If You Knew Her Page 27

  What did you do?

  I swear up a storm inside, but to her, of course, I must seem as still as a millpond. I’m forced to look at her; she stares down at me, as thorough as if looking at an X-ray. She has large, solid-looking features and alabaster white skin, patterned with freckles.

  Why are you here?

  At the end of the ward, there’s a white board with all our names written on it. I remember she paused there, the first time she appeared. She must have seen my name there. She inspects me, her eyes narrow slightly in curiosity, but she doesn’t wince; she must have a strong constitution. The alarms from my noisy new neighbour at the far end of the ward keep screaming.

  She picks up a framed photo on my bedside unit; it’s of Lucy and me from our fishing trip to Wales. Lucy brought it in yesterday; she left the frame on my nightstand, too high for me to look at, and all I can see now is the black velvet back of the frame. I know what photo it is, though; I remember it was one of the happiest days of my life. Lucy’s about ten in the photo. I’m kneeling down by her side and we’re both wearing one of my dad’s old flat caps. We’re smiling at the camera; Lucy’s smile is so wide her eyes are almost closed. We’re each holding up a sea trout we caught in the River Towy behind us. Lucy caught loads, and the one she holds up to the camera is twice the size of my one and only catch, which always made Lucy laugh. The woman only looks at it briefly before she lets out a sad little sigh as she places it back where it was before, out of my sight.

  Then she looks sharply away from me, and I know why she’s here.

  No!

  Our curtains twitch with her movement, but she walks almost silently, even in her heavy boots, across the ward to Cassie.

  She casts her eyes over Cassie. I watch as she strokes Cassie’s cheek just once with her forefinger and then she says, ‘It should have been me, Cassie, not you. It should have been me.’

  ‘It should have been you who what, Nicky?’

  I’d been listening so intently to this woman, this Nicky, trying to catch her words over the noise of the new patient’s alarms that I’d missed Charlotte’s clean footsteps on the ward floor.

  Nicky spins round to Charlotte and at that moment, one or two of the alarms stop; only one keeps up its mechanical wail.

  Charlotte moves forward towards Nicky. She tries to pull Nicky’s arm, to move her from Cassie’s side, but Nicky corkscrews her arm away. It’s Nicky who leads, followed by Charlotte, back to my bedside. As Charlotte walks behind Nicky I see Charlotte’s face fall, from her held smile, livid and hard as a fist. Charlotte carefully closes my curtains before she comes to stand on the other side of my bed, opposite Nicky.

  Thank god, Cassie’s safer.

  ‘What are you doing here?’ Charlotte asks, her voice thick, her question as uncompromising as a stabbing knife.

  ‘I had to lie to see her,’ Nicky says. ‘Jack wouldn’t let me visit, so I had no choice.’ Nicky pauses; her face crumples into a frown but her voice softens as she continues. ‘I’ve tried to be there for him, for the baby. I thought he’d need me now, now that he doesn’t have Cassie. But he won’t let me help him. He ignores me, just like Cassie did.’

  Charlotte leans across the bed, towards Nicky. I can hear the effort it takes for her to keep her voice steady as she says, ‘Is that what you meant when you said it should have been you? You wanted to be with Jack?’

  Nicky looks up at Charlotte. She shakes her head, and her eyes fall away from Charlotte’s face.

  ‘I never wanted any of this,’ Nicky says. ‘All I wanted was to make things right between us. She wouldn’t answer my calls, my texts. I saw no choice. I came down that night to make her talk to me.’

  She was there that night.

  Nicky keeps her arms locked by her side, occasionally flexing her hand open before balling it into a fist. She’s nervous and it’s obvious Charlotte can sense that.

  ‘You drove that night …’ Charlotte says, her voice strained.

  In that moment, Nicky’s face is wiped clean, strangely naked of all expression as she realises what she’s said. She takes a step back, the corner of my bedside unit jars hard against her hip. It must have been painful, but she doesn’t wince.

  ‘You drove down that night, Nicky, but not to apologise to Cassie. You came to try and take my son away from his wife. When you saw Cassie with her bag on the lane, you saw an opportunity, you thought you could have what you’ve always wanted: Cassie’s life for yourself.’

  It was her.

  At last, Nicky’s face ruptures. She gasps, her breath too fast. She starts hyperventilating as she says, ‘No, no, no, no …’

  I was right from the start.

