Losing You (30 page)

‘You sounded pretty bad when we spoke last night,’ Charlie informed him.

‘Did I?’ Cracking open the curtains Oliver saw his father going across the courtyard to the stables. It seemed they were all early risers this morning.

‘Oliver, you’ve got to stop thinking about the girl,’ Charlie said firmly. ‘You’re going to drive yourself crazy if you don’t, and there’s nothing you can do.’

Tension tightened round Oliver’s head. Did his brother seriously think he didn’t know that?

‘I don’t want you to keep worrying,’ Charlie went on, ‘because I’m on it, OK? As soon as I’m done here I’ll be home and we’ll work it out.’

Oliver’s thoughts were scathing. Exactly what did Charlie think he could do that top doctors, lawyers and their father couldn’t? This law degree was going to his head. ‘Have you spoken to Mum?’ he asked, changing the subject.

‘Only briefly, after I rang off from you last night.’

‘Was she OK?’ He didn’t want to care, but he supposed he ought.

‘As OK as she ever is. I’ve come up with a way to work that out too.’

‘I thought you were studying to be a lawyer, not a magician.’

‘Ha, ha. Did Dad get his car back after she drove off in it?’

‘Yeah. It’s a bit dented, but driveable.’

‘Any news on yours yet?’

Oliver felt himself shrinking inside.

‘I guess there probably won’t be for a while,’ Charlie ran on. ‘The forensic stuff takes time. Just remember, you’re not banned yet, so you’re still free to drive – and to have a life.’

Seeing his freedom as a great mass of light being swallowed by some hideous black cloud on a close horizon, Oliver turned away from the window, as though he could somehow escape it.

‘What are you doing today?’ Charlie asked.

‘Starting work with Paul Granger.’

‘Of course, you mentioned it last night. That’s good. It’ll keep your mind off things.’

‘She’s got a name,’ Oliver snapped.

Charlie drew in his breath.

‘It’s Lauren Scott.’

‘I know.’

‘Did you go online like I told you? Have you seen her, what she was like?’

‘Yeah, I’ve seen her, but you’ve got to stop obsessing over this. It’s not going to help.’

Oliver’s tension clenched again. Didn’t Charlie get that everything was way beyond help? Why was he going on like it was possible to turn back the clock, or bring Lauren
Scott round, or do away with the charges that were going to pile up whether she pulled through or not? His life, his future, everything was ruined and there was no escaping it.

And what kind of mess was hers in now?

‘I guess I should go,’ Charlie said. ‘I’ll call again tonight, OK?’

‘Sure. Good luck with the exams.’

After ringing off Oliver went to slump down at his computer, but knowing he’d only go on tormenting himself with everything he could find about Lauren Scott, he decided to put the TV on instead. No better really, because his first stop was the local news just in case they mentioned her. They didn’t, mainly because everyone was talking about the creep who’d been arrested for murdering the girl from Thornbury.

The Box channel should give him some decent background sounds while he showered, no classical flute stuff, or piano, or jazz-type singing – the kind of funk Lauren Scott went in for (it seemed she could do it all).

Not now, thanks to him.

He wondered if his dad had heard about the arrest of Mandie Morgan’s killer yet. If he had, he’d be relieved, like everyone else – no one wanted a psycho on the loose – but in his dad’s case he’d actually met the girl only hours before the lowlife had offed her. He’d even been interviewed by the police; everyone in the office had, while his mother – his
sick
mother – had got it into her head for a while that his father was in some way involved. She’d let it drop, thank God, probably because she’d washed it away with a few dozen gallons of vodka-laced vino by now, but there was never any knowing when it might be regurgitated, and since he, Oliver, was making a quality job of heaping shame on the family all on his own, they really didn’t need any help from her.

So, hooray for the cops, they’d finally nailed the sicko neighbour who everyone was saying they’d always thought was weird.

They’d nailed him too and he didn’t have to worry what
they might be saying about him, he already knew. It had been in the papers, on the news and was pouring into his email and plastering his Facebook page every minute of the day.

