The Friend Read online

  ‘Mrs Solarin, do you still want to hold?’ Sol’s personal assistant asks. If possible, she is sounding even more embarrassed.

  ‘Oh, yes, thank you.’

  The first thing I had typed in about the school had brought up the news articles. The pictures. I’d looked at Yvonne Whidmore, standing with her husband and children, looking so happy, so contented with her life. And this was what had happened to her.

  I had to take several deep breaths, had to walk around and around the kitchen several times to stop myself running down to the school and grabbing my children out of class and bringing them home. By home, I mean London. This place is not my – our – home. That sort of thing never happens in London. Well, of course it does, but not to people I could potentially know. Not on the premises of the place where I dropped off my kids.

  The Whidmores looked like a nice family. He looked considerably different to the crumpled, highly stressed image I got of him walking into the school with his children, but they seemed so together. How could—

  ‘Cee, yep, what’s up?’

  ‘Sol. Did you hear about what happened at the boys’ school?’ I ask.

  ‘No, what? Are the boys all right?’

  ‘The woman who was found on the school grounds in the summer?’

  ‘Oh, that,’ he says dismissively.

  ‘So you heard about it? But didn’t bother to tell me?’ I ask.

  Sol pauses now. He knows he’s about to plunge himself into a whole world of trouble. ‘I might have heard something. But it wasn’t … I knew you’d just get yourself all worked up about it.’

  ‘Get myself all worked up about it? Aren’t you even worried, Sol? Because I am. What if it was part of a grudge someone has against the school? What if they come back and harm our boys? What if this is the start of something awful?’

  ‘It’ll be fine,’ Sol says. That’s it. To that devastating revelation, to my worries, to my assessment of the atmosphere at the school, all I get is ‘It’ll be fine.’

  ‘You didn’t just hear something, did you? You knew all about it,’ I say to him.

  ‘I told you, I heard something. But seriously, Cee, stop fussing, it’ll be fine.’

  Over the last three months Sol has been doing this: dismissing me and anything I try to bring up with him in a condescending manner. ‘I really hope you’re right,’ I say to him.

  ‘I am. Look, Cee, I have to go. Stop worrying. See ya.’

  He hangs up before I can even say a proper bye and the anger I’ve been suppressing flares up like an inferno in me.

  I really didn’t want to move. But I had to. The longer Sol and I were apart, the more distant he became. When he first got the promotion, six months ago, he was commuting down to Brighton three or four times a week because none of us wanted to move. And he’d get back late, grumpy and irritable, unpleasant and hostile. When we decided to try him living down in Brighton for a month he began to disappear. His texts during the day stopped completely, his replies to my texts dwindled, and on the phone he was short and distracted. Then we’d go three days sometimes without any communication. I didn’t want to move, but I didn’t want to lose him either, so I said yes to us moving, I convinced the children it was going to be a big adventure. And I ignored the fact that I was the one who lost the most in this. I didn’t want to be a stay-at-home parent – I didn’t have the strength for it. I liked working, I liked being independent and not reliant on anyone for anything. I truly thought once we were here that Sol would go back to who he was. But no, he is still being dismissive and condescending. He is still treating me like an afterthought. Is that because someone is ‘see ya’-ing and ‘TBH’-ing with my husband?

  April, 2005

  ‘So, I have two questions to ask you,’ Sol said to me. We were cooking in my little kitchen, and Harmony was sitting in front of the television, counting her toes in time to something on In the Night Garden.

  ‘Go ahead, but just remember, I may not answer depending on how invasive the question is.’

  Sol smiled and put down the carrots he was washing. He came to me, took the knife out of my hands, and stood behind me. He wrapped his arms around my waist and nestled his cheek on my shoulder. ‘They are kind of interlinked.’

  ‘Go ahead.’

  ‘Right, well, the thing is, I was wondering if I could adopt Harmony?’

  I froze. That I was not expecting. I was expecting him to ask if we could move in together, not this. ‘What’s the other question?’ I managed to squeeze out.

  ‘Well, will you marry me?’

  I froze again. I was not expecting that, either.

  ‘Do you see how the two are interlinked now?’

