Nemesister: The gripping women's psychological thriller from Sophie Jonas-Hill

by Sophie Jonas-Hill

  We lay wrapped in the embrace of the afternoon, trying not to feel the day slipping inexorably toward tomorrow. I let myself imagine I was pretending we were there just to be together, like we were real people in a regular world. I laced my fingers through Paris’ and lay with my head on his chest, watching where our bodies met. I heard a laugh rumble within him.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Hell, I know what you’re doin’.’

  ‘What d’you mean?’ I asked, and the warmth and the light of the moment evaporated as guilt prickled my skin.

  ‘I see you,’ he smiled. ‘You’s just like all the other white chicks.’

  ‘Excuse me?’ I sat up and gave full rein to my indignation, glad of the distraction of a row. ‘What the hell d’you mean by that?’

  He was still laughing at me, shaking his head. ‘I see it, you’s lying here just looking as your lily white skin next to my rough ole black skin, and you’s thinkin’ as how I make you look all li’l an’ white, an purdy …’

  ‘Stop it,’ I said, and went to hit him, only he caught hold of my wrists, grinning.

  ‘Oh, yeah. I is such a big strong black nigger; I make you feel like all the covers of them cheap paperback books you get in the airport down here.’ I got free from him as he laughed at me.

  ‘What the fuck you mean?’ I demanded, grabbed up the pillow and hit him with it. Laughing, he fended me off.

  ‘Oh pleeze missus, don’t hit me, I’s a-beggin’ you!’

  ‘Don’t you fuckin’ pull that shit on me; that just ain’t funny.’

  ‘Baby, chill!’ he said, still laughing but alert to the tone in my voice. ‘Hell, I was just messin’ with you!’

  ‘Is that what you think of me?’ I pushed past him and clambered off the bed.

  ‘Oh, shit, Shoog …’ he said as I wrapped myself in the hotel’s bathrobe. ‘What’s you’ problem?’

  ‘My problem?’ I yelled. ‘Shit, you know how that sounds? What, you think bein’ with you is just some … some fuckin’ game I’m playing?’ I said, knowing full well it was. ‘You think, what, I’m with you ‘cause you make me look good?’

  ‘No, I don’t think that, you crazy bitch. I just sayin’ as how some white girls think like that.’

  ‘No you ain’t, you were sayin’ that’s how I think!’ I turned to the dressing table, and with a sudden, burning rush of anger, swept everything onto the floor.

  Paris jerked up from the bed as an explosion of hairbrushes, make-up and lingerie hit the floor.

  ‘So what?’ I turned on him. ‘What if I said as how you’s only with me, ‘cause you think how white woman’s easy, how they don’t give a brother no shit and take everything you give ‘em, cause they’s too fuckin’ hog-tied with guilt to stand up for themselves?’

  ‘Now hold on a minute, I ain’t ever said as how I think that …’

  ‘Is this why the wig freaked you out? Made you think I’m getting’ too white for you?’

  ‘That ain’t it!’ Paris retorted.

  ‘Oh, you tell me what it was then, where all this is comin’ from?’

  ‘Don’t do this,’ he warned.

  ‘What is it?’ I screamed.

  He gripped the back of his head with both hands. ‘It fuckin’ makes you look like his wife!’ he bellowed at me.

  ‘Whose wife?’ I demanded, though I knew, I knew at once who he meant, and the thrill of it jabbed through me. ‘Whose wife?’

  ‘Red’s wife.’

  ‘What? How’d you know?’ Lisa, I screamed at him inside my head, say her name. Say her fucking name!

  ‘Cause I fucked her!’ He flung his arms down as if he’d thrown the words on the floor between us. After he’d said it I laughed, the relief of finally hearing him admit it was so immense I was almost dizzy with it. I could have said it then, I could have told him and maybe he’d have understood, but I turned my laugh into a snort of incredulity as he sat on the edge of the bed, elbows on his knees.

  ‘You what?’ He didn’t look at me as I glared at him. ‘So that’s why you’ve been gettin’ fuckin’ cold feet. If there’s a problem with what we’re doin’, you better say something, ‘cause this thing’s on now, and …’

  ‘Damn it, girl.’ Paris looked at me at last. ‘It was nearly a year ago, it were nothing.’ He held out his hand, fingers spread.

