In a Dark, Dark Wood (8 page)

I was going to have go down there and talk and laugh too. Instead, I curled myself into a ball, my knees to my chest, my eyes tight shut, and I screamed a silent scream inside my head.

Then I straightened, feeling my tired muscles protest, got out of bed, and picked up the top-most towel off the pile Flo had stacked carefully on the foot of each bed.

The bathroom was on the landing, and I locked the door and let the towel drop to the floor. Over the bath was another uncurtained plate-glass window, looking out over the forest in an incredibly unnerving way. It was angled so that, in practice, you wouldn’t be able to see inside the room unless you were perched on top of a fifty-foot pine, but as I took off my bra and knickers I had to fight the urge to cross my hands over my breasts, covering my nakedness from the watchful darkness.

For a minute I considered getting straight into my change of clothes, but I was tired and mud-spattered and I knew I’d feel better if I had a hot shower, so I climbed carefully into the walk-in enclosure and turned the lever, stretching gratefully as the huge shower head coughed twice, and then flooded me with an enormous, forceful gush of hot water.

Standing like this, I could look out of the window, though it was too dark to see much. The bright bathroom light turned the glass into a sort of mirror, and aside from a pale, ghostly moon, all I could see was my own body reflected in the fast-steaming glass as I soaped and shaved my legs. What kind of person was Flo’s aunt anyway? This was a house for voyeurs. No, that was people who liked to watch. What was the opposite? Exhibitionists.

People who liked to be seen.

Perhaps it was different in summer, when the light came flooding in until late into the evening. Perhaps then it was a house for looking out of, across the forest. But now, in the dark, it felt like the opposite. It felt like a glass display case, full of curiosities to be peered at. Or a cage in a zoo. A tiger’s enclosure, with nowhere to hide. I thought of those caged animals pacing slowly backwards and forwards, day after day, week after week, going slowly crazy.

When I was finished, I climbed carefully out and peered at myself in the steam-misted mirror, swiping away the condensation with my hand.

The face that looked back at me startled me. It looked like someone ready for a fight. It was partly my short hair; after my shower and a rough dry with the towel, it looked aggressively spiky and defiant, like a boxer’s between rounds. My face was white and stark under the bright lights, my eyes dark and accusing and surrounded by shadows, like I’d taken a beating.

I sighed and got out my washbag. I don’t wear much makeup, but I had lip gloss and mascara; the basics. No blusher, but I rubbed a bit of lip gloss into my cheekbones in an effort to brighten the pallor, then yanked on clean skinny jeans and a grey top.

From somewhere far below, music started up. Billy Idol, by the sounds of it: ‘White Wedding’. Someone’s idea of a joke?

‘Le— I mean, Nora!’ Flo’s voice floated up the stairs, above the sound of Billy Idol telling us to start again. ‘Are you ready for something to eat?’

‘Coming!’ I shouted back, and with a sigh, I bundled my dirty underwear into my towel, picked up my washbag, and opened the door.

8

WHILE I HAD
been in the shower, the hen night had started in earnest.

In the living room, Tom and Clare had plugged in someone’s iPhone and were dancing round the living room to Billy Idol, while Melanie laughed at them from the sofa.

In the kitchen, which was hot as hell from the overworked oven, I could see someone shovelling industrial quantities of pizza onto boards and dumping various tubs of dip into bowls. For a disorienting minute I thought it was Clare – they were wearing the same grey jeans and silver vest that Clare had been wearing next door. Then she stood up and wiped the hair off her forehead and I saw it was Flo. She was wearing exactly the same clothes as Clare.

Before I could pick that apart any further, my thoughts were interrupted by a strong smell of charring. ‘Is something burning?’ I asked.

‘Oh my God! The pittas!’ Flo shrieked. ‘Lee, can you rescue them before they set the alarm off?’

I ran across the rapidly smoke-filling kitchen and grabbed the pitta breads from the toaster, before dumping them in the sink. Then I set about wrestling with the door at the far end of the kitchen. It was locked, and there was a trick to the handle, but finally I managed to fling it wide open. Freezing air gusted in, and I saw to my surprise that the puddles on the lawn were frosting over.

‘I’ve looked in the wine rack and I can’t find any tequila.’ Nina’s voice came from the doorway, and then, ‘Bloody hell, it’s freezing! Shut the door, you mentalist!’

‘The pittas were burning,’ I said mildly, but I swung the door shut. At least the temperature in the room was closer to normal now.

