Escaping Life (3 page)

“Betty, I never
stopped missing you.  I’m so sorry that I had to go away.”  He looked up at his
wife, who was nodding in agreement at the strange letter before them.  “I know
in your heart you will believe this is me, and I know you will read it.  It’s
time to learn the truth.  Your big sister.”  Taking a big breath in, he bought
himself some time, unsure of how to respond. 

“You missed the
name, Graham.  Becca.  It says Becca.”

“I know.  I
know.”  He paused.  “This is today’s paper?”  He rummaged for the front cover,
snatching at hope as he looked for the date.

“Graham, of
course it’s today’s paper.”  She wasn’t irritated by him.  She knew he wasn’t
stupid, but rather like her, was completely bereft of answers.

“Listen, baby,”
he said as he tried to stifle a yawn.  “There is no way that this can be from
your sister, or even intended for you.”  In her mind she knew that that was the
most reasonable answer.  But she couldn’t accept it so easily.  Biting her top
lip, she pushed on.

“Learn the
truth?  What does that mean?”  It was the most cryptic message, as much in its
wording as the possible identity of the sender.  He could see her initial
eagerness for answers was giving way slightly:  giving way to a look of hopeless
hope, impossible dreams and the kind of sadness that he hadn’t seen on her face
for such a long time.  He didn’t say anything at first.  Instead he put the
paper down and stretched himself back onto his pillows, one hand on his neck, and
one hand running through his floppy hazelnut bed hair.

She tried to
wait for his silence to pass but her impatience was no longer able to withstand
it.  “It sounds like her,” Elizabeth said.  She was almost embarrassed to say
it out loud as she looked down at the bed, aware of how crazy her last
statement sounded.

“Elizabeth, it
can’t be.  It’s a horrible coincidence.”  He reached forward, and she felt the
heat from his body against her own skin.  “It can’t be from Becca.  She’s
gone.”  As he reached out his hand, his large and supportive palm caressed her
che
e
k.  She nestled her face
into it.  He took off his glasses and placed them back down on the bedside
table as he guided her down next to him.  She shuffled herself into his
embrace, and he held her in his arms, their faces touching, his stubble
scratching familiarly at her face.  It always left a red rash, but she didn’t
care.  She felt so cared for in his arms, and knew in her heart that he had to
be right.  The dead cannot speak.  She thought of the day when he had told her
that there had been an accident.  She thought of the visit she had made to the
scene of the crash, and how the images of the burning car had stayed with her
for so long.  It had happened only four days after her mother had died. 
Another funeral.  Another gravestone.  More intricately stone carved letters
the only reminder of a life lived, and ended too soon.  She had stood at the
black memorial on the ground, the heavy solid plaque compressing the earth
around it.  As she stroked its surface, her last connection to Becca, she
wondered how she could find a way to move on with half of her family gone.  This
was just a black stone.  Empty words carved by an unknown face who never knew
her.  There was nothing here is this cold wet earth and solidity of the stone
lump that reminded her of Rebecca.  She vowed never to go there again, but to
find a different place to feel her.  She found it on the beach.  She found it
in the sky.  She found it in a broken-down house so different to her previous
life.  She found it in the sounds that filled her garden as she planted berry
bushes, the fruit of which she would eat on a Sunday.  She found it in her own
life much more so than ever she would have in an empty black plaque.  She
couldn’t mourn Becca there.  It was just a stone.  They hadn’t even buried her
body.

