The Playdate (39 page)
My eyes drop down and suddenly I know. This is what was missing from my flat.
The plumber’s invoice.
And then I feel my legs give way, and I grab the table to steady myself. “Where did you get it?” I ask, trying to control the tremor in my voice.
“Your friendly plumber. Said he saw the address on it and thought he’d help you out by dropping it in for—now, how did he put it—that’s right . . .
the little girl’s dad
.”
Rae’s dad.
I look at it. There, in my own handwriting. “Flock Ventures,” with Jez’s business address—his home address—underneath. The invoice I meant to hand to him in private, as normal, when he paid for something to help me out. I was so tired from the hospital, it didn’t even occur to me that the plumber would see the address and take the initiative to post it through Jez’s letterbox, without asking me.
How could I have been so careless?
Unsteadily, I reach out for a chair. The adrenaline that has pumped through my body for nearly twenty hours now is draining away fast, leaving my limbs so weak I can hardly move them.
“Suze. He’s not her dad,” I mumble, trying to pull the chair
out from the table. “Tom’s her dad. Jez is a bloke I met in a bar six years ago when I was upset on the anniversary of my mum’s death. It happened before you, Suzy. Long before.”
She nods her head. “Uh-huh, and it didn’t occur to you he might be married, Cal? You didn’t bother to ask?”
“I was drunk . . .”
“Oh yeah, of course, that delightful British habit of drinking till you puke. Course you were, Cal. But if you hadn’t been, and you had done the decent thing, you’d have found out that I was back in Denver, four months’ pregnant, wondering when he was ever coming home.”
I turn my eyes away, ashamed. “You’ll have to ask him about that, Suzy,” I say, taking a seat as my legs threaten to give way.
“Oh, I plan to,” she says in the same cold voice. “Trust me, I do. And yeah, take a seat. Make yourself at home. I mean, that was always the plan, huh?”
I try to maneuver my legs under the table, then realize I can hardly move them anymore. I am trapped.
“Of course, I couldn’t leave it there, though,” Suzy continues, moving into the kitchen area. Vaguely, I am aware that she is taking something from a drawer. “Got a friend of mine to do a bit more checking around. And guess where Jez was the other night when I was waiting for him to come back from Birmingham? And you know what, Cal? I only realized later, but I could smell him on you.”
I lift one thigh with my hands, trying to make it work. Nothing happens. I can’t get up. A burning desire to get back to Rae overwhelms me. I can’t cope with this. What have I started? I have to get out of here.
Suzy lets out a sharp breath, and I look up. Her eyes are staring down.
“Suzy. This isn’t just about me,” I say, desperately trying to use my hands on the table to pull myself back up. “You know as well as I do that there’s something wrong with you and Jez. I know you try to hide it, but I can see it now. I don’t know what it is. But I do think that he’s lonely.”
“Lonely?” She smiles, looking back up. “Really? You think you’re the only one he sees, Cal? You should speak to my friend Vondra. There’s at least two more like you. Probably loads of little Raes, all over the place.”
She shakes her head when she sees my shocked expression.
“Yeah, so any plans you had to move in here and steal my husband are on hold. Looks like you got competition, hon. And one of them’s quite a bit younger, apparently.”
“That’s never what I was trying to do. You and me had become friends before Jez even turned up. I didn’t know how to tell you and then it was just too late and . . .”
All of a sudden, there is a knocking at the front of the house. We both turn to see Debs, peering nervously round the open door.
“Callie?” she says hesitantly. “Are you all right, love?”
“Debs,” I call. “Please. Not now.”
Suzy throws her hands up in the air.
“Oh, great—now we got Crazy Lady, too. You see this, Cal? See her screaming at my doorstep? You know, even after I found out that you were sleeping with my husband—did you know that, Debs, that our good friend here was banging my husband—I still tried to protect your child from this nutcase. Because that’s what friendship is about. And instead of thanking me—because Lord knows, Callie, you haven’t got any other friends, probably because you never shut up talking about yourself, by the way—you accuse me of lying. Unbelievable.”
I turn to see Debs’s face frozen in uncertainty. Her eyes flicker from me to Suzy, and back to me.
She comes farther into the corridor, hesitantly.
“Callie—you’re having an affair with Jez?”
“Debs, please, will you go away, that’s not your business. I’ll talk to you later.”
But she stays put.
“Callie,” she stutters. “You’ve got to listen to me. Suzy’s telling lies. About me, about everyone . . .”
Suzy gives a little yelp. She walks purposefully out of the kitchen area past me toward Debs, and physically stands in front of her in the hallway.
“Quiet, you. Out of my house.”
But Debs persists, peering at me around Suzy’s waist.
“Callie, please listen. My neighbor, Beattie, will tell you. Everyone on the street is terrified to speak to you because of her . . .”
“Out!” Suzy yells at her, trying to herd her to the door, but Debs won’t stop, her little head with its big glasses popping out either side of Suzy.
My exhausted brain struggles to understand. What is she saying?
“And she’s done it at the school, too. Beattie’s daughter says that she’s told terrible lies about all the parents to each other.” Suzy keeps inching her back toward the front door, using her full height, but Debs won’t give up. From somewhere I finally find energy to push myself up onto my feet and start to follow them out into the hall, curious, holding on to the sofa for support. “The school’s had to speak to her about it,” Debs continues, her voice taking on a desperate tone as Suzy gets her to the door and tries to push her out. “And she’s told people terrible lies about you, too. Apparently all the parents knew Rae had been
ill and that you were on your own, and they were desperate to make you welcome at the school, but she stopped them. She told them that you’ve said terrible things about their kids. And that Tom is violent, so that no one allows their children to come and play. And she even started a rumor that you slept with a divorced parent at the school—Matt, is it?—then said he was bad in bed.”
