The Fall (17 page)

Nobody offered her coffee all morning; they just left her there. She sat hunched over the screen, her spoiled nails clacking off the keys and reminding her they were supposed to be sporting a perfect wedding manicure right about now. Beside the Snax pitch she was pretending to work on was a website for people who’d been wrongly convicted of crimes.
Innocent
, the banner flashed red and black.
Innocent, innocent, innocent
. A word so powerful it could slay you right through the heart. She did her best to stay away from sites mentioning Dan but the story was everywhere.
Racist murder. Racist
.

‘Charlie?’

She jumped a mile, what was wrong with her? She was used to Simon by now, surely. ‘Oh, sorry. Is it time?’

‘
Cinco minutos
, darling. Better print out the pitches.’

‘I’ll just go – freshen.’ She bolted to the ladies’ and into one of the cubicles, suddenly breathless at the smells of toner and people’s tuna lunches. Charlotte sat in the cubicle, trying to breathe in and out. It would be OK. It would be OK. She’d been all over those Snax before. Surely it would come back. Crispy, crunchy snacks, just seventy calories a bag . . .

Outside she heard the door open, and Chloe’s voice said, ‘Oh my GOD, I so totally did not know what to say to her.’

‘I know, yah.’ Tory. ‘I thought she’d be away for ages – she was going on and on about her honeymoon.’

‘I’m not being funny, but how can she even come in after that?’ She could tell from the slurring of her voice that Chloe was putting on her lipgloss, like she always did before and after lunch. ‘I mean, he like,
killed
someone.’

‘And Fliss is so totally peed off that Simon’s putting her in the Snax pitch meeting. I bet she is so totally not ready.’

‘Well.’ The tap ran. ‘Simon’s always had a soft spot for Charlotte, if you get my meaning?’

Tory gave a posh-girl laugh. ‘Totally!’

‘Anyway, Prêt?’

‘Yah, but I’m not eating carbs today, like, at all.’

‘I know, I need to lose four pounds . . .’

They went out, banging the door. Going to Prêt à Manger at lunchtime was what Charlotte did with Chloe. Chloe would be small-minded about everyone she knew and Charlotte would say how creepy Simon had been that day (it was easier somehow if she made jokes, that way no one would notice she really meant it) and they’d goad each other into getting a chocolate pot or a flapjack. Though in recent weeks Chloe had seemed a little miffed at the success of Charlotte’s wedding diet.

‘Maybe I need a big white dress to fit into, too,’ she’d said, sucking the sugar off her coffee stirrer instead. ‘Maybe that’s the motivation I’m after. Skinny bitch!’

There were voices in the corridor, loud noises of welcome, so the Snax people must have arrived. Charlotte rearranged her dress and ran water over her hands and face. She would have to go back out there.

Keisha was meant to be out by noon today, the council said they’d given her enough time. Whatever was left would have to go to landfill.

Finding her father’s name hadn’t had as much an effect on her as she might have thought. He was still an unknown white guy, a blank, just like he’d always been to her. Now she knew he was smart, not a drunk like Chris’s dad, shouting about the IRA all the time. That was something, she supposed. But then she thought,
And what have I ever done? Fucked up my GCSEs and worked in a nursing home?
Yeah, he’d be proud of her – not.

Mercy had been everything – head-wrecker, pain in the arse, source of all food and advice – wanted and unwanted. Mercy had been home, and now she was gone and so was home with her. This guy, this Ian Stone, he was nothing but a bundle of genes. What difference did it make if she knew his name?

Still, she put the contents of the old folder into the ‘keep’ bag, and closed it up before she humped the rest of Mercy’s stuff down the high street to Oxfam, hoping no one thought she looked daft.

‘Some stuff,’ she muttered, dumping the bags at the old white woman behind the till.

‘Oh, thank you, dear.’ The crumbling woman peered at it through her glasses. Posh. Keisha waited a second, as if the woman was going to challenge her to prove she owned the stuff, hadn’t nicked it. ‘It was me mum’s,’ she said.

‘That’s kind.’

They believed her. Keisha headed back to the house, light-handed. It was bright and sunny, and everyone seemed to be out on the streets, mums with buggies (she didn’t look too closely at the kids, wondering where Ruby was on this nice day), old ladies shuffling along with huge plastic shopping bags, dodgy geezers hanging about with mobile phones. It was when she was passing the fruit and veg shop that she suddenly got a bad feeling. Had someone stopped in the crowd for a minute, and she’d sensed it? Whatever it was, she could feel eyes on her. Someone was watching. On the warm street, Keisha felt a chill run over her, and zipped up her Adidas top. She looked around the street, noisy with voices. Nothing. She walked on faster, and turned into her mum’s quieter road.

