Dark Avenging Angel (4 page)

A good job I didn’t tell him
why
I wanted to do those subjects. But I knew it would just subject me to more of his ridicule if I revealed my long-held heart’s desire.

He’d given up insisting I become a doctor. My science and math results simply didn’t qualify. Eventually, even he seemed to have grown bored with his endlessly repetitive taunts. And he couldn’t deny that my results in arts subjects were pretty consistent.

He insisted I mustn’t even think of going into “industry”. Not that I had particular leanings toward any type of trade, anyway. No, I must choose one of the professions. At least he’d mellowed enough to allow me the choice of which one. Up to a point, anyway. He wouldn’t have been too happy if I’d chosen the police force. “Mixing with all those rough types,” he would have said, his mouth turned down.

So, law it would be. A combined honors degree in law and philosophy, simply because that was a combination offered by six universities of the caliber I was allowed to select from.

One of them offered me a place, on achievement of a B and two Cs in my Advanced level final exams. My lack of self-confidence meant I doubted I would accomplish that. Even if I did, I would have to accept that my father wouldn’t allow me to live a proper student’s life. I’d be over a hundred miles away but he’d still be in control. I would still be dependent on him.

As expected, along came the inevitable lecture. “
If
you get to university, I will expect you to work hard. None of this gallivanting about, going on stupid protest marches. I expect you to get a first class honors degree. Nothing less will be acceptable. You’re going to be costing me a great deal of money, even with the grant. So, you will account for every penny you spend and I will expect to see a list of your expenditures every month. I don’t expect to see that you’ve been spending my money going out to the pub.”

I said nothing. I’d already lied to him in order to make sure I didn’t have to apply to the local university, which would have meant staying at home. I told my parents that the careers teacher had recommended the six I did apply to as having the best academic record for law. With no other knowledge to go on, they believed me.

So now I was faced with the prospect of slogging hard all day, every day, while every other student at the university would be enjoying nights out, making friends, having a ball.

Looking back, I could have just rebelled. After all, how would he know what I got up to? But he had orchestrated my life for so long I felt certain he would know. Somehow, by some means, he would be aware if I so much as crossed the threshold of a pub when I was supposed to be working on an assignment. I wouldn’t have put it past him to turn up unannounced one evening, only to check up on me. Then it wouldn’t just be me who suffered.

I started to apply for jobs.

As for boyfriends: I dared to have one—or, should I say, attempted to have one—just once. George was a nice guy. He went to the boys’ grammar school and was the brother of a schoolfriend. I was told I had to bring him home before I would be allowed to go out with him.

My father took one look at him and left the room. Next, he summoned my mother.

George and I sat in awkward silence while embarrassment burned my cheeks. Poor George looked as if he would love to be almost anywhere but where he was right then.

My mother came back in and called me out.

“I’m sorry about this,” I said.

George just gave a weak smile.

My father’s darkened face sent my spirits plummeting.

“Get rid of him. I don’t care how you do it, but get rid of him.” His eyes blazed with that cold fire I had grown to both hate and fear. “You’re not going out with him.”

“But why not?” What on earth could be wrong with well-mannered, polite George?

“He’s not wearing a tie. Fancy turning up here in an open shirt and casual trousers. It’s an insult.”

I stared at my father and then at Mum, who raised her eyes to heaven, knowing he couldn’t see her.

Once again that coil of anger sprang up from my stomach to my mouth. “I’m not telling him. I
like
George.”

“Don’t you defy me. Tell him to go.”

My father’s voice had risen to a bellow. I heard the front door close. George had made his own decision.

“The sooner I’m out of here, the better,” I said.

I didn’t wait for my father to remonstrate with me about respect. I couldn’t stay in that room one minute longer. I dashed to the front door and out into the street. I looked both ways, but there was no sign of George. He must have run like hell to get away.

At that moment, the hammers began to pound in my head. Within seconds, the full force of another migraine hit. This time, no bile washed up into my mouth. I crawled up to bed.

The pain hit harder. I put a cold, wet flannel on my forehead but it did no good. Only one thing would help. I needed to be sick.

I dragged myself to the bathroom and knelt in front of the toilet, willing myself to throw up. My head pounded harder. I moaned in pain. Fingers down my throat. That’s what I had to do. I’d heard of other migraine sufferers doing it. It helped, they said. I needed to make myself gag. I opened my mouth and, hesitating at first, stuck two fingers as far back as I could. I gagged. Nothing. I tried again. Success.

The pounding eased a little. I crept back to bed.

Half an hour later, I was vomiting again. This time my fingers did their job the first time. Now I knew I could do it.

