Sworn Secret

by Amanda Jennings

  ‘It’s OK,’ said Jon, touching her knee. ‘It’s fine that you did that.’

  She began to shake her head. ‘No! It’s not fine. I searched for it for over an hour. Every nook and cranny in the brick walls, the tarmac, the recycling bins. Everywhere. I’m crazy, aren’t I? I must be.’ Kate remembered how the key had dug into her hands as she’d clutched it so tightly. The rising panic in her stomach as she realized she wasn’t going to find the lock. The desolation she felt as she collapsed against her car emotionally spent, exhausted. ‘I’m scared, Jon. I’m just so scared.’

  Then she felt him. He leant forward, kissed each of her hands, so gently. He eased them back from her face and kissed each of her cheeks, then her lips. They stared at each other. His eyes told her he understood, about the key and the hidden lock and the parallel world where Anna played in the sunshine. He didn’t think she was mad. And he loved her.

  She needed him suddenly, her body aching to be close to his. She pulled him towards her and kissed him. It felt so good to kiss him, his lips, his softness, the way their mouths fitted, the familiarity of him. Then she felt his lust fire with a sudden desperation. His hand went behind her head. His fingers buried into her hair. He stood her up. Pulled her into him. Pushed himself against her. She responded, kissed him back. His hand went under her shirt, fingers splayed across her chest and collarbone. He nuzzled his face into her neck and whispered words she couldn’t hear. She threw her head back, indulging the desire that coursed through her veins. It felt good, right and comfortable, to want her husband, the man she’d loved for twenty years.

  ‘Let’s go upstairs.’ His gravelly words shattered the spell and she remembered Anna with a thud that took her breath. The moment was gone like smoke in the wind. What kind of monster was she? How could she forget? Self-loathing and disgust erupted inside her. Suddenly and aggressively, she pushed him away. She felt faint and cold. Her hands shook.

  ‘No!’

  She couldn’t look at him. He grabbed at her and dragged her back into his arms.

  ‘Kate,’ he moaned. ‘Please stay with me.’

  ‘Let go of me.’

  He reached for her again, but she jumped backwards out of his way.

  ‘I love you, Kate. Please, come here.’ He moved to kiss her again, but again she stepped back. She straightened her jumper. Ran her hands over her hair and breathed slowly to calm her heart that raced with the remnants of her lust. He didn’t move, shoulders hunched, hands hanging loose at his sides. Her heart spasmed. She wanted to take him in her arms. She wanted to hold his head against her chest, reassure him, show him, somehow, how much she loved him.

  ‘How can I?’ she whispered.

  He was silent.

  ‘How can I do that?’

  ‘You’re allowed to love me. You’re allowed to make love to me,’ he said. ‘We’re allowed to feel some happiness.’

  ‘No,’ she said. ‘I’m not allowed to be happy again. How can I be?’

  Everything has changed, she thought, why don’t you understand that? But his body, his sadness, the defeat in his shoulders, told her he never would. He wanted to pretend nothing was different, as if Anna was upstairs listening to music or reading a magazine, or chatting to a friend on her phone. Her guilt and sorrow hardened into anger.

  ‘Don’t look at me like that!’

  He opened his mouth, but then shook his head and closed it again.

  ‘What!’ she said. ‘Speak, for God’s sake. Tell me you understand what I’m saying!’

  ‘You’re letting her death kill our family,’ he said then. His words stung and tears spiked. ‘It’s suffocating us.’

  ‘And you’d like to carry on as normal?’

  ‘No. No, that’s not what I want.’ He sat down at the table and stared at the wall. ‘I know our lives will never be normal again, whatever the hell normal is.’ His voice was flat. ‘I just wish you wanted to fight for us. I need you. Lizzie needs you; she needs her mother. I need my wife. We’re desperate without you.’

  She stared at him. Hating him, not for voicing such a hideous truth, but for expecting anything else of her; when Anna died she took her mother’s soul, and the empty shell standing beside him was all that was left.