  ‘What?’ It sickened me to think of him with her, how vulnerable she must have been, how he must have charmed her, but that at least made my outrage convincing. ‘Why the hell didn’t you say nothin’ before now?’

  ‘Well, it ain’t something I’m proud of …’

  ‘Jesus, you bastard, there’s plenty you ain’t got to be proud of. Oh, fuck, does he know who you are?’

  ‘It ain’t like that … he never knew me,’ Paris said, frowning. ‘I ain’t a goddamn amateur …’

  ‘How d’you know that?’ I demanded, hands on hips.

  ‘Trust me. He ‘n’ his good ole’ boys’ would have found me already if he knew.’ He put his hand on his chest. ‘Seriously, they’d a’ hung this nigger’s ass from the nearest poplar tree soon as look at me!’

  ‘You better be sure. What if he’s plannin’ on a klan reunion on your behalf?’

  ‘He don’t know me from the next guy.’

  ‘What happened?’ I said. He held out his hand to me, but I remained standing.

  He stood, picked his pants up off the floor and began pulling them on. ‘You knew what I was when we first met. You been runnin’ these cons for the last month, so don’t you start getting’ all uppity.’

  ‘Don’t you run out on me,’ I said taking a step toward him. ‘I just wanna know what’s goin’ on here. You say we’re okay to get one over on old Red Rooster, but then you sayin’ you’ve already been with his wife?’

  ‘Okay.’ Paris zipped up his fly and turned back to me. ‘Look, she was just some girl half his age, I never knew who she were or nothin’. An’ yes, I went wiv’ her cause she put a fifty in my guitar case, and she had designer shades on. It weren’t right but it were for the money, that’s it.’

  I sat down on the dressing table stool. ‘Where’s she now, then?’ For one glorious, desperate moment I wanted him to just come out and tell me, to say that he’d driven her to the airport, or the train station. Or left her in a motel like this one, with tiny soap and irregular cleaning rosters. Or taken her down a thin, dry road, somewhere the land melted into swamp, and shot her and thrown her in. Something, anything that might have meant this was over, that I would know where she was.

  ‘I don’t know,’ he said, and pulled his smile into a frown before he went on. ‘We was supposed to meet, but she never showed. I waited, but she never came.’ He exhaled, and hooked his thumbs into the loops on his jeans.

  ‘You were going to go off with her? She was going to leave Rooster for you?’

  ‘Guess?’ I pulled a face at him. ‘Okay, course we were gonna go off together; we were in love.’ As he shrugged his shoulders, shifting his weight casually from one foot to the other, my rage erupted.

  ‘You stupid fuckin’ …’ I tore myself up from the stool and sent it flying ‘… two timin’ …’ I snatched up some of the debris from the floor and hurled it at him … ‘bastard!’

  ‘What’ wrong with you?’ He deflected a hairbrush on his forearm. ‘Crazy bitch, what the hell’s gotten into you?’

  ‘Shut up!’ I screamed. ‘Liar!’

  ‘What da’ fuck you—?’

  ‘Because you said you loved me!’ I screamed, because it was what I should have said, had all of this been true, had I really been Margarita. I ran to the bathroom and locked the door. I sat on the floor with my back pressed against the door, hugging my knees. I needed this, I need him to really think I’d fallen for him, and a good old-fashioned fight was perfect.

  ‘Fuck me girl … why y’all bein’ like this?’ he said on the other side. He sounded crestfallen, like a guy who really didn’t quite get it, but thought he really ought to apol
ogize. Part of me was starting to feel sorry for him. He was really starting to enjoy the two of us together, getting used to having me at his back. And we were good together, we really were. I could see it from his point of view. I could see our potential.

  ‘Don’t you go getting sentimental,’ Margarita said. ‘This is business, alright? Fact that he’s pretty wiv’ it … that’s just a bonus.’

  I stared at the space under the pale pink washstand. There were cobwebs on it, and one of the motel’s complimentary slippers curled up like a discarded cocoon. On the other side of the pedestal was my make-up case, the soft pink suede decorated with the familiar, expensive pattern of brown flowers interlaced with elegant script, part of a set. One that came with a jewellery roll.

  ‘Open the door please, darlin’. We can’t sort this out with you in there.’

  ‘You tell me what happened first,’ I said, pressing the back of my head to the door, eyes closed. It wasn’t going to change anything but I wanted to hear him say it. Lie to me, I thought, lie to me, because I’ll know it. I know you too well.

