Greenwich Park

by Katherine Faulkner

  And then their home, with its perfect symmetry, the box hedges, the matchstick-straight black railings. The yellow glow of log fires and lamplight shining from its tall Georgian windows – windows that gazed straight out over the park. It looked like a painting.

  ‘Here we are.’ Helen was beaming. She couldn’t disguise the catch in her voice; of pride, of nervousness, of wanting us to love it. She kept glancing at me, as if my approval mattered to her almost as much as her boyfriend’s. Neither Daniel nor I said anything. I couldn’t believe this was really their home.

  Helen rang the bell, and moments later they were upon us: the mother kissing me on both cheeks, pulling an awkward Daniel into a bony hug with her long slender arms, then steering us all into the kitchen.

  The father, Richard – apparently some sort of famous architect, though I’d never heard of him – was in there, on his hands and knees. He was attempting to relight the ancient-looking gas oven with a pipe hanging out of one side of his mouth while still holding a glass of port. I came to suspect it was not his first of the evening. He rose to his feet to hug Rory and Helen. Then he pumped Daniel’s arm before beamingly thrusting a gin and tonic into my hand and planting a hot kiss on my cheek.

  All evening, Daniel and I were treated as if we were their long-lost children. We were fed profusely, and solicitous questions were fired in our direction. Daniel kept having to bring his hand to cover his mouth to answer without displaying a mouthful of food. Every detail of Daniel’s dull upbringing was deemed utterly fascinating, my every half-formed insight into law – my subject of study – met with enthusiastic assent. And how were we finding life in Cambridge? Was I keeping Rory under control? Had Daniel witnessed him actually turning up to any of his architecture lectures?

  Even Charlie was nice to us. On the train there, Helen had warned us darkly about this ‘difficult’ younger brother, who refused to apply to university and who lived in a twilight world of Call of Duty and marijuana in the uppermost bedroom. To me, though, he seemed pleasant enough, telling me about his plans for a music course at the local college, passing me the bread, asking Daniel thoughtfully about the football team he supported – although it was painfully obvious that this was a rugby family.

  As the night went on, I realised Daniel was being treated with particularly lavish attention. Everyone was in raptures over the middling bottle of wine he had brought with him, over his shyly stated thoughts on architecture. Even Rory was at it, I noticed. Slapping this shy, diffident boy on the back, making out his jokes were funnier than they were. Over the course of the evening, he was enthusiastically invited to an entire calendar of family occasions – the country for Christmas, Courchevel at Easter, sailing in the summer holidays.

  I tried to work out if he was finding it at all strange, how eager they all seemed for the evening to be wonderful, for him to be pleased with everything we ate, drank and saw. Looking at his face, I think he just didn’t know what to make of it, of their exuberance, the decadence of it all, the platter of riches he was being offered. A few times, I noticed him glancing over, as if pleading for help.

  When Daniel had quietly asked Helen about the time of the last train, Richard had waved his question away, insisted we all delay our return to Cambridge until the next day. Daniel protested stutteringly about a supervision first thing that he wouldn’t have time to rearrange, but the look on Richard’s face had silenced him.

  Months later, when Helen and I had formed our obligatory friendship, she blushingly told me the story of what had happened later that night. How she had crawled down Daniel’s body in her childhood bedroom and taken him into her mouth. I imagined poor Daniel, staring at the teddy bears on Helen’s shelves, the branches of the horse chestnut tree tapping against the tall windows. Helen had giggled at the memory of how he had voiced concern about the noise, about her parents hearing them. She had silenced him. I imagined her flushed cheeks, her fox-coloured hair spread out over the pillow. A pool of rusty red.

  Perhaps Daniel hadn’t detected it then, what lay behind the grinning faces, the elaborate overtures. The extravagantly prepared food, the carefully laid table, the noisy, parentally sanctioned fuck. I think he probably would have done, if he’d known to look for it. They did their best, of course. But it is, in the end, not an easy thing to hide. The unmistakable stench of desperation. The cringing eagerness of the salesmen of damaged goods, for whom they’d finally found an interested buyer.

