The Bones of You (6 page)

8

September

T
he next time I see Jo is at Rosie’s funeral, a sweet, gentle endurance test, with sunlight, tears, and too many people crowding into the small village church. The overflow mourners stand outside, forming a human tunnel, which, I’m told later, closes in as her coffin passes, and follows behind. Here at least, no side of her is left unguarded.

The service is far removed from the brutality that’s brought us here, with flowers, familiar hymns, and the unbearable, overwhelming sadness that unites us. The only indication of the untimeliness of Rosie’s death is the two uniformed officers standing at the back. At one point, Grace nudges me, mouthing, “Poppy,” and across the church, I glimpse a pretty face flanked by two others, caked in thick makeup running with little rivers of black mascara.

Some classmates bravely deliver a eulogy through their tears, painting a picture of Rosie so bright, none of us will ever forget, while ugly, pointless thoughts filter into my head.
Is the giver of the necklace here? The murderer, even?

There’s relief afterward that it’s over. I snatch the last days of our summer, cramming them with late nights and early mornings. Long rides with Grace, where we gallop recklessly, flat out across stubble fields, then let the horses wallow in the stream. With barbecues and friends and oversize plates of food, the house upside down but scented with cooking and the last of the roses from the garden. They’re joyous, life-affirming gestures, where I concentrate enough love and laughter into sweet, precious memories to tide me over until Grace is back.

One evening, I find myself alone, and there’s a window of daylight that’s just wide enough to exercise Zappa. He’s my sole remaining client, which at this time of year, with its shortening days, is a blessing.

As I walk across the fields, I see the three of them—Zappa; Grace’s pony, Oz; and my old Reba—walking peacefully together as they used to follow Rosie. For a moment I fancy I catch a strand of pale hair, see Oz rub his head on an invisible shoulder, Zappa nuzzle a hand that isn’t there, before suddenly, they throw up their heads seemingly at nothing, then wheel round and canter away.

As I ride up the lane, the sky is quiet, a veil of high cloud washing it a milky blue. There’s also a chill in the air, and I jog Zappa to keep warm. Then at the top of the hill, on impulse, for the first time since the storm, I turn him into the woods.

I’ve known for some time that I have to do this. Lay Rosie’s ghost, if that’s what it was. Only, unlike the last time, we’re not alone. As Zappa trots past dog walkers and someone running, he snorts gently, feeling the layers of freshly fallen leaves under his hooves, wanting to canter. When I touch his sides with my legs and lean slightly forward, he breaks into strong, rhythmic strides.

Here and there, sunlight brushes the trees, painting them burnished copper and gold. We keep going until up ahead, I see the slope where I fell last time. Boldly I point Zappa up there, and again he takes it in two long strides, only now I’m ready.

This time, at the top, I just listen. To Zappa’s breathing gradually slowing, to the wind through the treetops, to crisp leaves floating, then landing on the ground. Here and there are the scattered remains of flowers people have left, nibbled at by rabbits or the deer that hide until dusk, when they can claim the woods as their own. And again, I can’t help thinking,
Rosie? Are you here, too?

 

Then all too soon, Grace goes.

I always knew it would be difficult, but in the aftermath of what’s happened, illogically, I want to keep her close. It’s a three-hour drive to the university in Bristol, and we manage to laugh most of the way there, but after, when the last of her possessions is unloaded and installed in the simple room that’s to be her home, when it comes to good-bye, I fall apart.

“Please, Grace, be careful.”

“Mum! I’ll be fine! Don’t! You’ll set me off, too.”

“And call me . . . anytime you like.”

“I know! Of course I’ll call you, Mum.”

“And . . .” But I can’t let her go.

Angus kisses her cheek, then firmly takes my hand. “Come on, Kate. It’s time to go.”

I can’t speak at that point, just steel myself, indelibly scorching our hug into the fabric of my memory.

