Dear Anybody Page 19

  He might be an arsehole but he’s right about one thing. I need closure. Proper closure. It’s time.

  Carey is on the phone, sitting on the stairs when I crash into the hallway, my cheeks still flaming red.

  ‘I’ll call you back,’ I hear Carey say as she follows me to the kitchen. Because I’m not sure why I’ve walked into the kitchen I swing back around and almost bump into Carey.

  ‘You were right,’ I say into her puzzled face which is only inches away.

  ‘Was I?’

  ‘Yes. I’m going to London. I have to sort things out with Rob, with Helena. For me. So I have closure. So I can move on.’

  ‘Good for you. When are you going?’

  ‘Now.’

  ‘Right this minute?’

  ‘Yes,’ I proclaim and then stop by the front door after stomping all the way to it. ‘Why?’ I say turning back. ‘Do you think it’s a mistake?’ My voice has softened considerably and so has my resolve to get justice for all the wrongs that have been done to me.

  ‘No. You are doing the right thing. I was just concerned about the ‘How’. I mean you seem pretty rattled. Did something happen?’

  ‘No. It’s just that I’ve woken up and it’s time to face the music. You are brilliant at giving advice, Carey and I’m taking it. Right now. Today. I’ll see you tonight. I’ll drive there and back.’

  ‘Okay then.’

  ‘I, er … do you think I could borrow your car?’

  Carey doesn’t hesitate. She pulls a spare set of car keys from the drawer in the hall table. I want to hug her. She is my inspiration. Her and the Arsehole sitting at Daisy’s.

  ‘You’ll need to get petrol,’ she says.

  ‘No problem. I’ll be back tonight. Well maybe early hours.’

  ‘Don’t rush back. Take your time and stay over if you need to. I’m going away tomorrow but I’m taking the train.’

  I hug her and place a soft kiss on her cheek. Despite what Jed said before, Carey is my friend. Okay so she doesn’t confide in me completely but I’m sure she will one day.

  ‘Carpe diem,’ she says, waving me off as if I’m about to take up arms on a battlefield.

  I’m not after a war, though, nor a battle. I just need to say my piece and move on. I have two hours and three quarters to work out what my piece is. I’ll say my piece, to both parties, and head straight back to Bridley.

  Chapter 28

  I had forgotten what a bitch parking in London can be. I’ve driven around Helena’s neighbourhood for about half an hour, cursing myself for not parking at a train station or multi-storey car park and jumping in a taxi instead of driving straight to Vauxhall. I curse Jed mostly for getting me so fired up I took on this mission without doing the logistics.

  Finally, I spot an underground car park, a fifteen-minute walk from Helena’s apartment. As I pay for parking and start heading up to ground level it dawns on me that there are serious flaws to this mastermind plan. Firstly, is Helena even in? And if she is, will she open the door for me or will I have to stand outside and say my piece via the letterbox? If so, will I get closure if I have to pour my heart out in a stooped down position, not actually seeing the expression on her face? Would Rob be at Helena’s despite what he’d said about never wanting to see her again and that their affair had been a meaningless, casual fling?

  My mind is working overtime as I get closer and see Vauxhall Bridge. I didn’t feel this tired when I started the car journey but now, I’m genuinely woozy from the long drive and I came down from my coffee high about two hours ago. I have a full bladder after having had no comfort breaks for the whole trip.

  A chilly wind whips around the collar of my coat as I cross the bridge and I try to organise a speech in my head. I’d tossed around ideas of what I was going to say to both Helena and Rob and everything I’d come up with seems to have been wiped from my memory. A couple pass by and stare at me. I must look odd, clutching my collar and muttering under my breath. I can’t find anything dignified or hard hitting enough to say. With minutes to go until I’m at the tall riverside apartment block, I’m biting my lip so I won’t cry and having serious thoughts about turning round and going straight back to the car to regroup.

  I could drive over to my parents’ for a sob, anything to avoid a face-to face with Helena. Tall, beautiful, elegant and sophisticated Helena who could have any man she wanted. She was always saying what a great couple Rob and I made.