  HELEN

  Daniel and I have stopped talking about Rachel’s presence. In fact, with her being around all the time, listening to our every conversation, we seem to have fallen out of the habit of talking altogether. In the morning, we move around from drawers to toaster to kettle, politely moving out of each other’s way, like lodgers in a shared kitchen, while she sits at the table, slathering cream cheese onto bagels and slurping coffee. At night, we brush our teeth in silence. Daniel has started putting in earplugs before he is even in bed. He doesn’t say goodnight.

  I can’t face the thought of telling him about my suspicions, about the note I found and what it might mean. He is cross enough with me about Rachel being here without me making it worse by telling him she is a thief, not to mention a potential homewrecker. I still can’t make up my mind on the latter. Sometimes, I decide it’s just too ridiculous to imagine anything could be going on between Rory and Rachel. But other times, the more I think about it, the more the pieces seem to fit. After all, hadn’t Rachel more or less admitted to an affair with a married man, who wasn’t interested in the baby? It would explain her determination to be friends with me. Her strange interest in Serena, asking whether Rory was happy about Serena’s pregnancy. Why else would she ask something so odd about someone she’d never even met?

  Then there was Rachel’s excitement at being asked to Rory’s birthday meal. And Rory’s reaction. As soon as he’d seen her, he’d dropped all that glass. The look on his face, as if he’d seen a ghost. Could it have been the sudden apparition of his lover, standing right next to his wife at his own birthday dinner, that threw him off balance?

  And then, to add to all that, there was Lisa. She’d seemed so sure she had seen Rachel before. It’s not as if she’d any reason to lie. And why else would Lisa have seen Rachel, if not at Rory’s office? That could, I thought queasily, have been where they had their secret assignations.

  The thought of them together, at Haverstock – conducting some secret affair in the offices of the company Daddy built from nothing, while Serena sits clueless and pregnant at home and Daniel slaves away trying to save the company – makes my stomach sick with fury. How could Rory do something like that? He’d never have done this if Mummy were still here. It’s like he’s forgotten about her, now. It’s like he doesn’t think he needs to be good any more.

  With the thought of the two of them at Haverstock comes another, awful prospect. Maybe Daniel isn’t in the dark after all. Maybe he knows about it, too. Could that be why he is so weird around Rachel, so unhappy that she is here? Has he been covering for Rory? Are Serena and I the only ones in the dark? Then, of course, there’s the most horrifying thought of all. Rachel’s baby. If they have been having an affair, could the baby be Rory’s? A child of my own flesh and blood?

  Since Rory’s birthday dinner, I’ve been back in Rachel’s room time after time, looking for the things I found there. The laptop, the photograph of the four of us at Cambridge, the note I found at Serena’s. I know she has taken those things. I know they are there, somewhere. But I can’t find them. Last night – while she was splashing around in our new bathtub, yet again – I took another look, but there was nothing but clothes in her suitcase. In desperation, I looked in her handbag, found her wallet. No notes, no photograph. Just the usual stack of fifties – where on earth is she getting all this cash? – and a battered old provisional driver’s licence that expired years ago. RACHEL WELLS.

  What I still can’t work out is what Rachel wants. If she wants Rory, wants to force him to choo
se, why doesn’t she just come out with it? Or perhaps he has ended it already – but she refuses to accept it? Perhaps this is her twisted way of getting close to him. But why? Is she tormenting him, punishing him for choosing Serena? Or is there more to it?

  And then there are the marks on her neck. They are almost gone now, faded to little clouds of yellowish grey. Barely noticeable. How did she get them? Who wants to hurt her? And above all, why is she still living in our house, sitting and eating breakfast with us, coming out with her weird, jarring small talk? What does she want from us?

  I am desperate to talk to Daniel about it, properly. Daniel always knows the right thing to do. We used to talk about things like this, solve problems together. We used to feel like a team. I can’t bear this distance that seems to be opening up between us since she’s been staying.

