Before I Wake (8 page)

“I have something for you too,” Mum says, twisting back to her drawer. I try to object, to tell her she mustn’t, when Mozart’s Symphony Number 40 in G Minor fills the air and I rummage in my handbag for my phone.

“Brian?” I say, standing up and walking across the room, my back to Mum, my voice hushed. “Now’s not a good time. I’m with Mum.”

There’s a pause, then, “It’s Charlotte,” he says. “You need to come to the hospital. Now.”

Tuesday, October 16, 1990

Tonight I finally got to see James’s house. And now I know why he kept me waiting for so long.

We were supposed to get to his house for one o’clock, the time Mrs. Evans had said we should come for lunch (yes, he lives with his mum!), but we’d hit the pub early and James, who was ridiculously nervous but wouldn’t admit it, insisted we have one more for luck. His mum wouldn’t mind if we were late, he said. She was probably too busy watching
Murder She
Wrot
e to notice the time.

Two hours later, we finally rolled up at his house in Wood Green. James could barely get the key in the lock and I couldn’t stop giggling.

“Shoes,” James said, nudging me in the ribs as we fell into the hallway.

“Socks!” I nudged him back and burst out laughing.

“No.” He glanced down at my beautiful red patent heels. “Take off your shoes. Mother doesn’t allow shoes on the carpets.”

I reached a hand down and yanked one shoe off. I had to brace myself against the wall to stop myself from tumbling over. “I thought you were playing a word association game. You know—shoes, socks, toes, feet…”

“Why would I do that?” He gave me a look. “I’m not a child, Susan.”

I shrugged and reached for my other shoe, unsure what to say.

“Kidding!” He poked me in the side and I instantly lost balance and tumbled to the floor. “Feet! Cheese! Beans!”

I laughed as he helped me back onto my feet, but it felt forced. The joke wasn’t as funny anymore.

“Slippers,” James said.

I assumed he was still playing the word association game so I ignored him and glanced around the hallway instead. It was a wide space but the deep red textured wallpaper and mahogany furniture that lined one wall made it seem small and dark. A single lightbulb, smothered by a dark brown velveteen lamp shade, hung from the ceiling, and framed photographs decorated one wall, some in black and white, some Technicolor but faded with age. There were a lot of a small blond boy with a wide smile and sparkling blue eyes, so I stepped toward them to see if they were of my boyfriend.

“Slippers.” James grabbed my wrist and jerked me back toward him.

I yanked my hand away and rubbed my skin. “James, that hurt.”

He kicked something across the carpet toward me. “Stop making a fuss and put those on.”

I looked down at the beige suedette slippers at my feet and shook my head. They looked like something my grandma would wear.

“You need to put them on, Susan.” He yanked open the cupboard door beside him and pulled out an identical but larger pair of slippers and slipped his feet into them. I looked at his face, waiting for him to burst out laughing, but it didn’t happen.

I looked back at the slippers. I didn’t like the way he was telling me what to do, but the last thing I wanted was for us to get into an argument before I met his mum for the first time.

I put the slippers on, trying not to think about who’d worn them before.

James looked at my feet then laughed and said they suited me. He slipped a hand around my waist, pulling me into him, and his mouth found mine. I relaxed in his arms as he kissed me.

“Come on,” he said, taking my hand, “let’s find Mum. I just know she’s going to love you.”

He led me down the corridor and through a white door.

“Mum,” he said, holding tightly onto my hand, “this is Suzy. Suzy, this is Mum.”

I smiled and held out my other hand as the small, dark-haired woman on the sofa stood up and crossed the room toward me. It remained outstretched as she swerved around me and disappeared out through the living room door.

“James,” she said from the hallway. “A word, if you please.”

I was surprised by her strong Welsh accent. I’d assumed she’d be posh like her son.

