother had returned from church, regaling her with some dull story about the children and the fourteen Stations of the Cross.

  The words appeared to paralyze her mother, who stood quite still for a moment, a serving spoon full of carrots poised over Emily’s dinner plate. “Hated what?” she asked eventually, apprehensively.

  “Me and Jess,” she had replied, knowing how her sister’s name would push the wound deeper. “We hated catechism. As if it wasn’t bad enough being the only Catholics among our friends, we then had to give up half of Sunday to the church, no matter what. Do you remember how we weren’t allowed to go on sleepovers on a Saturday night, in case we missed Sunday Mass? Our friends’ families used to go on Sunday picnics—day trips to the beach—or, heaven forbid, have a lie-in. We got to sit in a dusty church hall. It felt like a punishment.”

  Emily didn’t feel a thing when her mother’s eyes filled with tears, when she dropped onto her seat clutching a napkin to her mouth. Actually, she hated her a little more, for her weakness, for her blind faith, and she knew then that she had to find a way out of this, find a life of her own.

  The solution presented itself more quickly than she could ever have imagined when she took an admin job at a successful young IT firm in Fleet, as personal assistant to the branch manager, working in the swish environment of their first-floor offices overlooking the high street. It wasn’t quite what she’d had in mind when she had signed up for a degree in English and politics three years earlier, but her final grades had been mediocre, and to be honest, by the time she graduated, she had found herself entirely lacking in political ambition and uncertain of where to go next. All she knew was that she couldn’t keep living at home and retain her sanity, and the best way out she could see was to get a job and save enough money for a first month’s rent somewhere. She’d live anywhere, she thought, so long as it wasn’t with her mother. When had she come to resent her so? she wondered. Perhaps Mum had always been this awful, this pathetic; perhaps, distracted by the bright presence of Dad, Emily just hadn’t noticed.

  Her first day at work came as welcome relief from the monotony of home life, and after a morning’s induction across the various departments of the firm, she was introduced to her boss, James, a handsome, gently charming man, a decade older than her and, it turned out, recently widowed with a young child. Emily was captivated: by his calm demeanor, by his tragically romantic situation, by the way in which everyone who worked for him seemed equally entranced. Rumor had it that before arriving in Fleet he had taken a few months off to care for his daughter and get over the shock of his wife’s death, the word breakdown hinted at in hushed tones across in-trays and coffee cups. His charisma was a strange thing—not born out of narcissism or a knowing quality or sexual appeal—it was something rooted in his goodness, and his quiet sorrow. He was a good man, a kind man, and everyone loved him. Within six months, he and Emily had embarked on a covert affair, which continued in secret even after James announced that he loved her and wanted them to share a life together—a life s
omewhere else, a fresh start for him, Emily, and little Chloe. He had had enough of his job, knew he possessed the resources to go it alone, and for the next year, they quietly plotted and organized, until they were ready to announce their plans and leave. It was the most exciting time of Emily’s life—those clandestine weekend trips over to the island with James and Chloe, searching for the perfect house, the perfect town, the right office space, the best schools—all the while telling Mum that she was off meeting some old uni friends or staying late at the office for a business meeting. None of their colleagues had a clue that they were a couple, so careful were James and Emily to avoid meaningful eye contact or anything more than very public conversation. One of the IT consultants even asked her out to dinner during that period, and when she turned him down, it took great self-restraint not to laugh at him, tell him, “Don’t you know? I’m sleeping with the boss?”

  And so it was almost an anticlimax, a disappointment, when the time came to tell everyone, to go. Perhaps the most exhilarating part of a secret is the keeping of it, greater than the secret itself. Their colleagues were surprised and delighted for them; Emily’s mother was quietly heartbroken all over again.