  But I know what he’ll say. He’s always so logical. He’ll say I’m reading too much into things. That I’m imagining it, making things up. He will want proof, or he won’t believe me. And a part of me doesn’t even want to know what is really going on. I just want it gone. I want her gone.

  When I traced it back, I couldn’t quite work out how I’d even got to this point. Had I ever even liked this girl, really? Had I encouraged her friendship? I didn’t think I had. Yet somehow, she had become my problem. A problem I wasn’t sure how I was going to solve.

  GREENWICH PARK

  She has always hated meeting in the tunnel. She prefers to smell the grass, the earth, the moss. But the rain is coming too hard tonight. Besides, they don’t have much time.

  The skies are heavy now, the tumbling clouds epic, the growl of thunder chasing people into their homes. The rain comes, scattering them like mice. She walks past the warm glow of other people’s houses.

  She makes her way through the tunnel, through its concentric circles of light and shadow. She passes signs on the tunnel walls. S9, S11, S12. She doesn’t know what the numbers mean. The ceiling drips, and her footfalls echo north and south.

  S19, S20, S24. She feels the pressure of the water overhead, the weight of it, the dampness, seeping through into the air. They usually meet by the bulb that flickers, insect-like, beside a sign that says ‘No Cycling’. As she nears it, the sudden bump of a bicycle over a storm drain makes her jump. It passes, its light flashing into the darkness. She carries on.

  When she arrives, he is pacing, breathing heavily, eyes wild. He is angry, she can tell. He lifts her, roughly, pushes her against the wall. The white subway tiles are cold on her back, his breath hot on her neck. She feels weightless.

  They said they wouldn’t do it again. But now the landscape has changed, the horizon shifted. Their doors are closing, sooner than expected. The thunder comes again. They need to start making plans. He feels frightened. Of her, of them, the thunder, both. Frightened to go. Frightened to stay. Frightened of what they might do.

  On her way home, the thunder has stopped, and something in the atmosphere is altered. She walks quickly, past the doors in the park walls. She wonders who uses those doors. She has never seen them open or close. Autumn leaves are gathered at their feet, like rusty hands spread wide. The bricks darken in the rain.

  The next day the birds are circling over the park, sweeping across the sky like iron filings. They are gathering their numbers, flying south for the winter. It was him that pointed it out to her, this melancholy wheeling. Now she can’t not see it. She can’t not think about it. Wishes they could go with them. She wishes they had gone already. She fears it might be too late.

  And now it is, and now they are here. Left behind in a world without birds, to face the cold.

  37 WEEKS

  HELEN

  I am locking Monty in our bedroom at the top of the house. He stares up at me miserably as I set his food and water bowls out beside the wardrobe, a litter tray next to the door. He hates being shut up here. But the last time Charlie brought friends along to one of our parties, one of them thought it would be funny to singe his whiskers with a cigarette lighter. I’m not taking any chances.

  Even though I can’t imagine anything I feel less like doing at the moment, I somehow ended up agreeing to throw this bonfire party. Katie kept going on about it, saying how it was her first weekend off in ages, and how nice it would be to have fireworks at the house again, to do something to celebrate the baby coming, even something low-key. To fill the house with lovely memories again. I told her I wasn’t sure. The building work is nowhere near finished. The house looks a mess.

  ‘No one minds that,’ she said. ‘Anyway, that’s the perfect time to have a party, because it doesn’t matter if things get ruined.’

  ‘I thought you said it would be low-key?’

  ‘It will. But you want it to be a party, don’t you?’

  And then before I knew it, Charlie was talking about bringing his decks and some friends from the club. I made him promise not to invite too many. I told Daniel I didn’t want the house any more ruined than it already was. But weirdly, Daniel seemed keen on the idea of a party.

  ‘I think Katie just thought it would be nice,’ Daniel said. ‘An old-fashioned Bonfire Night party. Like your mum and dad used to do.’

  ‘Mummy and Daddy used to do toffee apples and sparklers and sausages, Daniel,’ I groaned. ‘Not Charlie and his idiotic druggy friends smashing up the house.’

