Twenty-Four

 

Present Day

 

Sunlight peeked through the trees and the scent of wet earth filled Laurel’s nose. A snail made its way along the sun-dappled ground, leaving a silvery trail behind. Laurel sat on a tree stump, sucking in deep breaths to stabilise her racing heartbeat. For the last thirty-seven minutes, her body had worked like never before. She’d pushed herself to the absolute limit, running away from the house and into the woods in an effort to outpace the memories of her dreams.

The night before, Nico had filled her mind as she’d slept, reliving the night they’d got together at Tom Bartley’s party. The dream was so vivid, it had felt real, as if she were really there again. She’d felt the plastic cup filled with vodka and coke in her hands, smelled the sharp tang of Nico’s aftershave. She’d got lost in that first kiss, as if she were in a labyrinth without a map to show the way back out. She’d felt her heart beating so wildly it felt as though it would explode from her chest. She’d tried to tell her seventeen-year-old self to stop, that it would only lead to heartache. And then she’d woken up, bathed in sweat and drowned with guilt because if she had stopped herself back then, she wouldn’t have had Seph. And whatever hardships had come after, Laurel wouldn’t swap her for anything. She hadn’t been able to sleep after that. Instead, she’d lain in bed next to Tony, focusing on the shadows on the wall and tracking their movement as the sun began to rise.

Laurel rubbed her hands over her face and stood up. A few moments of silence and sitting still were all it had taken to threaten to undo the calmness she’d built up on her way here. Rather than let it slip away, she set off again, following the shorter path through the woods and back onto the bridleway. Her feet pounded the earth, driving away the guilt and flashing memories of her dream. Her thighs burned as she ran uphill under the old railway bridge and then down the narrow, winding lane with hedges so tall she couldn’t see over them. Soon, she was back in the picturesque village of Oxley, running past the closed shops and slumbering houses until eventually slowing down to stop outside her own.

The stone slabs leading from the front gate up to the eighteenth-century cottage always reminded her of a child’s drawing. It had a small chimneystack and slate-tiled roof, dark green ivy creeping up the walls and tiny windows. The perfect family house for the perfect family. Except, the family wasn’t so perfect anymore.

The aroma of fresh coffee welcomed her as she stepped inside, unzipped her windbreaker jacket and draped it over the post at the bottom of the stairs. She looked at Taro, curled up on the windowsill above the radiator. He flicked his tail as she gently stroked his head. Her run had done nothing to shake away the strange feeling that had settled over her since the row with Seph but she didn’t want Tony to pick up on it. She fixed a smile onto her face and entered the kitchen, where he was leaning against the counter.

He looked up and smiled back at her. ‘Morning, beautiful.’

She shook her head with a small laugh and took a mug from the draining board, knowing she looked anything but in her sweaty running gear. ‘And you say you don’t need glasses.’

‘I don’t,’ he replied. ‘You still look like the bright-eyed twenty-year-old I met.’

Laurel snorted. She might have been twenty years old back then but bright eyed, she definitely hadn’t been. She’d been a floundering, heartbroken single mum, living with her parents. They’d had their windows refitted that summer and Tony had been working at his dad’s glazing company. A few days after the job had finished, he’d come back to collect a tool he’d left behind, in what Laurel now knew to be an excuse to see her again.

She snuck a look at him as she poured out her coffee. He’d always had a quiet air of determination about him. It had taken over a year for her to realise that whenever Tony was around, she felt less heartbroken and less floundering. She often felt guilty that it was Nico who’d got her when she’d been at her very best, when she’d been young and fresh and too naïve to know that too much excitement could make a girl sick. By the time she’d met Tony, she’d felt like an old, dried out sponge. But he’d filled her out again. He’d shown her that love didn’t have to mean heart-stopping highs and dramatic lows. Love didn’t have to hurt. It could be something constant and dependable, rich and deeply comforting.

Tony poured the dregs of his coffee into the sink. ‘What do you say to a pub dinner tonight? My treat.’