I reach the kitchen door and stop.
“What?” I call. “Suzy, stop! Leave her. What did she just say? I’ve never even spoken to that guy . . .”
Suzy turns. Her face is bright red; her eyes wide and furious. She is trying to push the front door shut across Debs’s body.
“I said, stop it, Suzy! How could she know that? How could she know any of this?”
Suzy crosses her eyes and does this stupid comedy face.
I stare at her. “Suzy. Tell me you didn’t do this? Tell me you’re not the reason this whole neighborhood has ignored me and Rae for two and a half years?”
A stupid, silly smirk crosses her face, like a schoolgirl caught passing a note in front of a teacher. She lets go of the door and pulls back. Debs shakes herself down and moves back inside.
“What is wrong with you?” I gasp. “Why would you do this to me, Suzy?”
Suzy gives this long, comedy sigh. As I watch her, it is as if she is deflating, all the anger seeping out of her.
“She’s jealous, love,” Debs calls. “I think she did it to me because she thought you and I might become friends. I think she can’t bear you to have a relationship with anybody but her. And I think she didn’t want you to go to work and see other people so she tried to scare you into thinking that something might happen to Rae if you weren’t here. It is a terrible thing, jealousy. I should know, love, my sister . . .”
I stand there, confused. Trying to work it all out.
And then the blood drains from my face.
“But even if that’s true . . . I mean . . . Rae. Suzy, you wouldn’t . . . Not Rae? You wouldn’t hurt Rae. Not on purpose . . . ?”
Debs looks up at Suzy. “Are you going to tell her, or am I?” she says, a brave new tone entering her voice. Suzy slumps slightly to the side, saying nothing.
“She drove the car at the bench, Callie,” Debs says. “With Rae inside. And I think she was going to do it whether I’d turned up or not. I’m sorry, but it’s the truth.”
But my thoughts are elsewhere. There is something odd on the floor. Small red dots running down the hall toward Suzy.
Then Suzy lifts up her hand, and finally I see what she was doing in the kitchen. “Debs,” I gasp.
“What?” she says.
I point my eyes at Suzy’s hand. In it, she is holding a small, sharp vegetable knife. Debs’s eyes follow. At the same time, we allow our eyes to drop down to Suzy’s left trouser leg, the inside of which is rapidly turning from khaki to deep burgundy. I become aware of a tutting noise, and realize it is blood hitting the floor.
“Suzy,” I whisper. “What have you done?”
Without hesitation, Debs marches straight up to Suzy and holds her hand out.
“Give it to me, Suzy. Now, please,” she says in a gentle voice. “You’re all right, love. It’s going to be OK. Callie, call an ambulance.”
And I watch in horror as this tender expression crosses Suzy’s face, and she turns to me and gently slumps against the wall.
“I just thought you were it,” she says, her voice draining away to a tired murmur. “You know, you and me, Cal. Friends forever.”
I sit by Rae’s hospital bed, watching.
She opens one eye, sticky with sleep, and tries to focus on me.
My face bursts into a smile as big as the sun.
“I’m thirsty,” she says. “I want Ribena.”
“Better to have water at the moment,” I answer, avoiding the ongoing temptation to climb into her bed and hold her warm little body so close that it becomes part of mine again.
“Kaye gives me Ribena.”
I smile. “Does she now? Well, I’m glad to see you’re trying it on again, anyway. Listen. I’ve got something for you.” I reach down into my bag and pull out a white envelope. “It’s from Hannah.”
Rae’s face lights up. She rips open the envelope and pulls out a card. On the front is a drawing that Hannah has done. It is of her and Rae. Rae has enormous eyes that fill most of her face, and curly hair jutting out in a ball, and a big grin with jaggy teeth. Hannah has bright orange hair and is holding Rae’s hand.
She has put Rae carefully on a box so that they are the same height. There are hearts all over the picture with “BF” written inside them.
“That means best friend,” Rae says breathlessly.
I stroke her cheek, pleased for her, and together we open the card. “To Rae. We’ll Always Be Together, love Hannah xxx,” it says.
Rae giggles. “Hannah sings that song a LOT. It’s from
Grease
. She says I can watch it at her house.”
I smile at her shining eyes, and look again at the words.
We’ll always be together.
And I lean over and hold her tight, and hope in her case it is true.
“Rae, darling, listen. I’ve got to go and ring Granddad to find out what time he’s coming this afternoon. I’ll be back in a minute.”
I pop my head out of the door and motion to Tom, who is chatting to one of the doctors in the corridor, and he nods and comes to take over, placing his hands on my shoulders as we pass in the doorway.
“OK?” he says, rubbing them.
“Hmm,” I reply, leaning my head into him a little as he does it.
“Where are you going?”
“I won’t be long. There’s something I have to do.”
We turn to see Rae sitting up, radiant. Watching us.
And we roll our eyes at each other, and I leave.
* * *
I wander down to the cafeteria, thinking how different it looks in the daytime. Sun streams in through the glass atrium. In the distance, I can see the London Eye. The doctor says Rae is doing
well. That she won’t be here too long. We could be free of this place again soon. And for good, this time. Forever.