One Step Too Far Read online

  “Wouldn’t you rather let me just waste away? Then you’d only have Emily to worry about. Isn’t that what you want?”

  Frances thought then of the dreadful day Caroline had entered the world, unexpected, alien, and how at the very moment of new life she had wished her youngest daughter dead. The memory had been buried for so long that Caroline’s question invaded Frances’s brain, hot and bright like a nuclear bomb, and jerked the whole horrible saga back to the surface. Caroline saw the expression on her mother’s face and understood unequivocally that the answer was yes.

  Frances felt denial, then shame, and then an overwhelming relief that at last she had shared her secret. The fact that it was with Caroline of all people didn’t actually matter. The poisonous choking ball of hate in her heart was expelled into the room, as if physically, allowing the love to flood in. They looked at each other, Frances with love at last, Caroline with desperation. And then Frances fell into her daughter’s bony arms and held her tenderly, for the very first time, 15 years too late to save either of them.

  9

  I wake up in my new room and it smells of paint. My sleep has been full of emulsioned visual canvases, splattered and raw, Pollock-like, and I can’t seem to get rid of them unless I open my eyes. My bed is comfortable enough although I’m not used to a single, and it feels strange not to lie with my back to my husband, apart from him, not touching yet knowing he was there, our marital bed having felt like the loneliest place in the world by the end. I try not to think about him or our son, instead I focus hard on my new surroundings and notice that the bedding is still stiffly new and feels almost good. The sun is leaking through the sheer white curtains and when I check my new phone it's still only six o’clock – they may look great but they’re useless at keeping the room dark. I wonder dully what I can do today. I’ve had such clear deadlines for the two days since I left – find somewhere to live, make my new room habitable – that today stretches in front of me, expansive, boyless, empty. I know I need to get a job soon, open a bank account, but somehow it all feels too much. My body tells me I’m tired, that I need time to recover from the upheaval and stress, from this latest trauma. I’m a survivor at heart, I guess. It’s too early to get up but I’m wide awake, so I scrabble under my bed and find Monday’s paper, the one I bought at Crewe. I prop up my new pillows against the white bumpy wall and open the pages. I read about a disease affecting yellow finches, making their throats swell so they can’t eat: half a million of them starved to death last year, it says. I try not to think about this, try not to picture them, but still my eyes fill and so I move on to the next story. A man has raped and killed his twelve year old niece, she only went round to watch the football and her aunt happened to be out, surely she’d be alive otherwise. I turn the page. A merchant banker has been convicted of murdering his wife’s lover, whilst they were all camping together in Brittany. A woman in a shop has been beaten by robbers with batons, it’s been caught on CCTV – it’s probably already available to watch on YouTube.

  I stop reading. The news is making me feel depressed again, adrift. I try to go back to sleep but my mind is too active, wired, thoughts of my golden boy keep drifting in, uninvited, and I’m worried that any progress I've made in the last two days will be dissipated here, in this blank white room. I didn’t bring a single one of my books from Chorlton and the novel I bought at Crewe is trashy, what was I thinking. I can’t face the bathroom again, I’d rather not even bother this morning, although I’m sweaty from the night. I’ll make sure I buy some flip-flops today to use in the shower, and maybe a wash bag that hangs on a peg and folds open, so I don’t have to put it down on any of the surfaces – that will help make the bathroom bearable, give me something to do. I’m restless still so I try the paper's review section this time. My mind won’t concentrate on any of the articles, and as I go to put it down I notice the Sudoku on the back, next to the crossword. I’ve never done Sudoku before, it always seemed such a total waste of time, yet that’s exactly what I want to do now, waste time, help make the gaping minutes go by. The level is moderate, it says, but although I try and try I can’t fill in a single number. It’s something to do with patterns, I remember my sister telling me (forget about her), and I keep staring until the random numbers swim, and then finally I’ve got it and I fill in my first number and I’m off. I’m good at maths but this has nothing to do with maths really. It's strangely compulsive and I keep going and it takes me ages and I’m on a roll now and then in the very final box I find I have two 6’s but no 3. I must have made a mistake, somewhere along the line, but although I try for ages it’s too hard to unravel, and that’s how my life feels – it was all going along so beautifully and then I got two 6’s and no 3 and now it’s fucked up, irreparable. The tears come again, silent, gliding, ominous, and I see the room for what it is – a grotty horrible little room in a grotty horrible house in a grotty horrible part of London. I see myself for what I am, a stinking self-centred coward who has run away from Ben and Charlie, rather than stay and face up to things. I miss Charlie in particular right now, the still-baby smell of him, the feeling of holding him tight, despite him trying to wriggle out away from me, and us both enjoying it anyway – me for trying, him for knowing that I’ve tried, that I love him.

