Authors: C. L. Taylor
I didn’t go to Liam’s house last night. Just as I was about to announce my intention to take the dog for a walk, Brian shot out of his seat and disappeared into the hallway. When he returned a couple of minutes later, he was wearing his jacket with Milly’s lead dangling from his hand. He said the briefest of good-byes to Oliver and then he was gone, out of the porch door like a shot.
Oli raised an eyebrow. “Not like Dad to take Milly for a walk.”
I said nothing. Instead I offered him another cup of tea and more cookies, but he shook his head, said it was getting late and he needed to get back to Leicester.
I glance at the kitchen clock. Brian left for work ages ago and it’s still only 8:50 a.m. If Liam is anything like Oliver was as a teenager, there’s no way he’ll be awake at this time during half term. I should visit Charlotte first and then go and see him. I put down my cup of coffee and stand up. But what if he goes out for some reason and I miss him? Better to try and get hold of him first and
then
go and see Charlotte. Maybe if I take the long route to his house, he’ll be awake by the time I get there. It’ll be at least 9:30 if I go through the park.
No, I change my mind again as I step into the cloakroom and reach for my coat. I should ring first. Or maybe I should text. That way I won’t disturb his family. But I don’t have a mobile number for him, just a landline.
Charlotte would though.
I fly up the stairs and head for her room, then pause in the doorway. Where’s her mobile? I haven’t seen it since before her accident.
I didn’t touch Charlotte’s room for two weeks after she was hospitalized, not one thing. Not the mascara-stained makeup removal pads strewn across the dressing table, the dirty bras and underwear kicked under the bed, or the magazines scattered across the floor. Nothing. I thought that if I tidied up, I’d regret wiping all traces of her personality from her room if she never woke up. It sounds ridiculous, but I was in shock. How else could I have failed to notice that her phone wasn’t in the clear plastic bag of her things that the nurse handed me? It contained all the normal things she’d take out with her—purse, keys, makeup, and hairbrush—but no phone. Why? Like most teenagers, she was umbilically attached to her mobile.
Three weeks after her accident, my shock finally dissipated, and with it my insistence that Charlotte’s room remain untouched. Instead of seeing the mess as a sign of normality, it became a morbid shrine. My daughter wasn’t dead—she was just ill—so I tidied up, ready for her return. And that’s when I found the diary.
I throw open the wardrobe doors and root around in the pockets of some of her clothes. There are several items I’ve never seen before—a jacket that looks like it’s Vivienne Westwood and an expensively cut dress with a VB label. I stare at it for several seconds. What’s Charlotte doing with a Victoria Beckham dress? I push it along the rack and turn my attention to the pockets of a pair of Diesel jeans instead. I’ll have to have a word with Oli the next time I see him.
I close the wardrobe door. The bus driver didn’t mention anything about a mobile phone and neither did any of the other eye witnesses, and the police immediately cordoned off the area so if it was lying crushed or broken nearby, they’d have found it. So it must be in the house somewhere.
Charlotte must have deliberately hidden it. And if she did that, then maybe she had something to hide.
I yank open Charlotte’s sock drawer and root around at the back. Nothing. I tip up the box of folders and schoolwork under her desk and sift through the papers. No phone. It’s not hidden in any of her shoes or boots or secreted behind the novels on her bookshelf. I return to the sock drawer, squeezing each bundle, but still find nothing. I search the room for fifteen, twenty minutes, going through every drawer, bag, and shoe box, but there’s no sign of her mobile.
Where is it?
I reach under the pillow for her diary and flick through the pages. I must have read it ten, twenty times, but whatever secret she was keeping, she didn’t share it with her diary. She shared other worries—anxieties about her weight, nervousness about sleeping with Liam for the first time, concern about exam results, and indecisiveness about the career she wanted—but nothing huge, nothing so terrible she’d consider taking her own life.
I close the book and tuck it back under her pillow. There are no answers here. Maybe Liam will have some.
