Untouchable Things (38 page)

“Anna.”

“What? Don’t tell me you haven’t wondered?” She looks round the room. “We may not know everything about each other, but we know almost nothing about him. Do we, Jake?”

Jake’s face is weirdly still. No winks, no naughty grin. He spits out his chewing gum and rolls it into a wrapper. Rebecca tastes acid at the back of her throat.

José glares. “Leave him alone, Anna.”

Jake holds up a hand. “No, it’s fine. Let’s get this done with. What is it you’d like to know, Anna?”

The room watches.

“Nothing to say now, eh?” They are circling each other.

Anna looks only at Jake. “Far from it. What did you do before you met us?”

“Before I met you?” He laughs, hard, letting his head roll back for a second. Then the smile is gone. “I had a whole life, Anna, believe it or not. People do exist away from your cosy little bubble, you know. Maybe they don’t go to Sunday School or Boy Scouts, maybe they don’t come from a nice, respectable family unit, maybe they make some mistakes and get into trouble. But it doesn’t mean you can treat them like shit on your shoe.” He laughs again. “Especially when you’re not so whiter-than-white yourself.”

What do you think he meant by that?

I don’t know. He said it meaningfully, though. Looking at all of us.

Michael steps forward and speaks quietly. “Anna shouldn’t have said that. You don’t have to explain yourself to anyone.”

Jake looks at Michael for a second then releases his breath in a soft hiss. He looks at the wall. “When I met you lot I’d recently got out of prison.”

Anna folds her arms but Jake ignores her. “I was running a stolen car racket. A young father was killed driving one of my cars. Brake cables were chewed through.”

Stifled gasps. Even Anna looks like she got more than she bargained for. Jake looks right at her.

“So there you go. Feel better, knowing you were right?”

Anna says nothing. Jake smiles but his eyes don’t crinkle. “Do you think I should’ve told you? Do you think you’d have given me a chance if I had?”

His questions now address the whole room. Rebecca wishes she could push off this precipice and plunge down into the wind, her clenched, hurtling body arcing and twisting through white sound.

“Of course you wouldn’t.” Jake’s voice drifts into her shutdown. His words are light and singsong. She sees movement and realises that he is walking to the door and other people are getting up.

He turns on his way out. “Seth did, though. Seth gave me a chance.” For a second she catches his eye and she wants to say something, but the wind is still rushing in her ears and all she does is watch him leave. She does catch his parting shot, though:

“It’s Jack, by the way.”

Quite a day for you, Miss Laurence.

Yes. It’s hard to believe it was only a week ago. So much has happened since.

Have you seen Jake Etheridge since that night?

Er, no. No I haven’t. I’ve just realised, by the way, when we reported Seth missing, we said he had no next of kin. Obviously that’s not true.

Don’t worry, Miss Laurence. We’d figured that one out for ourselves.

“There you go, then.” Despite its harsh timbre, Anna’s voice wobbles. Rebecca knows she wants contact, reassurance. But no one looks at her. “We needed to know.”

“Did we?” Charles sounds unusually keyed up. “Seth knew. And it didn’t matter to him.”

“And that’s just it. Seth’s not here now. Is he?”

“Exactly what do you mean by that?” Michael speaks slowly, enunciating each word.

“Well, maybe Seth was a bit too trusting. There was clearly something weird going on. I don’t mean like
that
. But we all know that after Jake shagged his boss’ wife and lost his job, he never really worked, and he never seemed short of cash. We also know how generous Seth was. Is.”

Catherine nods. “I do think Seth was helping him quite a bit financially.”

Michael shrugs. “So? Seth can give his money to whoever he likes. God knows he has enough of it.”

“It’s not just that. I don’t trust him – Jake, Jack– I mean, look at what he’s just told us. And his whole reaction to Seth’s disappearance has been odd. You know it has.”

Michael smiles. “I see. So because Jake has a record he’s now – what? Murdered Seth and taken his money?” He looks round the room for backup but most people are looking at their feet.

Anna raises her voice. “It’s not just a record, Michael. He didn’t get done for nicking a wallet. He basically killed someone. Who knows what he’s capable of?”

