The Other Side of the Door

by Nicci French

  ‘That’s not what’s important,’ said Neal. ‘The only thing that matters is that you killed Hayden.’

  Sonia closed her eyes. She seemed to be thinking. When she opened them again she looked first at him and then, for a longer moment, at me. She nodded. ‘Yes, I did.’

  ‘And?’ I said. ‘You can’t just say that. Why did you do it?’

  ‘I should have said this earlier.’ Her voice was quiet but still steady. She spoke slowly, as if she was considering each word, making sure it was correct. ‘I knew you and Hayden were together. It wasn’t a very secret secret. And I knew he’d hit you.’

  ‘What’s that got to do with anything?’

  ‘I never really liked him in the first place. On the Friday at the rehearsal, when you had that bruise on your neck and seemed so subdued and unlike yourself, I asked myself what I should do about it. As your close friend. As someone who cared about you, loved you, and hated to see you putting up with treatment you should have reported to the police. In my opinion, he was abusing you.’

  ‘It wasn’t like that.’

  ‘It never is. So, immediately after the rehearsal, I went round to see him, to tell him I wouldn’t stand by and see him hurting you. Do you really want to hear this?’

  ‘I think we’d better,’ said Neal.

  ‘All right. I got to the flat and he let me in. He was a bit drunk, although it was still early. About six, I think. He didn’t seem surprised to see me, and he didn’t really seem to listen to what I said.’ She paused and swallowed. ‘He kept smiling at me, as if he was taunting me. It was horrible and it also made me feel scared of him. Then he grabbed hold of me. I didn’t know what he was going to do. I thought he might attack me or even try and kiss me or something. I struggled, tried to get away. Things got knocked over, smashed. I could hear this horrible noise around me of things breaking and me shouting – and suddenly everything was out of control and I was very frightened. I reached out and tried to grab something, anything. I found I had the vase in my hand and I swung it at him and it hit him on the head and he staggered and fell over and he must have hit his temple on the corner of the table because he was lying on the floor and not moving. He was dead. I’d killed him.’

  ‘And then I rang you.’

  ‘I’d just got home when you called and asked for my help.’

  ‘That was a bit of a problem for you,’ said Neal. He was tapping his fingers against the steering-wheel and frowning.

  ‘It was like a sick joke,’ said Sonia.

  ‘Why didn’t you tell me?’

  ‘That it was me who’d killed Hayden?’

  ‘Yes. Why did you go through that whole awful pretence?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ she said. ‘I’d done it for you. Maybe I was letting you help me in return.’

  I opened my window and let the cool damp air in. ‘So Neal thought I’d done it and cleared away evidence. I thought Neal had done it and called you to get rid of the evidence. I thought you thought I’d done it and were doing me a huge, unimaginable favour. And all the time you were the one who’d done it and . . .’ But I couldn’t continue. My body felt as though it was coming apart. My head rang and my eyes stung and I found that little snorts were coming out of my nostrils.

  ‘Let’s get out,’ said Sonia. ‘Get some fresh air.’

  The three of us walked down to the side of the canal. For several minutes none of us spoke.

  ‘What are you going to do now?’ asked Sonia, finally.

  ‘You mean, about knowing you killed Hayden?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘What should I do? Go to the police?’

  ‘When you thought it was Neal . . .’

  ‘When I thought Neal had done it for me, I cleaned up after him. Now we know it was you, we’ve already done the cleaning up. There’s nothing left to do, is there?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘You should have said.’

  ‘Would it have made it easier?’

  ‘What were you thinking, all this time? What did you think when I called you to help me get rid of the body?’

  ‘I was surprised.’

  ‘Surprised?’

  ‘I’m not very good with words,’ said Sonia. Her voice trembled and I realized that, for all her calm, she was deeply shaken. ‘What do you want me to say? I was completely shocked, stunned. I don’t know. Like an abyss opening up at my feet.’

  ‘Why did you not say anything when you realized what Bonnie and I had both been assuming?’ asked Neal. ‘When you understood what had been going on?’

  ‘I don’t know. It was too late.’

