I haven’t seen Tilda’s flat since Felix’s builders were there, doing their work. “Nothing drastic,” Felix had said. But the place is transformed, hardly recognizable, and for an instant I’m disorientated, as though I’ve come to the wrong place. Before the builders, Tilda’s main room had been in three distinct parts—kitchen and dining and sitting—all of them different colors, with cobbled-together, makeshift furniture, acquired before she became successful. It was messy and cluttered. But now the place is a single minimalist shell in shades of white and pale gray. A nearly white stone floor instead of painted boards. Two white leather sofas where the old sofa with the mangled springs had been. The squashy comfy chair is gone, along with the pine table and the kitchen units, all replaced by white furniture. I guess that the paint on the walls is called soft baby fawn or bare buff or something else equally anemic. The brightest presences are the pale yellow blinds and a wan lemon-colored orchid.
I stretch out on one of the sofas and put my feet up on a glass coffee table, not minding that my trainers are filthy, and I’m overwhelmed by an urge to disturb the order of the place. A nosebleed would be very welcome, because I’m in a mood to protest that this vapid, sterile flat is all wrong. My sister isn’t like this. She’s always been a chaotic, messy person. You only have to remember our bedroom when we were young, her clothes in heaps all over the floor, her makeup scattered across the dressing table—clumped mascara going hard on brushes she hadn’t bothered to put back in the tube, used tissues left for months on end. It’s obvious that this newfound tidiness, all this order, comes from Felix.
I decide to make a cup of tea and look for mugs in the kitchen units, but I find that all I have to do is touch the drawers slightly and they slide out on their own, and then back in again with another tiny tap. I set them all going, in and out like a silent symphony of little white coffins, and I see that inside the drawers the cutlery is perfectly aligned—the forks on their sides all facing the same way and the spoons actually spooning one another. The crockery—all new—is creamy-white bone china and neatly stacked. I register the absurd neatness of everything, but what strikes me as totally, mind-blowingly insane is the fact that the crockery is wrapped in cling film, so that whenever you want to use a bowl or a plate, you have to unwrap it. I look in more drawers and find more cling film, around cups and glasses and pots and pans. It’s obvious that Tilda was making an excuse when she told me not to come here. It was this mad stuff she didn’t want me to see. Her cling-filmed life. As I make my tea it occurs to me that Felix might actually know how many tea bags are in the box, and know that I’d been here and taken one. Then again, Eva probably makes herself cups of tea.
My mug in my hand, I head for the bedroom. By now I’m ticking off the changes in my head. New cupboards, new blinds, new bed—king-size and with a suede headboard the color of rotted meat. Barely thinking about what I am doing, I start taking Tilda’s clothes from the drawers and the wardrobe, piling them up on the bed; a strange mix of things—T-shirts in flimsy cotton the same washed-out colors as the flat, jeans with nonsensical brand names—Paradise in the Park, XXOX, Lost and Found. And long, sparkly dresses that I suppose she wears to movie premieres and awards ceremonies—not that she’s been to any recently. I run my fingers over them, feeling the softness and lightness of the silk, the hard edge of tiny sequins, and then I take off my T-shirt and jeans and pull on a pale-gold, gossamer-thin dress with a network of spaghetti straps that crisscross down the back. It isn’t easy to pull the dress down because I’m two sizes bigger than my emaciated sister, and when I do force it into place there’s no question of being able to do up the zip—the dress just gapes open at the side. I pose in front of the mirror, looking preposterous; a lump of chicken tied up with tinsel. Also, I can hardly breathe. But I keep the dress on while I inspect the next cupboard, the one containing Felix’s clothes.
Piles of white boxes, with shirts in them. Twenty-five boxes, in fact, all numbered—eight in blue ink, for blue shirts; eight in black ink, for white shirts; and four in red ink, for shirts that are the palest pink. The remaining five boxes, numbers 21–25 (more black ink), are empty—so I suppose he’s taken those shirts to Martinique. I imagine Felix checking that the boxes are perfectly aligned, and that the shirts are immaculately pressed and folded, and by now I’m finding the urge to ruffle things up unbearable.
Then I see, on the window ledge, a dead bluebottle on its back, its crunchy little legs in the air. Carefully, I pick it up and place it inside the collar of a pink shirt. Then I open a small white drawer, a tiny thing, and see a watch inside, and some cuff links. I pick them out to inspect them, and find that they are all exquisite little pieces of jewelry, one silver set shaped like a starfish; another, gold set like a four-leaf clover. I pick up a clover piece and turn it over and over in the palm of my hand, thinking about lucky Felix with all his perfect things. I pop the clover into my mouth, suck on it, then return it to its box.
I sit on the bed, amongst Tilda’s clothes, and remember how I used to eat her things, and become nostalgic for all the Tilda sustenance that would lie around, the hair in her hairbrush, the paper from her diary, her teeth. There’s nothing like that here. But, just in case, I get down on my knees to see if she’s tried an old trick and hidden something by attaching it to the underside of the bed. I crawl under, and feel around the empty space, and I’m crouched down like that when there’s a knock on the front door—or rather, three loud knocks.
I pull myself up and survey the mess—clothes thrown on the bed and floor, drawers and cupboards open everywhere. I start to tidy up, but there’s no time, so I sit on the edge of the bed, willing the intruder to go away. More loud angry knocks. I stay perfectly still, until I hear the sound of a key in the lock, the door opening and footsteps on the stone floor, pacing about. I dash to the en suite bathroom, grab a white bath towel, wrapping it round me, over the gold dress, then I run to the bedroom door and open it a tiny amount, so I can see out. Eva’s standing there, hands on her hips.
“Hi.” I stick my head through the gap. “What do you want?”
She looks at me with a distrustful expression. “What you doing?”
“I was about to have a bath. What are you doing?”
“I come to tell you to bring key back to me when you leave.”
“But you don’t need it. You’ve got another key. You just used it.”
“It’s my responsibility. You must return it.” She’s in the mood for a fight.
“Okay. Write your address down, and leave it on the table.”
I slam the bedroom door shut, and lean against it for a few seconds, listening to the sounds she’s making, walking around; then I hear her leave. I come out, the towel still wrapped round me, and inspect the flat. I want to see the full extent of what Eva has seen, and realize that I left half the drawers in the kitchen wide-open, bowls and plates out of their cling film, and my dirty trainers on the coffee table. It’s messy, but not as bad as the chaos in the bedroom.