9

October

W
ith the funeral behind us and our teenagers scattered around the country, as the wrench of separation gives way to relief that away from here, at least they’re safe, as we adjust to new, quieter lives, I get together with other mothers to organize an informal rotation where we take turns calling on Jo. A good idea in principle, we agree, but being up close to Jo’s grief, in the home in which Rosie’s absence is so noticeable, is too much for most of them, and before long it dwindles, then stops altogether.

“You’re so good to me,” she says as she lets me in, beautifully dressed as she always is in a slim tunic and pale linen trousers, one of her trademark scarves looped round her neck. Touched up before Rosie’s funeral, the roots are perfect again. “But you mustn’t worry, Kate. I’m fine.”

I know she isn’t. How can she be? I wonder, too, how she ever will be.

“I brought a cake.” Even though I know Jo won’t eat it, but it’s a gesture. “Chocolate. I thought Delphine might like it.”

She takes it, says nothing. As I follow her down the steps into the kitchen, over on the table, her mobile buzzes. She glances across at it.

“Would you mind? It’s probably about the work I’m doing for Neal.”

“Of course. I’ll put the kettle on.” I’m gradually feeling my way around this pristine, ordered kitchen that’s so unlike my own. I know to fill the polished steel kettle from the tap with the built-in filtration system. Once I used the other one. Only once.

I get out two of her coffee mugs, distinct from tea mugs—Jo has a separate shelf for each type—and notice some new additions in there, gleaming white with intricately designed handles. She’s still deep in conversation, and absentmindedly, I pick one up, turn it, admiring the unusual shape, before it slips through my fingers onto the floor. Jo looks up from her phone, aghast.

“I’m really sorry,” I tell her later, for about the tenth time, because she looks so upset. “Please can I replace it?”

“Oh, it’s fine,” she says, managing a laugh I know is forced. “Really. Don’t worry, Kate. It’s just a mug! It’s my fault, anyway. I shouldn’t have been chatting for so long.”

Is she really taking responsibility for my clumsiness? It puts me in mind of the kind of thing I’d say to Grace—when she was four.
It’s my fault you tipped the paint over. I should have been keeping an eye on you.

We move on to small talk about the weather and how unseasonably warm it is. How gorgeous her kitchen is, which clearly pleases her, because she animatedly, bizarrely, tells me at length about the company that designed it for them, but how it isn’t perfect and how next time, they’re already planning something better.

Then I comment on her garden, designed by someone who really knows what they’re doing. It has the structure and year-round interest that many lack. Something’s changed, too, since I was last here. A small, evenly shaped apple tree has recently been planted—not by Jo, who has beautiful hands. Her unchipped nail polish is a dead giveaway.

“It’s a lovely shape, Jo. Do you know which variety it is?”

She shakes her head. “I’m afraid I don’t know the first thing about gardening.”

“Does Neal look after it?” I gesture through the window. The long, neat lawn is flanked by elegantly planted borders. The new tree is dead center at the far end.

“Oh, no . . . We have this man who comes in every week. That reminds me—I must call him. He’s missed the last two.” She shakes her head. “Or maybe he’s not coming anymore. I get so muddled, Kate.” She looks at me beseechingly. “He and Neal didn’t get on.”

“Where is Neal?”

“He’s gone away.”

“How long for?” I can’t believe he’s left her alone so soon after Rosie’s funeral.

“He wasn’t going to,” she adds, reading my face. “He’s in Afghanistan, though not working this time. He and some colleagues started a charity. For children orphaned by the fighting.”

“I had no idea.” Laura had mentioned the orphanage, but she hadn’t said he started it. Suddenly, Neal Anderson’s joined my list of people who do great things in this world, who count. And just maybe, too, it gives him something else to think about and takes him away from what’s here. “You must be so proud of him.”

She nods. “It’s the main reason I don’t have a job. Oh, I know some of the mothers think that I do nothing with my life, but sometimes he’s away for weeks. And anyway, I help him—do some of his paperwork, make calls, organize meetings.”

As she speaks, I realize how little I know about her. About either of them.

“Why don’t I help you with the garden? Just for now? I could fit in a couple of hours . . . if you wanted me to.”

But Jo doesn’t reply. She’s gazing outside, beyond the trees, beyond the sky even, somewhere far away where I can’t reach her.