  I’m at her building already, my finger poised at the intercom. Going for it, I press the button and take in a breath. No one answers. She must be out. It’s Saturday evening after all. On the one hand I’m glad she’s not there but on the other I’ve come all this way for a long overdue talk and I want to see her. In a state of confusion and for what seems like a lifetime of standing looking at the intercom, it crackles and comes to life. I hear Helena clear her throat. She must be looking at me via the screen inside her apartment.

  ‘Sydney,’ she says at last. My name leaves her lips like a sigh, one I can’t interpret. ‘You want to come up or should I come down?’

  ‘Open the door Helena. We need to talk.’

  I have no idea where this confident sound in my voice is coming from. My stomach is leaping around, my intestines both small and large, are wrapping themselves in knots, tightening and relaxing and making me want to throw up. The door releases, opens, and I step inside onto the marble hallway. A light comes up automatically from the ceiling. There are three ground floor apartments, I take in their gold-plated numbers as I walk to the lift. Flat 1. Get Ready. Flat 2. Get Set. Flat 3. Go. I’m at the lift. It’s now or never.

  I press the button for the top floor. Helena’s plush suite overlooks the Thames from a great height. The lift is glass and I watch the London lights both near and far, illuminating the city I grew up in. It’s a place I loved and never thought I’d leave. Now it feels strange, even after only a couple of months. The cars crossing Vauxhall Bridge grow smaller as the lift continues its slow ascent to the penthouse suite. Helena and I would be on top of the world, on our own, with only our pasts connecting us. Our future is certain, though, this is going to be the full stop to what should have been a wonderful story. I would never have anticipated an ending to it, especially not one like this.

  Helena’s front door is ajar when I get out of the lift. It closes quietly behind me as I enter. I take deep breaths, just as in my yoga practice. A welcome wave of calm starts at the top of my head and runs down the entirety of my body. It’s a surprising sensation since my hands were trembling just seconds ago. My body is preparing. For what I don’t quite know yet but I’m hoping I’ll have the right words when I open my mouth. I spot a figure pacing across the living room. She hasn’t even bothered to greet me at the door. She must be getting poised, standing up so she can look down on me and I can appear little and insignificant to her.

  But I don’t feel insignificant as I walk into the living room. My eyes sweep casually and slowly across the entire room until they land on Helena. There’s no Rob. No sign of her fiancé, Leon.

  Her hair is slightly damp and clings to her head and shoulders. Her flouncy curls are soft waves around her face. She looks pale in silky, aubergine camisole pyjamas with a matching dressing gown draped over the top. Helena has always been a slim woman. Her body is fifty percent salads and fifty percent personal trainer, but tonight she looks gaunt, frail and drawn. Helena has always been a good actress and I expect she has coached herself into a state of frailty just so I won’t be hard on her.

  ‘Sorry I didn’t call first,’ I say. It’s the sort of thing you would say to a friend, so I don’t know why I’m leading with that.

  ‘It’s all right. I wondered when you would come. Or call.’

  ‘And it didn’t occur to you to make the first move? An apology of some sort?’

  She shuffles from one foot to the other, jutting out a bony hip she crosses her arms. ‘Would you have accepted an apology from me?’

  ‘Wo
uld you have accepted one from me had it been the other way round?’

  ‘No. I would have killed you that night.’ She walks casually to one of the sofas and flops down into a corner seat, elbow propped on the armrest. She seems to grow in stature. Not taking on the guilty party role but rather one of indifference, much to my annoyance. I remain calm, though.

  ‘I didn’t kill you that night, Helena. Actually, that’s what you did to me. Killed me. You got me right between the eyes. Although I didn’t have them open, did I? Didn’t see what you were up to.’

  ‘There were two of us involved, Syd.’

  ‘Don’t call me that, please.’

  ‘Sorry.’

  ‘And don’t say sorry because I really don’t think you are. Did you feel sorry for me while it was going on? For Leon?’

  ‘You say “going on” as if it lasted for ever. I’m sure Rob must have told you it was nothing but a few months. We were completely out of order, I know that, and I know you don’t believe me, but I really am sorry, you know?’

