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‘Where are you? Where are you? Why are you not answering? I’m scared, Claudie, I can’t do it, Claudie …’
My heart was pounding as I tried to think where the hell I was. I tried to hold on to the last dream but it was ebbing away already, and fear was setting in. Momentarily I couldn’t remember anything. Why I was here. I was meant to be somewhere else surely – I just couldn’t think where.
I had spent the weekend at Natalie’s, against my better judgement but practically under familial lock and key. Natalie was truly our mother’s daughter, and I’d found the whole forty-eight hours almost entirely painful. She had fussed over me relentlessly, but it was also as if she could not really see me; as if she was just doing her job because she must. In between cups of tea and faux-sympathy, I’d had to speak to my mother several times, to firstly set her mind at rest and then to listen to her pontificate at length on what had really happened in Berkeley Square, and whether it was those ‘damned Arabs’ again. And all the time she’d talked, without pausing, from the shiny-floored apartment in the Algarve where she spent most of her time now, and wondering whether she should come over, ‘Only the planes mightn’t be safe, dear, at the moment, do you think?’ I’d kept thinking of Tessa and wondering why she didn’t answer her phone now.
Worse, it had poured all weekend, trapping us in the house. The highlight was Ella and the infinite games of Connect 4 we played, which obviously I lost every time. ‘You’re not very good, are you, Auntie C?’ Ella said kindly, sucking her thumb whilst my sister scowled at her ‘babyish habit’. ‘Let her be, Nat,’ I murmured, and then Ella let me win a single round.
The low point was – well, there was a choice, actually. There had been the moment when pompous Brendan drank too much Merlot over Saturday supper and had then started to lecture me on ‘time to rebuild’ and ‘look at life afresh’ whilst Natalie had bustled around busily putting away table-mats with Georgian ladies on them into the dresser. I had glared at my sister in the hope that she might actually tell her husband to SHUT UP but she didn’t; she just rolled table napkins up, sliding mine into a shiny silver ring that actually read Guest. So I sat trying to smile at my brother-in-law’s sanctimonious face, thinking desperately of my little flat and the peace that at least reigned there. Lonely peace, perhaps, but peace nonetheless. After a while, I found that if I stared at Brendan’s wine-stained mouth talking, at the tangle of teeth behind the thin top lip, beneath the nose like a fox’s, I could just about block his words out. For half an hour he thought I was absorbing his sensitive advice, instead of secretly wishing that the large African figurehead they’d bought on honeymoon in the Gambia (having stepped outside the tourist compound precisely once, ‘Getting back to the land, Claudie, and oh those Gambians, such a noble people, really, Claudie; having so little and yet so much. They thrive on it’) would crash from the wall right now and render him unconscious.
The second low came on Sunday morning, just after I had turned down the exciting opportunity to accompany them to the local church for a spot of guitar-led happy clapping.
‘Leave Ella here with me,’ I offered. My head was clearer today, not as sore and much less hazy than it had felt recently. The paranoia was receding a little. ‘It must be pretty boring for her, all that God stuff.’
‘Oh I can’t,’ Natalie actually simpered. ‘Not today. We have to give thanks as a family.’
‘What for?’ I gazed at her. She looked coy, dying to tell me something, that familiar flush spreading over her chest and up her neck and face. I looked at her bosom that was more voluptuous than normal and her sparkling eyes and I realised.
‘You’re pregnant,’ I said slowly.
‘Oh. Yes,’ and she was almost disappointed that she hadn’t got to announce it, but she was obviously wrestling with guilt too. ‘Are you OK with that?’
‘Of course. Why wouldn’t I be?’ I moved forward to hug her dutifully. ‘I’m really pleased for you.’
Natalie grabbed my hands and pushed me away from her so she could search my face earnestly. ‘You know why. It must be so hard for you.’ A little tear had gathered in the corner of one of her bovine brown eyes. ‘I – I’d like you to be godmother though,’ she murmured, as if she was bestowing a great gift. ‘It might, you know. Help.’
‘Great,’ I smiled mechanically. And I was pleased for her, of course I was, but nothing helped, least of all this, though she was well-intentioned; and I knew it was impossible for anyone else to understand me. I was trapped in my own distant land, very far from shore; I’d been there since Ned closed his eyes for the last time and slipped quietly from me. ‘Thank you.’ And I hugged her again, just so I didn’t have to look at the pity scrawled across her face.
‘If it’s a boy,’ she started to say, ‘we might call him—’
I heard an imaginary phone ringing in my room upstairs. ‘Sorry, Nat. Better get it, just in case—’ I disappeared before she could finish.
