Accidents Happen (46 page)

It is 3.25 p.m. It has taken Suzy sixteen minutes to race from Hampstead Heath across North London in her yellow convertible to Alexandra Park. She skids to a stop outside the kids’ school, completely ignoring the ‘No drop off’ sign.

‘Go get ’em, pardner,’ she shouts to me over the horrible American soft-rock music she likes to play loud in the car, oblivious to the looks we get from mothers walking through the school gate.

I laugh despite my embarrassment, and jump out. We both know the routine. I pick up Rae and Henry, she fetches Peter and Otto from nursery. We do it without speaking now, guiding each other through our shared daily routine like dressage horses, with a gentle nod or a kick towards school or soft play or swimming.

‘I’m going to take them to the park,’ I say, shutting the door.

‘Coolio, baby,’ shouts Suzy cheerfully, and drives off, waving a hand above her head.

I turn and look at the arched entrance with its century-old brick ‘Girls’ sign. Instantly, my shoulders hunch up. The massive wall of Alexandra Palace rises dramatically behind the school, like a tidal wave about to engulf the little Victorian building. I run through the gate, turn right into the infants’ department and smile my closed-mouth smile at the other mums. Everyone told me that having kids is when you really get to know your neighbours in London. They must have neighbours different from mine. A few mums nod back, then continue arranging playdates with each other in the diaries they carry around. I’ve tried so many times to figure out what I’ve done wrong. My best guess is that it’s because in Rae’s slot on the class parent contact list ‘Callie’ and ‘Tom’ sit separately at two different London addresses; unlike ‘Felicity and Jonathan’ and ‘Parminder and David’ and ‘Suzy and Jez’. Suzy says if the mothers are not going to be friendly to me because I’m a divorced, unemployed, single mother who lives in a rented flat, she and Jez won’t accept their invites to stupid drinks parties in their double-fronted Edwardian houses in The Driveway, the only road apart from ours with a guaranteed catchment into this tiny, one-form-entry infant school. She says this is the price we pay for ‘getting our kids into a posh, oversubscribed primary school’ and that ‘they’re a bunch of stuck-up, middle-class cows for ignoring me’, and that I am much better than they are.

I try to believe her, but sometimes it’s difficult. Sometimes I think it would be nice to belong. Sometimes I think that if one of these mothers invited Rae to her house for a playdate, I would fall on the floor and kiss her feet.

The classroom door opens and Henry and Rae burst out looking grubby and stressed. ‘What have you got to eat?’ Rae murmurs. I give them the rice cakes I always carry around in my bag. She has red paint in her mousy hair and her hands are greasy as if she hasn’t washed them all day. As usual I search her eyes for signs. Is she overtired? Too pale? I scoop her up and hold her too tight, kissing the side of her face till she squirms and laughs.

‘Are you all right, Henry?’ I say. He looks dazed and wired, checking behind me to see if Suzy is there. If she were, he would be whining by now, making his disapproval of her abandonment apparent. I put Rae down and hug him to show that I understand. He leans into me a little, and sighs. Then the pair of them head out of the outer door, gnawing their food like puppies.

At the school gate, Henry starts to run. He does it every day, yet I am so busy trying to shove their scribbled drawings into my bag that it still catches me unawares. ‘Henry!’ I shout. I chase him along the pavement, grabbing Rae who is following him blindly, dodging round a man, a woman and two girls. The man turns. It is Matt, a divorced dad from another class. Or The Hot Dude That Callie Must Get It On With, as Suzy calls him. And I have just shouted in his ear.

‘Sorry,’ I say, lifting a hand to emphasize it. He smiles coolly, rubbing his hand over a new crewcut. Embarrassingly, I blush. ‘Stupid, stupid, stupid,’ I mutter. As if.

I catch up with Henry at the play park behind the school. ‘Henry,’ I say, ‘you mustn’t run like that. Remember, Rae follows you and it’s dangerous for her in case she falls.’

He shrugs a ‘sorry’, jumps on a swing standing up and throws himself in the air with violent jerks, as if trying to shake out his excess energy like ketchup from a bottle. Rae sits on the next swing, playing with the tiny doll that she manages to keep hidden about her person however much I search for it before we leave for school. I am going to look up her sleeve on Monday. They don’t talk much, Henry and Rae. But, as their teacher says, they seem joined together by an invisible wire. Wherever one is, the other is never far away – just like me and Suzy. I wonder what Rae feels about that sometimes. I wonder if she feels like me.

I watch Rae, and I think about Suzy, and I can’t even bring myself to imagine what it will be like for them both when I’m not here.

Accidents Happen

Louise Millar was brought up in Scotland. She began her journalism career in mainly music and film magazines, working as a sub-editor for
Kerrang!
,
Smash Hits
, the
NME
and
Empire
. She later moved into features, working as a commissioning editor on women’s magazines. She has written for
Marie Claire
,
Red
,
Psychologies
,
Stella
(
Telegraph
magazine), the
Independent
, the
Observer
,
Glamour
,
Stylist
and
Eve
. Her first novel,
The Playdate
, published in 2012. She lives in London with her husband and daughters.

Praise for Louise Millar

‘This compelling and impressive debut is told from the point of view of all three women, and the reader’s sympathy shifts constantly as the story becomes more creepy and unsettling when layers of intrigue and manipulation are slowly revealed’

Guardian

‘Millar is a genius at capturing the complicated emotions of parenthood, and her taut, suspenseful plot makes this an unputdownable read’

Marie Claire

‘A well-paced psychological thriller with more than a hint of Minette Walters about it’

Sunday Express

‘A thought-provoking, taut and suspenseful thriller that you won’t forget in a hurry’

Easy Living

‘Like the best thrillers, it is quietly creepy and expertly crafted. Add it to your book-club reading list now’

Stylist

‘The story becomes increasingly sinister, arriving finally at an unexpected close’

Image
magazine

Also by Louise Millar

The Playdate

First published in the UK in 2013 by Pan Books

This electronic edition published 2013 by Pan Books
an imprint of Pan Macmillan, a division of Macmillan Publishers Limited
Pan Macmillan, 20 New Wharf Road, London N1 9RR
Basingstoke and Oxford
Associated companies throughout the world
www.panmacmillan.com

ISBN 978-1-447-23766-2

Copyright © Louise Millar 2013

The right of Louise Millar to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

You may not copy, store, distribute, transmit, reproduce or otherwise make available this publication (or any part of it) in any form, or by any means (electronic, digital, optical, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise), without the prior written permission of the publisher. Any person who does any unauthorized act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.

A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

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