The Forgotten Sister

by Caroline Bond

  She must have paused for too long. He raised his fist and Leah flinched, but instead of a punch, he threw the wad of money onto the bed. She should have just told him about seeing Cassidie, and about the cash. Leah couldn’t properly explain why she hadn’t, but it was too late now.

  ‘I found that stashed in the kitchen, in a mug.’

  What had he been doing, poking about in her cupboards? Concentrate, Leah told herself, it doesn’t matter how he found it; this drifting off while he was talking was dangerous. She really must concentrate.

  ‘Well?’ He stared at her.

  ‘Sorry. I meant to tell you.’ His face said, I don’t believe that for one second. Leah hurried on. ‘She gave it to me.’

  ‘When?’

  ‘The last time I saw her?’

  ‘Which was when?’

  This was going to tip him over the edge. ‘Thursday.’ Three days ago.

  He breathed in, then out, slowly, as if he was trying to calm himself, but Leah knew from past experience that Naz could just as easily strike when his blood was running cold as hot. You crossed him, you paid for it. When – and how – was up to him. ‘You met up with her again?’

  ‘Sorry.’ Grovelling sometimes worked.

  He stretched across her and picked up the curl of cash, unrolled it and started counting out the notes onto the bed. Leah felt a nerve in her neck start to tick.

  ‘Twenty, forty, sixty, eighty, one hundred, one-twenty, one-thirty, one-forty, one-fifty, one-sixty, one-seventy?’

  She nodded.

  ‘Odd amount.’

  ‘I had to buy a new bus pass.’ He stared at the pile of notes and she stared at his dipped face. She needed to say something to bring him in on it, quickly, he wouldn’t let being excluded slide; it showed a lack of respect, and Naz was all about the respect. ‘I told her that I needed it for my rent. She coughed up – real easy.’ Still he didn’t look up. ‘There’s more where that came from.’ Greed, it was the only appeal she could think of making.

  Naz fingered the notes, thoughtfully, silently, then straightened them into a neat stack, folded them over and stood up. He slid the wad of cash into his back pocket, staring down at her as he did so. She tensed.

  ‘Get her over again. It’s time I met your new best friend.’ Leah nodded and allowed herself to breathe again, thinking that it was going to be okay – this time – but Naz had one more message for her. He bent down, slid his hand round the back of her head and grabbed hold of a fistful of hair. He yanked her close and whispered in her ear. ‘You and me belong together, Leah. You know that, don’t you?’ He twisted her hair, sending a screw of pain down her neck. ‘What’s yours is mine, Baby. Don’t you ever forget that.’

  He let go, kissed her lightly on the cheek and left.

  Chapter 36

  CASSIE WAS back in Oldham, back in Subway, back on Leah’s home turf – dependent, yet again, on Leah’s whims, but the glow of expectation at meeting up with her was rapidly being replaced by irritation. Another long, slow trip over the Pennines and another twenty-five minutes of hanging around waiting had created ample opportunity for the affection that Cassie had been feeling towards Leah to be replaced by frustration. At last Cassie spotted her crossing the road, walking slowly as if she had all the time in the world. As Cassie watched Leah amble towards the cafe, she reminded herself to be less eager, less amenable.

  ‘You’re late,’ Cassie blurted out. Leah didn’t seem to register Cassie’s tone. She slumped down in the seat and glanced at the counter, clearly expecting Cassie to leap up and get her a drink. She could go whistle. Leah unzipped her jacket and shrugged it off her shoulders, revealing some sort of tunic. That threw Cassie.

  ‘Sorry. I was late getting off my shift,’ Leah said, then coughed.

  ‘From work?’ Cassie blurted out.

  Leah looked at Cassidie, coolly. ‘Yeah.’ She raised an eyebrow. ‘What? You assumed I was a scrounger?’

  ‘No.’ That was exactly what Cassie had assumed. ‘You’ve just never mentioned work before.’

  ‘Yeah, well, it’s nothing to shout about. I’m a cleaner in a care home. Crap money. Crap hours. A lot of crap all round.’

  ‘Oh.’ Cassie’s resolve to be tougher frayed. She went to fetch Leah a tea, at the last minute adding a couple of doughnuts to the order.

  Leah wrapped her hands around her cup and drank. ‘Thanks. Sorry. I’m just a bit knackered.’ She did look even paler than normal, thinner too.