James followed her wordlessly without so much as a backward glance at me, pulling the living room door closed behind him. I stood stock-still, staring at the closed door. When I finally moved, it was to perch on the edge of the pristine maroon leather sofa that shared a wall with an enormous mahogany display case. On the wall opposite me, hanging behind a sideboard housing a small gray television and an ancient-looking record player, was the most terrifying batik wall hanging I’d ever seen. It was black with a huge tribal mask in the center, picked out in blues, whites, and purples. The mouth was open, gaping, a black void beneath empty white eyes that stared across the room at me. I looked away to the bookshelf, crammed with green-spined hardbacks I’ve never heard of, and then at the table covered with a white lace tablecloth, laden with food. My stomach rumbled at the sight of plates piled high with cucumber, egg, and salmon sandwiches, a beautiful fluffy Victoria sponge on a silver cake stand, and bowls of olives, nuts, and crisps, but I didn’t touch a thing.

Instead I wandered up to the bookcase, plucked a green book off the shelf, and opened the cover. Ten minutes later, the sound of raised voices filtered into the room. I placed the book back on the shelf and opened the door a crack.

“James?” I shuffled noiselessly toward a door at the other end of the house. It was ajar, light flooding out, turning a triangle of maroon carpet pink. The murmur of voices filled my ears as I drew closer. “James?”

“How could you?” His mother’s voice was strained, verging on hysterical. “After everything I do for you. How could you be so disrespectful?”

“Mam…please…calm down.” My outstretched hand fell away from the doorknob. James was talking with a strong Welsh accent too. “We’re a couple of hours late, that’s all.”

“For family lunch! Have you no manners? Or did you lose them all the day Da killed his self?”

Killed himself? I rested a hand on the wall. James told me his father had died of lung cancer.

“I’m here now, aren’t I?”

“Late. With her. Some tart you’ve known for ten minutes.”

“She’s not a tart, Mam. She’s special.”

“And what does that make me? Something the cat dragged in.”

“Of course not. You’re—”

“I got up at 6 this morning to clean the house, James. 6 a.m.! I’ve been scrubbing and cooking and cleaning all day. For you, Jamie, for you and that woman. The least you could do is show me some respect and turn up on time. I thought we brought you up better than this.”

“Oh, for fuck’s sake—”

A sound like a cracked whip cut him short and he gasped. I took a step back from the door. The maroon walls seemed darker and the furniture bigger. Even the photographs were leering at me. I tried to take a deep breath, but the air was thick and heavy and I felt it catch in my throat. I glanced toward the front door.

“James! James, I’m sorry.” Mrs. Evans’s voice was thin and desperate. “James, please don’t go. I didn’t mean to—”

I was sent flying as the kitchen door slammed open and James flew out toward me. He gripped my wrist and yanked me after him as he strode toward the front door.

“We’re leaving.” He pulled me, slippers and all, out into the front garden. I stretched my fingertips toward my beautiful red patent heels, but we were already through the gate and onto the street. “Fuck family lunches. Fuck her. Fuck it all. Now do you see?” he said, shaking me as he twisted me to face him. “Now do you see why I didn’t want you to come back to my place?”

He didn’t say another word to me for the next hour and a half.

“I don’t know why you’re looking so stressed.” Brian indicates left and exits the roundabout. “It’s good news.”

I glance at him. “Is it?”

“Of course. You heard what the consultant Mr. Arnold said. Charlotte’s tube is out and she’s able to breathe unassisted. The damage to her cerebral cortex has healed.”

“How unassisted is her breathing if they’re insisting she wears an oxygen mask? And the exact words he used were ‘the scans show the damage has substantially reduced.’”

“Yes. It’s healed.”

“Reduced, not healed.”

Brian exhales slowly and deliberately. “Sue, we both heard him say there’s no medical reason why she shouldn’t wake up.”

“But she hasn’t, has she? I’m delighted that she can breathe on her own now, but it doesn’t mean anything if she still hasn’t actually opened her eyes and—”

“Oh, for God’s sake!”

“Brian! Can I just finish my sentence? Please?”

He shoots me a sideways look and raises his eyebrows.

“I’m worried because of the other thing Mr. Arnold said, the part about the longer Charlotte stays in a coma, the more likely it is that she could develop a secondary complication. She could still die, Brian.”

