And it had almost worked. For a few, heart-clenching wonderful hours—so absolutely pure and beautiful that I felt at times that I could not breathe for the joy of it—I had managed it all. I dug out my camera, taking photographs. I smiled into the faces of strangers, I laughed at the kindness of children. I stood face-to-face with the unknown and I only wanted more. And so I ate and I drank until I thought I would burst from it. I laughed until my muscles ached, until my limbs grew heavy. And then—and then the facade came shattering down around me, breaking and splintering around my bare feet, and I knew that it could never be put back together again.
She had whispered to me about John’s infidelities, reminding me of knowledge I already had possessed, though I had worked to bury it, deep. She had convinced me that I must leave Tangier, that we must leave Tangier. In secret, under the cover of night, because she also knew about the money, about the allowances passed from Maude to me and on to John, knew about what he would really lose with my absence, and I did not question how, knowing only that she must, in that way that she always knew everything. It had all made a perfect sort of sense, and so I nodded and agreed. Tangier was not mine, I had never laid claim to it, nor it to me. I knew that I could leave and not be too bothered.
But then she had mentioned the accident. She had said the word—Tom—magic in its incantation, dispelling everything all at once, bringing it to light so that I had no choice but to look at it again, once more. I had not wanted her to say his name, I had not wanted us to be forced to confront, to remember. I had wanted to continue as we were—if only for a little while longer. But then she had said his name, and the spell had broken. She had said the next words, ones that were never mentioned in any newspapers, by any police officer, not even by Maude, because I had never mentioned it, had never told them—what had happened in the span of those last minutes, tucking it away and keeping the information to myself, knowing that voicing it aloud would not change anything, could not change anything. Aunt Maude had told me, weeks later, when I started to come out of the shock, when at last I could sit and listen and eat again once more, that there was little left of the wreckage, just burned-up bits and pieces that the police had done their best to sift through, though they had never arrived at any official answers.
In the taxi ride home the next day, something pulled at my memory and I struggled to bring it to the forefront. I thought of the few stories she had told me about her family, her father—about the garage that he had worked in—and I felt as though the air had been ripped out of me, as if my lungs no longer worked. I struggled to breathe, the space between Chefchaouen and Tangier fragmented and blurred, so that I remembered nothing, nothing at all except what she had said, what she had whispered, lying in bed, the rain slanting down the rooftop, loud and insistent, so that for a moment I thought I was mistaken, had hoped that I was.
But I wasn’t, I knew. I had heard her correctly, had heard what it was that she had said, her breath hot and moist against my cheek as she had smiled and sighed and leaning toward me whispered his name, whispered about that night.
Whispered about the brakes.
WHEN JOHN GREETED US upon our return, watching from the threshold of the doorway as Lucy and I made our way, one slow step at a time, back up and into the flat, I did my best to rearrange my face, to inhabit some semblance of the person I had been before we left. I mounted the steps with something like dread, the knowledge of what I had learned pressing against me so that I could no longer foresee the future, could no longer, in fact, see past one step and then another.
As we came into view, John called out to me, “What on earth are you wearing?”
I looked down, tugging self-consciously at the blouse and running my hands nervously over the pleats of the trousers, eager to be rid of them both. “I borrowed them from Lucy,” I said, blushing as I said her name, as if that night was something etched into my face, as if John would only have to look in order to read everything that had happened, that had transpired between us.
His face rearranged itself into a frown. “What happened to your own clothes?”
“They got dirty.” I knew my voice sounded short, curt, but there was nothing that I could do to change it—I felt as though all the energy had been leaked from my very bones, that the effort I had made, all these months, to smile and nod my head, to act as though I had not made an enormous mistake in coming to Tangier, with him, had suddenly left me.
It was no longer possible.
“Dirty?” He laughed. “What on earth from?”
I heaved a loud sigh. “Does it matter?”
John looked momentarily taken aback. Finally he said: “No, I suppose it doesn’t.” He gave a shake of his head and stepped aside to allow us into the apartment, followed by a quick gibe about his surprise at finding my note, although it was clear that what he really meant was displeasure. Running his fingers through his hair, he attempted a lighthearted laugh, but I could feel his eyes searching out mine: wondering, speculating, puzzling over whether Lucy had managed to pass along his little secret. He did not realize that I had already known—that he was not the only one who could keep things hidden.
“Maybe you should take a bath,” he said, his voice hollow. “You’re covered in dust.” He laughed again. “And in those clothes, people will start to wonder.”
I looked at him, eyes narrowed. “Wonder what, John?” A dare, just there, beneath my words.
“I don’t know,” he said, with a touch of defiance. “But not anything good, I suspect.”
I wanted to respond, to snap, but the words stuck in my throat and then the moment was gone, along with the insinuation. In the silence came John’s insistence that he didn’t mean anything by it, that he was just on edge, worried by my absence. And there did seem to be a truth to it—his eyes were red and swollen, as though he hadn’t slept the night before. I felt ashamed then, for snapping, for being angry at him for something he knew nothing about. I began to tell him this, but he had already moved on, suggesting drinks, suggesting that we go out, visit a jazz club, that promise he had made the first night—and which now seemed like ages ago—his enthusiasm for the outing, I suspected, built upon the prospect of keeping an eye on us, of monitoring what was and wasn’t said. I wondered why he even cared, now that he had someone else. Or perhaps he meant to try and keep us both—Sabine, that was what Lucy had called her. It would not have surprised me. I felt Lucy’s gaze—hard and insistent, as always—demanding me to speak, to set our plan, no, her plan, I reminded myself, into motion. I stood, feeling the intensity of both their gazes upon me and I felt for a moment that I might burst, shatter into a million pieces, right in front of them. The idea filled me with something like pleasure. I ground my fingernails into my palms. “I’ll just take that bath first,” I said, trying to make my words light, though they seemed to resound throughout the room, heavy and dull. John had been right. After our long drive home, Lucy and I were both filthy, covered in dirt and sunburned, our bodies peeling and flaking with each move.
I moved quickly from them, feeling their eyes on my back.
Once I was behind the closed bathroom door, a long, heavy sigh escaped me, and I wondered if they could hear me, wondered whether they, both of them, were listening from the other side of the door. I ran the water, sitting on the edge of the tub’s ceramic shell, letting it develop into a scorching heat, not caring, but rather welcoming it—the moment my sunburned skin would turn an angrier shade of red.
I lowered myself under the water, grateful that it muffled the sound of my scream. And when I resurfaced, when I at last felt the air enter my lungs, burning, I coughed and sputtered and feared that I might retch from the force of it.
She had done it. And I had always known.