  I stay where I am but Helena gets up and moves towards me. I step back and hold up both my hands. I need us to keep our distance.

  ‘I only wanted to hug you, Sydney. I want to show you I’m sorry. I want you to know it’s been eating me up inside what we did. What we did to you. God only knows what you’ve been going through.’

  ‘Still going through. And don’t for one second try to play this down as some little thing that happened once long ago. It’s not as if I had a minor operation I had to get over. It’s so much more than that. It’s everything. My hopes, my dreams, my whole world. I thought I could always depend on you.’

  ‘I know. We let you down.’

  ‘Don’t keep bringing him into it. I didn’t come here to talk about him. This is about you and me. This is about every time we shared a story, a secret, went out, shopping, a meal. When I had Christmas lunch with your mum or when you pretended to enjoy turkey sandwiches at my mum’s on Boxing Day. Every time I … Look, you know what we were to each other. Do you remember that time after uni when we didn’t see each other for ages? Do you know I was always wondering how you were? I cared about how you were doing and wishing every day that you would find the job you wanted, meet the man you deserved, were happy, healthy. I hoped you were thinking of me too and that you wanted all those things for me. When we got back together it was like nothing had changed between us. In fact, I thought the time apart made us stronger together and that we would always go on like that. Friends. Good friends. Best friends who look out for each other, have each other’s backs. How could you stab me in mine?’

  She blinks several times and looks away. She moves as if gliding, over to the window. Against the evening view outside Helena looks beautiful, stands out. In the distance, the lights on a crane twinkle and the outline of offices on the other side of the bridge is just visible. I want the night sky to swallow her up, stop her looking so amazing, so graceful and poised. I want her to disappear. To have never been a part of my life after university at all. Rob having an affair I would have grown to live with, but the blow of being cheated on has doubled because it’s Helena. Her being Rob’s affair is something that might take me a lifetime to forget and one I could never in a million years forgive. As she stands there, her mouth opening and closing trying to shape the perfect thing to say, I wish more than anything that she and I had never met.

  The next thing Helena does is to hug her slim waist with her long arms and double over as if she has been shot. Her mouth gives way to a strange sound, almost feral, so out of place for a woman like Helena. She’s crying. No, she’s wailing as if she is in physical pain. I instinctively want to run over and hug her. Stupidly I feel guilty for having caused her such grief. It occurs to me that if she loved me as much as I had her then maybe she is hurting over the end or our friendship. But no.

  ‘Stop it!’ I shout at her. ‘Stop that now. This isn’t your misery. It’s mine. Allow me to have it and don’t steal the show the way you always do, the way I’ve always allowed you to.’

  She lets her arms drop and straightens up only as far as to her shoulders. They remain hunched as she shakes, trying to stifle back tears.

  ‘You don’t get to cry during my time. You have managed to ruin a great friendship and what was a great relationship between two people. Maybe you’ll say Rob and I were doomed anyway. He did cheat on me after all. And maybe you would be right. But you are the first thing that will come to mind when I remember the time my heart was broken into pieces. You Helena. I will think of you as the friend who took away my happiness. I actually hope you find a real love one day. If you had, you wouldn’t have cheated on poor Leon. God help him if he marries you. You are not the person you think you are and you will never be the person you aspire to be. You’re a failure in my eyes, Helena. I no longer worship you. I pity you and the only thing I wish for you is that one day you might change. But I will never see it because I won’t be here, walking around in your shadow, anymore.’

  Thoughts of picking up the floor lamp by the door on my way out and smashing Helena over the head with it build up in me. But I refuse to lower myself. In my daydreams about this moment I always walk away with my head held high, straight back. Sometimes she’d grovel at my feet, begging for forgiveness. She doesn’t do that now and I’m glad. I’ve made my point. Said all I have to say. I know exactly how she is feeling, I read every emotion in her face and in her body just before I turn on my heal and leave. I copy a classic Helena move to perfection.

  I leave her front door ajar as I go and call the lift. The doors open immediately and I get in. I will never know if she came to the door to watch me. I refuse to look up.

  Cold hits my face as I exit the building. I walk fast and full of determination, back to the car park. A burden has been lifted from me and I feel ready to tackle the small matter of splitting up the contents of the flat in Kilburn with Rob.

