My Second Life (16 page)

“Another strange coincidence, is it, then?” Dad said with an angry sarcasm in his voice.

“I didn't mean to do it…,” I said.

The words just fell out of my mouth.

“What?” he said, now looking at me properly for the first time.

I met his gaze, head-on, and when I did, I knew why I didn't have that same feeling about him, why I didn't instantly recognize him as the dad who had swung me endlessly on our swing, tickled me until I cried, taught me how to tie my shoelaces. It was because he didn't look like the same man. He wasn't just old
—
he was broken.

“To hurt you
—
so much,” I said. I thought I was going to cry as I said it, but I didn't.

“I'm not sure I know what you mean,” he said, slower, less angry, and I saw his face younger, smiling, looking at me like he loved me
—
and I so wanted him to love me. Just me.

“Why did you come today, Richard?” Frances asked.

“I'm not sure I really know,” he said, staring into his mug.

“And Amanda?”

“She doesn't know I'm here,” he said.

“Nothing changes,” said Frances, and it made me feel sick to hear her talk like that.

“So you are still together. You and”
—
I paused
—
“Amanda.” The word “Amanda” felt alien in my mouth. I so wanted to say the word “Mum”; to call her Mum.

“We're still married,” he said. “If that's what you mean.”

“This is a happy coincidence!” said Frances. “You both being here today!” And she clapped her hands like a child. I'd never seen her behave like this before.

“I can't say that I agree,” said Dad.

“You should talk to her, Richard,” said Frances. “We all should.”

“Why?” said Dad.

“She has come to us for a reason, I'm sure of it.” Frances was talking to Dad as if I wasn't in the room. “I've been searching for an answer for so long. And she came. Not Catherine, but Emma. And of course this involves us all. It involves you too now, because it is your daughter who came. It is Emma.”

“There are no answers, Frances,” said Dad. “What happened has to be left alone.” And he stood up and stepped back, away from us, his voice far louder than it had been before. I'd forgotten how tall he was, how lean.

He put his mug on the mantelpiece and it made a clank as he did. The noise of it echoed. And I saw him standing there, younger again, smiling, handsome. He was holding a glass of wine in his hand and his eyes were hungry for Frances. I understood that look now. And he ignored me. He shoved me out of the room and he told me to go and play on the Green. To take Catherine and to go and play on the Green.

“I don't think what happened can be left alone…,” I said. “Not now I'm here.”

I stood up, as if to meet him. I wanted to go to him.

“I'm not interested in what you have to say,” he said, finally looking at me now. “I don't know who you are, and I don't care who you think you might be. You know nothing about any of this. Nothing.”

“But I do … I know loads. Loads more than I want to
—
”

“No one can know! No one can!” he interrupted, his voice still raised. And he came toward me, his face close
—
too close
—
to mine. I could feel the heat of his anger. It was rising up, seeping out through his pores like poison. It was directed at me. It was for me. Only me.

I drew in some air and filled my lungs and I answered back, like I was his daughter again.

“But I know!” I said. “Maybe no one else can know, but I know!”

“And you really expect me to believe that?” he said, and the harshness of his words and his body towering over me made me move back toward the sofa. I could see him standing over Mum
—
she was crying and he was saying he was going to leave and that he had no choice.

“Richard, calm down.” Frances was on her feet now, moving toward Dad, her voice like her body, strong. “Please
—
don't be like this,” she said, and I turned to look at her because I couldn't believe what I was hearing; there was kindness in her voice, and she was softer.

“Like what?” Dad said, stepping back, away from me and away from Frances too now, rubbing his face with his hands.

It was his hurt
—
his raging hurt
—
that was making him act like this. I tried to make myself believe it, to remember, to understand.

I took another deep breath
—
and with it came a flutter of memories like paper blowing on the wind.

“You bought me Doublemint chewing gum every time we went to fill the car up with petrol. You used to drop it through the sunroof. I'd wait for it, every time. You'd walk toward the car, like you had nothing in your hands, no treats, nothing, and then as you went to open the car door you'd drop it onto my lap from above, and I'd squeal with delight.”

Dad didn't say anything. But he kept looking at me. I could tell he wanted more.

“I used to clean the car with you. On Sundays. You'd wax and polish and I'd take a washing-up bowl full of soapy water and an old toothbrush and I'd scrub the wheel hubs until the silver metal shone.”

“What color was it? The car?” he said.

“Red,” I said. “Red with a black stripe along the sides.”

“Where did we live?” he said, questioning me.

“Here,” I said. “The Avenue. Number 42.” I glanced at Frances as I said it. Her face was utterly still. She didn't for one second give me away.

“Where did I work? What did I do?” Dad asked.

“I don't know … I don't know where it was. I don't know what you did…,” I said. I was desperate not to lose this conversation.

He sat down and dropped his head into his hands, his neat suit hiding his crumpled body.

I looked at Frances. I didn't know what to do
—
whether to go on talking. She looked at me and nodded.

“Go to him,” she whispered, but I could sense that she wanted to go to him too. We both felt it: his need. I wanted to touch his back, to comfort him, and Frances
—
well, I think she wanted to hold him, be tender, to mend him. But neither of us moved, silently allowing the other to take the opportunity to go to him. Then as she went over to him, I spoke:

“Dad, I…”

He looked up. And he scowled. His face was distorted with it
—
an expression I wished never to see again
—
a mixture of tortured confusion and anger and horrified disbelief. And I'd put it there. And somehow I knew it wasn't the first time that I'd done it.

And he left.

The front door slammed, and Frances stood alone, her arm suspended in midair where he had been, and the word “Dad” in my voice left hanging like a solitary and desperate unanswered cry for help …

My phone rang.