  * * *

  All the time the others are in the house, Emily does what she can to avoid them. She is so full of hate and resentment, and only the tablets seem capable of taking the edge off these feelings of anger and blame, so that she can operate in anything close to a normal fashion. She hates them all: James and Chloe—Jess—the journalists—the police force—her poor dead mother. She knows it’s irrational and wrong and unfair, but if she doesn’t give way to hatred, what will she give way to? She can’t stand to be around the members of her family, and yet when Monday morning comes around again, she is left bereft in their absence. James and Chloe are the first to leave, setting off at eight, and by the time Emily makes her way downstairs, Jess is already putting on her coat to head out for her daily walk.

  “You must be getting fit,” Emily says as she passes her at the foot of the stairs. She takes in the athletic form of her sister, still managing to look attractive in faded black jeans and a scruffy man’s coat.

  “Why don’t you come, Ems?” is Jess’s reply, but Emily just tuts and carries on toward the kitchen.

  “I’ll see you later?” Jess calls after her. “I’ve bought ingredients for lasagna, so I’ll do that for supper tonight. OK? It’s Chloe’s favorite.”

  “And James’s,” Emily mutters as she hears the front door slam shut behind her sister.

  This train of thought sparks something alight and continues throughout the morning, as she sits in her corner seat nursing the same cooling cup of bitter coffee—thoughts of James and Jess together in the kitchen, the little looks they share, the way Jess touches him on the forearm when he says something funny, the way he defends her whenever Emily is vicious-tongued. She thinks about the dining room and the natural seating positions they adopted when Jess arrived to live with them: James between Chloe and Jess, Emily opposite. She sees the three of them in a warm, smiling cluster, and her, a long way away, shut out from their easy conversation and laughing eyes. The more she thinks about it, the more convinced she grows that they are sharing secrets, that they’re shutting her out purposely, making their plans together. There’s no hard evidence, she knows, but she’s certain. But then she’s been certain in her suspicions before—both of Jess and James—and she hasn’t always been right.

  By late morning, Emily is dressed and pulling her trainers on in the hallway. She opens the front door to test the air and reaches back inside for her jacket and hat. There’s been a hard frost overnight, and although it’s nearly midday, the frost remains, coating the gravel drive, the pillars that flank the entrance, the leaves of the rosebush that cling to the trellis. Her breath billows out white in the quiet driveway, and she’s relieved to find the road free of journalists for the first time in days. Checking her pockets for keys and purse, she pulls the door closed and sets off to pick up the bus into town, getting off at the Carisbrooke stop so she can walk for a little longer, think a little more clearly. The sharp air feels good on her face, and she pushes her hands deeper into her pockets and quickens her pace, slowing down only when she reaches the street where James’s offices are located. There are a few people about, mostly shoppers and young parents on their way to and from playgroup. That would have been me once, Emily allows herself to think, but then she realizes that even that is wrong. That would have been Jess once, while Emily was out at work. What had she been thinking, letting someone else look after her baby? She runs her fingers over the keypad of her phone and thinks about phoning DCI Jacobs, to ask if there’s any more news about Marta, but somehow she knows there is none. Marta is a spiteful bitch, and someone who should never be left in charge of young children, but standing here on the high street in the cold light of day, Emily fears that Marta is no more guilty of taking Daisy than she is.

  Crossing the street, she ducks her head down and rushes along the path, darting into Rosa’s Café directly opposite James’s office. It’s risky, she knows, as the café is used by members of his staff, who pop in and out for takeaway coffees and buns, but James never comes in himself, and Emily is pretty sure she won’t be recognized if she keeps her hat on and sits close to the window with her back to the door. The only other danger is Marcus— she’s pretty sure he would spot her straightaway, but she decides it’s a risk worth taking. Marcus never struck her as the tea-and-a-bun type; he probably has a cordon bleu platter yachted in from the mainland every lunchtime. She orders coffee and a shortbread biscuit, more for appearances’ sake than from hunger, and settles at a small table looking straight out across the street. The office building is set between two retail units, a print shop on one side and a nail salon on the other. The ground floor is the reception area, but Emily knows the desk is set far enough back that she won’t be noticed through this steamy window, and James’s desk is on the first floor, with no view of the street.