Wilkie, as he and Charlie usually called Connie Wilkes, their mother’s old secretary, was staying with their mother now, no doubt following strict instructions from their father not to let her charge behind the wheel of a car. It was a sorry irony, Charlie had said last night, that she, who racketed about in her Merc under the influence all the time, had managed to escape the law, while he, Oliver, had only done it once – and then to save her – and now look where he was. As far as Oliver was concerned, there was no sorry irony about it; it was serious, fucking bad luck that he’d no way deserved, and if there was any effing justice in the world his mother would be sobering up fast and taking the rap for him, not sneaking about her own flat taking crafty swigs from her secret stash of booze.

Once he’d showered and not bothered to shave, he pulled on a clean pair of jeans and an old Chelsea T-shirt, covered it with a thick, baggy sweatshirt and tied a black wool scarf around his neck before going across to the stables to see his father. No way was he looking at his emails and Facebook today; he’d had enough of all the crap that had been turning up since early Sunday; real shitty hate-mail stuff calling him anything from a waste of skin, to the scum of the earth, to a raving psycho. A few had even sent links to suicide sites recommending he did himself and everyone else a favour.

Maybe he would.

He’d had no idea until now that this was how people who got done for drinking and driving were treated by strangers. He hadn’t even been to court yet, but to them he was obviously guilty, the breath tests said so, and who gave a shit about backup blood tests, let’s hang him anyway, cretin shouldn’t even have been on the road. Plus, even worse, like a million times worse, he’d caused grave physical injury (and they didn’t always put it like that, morons) to a ‘beautiful, innocent young girl’ (that was the general description of her, and having seen and read what he had,
he wouldn’t argue with it). Of course some of his new correspondents, maybe even all of them, would be friends of Lauren’s – actually he knew some were, because they said so. If it was their intention to make him loathe and despise himself any more than he already did, then they were failing, because he was already so far down in the pits that it just wasn’t possible to go any further. Even his own friends didn’t seem to hold him in any greater esteem than he did himself, and who could blame them? Although Alfie and Jerome had written on his wall that they’d support him no matter what he’d done, and maybe his ‘anonymous accusers, how brave are you?’ ought to get over themselves and find out all the facts before ‘you start shouting your mouths off’. Oliver knew that if he’d allow it they’d broadcast to the world the reason why he’d been driving that night, but furious as he was with his mother, and as much as she probably deserved to be outed, he just didn’t want everyone knowing what a pitiful wreck she was.

‘Hey,’ his father said, looking up from his computer as Oliver came in. ‘What are you doing about so early?’

Closing the door as the wind tried to rush in, Oliver said, ‘Couldn’t sleep, so thought I’d make a start on some of the research stuff for Paul.’

Russ nodded approval. ‘Have you had breakfast?’

‘Not hungry.’

‘Well, starving’s not an option, I’m afraid, so I’ll make you some when I’ve finished here. Meanwhile, there’s fresh coffee in the machine.’

Going to help himself, Oliver said, ‘I can make my own breakfast.’

‘I know, and you will tomorrow. Mine too. Today can be my turn.’

‘So what are you doing?’ Oliver asked, coming to look over his shoulder.

‘Reworking a pitch that Angie and Graham are presenting to the Beeb this afternoon. It’s more or less there, but it could do with being a bit punchier.’

‘Aren’t you going with them?’

‘No, I’ve got too much to do here. Paul’s coming at ten
to start going through an order of shoot for the new series. You should be in on that too.’

Oliver shrugged, and went to sit at the desk he’d used the last time he’d worked for his father. It was at the back of the large room, about as far from his father’s desk as it was possible to get.

Russ watched him put down his coffee and turn on the computer. ‘I was thinking it might be a good idea for you to drive us to the garage later,’ he said.

Oliver immediately baulked.

‘My car’s going in for repair and they’re lending me another which you won’t be insured for, so ...’

‘I know where you’re going with this, and I don’t think it’s a good idea.’

‘You have to get back behind the wheel sometime, son.’

‘Why? They’re going to take my licence, aren’t they? I’m going to be banned for at least three years, and if I end up in prison ...’

‘It might not come to that, so don’t let’s start making assumptions.’

‘So what, we start kidding ourselves instead?’