  I start the engine and head to my parents’ house. I urgently need the loo, followed by a cooked meal and a big mug of tea.

  Chapter 29

  Sunday morning and a Full English awaits. When I arrived at Mum and Dad’s the evening before, unannounced, Mum look panicked.

  ‘You lost your job?’ she asked, nervously, although looking as if she expected worse.

  ‘Nothing like that. I’ve just been over to have words with Helena and it feels great.’

  That was how I came to tell them both about what Rob had actually done and with whom. It was liberating to finally tell my family the complete truth. Later I dined on their leftover supper and fell asleep on the sofa after The Graham Norton Show. They didn’t try to get me up to the spare bedroom. Mum, or maybe Dad, put a blanket over me and angled my body to a lying position with a cushion under my cheek for a pillow.

  ‘I never would have thought it of her,’ Mum says over breakfast. ‘She seemed like such a nice girl.’

  ‘Nice people can be bitches sometimes.’ Dad shocks both me and Mum. We look at him, speechless, for several seconds. Mum with a teacup inches from her lips and me with a “You go, Dad,” expression on my face.

  ‘You didn’t bring any luggage,’ Mum remarks.

  ‘No. Like I say, I was planning on driving straight back but I decided to see you guys and now I’m going to see Rob.’

  They both stare at me in silence.

  ‘It’s okay. I’ve got the whole confrontation thing down to a T. I need to do this. I’ll drive back to Bridley from Kilburn after it’s done.’

  ‘Make sure you call me when you get back to Carey’s house,’ Mum insists.

  I kiss and hug Mum and Dad before I set off for Kilburn. I hadn’t told them that in the early hours of the morning I’d sent a text to Rob, telling him I’m in London and that we must meet. He’d agreed straight away. I sensed he wasn’t at the flat when I sent the message and would have to make his way there from wherever he’d slept the night before. I wondered if he’d heard from Helena and had gone over to console her
. If so, he’d know the purpose of my visit today and he’d be prepared for me. I’m not happy about that. The element of surprise was what gave me the upper hand over Helena. But I have a mission: To rid myself of Helena and Rob and nothing will stop me.

  I take a calming yogic breath as I park Carey’s car a few streets from the house. It’s Sunday and all the roads closer to the flat are packed with cars. I slam the car door with purpose, striding off towards my next showdown.

  When I arrive at my and Rob’s flat, although I have a key I hesitate before using it. I want to continue distancing myself from my old life and decide to treat the flat as a hostile environment. That way, finally leaving it will be easier. I loved our flat. It was a damp and mouldy old place when we first went to look at it but even with our combined salary it was all we could afford in London at the time. We’d always dreamed about the day we’d finally sell it and buy somewhere bigger and better. Perhaps a three bedroomed house in the suburbs or a two bedroomed flat somewhere a bit more swanky with a walk-in shower. I used to hate going into the bathroom. It had a weird smell and the little skylight window would steam up when you walked in or it was speckled with so much condensation you could never really see the sky clearly. The bath was small too. So small I’d take a tape measure to my friends’ houses to compare the size of my bath to theirs. Rob had said baths are pretty standard in old houses and stop complaining. Of course ours was a standard size but everything seemed tiny in our flat.

  Although the flat stayed poky, Rob and I had made it a home. We got rid of the strange smells, the mould and the old carpets. Walls had to be re-plastered and windows replaced but it was fun. It took a good two years to modernise it and put our own stamp on it. Rob let me choose all the colours, going along with my every decision. He didn’t stop me in my pursuit to find the perfect cushions. I’d see something better than the last and buy them, piling them onto the old ones so that in the end you couldn’t see our sofa for cushions. Or our bed come to that. I have a picture in my mind of the day Rob leapt onto the bed and fell straight back off because of the trampoline effect the cushions caused. He bounced off the bed onto the floor. I’d screamed with laughter and Rob began to laugh, too, until he found he couldn’t move to get up. A slipped disc. He was off work for weeks. I donated half my cushions to charity and ran around after Rob until he was fully recovered.