  ‘Yes,’ I squeaked.

  ‘Have I scared you?’

  ‘Yes,’ I squeaked again.

  ‘Cece, I love you. You love me. Let’s get married. Make more babies.’

  ‘Is it really that simple?’

  ‘Of course it is. Come on, Cee, when you think about it, if we weren’t together, how would you feel? I mean, I know you’d cope and you wouldn’t fall apart, but how would you truly feel?’

  How would I feel? Devastated. Hopeless. Broken. ‘Not good,’ I said to him. ‘But adoption and marriage, they are huge things.’

  ‘What sort of an answer is that? I’d be broken if we weren’t together. Devastated. Hopeless. Broken. That’s why I want you to marry me and to let me adopt Harmony. You’re my family.’

  ‘OK,’ I replied as he wrapped his arms around me. ‘OK, I will marry you and I will let you adopt Harmony. OK.’

  Sol spun me in his arms and picked me up, holding me above him, his grin so wide I could barely see his face. His grin, of course, matched mine, because I couldn’t remember a time when someone had made me so happy.

  10:20 a.m. I toss my phone onto the table and pick up my tablet again. I need to stop reading about Yvonne Whidmore. I need to focus on something else, anything else, because if I start down that road and discover stuff about her that makes her life in any way similar to mine, I will be leaving before Sol gets back tonight. I look around at the boxes that need unpacking. I need to focus on something else. Just not that, either.

  Anaya

  11:15 a.m. I was dubious about this car when Sanjay first suggested it. It’s too flashy, I’d told him. And not that brilliant for the environment. But he’d gone on about the safety record, about how the children would be better protected in a crash, and I’d asked him if we’d just have to ignore what sort of planet they’d grow up to inherit then? And he’d replied that he would make the equivalent donation in the car price to any environmental charity I chose. Fair play to him, he did as well.

  Since leaving the others, I couldn’t go home. Sanj is working up in London most days for the next few weeks, so the house will be empty, echoey and empty, and I can’t be alone in there right now. I can’t be with the others, but I can’t be alone at home.

  My foot presses down on the accelerator and the car surges forward, eating up the black line of road that leads upwards through the green hillside to the top of Devil’s Dyke. Sometimes the way to Devil’s Dyke feels like an almost vertical incline. When I used to come running up here, I had to dig deep, concentrate on every step, push through the shuddering of my leg muscles to reach the top, to stand at the very summit and throw my arms in the air, victorious like Rocky Balboa after his famous run. I was humming the Rocky theme tune in my head, of course.

  Now I’m driving up here, climbing all this way to be closer to the sky, to be as far away from the beach as I can while still being able to see it. I want to think about that night with Yvonne and forget about it at the same time.

  When Trevor wasn’t bringing the girls to school, last week, when it was simply everyone hanging around until the kids went in, and no one really talked about it, it was easier to act as if it hadn’t really happened. To pretend that I hadn’t seen her that night, that … I’d told the police all about it, of course. Apart from the bits I cou
ldn’t tell them. Wouldn’t tell them. What does it matter, the semantics of it – I didn’t tell them everything. Most, but not all. It’s always that detail that catches you out.

  I almost knock the car door off its hinges freeing myself, pushing myself into the windy top of the hill. I can see for miles and miles, but you have to know exactly where to stand to see the beach, to see the sea, to see where one of my former best friends began the night that would end with her in a coma. Without thinking, I stand in that spot and cover my eyes. Hide myself. It’s too much. Too much. I have to tell. I have to tell Sanjay everything. Even if it ruins my life.

  I have to tell.

  But I can’t.

  I won’t.

  I mustn’t.

  April, 2003

  I stood behind the metal mesh railings of the balcony of this hot new London club, looking down at the party I had put together. I’d organised it to celebrate the merger of two huge companies, and it had gone off without a hitch. Obviously we’d had the usual tantrums – the clients not liking the decor, food, location, about three minutes before the event was meant to start. Obviously I’d discovered that the people I’d put next to each other on certain tables had once been married/caught having affairs/threatened to kill each other and so I’d had to rearrange EVERYONE to make sure they were properly far apart. But those were mere glitches to be expected and I wasn’t in danger of losing my job over them.