‘I can’t.’ Laurel pulled a face. ‘I’m going to see Seph after work.’

‘In London?’ He raised his eyebrows.

She shrugged lightly.

‘What’s happened?’

‘Nothing, really,’ she replied. ‘It’s just that we haven’t spoken since we argued and I want to sort things out. Face to face.’

Tony picked up his suit jacket from the stool next to the fridge. ‘I can come with you, if you want?’

‘No, there’s no need.’ She smiled. ‘I just worry about her, that’s all. Meeting up and talking things out will put my mind at rest.’

He nodded. ‘I know all this stuff with Nico has been tough but…’

‘But what?’

‘We carried that secret around for such a long time. Now that everything’s out in the open, shouldn’t it feel like less of a burden?’

The burden hadn’t been lifted. If anything, Laurel was sure a weight had been added to her shoulders. After all, she was the one who’d met up with Nico in the first place and given him the impetus to push himself back into their lives.

‘It’s not that everything’s out in the open that’s the problem,’ she said. ‘It’s the way it’s all happened. It wasn’t supposed to be like this.’

Tony didn’t reply, but then he didn’t have to. She knew he’d be thinking that if it wasn’t supposed to be like this, then how else should it have been?

Lying to Seph hadn’t been intentional. They’d always planned to tell her the truth, it was just a matter of when. But somehow, it had always been put off to another time - after her first term at school, after starting secondary school, her GCSEs, A-Levels and university. As each milestone had passed, not saying anything at all became much easier to live with. Seph had lacked nothing and their little family unit had been a happy one. Why fix something that wasn’t broken?

‘Don’t you wish we could turn back the clock and take it all back?’ she asked.

‘Not really,’ Tony replied slowly. ‘If anything, I’d turn the clock way, way back to the start and make sure we’d have told her earlier.’

Laurel frowned. How could she have possibly told a little girl that her daddy had turned his back on them? That he’d left them to think he’d died?

‘Everything will turn out alright,’ Tony said, with such conviction that Laurel almost believed it. ‘I need to get going, or I’ll be late. I’ll text you later.’ He gave her a quick peck on the cheek. ‘Love you.’

‘Love you too. Have a good day.’ She smiled back and waited until he walked out of the house before letting it drop from her face.

 

Later that afternoon, Laurel slid the last book from the pile onto the shelf. It had been a relatively quiet day and she’d spent most of it watching the clock. She made her way around the cluster of desks, shutting down the PCs and wondering, as she often did at the end of the working day, what her teenage self would have to say if she knew she’d end up as a librarian. It was about as far away from a glamorous photography career as it was possible to get, but books had always been a comfort. They still were. She liked the smell of them, and the library building was almost two hundred years old. The weight of the millions of words in the building was reassuring. Everyone from Hardy to Brontë and Dickens were stacked on the shelves around her. Despite the popularity of e-readers, books were still in high demand and she smiled, thinking about the elderly woman who’d borrowed an erotic novel that morning. Whoever said libraries no longer served a purpose?

Once she’d finished her last check for any left property, Laurel switched off the lights and bolted the door shut before making her way across the small car park. The evening air was hazy with a slight, crisp breeze heralding the onset of autumn. She dug her sunglasses out from her bag and put them on before getting into the car. Her plan was to drive to the station and take the train into London before getting a cab to Seph’s. It meant she wouldn’t have to disturb Tony by asking him to get her from the station later and it also meant that she’d have enough time to pull herself together on the drive home if things went badly. The plan sounded easy enough but the way her stomach leapt as she put the key into the ignition said something else entirely.

The traffic was light and she reached the station earlier than planned. Laurel sat in the car for a moment staring at the entrance before taking her phone from her bag to open the Skype app. Within a couple of seconds, she was listening to a dialling tone and waiting to hear the distinct hello on the other end.

‘I’m sitting in the car waiting for a train to take me to London so I can try and patch things up with Seph.’

‘And why do you need to patch things up with Seph?’ Kim asked.