  ‘I’m sorry if that’s how you feel, but this is the best I’ve got. Most of the time I want to curl up and die, but I don’t, and that’s only because of Lizzie and you. But life won’t be the same. It can’t be.’ She stared at him, waiting for him to speak. He didn’t. She clenched her fists and walked away from him. She paused at the kitchen door.

  ‘Please don’t touch me like that again.’

  Untouched Croissants

  ‘Thank you for coming to meet me,’ Jon said, standing as Rachel approached.

  She took off her jacket and sat at the table without meeting his eyes. ‘If you mention dropping the charges against Kate I’m afraid I’ll have to leave.’

  He was taken aback by the harshness of her clearly rehearsed words that was so unlike the Rachel he knew. ‘That wasn’t my intention,’ he said.

  ‘So what was?’ she asked. ‘It must have something to do with what’s going on.’

  Sitting opposite her, it was hard for him to remember the precise reason he had for wanting to meet up. In part it was to make him feel like he was actually doing something. Kate wasn’t talking to him. Since they’d received the letter informing them of Rebecca’s decision to press charges she’d completely withdrawn, painting a lot, mostly waiting until he was in bed before emerging from her studio. He listened to her creeping in, holding her breath as she slipped under the covers beside him, keeping herself as close to her edge of the bed as she could. Perhaps he wasn’t being honest with Rachel when he said it wasn’t his intention to mention the charges. He had certainly hoped to influence her by getting together, hoping to remind her how close she and Kate had been, hoping nostalgia might help prompt Rachel to question whether twelve stony strangers sitting in uninformed judgement on Kate was really what she wanted. His own memories of their friendship were acid sharp. All those evenings he arrived home, tired and stressed, to open the door on their glorious laughing. Then hushed giggling as they realized they’d let time slip. He’d poke his head into the kitchen and they’d both look shamefaced, barefoot on kitchen chairs with glasses of sov blonk in their hands. Rachel would make an apologetic excuse, while Kate got up, kissed him and opened the fridge to grab him a beer. Then he’d settle down and join them, listening quietly to their gossipy patter.

  A waitress appeared and asked if Rachel was ready to order.

  ‘I’d like a cup of tea, no milk, and a croissant, please.’

  ‘That sounds good,’ Jon said. ‘I’ll have a croissant, too.’

  ‘Another coffee?’

  Jon shook his head and the waitress thrust their scrawled order under the pepper mill.

  Rachel watched her leave then looked back at Jon. ‘Before you say whatever it is you need to say,’ she said, ‘I’d like to speak first.’ She took a deep breath. ‘I haven’t said this to you before,’ her voice trembling, ‘but I’m sorry. I hope you know that. I’m sorry about Anna.’

  ‘You have nothing to be sorry about.’

  Jon meant it. Unlike Kate, he laid no blame at Rachel’s feet. Anna stayed at Rebecca’s a lot. She’d returned to them safe each time. Just not that last time, the night she told Rebecca she felt ill, pretended to be asleep – snoring, as Rebecca recalled – then snuck out to meet her boyfriend. He and Kate had stopped fighting over it. There was no reasoning with her. As far as his wife was concerned, Rachel was responsible for the welfare of her daughter while she was under her roof. He’d heard it over and over. It was her responsibility, Kate said. She was in charge of our daughter, and Anna died because she let her leave her house.

  But Kate was blinkered. It wasn’t that straightforward. Anna knew what she was doing. She wilfully deceived Rachel and she knew it was wrong. After all, she was fifteen, old enough to know to stay in bed in
the house as Rachel expected her to.

  ‘Anna would have ended up on that roof if she’d been with us, or with her grandparents, or with another friend. It wasn’t—’ Jon’s voice cracked. ‘It wasn’t your fault and you have no reason to apologize.’

  ‘That’s not what Kate thinks.’

  ‘Just forget what Kate thinks. Kate blames everybody. Christ, she even blames me. You know what for?’ He paused, but Rachel didn’t speak. ‘For looking like Anna.’ He shook his head with bitterness. ‘She sees her in my face and every day it breaks her heart. But what can I do?’ Jon paused to allow a wave of emotion to sweep through him. ‘And Lizzie? Well, she sounds like her. Kate finds it difficult to talk to her because all she hears is Anna. Does she think Lizzie doesn’t pick up on that? You’d have thought the kid had enough to deal with without her mother bursting into tears and rushing out of the room whenever she asks for cornflakes.’