  But Charlotte talks over her. ‘It was you … it was you, Nicky. You tried to kill her!’

  Nicky holds the side of her temples with both hands, her eyes wild and her voice becomes a long attenuated cry before she shouts, ‘I came to say sorry for what she saw!’

  Charlotte stops talking suddenly, like she wasn’t expecting Nicky to say that. She keeps her eyes fixed on Nicky. Nicky’s breathing is becoming more frenzied; her chest beats like something inside her is trying to escape.

  ‘What did she see?’ Charlotte’s voice is clear.

  ‘She saw me and Jack.’ Nicky’s hands drop from her head, her voice fragile. ‘She saw us.’

  I feel my sheets shift as Charlotte grips the top of my bed.

  ‘How do I know you’re not lying?’ Charlotte spits the word at Nicky.

  ‘She saw us together, Charlotte, back in the autumn. I was coming to stay for the weekend and arrived a couple of hours earlier than planned to surprise Cassie. Jack was home. I was glad to have some time with him. He’d had a bad day, left the office early. We were talking on the sofa. He was telling me how stressed he’d been at work, with the miscarriage, how he knew Cassie wasn’t happy and he didn’t know what to do. I don’t think either of us knew what was happening, but suddenly we were kissing and Cassie saw us. She was at the window. She saw us kissing.’

  I watch as fine cracks spread across Charlotte’s face like fault lines. Her smile drops and her gaze flicks, sharp as a whip, across Nicky’s face, searching for a lie.

  Charlotte suddenly moves, walks around the foot of my bed and comes to stand on the same side as Nicky. I think for a crazy moment that Charlotte might hit Nicky, there and then. The violence I saw in her the other night is back, like something has been released and won’t be caged again.

  ‘He isn’t … he isn’t like that.’ She talks quietly, but it sounds like she wants to scream. Her jaw snaps around her words.

  Nicky just stares at Charlotte. Her hands ball into fists.

  ‘He is, Charlotte.’

  ‘You made him. You made him do it.’ Charlotte’s face twists ugly around her words,

  ‘I’m not blameless – I’m not saying I’m blameless – but I didn’t make him, Charlotte,’ she responds, before she adds weakly, ‘It was just a kiss.’

  ‘You say it was just a kiss? It’s never just a kiss.’

  Nicky flinches as Charlotte comes closer to her.

  Charlotte strains like a dog on a lead against herself. She looks like she could bite into Nicky’s neck. She points her hand violently towards the curtain, towards Cassie.

  ‘She wouldn’t have left him that night.’ Charlotte hisses the words through her teeth. ‘We wouldn’t be here now if it was just a kiss.’

  Charlotte’s anger doesn’t have the rawness of a fresh rage. She doesn’t seem shocked by it; it is familiar to her, almost rehearsed, as though she’s practised similar scenes in her head late at night many times before, and finally, now, Nicky has given her a stage.

  Nicky’s gaze drops to my bed, away from Charlotte. Her eyes pool; her sight must be blurred. The words come cleanly out of her, like they’ve been simmering under her skin for a long time.

  ‘I left a party just after midnight. Picked up my car and started driving. I was still too late by the time I got to th
e cottage. There was no one there. It was cold. The security lights flashed on outside. Ice had started to settle everywhere –’ she pauses, catches her breath and looks up at Charlotte ‘– but it hadn’t formed on Jack’s car. I put my hand on it. I knew he was there because he’d just been driving. His car was warm.’

  Jack.

  ‘What are you saying?’

  ‘I tried to tell myself there would be a reason why his car was warm, tried to tell myself after Jonny was arrested that it was him, Jonny who hit her. Deep down I think I always knew it was Jack. I don’t think I was the first, I think there were other women before me. He didn’t want Cassie any more …’

  ‘Stop it. Nicky …’

  ‘He drove after her, didn’t he? I know it was him.’

  Charlotte speaks slower than Nicky, her voice authoritative as she says, ‘I can call the police right now. They’ll watch the CCTV. They’ll see you driving down. You’d been drinking … you had a motive.’

  Nicky lifts her hands to her head again, as though Charlotte’s words are needles pricking her ears.