  ‘You really wanna hear all that?’ I didn’t answer, because both yes and no would have been the wrong answer. I heard the sound of him sitting down on the other side of the door, heard his sigh of resignation.

  ‘I never knew who she were. I was just doin’ my tourist game – you know, playin’ my guitar wiv’ my bare feet n’ all.’ He laughed. ‘Hell, sometimes I think they was just pleased to see a good lookin’ man on the street; we’s pretty thin on the ground round these parts!’

  ‘And?’ I said, glad he couldn’t see I was smiling.

  ‘She just went by me one day, dropped a fifty in my case. What’s I suppose to do with that, give it back?’

  ‘You followed her then, you marked her out?’

  ‘No, it weren’t like that. She give me a lift one day, saw me walkin’ back. Hell, couldn’t really drive my car ‘bout now could I? Didn’t go wiv’ the act.’

  ‘Then you slept with her?’ I dug at the carpet with my finger, working my nail into the pile, picking and picking at it.

  ‘What’s the matter, you feeling jealous?’ Margarita asked.

  ‘Sure, I slept with her, in the end. I ain’t no saint. I could see she were unhappy, I could see she were rich. I ain’t proud!’

  Neither was I. ‘But you told her …’ dig, dig. ‘You told her you loved her?’ dig, dig, dig.

  He paused, and I could hear him wondering what to do. Lie to me, lie to me, please, I begged silently.

  ‘I didn’t mean it,’ he said eventually, sounding like a little lost boy caught out. I slammed my fist into the door, because I should have been angry, real angry, if I’d really fallen for him. And because I was angry at him, real angry.

  ‘What the hell?’ he shouted.

  ‘If you lied to her, how’d I know you ain’t lying to me?’

  ‘’Bout what?’

  ‘That you love me!’ I closed my eyes and clutched the carpet under each hand.

  I was back there, for a moment, in our special place under the bed. I couldn’t remember which of the thousand times we’d hidden there it was, but there was a chill in the air, and we both had on winter stockings and hand-knitted crew neck sweaters. Lisa had Mr Pooter in her hand, when his little blue velvet jacket with the pearl buttons was new.

  ‘You’ll be okay, you know?’ she said to me. I didn’t look at her, I just shrugged. She was going away, not for the last time but the first, and right then I’d thought it would be forever. ‘I’ll write, I promise.’ Even that didn’t elicit a response from me. Lisa was going and I was being left behind, and I could see how guilty she felt.

  ‘I don’t wanna go,’ she said and she reached out and put her hand on my shoulder. ‘But he won’t hurt you, I promise. He only hates me.’ And she smiled a light, wan smile and I did also, because we both knew she was right. I was not scared for myself; I was scared for her, though at the time I did not know why. She held out Mr Pooter to me, and after a moment, I took him.

  ‘You can have him now,’ she said, her eyes wet but determined. ‘I mean, just to look after till I get back.’

  ‘You sure?’ I said, squeezing him gently, feeling the delicious, firm resistance of his body.

  ‘Sure,’ she said, and we smiled a sister’s smile.

  ‘You are comin’ back, aren’t you?’ I asked her.

  ‘Course, I want him back; you’re only looking after him while I’m away.’

  ‘Shoog?’ Paris said, as I had been silent for a while. I reached across and picked up my make-up bag. ‘You remember when we met?’ I heard the creak of the door as he moved again, changing position, his back to mine with the wood separating us. ‘You looked so pretty, wearin’ that li’l dress, with your hair all down and them big eyes of yours. You know, I ain’t gonna pretend, I just thought as you was a honey, y’know? Then we kinda started doin’ them cons n’all, and thought hey, you got, you know, potential?’ He chuckled, then said quickly, ‘But you’s more than that now. Hell’s teeth baby, you’s the nearest anyone’s ever come to makin’ me wanna give this shit up. You just say, say it now, and we’s gone, we’s gone a thousand miles away from all of this.’ I looked at the bag and unzipped it. Mr Pooter looked up at me with his one eye. I closed the zip again and put the bag back on the floor.

  ‘You tell me you lied to that man’s wife ‘bout lovin’ her, but I’m supposed to believe it when you say you love me?’

