The Swimming Pool (29 page)

As my gaze strayed over his shoulder, my smile froze on my face.

‘Something wrong?' he asked.

‘Yes. Would you just excuse me for a minute, Miles? I need to check on Molly …'

To my horror, she was standing, quite alone, in the last place I would have expected to see her: in the prohibited zone, at the main-entrance end of the pool, barely a metre from the edge. Her back to the water, she began taking slow measured steps towards the emergency doors at the rear of Reception. The main entrance was closed this evening, a side door in use for the party, so at least she would not be seen and reprimanded, but that was hardly my first concern. Abandoning Miles, I hurried to the edge of the sundeck and leaned over the rail, waving wildly.

‘What are you doing over there?' I yelled. ‘Come away!'

Turning by the fire doors, she caught sight of me and at once made her way towards me, walking close to the wall at the cautious pace of a cat entering unfamiliar territory. ‘Don't shout,' she admonished, and as she approached, her eyes radiated fury.

‘The
pool area's off limits,' I said at normal volume. ‘You know that.' I could hear the slight shake in my voice. ‘You mustn't go out there again, understand? There's no one on duty.'

‘Fine. Sorry.'

We both caught our breath. ‘It's OK,' I said, instinct telling me to leave the matter there. ‘Come and hang out with me for a bit.' She ducked under the railing and hovered expectantly beside me, as if waiting for me to pitch for her custom.

‘Look, isn't it pretty inside from out here?' I tried, and we looked through the window together, my hand on her waist. The whole interior was bathed in ultramarine from the film footage, the light striking off the guests' drinks and phones, off their silver fingernails and studded ears and bared teeth. With Molly safely by my side, I was filled with sudden wonder that this glamorous, rarefied spectacle could be happening in Elm Hill and that we were a part of it.

Turning to seek similar emotions in her response, I saw instead pure relief.

‘Here's Dad!' Her voice lifted and then she was darting past me into the bar.

‘Dad?' I was slow to react, thinking initially that she'd just said the first thing that popped into her head in order to give me the slip. But, astonishingly, she was right: there was Ed, chatting to Liam, passing him some folded banknotes. A conflicting chain of thoughts ensued: he was here, he hadn't given up on me, thank
God! Or was he here not for me but to confront the Channings? And, whatever his reason, how was his attendance going to affect my access to Lara?

I waited a few minutes before collecting a fresh margarita from the bar and sidling up, Molly having already greeted him and gone. ‘I'm so glad you decided to come,' I said.

He turned with the scarcest of smiles, as if we were not husband and wife, or even friends. ‘Nat, hello. I thought you'd be busy helping out?'

‘Oh, I've done my bit,' I said vaguely.

‘In that case, can I have a quick word?'

He ushered me to the quietest corner of the deck, not far from the spot where I'd just hailed Molly, next to an open window. On the far side, Angie and Stephen chatted with David, Suki and another couple, while Lara talked to two men whose civilian clothes placed them with the band. Miles was nearest us, having drifted indoors with a woman I half recognized from my lido afternoons with Lara; his grip on his drink was crushing, as if the glass might crack, and I had a queasy premonition of sliced flesh, of blood dripping to the floor. I was aware of nerves and that they were connected with him, with the danger of his looking up and spotting Ed, deciding to come over and face him down about Georgia.

‘I've been thinking,' Ed said.

‘Oh, yes?'

‘I
know this isn't the best time, I know it's your birthday and you just want to enjoy the party, but I have to say it.'

‘Say what?'

‘No more.' As I reacted with a look of query, he snapped, ‘Stop pretending you don't speak English, I'm serious about this.'

‘About
what
?'

‘You said I can't tell you who you should and shouldn't spend your time with, and I'm not going to do that. But I'm making a request. And I'm saying that your choices will have consequences.'

‘What on earth do you mean, “consequences”?' I demanded. ‘You're speaking to me as if I'm a pupil you're threatening with detention.'

Ed's expression was as severe as I'd ever seen it. ‘I'm saying what needs to be said. If you choose to carry on with this group, then I don't know if I'll be able to carry on with us.'

‘With us?' I waited for my heart to skid, but it did not. It did not. For a moment I feared I might not experience any emotion at all, but then exasperation reared: ‘Have you gone completely mad? We've been married for sixteen years, we have a daughter! We're a family.'

‘I know that, which is why it shouldn't be hard for you to choose.'

I paused, allowed the clamour of other people's conversation to separate us. I couldn't deal with this, not
tonight. I needed to find a response that would please both of us, that would act as a placeholder. ‘I would never put you in that position,' I said finally.

‘I would never put
you
in the position of having to put me in this position,' Ed said.

