Читать книгу To My Best Friends - Sam Baker - Страница 7

Chapter Two

‘Isn’t David going to wonder where we’ve got to?’ Lizzie asked, as she fumbled with the lock of the shed. In the fading light, she misjudged the distance and the key landed in the sludge at her feet. Bending, she noticed her high-heeled loafers were now crusted with mud. ‘Anyone got a tissue?’

Mona shrugged, and Jo shook her head.

‘Where is David, anyway?’ Jo said. ‘I haven’t seen him for at least half an hour.’

‘Hiding, probably,’ Mona said. ‘Who can blame him? House full of total strangers feeding their faces at his expense. Anyway,’ she added, ‘it’s not as if it matters. It’s Lizzie’s shed now.’

Lizzie didn’t look convinced. ‘I know that, but does David? Does David know any of it?’

‘Look,’ Jo said, turning back to the house. Every window in the Victorian terrace was ablaze and the kitchen was crammed with people. ‘It looks odd, doesn’t it? Wrong, somehow?’

The others followed her gaze.

‘It’s not that the house is full – ’ Lizzie said – ‘it was always full – it’s those people. Who are they? Does anyone know?’

‘Someone must,’ said Mona. ‘David probably.’

‘Come on,’ Jo said, ‘you must recognise some of them? The girls from Capsule Wardrobe, some suppliers, a few clients. David’s mum and dad, his brother and his wife . . .’

‘There was an awful lot of family at the church for someone who didn’t have any,’ Lizzie said.

Jo shrugged. ‘David’s, I suppose, like the wedding. And there are some old friends of Nicci’s from the drama group at uni.’

‘I can’t believe none of Nicci’s family bothered to show up,’ Lizzie persisted. ‘You’d think some would have wanted to pay their respects.’

‘You don’t know they didn’t,’ Jo said. ‘There were plenty of strange faces in that church. Not inconceivable one or two of them belonged to Nicci.’

‘You pair of romantics,’ said Mona. ‘Nicci didn’t have family, you know that. She was always saying so: “You’re my family. You, David and the girls. You’re the only family I need.”’

‘That doesn’t mean she didn’t have one. No one comes from nowhere,’ said Lizzie. ‘Much as they might want to.’

‘She fell out with her mum, we know that,’ Jo went on as if Lizzie hadn’t spoken. ‘I remember her talking about it one night – when we were pissed, of course. You must remember?’ Jo grinned. ‘Whisky night.’

‘Not sure I remember much from whisky night.’ Lizzie grimaced.

Jo never forgot anything. It amazed Lizzie, and annoyed her slightly. Jo and Nicci always could riff off events, jokes and incidents she barely remembered at all. Most of her time at university was a blur. A blur then, and a blur now.

‘Think that was the only time she mentioned it. And you know how she always spent every holiday at uni, working in Sainsbury’s, when the rest of us went home. Said someone had to look after our house. Like we were going to fall for that.’

‘We did, though, didn’t we?’ Lizzie said.

‘Her dad left when she was a baby, didn’t he?’ Mona said, tucking her hands under her arms in a bid to keep warm. The fine wool suit looked good but it wasn’t much use against the damp chill that hung in the air.

‘So Nicci said that night. You know how she was: all ears where our problems were concerned, but always playing her own cards close to her chest.’

Having wiped the muddy key on her hem, Lizzie pushed it into the lock, turned it but found the door wouldn’t open.

‘Come on,’ said Mona. ‘My toes are going to drop off if you don’t let us in soon.’

Lizzie looked puzzled. Turning the key back the other way, she felt it click and reached for the shed’s door handle. The shed had been unlocked all along.

‘Here we go,’ she said, pushing open the door, and stopped . . .

Lizzie could hear breathing. There was someone in there. As her eyes adjusted to the dimness, the toes of a scuffed pair of shoes came into view. Church’s brogues.

‘D-David,’ she asked, ‘is that you?’ Her mind raced through their conversation. Had they said anything he shouldn’t have overheard?

