Lies Like Love (25 page)

There was so much he needed to say to her. But it was like treading a path through fire. She could flare at any moment, burn him with her words. It had happened before, the heat searing her cheeks, her eyes flashing bright with tears. It was clear she didn’t want to be here; he’d thought she’d love it, but she hadn’t smiled once. Leo thought about his mum. If someone said something against her. That she was a pushy bitch. That she had hurt him. If Graham asked Leo who was responsible for his breakdown. Not that Graham ever had, it wasn’t his job to apportion blame, he said. But what would Leo say? Would he just say, ‘My mother,’ and leave it at that? He didn’t think that would be right or fair. What about everything she’d given him? Did he just throw that on the heap? Pretend none of it was worth anything?

‘We should get going,’ Audrey said. He knew what that meant. The binbag of clothes in her room at the farm was a crumpled rebuke, waiting for her return, reminding him that he hadn’t done enough. As soon as they got back, she was going to leave. She nudged him again, waiting for an answer. No one else had ever fitted right next to him, like this. No one else had made him feel like she did.

They were on the beach, drinking coffee from his flask, huddled up in their coats. It wasn’t warm enough to
sunbathe, barely warm enough to be outside. You might say they were stupid to be here at all. Leo pushed that thought aside.
Carpe diem
, Graham said; Leo didn’t give a shit about clichés, because there was a lot of truth in those words. Perhaps now was the time to tell her he loved her. It didn’t come out like that.

‘So, you’re going back, then?’

That question, his voice so bitter and unkind. He hadn’t meant it like that, and it ruined the moment. Totally. She edged away, just a little, over the rock, sliding on seaweed like a mermaid ready to slip back into the sea. The waves crashed closer, storming the beach, then hissing away.

‘Yeah, I reckon.’ She stared out, not meeting his eyes, as if the yearning horizon held everything she needed.

‘Would it make any difference if I asked you not to?’

She didn’t answer. She didn’t want to talk, but it didn’t matter now; he’d started and had to finish. He was going to say it. What did he have to lose?

‘Audrey, if you go back, I’m scared about what’ll happen.’

‘What do you mean?’ The fire in her was rising; he could see it on her neck, fingers of rage creeping up towards her face, obliterating the health in her cheeks and turning it to hate. He didn’t want her to hate him.

‘I mean. Life’s a bitch, Aud, but you don’t have to walk into its jaws; you don’t have to let it bite you. You can stay with me. Sue doesn’t mind; she likes having you.’

‘She doesn’t. She feels bad. She and Mum are friends; it puts her in a spot.’

‘Well, sod it. What does it matter what Sue thinks?’

Audrey stood up and spoke again: ‘Look, Leo. The reason I’m going back to the Grange is for Peter. You know I hate being away from him, and he’s my brother, so he comes first. I’ve decided.’

‘All right. I know that.’

‘So why do you think you can try and dictate what I should do? Like coming here, wasting the morning. I have stuff I need to get on with. I need to be with my brother.’

Waste the morning? Is that what she thought? And all this: the seals, the sea, the breakfast on the beach – she threw it back at him. Her words stung, catching on his skin like tiny hooks on a line.

‘I’ve been trying to help,’ Leo said.

‘But I don’t need any help. Just don’t get involved – keep out of it. I don’t need you fucking interfering in everything I do, do I?’

‘Audrey, this is mad.’ She flinched. ‘I mean, what the hell?’

She interrupted him again, not giving him time to finish a thought or a sentence: ‘This is it, Leo.’ And then, after a pause: ‘I don’t want to see you any more. Right?’

‘What?’ Where had this come from? Her eyes were a dull jade. Cruel. The wind blew and the clouds raced. Audrey kept talking, gesturing with her hands, holding them up, the words coming fast.

‘I mean it. You and me; just forget it. I don’t want to be with you any more. You crowd me; you get in my face. I just can’t take it.’ She turned her back on him, her shoulders sharp and hunched. ‘So. We’re finished. Don’t try and see me; don’t get in touch. I don’t need you. Right?’

‘Audrey,’ Leo said, a million words bubbling up in his throat to shout back at her, but she stormed up the beach towards the car park before he could put them into order.

‘Let’s go,’ she called, and he followed her, paces behind, the gap between them growing wide, like a hole opening up in the ground.