  ‘I know how it sound, what d’you want me to say? You think I’d have told you ‘bout her, if I didn’t mean it this time?’ He sounded more disgruntled when he added, ‘Why the hell d’you care so much ‘bout what I said to her? It didn’t mean nothing!’

  ‘So what the hell does it mean, when you sayin’ it to me?’

  ‘It means I love you, you crazy goddamn bitch!’

  ‘Well I love you too, you asshole!’

  I sounded pretty convincing. Perhaps for a moment I’d meant it, in a way. Perhaps I did love him, because I needed him. What is love, anyway, but needing someone else? Whatever, I had to act like I believed it when he said he loved me, because I needed him to love me back.

  ‘I think we got him,’ Margarita said.

  Chapter 18

  WHEN I RETURNED from my interview with the Sheriff, it began.

  I lived my life the way I had been: set on automatic. In between, I began to prepare. I put away the money that my paternal grandfather and maternal grandmother had left me, in an online savings account innocently titled ‘road trip’. Frances – he’d stopped being Franny at last – was furious to discover that he was to get nothing, and tried to get me to lend him five thousand dollars to help him open a vintage record store, just weeks after the funeral. The arguments made it easier to reduce my contact with all of them to the barest minimum, without the need for further explanation. I went to work, I went to the gym, I went to the store and I came home. In between, I was Margarita.

  I got her a new laptop and I built her life on it. I invented people on Facebook, and they made friends with real people, real people who then added Margarita to their lists, when an algorithm suggested it might be a good idea. I found her a mother and a father and two brothers; I couldn’t quite bring myself to give her a sister to usurp Lisa’s memory, but she had a school record, even a group photo from the year she’d graduated. I found one from a high school across state that had a Facebook page; there was a girl at the back no one had tagged who could have been her, so I uploaded the picture to Facebook and tagged it as Margarita. Some of the other people from the photo wrote and said hi, said they liked the new name and that I was looking good. One, who called herself Mary Contrary, even told me a story about her from high school. It sounded just like something Margarita would do. That’s what I wrote on her wall, anyway.

  Margarita had two boyfriends: one whose picture I lifted from a London tattooist’s website, and the other a bass player in a local band. She broke up with both of them, and they bot
h left heartbroken messages on her wall, while her relationship status switched to ‘it’s complicated’. The musician even wrote her a song, but she just laughed about it. Some of her friends joined in – they were quite cruel – and despite often going on record as wishing men would show their feelings more, they tore his to shreds. I nearly felt sorry for him, but he hooked up with a groupie pretty soon afterwards and moved to Boston, so he was okay.

  I started to buy her things, as if preparing for a new baby. I filled the cabinet in the bathroom with her brand of skincare products and make-up. I consulted consumer reports stratifying our society and predicting what products any particular socio-economic group would buy – it helped out at work also, and netted me an Easter bonus. After a while, I knew exactly what she would buy from any store I went into. My apartment had two bedrooms, and I dressed the smaller one as she’d have liked, until I could walk from one to the other and almost believe I had a flatmate. She left her underwear pegged to the Venetian blind over the open bathroom window; it was always me who had to put it away for her, and it was always more scanty and cheap looking than any I’d ever wear. It itched. She was a lot less tidy than me, and sometimes she’d leave the cap off the toothpaste, which started to annoy me, along with her habit of leaving mascara smudges on the mirror.

  Margarita liked working out and swimming too, but her activities had more purpose than mine. She joined a shooting club, then kickboxing and circuit training, as well as our thrice-weekly swim. She was louder than me; she played her music at full volume and she drank, but she was confident in a way I envied.

  I was top of the self-defence class; my personal instructor Ralph was impressed. He offered me some one-to-one tuition, which was really beneficial, but then Margarita slept with him and it got kind of weird after that. He was nice, I liked having him round, but Margarita just wanted him to show her different moves, to spar with her, to have him hold her down and see if she could get free. It got awkward in the mornings when I met him in the bathroom, knowing what he and Margarita had been up to the night before. I wished that he was seeing me, wanted to say that I wasn’t really like her, but it was Margarita he was more attracted to. Then she really freaked him out, when she began begging him to hit her and he said that he wasn’t into that sort of thing and, though they’d had fun and all, he felt that they were kind of over. They had a blazing row, which got quite physical; and so after that we had to find a different class. She broke one of my favourite plates too, throwing it out of the window after him.