  ‘But you must have thought –’

  ‘I don’t know!’ shouted Sonia. ‘Don’t you understand? I don’t know. I can’t say anything else. I don’t know. I’m sorry. I did it for you and I don’t know why I didn’t say.’

  ‘Look at us,’ I said. ‘Three fools.’ I wiped my eyes with my sleeve. ‘And three friends,’ I added. ‘What we’ve all been through for each other.’

  ‘We did it for you,’ said Neal.

  Suddenly I felt cold and sober and very weary. ‘We’d better hope that the police go on following their red herrings and never find out what happened.’

  ‘And don’t arrest the wrong person,’ added Neal.

  ‘If they do that, we’re going to tell them, do you hear?’ I thought of Sally and Richard and clenched my fists at my powerlessness. ‘No one else is going to suffer for this. That’s a pledge we all have to make. Can I ask you something, Sonia?’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘Did he die at once?’

  She hesitated. ‘I think so.’

  ‘Doesn’t it haunt you?’

  She stared at me. I knew she’d been trying to help me and I knew it had been a mistake, but for a moment, I felt hot with hatred for her. She had killed Hayden. She had been with him when he died. My beautiful Hayden, my love. ‘What do you think, Bonnie?’ she replied at last.

  ‘All right.’

  ‘We’d better get home,’ said Neal.

  ‘Does Amos know?’

  ‘Of course not.’

  ‘You haven’t told him?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Can you manage that?’

  Sonia looked at the oily surface of the canal. ‘You could,’ she said. ‘And I can too. Our secret.’

  When I got home I was trembling with agitation and distress. I walked from tiny room to room, knocking against boxes full of tattered books, cracked china, clothes I would probably never wear again. The flat resembled my brain – chaotically disordered and full of things that were unwanted or in the wrong place. Falling apart, unloved, abandoned. I lay on the floor and stared up at the ceiling, thinking, trying to think, trying not to think, trying not to see Hayden’s smile as he taunted Sonia, his face as he reached out to take hold of her, his expression as the vase hit his head and he fell, his eyes as the life went out of them. How stupid, how sad and absurd and meaningless, to die like that, for nothing at all.

  Before

  I lay on the floor of my flat and stared up at the ceiling. Hayden lay beside me, on his stomach, his arm over my belly. The carpet was rough and stung my back; my face stung too, from his stubble. I turned my head and looked at him. His legs were bent; one knee pressed against my thigh. One of his toes was slightly bruised. There was a mole on his lower back and a long, faint scar running across his left shoulder-blade. His hair fell in a scruffy wing across his face and his eyes were closed.

  ‘I can tell you’re looking at me,’ he mumbled, without opening his eyes.

  ‘How?’

  ‘I can feel you.’

  ‘I left my bag in your flat and my stuff.’

  ‘We’ll go and get them together. Later.’

  ‘Why did you come back?’

  ‘I wanted to see you. I had to. I couldn’t wait. I was sitting in my friend’s house and all of a sudden I had to go and find you. I thought you might not be here. You might have gone.’
/>   ‘Where would I go? You’re the one who’s leaving.’

  ‘Am I?’

  ‘That’s what you said a few hours ago, remember? On Blackfriars Bridge.’

  ‘So I did.’

  ‘I feel strange,’ I said, rolling onto my side and curling up slightly, watching him.

  ‘Maybe I won’t.’

  ‘Won’t leave?’

  ‘Maybe not. I don’t know. You’ve got me all confused.’

  ‘What are you saying?’

  His eyes half opened. He put out a hand and ran it through my hair. ‘You’re a funny creature, Bonnie. Spiky but soft.’

  ‘Hayden.’

  ‘You’re hard to leave. Maybe that’s why I thought I had to go – because for once I don’t want to.’

  ‘Then stay awhile.’

  ‘Perhaps.’

  ‘Is it always you?’

  ‘Me what?’

  ‘You who does the leaving.’

  ‘Probably. I warned you. I told you not to get involved.’

  ‘You’ve never wanted to stay with someone before?’

  He muttered something I couldn’t hear.

  ‘Why haven’t you?’