  ‘You thought you could take him, but it hasn’t worked has it, Nicky? Look at you, still on your own …’

  But suddenly, Charlotte’s voice fades and her head whips around towards my curtain. Footsteps approach and as Lizzie pulls my curtain back, Nicky drops her hands from her head again.

  Charlotte smiles at Lizzie as the nurse moves forward next to my bed, as though Charlotte had just been passing on supportive words to Nicky and smiles to me all along.

  ‘Oh, hello, Charlotte.’ I can hear a small frown, surprise, in Lizzie’s voice, but she doesn’t notice the atmosphere that hangs in the air like pollution.

  ‘Um, so sorry to leave you, Ms Breton,’ she says, adding in a more discreet voice, ‘bit of an emergency, I’m afraid.’

  Nicky at last lifts her head, her eyes red. She shakes her head, knocking my bedside unit again as she moves. ‘No, no, that’s OK, I have to go now anyway.’

  Her voice shakes, but Lizzie doesn’t notice as Nicky grabs her bag from the floor, clutching the strap like a lifeline as Charlotte says, ‘Well, it’s been good to talk, really. Such a relief to be understood, isn’t it?’ Charlotte’s voice doesn’t waver; she doesn’t flicker or blush, her lies indistinguishable from the truth.

  Nicky doesn’t say anything and she doesn’t look at Charlotte. She just nods quickly, her head bowed as she pushes her way past Charlotte and Lizzie. Nicky’s boots sound heavy again against the floor as she rushes away and I know Nicky wasn’t here to defend herself. Nicky was here to finally tell the truth.

  Jack’s car was warm.

  Lizzie blinks, surprised by Nicky’s abrupt departure. ‘Oh, bye then,’ she says to Nicky’s back before she turns to Charlotte. ‘Was it something I said?’

  Jack wanted Nicky; he wanted other women.

  Charlotte’s eyes stay fixed on the space where Nicky just stood and she shakes herself briefly, as if she’s just woken up and, turning to Lizzie, she smiles and says, ‘She’s a bit emotional, that’s all. I think she found it hard seeing her uncle like this.’

  Cassie was in the way.

  The phone starts ringing on reception. Lizzie looks towards the noise, hoping someone else might take the call, before she says to Charlotte, ‘God, it’s one of those days, I’m afraid’, and she hurries away from us again, towards the reception desk.

  As soon as she’s gone, Charlotte seems to deflate as she exhales long and deep. She grips onto the end of my bed frame by my feet with both hands, and closes her eyes, and says a quiet mantra, ‘She’ll pay, she’ll pay.’ Still with her eyes closed, she shakes her head gently, back and forth as she says, ‘No one saw, no one knows. It wasn’t his fault.’

  Her words sting like a swarm of bees inside my head.

  She’s not accusing Nicky because Nicky did it. She’s accusing Nicky to protect Jack.

  I think she feels my stare, because she opens her eyes and I know she’s seen a shadow, this small ghost of Frank Ashcroft pass behind my dull stare and without meaning to, I blink.

  Shit.

  She stares at me.

  ‘You blinked,’ she says, her voice dumb with shock. She keeps her eyes fixed on me and I focus on the muscles around my eyes, forcing them to keep still, to not even flicker.

  But she doesn’t smile like everyone else when they see me blink. No, her expression hardens like it did with Nicky.

  She turns around, behind her, and calls, ‘Lizzie!’

  She pulls my curtain back

  ‘Lizzie!’ she shouts again, agitated now, and Lizzie appears, slightly pinked from exertion.

  ‘Sorry again, Charlotte. Honestly I don’t know what’s going on today—’

  ‘He just blinked,’ Charlotte says, interrupting Lizzie, pointing a finger towards me.

  Lizzie’s young face turns towards Charlotte and breaks into a wide smile, as though she’s just about to reveal the most delicious secret. She nods her head.

  No, Lizzie, don’t!

  ‘Frank’s wanted to keep it quiet, haven’t you, Frank? Until he’s well enough to say proper words.’ She turns to me briefly before turning back to Charlotte. ‘But I suppose you basically guessed, Charlotte, so I can tell you that, yes, Frank is getting better!’

  Stop, Lizzie!

  ‘But Mr Sharma said he was in a permanent vegetative state.’ Charlotte’s voice is bald with shock.

  ‘Well, that’s what he thought but, no, I’m happy to say he was wrong this time.’ To prove her point, Lizzie looks down at me and says, ‘Isn’t that right, Frank?’