Whilst they were at church, I gathered my few bits and pieces and wrote her a note. I was truly sorry to leave Ella, I loved spending time with her, but I needed to be home now. I needed to be far, far away from my well-meaning sister and the suffocating little nest she called home.
And so here I lay, alone again. In the next room, the phone rang and I heard a calm voice say ‘Leave us messages, please.’
My voice, apparently; swiftly followed by another – male, low. Concerned. I attempted to roll out of bed, but moving hurt so much I emitted a strange ‘ouf’ noise, like the air being pushed from a ball. I lay still, blinded by pain, my ribs still agony from where I’d apparently fallen on Friday. When it subsided, I tried again. Wincing, I stumbled into the other room, snatched the receiver up.
‘Hello?’
‘You’re all right.’ The accented voice was relieved. ‘Thank God.’
‘Who – who is this?’ I caught my reflection in the mirror. Round-eyed, black-shadowed; face scraped like a child’s. My bare feet sank into the sheepskin rug I hated.
‘Claudie. It’s Eduardo. I didn’t know if you’d be there. Your sister called. I thought you might be away.’
‘Away?’ My brow knitted in concentration. ‘Eduardo.’ I made a concerted effort. Eduardo was head of the Academy. In my mind I conjured up an office, papers stacked high, a man in a grey cashmere v-neck, big hands, dark-haired, moving the paperweight, restacking those papers. ‘Oh, Eduardo.’ I sat heavily on the sofa. ‘No, I’m here. Sorry. I think I – I find it hard to wake up sometimes.’
I had got used to a little help recently, the kind of pharmaceutical help I could accept without complication.
‘I’m ringing round everyone to check. You’ve obviously heard what has happened?’
‘About the explosion? Yes,’ my hands clenched unconsciously. ‘Awful.’
‘Awful,’ he agreed. ‘They have only just let us back into the school. But – well, it’s worse than awful, Claudie, I’m afraid.’ I heard his inhalation. ‘There is some very bad news.’
Bad news, bad news. Like a nasty refrain. I stood very quickly, holding my hands in front of me as if warding something off.
‘I’m sorry.’ I sensed his sudden hesitation. ‘I should have thought. Stupid.’ He’d be banging his own head with the heel of his hand, the dramatic Latino. ‘My dear girl—’
‘It’s OK.’ I leant against the wall. ‘Just tell me, please.’
‘It’s Tessa.’
‘Tessa?’ My cracked hands were itching.
Tessa, with her slight limp and her benign face, her hair pulled back so tight. My friend Tessa who had somehow seen me through the past year; with whom I had bonded so strongly through our shared sense of loss. My skin prickled as if someone was scraping me with sandpaper.
‘Tessa’s dead, Claudie. I’m so sorry to have to tell you.’
Absently, I saw that my hand was bleeding, dripping gently onto the cream rug.
Emboldened by my silence, he went on. ‘Tessa was killed outside the Academy. Outright.’ He paused. ‘She wouldn’t have known anything, chicita.’
‘She wouldn’t have known anything,’ I repeated stupidly. My world was closing to a pin-point, black shadows and ghosts fighting for space in my brain.
‘I’m so sorry to have had to tell you,’ he said, and sighed again. ‘I am just pleased for you that you are not here this week. It is a very bad atmosphere. I think it’s good your sister has arranged for you to have this time off.’ I hadn’t had much choice in the matter: Natalie had taken over. ‘Try to rest, my dear. See you soon.’
Tessa was dead. Outside the birds still sang; somewhere nearby a child laughed, shrieked, then laughed again. The rain had stopped. Someone else was playing The Beatles, Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds; Lennon’s voice floated through the warm morning, like dust motes on dusk sunshine. Death was in the room again. I closed my eyes against the cruel world, a world that kept on turning nonetheless, a sob forming in my throat. I imagined myself now, stepping off the bus, fumbling with the clasp of my bag, raising my hand in greeting, happy to see her …
The birds still sang, but my friend Tessa was dead – and I couldn’t help feeling I should have saved her.
TUESDAY 18TH JULY SILVER
7 a.m., and Silver was exhausted already. It had been a horrendous weekend; the worst kind of police work. Counting the dead, identifying and naming the corpses: or rather, what was left of them. Recrimination and finger-pointing and statistics that meant nothing. Contacting the families, working alongside the belligerent and somewhat over-sensitive Counter Terrorist Branch; waiting for the Explosives Officers who were struggling due to the amount of debris caused by the Hoffman Bank partially collapsing, hampered by torrential rain all weekend.