It proved to be
a difficult week for Elizabeth.  Lying there that Sunday morning in Graham’s
arms, she had told herself to forget the notice from the paper. 
You sound
like a crazy woman,
she told herself, when she dared venture again that the
message really could be from her sister.  She needed another focus.  She
decided that she should work, so she sat at her computer, yet didn’t type
anything.  She spoke to friends on the telephone back in the city, but when
Graham asked her how they were she realised that she couldn’t recall what they’d
said.  She thought perhaps something practical would help take her mind off the
lonely hours whilst Graham was at work and so set about making bread and
cupcakes, yet none of them seemed to taste any good.  She spent the first two
days of the week stuck in her house, trying but failing to get the notice out
of her mind.  She didn’t know why she didn’t want to go out; she didn’t know if
she felt safer at home, suddenly uncertain of the world around her, or if she
wanted to be here, just in case.  Just in case somebody knocked the door; just
in case somebody knocked the door and said they had found her sister.  Just in
case somebody knocked the door and Rebecca was standing there peering in
through the little panes of distorted glass, the kind that make faces look like
bubbles.  She wouldn’t know who it was at first, but she would open the door,
peel back the layers of distortion and the ag
e
ing of the last four years to reveal
her sister standing there with open arms, begging for forgiveness for her
absence. 
You still sound like a crazy woman,
she told herself again.

By the time
Wednesday arrived, as she stood in the bathroom looking at her face, she
realised that she hadn’t slept much in the last two nights, her normally pale ‘translucent
glow with just a tint of summer sunshine’ replaced by the grey sallow skin of
an insomniac.  Her eyes looked heavy and laden, her soft blonde hair dishevelled
from lack of care.  “You need to go out,” she told the stranger in the mirror. 
“You need to do something.  You are going to drive yourself mad.”  Stood in the
shower, the water ran over her slim athletic body like a gentle waterfall over
smooth water eroded rocks.  It was hot again today.  These last two weeks had
been the hottest on record for Haven in the last fifty years.

The fisherman
had taken advantage of the still waters of the early morning, the early fog
seemingly a continuum with the still surface of the ocean.  They had caught
more fish than usual, and the seagulls had been driven into a feeding frenzy
when the boats returned with their catches.  Charles Stewart, who owns the
local fish restaurant, which surely has the best views of the bay, had been
fully booked every day with the travelling masses coming from the nearest towns
on last minute holiday days to enjoy the sunshine and fresh food, and to lament
the benefits of clean air.  The beach had been filled with the sound of playing
children, the gentle lull of the rolling tide replaced by the patter of small
feet crashing in and out of the water.  An assortment of ice cream flavours
carried on the warm breeze.  She dressed in a pair of casual shorts and a loose
t-shirt, grabbed a pair of sandals from the chest in the hallway, and pulled
the door of her cottage shut.  Elizabeth pulled her hair back into a tight pony
tail, tiny wisps of hair hanging in her eyes as it escaped her grip. 

Out in the
village she realised that she could put the thoughts of the notice in the paper
behind her. 
I should have done what he said.  I should have gone out
yesterday,
she mused to herself.  She felt better to breathe the oxygen-rich
air, salty from the sun baked surface of the water.  She sat on the harbour
wall, with an ice cream from the local tea shop.  The same strawberry flavour
to which she had been lured as it had crept in through her bathroom window.  Mrs.
Lyons really could make good ice cream, but it was so full of cream it melted
almost instantly. 
Damn it
, she thought as it dripped down her arm,
simultaneously realising that she had forgotten to wish her a happy
anniversary.  That was one thing about a small place like Haven and the
announcements page.  You knew the important events in the other villagers’
lives.  It was village etiquette to make sure that you mentioned them. 
“Make
sure you read the papers.  Get to know people.  They appreciate it,”
the
artist had said to her as she browsed around her gallery during the first week
of moving here.  She was a young woman, maybe a little bit older than
Elizabeth.  Apart from the daily progress visit from Mr. and Mrs. Lyons, during
the refurbishment of the cottage, she was the first person she had spoken to in
the village.  She had been grateful for the advice of how to fit into such a
small place.  Nancy had become a good friend in the three years that had passed
since.  She could see the small artist’s shop across the other side of the
harbour, doors wide open with a steady stream of visitors.  She too would be
benefitting from the heat wave and influx of human traffic.