I lean forward and touch her arm. “Jo? This must be so hard. . . .”

Feeling it with every fiber of my being.

Her gaze doesn’t alter. “I wonder sometimes”—her voice seems to come from miles away—“what I did to deserve this, Kate. All I ever wanted, as long as I can remember, was a happy family. I thought it was one thing I could do really well. . . .”

There’s a lump in my throat, because I share every word, every sentiment of what she’s saying. To a mother, most of life can be reduced to the one thing that matters: family.

“I can’t talk about it,” she whispers, her eyes swinging round, catching mine and showing the full force of her agony. “I’m so sorry. . . .”

As I look at her, I see how little it would take for her to shatter into a thousand pieces—like the mug. Even taking her grief into account, she looks terrible. She gets up, pushing away her chair, struggling to hold herself together.

“Why don’t you lie down for a bit, Jo? Try and get some rest.”

Wishing with all my heart I could in some way ease the burden on her.

 

“It’s just
so
bloody awful,” I say to Angus that evening.

After the warmth of the day, the night is chilly, and he’s lit the first fire of the season. We’re slumped on the sofa, and I’m leaning against him, my feet up, with a glass of wine, watching the flames flickering against the heavy pattern of the fireback.

“Every time I go over there, it’s the same. She holds it together—just. I’ve no idea how. You know, since the first time, she hasn’t cried.”

“It’s probably just her way of coping. Different people react differently, don’t they?” says Angus. “And God knows what it does to you, knowing someone killed your child.”

“I know.” I’ve thought of that, also. Still do, far too much, imagining pain that can only be an echo of what Jo feels.

We’re quiet. I’m thinking of Grace. She’s called a few times, bright exchanges that leave my eyes blurry and my heart bursting with pride. She’s settling in, breaking away from us. Discovering beautiful, iridescent wings.

“Nice, this, isn’t it?” Angus sits back happily, feet up on the coffee table. “Just you and me . . . There’s actually food in the fridge, no teenagers tearing in and out. And Grace’s doing what we always wanted her to do.”

He’s right. I snuggle against him, feeling his warmth, my feet curled underneath me, trying but not able to savor the moment.

 

As Rosie’s death blends into the backdrop of our lives, the petals drop on the last of Jo’s flowers, which for weeks have kept arriving. But when I next visit, flowers aside, the sitting room’s changed.

“New sofa?” My surprise must show in my voice, because Jo looks up sharply.

“We were going to redecorate . . .
before.
... I’d forgotten all about it until the sofa turned up yesterday.”

“What a nuisance for you. I mean, right now, you could probably do without it.”

“Oh, it’s fine,” she says briefly. “It’s just a sofa. Would you like tea?”

“Please. Have you managed to track down your gardener?” I ask, following her into the kitchen, thinking how this normal, meaningless conversation about things that don’t matter is somehow bizarre.

“He’s not coming anymore,” she says vaguely. “Neal’s found a local boy to sweep up the leaves over the winter. To be honest, right now, it’s the last thing I want to think about. We can find someone new in the spring.”

She’s right. There are more important matters than her garden to worry about. “Tell me, Jo . . . only, how’s Delphine? She’s always at school when I’m here. I never see her.”

She considers her reply. “You know . . . she’s quite surprising. She’s not at all like Rosanna was. The police sent someone for her to talk to—a family liaison officer. But she’s okay. For someone so young, she’s strong.”

It’s a detached assessment rather than an affectionate one, and I look at Jo, wondering if she’s on something. Her tone is flat, her words are measured, and there’s the same numbness about her I saw just after Rosie was found. The same blankness in her eyes. Unless, as Angus says, switching off is the only way she can function.

She turns away from me. “The police told me. How Rosanna used to go to see your horses.”

There’s the smallest edge of resentment in her voice.

“She did—if she was passing by. She’d just walk down across the field to talk to them. Not for very long,” I assure Jo, feeling awkward that she heard about this from someone else. “She loved horses. I would have mentioned it before. I always assumed you knew.”