  ‘Don’t.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Don’t pry.’

  I sat up and wrapped my arms around my knees, feeling suddenly chilly. ‘Is that how you see it? Any kind of closeness, and you see it as prying, intruding? What makes you think I want you to stay, anyway? Nothing ever advances.’

  ‘What do you want to advance?’ He made it sound ludicrous.

  ‘You cry and then won’t say why, you tell me things about yourself but the next time we meet it’s as if it never happened. You want to go, want to stay – it’s all just a whim, nothing to do with me, and it’s as if I have no say in it at all.’ I stood up. ‘I’m going to make us some coffee and then I’m going out.’

  He lay on the floor and watched as I pulled on the dressing-gown I’d been wearing when I opened the door to him earlier, knotting the belt firmly.

  ‘Very milky for me,’ he said.

  ‘Right.’

  I boiled the kettle and scooped coffee powder into the pot, banging mugs loudly on the surface to make some kind of point, and turned as he came into the kitchen, wearing only his jeans.

  ‘Don’t be angry, Bonnie.’

  ‘Why not? I like being angry.’

  ‘Don’t be angry with me.’

  ‘Of course I’m bloody angry with you.’

  ‘Shall I heat some milk?’

  ‘You’re like a small boy. You’ve never grown up.’

  ‘Is that what you think?’ Suddenly he had a cold, sickening smile on his face. I should have stopped there, left the flat at once.

  ‘Yes, I do. Never have children yourself, Hayden, and if you do, God help the poor sods. A child shouldn’t have children.’

  It was very slow. I had time to think about everything that was happening to me. He swung round, knocking the milk bottle over so that white liquid streamed onto the floor and a puddle formed, spreading between my bare toes. Then he lifted up both his fists. His mouth was drawn back in a horrible grimace, like a horse having a bit forced between its teeth. His arms were strong. I could see his biceps clench. I thought how much taller and stronger he was than me and I imagined the pain I would feel when his fists landed on me. His eyes were wild, the pupils dilated, and I remembered, so vividly it felt as though it was actually happening again, the night my father had punched my mother so hard in the jaw that he had knocked out two of her teeth.

  That episode of long ago and this one taking place now seemed to merge, so that for a few seconds I almost believed I was a small child, trying to stand in the way of the thickset man with his fists raised and his face in an ugly snarl, crying out for him to stop. And, sure enough, I heard my voice saying, ‘No! Stop!’

  Hayden’s fist was coming towards me. I thought: I must leave this man;I must never see him again. He’s dangerous for me. There were tears in his eyes: how strange that he was already suffering for what he was about to do. Even as I tried to duck away, putting my hands up in front of my face, I thought: He’s such an unhappy man. I have never met anyone so unhappy. More terrifying to me than anything he was about to do was the sudden fear that I loved him. That I was in love with him. Oh, head over heels.

  One fist caught me violently on the ribs and the other on the side of my head. I staggered back, crashing into the surface, spinning a coffee cup to the floor where I heard it break. My knees were folding under me and I tried to stop myself falling, but then he gripped me around the throat and was shaking me. I couldn’t breathe or cry out. My side hurt. The pain throbbed from my throat into my eyes and now I could see colours, dark flowers of blue and green and red opening their petals. My head banged on the floor. Milk in my hair and shards of china on my left calf. I could feel the trickle of blood. I could see Hayden’s face looming over me, mouth half open in a cry of grief, as if he was about to kiss me, bite me. Passion is close to hate. I thought: Am I going to die?

  Then his hand loosened its grip and his face softened, creased, broke up. The colours faded back to normal day, and I could breathe again, although each breath was sharply painful. I lay quite still. Hayden was bent over the sink, as if he was about to be sick. He was breathing very heavily and occasional groans broke from him.

  ‘That’s it, then.’ My voice was a croak. It hurt to speak, hurt to swallow. I put a hand up and touched my neck, which was puffy and sore. There was a bump on my head and the blood on my leg tickled, like a fly crawling along my skin. Even picturing myself scrambling to my feet was too much of an effort. I closed my eyes and felt for the edges of my dressing-gown, making sure I was decently covered. I didn’t want Hayden to see my nakedness.

