‘The money Dad left you—’
‘Gone.’ Billy gives a bitter laugh. ‘It paid off the overdraft, but it didn’t touch the loan.’
‘What loan?’
Silence again.
‘Billy, what loan?’
This time he looks at me. ‘Your dad took out a business loan. Trade had been slow for a while, but we were doing okay. You have to ride the rough with the smooth in this game. But Tom wanted to do the place up. Get the lads using iPads instead of carrying clipboards; smarten up the forecourt. We had a row about it. Next thing I know, the money’s in the account. He went ahead and did it anyway.’
‘Oh, Billy …’
‘We fell behind with the repayments, and then …’ He stops, but I hear the rest of his story in my head. Then your dad topped himself, and left me with the debt.
For the first time in nineteen months, Dad’s suicide starts to make sense. ‘Why haven’t you told me this before?’
Billy doesn’t answer.
‘How much is the loan? I’ll pay it off.’
‘I’m not taking your money, Annie.’
‘It’s Dad’s money! It’s right that you have it.’
Billy turns so he’s standing square on to me. He puts his hands on either side of my shoulders and holds me firmly. ‘First rule of business, Annie: keep the company money separate from your own money.’
‘But I’m a director! If I want to bail out the business—’
‘It’s not how it works. A company needs to stand on its own two feet, and if it can’t … well, then it shouldn’t be in business.’ He cuts across my attempts to argue. ‘Now, how about a test drive?’ He points at the Boxster. Our conversation is over.
I learned to drive in a Ford Escort (‘Start with something sensible, Anna’), but once I got my licence, the sky was the limit. In exchange for valeting every weekend, I’d borrow cars from the forecourt, knowing I risked the wrath of both my parents and Uncle Billy if I didn’t bring them back in mint condition. I never developed the same speed gene as my mother, but I learned how to handle fast cars.
‘You’re on.’
The wet roads mean the Boxster’s a little tail-happy on bends, and I head out of town so I can open her up. I grin at Billy, enjoying the freedom of a car with no baby seat in the back. A car with no back seats at all. I catch a worried look on his face.
‘I’m only doing sixty-two.’
Then I understand it’s not the speed Billy’s concerned about, but the sign for Beachy Head. I hadn’t been thinking about where we were going; I’d been enjoying the feel of a responsive engine, of a steering wheel that twitched like a live thing beneath my hands.
‘I’m sorry. It wasn’t intentional.’
Billy hasn’t been to Beachy Head since Mum and Dad died. On test drives he takes people the other way, towards Bexhill and Hastings. I glance to the side and see his face, pale and crumpled, reflected in the nearside mirror. I take my foot off the accelerator, but I don’t turn around.
‘Why don’t we take a walk? Pay our respects.’
‘Oh Annie, love, I don’t know …’
‘Please, Uncle Billy. I don’t want to go on my own.’
There’s a heavy silence, then he agrees.
I drive to the car park where Mum and Dad left their cars. I don’t need to look for ghosts here; they’re all around us. The paths they trod, the signs they passed.
I last came on Mum’s birthday, feeling closer to her up here than in the corner of the churchyard where two small plaques mark my parents’ lives. The cliffs look the same, but the questions in my head have changed. No longer ‘why’ but ‘who’. Who was Mum with that day? What was Dad doing up here?
Suicide? Think again.
‘Okay?’
Billy nods tightly.
I lock the car and take his arm. He relaxes a little, and we walk towards the headland. Focus on the good times, I think.
‘Remember that time you and Dad dressed as the Krankies for the summer party?’
Billy laughs. ‘We argued over who got to be Wee Jimmy. And I won, because I was the short arse, only then—’
‘Then the two of you got pissed and fought about it all over again.’ We burst out laughing at the memory of Wee Jimmy and Dad rolling around the showroom floor. Dad and Uncle Billy fought in the way only brothers fight: fast and furious, and over as soon as it began.
We fall into a companionable silence as we walk, interspersed with occasional snorts of laughter as Billy recalls the night of the Krankies all over again. He squeezes my arm.
‘Thank you for making me come. It was about time I faced up to it.’
We’re standing on the cliff top now, safely back from the edge. Neither of us have proper coats on and the rain is coming from all directions, soaking through my running jacket. Out at sea a small boat with red sails cuts through grey choppy water. I think of Mum, standing where we are now. Was she scared? Or was she here with someone she trusted? Someone she thought was a friend. A lover, even – although the thought sickens me. Is it possible my mother had been having an affair?
‘Do you think she knew?’
Billy doesn’t say anything.
‘When she came up here. Do you think she knew she was going to die?’
‘Anna, don’t.’ Billy starts walking back towards the car park.
I run to catch up. ‘Don’t you want to know what really happened?’
‘No. Give me the keys – I’ll drive back.’ The rain has pasted Billy’s hair to his head. He holds out his hands, but I stand still, defiant, the keys between us.
‘Don’t you see: if Mum and Dad were killed, it changes everything. It means they didn’t leave us; they didn’t give up on life. The police will look for their murderer. They’ll find answers for us, Billy!’
We stare at each other, and then to my horror I see Billy is crying. His mouth works without words, like the TV on mute, and then he turns up the sound and I wish with all my being I’d driven towards Hastings instead.
‘I don’t want answers, Annie. I don’t want to think about how they died. I want to think about the way they lived. I want to remember the good times and the funny times, and the nights in the pub.’ His voice gets gradually louder until he’s shouting at me, the wind whipping the words straight at me. The tears have stopped, but I’ve never seen Billy like this before. I’ve never seen him out of control. His fists are tightly balled and he shifts from one foot to another like he’s spoiling for a fight.
‘Mum was murdered! Surely you want to know who did it?’
‘It won’t change anything. It won’t bring her back.’
‘But we’ll have justice. Someone will pay for what they did.’
Billy turns and walks away. I run after him, pulling him back by the shoulder. ‘I just want answers, Uncle Billy. I loved her so much.’
He stops walking, but he won’t look at me, and in his face is a mixture of grief and anger and something else, something confusing. Understanding comes a split second before he speaks, so quietly the wind almost takes it away without me hearing it. Almost, but not quite.
‘So did I.’
We sit in the car park, watching the rain on the windscreen. Every now and then a strong gust of wind rocks the car, and I’m glad we came down from the cliffs when we did.
‘I remember the first time I saw her,’ Billy says, and it should feel awkward but it doesn’t because he’s not really here. He’s not sitting in a Porsche Boxster at Beachy Head with his niece. He’s somewhere else entirely. Remembering. ‘Tom and I were living in London. Tom had done some big deal at work and we’d gone to Amnesia to celebrate. VIP passes, the lot. It was a big night. Tom drank champagne all night; spent the whole time on the sofa with a string of girls. I think he thought he was Peter Stringfellow.’ Billy gives me a sidelong glance. He flushes, and I worry he’s going to clam up, but he keeps talking.
‘It was 1989. Your mum was there with a friend. They didn’t give a second glance to the VIP area – they were on the dance floor all night. She was stunning, your mum. Every now and then some guy would come up to them and make a move, but they weren’t interested. Girls’ night out, Caroline said later.’