‘We haven’t had the blood-test results yet. If they come back negative ...’

‘Oh Dad, get real. I was over the limit, OK? And even if they did come back negative, Lauren Scott’s still where she is, and I’m the one who put her there. No blood-test result’s going to change that, is it?’

After waiting a moment for the tension to ebb, Russ said, ‘It was an accident, Oliver. You didn’t do it intentionally ...’

‘I know that. I’m just saying, we can’t change the facts, so what’s the point in trying to make out we can?’

‘My point is only this: it could be a while before you lose your licence – if it does come to that – so I think you’d be helping yourself if you started to drive again. Let it go too long and your confidence won’t ...’

‘I don’t ever want to drive again, OK? Not ever.’

‘Oliver, I understand ...’

‘No you don’t.’ Oliver’s temper was flaring. ‘You’ve never hit someone with your car. You haven’t seen them
go up over your bonnet and smash into your windscreen. You haven’t sat with them on the side of the road willing them to live. You haven’t been where I am now, knowing you’re the lowest of the low, hating yourself so much you might as well be dead. You don’t get the kind of emails I do, or texts, telling you you’re the worst form of human life. So please don’t tell me you understand, Dad, because you really, really, don’t.’

Russ continued to watch him, as, pale-faced and frightened, he turned his attention to the screen and began banging something into the keyboard. He couldn’t argue, because Oliver was right, he had never been in his position, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t feel his son’s angst probably even more deeply than he’d ever feel his own, because that he could deal with. Turning things around for Oliver, giving him back his hope, confidence, self-esteem and dreams of a future was slipping so fast out of his grip that there seemed to be almost nothing left.

Going to sit at the empty desk next to Oliver’s, he said, ‘We need some proper help, son. Some professional advice on how to handle post-traumatic stress, which is what I think you’re suffering from. And maybe they can advise me of the best way to help you.’

Oliver kept his head down.

‘All I want,’ Russ said softly, ‘is to do the best for you. It’s all I’ve ever wanted.’

‘I know,’ Oliver replied hoarsely.

Resisting the urge to hug him as though he was still a child, Russ said, ‘No matter what people are putting in emails and texts, you and I both know that you are a decent, worthwhile human being at heart who really cares about what’s happened, and who would do anything possible to make up for it.’

Oliver tried to nod.

‘We’ll find a way,’ Russ told him. ‘I don’t know how yet, but we’ll find one, I promise.’

During the night, finding herself awake after only a few hours of sleep, Emma had crept quietly past Lauren’s room where Berry was sleeping, to go downstairs to her computer.
Seeing so many emails from her own and Lauren’s friends, all of them presumably wanting to express how sorry and worried they were, had instantly made her regret going online. It was making it too real and there was a part of her that still wasn’t ready to catch up with that, so she’d left them unread and clicked on to Lauren’s Facebook page to find it crammed with so much love and grief that her own seemed to be swept up into the tide of it.

You are absolutely the very best friend in the world. I love you so much, Lauren. I can’t bear to be without you. If you don’t come back I’ll never play the piano or guitar or sing again, because I only want to do it with you. So you see, you have to come back. Great big hug to you my darling. Coming to see you at the weekend. We’ve got loads to catch up on, so you’d better be awake. Donna
.

As soon as they let me I’m coming to see you. I can’t stop thinking about you. I’ve known you all my life and you’ve been the best friend ever, even though we don’t live close to one another, or go to the same school. No one means as much to me as you do. Don’t worry about anything, I’ll always be there for you. Melissa xxxx

We’re here for you my darling, we’ll never let you go. Skye and Matilda
.

This can’t happen to you. You’re definitely coming back to us. Hold on, babe, love you, love you, love you, Salina
.

We’re trying to get the performance exams delayed to wait for you. Wouldn’t be the same without you. Pippa
.

I owe everything to you. I’ve got friends now and a life, because you talked to me when no one else would. Please, please, come back. Jessica
.

I can’t believe this has happened. I lit a candle for you and I just know that you’ll find it and come back to us. Anna
.

I can’t stop crying. This is so awful. I’m thinking about you all the time. School’s so quiet. Everyone really misses you. Alex
.