Everything to Nothing (60 page)

‘Have you seen
Michelle recently?’

For a moment
Sally was surprised but she managed to compose a reply. ‘Not for
years. How does she fit into this?’

‘She’s
dying.’

‘Pardon
me?’

‘She’s dying.
She never recovered from losing Simon, never recovered from losing
him in that way. Seeing your fiancé’s severed arm lying in the
grass can really destroy someone’s life. She became severely
anorexic and now the doctors have said there is nothing they can
do. I’ve heard from my sources she has only days to live, if
that.’

Sally slumped
into a chair in front of his desk. ‘I had no idea.’

‘Yes, I know
you don’t. If you’d only supported her as much as you did David
perhaps she would have pulled through.’

‘Don’t you dare
try to blame me for this. Don’t you dare! I tried my hardest to
support her but she cut me off…’

‘Do you blame
her? After all, you still insisted on being with the man who had
killed her fiancé. Not exactly the greatest foundation for a
friendship is it?’

‘Are you done?
Anything else you’d like to blame David or me for?’

‘I think I’m
done, but depending on how long you’re planning on staying for I’m
sure I could think of something else.’

‘For the last
and final time it wasn’t his fault!’

‘Oh yes, it was
this mystical Sarah’s fault. For the last few years I’ve had
private investigators combing the country trying to find her.
Ex-police detectives and a couple of ex-members of MI5 and nothing.
I’ve had people camped outside any address that I could find a
record of her living at and she has never once returned to those
addresses. It’s like she never existed. Funny that.’

‘So now you’re
saying that Sarah doesn’t exist? I think you need to speak to
Michelle again about that.’

‘Yes,
Michelle’s testimony certainly helped save David. How much did you
pay her to go along with that story?’

‘My God. How
can you say that? What’s happened to you?’

‘No Sally. The
question you should be asking is what happened to you? You
abandoned your best and closest friend in her darkest hour, and you
abandoned me, the loving father who gave you everything you ever
needed or wanted, who raised you as a father and a mother.’ His
voice broke as he finished the sentence. Sally looked up at him and
noticed the tears rolling down his face. ‘You broke my heart the
day you left, you broke my heart and I’ll never, ever be able to
forgive you for that, and I’ll never, ever be able to forgive David
for the pain he has caused. Please, leave now.’

‘And I’ll
never, ever be able to forgive you for the pain you’ve caused me.
With one phone call and one letter you’ve ruined our lives again,
your only daughter. David is slumped in his armchair drinking
again; I can’t work because every time I apply for something you
stop it. There is no point even attempting to change my identity
because you’d find me. Our lives were back together. We were a
family. We were happy.’

‘I think you
need to speak to your dying friend about ruined lives and
happiness. She’s in a room off ward six at St. Katherine’s. Go and
see her. I have. Then you’ll know about ruined lives! Now get out,
get out, get out and never, ever return to this house! Get
OUT!’

Sally burst
into tears and ran out of the room, past James who tried to speak
to her, and down to her old car that she had managed to save up and
buy. Quickly she drove down the long driveway, past the lake and
the island where her mother was buried and out through the
gates.

*

Sally walked
along the corridor off ward six at St. Katherine’s until she found
the room with Michelle’s name scrawled on a whiteboard attached to
the door. Hesitantly she stepped away from the door and then with a
deep breath she approached it and looked through the window.

Through the
gloomy light Sally saw a human form with a single sheet thrown
over. The form was skeletal and could hardly be recognised as a
woman. From this distance the person in the bed looked like they
were asleep so careful to not make a noise she opened the door and
entered the room.

The first thing
that struck her as she entered was the amount of machines in the
room, all of them whirring and clicking, doing whatever they needed
to do. Sally did not need to be a doctor to know that these
machines were keeping Michelle alive. As she approached the bed she
stopped and studied her friend.