I filled my days, evenings and weekends with A-level coursework. I knew I must achieve the best of which I was capable, but when one of the banks offered me a job, to start in September, I accepted. Then I had to let the university know. My father wasn’t happy about it, until his usual negative reasoning kicked in.

“It’s probably for the best. You’re never going to achieve those grades anyway, so what’s the point kidding ourselves?”

He’d browbeaten me so much over the years, I agreed with him.

I did have a major consolation, though. One that helped me sleep at night. The job was in Leeds, seventy miles away. I would have my own place to live, be earning my own money and not be dependent on him ever again. I was going to have a life for the first time ever.

The night I completed my last exam, I lay awake, eyes open, staring at the ceiling. I watched the patterns of leaves and branches silhouetted by the clear, full moon. The day had been hot and sticky; the evening, airless. I had thrown off the blanket and just a sheet covered my nightdress-clad body.

When the sheet moved, I assumed Sukie had somehow managed to sneak in and jump on the bed. I was about to sit up and reach for her. But then I stopped. It couldn’t be Sukie. She was let out every night. She had a shelter in the garden.

I lay as still as possible, conscious of how loud my breathing sounded. The patterns on the ceiling merged and changed shape. Branches became cloaked arms. Leaves became long, slender fingers. A familiar face emerged. White, smiling, with dark eyes and lips. My angel floated up there, looking down at me as I watched, too fascinated to be scared. Besides, she had never shown me any harm. She had always looked after me in her unique way. I’d never questioned it, or why no one else seemed to have a dark angel guarding them.

Her voice echoed in my head,
Time to move on.

I nodded and tried to sit up. Some invisible force stopped me and I settled back against the pillows. She moved away, the cloak billowing and swirling as if drifting through water. She melted into the shadows, but then her voice rang out, much closer now.

The entry is complete. In your life, you can name three to account for their sins against you. Will he be the first?

“Yes,” I said.

Now she stood next to my bed, a large, black ledger in her hand. The pages turned by themselves until she found the one she was looking for. She took a long, slim, golden pen from within the folds of her cloak.

She wrote for a moment. Then closed the book.

It is done.

Chapter Four

Waiting for vengeance is a strange and sobering experience. You know it’s going to happen, you just don’t know when, where or how. That’s how I felt as the days stretched into weeks, months and even years. Still my father thrived, and I hadn’t seen my angel again.

I began to think she must have been some vision created by my subconscious. Maybe I had outgrown her? Freud would have had a field day with me. I began to wonder if I had been through some sort of madness and was now cured. Whatever the cause, I decided to put the whole thing behind me.

My A-level results left me speechless. I had achieved an A and two Bs, but I told my father it was way too late to reconsider my university application. Besides, I had accepted the bank job. I’d sold him the idea of building a career there, although I possessed precious little enthusiasm for doing so.

Sure enough, I hated the bank. I hated the formality of constantly being called Miss Powell. I hated the work. Half the time the accounts made no sense to me and I’d be hauled over the coals by my boss—an accountant who reminded me too much of what I had left behind.

I found another job. One
I
wanted. At last, a chance to put my love of writing to profitable use. Of course, it didn’t quite turn out that way, but the change of direction brought me a career I could succeed at.

I went into advertising with a major local newspaper—the
Yorkshire Chronicle
—and loved it. I rapidly became known for my copywriting skills, and even though the major thrust of the job was telephone selling, I found I could overcome my natural shyness. My customers couldn’t see me. I could imagine myself as a successful, dynamic salesperson and project that over the phone, helping them gain extra business through successful advertising.

My Oscar-winning performances helped me achieve targets consistently and endeared me to my bosses. For the first time in my life, people said “well done” to my face. And after overcoming my initial embarrassment, I learned to say “thank you” without blushing.

Needless to say, my change of career didn’t sit well with my father. He said little to me about it, but I went home one weekend to find my mother with two black eyes.

“I tripped in the yard,” she said, avoiding my gaze.

“Yeah. Right,” I said.

Mum turned on me and pointed at her eyes. “If you’d just stayed at the bank, this wouldn’t have happened.”

“If you’d report him to the police, they’d put him behind bars and then none of it would happen again.”

But she wouldn’t. So many battered wives don’t. Especially those of her generation. She felt ashamed, however crazy that may sound. But if you can’t connect with that emotion, you’ve probably never been in her position.

I was also ashamed. Ashamed at my cowardice in not standing up to him and defending her. Ashamed at leaving her alone with him every time I returned to my happy life in Leeds.

