Friday, 28 October
‘So you’re going on another holiday, you lucky thing. Where’s Abisko?’
‘Sweden, but it’s not exactly a holiday, Millie.’ Isla tugged the kinks from her hair with her straighteners, catching her sister’s eye in the black-framed mirror above the fireplace. ‘It’s work.’
‘OK, if you say so.’ Millie smiled from the sofa, where Luna was purring on her knee. Her hair was scraped back in a haphazard ponytail, and she’d gained weight, despite her dieting efforts. Isla thought curvy suited her, but Millie had never been happy with her appearance. And now her acne was playing up again, a cluster of angry spots on her chin, cruel at almost forty.
‘It really is work,’ Isla insisted. ‘I’m paying for the trip with a couple of commissions, and hoping to finish my book while I’m there.’
‘So, have you got a publisher yet?’
Isla shook her head, eyes still on her sister. ‘No, although I admit I haven’t really tried,’ she said, sighing as she bent to turn off the fake-flicker fire. It was burning her legs. Making them red. She glanced over her shoulder. ‘I feel bad that you’ve come over when I’m going out.’
‘It’s OK, I just felt like popping in and surprising you.’ Millie smiled again. ‘You look lovely by the way.’ She bit into a biscuit, crumbs sprinkling her tracksuit bottoms. ‘You always look lovely.’
‘What? No I don’t.’ Isla turned back to the mirror and screwed up her face, never seeing herself as attractive.
‘Actually, I should get back soon to cook dinner,’ Millie said. ‘Did I tell you Abigail’s gone vegan? I’m trying a cashew and mushroom korma tonight.’
‘Bless her. How is my lovely niece?’
‘Fine, although sometimes things seemed easier when she was younger. But I guess that’s true for all parents of teens.’ Especially those with a child with Asperger’s. ‘She seems so grown up at times. She likes a boy she met at the chess club she goes to, but, on the other hand, she’s still obsessed with dinosaurs.’ She paused for a moment before adding, ‘She still loves the stegosaurus you and Jack bought her for her birthday.’
Jack had bought the large plastic figure. Isla had only remembered her niece’s birthday at the last minute.
‘You’re an absolute genius,’ she’d said, when he walked through the door with it, making silly dinosaur noises and waving the thing about.
‘She loves the puppy too, of course,’ Millie continued, glancing at her watch. ‘Another reason I should get back. Larry’s taken to chewing everything in his path. He’s already ruined the ballet pumps Abigail got from Lindy Bop.’
‘Oh that’s a shame.’
‘I know. She just stared at them for ages, as though they would miraculously mend in front of her eyes. I’ve had to order another pair quick.’ She smiled. ‘Why didn’t someone tell me puppies are harder than babies?’ She dragged Luna to her face, and plonked a kiss on her black nose. ‘I should have got a cat. So much easier.’
‘Sometimes,’ Isla said. ‘Although Luna is super naughty, and has been known to poop in my trainers.’
Millie laughed, and Isla paused from straightening her hair, her eyes on her older sister once more.
Millie worked almost as many hours as Julian, as a teaching assistant at a village school just outside Letchworth, and Abigail, at fifteen, still needed as much help as she always had done. Isla felt it wasn’t right that everything fell on Millie’s shoulders all the time, while Julian snuck into the garage each evening and weekend to play with his ever-growing model train set.
‘Julian should help more,’ Isla said, glancing over her shoulder.
‘He wouldn’t know where to start.’ Millie crunched on another biscuit, and Isla couldn’t work out if her sister actually liked the idea that they couldn’t survive without her.
‘But it’s not the 1950s,’ Isla continued, before she could warn her mouth not to open.
Millie’s face wrinkled into a frown, and she prodded a spot on her chin.
‘And don’t touch that – you’ll make it sore,’ Isla said.
Millie whipped her hand away from her chin. ‘And there’s me thinking my spots weren’t noticeable.’ She pulled a fake sad face.
‘They’re not, not really.’ She shook her head, regretting her words.
‘It’s OK. I know I look like a fifteen-year-old boy, at times.’
‘No you don’t. It’s just . . . maybe you could get something from the GP to clear them up.’
