Double Exposure (10 page)

‘And there's nothing two-dimensional about Abby.'

He smiled, which pleased me. It meant he wasn't taking himself too seriously.

‘No, there certainly isn't. And no, I'm not sleeping with her. If that was your next question.'

‘It never crossed my mind … Why not?'

He was silent for a moment.

‘I don't know. Honest. I mean … I really don't know. You want another cup?'

*

Six o'clock.

The sun has dipped behind the roofline and the shadows have melted together into a solid absence of light along the west side of the street. Abby pulls her jacket tightly around her. The zipper is broken, and the chill breeze is cutting through her thin summer tee.

‘We're here,' Carla Dorney whispers, as she slides the key into the lock and pushes on the door, which sticks a little on the doorjamb, squeaking a protest as it opens.

‘She turned up yesterday. She wouldn't say where she's been hiding, but she's in a terrible state. I don't know if she's been eating – she totally looks like shit. I put her in a bath and gave her a meal – which she threw up half an hour later. Come on in.'

Inside, the house is dark. Carla fumbles for the switch.

‘Tess. Baby, it's me. And I've brought someone to see you. Tess?'

A noise in the next room.

‘Tess?' Abby calls. ‘It's Abby. Am I glad to find you, sister. I've been looking everywhere.'

A figure appears in the doorway, her face shadowed by the doorframe.

‘Hello, Ab.' The words are barely more than a whisper. A slight hesitation, then Tess steps forward into the light. She stands staring at her friend, then her face collapses into tears and she runs towards Abby, crying and hugging her. ‘I'm so sorry. I didn't know what to do. I was scared. I didn't mean to … I just wanted to … stop him. I didn't mean him to … die.'

A sudden cold chill and Abby's heart slows. She holds her friend at arm's length and stares into her eyes. Tess looks away, closing her lids on more tears.

‘Tess, what are you saying? It was an accident. He tripped and hit his head. You saw … You remember. Don't you?'

But the girl breaks away, shaking her head violently.

‘I didn't mean it. I just wanted to stop him. And he wouldn't … stop.'

‘The police found their murder-weapon, Abby.' Carla steps in front of her, demanding her attention. ‘And the thing is … It's
you
they're looking for. Not Tess. Because it's your fingerprints they found on it. They had them on record from your little shoplifting stunt. It didn't take them long to –'

‘But there
was
no murder-weapon. For Christ's sake, Carla. He fell and hit his freaking head. How many more times do I have to –'

‘The fall didn't kill him, Abby. Stunned him, maybe, but it didn't kill him. He was hit twice more. With an empty bottle. On the side of the head. The second blow was hard enough to shatter the bottle.'

‘I was scared,' Tess repeats. ‘I didn't mean … He wasn't supposed to die.'

‘Tess, what are you saying? What the hell happened back there?'

The girl retreats a step or two before replying.

‘I called you, Abby. I called your name, but you didn't turn around. He was getting up. After you left, he started to get up. He was shaking his head and cursing, calling you all kinds of names. I wanted to run, but I couldn't, and he was getting up. Then he turned and saw me and I saw the look in his eyes. He was going to kill me, Ab. I could see it in his eyes. So I picked up the bottle and I hit him. Across the head. And he fell. But he wouldn't stay down. He got up on his hands and knees and I knew that if he stood up, I was … So I swung it as hard as I could and it smashed across the back of his head. He went down and this time he didn't get up. I dropped the bottle and I ran. But I didn't mean … He wasn't meant to …'

The words run out and she stands with her hands on the back of one of the lounge chairs for support.

‘But it doesn't make any sense. Why would they think … How could my fingerprints be … ? Oh Christ, Tess! Of all the stupid …'

Tessie's little helper. Liquid amnesha …

She turns to Carla, who stands unmoving near the door.

‘Earlier in the night, Tess offered me a drink. I took the bottle from her for a minute. I must have put my fingerprints all over it. And Tess was wearing her damned gloves. As usual. Of course there wouldn't be any other prints on it.'

Carla looks at each girl in turn.