  ‘It won’t be that bad. Give your brother a break.’

  ‘You know what he’s like, Daniel! Say the word party to Charlie and he starts inviting everyone he’s ever met.’

  I thought back to our engagement drinks, when we’d first moved into the house. I’d hoped for a small, intimate gathering, a few jugs of Pimm’s on the lawn. I was secretly pregnant, anyway, so I wasn’t drinking. Then Charlie had turned up, a whole gang of friends in tow, and insisted on starting a game of something called beer pong in the garden. By the end of the night the house was littered with drunken corpses. We’d had to have a whole section of carpet replaced.

  Daniel smiled and shrugged, gesturing out of the window. ‘We could do with having a bonfire anyway, don’t you think? We’ve got all those cuttings in the garden. And fireworks are always fun.’

  I cradled my mug of tea in my hands, letting the warmth seep into my fingers, and gazed out at the wasteland of our garden. I couldn’t make out why Daniel was so keen to do it. I couldn’t understand why he thought all the cuttings needed to be burned, instead of just put in the garden waste bin. I hated the thought of people in our garden, trampling on the roses. And Monty can’t bear parties, or fireworks. He’d be traumatised for weeks.

  ‘I don’t know, Daniel.’

  ‘Think of it as a last hurrah before the baby.’

  He seemed to be actually excited by the idea. I couldn’t remember the last time he’d seemed excited about something. Him, Charlie and Katie. That was three against one. I opened my mouth to protest, then closed it again.

  ‘How about I speak to Charlie?’ he said, pulling me into a hug. ‘Keep the guest list under control?’

  ‘You can try,’ I muttered. Suddenly I felt too tired, too pregnant to argue.

  ‘And after the party, if she hasn’t gone by then, we’ll talk to Rachel again.’ He pulled away then, looked me in the eye, a serious expression on his face. ‘We’ll be nice about it, but she does need to go now. I mean, for God’s sake, Helen – our baby’s coming in three weeks. I know you’re worried about her. But she can’t just live here forever, can she?’

  I sighed. ‘OK. We’ll talk to her again. After the party.’ And just like that, I’d agreed to it after all.

  I rub Monty’s ears, and he purrs softly. Just for a moment, I wonder whether I could just lie down here on the bed by his side, a pillow between my aching knees. Stay here all night with my fingers in my ears, safe from the explosions. Pretend that none of it is happening.

  HELEN

  When I try to recall the night of the party, my most vivid memories will be of sticky floors, the smoke in my clothes, th
e hot air from the flames, the cold wet of the earth. And most of all, the hum of the dehumidifier.

  Wherever I go in the house, I can’t seem to escape it. It seems to be gathering, rising in pitch, building to a crescendo that never quite comes. As the night goes on, I feel a dull headache spreading, growing like a tumour. Like storm clouds gathering.

  The dehumidifier has to stay on all night. And no one, under any circumstances, can go into the cellar. The man who came to lay the cement was very clear on that point. I have written ‘NO ENTRY’ on a piece of paper in large red capital letters and stuck it on the cellar door.

  Charlie and Daniel started the bonfire in the garden together, but it’s begun to rage out of control. Flames keep leaping towards the fences in the direction of the wind. The flames seem so high, so bright. I’m worried it might set the neighbours’ gardens on fire.

  I’d invited some of the neighbours, just to try and soften the blow of what I feared would end up being a noisy and unpleasant evening for them. To my great relief, the family on our left said they were going to be away skiing that weekend. But Arthur and Mathilde, the elderly, childless couple to our right, had seemed pleased to be invited.

  They arrived early, wearing charming smiles, eager to socialise. Arthur – who knows about old churches and had been friendly with my father – thrust what I suspected was a very good bottle of Muscadet into my hands, while Mathilde, a retired music teacher, brought along a plate of her home-made gravadlax, with sprigs of dill and chunks of fresh lemon. As she laid it down and started to fiddle with the cling film, I realised to my horror that her nails had been painted, her silvery hair blow-dried especially for the occasion.