When I Was Invisible (29 page)

She smiled at me again. ‘Please. Let's swap.' Her dark eyes never left their quiet vigil of my face. She was so still, quiet, sure. Silence. She was the silence. ‘Please.'

I gave the silence, the bottle of tablets, and she handed me the book. ‘I always read this when I feel like you do.'

‘You feel like I do?' I asked her. How could she know what I felt like? Surely the only person who had any idea what it was like to be me had walked away and I was probably never going to see her again.

‘Yes, I sometimes feel like you do. That's why I read this. Every word feels like a blessing. If you read it, you'll understand why I wanted you to make this swap. I will keep these and you, please, keep that.'

With one last smile, she got to her feet and walked into the night. I saw her heading towards a group of people who looked homeless, who hung about the swings in the park, with bottles and cigarettes, and the stench of people who lived on the street. She stood and talked to them, laughing and joking as though she knew them all by name. Once she was gone, I looked at the book properly, its pages browned by age, the edges curled from being frequently turned. Its cover had missing patches of colour, the ink having cracked and peeled off. She had given me her silence, her escape. I observed the book, wondering what its pages would hold for me.

‘Will you be my silence?'
I asked the book.

Now she had taken my small-bottle-shaped exit, I had no choice but to try it.

Carefully, I opened the book. There were too many words, the lettering too small. Even under this street lighting, it was too dark for me to read. I strained my eyes, trying to make them out, trying to find the blessings. I couldn't see it. I couldn't understand what she'd meant. I had given my silence for this book I could not read straight away. I'd have to go home. Was that her plan all along? To get me to go home, to get me to rethink what I was going to do?

Two days later, when I finally finished the book, I had found the blessings she spoke of and I knew what I had to do: I had to become a nun and see if I could find the silence in God.

After the service, I stand outside the church, waiting to speak to Father Emanuel. He is saying goodbye to his congregation, shaking their hands and speaking warmly to them. He is a well-liked priest, always has been. A couple who are waiting to speak to him look familiar. My heart leaps in my chest as I realise where I know them from: they are Nika's parents.

They are both dressed for a special church service, both look like the respectable parents who would bring up a person as vibrant and caring as my beautiful friend. I remember them from all our ballet performances, how they would sit up front, near my parents, looking so proud and receiving congratulations on Nika's behalf. All the while I knew that they hadn't believed her when she'd told them what Mr Daneaux was doing to her, that they had listened to him when he'd said she was overreacting and misunderstanding his touches, that the day after he'd come to her house, he … he turned the ‘Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy' up really, really loud during the session he had with Nika.

But they may have changed after all these years. Maybe now she's an adult, on an equal footing with them, and they don't expect unquestioning obedience at all times, they have fixed things with Nika. Maybe, after she left her celebrity footballer boyfriend, she came back and sorted things out with them and she is now living in another part of the country, with a new – married – name, maybe a couple of children, and that is why I can't find her. Maybe Nika is doing just fine and they are doting grandparents and she doesn't need me to come storming into her life, dragging up pieces of her past.

I shall speak to them. If they have fixed things, and they know where she is, then that will be no problem. They will tell me she is happy and I will not need to contact her. I will, but I'll have no need. If they have fixed things, I won't have to worry about speaking to them, reminding them of that time, imagining which one of them told her that if she wanted to keep on living in their house she would carry on with her ballet lessons and stop complaining.

The palms of my hands are damp, sticky at the thought of speaking to them. But I have to, if I want to find Nika.

While I wait for them to finish talking to Father Emanuel, I look around. Gail and her mother are standing a little way away, and Gail's mother is fussing over her, adjusting the collar on her dress, picking imaginary fluff out of her perfect hair. I would love to speak to them, to ingratiate myself into their world, but for what reason? They don't know me, and I would only be doing so because she reminds me of myself. After a few minutes, one of the choir members, still in his robes, approaches them. He slips an arm around Gail's mother's shoulders and kisses her lightly on the lips. Clearly he is Gail's stepfather since he is an attractive, slightly older white man with a mixture of blond and silver hair. Gail rolls her eyes at her parents kissing and the eye roll lands her line of sight in my direction.

I offer another smile, another chance to connect. She glares at me this time and then slowly, very deliberately, turns her back on me.

Well
, I think,
that's me told
.

‘Hello,' I say politely to the other Mr and Mrs Harper as they reach the end of the path out of the churchyard. We are away from the main throng of Easter Sunday churchgoers and from where we stand, we can see out all over Chiselwick and the neighbouring towns. ‘Are you Mr and Mrs Harper?'

They stop and look at me, sizing me up. Nika's mother frowns slightly, as though trying to place my face at some past point in her life. She is incredibly stylish: her hair is perfectly straightened under her black hat, and her make-up has been so carefully applied you wouldn't think she was wearing any. She has an expensive-looking black coat and a designer handbag. Beside her, Nika's father is also very well put together. He doesn't seem to recognise me, he simply looks at me with a pleasant, inquisitive expression on his face. ‘Yes, we are,' Mr Harper says.

‘I don't know if you'll remember me? My name is Veronica Harper. I was your daughter's friend at school.'

Their dual reaction, to hold themselves a little more rigidly, their faces a little more reserved, hints that they haven't resolved things with their youngest child.

‘I've just moved back to Chiselwick, and I saw you and thought I'd ask you how Nika was doing? Does she still live around here?'

Mrs Harper swallows, slightly distressed at what I am asking. Mr Harper has softened a little, but not too much. For several seconds it seems neither of them are going to speak to me, and we'll have to stand here in front of this view of our home town, not speaking about the other Veronika Harper.

‘No, she doesn't,' Mr Harper eventually says. ‘Our daughter chose to estrange herself from us many years ago. She was a very troubled young woman.'