Tess is bordering on the hysterical, fear written into every line on her face. Her hands on the back of the lounge are shaking uncontrollably.

But Abby is calm. Focused. She is staring at a spot on the wall, as if it contains all the answers. As if the room and everyone in it has suddenly ceased to exist. Under the circumstances, such an unnatural calm is unnerving.

When Carla speaks, it is to assume control.

‘So, what do we do? You can't hide out forever, Ab. Sooner or later they'll catch up with you. Then what?'

‘I'll give myself up.' Tess's voice breaks as she makes the offer, but she is determined to remain strong. She takes a couple of steps towards the other two and folds her arms in an attempt to demonstrate her determination, but the effect is less than convincing. ‘I can't let you get in trouble for me, Ab. If I –'

‘Look, don't do anything right away. An idea has half-formed in Abby's mind. ‘Give me a few days before you admit anything to anyone. And stay here. I'll be in touch.'

Before they can reply, she is running from the room, closing the door hard behind her.

‘Come on, Abby. That's crazy!' Chris stands up, knocking over the empty coffee mug. ‘What makes you think you can get away with it?' He picks up the mug and places it on the sink. ‘Just tell them the truth and let Tess plead self-defence. With his record for violence, no court in the world would convict her.'

‘How can you be sure? She's eighteen years old, but she's like a little kid. Shit, Chris, she hasn't been sober one day in the last three years. She's a wreck. She won't be able to take the pressure of a trial, and if she ends up in jail it'll kill her. As sure as if they put a gun to her head. I can't let her take the rap.'

‘Even if she did it?'

‘Did
what
? Defended herself?'

‘She hit him in the head with a bottle, Abby. Twice.'

‘Once, twice … What's the damned difference? He would have killed her – and then come after me. You didn't know him, Chris. He was a thug. A sadistic animal. But the jury didn't know him either. All they'll see is that he was hurt on the ground and she bashed him to death with her own booze bottle. That's manslaughter at best. Most likely a murder charge.'

‘And what about
you
? What makes you think you'll do any better?'

‘I've got a better shot at self-defence. Besides, I'm only sixteen. They'll try me as a juvie. No jury. He was attacking me, I pushed him and he tripped, but he made a grab for me. He was too strong and I knew he was going to hurt me badly, maybe kill me. There was a bottle in the gutter and as he pulled me down I grabbed it and swung. Once, twice, before he let go and collapsed. And that was when I ran. I didn't know he was dead. I've been hiding out because I feared for my life.'

She moves across to stand next to him, leaning back against the sink and looking straight into his eyes.

‘Look, Chris, if they put Tess on the stand, she'll walk into any trap they set for her. She'll convict herself. But I can testify and I'd back myself to convince any magistrate. “I'm a victim of society, your honour, driven to the streets by an abusive stepfather and exploited by a sadistic, heartless pimp. If I did strike out, it was in self-defence, because I was in fear for my life. He was violent and so much stronger than me. I didn't stand a chance.” They already think it was me. My prints are all over the murder-weapon. If I give myself up and tell my side of the story, it probably won't even get to court. Either way, it gets Tess off the hook.'

‘But it's a risk. You said it yourself. You can't be totally sure. Even it's only a one in a hundred chance, why risk it?'

‘What's the other option, Chris? Watch my only friend go to jail, then attend her funeral before the end of the year? I'm not going into it blind. I've thought it through. I can do this. Trust me.'

He turns to face her, stepping closer until he is touching her.

‘I trust you. I do. But you're wrong about one thing, Abby. Tess isn't your only friend.'

This time when their lips touch, he doesn't pull away.

Seventeen
Muse

‘I don't know that I'd have the guts to do it.'

T.J. speaks through a mouthful of cereal and leans back against his legs. With her free hand she aims the remote at the TV, which winks obediently into silence.

‘I mean, we're not talking shoplifting here – or even soliciting. She's about to walk into a police-station – in the middle of a pre-election law-and-order campaign – and admit to beating her pimp to death with a booze-bottle. Talk about spitting into the wind.'

Cain shifts into a more comfortable position and rubs a hand slowly through her hair, choosing his words.

