I Should Be So Lucky (33 page)

‘Hey, don’t cry! That cheese is already over-salty and you’ll make it worse, dripping on it. Come on, tell Marco
all
about it and we’ll see what can be salvaged.’

So she did. And the worst bit was telling him what she’d done to the flowers. ‘They were so beautiful and it
was
such a beautiful thing of him to do but before I found out they were from Greg, what was I supposed to think, after getting those cards? I was so scared it was the mad person, persecuting me. And I couldn’t tell anyone, because I want to stay here. I can’t uproot Rachel all over again.’

‘A mess, yes, agreed. But if he really is with someone else …’

‘I don’t suppose I’ll ever know now. I called, left a message with the Mickey woman but he didn’t call back. Says it all. And we were going out to plant crocuses.’ She sobbed but giggled through it, realizing how ridiculous that sounded. ‘Oh, I wish I’d gone – those bits of fun with him were pretty damn innocent, and he was lovely just to hang out with.’

Marco frowned. ‘Yes, but hanging out with someone who’s attached to someone else, that’s dangerous stuff, Vee. Best out of it, do we think? Long run? There’ll be …’

‘Someone else. No. I don’t think there will be. I really
do
give up. First Rhys, then this. Still, at least this time nobody died. Comes to something when that’s the only plus, doesn’t it?’

TWENTY-EIGHT

RACHEL FELT WAY
out of her depth on just about every level. This was one seriously palatial house with huge creamy rooms and enormous abstract paintings everywhere. Ned had let her and Emmy in, hugged her, pointed them towards a massive basement kitchen, saying to help themselves to drinks, and then vanished. Emmy poured herself some wine but Rachel, still preferring sweet drinks and secretly wishing there was some 7-Up among the many bottles and cans on the worktop, scooped up a tumblerful of a drink full of fruit that had been mixed in a big bowl. Pimm’s, she heard one of the other girls say. She tasted it warily and was relieved it seemed to be mostly lemonade. She stuck close to Emmy, wondering how she could give the impression that she wasn’t totally out of place, knowing nobody and feeling awkward.

There were so many people who all seemed to be
each
other’s best friends, and every one of them looked like they were way older than her and Emmy. It was a hot night and most of the partygoers were draped over each other out in the garden, lolling on the terrace steps, smoking and drinking, giggling and chatting. Flicky-haired, skinny-legged confident girls were squealing at each other as if they’d never heard anything so hilarious
ever
, and most of what she overheard was about A-level results, which uni and which flights to Costa Rica.

‘I want to go home,’ Rachel murmured to Emmy. ‘I’m feeling, like, about
twelve
?’

‘Don’t be ridic. This is, like,
so
lush.’

‘
Ridic?
We’ve been here five minutes and already you sound like
them
. You’ll be all ya ya ya by the time we leave.’

‘No, really, give it a chance. Let’s check out the garden, come on. Those Jaz and Baz blokes must be somewhere.’

Rachel quickly gulped down half her drink, a passing boy in a torn dinner jacket topped it up from a jug he was carrying, saying to her, ‘You’ll love this. Really retro gear,’ which she didn’t at all understand, and she followed Emmy out through the huge, folded-back glass doors into the garden where more and more people were collecting. Jaz and Baz appeared and suddenly Emmy had vanished with them, whirled away to join a group of smokers sitting on a blanket under an apple tree. Rachel felt abandoned and a bit lost and thought about finding a sofa inside the house where she could
just
curl up and read a book till Emmy was ready to go home. This was
not
how it was supposed to be.

‘Hey, schoolgirl. Did you miss me when you were away in your gypsy van?’ Ned was beside her suddenly, pulling her in close to him. She had some more of her drink and giggled as he nuzzled her neck.

‘I did. You know I did – I texted you. Are you going to uni soon? Or gap year?’ He’d be doing one or the other, she thought, leaving her too soon after they’d met.

‘Like, no? Some time away then I’ll be an intern for a bit, you know?’ he said, plaiting his fingers through hers and leading her back towards the house. She could sense all the girls on the way turning to look at her. A pouty girl with blue pussy-cat whiskers drawn on her face actually hissed as she passed. She could feel them appraising her clothes, her hair, her body, and wondering where the hell she’d come from that she could actually pull the host, but she no longer cared. The evening had turned right around. She was
with
Ned and they
weren’t
. This huge, gorgeous place was
his
and
he
was
her
boyfriend. It felt good. She quickly drank some more of the punch because that made her feel good too.