‘It’s not in the cellar?’ Flo straightened up, brushing sweaty hair out of her eyes. Her face was scarlet from the heat. ‘Blast. Where on earth could it be?’

‘You tried the fridge?’ Nina asked. Flo nodded.

‘Freezer?’ I asked. She clapped a hand to her forehead.

‘Freezer! Of course – I remember now, thinking it’d be better if we wanted frozen margaritas. Ugh, I’m such an idiot.’

‘
Amen!
’ Nina mouthed at me, as she bent and opened the freezer under the counter. ‘Here it is.’ Her voice came slightly muffled by the whirr of the freezer fan. She straightened up, a frosted bottle in her hand, and scooped up two limes from the fruit bowl. ‘Nora, grab a board and a knife. Oh, and the salt shaker. Flo, did you say there were shot glasses through there?’

‘Yup, behind that mirrored door at the end of the living room. But do you think we should start with shots? Wouldn’t it be more sensible to start with a cooler first – like mojitos maybe?’

‘Screw sensible,’ Nina said as she left the kitchen, and then, under her breath to me as we crossed the hall, ‘I need something as strong as possible to get me through this.’

As we entered the living room, Clare and Tom turned, and Clare gave a whoop and danced over to take the bottle from Nina’s hand, and the knife from mine. She shimmied back to the coffee table, her top scattering motes of light around the dimly-lit room as she banged them both down on the glass with a crack.

‘Tequila slammers! I haven’t done these since my twenty-first. I think it’s taken this long for the hangover to wear off.’

Nina let the limes bounce onto the table alongside the rest, and then turned to hunt in the cupboard for glasses while Clare knelt on the rug and started slicing.

‘Hen first!’ Melanie said, and Clare grinned. We all watched as she shook a pinch of salt into the hollow of her wrist, and picked up a chunk of lime. Nina filled a shot glass to the teetering brim, and pushed it into her hand. Clare licked her wrist, gulped the shot, and bit hard into the lime, her eyes squeezed shut. Then she spat it out onto the rug and slammed the shot glass down on the table top, shuddering and laughing at the same time.

‘Jesus! Oh my God, my eyes are watering. My mascara’ll be halfway down my face if I have any more.’

‘Lady,’ Nina said sternly, ‘we are just getting started. Le— I mean, Nora next.’

‘You know …’ Tom said, as I knelt at the table, ‘if you want something a bit more upmarket, we could have tequila royales.’

‘Tequila royales?’ I watched as Nina overfilled the tiny glass, liquor splashing down and puddling on the glass tabletop. ‘What’s that? Champagne?’

‘Possibly. But not the way I make them.’ Tom dug in his trouser pocket and held up a little bag of white powder. ‘Something a bit more interesting than salt?’

Christ. I glanced up at the clock. Not even eight o’clock. At this rate we’d all be climbing the walls by midnight.

‘Coke?’ Melanie said. She folded her arms as she looked coolly across at Tom, and there was a note of distaste in her voice. ‘Really? We’re not students any more. Some of us are parents. I don’t think pumping and dumping’s going to sort that one out.’

‘So don’t do it,’ Tom said with a shrug, but there was an edge in his voice.

‘Grub’s up!’ The awkward pause was broken by Flo standing in the doorway, her arms trembling beneath the weight of a huge board covered with melting pizza. There was a bottle wedged under her arm. ‘Can someone clear the coffee table before I deposit this little lot all over my aunt’s rug?’

‘Tell you what,’ Clare said as she watched Nina and me make space on the table, then reached over and gave Tom a salty, citrussy kiss, ‘let’s save it for dessert.’

‘No problem,’ Tom said lightly. He pushed the packet back in his pocket. ‘I’ve no wish to force my rather expensive drugs on people who don’t appreciate them.’

Melanie gave a rather thin smile and took the bottle out from Flo’s arm as she slid the tray onto the table and stood up.

‘Hm. Talking of Champagne …’

‘Well! It is a special occasion,’ Flo said. She beamed, seemingly oblivious of the undercurrent of tension flowing between Melanie and Tom. ‘Pop the cork, Mels, and I’ll get the glasses.’

As Melanie peeled off the foil, Flo opened the mirrored cupboard and began rooting around. She came up, slightly flushed, clutching half a dozen flutes, just as there was a resounding ‘pop!’ and the cork flew through the air and bounced off the flat-screen TV.

‘Whoops!’ Melanie put a hand to her mouth. ‘Sorry, Flo.’

‘No worries,’ Flo said brightly, but she checked the TV screen surreptitiously as Melanie bent to pour out the Champagne, rubbing it with her sleeve as she cast a slightly harassed look over her shoulder.