“
Could
being the operative word, Sue. You need to stay positive.”

I rest my head against the headrest and stare up at the dull gray interior of the car. I’m snapping at Brian, and it’s not fair, but I can’t shake the feeling that this is all my fault. If I’d been closer to Charlotte, if I’d encouraged her to talk to me, if I’d run up the stairs after her instead of returning to my book, maybe she never would have walked in front of a bus and maybe she wouldn’t be at risk of pneumonia or a pulmonary embolism now.

“I should have protected her, Brian,” I say quietly.

“Don’t, Sue. It’s not your fault.”

I look at him. “I didn’t protect her but I can now.”

“What do you mean?”

“If I find out why she did what she did and tell her that I understand, that I’m here for her, maybe she’ll wake up.”

“Not this again.” Brian sighs heavily. “For the hundredth time, Sue, it was an accident.”

“It wasn’t. Charlotte tried to kill herself, Brian. She talked about it in her diary.”

There’s a squeal of tires on tarmac and my seat belt cuts into my throat as the car swerves sharply toward the oncoming traffic. I want to scream at Brian to stop but I can’t speak. I can’t scream. All I can do is grip the seat belt with both hands as we hurtle toward a 4×4. A cacophony of beeping horns fills my ears, and then Brian yanks the steering wheel to the left and we lurch left, speeding toward the grass verge, then lurch back to the right so we’re back in the center of the road.

My husband’s top lip is beaded with sweat, his face pale, his eyes staring ahead, fixed and glassy.

“You nearly killed us,” I whisper.

Brian says nothing.

He says nothing all the way home, then he turns off the engine, opens the car door, and crosses the driveway without looking back. I stay in the car, too stunned to move as he lets himself into the house, crosses the kitchen, and disappears into the hallway. I don’t know what scared me more—the fact that we nearly drove headfirst into another car or the look in Brian’s eyes as it happened.

My hands shake as I reach for the handle and open the car door, and I pause to collect myself. I’m being ridiculous. Brian would never have risked both our lives like that when Charlotte still needs us.
He
was
angry
, I reason as I cross the gravel driveway and approach the house. He asked the other day if there was anything in Charlotte’s diary he needed to know about and I said no. I lied to his face and he knows it.

“Brian?” I open the front door gingerly, expecting Milly to come bowling over but she’s not in the porch. She must have followed Brian into the living room. I’m about to step into the kitchen when something red and chewed in Milly’s bed catches my eye. It’s a “Could not deliver” slip from the Royal Mail. How did that end up in her bed? I turn and see the mail “cage” we erected around the letter box on the floor. It’s the third one that Milly has managed to wrench off the door. The older she gets, the wilier she becomes. I crouch down and pick up the remains of the card, smiling when I see what the postman has written—“in the recycling bin.” Brian thinks the postal worker is probably breaking Royal Mail rules by putting our undelivered parcels in the recycling bin, but I think it’s a fabulous idea. It saves him from hauling them back to the depot and it saves me a trip to town. I duck back outside and lift the lid on the recycling bin.

I reach down and pick up a green plastic parcel with Marks and Spencer splashed down the side. It’s hard, like a shoebox, not floppy like clothes. It can’t be shoes. They’re the one thing I still insist on buying from the shops. When you’ve got feet as wide as mine, ordering shoes off the Internet can be a bit of a gamble.

“Brian?” I carry the parcel into the house and search for my husband. “Oh, hi, Milly.”

She looks up from her prone position in front of the cold hearth, then lowers her head and sighs when she realizes I’m not Brian. He must be in his study. Milly knows she isn’t allowed upstairs.

“What have we got here, then?” I tear into the plastic packaging and discover a cardboard shoebox. “Very brave of Daddy to choose shoes for Mum—”

The opened box tumbles from my hands and a pair of beige suedette slippers tumbles onto the rug.

They’re meant for me. But they’re not from my husband.

***

“Brian?” I push open the door to the study. “Brian, we need to talk.”