Behind her she heard footsteps continuing, the soft tread of trainers, a shadow on the bright pavement, and she turned round with her heart racing.

‘All right, Keesh?’

‘You scared the shit out of me.’

‘Just saying hi.’ Jonny shrugged. A tall guy, heavy in the arms and legs, signet rings on his beefy hands. He was Chris’s mate – his best mate, she supposed. But what was he doing on her mum’s street?

She narrowed her eyes at him, stepping back out of his reach. ‘And what’re you doing here? Last time I checked, you lived in West Hampstead.’

He cracked a knuckle. ‘Deano’s been looking you. Asked me to keep an eye out.’

So he’d been watching her. She tried not to shudder. ‘And he sent you down here, did he? What’s he want me for? He’s the one changed the fucking locks.’

‘Naw, he got put out, didn’t he.’

‘He got evicted?’ That would explain the locks being changed – if it was true. She zipped her top up tighter. ‘Yeah, well, my mum died. Did he know that? After he “visited” her, she fell down dead with a fucking heart attack!’

Jonny dipped his head. ‘Yeah. He’s sorry. Never meant her no harm. All he did was talk to her.’

‘Yeah.
Talk
.’

‘Deano says he only wanted to see his kid. Got a right, hasn’t he? No reason to send the cops round on him.’

‘What? Don’t be daft, I’ve not been near no cops.’

‘You know they’ll be after you too, if you say stuff.’

She gave him a dirty look. ‘Look, I gotta go. Moving out today.’ Better let Chris know she wasn’t going to be here, just in case he felt like dropping by with any of his other lovely mates.

‘Oh yeah? Where you going?’

She shrugged. ‘Away. Far away. Mind your own.’ That was a good question though, wasn’t it? The lad wasn’t as dumb as he looked. Where the fuck
was
she going?

‘You been ringing anyone recently?’ Jonny asked innocently.

‘How the fuck would I do that? He’s cut my phone off, the twat.’

‘Deano reckons you might’ve seen that blonde chick. The one whose fella got banged up for Anto Johnson.’

‘What? I don’t even know her.’ She thought of the blonde girl’s purse with her address, inside the house in her ‘keep’ bag. ‘I’m busy. Fuck off, Jonny. Tell “Deano” I don’t have no more eyes for him to black.’

Jonny shook his head as if Chris had accidentally drunk her last can of Coke or something. ‘He never meant it, Keesh. Just stressed, you know? Times are hard. He misses you. Said you might’ve had a misunderstanding, like about that club night.’

She looked at him. Did this mean she’d been right – Chris
had
gone back to help Anthony Johnson that night after all? Why did he beat her up then, if all he’d done was get blood on him trying to save the man’s life? ‘Don’t know what you mean.’

‘You gonna visit the kiddie then? Your little Ruby?’ Jonny cracked his knuckles like he was just passing the time of day. ‘Deano was wondering where she was.’

There was no way she was talking about Ruby with this twat. ‘I don’t know where she is. And he won’t find her either. She’s not here.’

He smiled again. It was horrible. ‘Found
you
, didn’t he?’

Her heart was thudding. ‘Listen to this, Jonny. You can fuck off. And you tell him he can fuck off too. Leave me alone, leave Ruby alone. Or else I’ll tell what I saw. You tell him that. He’ll know what it means.’

Confusion was spreading over Jonny’s face. She set off walking, refusing to look back. But before she opened the door she paused; she didn’t want him to see what house she went into. He’d gone.

In the quiet gloom of the house, she put her back to the door, breathing heavily. Fuck. Fuck. Jonny had hands like a gorilla. Thank fuck it was the middle of the day. She had goosebumps all up her arms. What was Chris playing at? He wanted her back now, after he’d thumped her about? She wasn’t that girl – was she?

‘He’s after me, Mum,’ she whispered to the empty house. ‘What do I do?’

There was no answer from the oily shadows. Well, there was no need, she knew what Mercy would have said. Keisha picked up the bag of things to keep, then closed the door and posted the keys back through the letter box. Keeping a good eye out for six-foot-four loonies in Umbro tracksuits, she got on the train and took it up to West Hampstead. Without really knowing why, she was going to Belsize Park.