‘What else can she do? It's not like she can walk away and ignore the whole thing.' He counts his points on his fingers. ‘Strike one, they have pretty strong circumstantial evidence and they're already looking for her. Besides, she's not exactly your Mr and Mrs Average's idea of the perfect model citizen. That's strike two. Maybe it's good tactics to take a swing at the pitch, instead of playing defensive and hoping for a foul ball.'

‘No guts, no glory, eh.' She turns to look up into his eyes. ‘Which is fine, if you happen to be guilty and you have nothing to lose. I can't help wondering what I'd be capable of doing if Ian was attacking me – or Ty – and I had a weapon handy. Puts your ideas of right and wrong into perspective, doesn't it? But I don't know if I'd have the balls to take the rap for someone else. No matter how sorry I felt for them.'

Sitting up, she places the half-full bowl onto the carpet next to her.

‘I should go see her. She might need some moral support around now – and I don't imagine she's having too many visitors. She might need a female shoulder to cry on.'

Cain looks at her for a few moments, then he picks up the bowl and scoops a spoonful of cereal into his mouth.

‘She doesn't strike me as the type to cry on anyone's shoulder. But you could be right. Maybe I'll come with you.'

*

T.J.'s story

It was around 9 pm when we got to Chris's place.

I knocked and Abby opened the door. She had on a pair of hipster jeans with a sort of dusky pink V-neck midriff top and the stone in her navel-ring matched the top. Amethyst, I guessed – or a good imitation.

Cain made the introductions and we sat down on the lounge. At least Cain and I did. Abby was playing hostess, making the coffee and scouring the cupboards for something to serve with it that hadn't passed its use-by date. It wasn't hard to see that she appreciated the company.

‘He's hardly ever here,' she replied, when I asked about Chris. ‘If he's not acting as my eyes on the street, or working at Inferno, he's cruising the back alleys with his camera, looking for new subjects.'

‘Cain says you've been modelling for him.' I watched her turn down the heat under the kettle and pour the water into the cups before she turned to answer me.

‘Part of the arrangement.' A small laugh. ‘Suddenly, I'm his Muse. Personally, I don't see what he finds so fascinating.'

She had a habit of flicking her long hair back from her face as she spoke and when she looked directly at me I caught the power of the personality behind those eyes.

‘I think I do,' I replied. ‘After we've had this coffee, maybe the pair of you should show me some of the great man's work.'

Which is what they did.

‘Impressed?' she asked, as I stood in the middle of the studio with my jaw down somewhere near my chest.

‘You could say that.'

I was whispering, as if words were an intrusion in that place. As if anything I might say would detract from the effect. I remember visiting Saint Mary's cathedral with my father when I was five or six, and looking up at the high arch of the ceiling, speechless. My dad always said that if I'd opened my mouth any wider I'd have swallowed my face.

I still remember the feeling of awe. Even a small cathedral's a big place when you're five years old and you only have a three-bedroom project home as a point of reference.

I was feeling the same way again, and it wasn't anything to do with the size of the room.

As well as the completed works, there were three unfinished paintings of Abby, each one on its own easel, spaced around the gallery. They looked like elements of a series. Studies. When I turned to her, she was focused on a half-completed image of herself staring out from the canvas with eyes that seemed to seek you out and read something in you. The fact that the eyes were so alive in the two-dimensional ghosting of the unfinished face made them somehow more real, more intensely demanding. I glanced up at the photo of her that Chris had captured on the street, then at his transfiguration of her face on the canvas beside it. And I understood what Cain had been talking about all this time.

And looking back at Abby, I could see what the artist in Chris had seen.

Was it the altered environment, or was life beginning to imitate art? The girl in the photograph was not the girl standing next to me, flicking the hair away from her face and trying to read meaning in the half-realised vision of herself.

‘Pizza?' Cain's stomach was doing the thinking again – or was it a ploy to leave us alone? ‘There's a great little pizzeria a few blocks away, but you could die of malnutrition waiting for them to deliver. I'll give them a call, then go and pick them up.'

‘Fine with me,' I replied. Abby just nodded.

And a few minutes later we were alone.