We each took a glass and I tried to smile. I don’t actually like Champagne – it gives me a roaring headache and acid indigestion, and I don’t like fizzy drinks much full stop – but no one had given us the opportunity to refuse.

Flo held up her glass and turned to look round the little circle, catching all of our eyes, and then stopping, her gaze on Clare.

‘Here’s to a
great
hen weekend,’ she said. ‘A
perfect
hen weekend, for the best friend a girl could ever have. To my rock. To my BFF. To my heroine and my inspiration: Clare!’

‘And James,’ Clare said with a smile. ‘Otherwise I can’t drink. I’m not egotistical enough to toast myself.’

‘Oh,’ Flo said, after a slight check. ‘Well I mean, I just thought … shouldn’t this weekend be just about you? I thought the whole point was to forget about the groom for a bit. But of course, if you’d prefer. To Clare, and James.’

‘To Clare and James!’ everyone chorused, and drank.

I drank too, feeling the bubbles fizzing acidly in my throat, making it hard to swallow.

Clare and James. Clare and
James
. I still couldn’t believe it – couldn’t picture them together. Had he really changed so much in ten years?

I was still staring down into my glass when Nina nudged me in the ribs. ‘Come on, are you trying to read your fortune in the dregs of the Champagne? I don’t think it’ll work.’

‘Just thinking,’ I said with an attempt at a smile. Nina raised her eyebrows, and I thought for one stomach-churning moment that she was going to say something, one of her infamously blunt remarks that left you grazed and wincing.

But before she could speak, Flo clapped her hands and said, ‘Don’t hold back guys! Pizza time!’

Nina took a plate and helped herself to pizza. I did too. The meat pizzas were covered in cheap pepperoni that was leaking a chemical-smelling red oil all over the board, but after my run I was hungry. I took a piece of pepperoni, and a piece of spinach and mushroom, and then loaded up my plate with the charred pitta and houmous.

‘Guys, use napkins if you need to, I don’t want to get oil on the rug,’ Flo said, hovering around as the others began to dig in. ‘Oh, and make sure you leave the veggie slices for Tom, please?’

‘Flops,’ Clare put a hand on her shoulder, ‘I’m sure it’s fine. There’s no way Tom can eat all those slices. Plus there’s more in the freezer if we run out.’

‘I know,’ Flo said. Her face was red and she pushed her hair impatiently back into its clip. There was pizza sauce on her silver top. ‘But it’s a matter of principle. If people want the veggie option they should order it. I’ve got no patience with people who hog the veggie meals just because they don’t fancy the meat choice. It just means the veggie guests go without!’

‘I’m sorry,’ I said. ‘Look, I took a piece of the mushroom. Do you want me to put it back?’

‘Well, no,’ Flo said irritably. ‘It’s probably got pepperoni all over it now.’

For a second I thought about pointing out that there was already pepperoni oil over the whole lot, and that maybe if she was that bothered she should have put them on separate boards, but instead I bit my tongue.

‘It’s fine,’ Tom said. He’d stacked up his plate with three pieces of mushroom pizza and a big dollop of houmous. ‘This’ll do me, honestly. If I eat any more Gary’ll have me doing pull-ups from here to Christmas.’

‘Who’s Gary?’ Flo said. She took a piece of pepperoni and sat on the sofa. ‘I thought your other half was called Bruce?’

‘Gary’s my personal trainer.’ Tom looked down at his washboard stomach rather complacently. ‘He has an uphill job, poor love.’

‘You have a personal trainer?’ Flo looked deeply impressed.

‘Darling, anyone who’s anyone has a personal trainer.’

‘I don’t,’ Nina said flatly. She stuffed a slice of pizza into her mouth and spoke around it, her voice muffled. ‘I jus’ go to the gym and work out. I don’t need some tool yelling at me while I do it. Well—’ she did a heroic swallow ‘—I do, that’s what I’ve got my iPod for. But I like to be able to put the tool on shuffle if the refrain gets monotonous.’

‘Come on!’ Tom was laughing. ‘I can’t be the only one here, surely! Nora, what about you? You don’t look like you suffer from writer’s arse.’

‘Me?’ I looked up from my pizza, startled at being suddenly in the headlight beam of everyone’s attention. ‘No! I don’t even have a gym membership, I just run. The only tools I have yelling at me are the kids in Victoria Park.’

‘Clare, then?’ Tom pleaded. ‘Melanie? Come on! Someone back me up here. It’s a perfectly normal thing!’