  ‘That’s okay. Sorry I was narky about you being late.’ Cassie picked up one of the doughnuts, ripped it in half and passed the bigger piece to Leah.

  The girls chewed in silence for a few moments, drawing comfort from the familiar taste of fat and sugar. Her tea drained, Leah put her cup down and splayed her fingers on the table top, inspecting them with a weary expression. The skin on both hands was flaky and dry. The creases between her fingers red-raw.

  ‘It’s the cleaning stuff – it peels the skin off.’

  ‘Is it eczema?’ Cassie asked.

  Leah turned her hands over, studying the cracks in her palms. ‘I dunno. It gets bad, then I have my days off and it gets a bit better.’

  ‘They should give you gloves. And you could get some cream, from the doctor’s,’ Cassie suggested.

  ‘What are you – my mum?’ Leah said. Then she smiled, a small, hesitant proper smile, without the usual layers of suspicion and guardedness. She suddenly realised how hungry she was. She picked up the last doughnut and bisected it, offering the other half to Cassidie, who accepted it. They chewed in time.

  ‘I’ll never be thin.’ Cassie had a sweet tooth.

  Leah polished off her share. ‘I never put weight on. I can eat owt.’

  ‘Like Jack Sprat!’ The minute she said it, Cassie felt like a complete idiot, quoting nursery rhymes to a girl who’d never had a childhood.

  ‘What’re you talking about?’ Leah licked the sugar off her lips.

  Cassie was committed now. ‘It’s a kids’ rhyme…Jack Sprat could eat no fat, His wife could eat no lean, And so between the two of them, They licked the platter clean.’

  Leah looked at her for a long minute, then laughed, a short, harsh bark of laughter that segued into a prolonged coughing fit. When she’d finished she said, ‘What the fuck does that mean?’

  Cassie shrugged and pushed the last piece of doughy sweetness into her mouth and did what she’d always been told not to do – she spoke with her mouth full. ‘I think it’s supposed to mean that sometimes, even when two people are completely different, it can work, because they kinda balance each other out.’

  ‘Oh, right. I’ll take your word for it.’ Leah picked up her paper cup and stared into it. ‘Do you want another one?’ She leant back and pushed her hand into her trouser pocket, looking for cash.

  ‘I’ll get them,’ Cassie immediately offered.

  But Leah was already on her feet. ‘No, this is my shout.’ Another drink bought time, and Leah needed Cassidie to stick around for a little longer – there was an appointment to keep.

  Ten minutes later, in between spasms of coughing, Leah was being entertaining. She was telling Cassie about an old woman in the care home where she worked who swore blind that she’d been a stripper in a previous life, despite the manager insisting that she’d worked as an accounts clerk in a mattress factory for thirty years. ‘She gets up every now and again and starts to show off her moves to anyone who’ll watch. Nipple-tassel swirls and everything. And she ain’t a small lady. She says she once got picked up by an Arab at a club where she was dancing, who offered to—’

  The bang was so loud that Cassie thought a car had hit the front of the cafe. Everyone jumped and reached for their hearts, their mouths paused mid-word, mid-chew. But there was no glass, no breakage, no physical impact. It wasn’t a car that had smashed into the window – it was a young guy. His hand was imprinted on the window, his face was close to them, just the other side of the glass. He looked directly at Cassie, h
olding her gaze for a few long seconds before he switched his attention to Leah.

  Normality reasserted itself. Conversations picked up again and heartbeats slowed, as everyone realised they weren’t involved in some freak ‘hit-and-run’ accident. When Cassie looked at Leah for an explanation, she was saddened to see that the shutter had come back down. The bloke grinned and cartoon-gestured that he was coming in. In response, Leah sat up straight and started picking at the trim on her uniform.

  He strolled in and slid, in one liquid move, onto the seat next to Leah. ‘Hello, ladies. How’s things going?’ He smiled at Cassie, keeping his eyes locked with hers for a fraction longer than was necessary.

  ‘Fine.’ Leah shuffled in her seat.

  ‘Aren’t you gonna introduce me then?’ the guy mock-chided her.

  Leah paused ever so slightly, then said, ‘Cassidie, this is Naz.’