Just like always, they needed no introduction and Laurel took a second to soak up the sound of Kim’s voice. It sounded so clear that she could very well be sitting in the car next to her instead of being thousands of miles away in Colorado.

‘Nico.’

‘I take it your meeting didn’t work, then?’

‘Obviously the words stay away mean nothing to him,’ Laurel replied.

When he’d got in touch months ago, Laurel had gone straight to Kim. She’d needed advice from someone who knew her with Nico in context, as well as without, and had sworn her to secrecy.

He wrote her an email,’ Laurel continued.

‘No!’

‘And they met up.’

‘No!’

‘Yes!’ Laurel slapped a hand against her thigh at the audacity of it before going on to give Kim a quick rundown.

After exposing her eating disorder, Laurel had feared they would never speak again. It had taken almost a year for their friendship to be rekindled, from that awful Boxing Day at Kim’s parents’ house to the days after Nico had disappeared from her life. They’d both been through a life-altering time but, in the end, their friendship hadn’t changed. If anything, it had only got stronger and Laurel was grateful for it every day.

Laurel loved Tony’s ability to remain calm in a crisis, but she adored Kim in equal measure for giving her the kind of energetic response she wanted and needed to hear. She wouldn’t have expected anything less.

‘I’m such an idiot,’ Laurel said, shaking her head. ‘I should’ve told Seph that we’d met up right at the start.’

‘You’re not an idiot, you only did what you thought was best.’

Laurel sighed, looking through the windscreen at the station. She’d only had Seph’s best interests at heart and there never seemed to be a good time to bring it up. Seph’s career meant the world to her and she’d been under such pressure to get ready for the exhibition. Sometimes, it scared Laurel to see just how much of herself Seph gave. It was what made her so brilliant, but it drained her. Seeing her collapse in Bicester Village had been one of, if not the, scariest moment of Laurel’s entire life. Even then, telling Seph to try and relax had fallen on deaf ears. She loved her daughter, but she was as stubborn and temperamental as her biological father.

‘Has he contacted you since?’ Kim asked.

Laurel’s face darkened. ‘No, but I’ve half a mind to find out where he lives and kill him.’

She hated the power he still had over her, how he made her feel so bitter and vengeful even after all these years. It had taken a long time to move on from him and all she wanted was for life to go back to how it had been.

‘Anyway, that’s my drama,’ she concluded. ‘How are things on your end?’

‘Oh, you know. I’m living, quietly. Everything’s good,’ Kim replied and Laurel heard the smile on her face.

She thought about Kim in her wooden house, deep in the vivid, green fairy-tale-like forest. They’d visited a few years ago for her wedding and Laurel had fallen in love with the place. She’d adored the ancient trees, the earthy scent and peaceful silence surrounding the house. She’d especially loved Kim’s kitchen with its hanging copper-bottomed pots, her plants and fragrant smelling herbs. It had made her think of an alchemist’s laboratory. And more than anything, she’d felt such an overwhelming sense of happiness for her friend, because she seemed to be living the dream.

Of all the places Kim could have ended up in, Colorado wasn’t one Laurel would have imagined. After years of battling eating disorders and depression, she’d followed a so-called healer she’d met in Bristol to the States. Laurel had been sceptical, but it seemed to make Kim happy. She’d gone on to study herbal medicine and now worked as a therapist and counsellor. She’d met her now husband and they lived out in the middle of nowhere with their three dogs. And, as far as Laurel could tell, she was healthy. She could never forget the heavy feeling of betrayal for ousting Kim’s secret eating disorder, but Laurel would do it all over again in a heartbeat if she had to.

‘How’s John?’ Laurel asked.

‘Oh, he’s fine. In fact, I might see if he wants some bachelor time. It sounds like you could use some support over there.’

‘You don’t have to do that,’ Laurel said, even though it was the opposite of what she felt. It would be wonderful to see Kim again.

‘It’s been ages,’ Kim said. ‘I miss you. All of you. Even that damned cat of yours.’

