The Fantastic Book of Everybody's Secrets (11 page)
Read The Fantastic Book of Everybody's Secrets Online
Authors: Sophie Hannah
âBut what would Tom write, to be sent to all of them?' asked Clive.
âWe'll worry about the details later,' said Selena.
âCan we all write it? Can we write it together?' Petra shrieked.
Tom shook his head in mild exasperation. He turned his back on the glee that had broken out in the lounge and stared out over the river towards the hills in the distance. For the first time, he noticed a wind farm. It looked like a group of people, far away, waving. He had only stood on this balcony once before, and on that occasion he'd looked mainly at his feet on the bumpy metal, wondering how secure any such contraption could be; what was to stop a balcony from snapping off the side of the house and plummeting to the hard earth beneath?
Something: that was the answer. There was something in place to prevent that from happening. He didn't know what, but then he wasn't a builder or an architect.
Let other people worry about it.
At exactly nine thirty the next morning, Tom walked into Nora's office. Nora sat behind her desk, her hands folded in
front of her. She wore the expression of a mortuary assistant, about to open a metal drawer and show somebody their deceased beloved. âCome in, please, Tom,' she said. But he was already in.
On either side of Nora were Gillian Bate and Imrana Kabir. Tom nearly laughed when he saw their faces, which were even grimmer than Nora's; they looked like two reluctant spectators at a cult slaying. Frankly, it wasn't convincing. Tom was certain that, secretly, they felt as merry and rejuvenated as he did. He noticed that Alastair Hardisty was not present. Why not? Tom had been promised Alastair Hardisty. Where was he? Had Nora made him up? Perhaps he was a tiny plasticine man from an ancient television programme, one Tom had never seen.
Tom sat down on the chair that had been put out for him, opposite Nora's desk. âRight,' he said, rubbing his hands together to convey enthusiasm. âWhat's all this about?'
1) Sometimes I dream about killing myself, just to make people like me more.
2) One afternoon I went to the loo at work. I'm a Business Studies teacher at a grammar school (well, it's not really a grammar school, it's actually a comp but it used to be a proper grammar and it's still called that). Anyway, I knew I was going to be in there for a while, if you get my drift, so I remembered what I learned about what they call âcritical path analysis' when I did my teacher training (basically this means being as efficient as possible by combining more than one task wherever you can â the example most often used is putting the coffee and milk and sugar in the cup while you're waiting for the kettle to boil). So I thought, I'm going to be on the bog for a while, so I'll take some work with me to mark. I took Helen Pritchard's essay, and managed to read the whole thing and mark it before I'd finished crapping. It was pretty good, and I gave it 68 percent. Anyway, then when I reached for the loo roll, there was none. I hadn't noticed! I didn't have any tissues or anything in my pocket, and the bin (which could well have contained some old bits of toilet paper) was right on the other side of the room. So was the sink. It's a disabled toilet,
so it's not small. I couldn't hop across the floor without risking getting my trousers and boxers dirty, so I had no choice but to wipe my arse with Helen's essay! I had to pretend I'd lost it and ask her for another copy, which didn't go down very well, but I did bump her mark up by a couple of per cent, to make up for the inconvenience! I never told anyone, because I was worried I might get sacked!
I am the editor of
The Book of Secrets
. Or I would be, if I had any decent contributions. These two disheartening offerings are all I've received so far. The first is intriguing, but too short. It lacks narrative drive and does not contain enough psychological detail to bring it to life. The second has detail, but it's crass and essentially boring. It is early days, however, so I will try not to be too disappointed. And my box isn't the only one. Perhaps when I speak to Debbie and Lisa, they will tell me that they have had more promising deposits. You're bound to get a better class of secret in cultured places such as Cambridge and York than in Loughborough. People will write better and be generally more insightful.
I don't yet have a publisher, let alone an advance, so at the moment I'm working on the book for free. I'm not too worried about this. It's such an interesting project that I can't see how anyone could resist it. Who wouldn't want to buy it? Eventually there will be plenty of money. Enough for me to give up my job, hopefully. The great thing is, if it works, it will continue to work. There will always be new people, new secrets.
The Book of Secrets
can be followed by
The Book of
Secrets 2
. I am hoping that the series will become a talking point, a cultural phenomenon, and the contributions will come flooding in.