  There’s a soft knock on the door. I startle and wipe my eyes, and Angel pokes her head around.

  “Oh, you are there babe, just checking you were OK.” She looks around. “Jesus Christ, have you been on Changing Rooms? This place looks amazing. Can you do mine next?”

  “Yeah, I went on a bit of a mission yesterday,” I say, as brightly as I can manage. “Chanelle seems OK about it too – it’s better isn’t it?” I look at her glitzy top. “Are you going out?”

  “No, I’ve just come in babe. I keep funny hours in my job. I’m starving, though. D’you fancy going out for breakfast – there’s a cafe round the corner that’s not too bad?”

  “I’d love to,” I say, instantly feeling better.

  “I’ll just get changed then, give me two secs.” She disappears.

  I jump out of bed and survey the clothes in my new wardrobe: two pairs of jeans, one interview outfit, two T-shirt dresses, some linen trousers, expensive belted grey jacket (ruined), a few tops, a denim skirt, a cable knit jumper. Nothing feels right anymore. I choose jeans and a mid-blue jersey cowl-neck top and I feel boring, un-Catlike, although I don’t know who Cat is yet. Ten minutes later Angel reappears. She has changed from her short black skirt and red satin blouse (is that her uniform?) into a floaty white Indian cotton dress and she has tied her ash blonde hair back, it’s just long enough, and gentle tendrils escape. She looks effortlessly casual and stylish and innocent. Her heart-shaped face is small and guileless and she doesn’t look like she should work in a casino. I realise I don’t know what a croupier does look like, apart from in Oceans 11 and that doesn’t count.

  “Come on, babe,” says Angel and I follow her quietly, gratefully, down the steep threadbare stairs, through the trainers- and coat-stuffed porch, past the debris-filled front garden, onto the sallow early morning street.

  10

  Angela shoved her way through people’s legs, past the stools that were as high as her, away from the bar, towards the stage. As she moved the odd hand came down and ruffled her hair affectionately, as if she were a dog. The punters were used to seeing a small blonde girl in here these days, and Angela had grown used to them, mostly. She still hated the choking smoke and the adultness of the club, dimly aware that this was no place for a child, and some of the men looked at her in a way she didn’t yet understand but knew she didn’t like, and sometimes they even squeezed her bottom as she passed. But she’d worked out how to pass the time in here now – sitting on a bar stool drying beer glasses when her favourite barmaid Lorraine was on, she seemed to really appreciate the help; or playing with her mummy’s make-up in the tiny dressing room behind the stage, being careful to cover her tracks in the lipsticks and rouge so Ruth woul
dn’t find out and go mad; or sometimes playing dominoes with Uncle Ted, if she could persuade him. It wasn’t fun coming here anymore though, she was bored of it and it made her tired for school – but now she was older her mother had started bringing her along to jobs more often, she wouldn’t shell out for babysitters, and she supposed it was better than being left at home alone.

  By the time Angela reached the front Ruth had disappeared and the pianist was already packing up his sheet music. It was quicker now for Angela to get to the dressing room via the stage than cut round the back of the bar. As she raised her arms to climb onto the too-high boards one of the customers said, “Need help, sweetheart?” and he lifted her above his head and she clambered up on her hands and knees. She stood up, straightened her red spotty dress to cover her knickers, and ran diagonally to the left, as fast as she could.

  “Hello Mummy,” said Angela shyly, as she poked her head around the dressing room’s curtain. She adored her mummy but was never quite sure what mood Ruth would be in, what reception she'd get.