When we got back to the farm Leo walked straight inside. He didn’t say goodbye or help me with my bags. Sue frowned and hollered after him.

‘Leo, come on, where’s your manners?’ But he just walked away.

I understood; I didn’t blame him. It’s what I’d asked for. We were over. Sue drove me instead. The bag was too heavy to drag across the fields. I still couldn’t manage on my own and that made me dig my fingers into my thighs. Pathetic. I didn’t dare look back: what if I gave in? What if I shouted, ‘
No! Turn round. I’ve changed my mind
’? So I focused on Peter. I thought of his hug, how we’d play cards later the two of us, Snap maybe, or I’d teach him another game, then read his bedtime story. The thought should have made me happy but I was numb.

‘I’m glad you’ve made peace with your mum,’ Sue said as she drove, glancing at me, casual, and not.

‘Mmm.’

‘But what about Leo? You’ve not fallen out? Not you two.’

‘No. It’s my fault, Sue. Don’t blame Leo. We broke up.’ I swiped at my eyes. The sea was still on my skin, salty and strong. My hair knotted with the wind. But the memory of the boat, Leo close, holding me tight. That was cold.

‘I don’t blame anyone. I just hope you can still be friends. He’s been so happy recently.’

‘We are friends. Always will be.’ I swallowed, but my throat ached and everything was too close, too real, and about to explode. It wasn’t the time. I couldn’t do it here.

She dropped me in the driveway.

‘Thanks, Sue. For everything. It was so kind of you to have me. Sorry for just landing on you like that.’

She hugged me. ‘Come over often. I’ll miss you too.’

She had to prise herself away; I didn’t want to let go. She was all I had left of him.

‘Say hi to your mother from me. I’ll give her a ring in the week,’ Sue said, stepping back. ‘Tell her it’s been a pleasure. And I’m glad you’ve made up.’ She smiled; she really thought that was it.

‘I will,’ I called as she hopped back into the car and, wheels spinning on the gravel, drove away.

And then I picked up the black binbag, and my school bag and walked towards the Grange. The moat sang behind me, circling, the water drawing closer, and Mum stood on the step, the door propped open to the dark.

Leo didn’t look at the Grange for days. He walked to and from the farm, his eyes on the horizon, towards the sea or school; anywhere but there. But it still loomed in his consciousness; he still felt its presence, a hard darkness in the distance that couldn’t be reached. The land expanded and grew in his imagination until it was impossible to contemplate going anywhere near that place ever again.

After a couple of days – dull, dark days – Jen came up to him and stopped him in the corridor.

‘Where’s Aud? We’re supposed to be doing our presentation in History today,’ she said. ‘We need to go through it.’

‘She’s not staying with me any more.’ Leo tried to walk by, but Jen followed.

‘Oh, right. So she sorted things with her mum, did she?’ Her voice was curious, glad.

‘I guess so.’ Leo gritted his teeth.

‘That’s good, but why’s she not coming in?’

‘Who knows? Ask someone who gives a shit, Jen.’ Leo walked away from her, back down to the art block, but then he didn’t go in, and instead sat outside watching a group of kids arsing around with a football and tried to forget.

School broke up for the February half-term and
someone was having a Valentine’s party. Leo’s lip curled at the thought, but in the end it wasn’t as he expected. A huge converted barn filled with kids from the sixth form, Year Elevens too, very loud music and bottles and bottles of alcohol. Somebody’s parents had gone on holiday somewhere hot, and pissed-up girls and boys crawled over their property like ants. Leo spotted Jen dancing and avoided her. He found himself drinking Jack Daniel’s and coke and decided he liked it and would keep drinking it until he couldn’t see. There was dancing and loud music and darkness and every time the barn doors opened Leo stopped himself from looking round. Of course she wouldn’t come. There was no hope of that and he was a fool for thinking she would. Even if she did, he wouldn’t speak to her. It was too late for that.

Leo slumped on a sofa, still holding the coke bottle that was half full of whisky. Someone passed him a spliff and he took it and dragged in the sweet smoke. He’d wasted the last six months of his life, he thought then, hanging around like a love-sick idiot, mooning after a girl who didn’t give a shit. What an idiot he’d been; people must have been laughing their asses off – Leo the fool, Leo the mug – he thought, and when a girl called Lucy, who had long red hair and sweet brown eyes, sat beside him, he didn’t move away. He passed her the spliff and his drink. He put his arm round her.