Millie shrugged. ‘Yes, maybe I could, although there never seems time, somehow.’ She paused again. ‘And let’s face it, nobody looks at me anyway.’ She laughed, but Isla could tell she meant it.
‘Are you OK?’ she said softly. She wanted to be there for Millie. ‘You know if you ever need anything . . . to talk . . . you know I’m here.’
‘Blimey, Isla, where’s this come from?’ Millie sounded way too upbeat. ‘I’m absolutely fine. Always am.’ She turned from Isla’s gaze. ‘So are you going to tell me where you’re off to tonight?’
‘Spoons in Cambridge.’ She turned, eyes back on her reflection, and once more dragged her hair straight. ‘A university reunion.’
‘Bit of trek, isn’t it?’
‘Not really. I’ll get the train and a taxi.’
‘You hate taxis.’
‘Used to hate taxis,’ Isla said. She refused to let on that the enclosed feeling of a taxi had triggered her anxiety only a few days ago. ‘I’m OK now. If I can go to Canada alone, I’m sure I can get in a taxi.’ She wondered if she sounded smug, although she felt far from it.
Millie had never travelled. Married at twenty-three with Abigail on the way had meant they’d struggled at first. And later Millie hadn’t seemed to want to go far. Although lately, Julian had taken off to European countries alone, claiming to need space. ‘Abigail wouldn’t cope,’ was all Millie said, when Isla suggested she should go too. ‘I could take care of her,’ she’d offered, but Millie had declined.
Not that her sister had ever given Isla reason to think she wasn’t happy with her life. Bringing up a child with Asperger’s syndrome had been difficult at times, of course it had, but Millie had never complained.
‘I think you were amazing doing the journey to Canada on your own,’ Millie said. ‘Really, really brave, after what you went through in Sydney.’
Isla felt a prickle behind her eyes. Millie had always had a knack of barging in with mentions of Carl Jeffery over the years. Oblivious, it seemed, to how wretched it made Isla feel.
‘Can we not talk about that?’ Isla said. ‘You know I try to put it out of my head.’ She turned and slammed her straighteners down on the coffee table, and padded across the room.
‘Sorry,’ Millie said. ‘I didn’t think. Sorry.’
‘It’s fine, don’t worry.’ Isla tugged her make-up bag from her handbag, and glanced out of the window at the star-free night sky. She lowered her gaze to the road crammed with traffic: vehicles slowing as they approached the roundabout. About to close the curtains, she noticed someone standing on the other side of the road, silhouetted against the trees that edged the park. The bright light behind her made it hard to see, so she moved closer to the glass, narrowing her eyes. Someone was watching her.
‘What are you looking at?’ Millie asked, and Isla glanced over her shoulder to see her sister pick up the mug of coffee she’d made her fifteen minutes ago, and take a sip. ‘Jesus, this is cold,’ she said, banging it back on the table, startling Isla. ‘It’s your fault, Luna, darling,’ Millie went on, tickling the cat’s head, ‘demanding so much attention.’
Isla returned her eyes to the figure, tingles biting at her neck.
‘Are you OK, Isla?’
‘Yes, fine,’ she said, running her hand over her rubber band. Whoever it was wore dark clothes and a scarf and hat, their face barely visible. She snatched the curtains closed, and stepped back from the window.
Millie rose, and headed over. ‘Did you see something?’ she asked, cracking open the curtains and looking out.
Isla stood behind her. ‘It’s just . . . well . . . I thought I saw someone, that’s all . . . someone staring up at the apartment.’ Her voice was soft and uncertain. She pinged the band three times, snap, snap, snap.
‘Well there’s nobody there now,’ Millie said, turning and touching her sister’s arm gently.
Isla peered over her sister’s shoulder. Whoever had been there was gone.
‘Perhaps you were mistaken,’ Millie said.
‘Yes, yes, I must have been.’ She yanked the curtains closed once more, scooped her hair behind her ears, and moved back to the mirror.
Millie followed her, and looked into Isla’s eyes through their reflection, in a way she had after Carl Jeffery. It was her I’m worried about you look.
‘I’m fine,’ Isla insisted.