  I was aware of the tall, handsome man moving up the metal staircase as though he glided, and I pretended not to see him. He was Sanjay Kohli and he’d arrived with the bigwigs who’d spent the best part of a year negotiating this deal. He didn’t work for either company, he was the man who’d made it happen. He was a matchmaker for companies who often didn’t know they were looking for someone to hook up with, and he’d been all over the business pages as the hot new thing. He was certainly the best-looking thing. I’d read all about him when my company, Logan & Lachlan & Lockhart, had won the pitch for this account. When I’d seen a picture of Sanjay Kohli, I’d actually gasped. They were all polished, these people involved with big business and mergers, but he was that handsome reserved for movie stars who had access to filters, make-up artists and time to take care of themselves. His saffron-brown skin was smooth and unmarked, his large eyes were edged by thick midnight-black eyelashes, his features were framed by thick black eyebrows. The way he was smiling at the camera gave the impression that he knew something about you but he wasn’t going to tell you what – in fact, he wasn’t ever going to tell anyone. I knew I’d see him at the launch and decide he would be my event crush.

  When he’d walked in, told me his name, and smiled that smile as I ticked it off, I’d felt my cheeks grow warm. I’d stared very hard at the sheet in front of me and pretended I was immune to his looks.

  I’d watched Sanjay Kohli from my balcony, moving from group to group, talking, engaging, making everyone feel at ease, while most people were slowly descending. I was fascinated by this process: the sloughing off of sensibility and decorum; the formal layers peeling away with every sip of the drinks in their hands and becoming a different breed to the ones who’d walked in the doors. It would end in tears. Tantrums, tears and taxis. Always. No matter who, no matter how refined, these parties, these events that kept me employed, always ended the same way. And I always came away a little deflated that the person I’d decided was my event crush had descended with the rest of them.

  ‘I hear you’re the one to thank for this splendid event,’ Sanjay Kohli said to me. Most of the time, my event crush did not speak to me beyond telling me his name on the door, or to complain about something that wasn’t in my power to change. Beyond being the gateway to the end of the night and a body full of alcohol and good food, I didn’t exist to most people.

  I took a fake sip of the champagne glass in my hand and smiled at him. ‘I am part of the team that put this event together,’ I replied.

  ‘I see,’ he said. Amusement danced around his mouth and eyes, as though he was mocking me for being self-effacing. ‘Part of the team.’ He nodded. ‘You wouldn’t happen to be Anaya Harshani, would you?’

  I gulped, discreetly, so he wouldn’t see how flattered I was, positively brimming with excitement that he might know who I was. ‘Yes, yes, I am.’

  ‘I seem to remember that most of the emails about this event came from you. Sometimes late into the night.’

  ‘I didn’t know you were on the email list.’

  ‘My assistant is, and she forwards everything on to me. I always like to know what is going on with my projects.’

  ‘Good plan,’ I replied. ‘I’m the same.’

  He took a fake sip of the drink in his hand and I smiled because he probably wasn’t going to descend. ‘Tuhānū rāta dē khāṇē la’ī jāṇā cāhudē hō?’ he said quietly, while staring straight into my eyes.

  I had to rewet my lips, take a deep breath and remind myself to smile before I could speak. Those eyes. They were like whirlpools that drew you in and then swirled you around. ‘I’m sorry, my parents are from Sri Lanka,’ I said. ‘I don’t speak or understand Punjabi.’

  ‘Ah, shame,’ he replied. ‘That will teach me to make assumptions based on a name and a picture. OK, in English: would you like to go to dinner?’

  ‘I would like to go to dinner. But I am not going to go to dinner with you.’

  ‘Ah … And why not, may I ask?’

  I glanced at the event below and spotted my boss, with his sun-induced wrinkles and expensive glasses, staring up at us. He’d been hired after me so had ‘inherited’ me. I’d overheard him, on a night when he had descended with the rest of them, say that I was too pretty to try hard enough, too ethnic to be promoted, and too fuckable to not be a sexual harassment suit waiting to happen. He’d been mortified when he’d realised I’d overheard, and had been trying to get rid of me ever since. I knew he was going to watch how this interaction with someone important would play out and add it to the list of things he would use to get me out.