Noone is watching me at the moment, so I have stopped working. I am obsessed with getting on with the book and I don't care if I'm caught and sacked. This isn't a job anyone
in her right mind would fear losing. I used to have one of those. I was the assistant director of a literature festival. Not in Loughborough; I used to live somewhere superior, the sort of place where, I imagine, the secrets dropped into any box such as mine would be exceptionally entertaining as well as wittily presented.
I'm not sure I'm even going to use the two secrets I've been given so far. I can't work up any enthusiasm for editing the second, and the first is so short that it would need extending, if anything. Since I don't know the situation behind that odd sentence, I am in no position to add to it. Still, there is work I can be getting on with â creative work, I mean, not the demeaning kind the hotel pays me to do. Until now I haven't felt ready to start the introduction, but today, at last, I think I do. I get out my notebook with the soft black leather covers and begin to write:
This book would not exist if I had not met Ian Prudhoe.
I stop and smile. Ian will like that. Who wouldn't? What man could resist the idea that a book existed â a successful,
much-discussed
book â solely because of him? I chew my pen for a few seconds. I must be careful not to mix up my
introduction
with my own secret, which of course I am planning to include. There can't be any overlap between these two pieces.
The story of how I met Ian is a peculiar one. It started with a phone call from my friend Debbie. She and I used to work together at the Hathersage Hotel in Loughborough.
I pause here, wondering if I ought to mention that
Hathersage
have since transferred Debbie, against her will, to their Cambridge hotel. I decide not to. Her move was unexpected and unwelcome, but it is irrelevant. I turn to the back page of my notebook and write a reminder to myself to include Debbie and Lisa in the acknowledgements. At first they both had doubts about collecting secrets for me, but they eventually
allowed me to send each of them a box and promised to display it somewhere prominent in their hotels.
Debbie phoned me one night, clearly upset. I asked her what was wrong. âI'm not sure I should tell you,' she said. âI'm not sure I should tell anyone.' From the seriousness of her voice, I assumed something awful had happened, and I wanted to know what it was. As someone who had recently survived a shattering experience, I was interested in, shall we say, the genre of ordeals.
I pause again. Does it matter that I have hinted at my own secret? I decide not. Readers are bound to be fascinated by the suggestion that the book's editor is an enigmatic, troubled figure.
It didn't take long to persuade Debbie to tell me. She didn't know what to do, and hoped I would be able to advise her. âAn anonymous letter came in the post,' she said. âA really nasty one.'
âSomeone wrote you a nasty letter?' I was amazed. Debbie is one of the kindest people I have ever met, and I couldn't imagine why anyone would wish to do such a thing.
âNo, it wasn't to me. It was addressed to someone called Ian Prudhoe. I know what must have happened. His address is 6 Harrow Square, and mine is 6 The Square.' She sighed. âI just wish I hadn't opened it. I opened it automatically without even looking at the envelope. Now I don't feel I can send it on to him because he'll know I've read it andâ¦well, I'll feel I'm the one attacking him, by passing on such a horrible letter.'
âWhat does it say?' I asked.
âIt makes no sense. It says, “All good criketers cum over each other. Hope you die a slow and painful death.” Cricketers is spelled wrong, and cum is spelled c-u-m.'
âAnd it's not signed?'
âIt's signed “M8”. Whatever that means.'
I told her it could be text message shorthand for âmate'. She
agreed and said, with a sob in her voice, âOh, Tamsin, you're so much better at all this than I am.'
Because it has no place in an introduction to a work of
literature
, I decide not to describe how I felt at this point in my conversation with Debbie. I remember my feelings clearly, however, and could describe them if I chose to. First, I was flattered by her compliment, even though it was an odd one. What does it mean to say that one person is better than another at receiving and interpreting wrongly delivered hate mail?
All the same, I knew exactly what Debbie meant, and she was right. It should have been me, I thought. I wished the letter were in my hands, in my house. I wished it were up to me to decide what to do with it. I saw potential in the
situation
, while Debbie saw only trouble. I was, I freely admit, thrilled and intrigued by the mysterious line about cricketers. What could it possibly mean? I found it tantalising to
speculate
about what precise context might have provoked those words in a way that Debbie did not.
