Where the Memories Lie

 

I couldn’t tell Ethan what Tom had said. Not after the last time when he’d got so angry. Not after the whole thing about Georgia had been proved to just be the ramblings of a mixed-up mind and we’d wasted the police’s time. Not after Tom’s heart attack when everyone was so upset and worried. It would sound like my imagination was going into overdrive, neurotically piec-ing together events that couldn’t possibly be true. I couldn’t tell Nadia, either. She was devastated about Tom’s heart attack, too, as well as worrying about Lucas’s affair. She didn’t need any extra stress now. Plus, it was all completely crazy because of the goodbye letter.

 

And yet . . .

 

I’d always wondered what had happened to Katie. When she first left, I’d felt so guilty. I hadn’t been there for her enough.

 

Hadn’t been sympathetic enough. If she’d only just talked to me about things, we could’ve come up with something to make her feel happier. I didn’t have any clue she was intending to up and leave.

 

I mean, I knew her home life wasn’t happy. Living with Rose and Jack drinking all the time couldn’t have been much fun. Katie had had to grow up quickly if she wanted to survive. She was the adult in that household, not her parents. She’d been carrying a tremendous load since she was a kid and I hadn’t understood just how bad things were until she left. Until I got older and became a proper adult myself. She hid things so well, you see.

 

I chucked some ketchup, tinned tomatoes and baked beans in the trolley.

 

Losing Chris must’ve been the last straw for her, though. She’d talked about them getting engaged, getting a house together. Chris was working for Tom as a builder and earning decent money, and she’d left school at sixteen and was working in a shop in Weymouth, 83

 

Sibel Hodge

 

so they could’ve afforded to rent somewhere as a starter home. And Tom would’ve helped Chris out, I was sure, since Tate Construction was doing really well. Better than well, actually. Tom was loaded, but he worked really hard for what he had. It was Katie’s dream for her and Chris to be a family. Sometimes when I saw her at Tom’s house for a Sunday BBQ or something, she’d be taking everything in, studying the whole family ? Nadia, Chris, Ethan, Tom ? with a look of . . . God, what was it? It was like a mixture of envy, sat-isfaction and happiness. She wanted a happy family, wanted to be a part of theirs, and she finally was. And who could blame her? I knew what it felt like, too, to be included in this big, close-knit family. Even though my childhood was great and my parents doted on me, I’d always longed for brothers and sisters. Being an only child was tough sometimes, and Katie’s life was a lot tougher than mine. She wanted the son of a rich developer, the security, the protection that she’d never had from her own family. But somehow her dream shattered. They were only eighteen but she wanted to get her own home and get married. Have kids. It was too much, too soon for Chris, and even though I believe he really did love her, he panicked.

 

I chose a big bag of crisps and some honey-roasted peanuts Ethan liked, then scoured the bottles of wine. I needed a drink.

 

I think Chris felt too pressured to settle down, and rightly so, I supposed. Eighteen was so young. He wasn’t ready. And instead of sticking around and waiting for him to be ready, enjoying just being together and being in love and having fun like I’d been doing with Ethan and Nadia had been doing with Lucas, Katie had pushed and pushed and gone on and on about settling down until Chris couldn’t take it anymore and had ended things.

 

So, yes, I felt guilty that I hadn’t been there for my friend.

 

Guilty that I’d thought about her less and less over the years as I got on with my life. Guilty that I hadn’t known what had happened to 84

 

Where the Memories Lie her or where she’d ended up. But I didn’t think Tom had buried her.