  Rachel reached out, hesitating before taking his hand. He stared at her speckled skin for a moment or two and then he pulled his hand away and laid it in his lap.

  ‘I don’t mind you talking,’ she said. ‘Even if you cry, it doesn’t matter.’ She paused. ‘It must be so hard living with Kate in the state she’s in.’

  Jon looked out of the window and watched the cars stop-starting down the Fulham Palace Road as he let Rachel’s words roll gently around his head. Was it hard living with Kate? Yes, he wanted to say, it was hard living with Kate in the state she’s in. Too hard, sometimes, and he’d certainly thought about leaving. Not because he didn’t love her, not even because he thought she didn’t love him. It wasn’t about love. It was about statistics, the paltry number of marriages that weathered the death of a child. And he understood how those marriages crumbled, because just as he was a constant reminder of Anna for Kate, so she was to him, because Kate might think she could see Anna in him, but the truth was that it was Kate who was so agonizingly like their eldest daughter, and so neither of them could escape it, waking up with each other every morning, getting into bed every night. Every look. Every sigh. Every slammed door. A constant bombardment of sickening aides-memoire. It was only natural to wonder whether it might be less cruel to put their marriage out of its misery. But just the notion of this made him sick with despair.

  Yes, Rachel, he thought, living with Kate is hard, but it’s the thought of living without her that freezes my heart. Whatever state she’s in.

  ‘It’s kind of you to offer to talk,’ he said. ‘You know, most people don’t want to. They don’t know what to say, you see. You’d be amazed how many friends would sooner cross the road than say I’m sorry for your loss, or how are you doing? My first day back after the funeral was the worst.’ He turned his cup slowly in the saucer. ‘I walked into the office, desperate for a snip of normality, and was met with this pin-drop silence. People looked away, dialled pretend phone calls, rushed off to meetings. Nobody said a thing. There were some flowers on my desk with a card I didn’t open.’ He smiled at Rachel. ‘Death is worse then leprosy for popularity.’

  Rachel nodded. ‘When Rob left I felt that. No telephone calls any more, no invites, half the number of Christmas cards. I presumed they didn’t know what to write. To Rachel, Happy Christmas, try not to think of your husband shagging the receptionist. Lots of love, kiss, kiss, kiss.’ She paused and studied her thumbnail for a moment or two. ‘Except you,’ she said.

  ‘Sorry?’

  ‘You always treated me the same. I’ll always be grateful for that.’

  ‘You were a good friend.’

  She dropped her head.

  Jon was quiet, aware the past tense had stung her.

  ‘I know I haven’t been around for her, Jon. I know that. I mean, losing a daughter, God, I can’t imagine. But . . .’ She took a deep breath. ‘Kate made it so difficult for me to do anything else. She closed herself off from me. I rang all the time, sometimes five or six times a day, but she put the phone down on me every time. She never called back.’ Rachel shook her head. ‘Maybe I should have tried harder. I don’t know. She just made it so clear she wanted nothing to do with me. Quite honestly, it broke my heart. I felt so helpless. I knew how much pain she was in but I couldn’t do anything. For the first time in fifteen years she was going through something without me. All I wanted to do was hug her, to help you all, to help Lizzie. I’ve never felt so alone, even more than when Rob went. Those weeks after Anna died are some of my blackest.’ She paused. ‘And I went over it all. Again and again. Wondering what I should have done to stop it, filling my head with what ifs: what if I’d Chubbed the front door and hung the key in the cupboard, what if I’d heard her, what if Rebecca had been awake?’

  Jon saw her eyes had filled with tears and handed her a paper napkin.

  ‘We all have the what ifs,’ he said. ‘Nobody has more of them than Kate, believe me. She doesn’t blame you any more than she blames herself. She just seems to need things to focus her sadness on. She’s,’ he paused to choose his word, ‘struggling.’