‘Of course not, because you never do anything wrong, do you?'

You never stand in front of a mirror with a friend's hands on your body, her lips at your neck.

‘We're agreed then?' he demanded. ‘After this party, it's over?'

I glared at him, reacting correctly at last. I was frightened and indignant and impotent. ‘It doesn't seem like I have a choice, does it?'

He stepped away from me, the subject closed. ‘I'm going in to get a drink. I don't think you need one, do you?' It was less an offer than a judgement: I was drinking too much. It was not appropriate, not for an
educator
.

‘Ed?'

He turned, his expression not open, but not closed either.

‘Why were you giving Liam money just now?'

Now it slammed shut. ‘What – you think I'm buying drugs now, as well?'

I gasped. ‘I didn't say that!'

‘You didn't need to. It was for your cake, Nat. Your fucking surprise birthday cake.'

Shamefaced, fuming, I sucked at my straw, felt a chute of icy liquid hurtle down my throat, suppressed the
reflex to splutter. Through the window I noticed Molly at a nearby table, on her own again, fiddling with her phone. I hurried inside, crouched beside her. ‘What is it, darling? Why aren't you with your friends?'

She looked faintly hostile and I knew I had not been forgiven for calling her away from the water as I had. Only now did I understand she'd been testing herself, taking the kind of leap of faith that had to be taken alone, and I'd blundered in, crying out, like the overprotective mother I was.

‘Mum?'

‘Yes?'

‘Can we …?' And she paused, eyes unsettled.

‘What? You want to leave already? The band hasn't come on yet.' And I heard it just as she did, perhaps a split second before, the unguarded impatience, the touch of petulance that said, I
knew
this would happen. I
knew
you would ruin it for me.

‘It's OK,' Molly said. ‘It doesn't matter.'

Over her shoulder Josh was gesturing, trying to get her attention.

‘No, it does matter, sweetheart.' My tone was on track, and my instincts too. ‘Listen, I'm sorry I shouted like a fishwife earlier. I was just concerned. This is all new to me too. We'll talk properly in the morning, all right? I'll be all yours.'

‘All right.'

‘Do you want to come with me and chat to some of my friends?'

She
said something then, in a mumble, not meant for me to hear.

‘What did you say?'

She looked at me, defiance in her eyes, chin high: ‘I said, none of your friends are here.'

Though I was taken aback, I didn't allow my smile to waver. ‘That's a bit rude, darling. They're new friends, same as yours. I think Josh wants to talk to you, by the way.'

And Lara wanted to talk to me. No sooner had Molly joined Josh than she was by my side.

‘After the band, I'll come and find you,' she said.

‘Ed's here,' I told her. ‘And he's very cross with me.'

‘Oh dear. Should I recruit someone to keep him occupied?'

She probably meant Miles, or else Angie or Stephen, but putting Ed together with any of the group was not one of the better ideas I'd heard that evening.

‘No, it's fine,' I said. ‘I'll make sure I'm alone.'

‘I look forward to it,' she said.

The jazz quintet was all that Lara had promised, a swinging and throbbing and keening musical brew, its hypnotic fixed point an almost motionless female singer with snaking raven hair and sultry, trembling vocals. As the evening darkened, the intimacy between her and her audience deepened.

I watched with Ed. My feelings for the man by my side, the man with whom I'd fused genes to create a little family and with whom bodily contact continued to be made as the crowd on the terrace stirred and shifted with each change of tempo – well, those feelings underwent several stages. First, I consciously refused to give headspace to his ultimatum; next, having failed in the first, I was deluged by resentment of his self-righteousness (not helped by the evident ease with which he was now enjoying the music – at
Lara's
invitation, at
Lara's
expense); then came remorse, the veracious, irrevocable knowledge that he was the victim here and not I.
I
had forced
him
into a corner, not the other way around. Last, as a break in the crowd in front allowed a glimpse of green-and-yellow print, the sight of Lara swaying to the music, I forgot he was there at all.

When
the band finished and the stage lights dimmed, there was a general retreat indoors to the bar and I supposed he must have headed in too. I didn't follow. As for Molly, one second she was in a tight scrum with Georgia and Josh, and the next the trio had vanished. I guessed I had at least twenty minutes before she thought to find me again. Lara was side-stage congratulating the musicians, but I was too shy to join her, moving instead to the far edge of the sundeck, the point at which ‘our' table would normally be situated. The underwater lights had come on, creating pretty clouds of neon blue below the gently bobbing heads of the balloons. I thought of the same water last weekend, ink-black and concealing, and was moved by the different human moods it was able to reflect – or dictate.

Then Lara was beside me, our bare shoulders bumping. ‘Weren't they fantastic?'