Images stuck to the whiteboards at the end of the office made him wince; the carnage, the tangle of metal, strewn rubber, clothing, the covered dead and the walking wounded. The life-affirming sight of human helping human – only wasn’t it a little late? Too late to make a difference: one human had hated another enough to do this – possibly … A gas leak was still being mooted, but Silver knew the drill, knew this was to prevent panic spreading through the city, another 7/7, another 9/11, the stoic Londoner weary of it all already. The Asians fed up of ever-wary eyes, the Counter Terrorist Branch overworked and frankly baffled. How do you keep tabs on invisible evil that could snake amongst us unseen? Silver was hanged if he knew.
He yawned and stretched as fully as his desk allowed. That bastard Beer was calling him, whispering lovingly in his ear over and again. He needed a long cold pint, smooth as liquid gold down his thirsty aching throat. He swore softly and checked the change in his pocket. Out in the corridor, he bought himself his fifth diet Coke of the night and unwrapped another packet of Orbit. Distractions. He wished he felt fresher, more alert, but he felt tired and rather useless. However much he preferred work to home, he wished himself there now, asleep, oblivious to the world’s inequities. Leaning against the wall wearily, he drank half the can in one go.
Craven popped his balding head out of the office. ‘Your wife’s on the phone.’
‘Ex-wife,’ Silver said mechanically.
In an exercise of male camaraderie, Craven grimaced. ‘Sorry. Ex-wife.’
Silver checked his expensive Breitling watch. Following Craven, he leant over the desk for the receiver. It was early even for her.
‘Lana?’
There was a long silence. He rolled his eyes; he thought he heard a sniff. Lana never cried.
‘What is it, kiddo?’ he tried kindness. He had ignored so many things recently, he was stamping all over his ‘emotional intelligence’ apparently; the intelligence they’d been lectured on recently at conference.
‘Don’t call me that, Joe,’ Lana snapped. ‘It drives me bloody mad.’
Some things never changed. And he didn’t have time for emotional intelligence anyway. He relied on gut instinct.
‘Sorry.’ He almost grinned. ‘What is it, Allana?’
‘I saw her on the News.’
The hairs on his arms stood up. Not this again.
‘I couldn’t sleep so I got up. It was GMTV,’ she was breathless and angry. ‘She was just there, smiling. A photo. I saw her, Joe.’
He’d thought they were through this. ‘Don’t be daft, Lana.’ Through, and out the other side. He dropped his voice to little more than a whisper. ‘We’ve been over this a million times.’ Persuasive, comforting. ‘It’s not her. It can’t be.’
‘On the News. I was watching about the bomb.’
‘Explosion,’ again, he corrected automatically.
‘Explosion. Whatever.’ Her distress was palpable. ‘They had a separate item about missing kids. She’s a dancer. I saw her face.’
‘Whose face?’ He knew who; but he needed her to say it, needed to hear the name.
A gulp, as if she were swallowing air. ‘Jaime. Jaime Malvern.’
‘Lana. Are you drunk?’
‘Nooo,’ the vowel was a long hiss, drawn-out. ‘I am stone cold sober, Joseph. But it’s her. As sure as eggs is eggs.’
They used to laugh at that expression. They used to lie in bed, legs intertwined, and do all the egg expressions: ‘Eggs in one basket, don’t count your chicken eggs.’ They were young, they were in love. They thought they were hilarious. ‘Teach your grandmother to suck eggs.’
Neither of them was laughing now.
‘Lana. It can’t be Jaime, you know that. She’s dead, kid— sweetheart. She’s been dead a long time now.’
‘I know,’ she howled, and the pain in her voice pierced him in the old way. ‘I know she’s bloody dead, Joe.’
Of course she did. Of course Lana knew this better than anyone.
‘But I saw her, Joe. I’m not mad, and I’m not drunk. Not yet anyway. I saw her.’
He stood now. ‘Lana. Don’t. You’ve done so well.’
But she’d gone. He was talking to the air.
Silver didn’t believe his ex-wife’s claims that she’d seen Jaime; he’d heard it a million times before. Allana had been haunted by Jaime’s face every day for six years, obsessed since the accident – since the afternoon that changed their lives forever. The afternoon that ruined Lana irrevocably and finished Jaime’s forever.
Silver had tried his damnedest to bring his wife back to the present, tried and failed; he’d grown used to Allana’s distress and his own guilt. He’d attempted every tactic: therapy, rehab and finally anger, until eventually he knew she was beyond reach. He mourned his lost love – for too long; until finally the mourning turned to indifference as he accepted he could no longer connect. No one could really pierce that layer of pain; not even her own children.
