Lemonade and Lies (17 page)

“Christmas shopping, eh? That sounds like fun.”

Really
? But then if you’ve been stuck in hospital for two weeks, maybe trailing in and out of shops looking for the perfect Christmas gift for your granny or dotty Aunt Ginny will do it for you.

He winked at the kids. “Why don’t you two go down to the hospital shop with your grandma? She’s got some pocket money for you.” He looked over at me. A questioning expression on his face that was asking my approval. “If it’s okay with your mum, you can buy some snasters in there.”

“Snasters?” I asked.

Tom looked superior and said “See, Mum! You don’t know
everything
. Snasters are sweeties.”

“That’s right,” agreed the man on the bed, a twinkle in his eye. “Of the nastiest kind. Ones that gum your teeth up. Give the dentist a good run for his money.”

He’d always been very particular about my teeth. Inspected them every night, like we were in the army. And I’d never been allowed anything that was remotely bad for them. Horses and courses and all that. So, the universe really had tilted. It wasn’t just my imagination.

My mother smiled at the kids, like it was some private joke they all shared, and herded them off.

“Hope you don’t mind? That was a bit of a strategy, so I could have a talk with you.”

“I’d call it a no-brainer.”

“That obvious, eh?”

“You’ve never been exactly subtle,” I said.

“No, suppose not. But a man can change.”

“So I see.”

“And so can a woman,” he said. He lifted an eyebrow. I guess it was meant as a clue, but I didn’t get it.

“Your point?”

He looked uncomfortable. Like he was about to deliver a speech he didn’t relish. He’d always been good at the preaching stuff. He’d had a lot of practice.

“All these bad things happening round you lately . . .”

“Not my fault.”

“I never said they were. Don’t get defensive. I just want to talk. Want to think about what’s best for you – and the children.”

“I should think I’m the best judge of that,” I said.

“Certainly.”

“You agree?”

“Naturally,” he said. (But there was nothing natural about it). “Now just let me get this off my chest, will you? It’s not easy for me, but I’m thinking of your future – and the children.”

“Naturally!”

“I probably deserve that,” he said. “And I know we’ve had our problems but everybody deserves a second chance, don’t you think? Even me.”

I was suddenly mute. An idiot with nothing to say.

“I’ve been wondering about your long-term plans,” he said, sounding like he really had.

“I don’t do much long-term planning.”

“It’s just that with me coming home and your mum up for looking after me, and the kids enjoying this place so much . . .”

He left the question out there to hang. A vague thought with just a face and head but no body and no feet. And for a moment I felt sorry for him, felt some kind of affinity.

“Yeah,” I said, “they like it here.”

“Things are going to change, of course. Bound to. I’m not stupid. You’ve got a life somewhere else.”

“Look, just say what you mean,” I said. “We all waste too much time dancing around the truth.”

“Fair enough. Well, as it’s so close to Christmas, I wondered if you and the children would be spending it here with us.”

I hadn’t thought past him coming home. I knew things wouldn’t be the same, for I’d been enjoying myself in the house, just me and the kids. But now the dynamic would change and how would I cope with that?

“The kids would love it,” I said, knowing it was true.

“And what about you? What about your job?”

“The job?”

“Maybe you should go back home for a few days - to sort things.”

“Why would you say that?”

“I haven’t been exactly truthful with you. I know that coming here to see us and staying on to look after things for the last few weeks has compromised your position.”

“I don’t follow.”

“Before he left Scotland, Jamie McDonald came to see me.”

“He’s gone?”

“You didn’t know?”

“I guess I’m last in line.”

“Maybe he was trying to protect you.”

“Sure.”

“He seemed like a nice man.”

“Nice? Yeah, I suppose.”

“He told me about the run-in with your boss. And I feel partly responsible. I’d hate to see you lose your job on my account.”

“You both sat here discussing me? Behind my back? Like I was some kid?”

“It wasn’t like that. I just wanted to know what your plans were. If you and the children were heading back. We love having them – and you.” (The last bit seemed like an afterthought). “Christmas isn’t far away.”

“Maybe you’re right,” I said, trying to keep the anger from my voice. It wouldn’t help. But I couldn’t believe they’d both been here calmly discussing my future between them, like I was some kind of chattel. Hadn’t they heard that women had the vote now? “My place is back home,” I said. “Things to do. Bills to sort. The future to plan.”

