The Black Path (17 page)

Long regarded as a local beauty spot, the Black Path is still popular with cyclists. In recent years, the area has also become a gathering place for local youths – as evidenced by the leftovers of bonfires, barbecues and broken bottles.

***

Helen opens her eyes and tries to swallow. Her mouth is dry, with the aftertaste of something vaguely metallic. Blood thumps in her ears and her vision is blurred. She blinks several times and turns her head.

Through a veil of fog she sees Siân sitting on another bed a few feet away, watching the television with the sound turned down.

‘Morning, sleepyhead,’ she says brightly.

Helen stares at her, wonders why everything is taking so long to come into focus. ‘What happened?’

‘You fell asleep in the car. We’re in Birmingham.’

Suddenly it hits her. Owen. The hospital. The uniformed officers waiting outside her house. She tries to lift her head and the room spins – beige carpet, high gloss furniture, flatscreen TV.

‘This isn’t the hospital. What am I doing here? I need to see Owen.’

‘Relax. It’s not far. They offered us a bed there but you were dead to the world and I thought a hotel would be more comfortable, so I checked us in here. And don’t worry about the bill. This is on me.’

‘That’s really kind of you,’ Helen says. ‘But I can’t stay here.’

‘I said I’d take care of you, didn’t I?’

‘Yes, but –’

‘So let me, okay?’

Reluctantly, Helen nods. She’s too exhausted to argue. She can pay Siân back later. ‘Why can’t I remember checking in?’

Siân smiles. ‘Like I said, you were dead to the world. Just as well I’m strong for my size, eh?’

Helen hauls herself up. She feels weak and tired, but the giddiness is receding and her vision is clear. There’s a glass of water on the bedside table. She takes it and gulps, barely slaking her thirst.
That’s it
, she thinks.
I’m never drinking again
.

She takes another sip and wipes her mouth, spittle sticking to her fingers. ‘I need to see Owen.’

‘Of course,’ Siân says, slipping off the bed. ‘I’ve spoken to the hospital. They’re expecting us in an hour. I’ve ordered breakfast and I put your clothes away.’ She slides open the door of a large mirror-fronted wardrobe to reveal the contents of Helen’s case neatly arranged on wooden hangers.

‘I’m not hungry.’

‘But you have to eat something. We need to keep your strength up.’

What strength?
Helen thinks.

‘C’mon,’ Siân says. ‘Why don’t you have a quick shower before breakfast arrives?’ She opens the door to the bathroom and turns on the light, like an estate agent showing a potential buyer around a new home. ‘They’ve got everything here – bath, shower, complimentary toiletries. The shower gel is to die for.’

She grabs a fluffy white bathrobe and tosses it to Helen. ‘The towels are behind the door.’

Helen climbs out of bed and pulls on the bathrobe. Her whole body aches. She wonders if she’s coming down with something.

‘Are you feeling okay?’ asks Siân.

What a stupid question
, Helen thinks, then hates herself for being so irritable.

‘I’m fine,’ she says and reaches for her jeans, which are neatly folded on a chair next to the bed. She pats the pockets, looks around the room. ‘Where’s my phone?’

‘Here,’ says Siân. She slides the phone from her own pocket and hands it over. ‘It fell out in the car, so I held onto it for you.’

Helen checks the screen. There are no voice messages, no missed calls and no texts. She frowns.

‘What’s the matter?’ Siân asks.

‘I was expecting a call.’ Helen wonders why her mother hasn’t rung. It’s not like her to leave anything to chance. Arrangements are always made, confirmed, checked and double-checked with painstaking precision. ‘Never mind,’ she says. ‘It’s not important.’

‘Right,’ says Siân. ‘Breakfast is on its way. How about that shower?’

Helen glances at the phone again, sees that the battery is low. She groans. ‘I forgot my charger.’

‘Good job you have me then, isn’t it?’ Siân unzips one of the pockets of her bag and produces the charger. ‘I grabbed it as we were leaving the house. Pass me the phone and I’ll charge it while you get yourself ready.’

Helen hands it back.

‘Off you go,’ says Siân. ‘You’ll feel better after a nice shower.’

I doubt that very much
, Helen thinks. She turns to move and her head swims. She reaches for the chair to steady herself.

‘Okay?’

‘Just a bit dizzy.’

‘Hangover, probably.’ Siân turns her attention back to the TV.