One weekend, two years later, Sukie gazed up at me with her stunning emerald eyes and, somehow, I knew it would be the last time I saw her. She gave me a little cracked meow and pushed her silky face into my hand. I stroked her, then bent and picked her up, cuddling her close. I heard and felt her contented, rumbling purr and tears streamed down my face. They seemed to come from nowhere, but our bond was so strong I knew what was happening. In her own way, she was saying goodbye. She was sixteen years old and could no longer hear. She had also grown thin as her appetite waned. The vet said she was fine. Just old. But I knew she was winding down.

She died two weeks later.

I wept for the little animal who had been closer to me than any human, apart from my mother—and in some ways, even closer. Sukie, the little cat who had let me cry into her fur and never complained. The gentle little soul who had curled up on my lap and purred her little heart out to make me feel better.

Mum broke the news to me over the phone. Liver failure took her in the end. Mum had to take my little cat, alone, on that last trip to the vet. She said my father had told her she was stupid to be so upset.

“It’s only a cat,” he’d said.

Unfeeling bastard.

My angel returned to me as I spent a sleepless night, my eyes still smarting from all my earlier crying. My bedroom was still and quiet, except for my snuffling. I blew my nose and tossed the tissue into the wastebin by my bed.

A sudden heavy atmosphere filled the room. I looked for her in the shadows, but still jumped as she moved. She held the ledger in one hand and her pen in the other.

I rubbed my eyes. “When will he pay?”

Soon. But it is not yet time.

“It’s been so long since you wrote him in your ledger. Please tell me when.”

But she faded from my sight, and left me alone again. She seemed to be waiting. Or maybe he never would pay for his sins. Maybe this was all in my head.

Something glinted on the carpet, illuminated by the moonlight which filtered in under the curtain.

I got out of bed and picked it up. A shiny, gold pen lay in my hand, freezing cold to the touch. I set it down on the bedside table.

In the morning it was gone.

Chapter Five

I had friends, but boyfriends didn’t fare so well. By 1979, at the age of twenty-five, I had a string of failed relationships behind me. I knew the fault was mainly mine. The main problem lay in my inability to believe any man could love me. If they said they did or behaved as if they did, I had to find fault with everything, pick away and pick away until they eventually gave up, dumped me and moved on.
There, you see,
told
you I wasn’t worth loving.

Andy, Lee, Patrick and Graham. Wonder whatever happened to them. All decent enough. Treated me far better than I deserved. I hope they all met the right girl, settled down and had lovely lives.

Mirrors were always my enemy. No matter which fad diet I went on, I never seemed to look any slimmer. Fat, plain Jane. Even starving myself and making myself sick didn’t seem to get the weight off.

As for my angel. Since Sukie died, she had shown up once or twice. After a particularly messy breakup with Graham, she even brought her ledger, but I declined. I didn’t want to waste one of my three on him. Besides, I already knew I had caused most of the problems with my insane jealousy.

I’d managed to drive him into the arms of a beautiful and talented actress. Until I accused him of having an affair, he barely knew the woman. She had a small part, soon to be enhanced—along with her tits—in a popular TV soap. Graham was an assistant to the producer on the show.

Poor Graham protested his innocence, but I railed at him until he stayed out all one night and then the next. He phoned me to say he had decided if he was going to be accused of sleeping with Melody anyway, he might as well do it. I bawled my eyes out and called him a bastard. He could have called me a bitch, but he didn’t. I heard they spilt up soon after, but I never heard from him again. Don’t blame him.

I had a group of four close friends, all work colleagues, all single females. We became sales trainers—junior managers—at roughly the same time. Each of us managed a group of telephone-sales people. The department was highly target driven and provided around 85 percent of the newspaper’s revenue, so the work was pressurized, but we had fun too. None of the four of us was particularly in to nightclubs, but we enjoyed going to the pub together after work on Fridays and round to each other’s homes for meals, drinks and a chat.

We were also all ambitious—even me, with my newfound yet still-fragile confidence—and egged each other on. Which is why, within a space of three weeks, each of us had found another job elsewhere. For all of us, it represented promotion.

When the advertisement manager from the
Baileyborough Evening Telegraph
phoned to offer me the job as his deputy, I thought I’d misheard him. I accepted and squashed down my apprehension. I told myself I was just afraid of the unknown. I’d moved before. I’d changed jobs before. I could do it again. Start over. Strange town. Strange job. Quantum leap forward and embrace a different method of doing things. But I could do that now, couldn’t I?

Then why did it feel so wrong? If only I’d listened to my inner voice, I’d never have left Leeds. I would have stayed where I knew happiness and job security because, there, I was good at my job. Senior managers thought well of me. I knew success and recognition for the first time in my life.