“Hey!” she called,
waving her hand across the shop floor and bustling bodies.  Elizabeth edged her
way through, sideways, like one of the crabs from the beach that children were
trying to catch on small lines, crouched down and peering over the harbour wall
equipped with their little plastic collecti
on
buckets.  Nancy hadn’t noticed her in
the crowd at first, too preoccupied with an inquisitive tourist who wanted to
learn more about the artist before he bought the painting.  It was a small
painting, a watercolour of the harbour.  It was bright; a happy scene.  If you
hung it on your wall it would brighten even the stormiest of days, when the
boats rocked and the waves crashed against the pavements.  That is what Nancy
painted; little tokens of summer happiness, a memory and reminder that as the
seasons change you will see the same bright days again.

As she reached
the back of the shop, Nancy had convinced the tourist of her merits, and he had
left, smiling to himself at the watercolour in his bag that he would hang in
his hallway.  He would recount the tale of the seaside artist who had moved to
the small tourist fishing village ten years before to pursue her dream to any
guest that would pass it by.  Nancy nodded to her friend, signalling her to go
straight upstairs.  As Elizabeth walked up the tight steep staircase that ran
up through the centre of the building like a great artery connecting the
chambers of the house, she glanced as she always did at the multitude of
paintings on the walls. 
So different to my home
, she thought every time
she was here.  There was no light in
the
stairway, at least not until you were near to the top. 
The
lounge was on the first floor, the
ground floor being completely taken up by gallery and studio.  Her gallery and
studio were one and the same, two small cottage rooms knocked into one held up
by big pillars, ideal for hanging the smaller artworks.  The upstairs lounge
was smaller, but with large open doors and a balcony with views across the bay
that soaked up the sunlight from early morning until early evening.  Although
Elizabeth loved her garden, here on this balcony, you were not just an admirer
of the view - you were the view.  You were part of that perfect picture
postcard.  Here, nothing could hurt you.

Almost thirty
minutes had passed before Nancy came up the stairs.  For the first time in two
days Elizabeth was so relaxed, mesmerised by the motion of the waves, the
rhythmical back and forth of the water’s edge that she had barely noticed her
arrive.

“Hey, sorry
about that.”  Nancy took off her artist’s apron and hung it up on the coat
stand.  “So busy today, what with the weather.  I’ll go and make us some lunch.” 
After another few minutes had passed, Nancy returned carrying a large oval
tray.  It looked like something she might have made.  She had made salmon
sandwiches with soft cheese, and next to them there was a huge bowl of
strawberries, lightly sprinkled with sugar, just the way Elizabeth liked them. 
“Hope this is ok?” she nodded towards the food.

As they sat and
ate, Nancy told her about how busy the shop has been, and how many paintings
she had sold.  She said, “I could shut up for a month and go away on my own
summer holiday,” as she spoke through mouthfuls of sandwich, stopping only to
push any escaping food back into her mouth.  Elizabeth loved this about Nancy. 
When she had lived in the city, the restaurants and cafes that she would
frequent
required a certain level
of behaviour.  They certainly didn’t like people speaking through mouthfuls of
food, of pushing escaping morsels back in with their fingers.  That’s one of
the things she liked about Haven.  People didn’t accept that kind of attitude. 
At Charles Stewart’s restaurant, if he didn’t see you picking at the fish with
your fingers he would be likely to ask you if there was something wrong with
it, and would be happy not to charge you if you told him that there was.

As the moments
passed, and Nancy had finished telling Elizabeth about her news, she looked to
her friend.

“Well, what
have you been up to?”  It was a simple question, and one that she would
normally have no problem answering.  Normally, she could tell her about her
latest work project, or her latest trip to the city.  She would normally tell
her about the trivialities of life that good friends take interest in.   Last
week
, she had told her about
the new insect repellent she had used on the raspberry bushes after a severe
case of greenfly.  This was not interesting news, but Nancy always listened as
if it was the scoop of the day.   She cared about her life, even if it was
boring in places.  She didn’t need her to fast forward to the good bits.  When
Elizabeth hesitated, she knew immediately something was wrong.