José looks up. “I’m not accusing Jake of anything but it has always felt like we don’t know much about him. And now, after this…”

Michael surveys the room and snorts. “Well, you’ve got your scapegoat, haven’t you? The big, black villain comes after poor little innocent Seth.” People try to interrupt but he holds up his hand. “I’ll tell you what’s going on here, he’s just not middle class enough for you, is he? Can’t join in discussions about philosophy and art history. How can you trust someone without a degree?”

Anna gets to her feet. “Don’t be so fucking ridiculous, Michael.”

He continues as if he hasn’t heard, pacing in front of the fireplace. “You turn nasty insinuations on Jake when your darling Seth has lied to us and toyed with us and fucked off without a word. It’s not Jake who’s phoney. It’s Seth. He’s played us and he’s still doing it now. Can’t you see that?” He bellows the last bit and Rebecca is back at school, chided in class.

Suddenly he turns and addresses them full on. “Have you ever wondered what really happened last year? Now that we know he lies? Or is that all forgotten in favour of this new, perfect version of Seth?”

Rebecca frowns and looks at the others. What is he talking about? She’s glued to her seat, doesn’t dare to ask. She sees alarm on the faces around her.

Anna moves towards him. “Michael!” Charles and José are on their feet too.

“Oh, don’t want to get that one out at the moment, right?”

“Michael, please!” Everyone stares as Catherine comes towards him. “This is not going to help.”

“Fine, have it your way. Your dirty secret is safe with me.”

She flinches like she’s been hit.

Could you wait one moment, Miss Laurence, while I note this down? Thank you. Do you know what Mr Stanley was referring to when he said, ‘what happened last year’?

Not exactly. Something before I met them all. They said it was nothing. Just Michael over-dramatising. When I pressed them, Anna said Seth had got into a fight in a bar one evening and then the police had shown up and they’d played the whole thing down. No one was hurt so no big deal.

A fight? From what I know about Mr Gardner, that doesn’t sound like his style. No one else has mentioned it.

I’m sorry, I can’t tell you any more.

Of course, carry on, Miss Laurence.

Michael still holds the floor, waving his hands by the fire no one has bothered to light. He’s on one now. “Look at us. We’re just like stupid little lapdogs still meeting in his house and drinking his wonderful fucking wine like he’s going to walk through the door any minute. Well, he’s not. He’s not coming back. Get over it!”

No one says a word. Catherine might be crying. Rebecca knows Michael is right, she does expect Seth to walk back in any minute, they all probably do, and he’ll get out his whisky and an explanation to satisfy them, make them laugh even. But what if he doesn’t come, what if he never comes?

She looks around for something to hold onto but all she sees is a disintegrating cluster of friends without the glue to keep them together.

Michael slams the door as he leaves. Charles offers to drive Catherine home. Anna, José and Rebecca kiss each other at Notting Hill Tube barriers and say they’ll talk tomorrow. Hot, viscous air floods the train, flinging Rebecca’s hair over her eyes. She gets off one stop early and walks through the windless night.

Scene 2

Catherine suspects Charles would like to be asked in but she longs for the cool greeting of her empty flat. It is the only thing that can soothe her. Work, friends, even talking to the man in the corner shop strains her mind to breaking point, or at least a migraine. But here, at home, she doesn’t have to pretend. Here she is free to run over the horror of it all endlessly, paraphrase the same old questions. There are new questions now. There must be a reason for his deception. His parents must have hurt him. She aches with the not knowing.

She closes the door on Charles and pushes scraggy, pallid limbs into summer-weight pyjamas her mother bought her for Christmas. She’s withering like a plant without sunlight. Her only scraps of sustenance are tucked away in memory and fantasy. She lies down under her pastel-striped duvet knowing she won’t sleep for some time. It is her time with Seth. She rolls onto her left side and picks up the fantasy easily from where she left it yesterday. In two minutes he is in her lounge, buried in her arms. He has come to her because he knows no one else can help him. He is a broken toy that she must lovingly mend. She holds him as he opens up to her, tells her things he has never shared with anyone else. She strokes his face as he clings to her. He cannot face the others, begs her not to tell them where he is. She is all he needs. She is his angel.