  ‘Because I can’t get involved with clients, no matter how tenuously a client they may be.’

  ‘So you know who I am?’ he asked.

  ‘Doesn’t everyone?’ I replied.

  He laughed, his face cracking from the fixed, knowing smile he’d worn all evening. ‘Well, isn’t part of your job giving the client what they want?’ he asked.

  ‘No.’ I shook my head, and I watched his eyes follow the movement of my hair, transfixed like it was black water flowing from my head. ‘My job is to give the client what they need, because rarely is what a client wants what is good or right for them. And anyway, I’m not part of this or any deal.’

  He reached into his inner pocket and pulled out his business card. ‘When you leave your job, give me a call,’ he said.

  I didn’t take his card – I couldn’t with my boss watching. ‘And if you ever leave your job, give me a call,’ I said. ‘I really must go,’ I added. I did not want to stop being around him, but I had to. It was the only way to stop myself descending with the rest of them except my overindulgence would be with Sanjay Kohli.

  11:35 a.m. The wind whips at me up on this hill and I close my eyes, put out my arms. I want to jump off. Jump off and float away from all of what happened and all of what’s to come.

  Cece

  4:35 p.m. Ore comes out of the building first, and he looks like he has all his belongings with him. He always does. It’s almost always Oscar who has to go back for his book bag, his hat, his jumper, his homework folder, his … his … his … Ore walks beside a girl with saffron-brown skin and shiny black hair swept back into a plait under her green and purple hat, talking avidly about something. Oscar brings up the rear, carrying some of his stuff in his arms, but I can see his cap is on his head, and he has both his rucksack and book bag, as well as his blazer, so that’s a good start. He walks beside a boy with pale skin and brown hair, they are also immersed in intense conversation.

  ‘How was your day,
boys?’ I ask them as they trail up to me and I relieve them of their belongings while handing over their scooters.

  ‘Great!’ Ore says.

  ‘It was so cool,’ Oscar says.

  ‘Really?’ I ask. I was hoping they’d have a good day and a tiny little part of me was kind of hoping they wouldn’t like it so I’d have an excuse to move back to London.

  ‘Yeah,’ Oscar says. ‘It’s like, the best school.’

  ‘Ever,’ Ore ends. ‘Ever.’

  I look from one face to the other: both of them are so excited and happy. I guess that means we’re staying.

  Hazel

  5 p.m. ‘Coats off, shoes off, then straight upstairs with your bags to wash hands and start homework. I’ll bring you up drinks and snacks.’

  I sound convincing. My voice is clear, my words are easy to understand and yet, and yet … I watch Russell chuck his green rucksack and mud-splattered purple sports bag down in the middle of the hall, just in time for Camille to half trip over it before she goes on to do the same. Russell rips off his blazer, and drop it behind him without missing a beat, then he sideswipes Camille so he can run into the living room and throw himself onto the sofa. Calvin brings up the rear, stepping over the detritus of his older siblings and shedding his book bag, then heads for the kitchen. Camille has gone for the playroom. I stand at the bottom of the stairs, watching the intention behind my words evaporate like wisps of steam in the ether. They just do not listen to me. But, fair play to them, do I listen to me?

  I inhale deeply, turn away from the mess that my children have left and turn towards the kitchen. Calvin has disappeared into the pantry and is probably knocking things onto the floor to find where I hid the chocolate biscuits. I ignore him, and go over to the far side of the cooker. I need to heat the oven, get this lasagne in, but I can’t move from here. I keep seeing Trevor’s face. Scarlett’s face. Madison’s face. I keep seeing their faces. All day they’ve been hounding me, coming to me when I’ve been trying to concentrate at work. I keep seeing what being without her is like. I grab the side to steady myself, bend forwards and take a long breath in. The out breath chokes in my throat, causes a loud sob. Oh God, what did I do? What did I do? Another sob, and I almost double over, the thought of it ripping its way through me, almost tearing me in two. ‘Oh God,’ I sob. ‘Oh God.’