Her eyes were
drawn first to Michelle’s hair. Her hair was not just thin; she was
practically bald with a few wispy strands of hair covering her
scalp. The skin of her face looked dry and pallid; her eyes looked
like they had collapsed into her head. It was clear that her lips
were also dry, they were cracked and broken. One arm was out from
under the sheet and Sally noticed bruises, a lot of bruises, dotted
up and down her lower and upper arm. Then Sally’s eyes looked at
Michelle’s body.

There was no
trace of breasts bulging the sheet, instead what bulged the sheet
were Michelle’s ribs, Sally could see each individual one, and her
sharp hips were also protruding into the sheet. Her once voluptuous
body did not have flesh on it, she was purely skin and bones and
nothing else.

Not wanting to
wake her, Sally was about to leave when suddenly, but slowly,
Michelle turned her head. For the rest of her life Sally did not
forget the sounds of Michelle’s joints creaking and cracking as she
moved so very slowly and gently. Sally would also never forget the
look in her once sparkling eyes as she opened them and looked into
Sally’s sparkling green eyes.

Michelle seemed
to try to take a breath which she struggled to do, and when she did
the sound made Sally want to run screaming out of the room. The
single breath rasped and rattled around the room as Michelle made a
desperate attempt to suck oxygen into her frail body. When she
spoke her voice was faint and crackly so Sally had to take a step
closer to hear her. She wished she had not. As Michelle said the
first words to her in years Sally smelled her breath and it smelled
of death.

‘Why… are… you…
here?’ Michelle spoke the sentence hesitantly, pausing over every
word.

‘I came to see
you.’

If she had
physically been able to Michelle would have laughed but instead she
stared at Sally with venom of pure hate in her eyes. ‘I… don’t…
want to see… you.’

‘I came, I
came…’ And for a moment Sally could not think of why she had come
to see her dying friend. ‘I came to see if there was anything I
could do for you…’ The words she spoke trailed off as she realised
the emptiness of them even as she spoke them.

Now Michelle
did laugh; a bitter, hollow, rasping, coughing, spluttering laugh
that had Sally reaching for the emergency button to call a nurse.
But Michelle managed to bring herself back under control and took a
few more deep breaths that caused Sally to think of graves when
Michelle’s expelled air was sucked into Sally’s nose.

‘You came here
to see… And what the… hell can you do for… me? A bit late don’t you
think?’ Michelle started to cough as she finished speaking, and
with a great effort she reached for a tissue by her side and spat a
blood stained glob into it.

‘I’m so sorry
Michelle. I had no idea you were so sick.’

‘And why is
that?’

‘Why is
what?’

‘Don’t be…
thick Sally. You had no idea I was sick because you… have not
spoken to me… or my family… for years. You abandoned me for that
murdering bastard!’ Michelle coughed again, her body now curling up
being racked with pain. Eventually she stopped and her eyes bore
into Sally’s again.

‘He, David,
didn’t murder anyone. It was a tragic accident.’

‘It was no
accident!’ She shook her head from side to side causing Sally’s
stomach to flop over again as she listened to her joints groaning
and creaking. ‘He was driving like a… lunatic! If he’d been driving
at thirty instead of eighty… Simon would still be alive!’

Now at a
whisper Michelle said the words that would haunt Sally for the rest
of her life, her breath rasping the words out, and the stench of
the words would also stay with her forever. In a haunting,
crackling, rasping whisper Michelle said, ‘Why… why did you not
drive with David that day? Why was it Simon’s arm lying in the
grass when it should have been yours?’ Michelle saw the look of
intense pain in Sally’s eyes and she enjoyed the pain she was
causing her.

‘You can’t, you
can’t mean that?’ Tears now brimming in her emerald eyes.

‘My life was
ruined that day… and now… and now I hope that yours is ruined too.
The girl who had everything…, now I hope you forever have nothing.
I curse you Sally with all the soul that is still left in my body!
I curse you to a life of misery…, a life full of pain, suffering
and misery so then you’ll have a small idea of what my life has
been like since you chose him over me, since you abandoned me. I
curse you Sally, and your children, with all my broken heart and
broken soul I curse you for eternity!’ The last word was a rattle
of death as Michelle forced it out of body. For the second time
that day Sally burst into tears and ran from a room.