‘Yes,’ said a familiar voice, and she felt her shoulders sag. ‘It’s me. Sorry. I didn’t mean to make you jump, I just had to . . . you know . . . get away for a bit. I couldn’t think where else to go. Every room in the house is . . . and Nicci always . . .’ David stopped, unable to go on. After a careful breath, he said, ‘She came down here when she wanted peace, you know. Said it was the only place she could think. Away from the house, with the sounds of the garden.’

‘And the A3 in the distance,’ Mona said wryly.

David flipped a switch and Nicci’s shed came into focus. It was larger than Lizzie expected. The light came from two small lamps. They were the kind of lights her gran might have had: dark wood sculpted base, lampshades of faded chintz. Lizzie wouldn’t have given them houseroom. Typically, here they looked somehow stylish. The one nearest David sat on an old sideboard, which doubled as a worktop, a kettle, glazed brown teapot and assorted mugs, plus a couple of boxes of herbal tea, piled haphazardly on its surface. In the far corner was an old-school Victorian sink. It appeared to be plumbed in.

One of the mugs Lizzie recognised: she’d bought them all ‘I NY’ mugs back from her honeymoon. The chair David sat in was from his and Nicci’s first flat. A battered old thing that had been more holes than leather when they’d bought it for a tenner in a junk shop. Nicci had restored it.

‘I always wondered what happened to that chair,’ Lizzie said. ‘And those cushions . . .’

‘What did she need a kettle for?’ Mona said. ‘I know it’s a big garden, but it’s not that big.’

‘Mona,’ Jo said crossly. ‘What?’

‘Think about it.’

An awkward silence fell. Lizzie and Jo were thinking the same thing: a couple of hundred feet is a long way when you’ve had chemo.

‘Like I said,’ David got to his feet, ‘Nicci used to spend time down here thinking. Until the last few weeks. Then the state of the garden made her feel too guilty. She hadn’t been well enough to put it to bed for winter, and she felt bad about that. Said it wore its neglect like unloved clothes.’

Yes, Lizzie thought, that sounded like Nicci.

David looked wrung out. Anyone who hadn’t known him with a purple Mohican would have thought the same hair-dresser had cut his short brown hair in the same style since he was a toddler. His brown eyes were bloodshot, his face puffy. His mouth, usually ready with a quiet smile, was set in a tense line, as if one wobble would bring his composure crashing down.

‘I’m sorry,’ Lizzie said. ‘We didn’t realise . . . I mean, if we’d known you were here we wouldn’t have intruded.’

‘OK,’ he said, brushing off his trousers, even though there was nothing on them. ‘I should get back anyway. After all, it’s my party . . .’

‘And I’ll cry if I want to,’ the women finished for him.

‘David,’ Lizzie said, ‘I’m so sorry.’

‘I know,’ he said, his voice almost inaudible. ‘But not as sorry as I am.’

‘He knows,’ Mona said, when David had shut the shed door firmly behind him. ‘About the letters. He knows.’

‘What makes you say that?’ Lizzie asked. ‘He’d say something, wouldn’t he? If he did.’

‘We know,’ Jo pointed out. ‘And we haven’t.’

‘Of course he knows,’ Mona said. ‘When has it ever been that awkward with David? He’s known us as long as he’s known Nicci. It’s never been awkward. If you’d asked me a couple of weeks ago I’d have said I was closer to him than my brothers, by a mile. Dan certainly is. I’ve seen a lot more of David in the last fifteen years than I have of them.’ She grinned. ‘Hell, when we lived in that dive in Hove he probably saw us naked almost as often as Nicci.’

A memory of David walking in on her in the bathroom came to Mona and her grin slipped as fast as it had arrived. His appraising glance, before embarrassment hit them both. Nicci’s forty-eight hours of coolness, David’s mumbled apology in Nicci’s presence, and the wariness with which she watched David and Mona for a few weeks after that. It was unnecessary. Even if Mona would have, David wouldn’t.