  ‘Hi.’ To Cassie’s surprise, he reached over the table and shook her hand. Dry hands, light pressure, a slight trail of his fingertips across her palm as he withdrew his hand. There was a nice smell, something lemony-fresh and expensive coming from him. ‘Lovely to finally meet you, Cassidie.’ There was a pause as they considered what he meant by that, and by his choice of name for her. ‘So, girls. Catching up on old times?’ It seemed innocently asked, but it was such a hard question to answer. ‘Plenty to talk about, I bet,’ he prompted.

  Leah muttered, ‘Yeah.’

  ‘And?’ Naz persevered. ‘Are you…bonding? Finding that you have stuff in common, despite all those years apart?’

  Leah glanced at him. ‘Yeah.’

  It was painfully awkward. Cassie didn’t know what to say or how to help, but she could tell Leah wanted away from him. In contrast, he looked utterly relaxed despite, or perhaps because of, their discomfort. It was as if he was proving he could out-chill them both. Cassie watched Leah, waiting for her cue, but she seemed unable to break the impasse. The pause stretched and became gluey. Then Naz did something weird, and more than a little creepy. He raised two fingers to his mouth and dragged them across his lower lip, revealing his small, sharp, perfectly white teeth and pale-pink gums. His smile smeared into a leer. Then he reached out towards Leah and pressed his fingertips, hard, against her neck, on the thin blue-veined skin below her ear. It was like the signature move of a villain in a movie. But it was Leah’s response that really threw Cassie. She leant into Naz’s touch and closed her eyes. It was an intimate and yet, at the same time, very public display – of what, Cassie couldn’t say. She looked away.

  ‘Anyway, girls. Glad to see you getting along so well. I just wanted to pop in and say “Hi”. Especially given I’ve heard so much about you, Cassidie. I didn’t mean to interrupt. I gotta get going myself – business, you know. I’ll come round later, Leah. I’ll aim for about two…like we agreed.’ He waited for her to nod, then switched his attention to Cassie. ‘Lovely to meet you, Cassidie. Hope to see you again, real soon.’ And with that, he was gone.

  Both girls breathed more easily once he’d disappeared.

  ‘Your boyfriend?’ Cassie risked asking.

  Leah hesitated. ‘No, not really.’ She didn’t elaborate, but simply sat and stared at her hands. Cassie waited, fully expecting to be dismissed again, but Leah surprised her by standing up and saying, ‘Don’t suppose you fancy a walk?’

  They sat on a bench, under a tree, in a park, a ten-minute walk away from the high street. The bench was speckled with bird shit and littered with the arrow-pierced hearts of local teenagers. Although Cassie was pleased to have been invited along, she was thrown by the change of venue and pace, uncertain, as always, of the etiquette. Leah seemed to want her there, but seemed disinclined to talk. The pressure reduced Cassie to talking crap. ‘I always think it smells of cucumber.’ Leah gave her a ‘what the fuck’ look. ‘The grass.’

  Cassie gestured at a lad with a bare, heavily tattooed chest on a ride-on mower, who was cutting the playing field across the way. At first glance he looked like Ryan, but on second glance he didn’t, though there was a similar swagger about his movements. He steered nonchalantly, with one hand, a series of wide sweeping arcs that sent the smell of freshly mowed grass onto the breeze. They watched him in silence and he, aware, of his audience, made his turns tighter and faster and increasingly impressive.

  In broad daylight, it was clear that Leah wasn’t just tired, she was ill. When she coughed, which she did repeatedly, it sounded like it hurt. She was very pale, her skin almost translucent.

  ‘Are you all right? You really don’t look very well.’

  Leah shrugged. ‘Cheers.’

  The lad on the mower seemed to tire of showing off. He suddenly revved the mower and shot away across the field, leaving a trail of grass in his wake.

  ‘So, how long have you been friends with Naz?’

  ‘I never said I was friends with Naz,’ Leah snapped, ‘he’s just someone I know. We met when I was in care. Known each other ever since.’ That was all she was prepared to divulge. In truth, she couldn’t rightly say when Naz had gone from being an occasional shag to a fixture in her life. It wasn’t a decision of her own making.

  ‘Right.’ Cassie feigned indifference. She was learning that non-committal responses were safer than questions with Leah, they seemed to provoke more information. So Naz wasn’t Leah’s boyfriend, and it hadn’t looked like an affectionate relationship, but there had definitely been something between the two of them.