Laurel laughed. ‘We miss you too.’

Kim was allergic to cats but Taro had taken no notice of the number of times she’d shooed him away whenever he’d climb onto her lap. That last visit had been two years ago already. Time seemed to move so quickly that it felt like only a few years ago that they’d spent evenings smoking out of Kim’s bedroom window, listening to music and chatting about what their lives might turn out like. The memories seemed so recent, but it was almost thirty years ago.

A while later, Laurel sat in the taxi on the way to Seph’s with the nostalgia that she’d felt while speaking to Kim disintegrating with every second. Outside the window, people strode along the pavement with their heads down, eyes glued to mobile phone screens and ears plugged with headphones. It all felt so lonely. The anonymity of being in a big city had played a big part in London’s attraction when she’d been younger. If you were anonymous, you could do whatever you wanted. In her mind, it equated to freedom. And Nico had offered that to her. When he’d asked her to move to London, her mind had been filled with the idea of freedom, to be who she wanted, to do what she wanted. And, to do it all with him. It had seemed too good to be true. Laurel grimaced, because she knew now that it had felt too good to be true, because it really had been. After being so excited about living in London, she simply couldn’t relate to it now.

The taxi driver turned onto a quiet street and pulled over in front of one of the two-storey industrial buildings. It was so far away from the picturesque village Seph had been raised in and only added to the sense of distance that Laurel feared had wedged itself between them. She handed a twenty-pound note to the driver and stepped outside. Even the air was different here. It was clammy and dense, and she had to work that little bit harder to draw in enough of it to calm her nerves. She stood in front of the door and raised her hand to knock on it. The door was so solid that she wasn’t sure if she’d knocked loudly enough, but seconds later it swung open.

‘Mrs Powell?’ Ben stood on the other side, his face lit with surprise.

‘It’s Laurel.’ She smiled a little with her autopilot response. 

‘How are you?’

‘Fine, thank you.’ Laurel hitched her handbag a little higher onto her shoulder and stood on her tiptoes, to peer over his shoulder and look inside. ‘Is Seph here?’

‘Of course, sorry. Bad manners.’ He grimaced and stepped to one side. ‘Come in.’

She walked through the doorway, narrowly avoiding two bicycles leaning against the wall. Takeaway leaflets and junk mail sat in a recycling box next to the door and the wooden floors were scuffed and smooth with age. Laurel followed Ben into a large open-plan space, dominated by a big grey sofa and low coffee table. A long bar-style counter separated it from an impressive, modern kitchen at the other end of the room.

‘Who was it?’ Seph asked, standing up from behind the counter with a handheld mixer in her hand.

‘Hi, love.’

‘Mum?’ She put mixer down on the counter and stared back at her with surprise and confusion across her face. ‘What are you doing here?’

‘I was in the area and thought I’d drop by.’

Seph raised an eyebrow in a move so reminiscent of George it made Laurel’s heart hurt. ‘You were in the area?’

Laurel nodded.

‘In London?’

She nodded again breezily, hitching her handbag further up her shoulder.

‘I’m going to head off,’ Ben said, picking up a leather bag from the floor.

‘Where are you going?’ Seph asked, tracking him with her eyes.

He shrugged. ‘Just out. We’ll talk later just…try and chill down a bit, yeah?’ He turned to Laurel. ‘Sorry to skip out as soon as you’ve walked in, Mrs Powell. Maybe I’ll see you when I get back.’

Laurel nodded. ‘Maybe. But please, it’s Laurel. Mrs Powell makes me feel old.’

He smiled and looked back at Seph, almost as an afterthought. ‘See you in a bit.’

‘Yeah, see you,’ Seph replied.

Everything about the way he kissed Seph’s cheek looked normal enough, but Laurel could sense her daughter’s anger coming off her in waves as she watched Ben leave. Seph’s eyes narrowed and her face flashed with a look of irritation. Laurel’s breath stopped. She’d seen that look before. It was just like the one Nico had given her so many times, especially in the last weeks they’d spent together.