  “Hello angel!” said Ruth, as she bent down and hugged her tight. “Have you been a good girl for your Uncle Ted?” She was wearing a tight sequined midnight blue dress and had big hair and kohled eyes and Angela thought she was the most beautiful mummy in the whole wide world, with the most beautiful heart-breaking voice that even Angela recognised cracked with sadness and a life lived.

  “Yes, Mummy. Can we go home soon, Mummy? I’m tired.”

  “I know, sweetheart, I’ll just get out of this dress and then we’ll have one drink with Uncle Ted and go straight home.”

  “But I want to go home now, Mummy,” Angela said.

  “I told you darling girl, one quick drink and then we’ll be off. Mummy’s thirsty after all that singing.”

  “Please Mummy, I want to go home. I want to go to bed."

  “I said no, Angela,” said Ruth. “Shall I get you a lemonade?”

  “NO!” yelled Angela, out of control suddenly as the tiredness took hold. “I want to go home NOW.”

  “Don’t you talk to me like that, young lady,” said Ruth. “We’ll go home when I say so.”

  Angela stopped screaming and pulled herself up into the only chair in the room, a proper dressing table chair, with gold legs and padded arms, covered in faded pink velvet with a single kidney-shaped stain on the seat. She dangled her legs sullenly and stayed silent – she knew not to argue with her mother when she took that tone with her, she didn’t want to get a whack.

  Ruth changed out of her evening dress and stood before the mirror in her matching bra and pants, in lacy petrol blue, still wearing her high heels, still sexy. She wiped at her armpits with a damp flannel and sprayed antiperspirant under her arms, across her still-flat stomach and around the tops of her legs. Then she put on plain black Capri trousers and a cap-sleeved tight black top. She left her hair and make-up as it was, and in this light and with the way she walked she could have been a raven-haired Marilyn Monroe. She took Angela's hand, firmly rather than roughly, she obviously wasn’t too cross with her this time, and they made their way along the corridor and out into the smoky club, where Ted was waiting for them at the bar. Ted bought Angela a lemonade and a packet of prawn cocktail crisps, and Ruth’s one drink turned to three or four, and Angela finally fell asleep, jack-knifed over a barstool with her head resting between her thin little arms on the beer-sopped counter-top.

  11

  I sit in the cafe with Angel and I'm surprised at how hungry I am. It’s run by a nice old Greek couple and the coffee is good but the food is great. It’s like I haven’t eaten in months, and I wolf down egg and bacon, mushrooms, beans, fried tomatoes, toast, my stomach telling me there’s more living in store for me yet, even if my heart doesn't believe it. Angel seems tired when you look closer, but she retains that sweetness at the core that only some people have, and it transcends the bags under her eyes.

  “What are you up to today, babe?” says Angel.

  “I don’t know, I need to go food shopping, maybe get to the bank if I can face it, and then tomorrow I need to start looking for a job.” The tasks seem insurmountable.

  I pause, try to lighten the mood. “One thing I must do today though is buy some flip-flops – how the hell d'you cope in that bathroom?”

  Angel laughs. “I try to shower at work mostly. And anyway I’m not here for long babe, I just needed somewhere where my bastard ex-boyfriend couldn’t find me. I wouldn’t normally live in such a pit, but needs must and all that.”

  “Oh.” I look down.

  “What’s your excuse, babe?” says Angel gently. The kindness pricks at my eyes.

  “Same as you really, I suppose. And I don’t mean to sound like a weirdo, I know we’ve only just met, but I thought it would be all right in that hideous house, with you there.”

  “Don’t worry, babe,” Angel says. “I’m not going just yet.”

  I feel ridiculous that I’ve formed such an attachment to Angel, but she doesn’t seem to mind – I get the sense that she’s used to looking after people, that she likes it, likes to feel needed. She seems in some ways more grown up than I’ve ever been, although I must have 10 years on her, and I used to be a wife, a mother.

  “Well, we’ll have to keep in touch when you do go,” I say limply.

  “Of course we will, babe. Anyway, I’m here now and there’s no-one else in the house I’d want to hang out with.” She smiles at me and there’s wickedness in her eyes. She puts on a terrible American accent. “Don’t you worry Miss Brown. You and me, we’re gonna have us some fun.”