Michelle though
simply closed her eyes; at last at peace now that she had said to
Sally what she had wanted to say to her for years. As she closed
her eyes a warning buzzer went off on the blood pressure machine as
her pressure sank to a dangerously low level. This buzzer caused a
warning light to go off on the nurse’s station in ward six but by
the time the nurses got there it was too late.

As Michelle
closed her eyes she saw Simon stood in front of her, a heavenly
glow radiating around him. He was dressed how she remembered him
best, the night he proposed to her. Smiling at her, with a single
finger he beckoned her towards him. With a smile of her own she
took a couple of steps towards him as he started to walk away. So
she followed him, catching him up, taking his hand as they entered
what was waiting for them through a bright circle of light.

*

Nobody ever
knew about Sally’s visit to Michelle that day. Sally never told
anybody and she did not believe that anybody could truly curse
another person. But through the dark days that were rapidly
approaching the words would haunt Sally, and they would haunt her
for the rest of her life.

Chapter 45

He noticed her
for the first time as she was walking along the high street in
town. Her long black hair cascaded down her back and he nearly
crashed his Ferrari as he watch her tight bum in the tight jeans
wiggle along in front of him. Slowing right down he passed her and
looked in his rear view mirror. Her face was unbelievably beautiful
and considering she was holding hands with two children her figure
was still amazing.

Quickly he
floored the Ferrari, racing down the high street until he came to a
roundabout which he quickly negotiated and then raced back up the
high street frantically looking for a car park space. Giving up he
left the car in a disabled space and dashed back along the street
to find the woman. Cursing he realised he had lost her so he
frantically backtracked and started to look through the windows of
shops near where he had seen her. Cursing even more he looked into
a bank and found her stood in the queue.

In a flash he
had entered the bank and barged an elderly lady out of the way so
he could be next to her in the queue. As he stood behind her he
admired her bum, her long slim legs and the shine of her black
hair. He listened as she chatted to the two young children, both of
them about seven years old, and he realised that they were twins.
With a shout of glee in his head he did not see a wedding or
engagement ring but that would not have stopped him anyway. They
reached the end of the queue and she went to a cashier and he went
to the one next to her.

He did not bank
there so he asked for an interest rate leaflet and chatted to the
cashier about the accounts. But he was not really listening to his
replies. All his attention was on listening to the mother next to
him as she discussed the accounts with the young children.

Apparently the
young boy was not impressed that his sister had more money but the
mother delicately reminded him that he had taken some money out to
buy a toy the previous month. The boy shrugged his shoulders as he
accepted this explanation and then the girl commented that in a few
more months she would have a hundred pounds. She announced proudly
to the cashier, hesitating as she worked out that she now had
ninety-five pounds in her account. This was too much of an
opportunity for him to miss.

‘So, that means
you’re how much short of one hundred?’

The mother
jumped as the man started to speak to her daughter and she laid a
protective hand on her shoulder. But the man looked harmless
enough, in fact he look more than harmless, he was in fact good
looking with a deep tan and he was dressed immaculately.

The man was
very impressed when almost straight away the young girl replied,
‘Five pounds.’

‘Yes, well
done! And I’ll tell you what I’ll do. Considering you’re so good at
maths and you obviously work hard at school I’ll give you five
pounds.’

Excited the
girl nodded eagerly and the man offered her a five pound note.

‘No, honestly,
it’s okay, you don’t need to do that.’

For the first
time he made eye contact with the mother and his heart skipped a
beat as he looked into her green eyes that were shining like
emeralds. ‘Really, I insist. I don’t know much about kids, but she
seems very intelligent?’

‘Thank you, but
it’s okay.’

‘I want the
five pounds mummy!’