Seph swore under her breath before switching her gaze to Laurel. ‘Coffee?’

Laurel blinked. The irritation that had pulled on her daughter’s face had fallen away as quickly as it had come along and now she wasn’t sure if she’d imagined it altogether. She looked at Seph and nodded.

‘That would be lovely,’ Laurel replied, turning on the spot to take in her daughter’s home.

It felt much cosier than the pictures she’d seen. Plants occupied the corners and the exposed brick walls looked chic rather than shabby. Black and white photographs hung from the walls and Laurel’s heart pulled in recognition. Seph had taken some of the negatives from Laurel’s collection, but hadn’t said what they were for. It was nice to see them hanging on Seph’s walls, especially with how things had been between them lately. Laurel smiled, taking in the rest of the space. It all looked surprisingly clean. Seph had always needed nagging when it came to chores, but Laurel would swear that even the skirting boards were dust-free.

‘Nice place,’ she said, looking at Seph. ‘Windows look clean.’

Seph shrugged a little in response and Laurel turned back to stare at one of the photographs. She moved closer to it, inspecting the image of the two of them, smiling happily. Seph had only been five years old then, and one of her front teeth was missing.

‘My first selfie. It wasn’t easy in those days. You never knew if it would come out right or if you’d end up chopping off heads.’ She smiled as Seph came to stand next to her, holding out a mug.

‘That was in Scotland, wasn’t it?’

Laurel took the mug and nodded. ‘The Isle of Skye.’

Another summer had passed without her leaving the country for a holiday. It seemed much longer than two years ago that her and Tony had gone to Kenya. She missed the thrill of travelling. When Seph was young, they’d holidayed overseas as much as possible. They’d wanted her to grow up knowing that there was more out there than their comfortable life in England, to expose her to how multicultural and diverse the world really was. The irony of them barely getting out of their middle-class country village anymore wasn’t lost on her, especially with Seph now living in one of the most diverse cities on earth.

She stole a look at her daughter. In the few days since last seeing her, Seph had lost weight. She’d always been slim but now her collarbones were more pronounced and her cheekbones were more defined. She seemed skittish too, with her eyes darting around the room, as if she couldn’t let them rest for more than a second. Laurel blew onto her coffee. Seph had always been tetchy when under pressure, a picky eater when stressed. But still, it was hard not to worry.

‘You weren’t just passing by, were you?’ Seph asked. ‘The only times you’ve come back to London since Uncle George died was for my exhibitions.’

‘I had some things to do.’

‘Checking up on me, you mean,’ Seph replied, walking back into the kitchen.

Laurel turned to follow her. ‘No, of course not. I just wanted to sort things out, that’s all.’

She slid into one of the high stools at the bar separating the living room and kitchen and rested her handbag on its surface. On the other side of the counter, Seph held a bowl filled with what looked like creamed butter and sugar mix.

‘I’m sorry I didn’t tell you I’d met up with Nico before. I didn’t mean for you to find out like that,’ Laurel continued. ‘I was just surprised that you’d met up with him.’

Seph’s face was unreadable as she cracked an egg into the bowl. Laurel wrapped her hands around her mug, waiting for a reply but her daughter’s face was unreadable as she cracked another shell and dropped the yolk into the bowl.

‘I just-’

‘For crying out loud, Mum.’ Seph chucked the eggshell onto the counter. ‘Do we have to keep going on about all this?’

‘Excuse me?’ Laurel blinked.

‘All this Nico stuff and the arguments, all of it. It’s old news.’ She looked down into the bowl before sighing heavily. ‘I’m tired of it.’