‘Damn it,’ she said. ‘He knows.’

‘The awkwardness could be coming from us,’ Lizzie said. ‘I know I’ve never felt uncomfortable around him before, but look at what we just did. We barged in on him in his own shed – a shed to which I now have the key – like we owned the place.’

‘Which you do,’ Mona said. ‘If those letters mean anything. Which is a whole other conversation.’

‘Look,’ Jo interrupted, ‘suppose Mona’s right?’ She’d been standing at the small window watching David’s back recede in the darkness. His drooping shoulders and scuffing walk radiated anguish. ‘And given that we just let ourselves into his shed – with his wife’s key – and he didn’t bat an eyelid, I think she is, then he’s waiting for us to make the first move.’

It took a while to sink in.

‘What did he say?’ Lizzie turned to Mona. ‘When he delivered your letter, I mean. How did he look?’

Mona shrugged. ‘Rough as hell. Like he hadn’t slept in days. Which he probably hadn’t. And he didn’t say anything much. Certainly wasn’t up for a cup of tea and a chat. He just handed me the envelope and said something like, “Nicci wanted me to give you this.” We hugged, just barely, now I think about it. He definitely wanted to get away as quickly as possible. Said he had the girls in the car.’

‘Which he did,’ Jo pointed out.

‘I found this,’ she said, pulling a crumpled piece of paper from her coat pocket. ‘After I’d read the letter – about a hundred times – I went up in the attic and dug out the copy of The Bell Jar Nicci gave me for my birthday.’

Mona and Lizzie groaned.

‘She was obsessed with that damn book for a while,’ Lizzie said.

‘Bloody depressing,’ Mona added. ‘I’m pretty sure I binned mine years ago, before I went to Australia.’

‘Anyway,’ Jo interrupted them, ‘this fell out. I must have been using it as a bookmark and forgot all about it.’

Smoothing the square of paper flat with her hand, Jo held it up. The picture was faded where the flare of the flash had turned pink. Blu-Tack stains still speckled its back.

‘I remember that night!’ Mona exclaimed. ‘It wasn’t long after I moved in with you.’

Jo glanced at her friend anxiously. She knew the fact that Mona had joined their little group a year after the others still smarted, but if Mona was thinking that it didn’t show.

The photograph was of the four of them, just before a party. Snarls and pouts and grins for a camera on self-timer and balanced on a bookshelf. All with that early nineties hair, which was still really late eighties. Except for Nicci, of course. She had a bleached crop, the kind that looked like she’d cut it herself, which she had.

‘Look at you!’ Lizzie laughed, and Jo was embarrassed to see she was hoisting her boobs for the camera. As if they weren’t big enough already in those days. She wore a towel and nothing else. Lizzie was all wild red hair, in an over-large man’s shirt and Levi’s 501s, a look she adopted in their first term at university, under Nicci’s tuition, and wore for years. As ever, her hair hid her face.

Mona was in the hippy phase that presaged her wander-lust. A long Indian skirt and a mirror-beaded waistcoat over a puffy shirt. On anyone else it would have looked like a sack, but she looked as lean as always. Only Mona would hide the slim-hipped, long-legged figure of a model under that outfit.

And Nicci? She was channelling Courtney Love.

Doc Martens, with her original sixties biker jacket, over a peach satin slip, her hair spiky. A bottle of vodka in one hand and a cigarette in the other. Jo was pouting, Mona was inscrutable and Lizzie was grinning, more or less. As for Nicci, she had a rock star snarl and that wildness in her eyes. The wildness that had only started to fade when she met David.

Lizzie’s sniff broke the silence. ‘Still no tissues, I suppose?’ she asked, glancing around the shed. Her gaze fell on the remains of a kitchen roll. She tore off a square and passed the roll to the others.

‘Nicci lived in that leather jacket,’ Lizzie said. ‘She was wearing it the very first time I met her.’