‘Let’s get you a better drink. That cheap stuff’s shite and you don’t know what’s in it.’ Ned pushed through the crowd in the kitchen and opened the vast fridge, pulling out a bottle of champagne. ‘We’ll take it somewhere we can talk and I can give you your birthday present. This lot’s so fucking rowdy.’

‘You got me a present? You remembered!’

‘Course I did. Come with me, I’ll show you.’

Rachel followed him up the basement stairs, through the hallway to the next staircase and then hesitated, nervous, wondering quite what Ned had in mind. Part of her was excited and curious and eager. She decided not to listen to the other, boringly sensible part that was suggesting she tell Ned that today was only her fifteenth birthday. Two girls were sitting smoking on the stairs. They looked up at her with glittery hard eyes and smirked at Ned. ‘Starting early, babes?’ one of them commented, shifting aside to let the two of them pass.

‘Just getting a bit of peace and quiet,’ he told the girl as he led Rachel past them. ‘You can’t have a conversation out there.’

‘Conversation. Yeah, right,’ said the other girl sniggering. Jealous, Rachel thought, trying to concentrate on keeping her balance on the stairs. They seemed to undulate beneath her, uncomfortable and slightly scary. How was she supposed to get down them again if they kept wobbling about?

From Ned’s bedroom window Rachel could see right across the private garden square to the building where her dad lived, though she couldn’t tell how far away it was exactly because it kept moving nearer, so it felt right in front of her, then retreating, like it was a hundred miles away. Days later, she remembered she’d been telling Ned this and he’d laughed; she remembered the
bang
of the champagne cork popping but then everything else was blank till the bit in the hospital where the lights were hideously white and she was throwing up into a cardboard bowl and wondering why her mum was crying and shouting down the phone, calling her aunt Kate an evil, scheming bitch.

It was much later that evening when Viola, fresh from a soothing bath (with no hazardous candles) to ease the aches from spending the last daylit hours digging dandelions and sorrel and loosestrife from the flower beds, remembered the envelope that Kate had left for her. She wrapped herself in her white waffle robe, made a cup of tea, then flopped on the sofa and opened it. Inside was a big sheet of paper with a roughly scribbled family tree, in Kate’s handwriting.

‘Told you we were all related, even if it’s a bit distant!’ was written on a yellow Post-it note. Viola’s first thought was to bin the whole lot, but she absolutely couldn’t resist a really good look through the names. Whether engaging in a genuine hobby or through sheer cussed control-freak nosiness, Kate had certainly been thorough, and the names went back a few generations. Viola found their great-great half-aunt who had married a Fabian and who turned out to be really very distant, relatively speaking, from Greg. Though less distant, she realized, moving to her desk and switching on a lamp for a better look, from Mickey Fabian. For there she was,
on
the tree further up than Greg and connected by a series of second and third marriages: only a few years older than he was and yet aunt to him, just as he’d said. And in turn, ah, there was Mickey’s baby, one George Fabian, six-month-old cousin to Greg. ‘Oh God, how fucking typical,’ she breathed. ‘I am
so
stupid.’

She reached immediately for her phone and clicked on Greg’s number before she could dither about and think of how she was to explain how she came to be studying his family tree in such fine detail, or at all, because what kind of sane person would, frankly?

‘Viola. This is a surprise.’ It didn’t sound like it was such a good one and Viola almost hung up.

‘I just wanted to apologize.’

‘You’re not keen on gladioli, then,’ he said, laughing, but sounding as if that were just a nervous reaction.

‘I’m so sorry. I had no idea they were from you. I only found the card a few days later. I’m so, so sorry. I’m a total idiot but I can explain about it all and I’d like to. I did call and left a message with Mickey, but you didn’t call back. So I assumed …’ She was rambling now, sounding a bit desperate.