“Now look, Jilly. I didn’t mean you weren’t welcome.”

“I get it. Things were great before. Fine, the kids can stay and I’ll go back and see if I still have a job. How’s that?”

He seemed to be having a struggle. What was best for me versus what he wanted for himself? Or Father versus Grandfather? I could only guess. In the long run it was academic. He’d do what he wanted. I’d do what I wanted.

“Promise you’ll be careful,” he said. “Bill can’t cause you any more trouble, but …”

“What?”

“I know you all think I’ve reached the final stages of senility, but I know what I heard. There were
two
people in the house the night that – you know. Never mind. Just take care of yourself.”

I couldn’t answer. He could do that to me.

“And you’ll come back for Christmas? You and the children could have Christmas with us,” he added anxiously and his eyes held a sort of sad puppy-dog look. This was as close to pleading as he would ever get. And I dug my heels in. Remembered all the stuff from before and refused to make it easy for him. He’d never made it easy for me.

“We’ll see,” I said. But the words didn’t bring the satisfaction that I hoped they might. And the feeling of power over him was only temporary. For the look of disappointment that made his features collapse into an old man’s face, left the bitter taste of defeat in my mouth. I was a shit. And he’d won again.

“Perspective,” said Alice. “Distance always gives you a proper perspective.”

“Easy for you to say. You’re not the one who’s abandoned their kids – again.”

“And
I’m
supposed to be the drama queen,” she said. “Stop throwing around words like
abandoned
. What else could you’ve done, eh? Yanked the kids back home before they do their bit in the nativity? They love this school, right?”

“Right.”

“And what?  You want to drag them away from it when there’s only a bit to go before they break up anyway. Transplant them again.”

Put like that it sounded cruel. But they were my kids, and I missed them. I didn’t answer. I suppose what I’d really wanted, why I’d phoned my friend in the first place, was for her to tell me that I’d done the right thing. That it had been okay to leave the kids up there. But now that she had, I wasn’t so sure any more. Didn’t make sense, I know. But then stuff doesn’t always.

When I didn’t answer, Alice said. “Get yourself a glass of wine, girl. Stick your feet up. Read a Chick-lit. This is the me-time you’ve been looking for. Enjoy it instead of bloody moaning and doing the self-flagellation bit.”

Alice’s contribution had been short, if not exactly sweet. And I got the feeling she was trying to get shot of me (maybe she was on a promise). Perhaps she was right. I should go buy a bottle of wine, enjoy what was left of the evening and stop feeling guilty and sorry for myself. I hadn’t even unpacked. I’d meant to, but self-pity had overtaken me and I’d reached for my mobile.

Tomorrow was going to be my do-day. I’d already decided that. Sort the bills, speak nicely to the gas people to see if they could do an emergency delivery, get the phone reconnected and face up to my boss.

This time tomorrow, I’d either still have a job or not. The prospect of losing it didn’t fill me with the horror that it did before, when Bill had first abandoned me and my confidence and optimism hit an all-time low. Now I had a decent little buffer in the bank. Thanks to my mother.

I thought about them all sitting up there in the cosy scullery playing scrabble or doing a jigsaw on the farmhouse table, the Aga pumping out heat. And me down here in my cold house with my miserly electric fire and my coat on. Alone.

I walked through town to the all night supermarket. Alice was right. I needed wine. But I bought cheese as well. To convince myself that I was a person who enjoyed fine wine rather than someone slipping closer to the bottle-a-night-brigade.

The air was cold and my breath puffed out in front of me in grey, ragged clouds.
You should take more exercise
, nagged the voice in my head,
get yourself
back to Yoga; take it seriously this time
.

“I’m plenty fit,” I argued back. All those long walks in Maidens, but the hills there were gentle (the guide book called them rolling). Truro was built on hills. You couldn’t get in or out of the place without having to tackle Everest. And it was a fair walk back to my place from the Trafalgar Roundabout. Plus I was now lugging a plastic bag with two bottles of Merlot, some Danish Blue and a packet of crackers. That was why I was breathing heavily, I told the voice in my head.