Laurel’s jaw slacked open as a deep frown creased her face but she said nothing as Seph pushed the whisking attachments into a handheld mixer. For a few seconds, the loud buzzing of it filled the room and the space between them. Laurel looked down at the string of gloopy, clear egg white dribbling from the shell that Seph had thrown onto the counter. What did she mean, it was old news? Their argument had been a fierce one. Surely they needed to talk things over, to clear the air? It didn’t feel right to simply ignore it but something about the look of complete apathy in her daughter’s eyes made her think twice. Maybe it would be better to just go along with what Seph wanted. To stop talking about it and move on.

Laurel watched her whisking the mixture with her eyebrows scrunched tightly together, as if that one simple task was taking every inch of concentration she had until she finally switched it off.

‘How’s work?’ Laurel asked.

‘Finished.’ Seph shrugged. ‘All done and ready to go.’

Laurel tilted her head to one side. ‘You look tired.’

‘I was up until almost three in the morning writing.’

‘Writing what?’

‘A book.’

Laurel’s eyebrows shot up and Seph half-laughed with a hint of defensiveness.

‘Don’t look so surprised,’ she said. ‘I can write, you know. Really well, as it turns out. And I have a story to tell. This whole stuff with Nico. I mean, it’s seriously messed up. I reckon it’d make a great book. Maybe even a film.’

Laurel nodded, not quite sure what to make of all this. Seph had never shown great aptitude or interest in writing. Painting, drawing, sketching – yes. But writing? She’d hated it from an early age and had despaired over creative writing homework, essays and her university dissertation. She glanced at Seph, noting the pinch between her eyebrows and the sour set to the corners of her mouth. Everything about her said that something was wrong, despite her efforts to hide it. Laurel thought back to the anger she’d felt from Seph when Ben had left earlier.

‘Everything okay with you and Ben?’ she asked lightly.

Seph shrugged. ‘I guess.’

‘You two seemed a little…I don’t know. Out of sorts.’

‘He’s just being a dick. He thinks my book is a stupid idea and that I’m stupid for writing it.’

‘Really? He said that?’

‘More or less. Obviously he thinks he’s the brains in this relationship. His lack of confidence in me is pretty astounding.’

From what Laurel knew of Ben, it seemed odd he’d call any idea of Seph’s stupid but she wasn’t about to say so.

‘I’ll show him.’ Seph added with a grin.

Laurel shifted her weight on the stool. She couldn’t help but think that the grin looked less playful and more edgy. Vengeful, even.

‘I spoke to Kim earlier today,’ she said, determined not to let her paranoia about Seph’s behaviour take over. ‘She’s thinking of coming for a visit. It would be nice to do something together when she comes.’

‘Ooh, yes.’ Seph snapped her fingers. ‘Can you finish this?’

Laurel barely had time to blink before the bowl was shoved into her hands. She frowned as Seph trotted behind her to pick up her laptop from the coffee table.

‘I almost forgot. I’m throwing a party to coincide with the exhibition and I’ve got to send more invitations. Hey, maybe Kim could make it for that?’

Laurel pulled a face. ‘I think that might be too soon.’

‘Well you should tell her to try. For me.’

The grin on her daughter’s face was the polar opposite to the one she’d flashed about Ben just seconds ago. It lit up her eyes and was so wide and childlike, it seemed ridiculous to remind her that transatlantic flights didn’t come cheap, especially last-minute ones.

‘It’s going to be great,’ Seph continued. ‘I’ve got your invitation done already.’

‘Thanks.’ Laurel smiled.

She’d been so worried that their last argument was a step too far, that it might have caused irreparable damage to their relationship. Although things weren’t going according to the script she’d formulated in her head on the journey here, she knew a peace offering when she heard one.

Laurel took the abandoned spoon and began folding in the flour, picking up where Seph had left off. Maybe things really were alright. Maybe she was just being too overprotective, projecting things that weren’t really there. There was nothing to worry about.

Seph quickly looked up and caught her eye and grinned. ‘Bestseller in the making.’

Laurel nodded lightly with anxiety clawing at her chest as her daughter, tapped away on the laptop at a rate that seemed almost inhuman. She’d always supported Seph, had always encouraged her. It was her job as a mother. But this time, she wasn’t so sure.