So, naturally, I had to go and destroy it, didn’t I? Because I wasn’t worthy of it. I would have to tear everything down I had worked so hard to build. And all it took was a letter of resignation and an unscrupulous, dishonest advertising man called Stuart Campbell.

Baileyborough is one of those new towns built in the 1960s. Roads and infrastructure were well planned and executed, but the housing consisted of massive estates which all looked the same. Like that song—“Little Boxes”. Most of them looked as if one strong gale would blow the roof off.

At around five foot nine, Stuart Campbell was a little taller than me. He spoke with a slight Canadian twang, the result of a combination of a couple of years spent living there and an affectation. Stuart had a few affectations. One included wearing a monocle. I never saw him actually use it. It just hung around his neck on a long, gold chain and provided a focal point. I don’t think anyone actually commented on it, but you couldn’t fail to notice it and you could tell he liked that.

Stuart also affected a beard, with a moustache that twirled upward. Whether he waxed it or it just naturally grew that way, I haven’t a clue, but the beard covered half his face, and a multitude of sins, no doubt.

As for my new role. Total culture shock. I was used to a massive open-plan office with sixty telephone-sales people, plus administrators and classified advertisement field-sales representatives. Phones rang constantly, buzzing and flashing when the number of calls waiting hit twenty. Managers shouted over tannoys for people to take calls. Everyone rushed about. A real newspaper. Noisy. Busy. Busy. Busy.

In contrast, the
Baileyborough Evening Telegraph
boasted just twelve telephone-sales people and four field-sales representatives who sold both display and classified advertising. I had been trained purely in classified—the advertisements that appeared toward the back of the newspaper. Display covered the generally much larger advertisements appearing among the news and sports sections. This was a world of a totally different set of field-sales representatives with whom, in my previous job, classified had competed. I knew nothing of the technicalities of display and had told Stuart so in the interview.

“Oh, don’t worry about that, Jane. You’ll soon pick it up.”

His confidence and flashing, white smile had reassured me then.

Now, on my first day, the same smile did nothing to raise my spirits as he told me what he’d done.

“A couple of the sales reps thought your job should have been theirs, so you may have some problems with them. Rick and Steve have been with the paper for a few years and they’re both a bit old-fashioned. They weren’t happy when I told them I’d decided to appoint someone from outside, and they were even less happy when they knew it was a woman.” He laughed.

I squirmed in my seat.
Great. Now I’d have a couple of chauvinists with chips on their shoulders.
But worse was to follow.

“If I’d also told them you had no experience in display advertising, they’d probably have gone ballistic. So I told them you had.”

“Pardon?”

“I told them you’d worked in display.”

My head began to pound. “But I haven’t. I don’t drive yet, so I couldn’t possibly have been a rep.”

“I know. I told them you were learning to drive and had been office based. You
are
learning, aren’t you? There’s a company car waiting for you when you pass your test.”

I nodded. I needed to get myself an instructor. Three lessons in Leeds hadn’t endeared me to life behind the wheel, but the idea of driving a brand-new car appealed to me, along with the independence it would give me.

“I want you to back me up on this, Jane.”

I stared at him. No boss had ever expected me to lie for them before. I registered the wall clock behind him. Nine fifteen. I’d been here fifteen minutes and already I was embroiled in a stupid, senseless lie, just to make his life easier. What the hell had I come to? A pang of homesickness for Leeds and the chaotic but familiar
Chronicle
stabbed me. But Stuart had already moved on.

“I’ll take you round to meet everyone in a few minutes. Just before we do, though, you’ll have seen already that this is a relatively small office. The administration manager is another Jane. Jane Marshall. That’s going to be confusing.”

“What is?”

“You both have the same name.”

So what? At
the
Yorkshire Chronicle
, there had frequently been three or even four Janes. No one, to the best of my knowledge, got confused. Why would they?

“Jane has been with us ten years now, so I can hardly ask her to change her name, can I? It wouldn’t be fair, so I’d like you to change yours. I thought Fizz might be appropriate.”

By now, I began to think I’d wandered into a badly scripted farce. “Sorry?”

“Fizz. You know. Bubbly, lively, effervescent. Gives out all the right signals.”

I continued to stare at him as a voice screamed inside my head to get out of there.

“Are you serious?”

The smile vanished, and for the first time, I saw the other side of Stuart Campbell. “Most definitely. I can’t have two Janes in my department and that’s it. If you don’t like Fizz, then come back to me by nine o’clock tomorrow with another name. But you must change it. Understand?”