I tried to remember all the moves to ‘Salute to the Sun’. I was half way through when I heard the footsteps. My mouth went dry and my adrenaline pumped into overdrive. I was being followed again.

Or not. Whoever was behind was probably just like me, a budding alcoholic getting their tinnies from the twenty-four hour supermarket. Or an upstanding citizen on their way home from a night out.

I turned round. There was nobody there. Maybe Alice was right. Maybe I truly was a drama queen. But I figured no jury would convict me, not after all the weird stuff that had happened over the last few months.

I started to run. It would warm me up. And even through the noisy pounding of my pulse I heard the sound behind me. Someone else was running. Keeping pace with me. Not a noisy pair of shoes, rubber soles perhaps. Nothing like the heavy clunking sound of the brogues I’d heard once before.

The woman wearing those had been harmless, but I reckoned this would be different. For this time, when I snatched an urgent look over my shoulder I could see a huge, mountain of a man. I wondered how he’d performed his vanishing trick. Now you see me, now you don’t. Elementary, Watson; he’d probably just ducked into the doorway of the launderette. Not that it mattered. He was here, now, and he was chasing me.

He wasn’t built for speed, and although he didn’t seem to be gaining on me, he was definitely keeping up. It wasn’t Viktor Kabak, I noted with relief. As tall as him, yes. But this guy would have trouble fitting through normal doors, could never buy his suits off-the-peg. Maybe he was just your average, everyday mugger. But something told me he was after more than my purse and my Merlot.

I needed a plan. But there wasn’t one. The part of my brain that was supposed to come up with the creative stuff was having a bad day. So I just kept running. And he kept on running. I could hear him panting away, and every so often a strange noise would come from him, an exaggerated, pissed-off grunt. His wasn’t an elegant style, more of a lope, and I figured that if I was having a struggle then it must be even worse for someone his size. Maybe he’d give up.

When we came out onto the junction, I automatically turned left up Richmond Hill. It had been instinctive. Turning right would have taken me down the hill and in a few minutes I could have been at my front door. It was a very steep hill and I couldn’t believe that I’d been so stupid. But it was too late.

There was a fire in my calf muscles. And the breath that came through the narrow funnel of my throat now made a dramatic, wheezing noise like an asthmatic. I was on my last reserves, draining whatever tank I’d been running on and couldn’t keep up this pace much longer.
And what then
? When I risked another look behind, the guy was still going, hadn’t slowed down. He was shifting surprisingly quickly up the steep hill for someone of his bulk.

I looked over at the station on the other side of the road. There might be someone there to help me. But the place was dark and deserted. The last train of the night had long gone, and even the taxis that usually lined up in the rank outside were missing. Where was everybody? The pavements were empty. It was down to me and the plan.
What plan? There was no plan
.

A small group of town houses nestled in up-market smugness on my left. They were set back from the main road and there was a slip lane leading up to them. I could pull off the pavement now (right now!) and make a run for them. Surely there would be someone in there to offer me a lifeline.

But both the slip lane and the small crescent they occupied would be like climbing Anna Perna and it would be taking a gamble, for I wouldn’t see a light or any sign of habitation until it was too late.

Just run! Get to the top of Richmond Hill. There might be cars up there going along Highertown
. (But should I listen to this internal Sat Nav? So far it had taken me up the hill instead of down.) I passed the town houses, saw a light in one of them, an upstairs bedroom maybe. Too late.

I suddenly felt the heavy weight of the bag dragging on me. What a prat. I should have dumped the thing long ago. Merlot is precious stuff, but hardly worth getting mugged for. I looked for somewhere to put it. I could have dropped it right there on the street, but I guess all that early training had made a law-abiding citizen out of me. My parents making me pick up my litter. So I wasn’t going to leave it on the pavement. That’s when the plan struck.

You see? There
was
a plan. The cavalry had arrived. A bit last minute, as usual, but maybe not too late. A daring plan. Or a stupid one – time would tell. And it would need careful timing. I held on tightly to the plastic bag as if it were made from precious metal. Peered at the dark shapes on my side of the road.