  She takes a sip of her coffee, which is still too hot to drink. What is she doing here? She has no real plan; she just felt compelled to come, to sit and spy, perhaps to see how it feels to be in the outside world, out from under the all-consuming weight of home, to gaze in on James’s life and make some sense of it all. Perhaps she wants to understand how they can all get on with their lives so easily, when hers has come to a standstill? An elderly woman passes the window, walking a small dog, and Emily feels an unexpected stab of loss for her mother. She should have been a better daughter. She should have visited her more than once a year; she should have made it easier for her mother to be a part of their lives. She’s losing her thread again. It’s the tablets; she couldn’t do without them right now, but at the same time she resents the way in which they buff off the raw edges of feeling, when she knows somehow that she ought to feel the feeling in order to find the answers.

  The front door of the office opens, and her breath accelerates in anticipation, but then a pair of young women walk out onto the pavement and head in the direction of the main street. Emily looks up at the clock: it’s 12:15. Does he have lunch at his desk? He doesn’t take a sandwich, so he must go out for one, or send someone out to fetch lunch. And then, just as she is thinking how strange it is that she doesn’t know the details of her husband’s day-to-day life, Jess appears, pushing open the office doors and wiping her sandy boots on the doormat before letting the door fall shut behind her.

  Jess? What the hell is Jess doing there? Emily feels herself rise from her seat, but thinks better of it and drops back again, her heart pounding against her rib cage. “Can I get you something else?” the owner calls over, alerted by Emily’s sudden movement. “Another drink?”

  Emily, not wanting to tear her gaze from the building across the street, raises her hand to decline, throwing a distracted “No, thanks” over her shoulder. She hunkers down in her seat, cradles the mug to her face, and waits. Five minutes later, the door swings open again, and James comes ou
t, laughing—he’s laughing, head thrown back, eyes bright—and he reaches an arm behind him to hold the door open, and Jess steps out alongside him. He gestures toward the town, and she smiles, and as though they are synchronized, they turn together in that direction, and then they are gone.

  15

  Jess

  I promised Chloe I’d meet her after school today, so with a couple of hours to kill after lunch, I wandered along Newport high street, half-heartedly window shopping until I was drawn into H&M with an unexpected urge to buy something new. Ever since I’d arrived on the island, I’d adopted a fixed uniform of jeans, sweatshirt, and comfortable shoes. There seemed little point in trying to dress up, when your day was made up of childcare, housework, cooking, and soft-play. This must be the way new mothers feel, I think, and I decide that I don’t want to feel that way anymore. I’m not a new mother; I’m a single woman, in my early thirties, and I should make more of an effort.

  The shop is fairly quiet, as it’s a weekday, and I meander along the aisles, running my fingers over fabrics, holding dresses and tops against myself, gradually accumulating an armful to try on in the changing rooms. Behind the cubicle door, I undress, pausing to meet my own gaze in the full-length mirror. Why do I feel as though I’m doing something wrong, I wonder—as if I’m bunking off school or being deceitful? When I met James for lunch today, I felt the same, though I had no reason to, and I’d only suggested meeting up so that I could ask him why he hadn’t been truthful about coming home later than Emily on New Year’s Eve. But when it came to it, he took me to this lovely little bistro, and we were having such a nice time, I couldn’t bring myself to say anything. Selfishly, I didn’t want to break the illusion that we were just two people out for lunch, enjoying the food, enjoying the conversation, enjoying an escape from it all.

  Daisy’s face rears up in my conscience, and I blink it away, guilt biting at me as I do so, hating myself for all the times I’ve denied her absence. But life can’t just grind to a halt, can it? I love that little girl with every fiber of my body, and God knows how many tears I’ve shed into my pillow—but we have to stride out, surely, to make a pretense at normality? To make a pretense at life. Don’t we?