Helen nods.

But something isn’t right. It’s not just the room that’s strange. There’s something else, something she can’t quite put her finger on. Then it hits her. It’s a feeling of total remoteness. It’s as if all of this is happening a long way away, to someone else. Despite everything, she feels eerily calm.

Maybe this is what shock feels like
, she thinks.

Shaking her head, she drifts into the bathroom and closes the door.

When Helen re-emerges from the bathroom ten minutes later, Siân is lying on the bed, still staring at the television.

‘Fucking God squad,’ she says. ‘They get on my nerves.’

‘What are you watching?’ Helen asks, towelling her hair.

‘Some twat in a dog collar going on about the sins of the flesh. Like he’d know anything about it. The only flesh he’s ever fingered is his own. Wanker.’ Siân looks up. ‘You’re not a Christian, are you?’

Helen thinks of all the times she prayed as a young girl, wonders if her lack of faith is tied to the fact that her father died. ‘Not really.’

‘That’s a relief. I can’t be doing with Bible bashers. Blessed are the meek and all that crap. They don’t know what they’re on about. The meek aren’t blessed. They’re fucked. Any idiot can see that.’

‘Siân? Can I ask you something?’

‘It’s not about the Bible, is it?’

‘No.’

‘Then shoot away.’

‘What was that pill you gave me last night?’

‘Just some herbal thing I get from Holland and Barrett. It’s supposed to help calm your nerves. Did it work?’

‘I think so.’

Siân grins. ‘There you go, then.’

She leaps up from the bed and hurries over to the door. Just inside the room is a trolley covered with a white linen cloth. She wheels it over and positions it between the two beds.

‘Room service came while you were in the shower. I left it covered to keep it warm.’

She whips off the cloth like a conjurer performing a magic trick. ‘Ta-dah!’

Helen stares at the enormous amount of food spread before her. There are bowls of fruit salad and cereal, a basket of bread rolls and pastries and slices of toast in a rack. There’s a pot of tea, another of coffee, a jug of milk and a selection of jams, honey and marmalade in tiny jars. And there in the middle are two stainless steel plate covers, which Siân lifts to reveal generous helpings of smoked salmon and scrambled eggs.

‘I’ll never eat all that,’ Helen says.

Siân’s face falls. ‘But we need to keep your strength up.’

This time, Helen doesn’t tell herself she has no strength. She has to be strong – if not for herself, then for Owen. She shakes her head. ‘No,’ she says firmly. ‘I’m not eating all that. Just coffee and a piece of toast. And then I want to see my husband.’

‘Of course,’ Siân says. ‘Sorry. I wasn’t thinking. You get some clothes on and I’ll fix your coffee. Milk and sugar?’

‘Please.’ Helen feels a pang of remorse and forces a smile. ‘Sorry. I just don’t have much of an appetite.’

‘Don’t be daft. You get dressed. Don’t mind me.’

Turning towards the wardrobe, Helen sees Siân’s reflection in the mirrored door, watches as she reaches for her bag and dips her hand into one of the many pockets.

Siân catches her eye and smiles. ‘My sweeteners.’

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

Angela opens the back door and steps out into the garden. There are only a few clouds now. Looking up at the sky it’s hard to believe that less than an hour ago it was bucketing down. But the air is still damp and there are puddles next to the bins. Yesterday’s washing hangs heavy on the line. She’s been so busy fretting about Kath, she forgot to bring it in.

She reaches into her dressing-gown pocket for her cigarettes, lights one and takes a long, deep drag. She doesn’t normally smoke this early in the day, but then this weekend has been anything but normal. She’s hardly slept a wink since Friday. First there was the ambulance ride to A&E and hours spent sitting on a grey plastic chair, waiting for Kath to regain consciousness and the staff to decide if and when she was well enough to be taken home. By the time they left, it was gone five in the afternoon. The remainder of the day was spent back at Angela’s, with Kath weeping and wailing and Angela trying to comfort her and failing miserably. It was just as well Kath didn’t know the whole story or she’d have been a complete mess.

Angela throws back her head and blows a long plume of smoke into the air. She feels the familiar rush of nicotine and a sudden surge of anger rising in her chest. What sort of man would spike a woman’s drink? If she’d had even the faintest idea who it was, Angela would have shopped him there and then. In fact, had it been up to her, the police would have gone back to that bar and searched every man in the place. But there were no police. Kath was distressed enough, without getting the law involved. The first thing she said when she came round in the hospital was, ‘Don’t make a big thing out of it, Ange! I don’t want my mam finding out!’