***
White Street is completely deserted apart from a bad-tempered ginger tom who hisses at us as we walk past. I’ve been to Liam’s house dozens of times, but I rarely go in. I normally sit in the car, engine running, as Charlotte rushes in to grab him so I can take them bowling or to the cinema. She never stayed overnight with him and he never stayed at our house, but I told her that, if she was still with Liam when she turned sixteen, I’d accompany her to the doctor so she could go on the pill. Then, once it was safe, her father and I would go out for the evening and she and Liam could have the house to themselves. I thought I was being very reasonable (or “ridiculously liberal” according to Brian), but Charlotte told me it was the “grossest thing she’d ever heard” and that, if she wanted her parents to know when she was having sex, she’d put an ad in the local paper.
I open the gate of the blue house at number fifty-five. The front garden looks lovely. The beds are awash with color, not a single weed to be seen. Claire, Liam’s mum, must have been very busy. What I’d give for her green fingers.
I knock lightly when I reach the front door. The curtains are closed in the living room, but I can make out the shadowy shape of a person moving about. I knock again, louder this time, and keep an eye on the curtains. A moment later, they twitch and a pair of bright blue eyes peers out at me, then they’re swiftly pulled shut again. I hear the sound of a wooden floor creaking, and then the front door swings open. Liam Hutchinson, Charlotte’s seventeen-year-old boyfriend, stands in front of me in nothing but his navy-and-white-striped boxer shorts. He looks confused, so I smile warmly.
“Hello, Liam.”
He nods. “Mrs. Jackson.”
“Could I come in? I was wondering if we could have a little chat.”
***
It feels strange to be sitting in the Hutchinson’s living room. I’ve never been in here before, and I can’t stop myself from staring around, drinking in the unusual lithograph prints on the walls, the color-coordinated scatter cushions, and the large, expensive-looking rug in front of the original Victorian fireplace. Liam is slumped on the sofa on the other side of the room, his knees spread wide. If he finds this situation odd, he isn’t letting on. We’ve been sitting here, sneaking looks at each other, for the last couple of minutes, neither of us saying a word. I rehearsed my opening line dozens of times on my way over, but now the time has come to say it, my mouth has gone dry.
“So…” I manage at last. “You’re probably wondering why I’m here.”
He shrugs. “Something to do with Charlotte?”
“Yes. Have you been to see her? I’m surprised we haven’t crossed paths.”
“No.” He picks at the ivory-and-gold throw covering his chair, plucking out the metallic threads and then dropping them on the floor. His mother will have a fit when she gets home. “I haven’t seen her. I didn’t think I’d be allowed.”
“Really?” I sit forward. “Because you’re not a relative? That’s fine. Friends
and
family are allowed in and”—I smile warmly—“you’re more than a friend.”
He shifts in his seat. “No, I’m not.”
“Sorry. I meant—you’re her boyfriend.”
“No. I’m not.”
I frown, certain I must have misheard him. “I’m sorry. I thought you just said—”
“We’re not going out anymore.” He glances away as though embarrassed. “Charlotte dumped me.”
“No!”
I can’t believe it. Charlotte ended it?
Charlotte
did? I felt sure that if anyone had called time on the relationship, it would have been Liam. She idolized him. Tall, dark, two years older than her, handsome in a scruffy hair-in-his-eyes sort of way, and in a band, she’d almost collapsed with excitement a year ago when one of his friends approached one of her friends in the school canteen to tell her that Liam thought she was “fit.”
She didn’t give the slightest hint that anything was wrong in their relationship, although…I look from Liam to the clock on the mantelpiece, distracted by the tick-tick-tick filling the room…and time slips away.
It’s three weeks before Charlotte’s accident—a Saturday afternoon—and she’s just returned from a shopping trip in town. I’m in the living room, reading, when I hear the door to the porch open. I call out, asking her if she’s bought anything nice, but I’m ignored. I don’t ask again, but I do keep an eye on the open living room door. Seconds later, Charlotte slams up the stairs, looking white as a ghost. I call after her, asking if she’s okay, but the only reply I receive is the sound of a bedroom door slamming. I half rise from the sofa, unsure what to do. Charlotte’s not one for mollycoddling, especially when she’s upset. She won’t let me hug her and flinches if I so much as stroke her arm. She’s stressed; all the kids are. You just have to stand at the school gates for a couple of minutes to work that out. Their exams are fast approaching and coursework is mounting up. Charlotte even had to go into school over the holidays so her teacher could help her complete it on time. I sink back into the sofa. I haven’t been sleeping well recently. My nightmares have returned, and the last thing I need is a screaming match with a fifteen-year-old.