  I keep perfectly still.

  ‘Oh, he’s probably just a bit tired. He’s got an infection at present, so he’s probably feeling the effects of the antibiotics,’ Lizzie says as she picks up my file and opens it to start taking my readings.

  ‘To be honest, I’m surprised you and Jack didn’t know something was up, Charlotte. He’s an absolute superstar. He’s starting to blink out words. Even though he’s got this infection, I heard he was absolutely determined today. Mary said it was like he was on a mission. He would not rest until he blinked Jack’s name!’ She turns to Charlotte and frowns briefly because Charlotte’s not smiling, not like she thought she would, but it doesn’t stop her talking.

  ‘Frank’s been here all along. He knows everything we’re saying, understands everything perfectly. Isn’t that right, Frank?’

  Jesus, Lizzie …

  Both women turn to look at me: Lizzie’s face smiles down at me briefly before turning back to my machines; Charlotte looks blanched, queasy, her mouth small and twisted, like she’s straining to keep it under control.

  ‘In fact, the doctors think he’s got supersonic hearing; they reckon he could hear a pin drop on the ward. But don’t worry, Frank’s promised me he won’t give away any of our secrets. Isn’t that right, Frank?’

  They both turn towards me, but again I don’t move. Lizzie glances down at me before looking at Charlotte. She’s disappointed; usually Charlotte’s full of smiles.

  ‘Charlotte, are you OK? You’ve gone really pale suddenly.’

  Charlotte’s eyes stay fixed on mine, and her focus burns my retina worse than any of the doctor’s torches.

  ‘I’m fine, Lizzie, really. Just happy for Frank and surprised we didn’t know.’ Charlotte’s voice has a new, mechanical quality like an automaton.

  ‘I keep thinking, maybe by the time the baby’s born, Frank will be able to talk to us all! Won’t that be something!’ Lizzie says, her smile fading because Charlotte hasn’t lifted her head away from me. Lizzie frowns, before she remembers what she’s supposed to be doing and starts scribbling down the numbers from my machines while Charlotte keeps her eyes on mine, hard as bullets.

  I can tell she knows what I’m thinking.

  I heard you warning Cassie.

  I feel her thoughts running alongside my own.

  I heard everything you said to Nicky.

  ‘Y
ou heard,’ she says to me, so softly I can hear the saliva move around her mouth.

  ‘Sorry, what was that, Charlotte?’ Lizzie looks up from her folder.

  His car was still warm.

  ‘I was just saying what wonderful news this is.’ Charlotte smiles at Lizzie and Lizzie smiles back, delighted that Charlotte seems to finally understand.

  He wanted her gone.

  From the other end of the ward, an emergency alarm starts to screech again, the sound panics the air around us.

  It was Jack.

  Lizzie drops my folder in its slot at the foot of my bed.

  ‘Oh god, not again,’ she says glancing down at me briefly.

  No, no, Lizzie you can’t …

  I blink twice, and I blink again, but Lizzie doesn’t see me because she’s turning to leave already, to join the other urgent feet that pound the ward as the doctors and other nurses run back again to the end of 9B.

  But Charlotte sees me.

  The alarms seem to ring through my organs. My heart monitor starts to beep as I watch Charlotte look left and right before she closes my curtains quietly and, coming back to me, she brings her face so close to mine I can feel her words as little puffs of warm air against my cheek, as she says, ‘You heard. You heard me talking about Jack.’

  I think of Luce, of Alice; I have to keep still for them, I have to keep still for Cassie, for her baby. Charlotte keeps her eyes on mine. She’s fixed, deep inside me, as though she’s seeing something in me even I don’t know.

  ‘I know you’re there, Frank, I know you heard things you shouldn’t have.’

  Her eyes widen around the truth and, as if in sympathy, her own eyelid starts to tic. She shakes her head and stands away from me, turning so I can’t see her. She’s not talking to me any more as she says, her voice desperate, ‘My god, he knows, he knows.’

  Then the air around my bed stills and the silence is worse than anything she’s already said, and I feel my heart turn to ice in my chest because I hear her thoughts before I hear her words.

  ‘Frank, I’m sorry. Really, I’m sorry.’

  You’re sorry your son almost killed his wife?

  ‘You shouldn’t have heard any of it, Frank.’