‘Did you? I didn’t know. If it was the day I forgot my phone, then Mickey wasn’t exactly on speaking terms with me. And I’m a bigger idiot. I walked past a bin bag overflowing with my totally wrecked flowers and still pruned your sodding roses. I don’t think I twigged, if
you’ll
forgive the pun. It didn’t cross my mind that you could be so brutal to them or to me, not after we … And then I thought about it, and your trip to Paris. Well, you know, I can just about put two and two together, even though I’m a mere man.’

She hated how sad he sounded. She hated how untrusting she’d been.

‘Greg, believe me, I had plenty of reason to assume they were from someone else. To say it’s been … well, difficult over the past year or so doesn’t really begin to cover it.’

‘You kept it very much to yourself. You could have said.’

‘I know. Well, no, I couldn’t really. It’s not something I talk about. But I will, if you still want to hear.’

‘OK. I do. So come and tell me.’

‘What, now?’ Viola glanced at the clock. It was close to midnight. What had she been thinking of, calling him at that time?
Herself
, Miles would probably have said. He wouldn’t be wrong there.

‘Yes, why not? Can you?’

‘Rachel’s out tonight so … well, I suppose I could. Where are you?’

‘On the big sloping grassy bit by the railway embankment, just over that roundabout where I planted the quince. The crocuses, remember?’ He sounded warmer now.

‘Shall I bring a dibber?’

‘You must never leave home without one,’ he said. ‘Don’t be long.’

‘OK. This is completely mad but, yes, I’ll come.’

Viola was halfway down the stairs, hurriedly dressed in jeans and a dark top and feeling an excited anticipation that she’d thought was no longer part of her life, when the house phone rang. It was nearly 12.30 a.m. She picked up the phone, her hand trembling and excitement leaking away fast, leaving only fear, because a call after midnight, when your daughter is out somewhere, is never going to be good news.

TWENTY-NINE

OH GOD, OH
God, please let Rachel be all right. Viola almost flung herself at the Accident and Emergency desk, just willing the girl behind it to tell her it was all a mistake, that Rachel was fine, all a fuss about nothing. A splinter, a tiny cut, a sprained ankle, something trivial, fixable, anything they could laugh about one day soon when the cold terror of the moment had long gone. It must have been like this for Naomi, back in Viola’s childhood when it seemed she was forever falling over something, losing possessions, breaking the odd bone. Could it run in families? Awful to think so – Viola wouldn’t wish her own unlucky track record on anyone, least of all her own daughter.

Viola had been to this hospital only once before.
This
was where she’d had to come on the terrible night of Rhys’s crash. Only minutes passing through A & E that time though, on the way to the mortuary to identify
him
. Miles had been with her, efficiently and briskly steering her through the corridors, offering to do the identification for her, saying she wouldn’t want to see Rhys all mashed up, but she’d insisted, and besides she was his next of kin, and in fact he’d looked surprisingly peaceful. The injuries that killed him had left his face still beautiful. She remembered thinking how pleased he’d be about that; such a horrible irony. Right now, she just prayed hard that she wasn’t going to have to go through anything like that tonight.

‘Mrs Hendricks … er, yes, I’ve got your daughter’s notes here.’ The girl at the desk was taking it slowly, managing to look as if finding patients’ records was not something she had to do every day, and her brow was furrowed with concentration. Viola could see a half-eaten sandwich on the desk, a smear of mayonnaise on a booklet about bereavement.

‘She has notes?’ Rachel had surely only been in the building less than an hour: what was to write up?

‘On the computer here.’ The girl still seemed confused, and kept tapping the side of her head with her pen.

‘Vo?’ Benedict Peabody suddenly appeared next to her, looking pale and scared.

‘Benedict, hello! What are you doing here? Are you all right?’

‘Friend. Girl.’ He looked hunched and worried, his
Cornwall-surfer-tan
grey under the harsh hospital lights. ‘Are
you
ill?’ he asked.

‘No, no, it’s Rachel, my daughter. I had a call …’ She gabbled the words as she looked past him, frantic and frightened, hoping to see Rachel come bouncing through the double doors beyond the department. Drunks were slumped in chairs, a mother and child were both crying quietly in a corner and several other patients sat staring blankly, waiting to be called.

‘Oh Jeez. What?
Rachel?
No shit.’ He was looking at the floor.

‘Sorry, Benedict. I need to find her, can’t talk. I do hope your friend is OK.’