So it had been left to Angela to lie to Kath’s mother, inventing some story about a stomach bug and explaining that she’d crashed at her place.

‘She can’t come to the phone right now,’ she said when Kath’s mother asked to speak to her. ‘She’s resting. Yes, I know it’s after lunch, but she was up most of the night.’

Kath was always quick to defend her mother, though from the few times they’d met Angela had seen sufficient evidence to suggest that she was a cold-hearted cow who treated Kath as little more than the unpaid help. Angela had been sorely tempted to tell her the truth, just to see how she might have reacted to the news that her daughter had spent the night in hospital.

‘That’s right,’ she’d imagined herself saying. ‘One of those date-rape drugs. She’s lucky to be alive. She was having trouble breathing and there was a moment when it looked as if her heart might stop. So just be nice to her, okay? The last thing she needs now is you coming down on her like a ton of bricks. I think she’s been through enough, don’t you?’

But Kath’s pleading eyes and pitiful expression swayed her and she’d stuck to the agreed script.

‘Thanks, Ange,’ Kath sobbed when the phone call was finally over, and then the tears had come thicker and faster than before. It had taken another two hours before she was in any fit state to be driven back home.

Angela sucks hard on her cigarette and stares at the wet clothes on the washing line. She’ll have to tumble dry them now, or they’ll never be ironed in time for work tomorrow. She can’t see herself staying awake much past 9 p.m. tonight. She barely managed five hours sleep last night, despite being exhausted from the night before. She could happily crawl back into bed now, she’s that tired. But she has a Pilates class this afternoon and some paperwork to prepare for tomorrow morning.

She thinks of Helen. She seemed to be enjoying herself on Friday night – at least as far as Angela can remember. It was all a bit of a blur towards the end. Then Kath had collapsed on her way to the toilet and it had been left to Angela to convince the security guard that her friend wasn’t simply pissed and that someone ought to call an ambulance. She’d sobered up pretty quickly then, but with all her fears over Kath, she’d forgotten all about Helen. It wasn’t until they were at the hospital and Kath was in the clear that she’d remembered. She texted Helen then – twice. And she called and left her a voice message yesterday afternoon and another one last night. But she still hasn’t heard anything.

She takes another drag on her cigarette. Surely Helen isn’t angry with her? It wasn’t as if she’d just gone swanning off somewhere. It really was a matter of life or death. She hasn’t repeated this to Kath, but before they left the hospital one of the nurses had taken Angela aside and informed her that without her swift intervention, there was a strong possibility that Kath wouldn’t have pulled through.

‘Your friend has a lot to thank you for,’ the nurse had said, smiling tightly and placing a hand on Angela’s shoulder. ‘We had a girl die last weekend. Respiratory failure. Now do us both a favour and make sure we don’t see Kath in here again, okay?’

Angela felt quite proud of herself then. But she isn’t feeling so good now. Something isn’t right. It’s not like Helen to have her mobile switched off, not when she’s waiting for news from her husband. And it’s not like her to not respond to messages. Maybe she’s lost her phone? Or perhaps she’s tied up with her mother? Angela remembers her saying that she tends to spend more time at her mother’s when Owen is away.

The sun appears. Angela takes one last puff of her cigarette before stubbing it out. She’s overreacting. Lack of sleep and the stresses and strains of the weekend are catching up with her. Kath didn’t die. Helen isn’t sulking. She’ll see them both at work tomorrow and everything will be just fine.

Helen is in the bathroom, putting the finishing touches to her make-up. It seems silly to be worrying about her appearance when Owen is lying in a hospital bed. But she wants to look her best for him. Assuming he’s conscious. Assuming he can see her. She pictures her husband with bloodied bandages over his eyes. Her throat tightens and she pushes the thought away.

She’s never stayed in a hotel like this before. She wonders how much it’s costing. The complementary toiletries lined up next to the sink are brands she doesn’t recognize, but they look expensive – all sandalwood, lavender and sage, promising to lift the spirits and promote relaxation and rejuvenation. Helen’s spirits don’t feel lifted. She barely managed a slice of toast at breakfast. But thanks to the coffee she’s feeling more energized than she was half an hour ago. The caffeine courses through her veins.