She
knows
where
I
am
, I think as I pick my book back up again.
“Did you split up on a Saturday?” I ask Liam. “About nine weeks ago?”
He runs a hand over his face. “No, it was…” He pauses and I sense that he’s struggling to suppress his emotions. “She ended it the day before her accident.”
“Why?” I lean forward in my seat, my hands gripping my knees. Why didn’t I contact him sooner? It’s as though I’ve been sleepwalking since Charlotte’s accident—longer than that—and I’m only just waking up. Splitting up with her boyfriend
has
to be the reason she stepped in front of the bus. You never feel heartache as keenly as you do when you’re young. You think it’ll destroy you and that you will never love, or be loved, again. She didn’t write about it in her diary though.
Liam stands up, crosses the room, and picks up his guitar from the stand next to the bookcase. He sits back down and strums a few chords.
“Liam?” It’s as though he’s forgotten I’m in the room. “Why did Charlotte end your relationship? How was she?”
He looks at me blankly.
“When she ended your relationship, how was she?”
He shakes his head. “I don’t know. I wasn’t there.”
“Sorry?”
He looks back at his guitar, strums a few more chords, then slaps the strings with the palm of his hand, silencing the sound, then looks across at me. “She dumped me by
text
.”
I can sense that he doesn’t want to talk about it. That he wants me to leave. But I can’t. “What did she say? In her text? If you don’t mind me asking.”
“Not much.” He reaches into the side of the sofa, and Milly starts to her feet as a small, black, plastic object whizzes through the air and lands on the sofa beside me. Liam’s phone. I look at him, to check it’s okay for me to go through it. He nods then looks back at his guitar.
Charlotte
the open message is titled. I read it then look at Liam in surprise.
“That’s it?”
He nods.
I look back at the text message:
It’s over between us Liam. If you love me you’ll never contact me again.
“Did you ask why?”
Liam doesn’t answer. He’s staring at the carpet, tapping his foot repeatedly.
“Liam?”
“What?” He doesn’t look up.
“Did you contact her?”
“Of course I did.” He moves as though he’s about to put his guitar on the ground then changes his mind. He hugs it to his chest instead, the side of his cheek pressed against the fret board. “You don’t get a text message dumping you out of the blue like that and not ring up to ask what the fuck’s going on, do you? Not if you still love the person.”
Milly snuffles at my feet.
“What did Charlotte say?”
“She didn’t.” Liam looks at me blankly, like the fight has gone out of him. “She wouldn’t answer her phone. I texted her, texted her loads, but she didn’t text back. Not once.” He shakes his head. “I know she’s your daughter, but I didn’t deserve that, Mrs. Jackson. I didn’t deserve to get dumped by
text
with no explanation and then get ignored like I didn’t even fucking exist.”
I’m torn. Part of me wants to cross the divide between us and wrap Liam in my arms and take away the hurt. The other part wants to ask if they argued, if he did anything to warrant Charlotte ending the relationship in such a brutal way. I decide to do neither. He looks close to tears, and I don’t want to upset him more than I already have. Not if I want him to talk to me again. I stand up and pull on Milly’s lead so she rises too.
“I’m sorry, Liam,” I say. “I had no idea about any of that. Charlotte didn’t breathe a word.”
He sighs heavily, then crosses his arms and looks away. Conversation over.
***
It’s only when I’m halfway home that I realize I didn’t bring up the one subject I’d traipsed all the way over to White Street to discuss. Sex. There’s no way I can turn back and knock on the door again, not with Liam the way he was when I left. I don’t know what drove Charlotte to do what she did, but I can’t help but feel that it was cruel, even for a teenager. But maybe Liam had done something to deserve it? Sometimes you have to escape from a relationship as stealthily and quietly as you can.
“Here we are, Milly,” I say as I fit the key in the lock, turn it, and twist the handle of the porch door. “Home again. Home ag—”
My voice catches in my throat. There’s a postcard, picture side up, on the mat. I start to shake as I reach down to pick it up.
“Stop it, Sue,” I tell myself. “Stop overreacting. It’s just a postcard.” But as I turn it over in my hands and read what’s written on the other side, my ears start to ring. My vision clouds and I grab the doorframe, blinking hard to try and dispel the white spots that have appeared before my eyes, but I know it’s too late. I’m going to faint.