Charlotte practically ran down the last street to her house. She hated being outside in that area now. There was the memory of the red gloop sliding over her eyelids, and maybe she was getting paranoid, but she felt people were looking at her, the gang of kids by the chicken shop, the black woman wheeling her baby. Everyone who was black, she felt they were staring at her and thinking,
That’s the one, the racist one. That’s her
.

Finally she was on her own, and almost in a fever she pulled Dan’s jumper round her, shivering in the emptiness of the flat. It wasn’t cold; it was just that he wasn’t there. Then she took the tea-stained letter out of the bin and sank down on the floor. It seemed better somehow, more suited to the depth of her feelings than just sitting down on the sofa. She remembered one time coming home from work with flu, sinking down like this, and Dan had picked her up and carried her to bed. No one was there to carry her now.

What an idiot she was! Of course she hadn’t been ready to go back to work. She couldn’t pretend to care about tampons and cereal now. But God, how embarrassing! She banged her head lightly against the door. Chloe and Tory and Fliss would be having a good old giggle at her. It was a mistake she’d never have made before. But when she came out of the ladies’ the Snax people had arrived, a greying corporate man, his wedding band eating into his pudgy finger, and a hard-faced blonde girl all shiny with lacquer and gloss.

‘Here’s Charlotte,’ Simon said with that fake heartiness of his, showing her he was nervous about this one. It was a big new account for them and the recession hadn’t been kind to PR firms.

‘Tea? Little café au lait?’ Ugh. Simon was so full of bullshit. They were making murmurs about transport. ‘Oh, tell me about it, that Northern Line’s making me prematurely grey! No, don’t look.’ Gales of fake laughter.

Charlotte hauled the corners of her mouth up into a smile, wiping damp hands on her dress. Before, she’d have known exactly what fluff to say to them. ‘Hiii! Have you come far? Love your shoes. Oh, it’s such an honour to work on this brand, I eat them all the time . . .’

Now, smiling blankly at them, all she could think was,
My boyfriend’s in prison. Did you know? My boyfriend’s in prison. I have to get him out! He’s locked up in there!
She swallowed her hysteria and wobbled into the meeting room on her uncomfortable heels.

The problem started when the blonde began leafing disdainfully through the documents Charlotte should have assembled in advance. Instead, running late, she’d pulled them off the copier in passing.

Simon was in full flow with his jargon-generator: ‘Social media platforms . . . Digital SEO strategies . . . Pushing the envelope on this one . . .’ when the girl curled up her mouth and said, ‘Er, what’s this?’

‘Paradigm shift in snacking behaviour . . . I’m sorry?’

‘This.’ She waved one of the bits of paper. ‘Why is this here?’

Charlotte’s heart thrust up her throat and into her mouth. ‘Oh God, that’s mine! Sorry! Wait, wait.’ She tried to grab it, but Simon had already picked it up. Printed on the paper was
INNOCENT
–
have you been a victim of rough justice?
She’d printed out the wrong screen. Shit shit shit.

Charlotte flushed a horrible colour, like rotten beets. For a second she wondered madly could she relate miscarriages of justice to low-calorie snacks.
It’s a crime that snacks have so many calories
. No, no. God, that was a terrible idea. ‘I’m so sorry. I’ve printed the wrong thing.’ And to her horror, the tears she’d been fighting all day rose up to her mouth in a sort of shrieking sob. ‘I’m sorry!’ She clapped her hands over her mouth. ‘Oh God, I’m so sorry.’

Blonde Girl, Corporate Man, Fliss, and Simon all stared at her as she tried desperately to hold back the tears, twisting and blinking and sniffing. Corporate Man cleared his throat and said, ‘Ahem. Do you have an actual sales plan for us?’

‘Of course. Of course.’ Tripping over her feet, wiping at her face, she went to print out the right thing, and the meeting continued, but it was already too late. Blonde Girl looked at her watch several times, and at the end of Simon’s presentation Corporate Man cleared his throat and said, ‘Well. We’ll be in touch.’

Everyone knew that meant:
Fuck off, you bunch of rank amateurs
. And once he’d shown them out, laughing and back-touching all the while, Simon turned to Charlotte. His expression changed like a shutter coming down. ‘A word?’

Alone in her kitchen, Charlotte moaned softly and banged her head again. The faint pain she felt on the outside was almost a relief from the twisted mess inside. It was unbelievable. She’d never even got less than seventy per cent in any test or exam ever, never missed a day of work, and now she was fired!