  Rachel pressed the corner of the napkin against both eyes and nodded in agreement that Kate was struggling. Jon was suddenly struck, feeling duplicitous. Kate would hate him using that word to describe her. Kate didn’t struggle. She was a fighter, feisty and independent. Traits that had bewitched him all those years ago, but traits that had been altered by Anna’s death, pushed off track and shifted in their line of trajectory. Feisty had become volatile rather than spirited. Independent was no longer unfettered but solitary, and though she was still a fighter, her fight was all taken up with just making it through to the end of each day.

  ‘I can’t forgive her for what she did to Bec. I have nightmares about it, horrible dreams in which Kate doesn’t stop, but keeps on hitting until she kills her.’

  They were quiet then, both staring at the croissants that sat untouched on the small white plates in front of them. Jon knew their meeting was over.

  ‘Thank you for coming to see me today,’ he said. He took the bill out from beneath the pepper mill, then pulled a five-pound note and two pound coins from his wallet and put them in one of the saucers. ‘Please send my best wishes to Rebecca.’

  Rachel dropped her head. ‘Thank you for breakfast,’ she said.

  He stood, but as he did he had a flash of Lizzie’s face. What on earth would she do if her mother was sent to prison? How would she cope? It would finish her.

  ‘I know what she did to Rebecca is incomprehensible and I would never expect you to forgive her, but please, Rachel, if you can, put yourself in her shoes. That’s all I’m asking. I know you’ve been hurt; I know she behaved dreadfully. But please think of what she’s been through.’

  Rachel lifted her head and he saw anger in her eyes. ‘You think I don’t do that? Of course I do! I put myself in her wretched shoes all the time. I loved Anna. I watched her grow up from a baby. Every day I thank Heaven I still have Rebecca, because God only knows how a mother copes with losing her child. But she attacked my daughter. An innocent child. You’re right, what she did was unforgivable; I’m not a strong enough person to forgive it.’ She sighed and rubbed her face with both her hands. ‘Look, I told Rebecca it was up to her. I don’t want to influence her either way, but,’ she hesitated. ‘But if it were up to me, Kate would be sectioned.’

  Jon’s head began to pound. ‘She’ll come through this,’ he said. ‘She will.’

  ‘It’s too late, Jon. She needs help.’

  I’m trying! screamed Jon in his head. God help me, I’m doing everything in my power to try and help her.

  Rachel stood and put her jacket on, then she patted his hand. ‘I should go,’ she said, gently. She waited at the table as if trawling her head for something else to say, but they both knew there was nothing. When she left, he turned to look out of the window again. There was a child right outside howling inconsolably, red in the face with livid tears streaming down his cheeks, his mouth circled in chocolate. His young mother, another baby in a pram beside her, loo
ked fraught. Jon watched her duck briefly out of sight below the window. She reappeared, and in her hand was a dropped ice-cream. For a second the child stopped screaming and watched intently as his mother tried to flick bits of whatever off what was left of the ice-cream in the cone. Then she shook her head and threw it back on the ground. Her son started screaming again. She bent down and tried to talk to him. Jon wondered if she was promising another treat or threatening bed or counting to five for the crying to stop before she got really, really angry. Then she stood, glanced down at the child and raised her eyes to the sky, before grabbing hold of him with one hand, taking the pram in the other and starting off, the little boy kicking and fighting and pointing back at the ice-cream in the gutter.

  Jon stood to leave.

  ‘Do you want me to pop those croissants in a bag?’

  Jon looked back at the table and then at the waitress.

  ‘That’s kind of you,’ he said.

  The waitress smiled and then took the two plates to the serving counter. Jon left before she returned.

  Haydn the Eco Hero

  It was hot. Sticky hot. Lizzie wore a long-sleeved cotton shirt, a skirt that reached her ankles and flip-flops. Her bag of allergy meds was, as usual, hung over her shoulder. It was Haydn who suggested the swings in the park. She’d agreed, terrified he’d think she was some kind of pathetic loony if she told him she felt uneasy outdoors in June, July and August. She held her bag like a security blanket and repeated over and over that there was nothing to worry about. The bees weren’t out to get her. She was completely fine.