Silver hung up the phone feeling weary of battle. Tired and flat, he was ready for his bed – but something nagged at him. Draining the final backwash of diet Coke and crunching the can in one hand, he sat at the computer and quickly scrolled through the gallery of faces that flashed up. First the missing from the explosion: a photo album of mostly smiling anonymity, gathered quickly by frenetic journalists, posing for graduation, wedding, family snaps. Mothers, sons, nieces, nephews. Many of the families still waiting for their worst fears to be confirmed. The mess that is identifying devastated bodies after fatal accidents. Fourteen dead; the death toll still rising.
He called up the general Missing folder. Nothing. Allana was mad as ever. Not mad, he corrected himself; obsessed. Yawning until his jaw ached, Silver reached the final screen – and then – on a separate page, that face.
With a violent stab of recognition, he clicked back; pulled her up to full-screen. Slightly blurred: pretty little heart-shape, vulnerable baby face – and yet oddly tough too. Long blonde curls, widely spaced light eyes, blue maybe, too knowing for their years. Leaning into another darker girl whose face had been cropped off.
Christ.
Lana was right. He felt a finger of cold horror hook the back of his collar. She looked just like Jaime Malvern. But she couldn’t possibly be. Jaime was long dead. Who then was this girl? A doppelganger?
A ghost …
TUESDAY 18TH JULY CLAUDIE
Someone woke me, banging at the door, banging and banging until I let them in. I was so groggy I could hardly see; looking at the face on my doorstep out of one sticky eye.
Francis.
‘You didn’t come last night,’ he said, ‘and then I heard about Tessa, poor angel. Mason called.’
Bloody Mason. I bet she couldn’t wait to spread the news.
‘So I came to you. I brought chai.’
He walked past me into the flat, his thermos of tea wafting fragrant scent into my living room. But I was a little perturbed. He’d never been here. Why was he here? Had I arranged it, and forgotten this too?
On Monday, after Eduardo’s call, I had gone back to bed and hidden. I couldn’t move, couldn’t function. I lay on the bed, on top of the duvet, entirely still, until I slept again. I dreamt of Tessa. I dreamt of Ned. I feared I was going down again. I had this overriding feeling I should have saved Tessa. I couldn’t save my son – but I could have saved my friend. What had she been so scared of? I kept thinking of the lost hours before Rafe’s; the thoughts went round and round until I felt like screaming.
‘It’s not good to break the treatments,’ Francis said now, perusing the room. ‘Let me pour you tea, and then lie on the sofa and relax. I brought my needles.’
Francis was the acupuncturist and hypnotist Tessa had introduced me to when I fell off the smoking wagon; when I couldn’t sleep after Will left, when the migraines got so bad. I was a mess. I’d been a mess since Ned. ‘He’s amazing, Claudie, really; he has the hands of a genius,’ Tessa said, and so I gave it a go. Actually, I suspected Tessa was slightly in love with him, although she’d never confessed as much. She’d met him on a yoga retreat in the Cotswolds last year, I thought, and extolled his virtues ever since; in the way people who are falling in love want to use the name of their newly beloved all the time, so did she, only I feared her love was not reciprocated. Still, half the staff at the Academy were now using Francis, including a once-sceptical Mason, so Tessa’s enthusiasm had done him no harm.
Francis was certainly a unique individual; dark hair with a mullet and a deeply cared-for goatee beard, black discs in his tribally pierced ears, a shark tooth round his neck but pushing fifty, I suspected. He was friendly and empathetic, but I couldn’t for one moment see the sexual appeal Tessa obviously did, though his needles undoubtedly worked.
I drank a little of his revolting tea out of courtesy and took my jewellery off first as Francis always requested. He believed the metal interfered with my chakras and who was I to argue? I hardly knew what a chakra was. And perhaps the acupuncture would help clear my head now. I put my necklace on the sideboard and lay down on the sofa.
‘You’re not wearing a nicotine patch are you?’ he murmured as he measured my arm with his own hand, and inserted two needles near my elbow.
‘No,’ I shook my head.
‘Good girl.’ Francis chose another needle from his little box, and jabbed suddenly. A searing pain shot through my wrist.
‘Ouch!’ That had never happened before.
Francis looked troubled and took the needle out. I thought his hand was shaking a little.
‘I’m so sorry, Claudia.’ He stroked his beard. ‘My own energy is a little depleted today, I fear.’