‘So, you’re not seeing that Year Eleven any more,’ she shouted above the music.

‘No.’

‘I get it.’ She held up her hands, laughing. ‘Don’t go there, right?’

Leo nodded.

‘Well, I’m glad. I’ve fancied you for two years, Leo. Two whole years. And you never even looked at me!’ She was shaking her head and laughing at herself, and he thought she must be drunk too to say something like that. He swigged from the bottle again; it squashed and cracked under his fingers. Lucy’s face was very close. He ground out the spliff under his boot and when she kissed him he kissed her back. It really didn’t matter.

‘So, Leo, when are you going to make it up?’ Sue had avoided mentioning Audrey for weeks. ‘You’ve not seen her since the end of January. What’s the story?’ For the first time ever there was territory between them that couldn’t be crossed; like a minefield it stretched, dangerous and loaded with unasked questions. Now she was exasperated. He could hear it in her voice.

‘Let’s not talk about it.’ He gave a tight smile.

‘Have you spoken to your mum?’

‘What about?’

She sighed and turned back to the shopping she was emptying out of the car. He grabbed a couple of bags in each hand and hefted them into the house. His phone buzzed in his pocket. It would be Lucy again.

‘Well, I for one am sick of this. Poor Lorraine’s run ragged. You know Audrey’s not too well again. Why don’t you make it up? Just be friends, at least?’

‘Don’t think so.’

‘Suit yourself. But I’m going round. I’m going to see what we can do. Come if you like, or don’t. Right?’

He watched Sue stride out across the fields in her jeans and wellingtons and fleece. Usually Leo admired his aunt, but today he thought she was being a fool. Lorraine wouldn’t let her in. They’d been cut out. Audrey could
have things the way she wanted them; as far as he was concerned, they were finished for good.

Leo checked his message: Lucy wanted to meet, to go out to the pictures, then for a pizza. He put the phone back in his pocket without replying and turned up the record. Mick Jagger shouting ‘You Can’t Always Get What You Want’ broke the peace of the farm and he smashed out the chords on the piano, his teeth gritted, his jaw set.

And he was right. Three quarters of an hour later Sue was back. Red-cheeked, windswept. The kitchen door slammed behind her, the wind snatching it out of her hands. Leo stopped playing. She stood in the doorway of the living room and looked at him.

‘No one home. Stupid, I should have phoned first.’ Sue threw up her hands. ‘This place is filthy, Leo. Spring clean. And you can help.’

They spent the afternoon scrubbing every corner, as if that would clear things up.

School was busier than ever. All anyone talked about was exams. Revision. The future. Well, what did he have to lose? Leo got his head down and studied. When he came home from school there was the piano. He bought a ton of sheet music from a music shop in town and worked his way through it, learning by heart, testing himself. And sometimes he imagined his audience. Audrey, usually. Always. Her head tipped to one side, her face full of concentration, deep in thought. Then he’d slam the lid of the piano and try to forget her again.

Then the call came from his mum.

‘Leo.’ She was sharp.

He’d been on his way out for a run and didn’t need this conversation right now. Stretching his hamstrings, he answered, ‘Yeah? Hello to you too.’

‘I’m sorry. I’m not in the mood for small talk.’

‘You don’t say.’

‘No. Well, I just called your school, since you’ve been so unforthcoming regarding your university applications.’

‘Oh.’

‘Indeed, you may well say,
Oh
. Your tutor informs me the forms were never even filled in.’

‘Yeah –’

‘Would you care to explain?’

‘Look, at the time, I was thinking about other stuff and I thought about having a year out, staying on here with Sue, maybe going travelling. I don’t know. But, yes, you’re right – it was stupid.’

‘Was it Audrey?’ His mother clearly thought she already knew the answer to that question.

‘No.’

It wasn’t really a lie. He’d decided long ago that he needed more time. His mum’s voice softened.

‘All right, well, never mind. I just wish you’d spoken to me, or to your father – you can talk to us, you know. We could have helped you; we want to help you, but, well, you’ll soon be eighteen. You have to make your own mistakes some time, I suppose. I’ve been trying not to interfere.’

Leo had been pacing; wearing out her carpet, Sue would say. Now he sat down.

‘Thanks, Mum.’ He stared out of the window.

‘All right. But you will apply next year?’

