Page 145 of Never Tell Lies

I could just imagine Alfie’s face if I told him I was jetting off to Paris with Bradley. He’d have an aneurysm, yet when he did it, it was perfectly acceptable. The double standard bothered me no matter how much I tried to stop it, but what bothered me more was the realisation that Angie Carter was going to be a part of my life. It hadn’t occurred to me that if I went with him, I was going to be seeing a hell of a lot more of that pinch-faced witch. It was a definite mark for the con list.

I eyed my phone over the top of Ryan’s head, daring it to do something. To give me a sign that Alfie and Angie were not currently fucking in some decadent Parisian hotel. She would wear expensive lingerie for him, all pure silk and lace, unlike my store bought cotton. And I bet she’d know the difference between a fish fork and a salad fork. She wouldn’t look out of place at a Michelin star restaurant. People wouldn’t stare at them and wonder why they were together. I administered my third mental slap of the evening and sighed.

“Why do you keep huffing, Auntie Lo?” Ryan asked as he coloured in the last of Geoffrey’s legs.

“I’m not huffing.”

“You are, I can feel your shoulders going like this.” He bounced his bony shoulders up and down, a comical exaggeration of what I’d done.

“And now you’re going to feel my arms doing this.” I scooped him up as best as one could scoop a wriggling, squalling child and carried him upstairs for a bath. I pushed away thoughts of Alfie and Angie. My time with my family was running out and watching Ryan happily dive-bombing flying sharks into innocent cargo boats, just brought home how much I was going to miss. I loved my nephew so much, even if he was more Artful Dodger than Oliver Twist.

Eventually, when his skin was wrinkled and the paint and dirt had been washed away, I lifted Ryan out and wrapped him in the fluffiest towel I had. He chatted away about everything; his plans for his novel, his upcoming football match, his not so subtle hint at wanting a skateboard. I listened, soaking in every piece of inane gossip from his day. These were the things that made up his world and I committed all of them to memory as I towelled his hair and tamed it as best I could.

I dressed him in teddy bear pyjamas—a misleading costume for such a devilish child. I watched him brush his teeth and then took him to bed, tucking him into the covers before settling in next to him to read Peter Pan. Ryan had a love of all books. He’d become obsessed with many characters over the years, but Peter Pan was his idol and Natalie couldn’t decide whether that was a good or a bad thing.

By the time Wendy was kidnapped by Hook, Ryan’s eyes were finally drooping. I closed the book gently and set it on his night stand. Half-asleep, he reached out his skinny arms and turned his face up to be kissed. His cheek was warm and baby soft, and I held him close with his arms wrapped tightly around my neck.

When his breathing had become heavier, I laid him down. I whispered a soft goodnight and left him, switching out the light but leaving the door open a crack because this mischievous little boy, for all his talk about his love of monsters, was still just a little afraid of them.

Fifty

After I had Ryan settled, my thoughts turned to my sister and the bomb I was about to drop on her. As I headed to her room, I had this inescapable feeling of panic, as if I was already straying too far from home and my instincts were telling me to turn back to safety, but I couldn’t. Keira had been right all those weeks ago when she’d told me I couldn’t live in my safe box forever. I needed to bust my way out no matter how bruised I got on the way. But first, I had to abandon a beloved sister and the thought left a sick feeling in the pit of my stomach.

I knocked softly but she didn’t answer. I opened the door and found her fast asleep. Her Georgette Heyer novel lay across her chest, her pale blue duvet bunched up around her hips. Her face was tired and careworn, the same way I imagined most mothers’ faces looked. I wondered if my mum had looked the same way when she slept.

I tiptoed into the room and put the book on her night stand. Her laptop lay askew on her bed, the evidence of another failed search for Ryan’s father on the screen. With a heavy heart I closed the laptop, covered her over with the duvet, and turned out the light. Fear of leaving her, Ryan, and my home weighed inmy stomach like an anvil, yet I knew it needed to be done. I had to make this break. Ihadto. But not tonight.

I closed the door on my sister’s sleeping form and crept downstairs. My home was trashed. With my sister rushed off her feet and me stuck in Alfie-land it hadn’t taken long for the dishes and the laundry to pile up. I was dog-tired but I found, after sitting in front of the TV for five minutes, that sitting still with this much on my mind was impossible.

A plethora of conundrums whirled around me and I felt powerless to make a decision about any of them, so instead I dealt with the only problem I could actually do anything about—my house. I did the laundry, I cleaned and scrubbed every surface, and I painstakingly tidied away every one of Ryan’s toys. Then came the ironing. The great mountain of it that was kept under the stairs and spilled out as soon as you opened the door.