‘They were. Do you need to see them off ?' There was an injection of hunger in my tone and she responded with a brush on the back of my hand with hers.

‘Already done, they're packing up now. They have to scoot straight off to a second gig. Liam and the guys are helping them with their gear.'

Of course. I smiled at the image of Lara helping lug amplifiers into the back of a scruffy van. How had she ever washed ashore here, in Elm Hill? How lucky we all were. How lucky I was.

‘So, can I borrow you for a moment?' she said.

‘Yes …
Just …' Having been sure, I was suddenly jittery. My brain flashed to Molly, the irritability I'd betrayed when I'd thought she wanted to leave. I would make it up to her; after tonight, I would refocus, reprioritize. ‘Where are the kids, do you know? I've lost track of them.'

‘The teens were last seen demanding mocktails from the bar staff, poor sods. Everett's with David and Suki and their kids. Don't worry, they won't miss us.'

Would Ed?
I thought. Would Miles?

She was leading me now past the chill-out zone to the narrow gap between railing and wall, unhooking the security rope and pulling me through before reattaching it. ‘We're being a bit naughty, going off limits …' And that step into prohibited territory stirred my blood like a criminal's. Seizing my hand, she pulled me around the perimeter towards the changing huts on the opposite side. The darkness was thicker at the edges, cloaking us as we came to a halt by the hut closest to the turnstile; the door was yellow, tinged green with the blue light from the pool. At the far end, the main entrance appeared more distant than the 60 or 70 metres I knew it to be, the floating field of balloons between. ‘Come in,' Lara whispered. ‘Quick, before anyone sees us.'

It was lightless when she closed the door behind us and for a moment utterly silent.

‘Lara? You are in here as well, aren't you?'

‘Of course.'

The
space was tiny, the air extremely warm. Unable to see her, I giggled, groping for the nearest surface. My fingers touched the back wall, my knee the edge of the seat, and then I found smooth partitions to either side, which meant she had to be leaning against the closed door. Feeling her soft, humid breath, I was reminded of her standing close behind me in her bathroom at La Madrague, her fingers smoothing the fabric of the dress, and I responded with a groan. My desire was swelling, growing uncontrollable, and I pressed myself against her, my mouth searching for hers, greedy for her touch, for those fingers to graze and probe. ‘Oh, La –'

‘Don't call me that,' she said, her voice very low pitched, almost a growl, and she moved her face from mine. ‘I know you have before, but not again.'

She thrust me from her. Overbalancing, I made heavy contact with one of the sides and righted myself.

‘Why?' In the dark, my cheeks flamed. Did she wish me to use her full name, as she did mine? To leave the playful single syllable for Douglas and Andrew and the others? ‘Why?' I repeated. I wanted to hear her say it, say I was special, but her voice, when it came again, was different. It had a flatness to it, a deathly lack of inflection:

‘You have no idea, do you?'

‘No idea about what?' I said.

‘About what you did.'

I felt the blood slow in my veins and with it came the beginning of lightheadedness. ‘What I did? What do you mean?' Self-preservation – hope – made me dense,
limiting my mind's reach to those sources of confusion closest to the surface: did she mean what had happened in her bedroom? Had I overstepped the mark, misinterpreted that encounter, or the promise of this? Or did she mean my having mentioned the Georgia concern to Ed when she had explicitly asked me not to? Had it had repercussions I was unaware of? Had Ed confronted her privately and upset her? That was surely it. How automatic it was, my blaming of Ed, how traitorous. He was no longer my mate but my scapegoat.

‘Years ago, Natalie,' Lara said, and her voice was gentler now, laced with a new emotion: sorrow. ‘Years ago.'

Two words that got my blood moving again, that might even have changed the direction of its flow in my veins. Two words and all my fancies, all my vanities, were exposed. Because I did have an idea, of course I did. I think I'd had it all along.

The occasion arose in the nick of time: not only was I due to be collected from my grandparents and returned home the very next day, but there had also been a break in the weather, a spell of rain that had put paid to any last woodland adventures. Without access to the pond, Mel and I had stopped talking about our Nessie plot, had all but given up, distracted in any case by the tension between the two of us, the future of our friendship,
whatever it had been, whatever it might become. It seemed to me that planning our persecution of Nessie had been virtually as satisfying as doing it.

Then, on my last full day in the village, the heavens cleared and we all converged on the pond for what would undoubtedly be the final swim of the summer.

Nessie was there, of course, for everyone else the star turn, and as if responding to our telepathic will she stayed in the water longer than usual. Time after time she sank into the invisible depths, twisting and tumbling and rolling, before exploding into view in that trademark way of hers. Most often, she would surface in the spots touched by the last of the sun, as if caught in her own mission to shatter liquid into glitter. By the time she waded out, the group had thinned and there were few enough left for Mel to be able to order them to scarper and be obeyed. Which left only the three of us.

