Julia walks to work and back. If the thought hadn’t woken me with a jolt, I’d probably have slept right through the day and maybe round to morning. All those pills they were giving me having a final assault on my system. It was two thirty in the afternoon when I got up, a whole morning lost. I felt brighter though. More together.
I showered, applied ‘Lily’, gathered my meagre belongings together in case I couldn’t return, and was out of the hostel by three thirty and on the bus ten minutes later. Julia walks to work. She bragged about it on the first day and has said it more than once since. It’s a couple of miles or so but I enjoy it. Julia Katie, Katie Julia. The names beat out the seconds and minutes of my journey and then, despite my sweating palms and palpitating heart, I headed towards PKR and grabbed a coffee in the cafe opposite, sitting in the window and pretending to read a paper. I was sure that at any moment someone would recognise me, or the police would swarm in and arrest me, but there was nothing. Not a single batted eyelid.
Finally, five o’clock came and within minutes Julia emerged from work. I’d half-hoped to catch a glimpse of Marilyn, to see she was okay, but there was no sign of her. Once Julia had got a few feet ahead, I sauntered out and, keeping my distance, followed her. She didn’t look back once. And so here I am. Still free. Still Lily, and also still terrified Lisa, desperately needing to save her daughter.
I hide under a tree and study the house. A sixties or early seventies terrace of four small homes in a row, a thin strip of grass – not nearly enough to be considered a garden – in front of each. Early council housing is my conclusion, and judging by the litter a little further along, this street hasn’t been sold off to private owners. Surely she can’t have Ava in there? There can’t be much privacy – neighbours would hear any noise. A cellar, perhaps? Do these houses have cellars? I’m bemused. I’m not sure what I’d expected of Julia; probably something modern and soulless, but also practical and safe. Like the house Ava and I lived in.
And Katie? Katie of the big house and the piano lessons and the perfectly pleated skirts? Could she live here? Katie could live anywhere, the Charlotte inside me whispers. Katie could do whatever it takes. Katie would pretend she was Charlotte. Games and fantasies and dares. Katie and Charlotte.
I reach inside my jacket and grip the handle of the knife in the pocket. Youth hostels are so easy, so friendly. A knife from a kitchen drawer gone in a moment while asking for a teaspoon. Charlotte’s old shoplifting skills served me well.
If she has Ava somewhere else, she’ll have to go out and check on her. She won’t have a partner in crime. Not Katie. That was always my role. My stomach tightens. She has my daughter. I want to peel her face off while she screams. But part of me wants to see her too. I’m sick. I must be.
I wait, unsure what to do – you can wear as much make-up as you want, but invisible Lisa still has a hold – as gathering storm clouds make the night darker than it should be in summer. Lights go on. Movement behind net curtains. Who the hell has net curtains? I move forward under the overhanging branches, and unable to take any more, sure I’m going to vomit where I stand, I decide this is it – I have to go and confront her.
Headlights turning into the road stop me. The car slows, pulling up on the kerb, and my breath catches as I shrink back into the gloom, khaki against bark. I know this car. It’s Marilyn’s car. What the hell is she doing here?
51
BEFORE
1989
‘It worked perfectly!’ Katie scrambles in through the window to where Charlotte is waiting in the stifling heat of the old house. ‘You’re so clever, Charlotte, you really are. How on earth did you know all that stuff?’
She shrugs. ‘Read it in one of my ma’s books.’
‘Well, it went like a dream.’ She holds out two large slices of chocolate cake. ‘Mummy made it for me to take to Mr Gauci’s house for him and his wife. I’ve got sandwiches too.’
They sit on the dusty mats and start their feast, Charlotte making sure to chew the thick white bread – no cheap thin doughy slices for Katie’s family – slowly, enjoying the butter and mustard and proper ham.
‘You should have seen his face,’ Katie’s eyes shine with the memory, ‘when I told him that if he didn’t go along with letting me out all day, I’d say he’d touched me. He went positively puce.’
Charlotte doesn’t know what puce is, but it sounds a bit like puke so she figures Katie means green.
‘He said no one would believe me, and so I said all the things you’d told me, the detail of what I’d say he did, and I swear I thought he might cry. I ended up pretty much comforting him. I did explain that no one would ever find out and he was basically getting paid for nothing, so why worry? I told him to take his wife out to lunch. And d’you know what I said after? Oh, Charlotte, you’d have been so proud!’
‘What?’ Charlotte says, smiling. Katie’s joy is her joy. Katie is the sunshine. Katie leans in, their faces kissing-close.
‘I told him maybe he should try some of the things I’d mentioned on her!’ She bursts into laughter. ‘Oh God, you should have seen it! I thought he might die!’
Charlotte tries to laugh but her smile is stretched too wide. Tearing at her like the sharpness in her gut. Those were things from the chippy that she’d given to Katie. She’d earned that knowledge not from a trashy novel, but from a small room reeking of hot fat and sweaty men.
‘Anyway,’ Katie waits until she’s swallowed a bit of her sandwich before continuing to speak and Charlotte makes a note not to talk with her own mouth full any more. ‘I did the work in about five minutes, so if Mummy asks when she picks me up, there’s no need for suspicion. The summer hols are ours! Four hours a day, anyway.’
‘Will she come to check on you, do you think?’ Charlotte says, worried. It would be shite if Katie’s ma caught her out. She’d lock her up all summer for it, to keep her safe.
‘No. She’s seeing the therapist and he told her she has to let me be during the tutor lessons. Death, death, death, worry. That’s all she does. I wouldn’t mind if she was worried about her own – her death I could cope with – it’s all being transferred to me. It’s not fucking fair.’
That makes Charlotte laugh. Katie has given her surreal and puce. In return, Charlotte has given her fucking and shite.
‘You wouldn’t have had to have the extra lessons at all if you didn’t play so soft and simple all the time.’
‘Life is easier this way,’ she says with a shrug. ‘Why do you play so tough?’
‘I don’t play tough,’ Charlotte grins and Katie smiles back, leaning on her shoulder. After a moment, she sits upright and frowns.
‘You’re getting boobs!’ One slim finger pokes Charlotte’s chest.
‘Get off!’ She pushes Katie’s hand away, blushing and awkward. She’s tried to hide it under a baggy shirt but her chest is getting bigger. She hates it. Ma said there was no point in getting a training bra because if she got big as fast as they did in Ma’s family then in a couple of months she’d need a proper one.
Katie looks down at her own slight frame. Not even the hint of anything other than flatness under her shirt. ‘That’s not fair. I’m months older than you. If you get your period before me as well, I’m going to be so annoyed.’
Charlotte wrinkled her nose. ‘Don’t be disgusting.’ She gets to her feet. She’s itching to do something. She’d taken half of one of her ma’s pills this morning but the haze is wearing off and she wants to rob some booze. She doesn’t want to think about boobs and periods and the things she’d pretended to have read in a book. She wants to run away with Katie and stay like they are forever.
The curse, that’s what Jean calls it. She’ll be getting the curse soon. You’d better make sure she knows what to use.
The curse. Getting the curse. It’s hanging over her, she can feel it. Of course she’ll get the curse first. She’s cursed already.
52
NOW