There it was, up ahead around a bend in the road. You could just make out the tops of the tall buildings looming out of the darkness. A cluster of them that used to be elegant town houses until somebody figured you could make more money turning them into bed-sits. Some of these were rundown (an eyesore, according to ‘anonymous’ from the readers’ page of the West Briton) but one thing I remembered about them was that they all had long, sloping front gardens that ran down to the road and most had some kind of wall or fence in front of them.

It had to be exactly right, though. I didn’t have much time and I needed a particular house. One around the bend in the road, so the guy trailing me would be blindsided for a minute. And it had to have a fence. Something not too tall – but tall enough for me to crouch behind.

There it was. Perfect. I jumped over the small picket fence holding my precious cargo aloft. Don’t ask me why I did that. It didn’t matter if it got broken.

I heard him before I saw him. He turned the bend and then came to a halt, almost in front of me. Like he’d run into an invisible wall. For this time
I
had done the vanishing trick. He looked puzzled. Twisted around and stared back down the road.

I slid a bottle of wine from the bag. Wondered why I hadn’t done that before he arrived. Because the noise alerted him.
But if life was perfect et cetera
. . . As it turns out, it didn’t matter. All he had time for was to move closer to the fence to investigate. Decent of him, because it made it easier for me to reach over and break the Merlot bottle over his head. It made a satisfying crunch and shards of glass went flying off everywhere. It was hard to tell what was blood and what was Merlot.

But it didn’t stop him. Fair enough, he bent over double for a second, but then he simply shook his massive head, like a fly had come in for a landing on it. Then he lunged at the fence.

Plan B! Well, there wasn’t exactly a plan B, but some sort of self-preservation instinct took over. I kicked out at the fence and one of the pickets came loose. I like to think it was my kick that did it, but more than likely it was him falling into it.

The kick sent me sprawling onto my back, but I had the presence of mind to hold onto the bottle. Hardly much of a bottle anymore, more of a neck with some jagged shards of glass still attached to it – the bits that hadn’t embedded themselves in this guy’s skull.

I lashed out at the only target available. His feet. The shot had desperation behind it and the bottle punctured the man’s cowboy boot. I watched the suede turn dark red. It brought back a memory of other boots. That’s when I knew for certain. This was the man who attacked me on the cliffs. The one who enjoyed beating up women. The memory made me tremble, but not with fear, with pure, undiluted rage and a bloodlust that was primal.

I smashed my one remaining bottle of Merlot on what was left of the fence and stabbed him fiercely in the other foot. I felt my weapon sink into soft tissue and splinter as it met with bone, felt the shockwave as his body hit the pavement, heard him scream. The high pitched wail proved he wasn’t dead and yanked me from my trance-like state. That’s when I ran. Across the road. Down the hill. Back towards the train station.

I didn’t get any farther. For I simply crumpled into the pavement and sat with my back against the station’s ancient, ornamental brickwork and shook. And then the taxi drove up, its driver decanting in slow motion, ambling over to me in a comical, surreal time frame. I wanted to laugh. To tell him he looked as if he was made of rubber. But no sounds came from my mouth. Only a silent, constant shake that refused to stop no matter how much I ordered it to.

The man spoke. I think it was English, but couldn’t be sure. For it was incredibly slow and muffled, hardly recognisable as speech; its register deep bass; Basso Profondo. It reminded me of an old wind-up gramophone that was running out of kinetic energy, the sound getting slower, more indistinguishable. Surely, someone should rewind it.

He touched me tentatively. Then shook my shoulder. Muttered something, and my hearing began to return to normal. My eyes honed in on the man. He was nothing special. Just your regular guy with flat feet and more weight round the middle than was good for him. But in my book he was a saint.

“Hey, you’re not sleeping here are you? The cops got this place on their rounds.”

It was good of him to warn me, brave too, for rough-sleepers could be unpredictable. I tried to smile, reached my hand out to him. A universal greeting. A benign handshake to show I was someone who meant him no harm.

“Christ! You’re covered in blood.”

I stared down at my hand. At both of them. They were a bloodied mess and trickles of the stuff made their way onto the concrete beneath me. It wasn’t his blood. Not my pursuer’s blood. It was my own, oozing from a myriad of punctures where tiny shards of glass were still embedded. The sight of blood has always freaked me out. I guess that’s why I fainted.