Page 94 of Close to You
THE NOW
Three weeks after the night that Ben rescued me from my flat, I missed my period. The thing is, even after I’ve told Jane, she nods only with acceptance.
‘How long have you known?’ I ask.
She sighs again and has another brief glance upwards towards Norah’s room. ‘A while,’ she says. ‘Ben was acting so strangely after the night he picked you up. After the night whereyou called meand asked for help.’
Jane spits the words and I don’t blame her. How can I? I never said I was a nice person, because I know I’m not. I did this to my best friend and then I killed my husband.
‘I thought I was being kind,’ Jane says. ‘I thought I was helping you – and look what you did.’
I don’t know what to say. Sorry isn’t enough – and nor will it ever be.
‘It’s not as if you hid it well,’ she adds. ‘You and Ben used to be decent friends and then, from nowhere, you could barely look at one another. You stopped coming over and, if ever I suggested doing something with Ben, you’d always find a reason not to. After that, you told me about your miscarriage and something clicked. I thought you were lying at first, but then I realised what the dates meant – and it wasn’t hard to see why David left.’ She stops, probably waiting for confirmation, before adding: ‘I’m right, aren’t I? This is why David left. He found out about you and my husband – and then he walked out?’
I don’t answer. She’s right and yet she’s so, so wrong.
‘How did you make him appear in the photo?’ I ask.
A smirk slips onto Jane’s face: ‘You don’t know how close I’ve been to asking you about that. I almost texted to ask if you’d seen anything weird in the photo. You never said a word and I wondered whether you’d missed it.’
‘How did you do it?’
‘Don’t you know what year it is? It’s easy enough to edit someone into a photo on your phone. There are YouTube videos everywhere showing how to do things far harder than this. I have to do something with my time while looking after Norah.’
She picks up her phone from the table and taps something on the screen before turning it around for me to see. There’s a photo of David in a blue suit – but he’s not at the awards dinner; he’s at some sort of evening party.
‘I took it at your engagement party,’ Jane says, although, for some reason, I don’t remember him wearing the suit. I suppose I’ve blocked much of that night from my memory. ‘It wasn’t hard to slice him out and paste him into the back of your picture. I thought you’d missed it.’
‘I don’t understand how you managed it all.’
A shrug: ‘The photo editing is easy enough when you know how. You can send anonymous texts from different apps. I thought you’d like that.’
‘What about my car?’
The smile disappears. ‘When you texted to say you were going to drive back, I was already in your flat.’
‘You don’t have a key?’
‘I got one when we were sorting out the cleaner. I suppose I hung onto it and then it became useful.’
‘What happened to the Tigger pot?’
She blinks, somewhat surprised. ‘Oh… I wondered if you’d notice that. I accidentally knocked it over when I was at yours – then I spent twenty minutes trying to make sure I’d picked up all the bits. I was only there to get your spare car keys.’
Even with this information, the truth doesn’t filter through immediately. ‘Youcrashed into that guy?’
‘I figured I’d move your car. Mess with your head a bit. I wasn’t going to go far – but then that Trevor stepped out of nowhere. I didn’t know his name at the time. I got the hell out of there.’
I wonder if this is how far a person has to be pushed to shrug off something like a car crash. People seem to hit and run all the time and I suppose the biggest reason is that need for self-preservation. Like that one-punch killer. Something stupid then lives change.
‘He could be dead,’ I say.
‘And whose fault is that?’
I want to say that it’s hers – and it is – but it’s notonlyher fault.
‘I know you’re angry,’ I say, ‘but it took two of us that night.’