I looked at my watch. It was three o'clock. I scrambled around in my bag for the phone, glad of the distraction it provided.

Frances bent down and picked the tray up from the coffee table and headed out to the kitchen.

One missed call. Jamie. I guessed he was ringing to see if I wanted to meet him tonight. I wanted to call him straight back, but I needed to speak to Frances first, tell her about Mum. That was why I'd come.

A text came through.

How about I come to yours? For 6p.m.? x

I didn't want him to come to my house, not yet, but I couldn't think of anything better to suggest, and I really wanted to see him, so I texted straight back.

Yes. OK. x

I dumped my phone in my bag and went into the kitchen to speak to Frances.

She was moving around like a fish darting between the reeds: lithe and quick. I stood and watched her for a minute.

“You're better,” I said.

“Today,” she said. “It goes like that sometimes.”

There was a silence.

“Did you know he was coming?” I asked.

“He called
—
an hour before he arrived,” she said.

“It didn't go very well. I
—
”

“No,” she said. “No, it didn't.”

“I thought … I almost thought I'd…”

“Convinced him?” Frances said, now turning to look at me.

“Well, yes,” I said. “Is there something wrong in that?”

Frances's voice sounded harder again, like before. “You
are
taking this seriously, aren't you, Ana?” she said. “These are real lives you are dealing with here. We
—
all of us
—
have real lives, you know.”

“I know that,” I said. “Why do you say that?”

I could feel the beginnings of her anger rising. All the softness in her voice had gone. I wanted to stop her changing. To stop her anger. I wanted the lighter voice back, the one she'd had before, when Dad was here. The voice that didn't frighten me so much. But I could only hear the voice that I remembered from before
—
and I could hear it now
—
and I could hear it as I'd heard it then
—

“You!” she'd said.

My shoes were wet from the river. There were people all around us in the darkness. Police were putting tape across the road and around the Green. Frances's voice was so clear and cold it made me shiver.

“I saw you!” she said. “I saw you!”

And I felt a panic rising up inside me, fast and urgent, and I thought I'd be sick with the guilt and the shame.

I looked up at her as she stood in the kitchen now.

“What is it, Ana?”

“Nothing,” I said, my heart racing. She'd been softer, kinder, with Dad, but that Frances was not the Frances I knew. The Frances I knew was cruel and hard, and her change of mood now was everywhere in the room, like an infection; it was crawling the walls.

She turned away from me, back to the sink, to start tidying up.

“I said I'd come back when I'd spoken to Mum,” I said.

She didn't reply.

“You asked me to come,” I said.

“I know I did,” Frances said, and she carried on putting things away, swiftly, with ease. It was as if seeing Richard had greased the joints of her decaying bones.

“It was amazing,” I said. “To see her, to hug her, to just talk.”

“I can only imagine,” Frances said, and she stopped what she was doing and she looked directly at me. “It seems so wrong to me,” she said, “that you have a reunion, and I don't.”

“I…” My voice slipped, cracked away from me.

“So will you see her again?” Frances said.

“I want to, but
—
”

“We should meet. All of us. Together.”

I felt unsure. I didn't answer.

“I want to know why you are here, Ana. I want to make sense of it. I believe we can only do that together,” she said.

“Surely no one can know why I'm here.”

“You must have come to me for a reason,” Frances said. “You must have. I realize that now. I have been searching for the answers for so long, and you came. You! Emma! I just need to decide what I must do now you are here.”

“Do?” I said. “There is nothing to do! I am just here,” I said. “I just am.”

“So what did Amanda say, about Catherine
—
I assume you asked?” Frances said.

“She said she wouldn't talk about it.”

“What did she say
—
exactly?”

“That she wouldn't talk about it, about that night, about Catherine. And then she told me that Dad wouldn't see me.”

“Ah, but he has!” said Frances. She was pleased with that, somehow. “And we will meet,” she said. “All of us. Trust me. It will happen.”

 

31

W
HEN
I
GOT HOME
from Frances's I went straight up onto the roof.

There was no sun.

I lay on the roof and the cold crept into my bones like a tide. Still, I stayed. Quietly I lay. So that I could look up into the wide expanse of the sky.

And I thought about how, if I could, I would pull all the badness out of me. I would pull it out of me like a long, wet, heavy rope, and I would drop it down the side of this building, and let it gather on the pavement in a coil.

It would make an ugly ring.

One wet layer lying on top of the other.

And I would leave it there.

I would walk away, and leave it there, to rot.

My rotting guilt.

And then I would be free.

I would be free.

 

32

G
RILLIE CAME OVER THAT
night. I had no idea she was coming. She started talking to me as soon as I got down the stairs.

“Your mother's in the bath. I won't eat pizza, so we're having salmon cutlets and baked potatoes,” she said.

Jamie was going to be here soon. There was no way I could stop him meeting the whole family now. My heart sank at the thought of it.

“I didn't know you'd be here tonight, Grillie,” I said.

“Grown-ups can have secrets too, you know,” she said, and she winked at me. “Come here and give your Grillie a hug.” And as I did I thought about Frances
—
about Grillie and Frances
—
and I worried that Grillie might know more than I wanted her to.

“You look tired,” she said.

“I'm okay,” I said, shaking my head, shaking her concern away.

“I believe you,” Grillie said. “I'm not sure if I should, but I do.”

I felt myself blush. I never normally blushed.

“Now,” she said. “Sit down. I want to talk to you about something. Before Rachel gets out of the bath.”

I went and sat next to her on the sofa. I braced myself for what she might say.