‘Yes.’ Next year. But what about now? He sighed.

‘And how’s the piano?’ she said, trying to lift him, he knew.

‘Fine. No, it’s wonderful. Thank you.’

‘Will you play for me now?’ He laughed and stood up again, carried the phone to the living room and propped it on the window sill. Opened the lid and flexed his fingers. Mozart, he decided; everyone loved Mozart.

Jen Blake approached him at lunchtime a few weeks before Easter. She was one of the few who’d bothered to
be welcoming or remotely friendly to Audrey. Did it really take that much effort just to be nice?

‘So, what’s going on with Audrey?’ she said. An answer didn’t come fast and Jen stared at him, her face confused.

‘They said she’s not well. Miss Jones, did, I mean.’

‘Did she?’ Leo replied in the end.

‘So, I guess it’s bad?’

‘I wouldn’t know.’

Jen pursed her lips and folded her arms.

‘Is she coming back, or what?’

‘Not sure.’

‘But she’s missed loads,’ Jen insisted, her eyes following his when he tried to look away.

‘Sorry, Jen. I don’t know what Audrey’s plans are.’ Leo picked up his sandwich, really wanting the conversation to end. It was pointless, ridiculous. And he was angry now, struggling to swallow.

‘Look, you should ask her yourself,’ Leo said when it looked like Jen wasn’t going away. ‘It’s nothing to do with me.’

‘Oh, right. You’re with Lucy.’ Her voice was accusing. ‘I remember now – you don’t give a shit. You split up.’

‘Correct. We split up.’ The words were mean, but true. It was how he felt, spliced and sharp. Like a piece of wood smashed with an axe. And this feeling that he’d never see Audrey again, that maybe she didn’t even exist any more – it was horrible.
I am half sick of shadows
, he thought, and remembered reading her that poem, and how she’d sat up, leant forward for the words, rapt. Were there other girls
like that? Would he find someone else who would understand him like Audrey did? He thought of the times he’d held her and wanted to say something, something so she’d understand.
I love you
. That was it; that was all. He never had and now it was too late. Leo screwed the sandwich up in its wrappings and lobbed it into the bin.

‘Right, well, if you do see her, could you give her this?’ Jen said, handing over an envelope. ‘It’s an invitation to my party. Sweet sixteen. Not.’ She pulled a sarcastic face and Leo managed to laugh and took the paper. He almost said no. And then he reconsidered; he could drop it at the Grange on his way home that evening; that would be OK. He wouldn’t have to see Audrey. But if she was there, maybe. Maybe he would.

‘OK. Sure.’

‘Thanks, and say hi from me. Tell her I miss her. And get well soon, all right?’

‘All right.’

Lorraine’s car wasn’t in the driveway so Leo pressed the buzzer for the flat. No answer. The front door hung open like always, so Leo stepped inside, cautious, slow. It was weird being back here; he should just post the envelope and go. But he lingered in the lobby and kicked at the pile of junk mail on the floor, wondering what he could make fast and leave in the letter box. A quick message, a surprise, just so Audrey would know he’d been there and that he was thinking of her. He picked up a pizza menu. Folded it in half and in half again. It was no good; he let it fall to the floor. She’d said no contact. For a moment he
had an urge to take his pen out of his pocket and scrawl on the high white walls of the hall. He would write in the biggest letters, so she wouldn’t miss it, couldn’t ignore it; her name, so maybe she’d see how he couldn’t forget her, no matter what she said, and read his apology written there – indelible.

AUDREY AUDREY AUDREY AUDREY AUDREY AUDREY

What did he want to say sorry for? For giving up? He didn’t know. He didn’t even know if he should be sorry for anything. His dad had always called him sissy, baby, little mummy’s boy, and he was right. His shoulders slumping, Leo wandered round the outside of the building to the fire escape and thought of all the times she’d been up there, watching, like a bird high in her eyrie or a sailor in a crow’s nest. The image worked. Leo smiled. Audrey, he thought again, and his heart picked up speed, kicked and punched at his ribs, just as it always had at the thought of seeing her. What if she was there? Waiting, like always? She would be, surely. It was that feeling, that before-an-exam sort of panic and rush. He felt a little dizzy and took deep breaths before he climbed to the top, the metal clanging beneath his feet. But he was alone and sat down, where she used to sit, and watched the world and tried to imagine what it was like to be her.