  I cheer up, like a screaming child who’s been given an ice-cream, and although Angel is done with eating she's happy to stay, and so we sit for longer and order more coffees and chat about everything and nothing, and I finish the buttered toast that’s piled up between us, every last piece.

  When we get home, Angel goes straight to bed as she’s been working all night, and as I don’t know what else to do I check out the kitchen, just to see if it’s empty. I haven’t yet sussed out who in the house does what, when or whether they work, who’s going to be in when. As there’s no living room I assumed there’d always be plenty of people in the kitchen, but so far it’s been fairly quiet. I’ve not seen Bev, the girl from Barnsley who had her chocolate stolen, since that first evening, but she’s here now, busy at the sink. It’s too late to not go in, she’s heard me. She turns her head over her shoulder and beams at me. “Morning!” she says. “Fucking dogs, I’ve just stood in fucking dog shit. I don’t know why people have the little fuckers, they could at least pick their crap up but people round here are so fucking IGNORANT.” I realise that Bev has her wooden clog in her hand, and she’s scraping at it with a table knife, over a stack of dirty dishes in the sink. She sees my face.

  “Oh, don’t worry, washing up liquid is amazing stuff, it gets rid of 99.9% of germs. I read an article on it, it's all fine.”

  I’m at a loss how to respond to this. Australian Erica enters into the pause. She’s wearing an aubergine skirt suit that shows off her incredibly petite figure and her plain face is thick with make-up and her dark hair is pulled up in one of those big hair clamps. I smile at her but she just scowls at me, then she goes over to the sink and sees what Bev’s doing.

  “For God’s sake, Bev!” says Erica.

  “Oh, get over it Erica, I’m going to clean up afterwards.”

  “That is DISGUSTING,” says Erica, and although I don’t much like her I have to agree with her on this.

  Bev laughs and carries on cleaning her shoe. Erica turns on her kitten heels and stomps out of the kitchen, slamming the door.

  “Good luck with the interview,” calls Bev cheerily, then under her breath mutters, “You sour-faced cunt.” I’m usually offended by that word, but I find myself sympathising in this case, almost wanting to laugh.

  I hesitate but she seems friendly. “Bev,” I say. “Do you know where I can buy flip-flops round here, you know, the rubber ones?�
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  “What? D'you think you’re in fucking Skegness love? D’you want a fucking rubber ring too?” Bev laughs at her own joke, but I don’t mind, I like Bev, with her dreadful language and total disregard for social niceties. It’s refreshing.

  “Try down the Nags Head, there’s loads of cheap pound shops, and shoe shops too, you might get something. While you’re there, can you get some bin-liners, big strong ones, we’re always running out.” This is the first profanity-free sentence I’ve heard from Bev. I acquiesce meekly and leave the dog-shit stench of the kitchen.

  As Bev predicts, I struggle to find rubber flip-flops in Holloway. I look for a hanging wash bag too but people don’t seem to know what I’m talking about when I ask about that. Once I’ve exhausted my search I don’t know what to do again – what are runaways meant to do with their time? I decide to explore, try to get my bearings in my new neighbourhood, take my mind off things. I head off the main road and walk for what feels like miles in vaguely the direction of home, through worn-out streets full of satellite dishes and crumbling stonework and wheelie bins. The odd house has full on bars on the windows and it seems to me like a horrid way to live, they must be in their own private jail too. As I meander aimlessly, I turn left out of another sad street and without warning find myself in a square full of grand well-kept houses with a beautiful garden in the middle, and I sit on the grass and tilt my head to feel the sun on my face and it feels nice, bearable, it’s not quite so hot today. A smartly-dressed mother sits on a bench and spoons a yogurt towards an invisible child somewhere in the depths of a bright red buggy, and her smile is wide and delighted and I find that I’m just about OK with this scene, if I look away quickly. Two hot-looking young men in suit trousers and open shirts eat sandwiches out of thick waxed paper swilled down with cans of Diet Coke. I lie down with my head on my bag and I am so exquisitely tired it feels like I’ll never get up again, it’s like I’m being pulled through the grass to the earth’s core, to the land of forgetting, into endless sleep...