My husband is sitting in his chair, his head in his hands, his elbows on the desk. He doesn’t look up at the sound of my voice.

“Brian?” I fight to keep the quiver out of my voice. “Brian, please. I need your help.”

He raises his head from his hands and slowly tilts back his head to look at me. His expression is blank, his eyes as fixed and dark as they were as we careered into oncoming traffic.

“What do you want, Susan?”

“I…” I hold out the slippers but I can’t do it. I can’t tell him that James sent them to me. There’s no note, no purchaser details, no gift card—nothing at all to prove who sent them. And besides, Brian looks like someone just hollowed out his soul.

I perch on the edge of a wooden chair near the door. “I’m sorry, Brian.”

My husband doesn’t say anything but I can tell he’s listening, that he wants me to continue.

“I’m sorry I told you there wasn’t anything to worry about in Charlotte’s diary. There is.”

“What?” Brian is no longer slumped back in his chair. He’s sitting up straight, the tips of his fingers splayed on the desk, his eyes fixed on mine. “Tell me.”

“She…” I can’t do it. I can’t ignore my gut feeling that I shouldn’t. Not with Charlotte’s safety at risk. “Why did you lie about going to the pool, Brian?”

“What?”

“Last week, when you took the morning off, you told me you went shopping and swimming.”

“And?” It’s just one word but I can hear the irritation behind it.

“The Prince Regent has been shut for renovations for the last two weeks.”

Brian doesn’t so much as blink. “I didn’t go to the Prince Regent.”

“Where then?”

“Aquarena.”

“You went all the way to Worthing for a swim?”

“Something wrong with that?”

“Brian, you haven’t been for a swim for months.”

“Which is why I fancied a dip.”

“Stop lying.” I stand up. “Please, just stop lying.”

My husband sits back in his chair. “Lying? I think we’ve established who the liar is here, Sue. Or would you like to take back your apology from five minutes ago?” When I say nothing, a small smile plays on his lips. “What did Charlotte write in her diary?”

“Where have you been going at the crack of dawn every day?”

Brian says nothing.

I say nothing.

We stare at each other, eyes locked, neither of us willing to back down.

Ding-dong.

The sound of the doorbell makes me jump. A split second later, I’m out of the study, relieved of the excuse to escape. I think I hear Brian call my name as I hurry down the stairs but I don’t turn back.

“Coming!” I call as I cross the hallway, pass through the kitchen, and walk into the porch. Milly follows me, nudging her empty food dish with her nose as I open the front door.

I can’t see anyone through the glass pane, so I open the door and peer outside, half-expecting to see someone strolling down the driveway, but it’s empty. Whoever rang our doorbell must have sprinted away the second their finger left the buzzer.

“What’s that, Milly Moo?” I turn back to find the dog gnawing on something. I take a step closer and crouch down. It’s a brown padded envelope.

“Where did you get that?” I distract the dog with a well-chewed tennis ball, slip the parcel away from her, and sit down with it at the kitchen table. My name is written on the front in blue pen, but there’s no address and no stamp. I turn it over. Nothing on the underside either, just a strip of brown packing tape holding the flap closed. Whoever rang the doorbell must have pushed it through the letter box.

I peel off the tape and slip a finger under the flap to open it. I can barely breathe as I upend the envelope and tip the contents onto the table.

Something pink and glittery lands on the cotton tablecloth with a clunk.

Charlotte’s phone.

Saturday, October 20, 1990

I didn’t hear from James for three days after the incident with his mum.

He finally rang yesterday. I’d expected him to be contrite, but he acted like nothing had happened and asked what my plans were for the weekend. I said I’d been invited to have dinner with some mates and he was welcome to join us if he liked. I said how much I’d like him to meet my friends. It was, after all, nearly two months since we’d met, and he still hadn’t met anyone I was close to.

“Helen and Rupert?” he repeated down the phone, after I told him whose house we were going to. “The same Rupert you fucked at university?”

I hated that, the way he said “fucked” like it was something dirty that I should be ashamed of.