Millie touched Isla’s arm again – the protective older sister. ‘Are you sure?’
‘Yes, yes of course I am. Honestly.’ But she wasn’t sure she was.
Eventually, Millie returned to the sofa, picked up the last biscuit from the packet Isla had put on the table earlier and bit into it.
Isla stared at her own reflection, breathing deeply, before unzipping her make-up bag and pulling out her mascara.
‘So you’re meeting up with old uni mates?’ Millie said, clearly trying for a change of subject, and putting on a bright voice.
‘Yes . . . sort of.’ She was distracted. Certain someone had been looking up at her. Someone in the shadows, watching like Carl Jeffery had. Was he free? She pinged the rubber band again, making her wrist sting. Maybe she shouldn’t go to Cambridge. But then if she didn’t, she would be letting him win. She was being ridiculous. Whoever it was was probably waiting for someone, and just happened to glance up at the moment Isla looked out. Or maybe they were searching for someone in another apartment, like the person in the sports car. After all, there were six flats in the converted house.
‘Isla?’ Millie snapped her from her thoughts.
‘What?’ She pulled the mascara brush from the tube, leant towards the mirror, and flicked the brush over her fair lashes.
‘Tell me about these uni friends you’re meeting,’ Millie said, as the cat leapt back onto her lap, and curled up.
‘Oh, OK, yes, well, Ben and Veronica studied English lit with me, and Sara studied chemistry. Just people I once knew. I wasn’t that close with any of them, well, apart from Trevor Cooper.’
‘Trevor Cooper? The bloke you went out with?’
‘God, do you remember that?’
‘Of course. You were with him for ages. Didn’t he get a bit clingy?’
Isla shrugged. ‘I suppose so, but it was mainly that I wasn’t ready for a serious relationship. I wanted to travel.’
‘Didn’t he turn a bit weird when you dumped him?’ Her eyes were wide.
Isla pushed her mascara brush back in its tube. ‘He was upset that’s all.’
‘But he followed you home, didn’t he?’
‘God, what is this, the Trevor Cooper Inquisition?’ She sighed. ‘He was a mess, Millie. The way I broke up with him was unkind. I regret that.’
‘Oh God, that’s right – you got Roxanne to dump him for you.’
‘I couldn’t face it. I gave him enough hints, but he didn’t listen.’ She rubbed her temples, a headache coming on. ‘And later he wanted to talk it through, but I didn’t have the bottle. I feel guilty even now.’
‘No, Isla, you were young, and didn’t know how to deal with it.’
‘Do we ever know how to handle breakups?’ She sighed deeply.
‘Perhaps you shouldn’t go tonight.’
Isla shrugged. She was beginning doubt whether she should. She pulled out her blusher brush, and flicked it across each cheek in turn, before pulling out her lip gloss.
‘Is Jack going?’ Millie asked.
Isla shook her head. There’d been no talk of partners on the event invitation. ‘He wouldn’t enjoy it,’ she said. ‘It doesn’t involve sci-fi or fantasy.’
Millie laughed. ‘It’s about time you got engaged, isn’t it? You’re almost thirty. Your body clock is ticking.’
The front door swung open, as Millie added, ‘Jack’s such a great bloke. You could do a hell of a lot worse.’
‘Did I hear my name?’ Jack said, as the cat jumped from Millie’s lap, and raced towards him, twirling her body round his jean-clad legs. He put a brown paper bag on the breakfast bar, and the waft of Chinese food filled the air. He bent to pick the cat up and lifted her to his face. She looked tiny in his arms.
‘I was only saying good things about you, Jack,’ Millie said, getting up, and brushing biscuit crumbs from her lap. She looked at Isla. ‘You should tell Jack what you saw . . . ’
‘Saw?’ Jack said.
‘It was nothing.’ Her mind whirred, as they stared her way. ‘Just a cute cat earlier, which looked a bit like Luna.’
‘Well there’s only one Luna,’ he said, with a smile, plonking a kiss on the cat’s head.
Millie looked at Isla, but Isla couldn’t read her expression. ‘I’d better get back,’ she said mildly. ‘Or they’ll send out a search party.’