I tackled it with a fury, hoping that if I worked hard enough a solution would come to me—a way to have Alfie and my dream together. I could leave with him and give up my dream of college and training to be a garden designer, or I could go for my dream and I would maybe get Alfie a few weeks out of the year. Either prospect was agonising.

I wondered if my manic cleaning was some sort of delayed reaction to the insanity of my weekend with Alfie. It was so hard to think clearly when he was around that when I was away from him, it was as if I had finally come up for air, rationality came back and made me realise how crazy he and I were together. When he was around there was a part of me that wished he would never leave, and yet that same part, a part I would never ever tell him about, wished that when he was gone he would never come back. To want him so badly that it scared me into wishing him away was an agonizing dichotomy that left me feeling split down the middle.

This whole day had been a series of heart-wrenches; my missing pills, Mark, Rosie, my family. On top of that was my Harrington Garden and the fact that I only had two weeks left to come up with something.

Midnight came and went before I finally came to the bottom of the ironing basket. I was exhausted. I sighed and slumped into an armchair, quickly falling into a fitful sleep, surrounded by clothes all ironed, folded, and separated into three piles—Natalie’s and Ryan’s on one side of me and mine all on the other.

I awoke around 3am with a pit in my stomach. The night had grown chilly and I pulled one of my gran’s crochet throws off the back of the sofa and wrapped it around me. It didn’t smell like her. There was no reason that it should after almost six years and many cycles through the washing machine, and yet I always expected the smell of lavender hand cream when I picked it up.

My mind still spun with questions unanswered. Several paths lay out before me, each of them manned by someone I held dear who beckoned to me to follow them and forsake the others. On one stood Natalie and Ryan, waving at me, ready to take my hand and lead me home to the memories of my mum and gran and the same bedroom I’d slept in my whole life. Keira stood on another, beckoning me to London, to my dream and to a world of adventure. Then there was Alfie. He didn’t beckon or wave, he simply stood there with an expectant look on his face.

I felt lost, lonely, and so, so confused. There was only one place I could go when I felt like this. With my gran’s throw wrapped around me like a shawl, I tiptoed into the kitchen, opened the back door as quietly as I could, and stepped out into the night. I didn’t need to take a torch with me. My feet knew theway and I let them lead me across the moonlit grass, through the small gate, and into the place where my gran and mum rested, where their memories were stored, where my secrets were kept.

Instead of taking my usual seat amongst the bleeding hearts, I sat under the wedding cake tree. The tiny white blooms of the lower tier dangled overhead and dappled moonlight shone through. I leaned against the thin trunk and placed my hand over the patch of earth where my mum’s ashes were buried.

Often, I talked when I came out here. I could carry out whole conversations with ghosts that could convince any eavesdropper I was batshit crazy, but tonight I needed silence. I needed peace. It was something I rarely got with Alfie. With him there was always an air of intensity, a game to be played. Even in his sweetest moments he was an intoxicating mind fuck.

My fingers moved to my necklace. I clasped it in my fist and held onto it for dear life. I could remember the day I got it so well. Memories were supposed to fade with time but some of mine only seemed to grow more vivid.

My eighth birthday—the day my mum gave me the necklace that would be my lifeline after she died. It was also the day I planted bleeding hearts for the first time. My mum once had a grove full of them. A whole corner of the garden, which was now occupied by a blue plastic slide for Ryan, was once filled with delicate heart-shaped blooms in pink, white, and red. She’d even had some rare blue, black, and yellow ones.

I closed my eyes and rested my head against the tree as I summoned up the memory of her on that day. My mum, Judith O’Connell, was partial to sundresses, paired with the biggest, softest knit cardigans she could find. That day, her dress had been pale pink, her feet bare as they often were, and her cardigan was dark blue and slipped off her shoulders to pool in thick folds around her elbows and in her lap. If I concentrated hard enough I could feel her warm hands over mine, helping me digthe soil and plant the new flower. I could feel her pale blonde hair tickling my cheek with feather light touches. I could feel her so clearly I ached with missing her.

When the new addition to her bleeding heart collection was safe in its new earth home, she’d pulled me into her lap and wrapped the cardigan around us both, pulling me in close. She’d smelt of chamomile tea and of the coconut oil that she massaged into her skin every day.

“Do you like them, sweetheart?” she’d asked as we gazed at their delicate beauty together.

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