I kept telling myself it was my first day. I had to tread carefully. I’d left Leeds now. If I didn’t make this work, I’d have to go back home to my parents. Besides, what would my father say? He’d never wanted me to go into advertising in the first place.

At least, now, he’d stopped going on about it. Probably because I was earning almost as much as he was.
And
I’d got a job that was listed in a national advertisement industry magazine—
Campaign
. I must have been up against tough competition. He’d never congratulated me, of course. That could never happen.

Right now, though, I wished Stuart had offered the job to someone else. Anyone but me.

“Jane? Do you understand? I’m serious about this. You
have
to change your name.”

I couldn’t speak. I nodded.

“Good. Let’s meet the team.”

Jane Marshall was welcoming, possessed a firm handshake and a no-nonsense attitude. I liked her.

“Jane’s agreed to change her name,” Stuart said.

Jane’s eyebrows shot upwards. “Oh, is that really necessary?”

“Sure. Don’t want any confusion, do we, Jane?” He looked at me.

I shook my head. “No.”

The monocle caught the sun and dazzled me. I turned away and caught a look of pity from Jane Marshall. My confidence ebbed and finally drained altogether when I was introduced to Rick and Steve.

Rick blinked at me from behind tinted glasses. He didn’t extend his hand to shake mine. Neither did Steve, whose black hair told me Grecian 2000’s profits would be up this year.

“Rick looks after clients in the eastern part of the city and county, and Steve looks after the south,” Stuart said. “Jane will be spending time with each of you. She’ll go out on calls with you and I’m sure will provide you with some valuable input. Coming from a much larger newspaper, her contribution will be just what we need here.”

Rick took his glasses off and his cold stare chilled me. “How long did you work in display?”

I hadn’t a clue what to say. I was never good at lying and this wasn’t even my lie!

Stuart stepped in. “Plenty of time to get to know each other later. I need to take Jane to meet Maurice.”

Halfway down the corridor and out of earshot, Stuart said, “You’ll need to work out a story for that. Make sure you have it in place by tomorrow morning. You nearly landed me in it then.”

The far end of the corridor was shadowy. A fluorescent striplight twitched, then went off. We paused outside Maurice Driffield’s office. General manager and Stuart’s boss. Out of the corner of my eye, I caught a movement.

Why was she here? Why now? I stared at her and she stared back. My angel.

Stuart seemed about to knock on Maurice’s door when he too appeared momentarily distracted by something. Surely he couldn’t see her? No. She was
my
angel. I had long believed I was the only one who could see her, unless she decided otherwise, as she had with my schoolfriends.

There was no reason for her to reveal herself to Stuart. But he did seem to grow pale, just for a second. And I realized he was following my gaze down to the dark end of the corridor. He said nothing. Then he looked back at the door and gave a sharp rap.

I glanced back. The corridor was empty. The light flickered back on.

I had plenty to think about that evening as I sat alone in my new flat. I also had the strongest desire to pack my bags and leave. Would they take me back at the
Chronicle?
It would mean admitting defeat and give my father plenty of ammunition to taunt me with. Why did that matter? After all, he was a couple of hundred miles away.

But then I thought of Mum. She still had to live with him.

I poured myself a glass of red wine and sat on the edge of my chair. Too tense to relax. Whichever way I looked at it, I was stuck here for a while. I couldn’t leave without another job and I didn’t know my way around Baileyborough enough to know where the jobs might be. Then there was the problem of Stuart’s ridiculous lie and his insistence that I change my name.

The phone rang.

“Hello, dear.” My mother’s voice brought tears to my eyes. I must fight them back. Couldn’t have her knowing anything was wrong. “How was your first day then?”

I pasted a smile on my face. “Oh, you know first days. Met loads of people and can’t remember who anyone is.”

“You’ll soon get the hang of it.”

“Yes, I’m sure I will.”

I didn’t tell her about the lie. I didn’t tell her about changing my name. I just kept it all light.

As I clambered out of the bath that night, I caught sight of myself in the mirror. Disgusting paunchy stomach. I wrapped myself in a towel and knelt down in front of the toilet. My fingers did their job. I was an expert by now.

Stomach emptied, I went to bed and dreaded the next day.

After three hours’ fitful sleep, I hauled myself out of bed and made myself coffee. I never ate breakfast. This morning I would have to tell Stuart what I intended to call myself. I hadn’t a clue. On top of my stereo, I saw the latest Carly Simon LP—
Spy
. I’d bought it just before I left Leeds.

I picked up my bag and went to catch my bus.