“No. Rupert, my very good friend who I happened to have sex with a very, very long time ago. Not that that matters.”

“It matters to me.”

“Well, it shouldn’t. It didn’t mean anything then and it certainly doesn’t mean anything now. Helen’s not bothered, so why should you be?”

“Helen’s not in love with you.”

“Oh, for God’s sake. Don’t come then.”

“And leave you alone with some guy who fucked you once and would probably love to fuck you again? No chance.”

“James!”

“What?”

“I’m going to put the phone down now.”

“Don’t. Suzy, I’m sorry. That all came out wrong. I’m still smarting from what happened on Tuesday. Forgive me, darling, please. I’ll be very well behaved at the dinner party.”

“You promise?”

“Of course.”

James was drunk when I met him at Willesden tube. So drunk he could barely stand, never mind speak. I took one look at him and told him he should go home. He refused.

“I’ll be the entertainment,” he said. “I tell really good jokes. What’s brown and sticky?”

I couldn’t help but laugh, and he was being very good-natured and affectionate. Maybe it’ll be fun, I told myself. At least he won’t be uptight about meeting Rupert.

I knew the night was going to turn into a nightmare when thirty seconds after we’d walked into Hel & Ru’s flat, James pointed at a Formula One framed print on the sideboard and said, “Only twats are into Formula One. Only a dull mind could watch a car go around and around a track ad infinitum.”

“I think you’ll find,” Rupert said, turning back, “that the number of laps depends on the track and that the sport demands a finite number of laps, otherwise there’d be no winner.”

“A blah blah blah blah blah.” James waved a hand in his direction, then just as Rupert disappeared into the living room, said, “Posh twat.”

I angled him into the bathroom and closed the door. He stumbled backward and collapsed onto the (lid closed, thankfully) toilet. “If you keep this up, we’re leaving.”

He grinned. “So we don’t have to have dinner with Twattle Dum and Twattle Dumber and two other Mad Twatters? Excellent.” He tried to stand. “Let’s go!”

“Not me.” I pushed him back down again. “You.”

“No, Suzy.” He pulled a face. “Please let me spend the evening with Fat Arse and Dull Face.”

“That’s it.” I yanked on his hand so he was upright. “You’re going home. I’m calling you a cab.”

“Noooo!” He wrapped his arms around me and, using his weight advantage, pinned me against the tiled wall. He pressed his lips to my neck. “Don’t leave me. Don’t make me go. I promise to be a good boy. Suzy, I want to wake up with you tomorrow morning. Don’t send me home to my bitch of a mother. I’m only being silly because it winds you up. I know how much you love Gingerpubes and her Fat Bear.”

“James!”

“See!” He mimed someone pushing a button. “It’s too easy. Please, Suzy. I promise to be good. I’ll make polite conversation over dinner and everything. I just need something to eat. I’ve only had a bowl of cereal all day.”

“James! That’s not good for you.”

He nestled his head into the crook of my neck. “See, I knew you still loved me. You care that I’m starving to death.”

“Of course I love you, you idiot.” I stroked the back of his head, relishing the feeling of his hair under my fingers. “Even when you do behave like this.”

True to his word, he did behave, even if his contribution to the conversation around the dinner table was more sarcastic than enthusiastic, but he barely said a word on the tube on the way home. I was grateful for the silence. James didn’t have to spell it out, but I could tell from his behavior over dinner that he didn’t like my friends, and not just because I’d slept with one of them.

By the time we finally walked into James’s living room, I couldn’t bear the silence a second longer and asked if he was okay.

He ignored me and crossed the room to pull the heavy velvet curtains closed, taking the time to arrange the folds of material so they hung evenly spaced. When he was satisfied they were straight, he strode over to the mantelpiece and wound the brass carriage clock. His face was expressionless, his mouth a thin line, his pale gray eyes dull. Only the tension in his jaw gave his mood away. I stayed by the door, shuffling my weight from foot to foot. The air was electrified, like a dark cloud was hovering overhead, threatening a storm.