Scene 3

It must have been the breeze that took her back so vividly, almost three years in a
whoosh
of chilly air. A June breeze that belonged in early autumn, in September ’94 to be specific, bringing people to life as she and José and Seth walked briskly along the Cromwell Road looking for the Institut Français. It was Seth’s idea, of course, just like everything else was Seth’s idea. He had decided he wanted to improve his French and took José along for backup. ‘You’re a continental, aren’t you? You’re bound to speak good French already.’

Anna got wind of the plan and decided to tag along. Partly for a laugh and partly…

“It’s a good way to meet men, don’t you know?”

Seth’s eyebrow shot up and José shook his head despairingly.

“Seriously, now. I read this article about where to go to meet men. Language classes are right up there with car maintenance courses and singles’ nights.”

“Car maintenance courses?” Seth roared with laughter. “My God, and we men sit there declining our verbs and twizzling our screwdrivers obliviously. Somebody shoot us.” Then a wolfish grin. “I’m looking forward to this class more and more.”

Anna wasn’t far wrong. Rows of young women turned to look at Seth and José when they walked in. Even José stood up taller and puffed out his chest. Bridget Jones clones, or ‘Bridgets’ as Anna referred to them. Black knee boots, low-cut cardigans and Sloaney ponytails. José got out his sketching pad and started some cartoons with a wink. He’d have a field day here. He did a couple of quick, caustic caricatures, which Seth leaned over and labelled Elouise and Annabel. The three of them dissolved into giggles and were glared at by Madame.

That pretty much summed up the evening. They were still laughing when they hit the pub afterwards.

“Madame and the Sloanes – great name for a band, don’t you think?”

Seth lit up. “I didn’t pull, though. Should have left you two at home.”

Anna nudged him so hard he spilt some of his pint. “Oi. You should be grateful. We saved you from the Bridgets. They would have had you tied up in a Fulham basement by now – with their Scrunchies.”

They all hooted again. Seth wiped his eyes. “They sound like Doctor Who monsters… We will exfoliate. We will exfoliate.”

They rolled around, helpless with laughter. And so it continued. At some point during the evening, José spotted a table of blonde ponytails studiously ignoring them but close enough to have heard much of it.

Needless to say, we never progressed further with French.

The memory of that laughter has an equal and opposite effect on Anna now, nearly three years later, walking into the wind. A stabbing pain in her abdomen so she has to stop, clutching her waist, and wait for the pain to subside.

I still see him, you know. And hear him. Sometimes I think he’s right there in the room with us. Other times I remember something so vividly it’s like it’s happening all over again.

All she can do is straighten up and keep walking, past the people sipping their drinks in pavement cafes, past the people laughing like she used to laugh.

Scene 4

She misses Jason. Finally she misses him. Or maybe she misses the idea of him: steady, straightforward, sticking around. It seems a long time ago.

There must have been a reason for Seth to lie. Something had traumatised him, the tear tracks she saw on his face before they slept together, the way he’d shut down afterwards. What could she have done to reach him? If she hadn’t gone over that day, would he still be here?

She let him down. No, he has let her down, all of them, making them need him and then abandoning them. She rings his mobile phone every day but his voice has gone. Now a machine tells her
this voicemail box is full
. Full of her worry, her questions, her pleas.

And now Jake has gone too, or Jack or whoever he is. Why didn’t she stick up for him, go after him? Because she suddenly didn’t know what she thought and who she could trust. Seth would never have allowed Jake to be cast out like that.

Panic rises like a tide. She squeezes her legs together, feels it hovering there, distilled stress manifesting as arousal. She has moved her hairbrush across the room. She could orgasm her way to brief relief in seconds just by continuing to squeeze but now only penetration will do. Hard, rough penetration to blot her out. She opens her bedside drawer and finds the Ann Summers box.

She feels sordid afterwards. And sore. She’s never had the urge to hurt herself before, only since he disappeared. Like she needs to feel the pain of missing him in her body.