It’s easier to lie than to tell the truth. Even now, it would feel like a betrayal of Rosie’s trust.

Jo nods very slowly. “I didn’t,” she says, adding tearfully, “I didn’t know about her friendship with Poppy, either, did I? It makes me wonder what else I didn’t know about.”

Guilt washes over me for adding to her already backbreaking burden. “I should have told you—only there really wasn’t anything to tell, Jo. It was never a planned thing. More like walking down the street and stopping to talk to someone you weren’t expecting to see. That was all.”

She dabs her face with a tissue. “I’m sorry, Kate. I overreact to everything.... I’m glad it was your horses she went to see. And you.”

Slowly, she turns back to making the tea. Feeling awful, I try to change the subject to the daughter Jo still has, who must surely be suffering, too.

“Does Delphine have many friends?”

“One or two. There was this dreadful girl she was friendly with, but we’ve discouraged that. It wasn’t the right kind of friendship.”

Another Poppy. It puts me in mind of the girl Grace befriended a few years ago.
Cleo.
Loud, in a too-short skirt, and reeking of cigarette smoke. I struggled with that one, wanting to steer Grace away from her. It was Angus who persuaded me not to and assured me that no harm would come to Grace if we watched her from the background, not too closely, but just closely enough. He was right.

“There’s always one,” I say sympathetically. “Only you have to let them make their own mistakes, don’t you?”

“Neal isn’t quite that forgiving,” she says. “He has such high standards. He always wants the best for them, for . . . her.”

She fumbles with the unfamiliarity of the singular. And we all want the best for our children. But whatever Jo says, Delphine can’t be that strong if her parents decide who her friends are.

“She misses Rosanna dreadfully.” Jo pours the tea and sits opposite me. “And the press coverage hasn’t helped.”

I shake my head. “It must be dreadful, for all of you. Especially—” I break off. I can’t bring myself to mention the rumors that even now are still being whispered around our neighborhood.

“What were you going to say?” Jo looks up from her mug.

I’m awkward again, treading on eggshells. “Nothing, really.”

Then I change my mind, because surely Jo should know.

“Actually, Jo, it’s not nothing. I was thinking about the rumors that paper printed. About Rosie . . . Rosanna having some kind of secret life. It was disgraceful.”

She freezes. “She really didn’t. She was a good girl who worked hard at school. They were just rumors, Kate. The papers are full of them.” She stirs her tea before looking up again. “You know what they’re like. Half the time, they print just for effect. You have to try not to let it get to you.”

I’m not sure I could handle it as well as she appears to. “What about Neal? How is he coping?” Gently, not meaning to pry, but the loss of a child can destroy the closest of families. I watch as Jo’s eyes fill with sorrow.

“He’s heartbroken. He just throws himself into his work. It’s what he does—to take his mind off things. We try to stay strong for each other, but underneath, he’s like I am. He just hides it better. He’s an amazing man, Kate.”

“You all are, Jo. Strong. Amazing.”

She shakes her head, but her eyes are shining. “Thank you. But I’m really not.”

 

Two days later, just as I finish breakfast, there’s a knock on the door.

Mildly irritated at the interruption when I’m rushing to get ready for work, I open it to find Laura standing there.

“Kate! I hope you don’t mind me turning up like this, only I didn’t take your number. Beth Van Sutton told me where you live.”

“Hi! I’m sorry. I’d ask you in, but I’m about to go off to work.” Aware it sounds like an excuse.

Laura looks uncertain, unsure whether I’m fobbing her off.

I pause. Rachael’s right. I should at least talk to her about this properly. “Why don’t you come back? Say, one-ish? Have lunch?”

She looks relieved. “Thank you. That would be great.”

But the few hours pruning and tidying a client’s walled garden allow me to order my thoughts and step outside my rather blinkered view of journalists. I realize I want to know what’s happened as much as any other parent around here. And just maybe, strangely, Laura has a place in all of this. By the time she arrives for lunch, I’ve come to a decision.

“Come on in. You’ll have to excuse the mess. I haven’t been back long.”