She was still towelling herself dry when we pounced. As planned, I pinned her down, face to the ground, while Mel set about her hair with the scissors. The blades were blunt, not at all fit for the task, and the sound was obscene, the sawing of something fibrous and alive. Mel cut it really short, too; right to the scalp.

Nessie screamed and wriggled so much it was her own fault when her ear got nicked. ‘You're mental,' she sobbed, her cheek greasy with blood. ‘There's something wrong with you two.'

‘Shut your face, bitch.'

Mel
spat on her then, a sticky blob that sat on her bare skin between her shoulder blades.

‘Everyone hates you!' Nessie cried. ‘Everyone. All the boys –'

‘I
said
, shut your fucking face!'

I started thinking how weird it felt to hold a girl down like this against her will. We'd done it so many times with the boys, but this was different. There was none of our usual suppressed laughter: this time we were hard-nosed, iron-handed, like trained officers taking part in a raid. Her response was not predictable, either, for I could feel strength in her fear, not the futile lashing out I was used to, a gathering of spirit rather than an ebbing of it. I had the horrible premonition that she was about to rear up, like she did in the water, to somehow double, triple in strength and defeat us, the way good always defeats evil.

Almost as if I'd determined it, there was a sudden scramble and she was slithering free, her bare feet sliding backwards in the mud as she tried to launch herself forwards. Without her long hair, she was like a boy, narrow and sinewy, a Mowgli figure.

‘Nat, you idiot!' At once Mel grabbed at her calves and brought her back down, finding time to shoot me a bad-tempered glare.

‘Sorry,' I said, redoubling my grip.

‘My mum will call the police,' Nessie screamed, in breathless gasps, as the final strands were sliced from her scalp.

‘What – to tell them her daughter's a slag?' I said.

‘No
one's going to tell anyone anything,' Mel said, her voice a blade's edge, sharper than the tool in her hands. Her blood was up now. Nessie had landed with her head closer to the water's edge than before, which gave Mel an idea. ‘Hold her under, Nat.'

‘What?'

‘I've got her arms and legs. You hold her head under.'

She meant under the water. ‘You don't –?'

‘Just do it before the bitch gets away again!'

And I did. I held her head under. The water was shallow at the edge and the strain of keeping her face down, her head steady, made my muscles ache. I gripped her hair to get tighter control, thinking about how her long hair used to pour from her skull to her elbows when she surfaced, how hard it was now to get even a short handful.

‘How long for?' I asked Mel, panting with exertion.

‘Keep going. Count to twenty.'

I counted quickly, cheating. Then I began to fear I'd lost sense of fast and slow and correcting that added further seconds. I wondered how long Nessie could hold her breath – she sometimes dived for what seemed like minutes – and that took us forward by another ten seconds or so. Then, just as I was about to ask Mel again, Nessie went quite still, her neck devoid of tension, and I slackened my grip in a reflex of terror.
Move
, I willed her, please move, but her head remained weightless in the water.

We've killed her
, I thought.

‘Fucking
played dead,' Mel said. ‘Oldest trick in the book. Let's get out of here.'

By the pond's edge Nessie's hair lay in long muddy rags and we kicked it into the water, like the leftovers of a disappointing snack. The scissors, we lobbed into the pond, right into the deepest part. We didn't even wait to watch the ripples.

‘Did you change your name?' I whispered. In the darkness of the hut my vision was sharpening and I could make out the faint gleam of light particles clinging to the curved bones of her face.

‘What?' Her voice was curt, impatient. ‘Why would I change my name?'

‘You weren't called Lara,' I said. ‘I know I would have remembered that. What were you called? Did you use your middle name or something?'

‘What
are
you talking about?'

‘You're the girl.' My emotions were too unruly to control and the muscles in my face were spasming. I thought I could feel my birthmark pulsing but I knew I must be imagining it. ‘You're Nessie. That's what we called you. Did you even know that?' And it came to me then that her real name had been Leah or Leanne, something like that. It had been exotic then, and considered pretentious on the part of her parents.
My stage mother
.

Years
I'd waited to be found and punished and now, just as I'd learned to let it go, it had happened.

‘You used to practise at the pond,' I said, my voice trembling.

‘Practise what, darling?' Though her tone was flinty and sarcastic, I felt her fingers touch my face quite tenderly, finding the spot above my eyebrow and smoothing it with the pad of her thumb. Thanks to this mark, this identifying stain, she had recognized me on the very first day.