I shouldn't be surprised that this is the party line – that she chose to give up on them, that she was the one with the problems. I wonder, if I hadn't become a nun, what my story would have become. Would I have gone to university, got a job, got a husband, made babies? Or would my story have ended that night in the park, with a bottle of pills and a bottle of wine? I wonder what they would have said then? Would I have been exposed as a troubled young woman, who got drunk every weekend, had sex with older men in alleyways and cars, and who broke her parents' hearts by taking her own life?

‘I see,' I say. ‘I'm sorry to hear that.'

Mrs Harper suddenly grabs on to her husband and needs him to steady her, comfort her by putting his arm around her. If I didn't live with my mother, if I didn't know what they said to Nika, I would probably be completely taken in by this. I would be thinking Nika was a selfish child, that they were loving parents and I would be better off without her in my life.

‘You haven't heard from her at all, then? Not since she left?'

‘No,' her father replies sternly. ‘As I told you, she chose to estrange herself from us many years ago.'

‘She didn't even send a postcard or a change-of-address card?' I'm pushing my luck, I know that, but I won't speak to them again. ‘I mean, you don't know even vaguely where she might be?'

Mrs Harper has a small sob that escapes from the back of her throat, and uncharitably, I think that she's a better actress than my mother. Mum can pull off a great performance of being a caring, involved mother whenever she needs to – but Nika's mum would beat mine hands down.

‘Please, you are upsetting my wife. We haven't heard from our daughter in nearly twenty years. Do you have any idea how devastating that is to us? We gave her everything, all of the very best opportunities in life, and she threw them back in our faces. Our other daughter, Sasha, has been such a source of support and she has spent many years trying to make up for what Veronika did to us. She is also devastated by her behaviour. Thankfully our son had left home before Veronika's behaviour became out of control, but we have all been hurt and damaged by Veronika's actions. Now, please, we would like to stop talking about this.'

I lower my head. ‘Of course,' I say quietly. ‘I'm sorry.' Nika. My poor, poor friend. I didn't realise how cold they were. That all of her family had turned against her. That when she went to the police station she really had nothing else to lose because everyone in her family believed she was the problem, the one making a mountain out of a molehill. ‘I won't bother you any longer.'

My poor Nika. No wonder what I did was the final straw. I was the only person she could rely upon and I …

The other Mr and Mrs Harper walk away and I feel it again: the swell of noise in my head, the crushing agony of knowing I have added to the pain of someone I so desperately loved.

I have to find her. I have to make things right.

Nika, Have been trying to catch you but you've engaged that superpower of yours again and I didn't want to knock on your door in case you shut it in my face. I'm sorry about the other night. That I didn't believe you. I confronted Eliza about it and you were right. She's known for a while that she's developing a problem with the drugs she does and she wants to get help. It's a really good thing you brought it up. Thank you. I'm going to do all I can to support her in getting the right help, and she's going to pay me back for the things she's taken. If you ever want to try dinner again, let me know. My number's below. I live in number 207 if you ever fancy dropping by to try that kissing thing again. :)

Marshall

I know every word of Marshall's note, I've read it several times a day since he pushed it through my letterbox two days ago. Today, though, it's been playing on my mind a lot. I've been tempted to ring him, text him. Get in touch.

By the time I get halfway through my first floor at work, I am no wiser about what to do. It's an odd feeling to be believed after the initial anger, but he is in serious denial about Eliza. I'm not sure how much in denial Eliza is about herself and how much she admitted it in a desperate need to say whatever is necessary to keep Marshall in her life.

I push my trolley, loaded with towels, replacement toiletries, bedding and cleaning items, down the corridor to the next room. The person in 413 was actually very tidy and clean. I managed to get the whole room done in ten minutes. I'm always doing that, trying to grab an extra minute or two where I can so I can spend a bit of extra time on the really mucky rooms. These floors have bigger rooms, which take more time to remake.

The left wheel on my trolley squeaks sometimes as I push it, and I make a mental note to have it looked at by the maintenance guys. As I think this, Marshall's note scrolls through my mind like ticker tape on the bottom of a television screen.

I feel for him. He has no idea what is in store for him. Eliza seems like a good person, but she will do bad things. She probably already has done bad things but there are a plethora of bad things for her to do which she will work her way through. She will do those things and will be horrified that at the end of it people aren't there for her. That Marshall isn't there for her. At the moment, he thinks – truly believes – that by being supportive and caring, not calling her out for stealing from him, that it'll help her; that by being a shoulder to lean on, she will seek help for her problem. He thinks being her rock, the person she can turn to and will have her back when she's facing it head on, will be what keeps her fighting against her ‘problem'. The reality is, it'll all be smoke and mirrors, it will all be lies, it will all come to nothing because she does not have a ‘problem', she has an ‘addiction'. Right now, she only wants her drugs, she only wants her life as it fits in with drugs, she only wants to get away with behaving like scum of the Earth.

Reese behaved like scum sometimes. Real, out-and-out scum. The only way I could stay friends with him, still love him like I did, was by being honest with myself about who he was and what he was willing to do to feed his habit. I did love him, too. I could love him because I saw exactly who he was. When I looked at him I didn't see the druggie who stole from me and Vinnie whenever I let him into Vinnie's house. I didn't even see the man who I had a coffee with after he stopped someone from attacking me. I saw the young boy who had to leave home because his mother didn't protect him. I'd never seen photos of him from the time before his life as Reese began, but I could picture him in my head. Under the grime, the needle-spackled skin, the dirty clothes, the grey-brown teeth and often his unkempt smell, I only ever saw the boy for whom home was so bad he had to run away. I saw him like that, but I knew what he was capable of.