  Leah started coughing again, bending over as the spasms racked her thin frame. When the coughing bout had finished, she straightened up, two bright spots of colour fading from her cheeks as she recovered from the exertion. It seemed quieter after she’d stopped.

  They watched the play area, neither of them feeling inclined to talk.

  It was busy. Lots of little ones with their mums and grans. There were no dads. The slide seemed to be the favourite piece of equipment, there was a queue to use it. A straggle of stocky little bodies stumped up the steps and squeaked slowly down it, egged on or ignored by their mums.

  Suddenly Leah said, ‘You were cute when you were little.’ Cassie waited, desperately wanting more. ‘You had lots of hair. Even when you were first born. People thought it was funny, how different we looked. I didn’t.’

  Cassie stared pointedly at the children, not risking a glance at Leah. Their dark, shared past hovered on the edge of the bright park. She waited for Leah to illuminate it for her, but she said nothing else.

  In the play area one little girl was defying her mum, refusing to come away from the slide, despite being told, loudly, to move! The little girl put her foot on the bottom step and looked over. Her mother shouted, ‘I’m warning ya. I’m not having it. Not today. I’ve had enough of ya already. Get here! Now!’ The child bit her lip and took another step up. The little boy behind her, unsure whether it was wise to follow, hesitated, looking to his mum for guidance. She wasn’t forthcoming. The children in the queue grew restless and the mums stirred nervously, unwilling to intervene. ‘Off!’ the woman hissed through clenched teeth, her voice curdling the atmosphere. The little girl bravely, defiantly, went to take another step. Her mum snapped. She grabbed her daughter by the arm and yanked her down the steps, her face rigid with anger. ‘I said, “Off!”’ A wail went up from the little girl as she was dragged away across the playground, her sparkly trainers catching and bumping on the asphalt.

  Cassie looked away, upset by the violence. Leah watched, her expression impassive, her weirdly unpredictable emotions less so. Prompted by an unsettling mix of motivations, Leah then surprised them both by blurting out, ‘I’ve got a more few pictures, at my flat – of when we were kids. Do you wanna come and see ’em?’ Cassie nodded.

  And so the erratic marble-run of their relationship tilted, fast, down another new, previously unexplored ramp.

  Chapter 37

  LEAH LED Cassie to a block of flats not far from the park. The entry system was broken, the doors ajar. Not what you’d
call secure. Anyone could come and go as they pleased, but at this time of the day it was quiet. In the lobby Leah pressed the Call button for the lift and they waited, listening to the sounds of the road outside and Leah’s ruttly breathing. Her colour, if anything, was worse than it had been in the park.

  When the lift finally arrived, the doors opened slowly and very noisily. They had to take a step back as a young woman with a buggy came out of the lift. As she passed, she half-nodded at Leah and stared hard at Cassie, acknowledgement and hostility clearly communicated in less than half a second. Cassie felt the thud of anxiety that was ever-present within her whenever she was with Leah. As the doors ground shut, she felt committed, and a little afraid.

  The lift smelt of fried food, the walls were a latticework of scratches and dents, boredom scratched into every surface. Leah saw the judgement in Cassidie’s eyes. ‘Yeah, I know. I normally use the stairs, but not today.’ She tapped her chest. ‘I’m on the seventh floor.’ They watched the lights as they ascended, for want of anything better to do. The communal landing was worse. The smell hit Cassie before they’d even stepped out of the lift. Again Leah picked up the unspoken criticism. ‘It’s the rubbish shoot,’ she said, pointing to a metal hatch in the wall. ‘People chuck owt down it. Nappies. Food. They never clean it. I’m here, right next to it.’ She dug her keys out of her bag and unlocked flat forty-five.

  Cassie braced herself.

  It was not what she was expecting.

  The minute Leah closed the front door behind them, the air smelt different. It smelt clean. There was a tiny bare hall, with four doors leading off it. Leah led Cassie into a decent-sized lounge, with a big picture window. It was a sparsely furnished room – which was exceptionally tidy. There were two cushions propped neatly on the small sofa. A rug was precisely squared in front of the TV, and a table with two chairs was tucked away in one corner. There were no pictures, no books on the corner unit, no clutter, no mess. The room didn’t speak of comfort. It spoke of a huge effort to make the most of a serious lack of money. But the most remarkable thing of all was that the room smelt of flowers, which was quite a feat, considering they were seventy feet above anything green or natural or floral.