‘They're so different.'

Her words broke the silence that was stretching between us and I turned from the picture I was pretending to study.

‘You think?'

‘Don't you? I mean, Cain is so … open. You know exactly where you stand – what he's feeling. With Chris …'

She moved across to sit down on the sill of the huge floor-to-ceiling window and looked down on the deserted street below.

‘Sometimes I think I know him, then he'll say something -or do something – that totally shocks me. Nothing violent or threatening. Just … old … for his age. Or totally left field. He's never once questioned me about my past or … my career moves. He never doubted my story and he never judged me. But then … I'll wake up in the night and he's standing staring at me. Not
staring.
Nothing sleazy or creepy. More like guarding. Watching over me. Other times I'll wake up and he'll be gone. Or in the middle of a sitting he'll just stop and say, “That's enough,” and walk out. Maybe he won't be back for hours – or until the next evening. No warning, no explanation, just, “You be alright on your own?” and he leaves without waiting for an answer.'

‘The artistic temperament.'

I was trying for humour, but she shook her head.

‘He doesn't have one – not like you see in the movies, at least. He's not precious about what he does, he just … does it. It's a passion, but it's the product he shares, not the process. The process and the emotion that drives it stay in the studio. There's none of that “look-at-me-I'm-brilliant” crap. I don't think he even sees how brilliant he is. And he doesn't seem to care about what people think. Or if he does, he hides it pretty well.'

‘Oh, I think he cares. I think he cares about a whole lot of things.' I turned and looked up at the painting of her. And the photograph. ‘I just think that
that's
how he's learned to express it. Ideals are easier to deal with than real people. Look at this stuff. It's all Yin and Yang. Maintaining the balance. It's how he makes meaning out of the meaningless.'

‘How he turns a whore into an angel.'

Her emotion took me by surprise. It wasn't guilt, or self-pity. And it wasn't anger. More like defiance. A hard shell, hiding … what? I took her hand, but the words wouldn't come.

‘He sleeps with me now. Did you know that?'

I shook my head. Looking at her – and at the paintings around me – I discovered that I wasn't surprised.

‘But that's all we do,' she went on. ‘Sleep. He hasn't tried … anything. And I don't know how to react. I've never …'

She paused, forcing back whatever unfamiliar emotion was trying to force its way out.

‘What?'

‘I've never allowed myself to care. To need anyone. And the first time I feel like … like it might be possible, he won't …'

‘What? Take advantage of the situation?' She had crossed back to the windowsill, and I moved to stand beside her. Her head was bowed and I watched her reflection in the dark glass. She was crying, wiping the tears away with an impatient movement of her hand, as if the show of weakness annoyed her.

I sat down beside her and put my arm around her shoulder. She felt cold.

‘Has he told you about himself? His background?'

She shook her head.

‘He never talks about himself.'

Why did that sound familiar?

‘Or his father? Talk about nineteenth century! If Chris thought for a moment he might turn out like his old man … I don't know what he'd do. You're vulnerable at the moment and he's taken you in. He's been kind to you. But that doesn't mean you owe him. Look at these pictures. If it was just about sex, the guy who painted these wouldn't be able to keep his hands off you. But it isn't – can't you see that? It isn't about the sex at all. It's about power. It's about dependency. Chris's mother chose his father because he offered safety, but there was a price. And the price was too high. At least it was as far as Chris is concerned. She gave away her power in a trade for safety, and everyone was a loser. He's not going to allow you to make that mistake.'

‘But what difference does it make? It's just sex. After everything I've done –'

‘It makes all the difference in the world!' I took her chin between my finger and thumb and forced her to look at me. ‘There's no such thing as “just sex” – and you should know that better than anyone. Power corrupts, Abby. He's scared of becoming his father.'

I let go of her face, and she looked away.

I continued. ‘Do you like sleeping with him?'

After a moment's pause she looked back and the slightest of smiles touched her lips. She nodded.

‘He holds me and we kiss, and I feel …'

‘Safe?'

‘Loved. And it's been so damned long.'

This time she didn't fight the tears. I held her for a long time, until Cain returned with the pizza.