  ‘I told you I was no good. I told you.’

  ‘Go now.’

  ‘I want to be with you. You’re all I want. Now I know.’

  ‘Go.’

  ‘I can’t leave you like this.’

  ‘If you don’t leave this minute, I’m going to call the police.’

  I heard him walk out of the kitchen, and a few minutes later, I heard him leave the flat. The door clicked shut. Now he would be walking down the road. I knew the expression on his face.

  I opened my eyes. I turned my head, first one way and then the other. I flexed my legs. Nothing was wrong with me, except that my ribs ached and my throat ached and I felt a bit sick. Soon I would get up and have a shower, bathe my face. In a minute. Not just yet.

  I woke, and for a moment I couldn’t think where I was. The floor was hard under my body and my back was sore. How long had I slept? I sat up cautiously, feeling pain knife through my ribs. Milk and pieces of china spread all over the floor. I manoeuvred myself onto all fours and gradually levered myself into a standing position. Everything felt slightly askew. I went into the bathroom and turned on the taps, then looked at myself in the mirror above the basin. My face seemed much smaller than usual, as if it had somehow shrunk. My hair stood up in spikes. And on my neck there was a large brown-blue bruise that seemed to deepen as I stared at it. I touched it with my fingers, feeling the soft puffiness of the skin. Everyone would know.

  I climbed into the bath and lay there for more than an hour, turning on the hot tap every few minutes. The tips of my fingers crinkled and steam filled the room. I only got out when the water turned tepid, and then I simply went and lay on my duvet, my arm across my eyes to keep out the light.

  It was afternoon when I finally got into a pair of shorts and a T-shirt. I wrapped a cotton scarf around my neck – I wasn’t going out but I didn’t want to see myself in the mirror. On my way to the kitchen to make myself something to eat, I saw that a folded piece of lined paper had been pushed through the door. I picked it up and opened it. ‘Bonnie,’ it read, in hasty, lopsided handwriting, scrawled with a blunt pencil. ‘There are some things I would like to tell you that I should have told you before. Please let me see you. Please. Sorr
y. So very very sorry. H’

  I crumpled it into a ball and threw it into the bin. Then I retrieved it and straightened it out, staring at the words until they blurred.

  The phone rang, startling me. I pushed Hayden’s note into my pocket as if somebody was watching me. It was Guy.

  ‘Are you all right? You sound as if you’ve got a cold. Are you losing your voice?’

  ‘A bit.’

  ‘I was just calling to say I’ll be a little late for the rehearsal.’

  ‘Rehearsal.’

  ‘I’ve been caught up. I’ll be there as soon as I can.’

  ‘I don’t think I can make it today, Guy.’

  ‘It’s at your flat. In half an hour.’

  Of course it was. I looked around me in despair. It was as if burglars had broken in and turned a building site into a bombsite, with me at the centre of the explosion.

  ‘It’s all a bit of a mess,’ I rasped.

  ‘No one minds that,’ Guy said heartily. He lived in an immaculate house, everything in its proper place. I think he liked other people’s chaos. I stooped down and picked up a piece of the broken cup. ‘But you’ll be there to let me in.’

  ‘I’ll be there.’

  As soon as I put the phone down I started clearing up the kitchen, mopping the milk with a cloth I kept having to squeeze into the sink, and gathering up all the broken china. It’s amazing how far china travels when it’s smashed. My feet were bleeding now as well as my leg. But then I suddenly grasped that I was concentrating on the wrong task: the mess of the flat didn’t matter, the mess of myself did. No one could see me like this.

  I hurried into the bedroom. The shorts would do, but not the T-shirt. I had to find something high-necked. I pulled clothes out of boxes until I found a Victorian blouse that I must have got in a vintage shop years ago. I couldn’t remember ever having worn it before – it wasn’t really my style. I pulled it on carefully, wincing as it brushed against my neck, then stood back from the mirror to examine myself. I looked like a girl who’d been through her mother’s dressing-up box. More to the point, the bruise showed above the collar. It seemed to be spreading higher and higher.