There are disadvantages to being the sort of person I am, one who opts for excitement over boredom every time, event over non-event. It can mean trouble. Once, when I was eleven, on holiday, I ignored my parents and sister for three days because they insisted that the car chase I was convinced we'd witnessed was just two unconnected cars driving down the road one after the other.
Luckily, Debbie seemed keen to delegate responsibility. She had considered several possible courses of action and had rejected all of them. She didn't want to go to the police in case Ian Prudhoe found out she had done so and thought she was a stirrer. She told me she knew Harrow Square. It was a dump, an underclass ghetto (this wasn't quite how she put it, but it was the gist), and noone who lived there would be likely to welcome a visit from the law.
âWhat should I do?' Debbie asked me. âI think I should just throw it
away and forget about it, don't you? I mean, why cause trouble when probably the letter writer's not going to do anything else? People who write anonymous letters are cowards, aren't they?'
She was clearly trying to convince herself, but she failed to convince me. âYou've got to tell this Ian Prudhoe,' I said. âYou can't tear up the letter and pretend it never existed. What if M8 sets fire to his house or something? You'll always wish you'd warned him. If I were you, I'd go round and see him, explain that you opened the envelope by accident, and give him the letter. Then it's up to him to decide if he wants to go to the police or not.'
âI can't do that,' said Debbie. âI just can't. I don't want him to see me or know who I am. I don't want anything to do with him.'
This puzzled me, and I asked why not. After all, Ian Prudhoe was the recipient of the abuse, not the sender.
âSomeone who gets sent a letter like that could easily be â probably is â mixed up in something dodgy. I mean, he obviously knows some bad people, doesn't he?'
Seeing that my friend was in a bind, I offered to help. âWould you like me to deal with it?' I said. âI wouldn't at all mind sending the letter on to Ian Prudhoe. He doesn't need to know it went to your house originally. I'll just say I came upon it by accident â I won't say how, he doesn't need to know that â and that I felt I ought to pass it on, although naturally I'd have preferred to destroy it, so that he could decide if any action needed to be taken.'
âOh, would you do that?' Debbie's voice was full of relief. âOh, yes, please. Thank you!'
I stop writing and frown. I am dissatisfied with my
introduction
so far. Is all this information strictly relevant to
The
Book of Secrets
? I may well have to scrap it and start again. But perhaps not. Perhaps I'm wary of it because I know that I am writing it to win Ian over, not for the sake of a wider readership. Still, it's an interesting anecdote, I think, and it does neatly lead in to the explanation for how the
book came into being. And I think it's quite well-written, so far.
I wonder, then, if my problem with it is that there is so much I have left out, even at this early stage in the story. My account of events feels dishonest, although I'm not trying to hide anything. I simply want to make the book a pacy read. No, that's not strictly true. I'm also trying to avoid
embarrassment
. God knows I've had enough of that already, and I don't want Ian to know how keen I was on the idea of him, even before we'd met. It might make me appear rather pathetic.
Debbie's desire to avoid Ian Prudhoe provoked a
defensive
fervour in me. Because he had received hate mail, she reasoned, he was probably a shifty character. I was astonished when I heard her say this. Yet more evidence, I thought, that one only has to be attacked once â even by a rabid savage, even by a person who can't spell the word âcricketers' â and other apparently sane, normal people will be queuing up to join in. The moral cowardice of most human beings never ceases to shock me.
Debbie's reaction to the letter brought my own sharply into focus. My instincts were the opposite of hers. As soon as I'd heard M8's letter, I had begun, I realised, to empathise with poor Ian Prudhoe. I wanted to offer him my support. I saw him as the entirely innocent victim of an unhinged persecutor. It also occurred to me that it was not impossible that I might find him attractive. If Debbie hadn't been so keen to give me the letter to do with as I wished, I would have had to resort to underhand tactics in order to seize control, but luckily she wanted rid of it, and by handing it over to me she satisfied both her conscience and her rather squeamish desire to avoid trouble.
I mustn't judge her too harshly, though. She and Lisa are my only friends. They met me here, at the hotel, and liked me in spite of my new, unglamorous job. They also both worked in the housekeeping department, and I miss them now that they've been transferred to other Hathersage hotels. I have
never told either of them that I used to help run a literature festival, that I was fired. Would Debbie assume I must have been mixed up in some shady or even illegal activity? That would make me laugh. Nothing could be further from the truth.
