The Day She Died

Thirteen

There’s a noise the computer makes at work when you fire it up for the day. It’s a bit like the start of Rhapsody in Blue from that film, and a bit like a fire alarm that doesn’t quite get going. There’s silence and then there’s a whooshing noise lifting up and then the computer sort of hums all day, except you don’t really notice until you switch it off at night. That’s what happened to me when Gus came home, eventually, at nearly six o’clock, when it was dark outside again. I thought I was awake and firing on all cylinders until he opened the door and walked through. Then I went whoosh and started humming, and it felt like I’d had about half as much again blood pumped into me. I felt the smile break out over my face and couldn’t help it. The same daft look spread over his and his neck went red. He picked the kids up, both together, and blew on their necks, but he was looking at me.

It wasn’t till after dinner that it all went wrong, and I had no idea what had happened or how to make stop, put it back again. I was washing dishes. He was sitting at the table, drinking up the last of the water from the jug I’d put there. No wine tonight. Family tea. And he was watching me.

“What?” I said.

He smiled, but a miserable smile like you’d never believe. “Nothing,” he said. And we were silent again. He was tracing a pattern in the water Dillon had spilled on the plastic tablecloth, pulling lines of it out from the puddle like spider’s legs. It was another five minutes before he cleared his throat and spoke. “So you went for a walk, eh?” he said. The wet clothes were hanging on the pulley, still dripping every now and then. “Meet anyone?”

The obvious thing was to tell him about Kazek. He’d had a flakey when I’d mentioned the guy last time, but that was because he thought Kazek was Becky’s boyfriend. And it was the day she died. Now I knew he was Ros’s creepy friend and it was two days later.

“Not a soul,” I said. I’d keep Ruby and Dillon away from that house with the awning, and I’d steer pretty clear too. “Apart from the woman in the shop. Oh, by the way-”

“I didn’t get any joy about the post-mortem,” he said, interrupting me.

I caught my lip. Couldn’t believe I hadn’t asked him. That must be why he’d been sitting there silent, waiting for me to remember. “They did the basic examination. But I didn’t find anything out. Nobody came to speak to me at all.”

“Isn’t it detectives they come and talk to?” I said.

Gus laughed and rubbed his face. Just like that, we were friends again.

“God, yeah, you’re right,” he said. “Bloody CSI strikes again. Me sitting there for hours!” He stood up and whirled a gob of kitchen roll off the holder, wiped the table, went to the bin, and then froze there with the lid pushed open.

“Gus?” I said. He said nothing and didn’t move. It was like that bit in science fiction when the world stops and you can skip about without anyone seeing you. “Gus?”

He cleared his throat. “Did you empty this?” he said.

“Ahhh, yeah?” I said. “I emptied all of them. Dillon did the nappy from hell and it went from there.”

He walked to the back window and looked out. If anyone had asked, I’d have said he was staring at the wheeliebin, but that was crazy.

“Gus?” I said, a third time. “Did I do something wrong?”

He spun round so fast I that I had stepped back before I could help it. “Did I say you did?” he said.

I took another step back.

He sat back down at the table and wrapped his arms around his shoulders. Then he started rocking, side to side, like he had one time before. “It can’t. God, it can’t. It can’t be happening again.”

“Hey,” I said, flinging the dishcloth into the sink. “What’s wrong? What did I do?”

Slowly he let his arms go, straightened up, and looked at me. “You’re not angry,” he said. It was a statement, not a question.

“Oh, I’m fuming,” I said. “I’ll turn green and burst out of my clothes any minute as soon as you tell me what I’m supposed to be angry about.”

He held out both his hands and took hold of mine. “That I didn’t do it before you had to,” he said. “That I left it for you. Took you for granted. Treated you like a skivvy. Expected you to run about after me, wait on me hand and foot, while I treated the place like a hotel.”

I nodded, understanding like. But the truth was it didn’t make sense, not really. He’d lain in his bed while I brought him coffee and gave the kids their breakfast. And he’d lain in the bath while I cleared the lunch and took them out too. So why would shifting a couple of nappies freak him out this way?

“Sometimes,” I began.

“What?”

But I thought the better of it. You’re like two different people, was what I was going to say.

He was quiet after that, moving through to the living room, lighting the fire, putting the telly on. He didn’t watch it, though. I could tell from the way the screen was reflected off the whites of his eyes that he wasn’t really looking there. I sat down in the other chair, watched the end of some cooking programme and the start of some dieting one, feeling like I hadn’t felt since I was fifteen and Steve Preston took me to see Pleasantville and grabbed my hand twenty minutes in. We were paralysed then, the pair of us, our hands warming and sliding so we had to grip even harder on to the other’s fingers to keep a hold. Neither one of us knew how to stop it, like someone who’s learned how to take off in a plane but had no lessons on landing. And I couldn’t help thinking about the pocket of space in between our palms filling up with sweat like a chicken kiev and what would happen when we burst it open.

It was over an hour before Gus spoke again, and I had to ask him to repeat it. I had been back with Steve Preston’s sister Sandra, who was my friend, who I’d told all about that very first therapist (what was her name?). And Sandra Preston had told everyone in our class, and the guidance teacher called my mum up and I got hell for it.

Literally. Got hell described, had the best verses of the Bible read out where they talked about it, had it explained why I was going there and why that was what I deserved.

“That’s not hell, Mum,” I’d said after a really mad bit. “That’s the earth after Armageddon. Get it right, eh?”

“Therefore shall her plagues come in one day, death and mourning and famine,” said my mother. “And she shall be utterly burned with fire: for strong is the Lord God who judgeth her.”

“There you go again,” I’d said. “That’s Armageddon too.”

“I was asking about the bathroom bin,” said Gus.

I turned and stared at him.

“Sorry,” I said. “Miles away.” I smiled. “Nice to be back, though. What about it?”

“I don’t suppose you happened to notice what was in it?” he said. “When you put it in the bin bag?”

“I just tipped it right into the wheelie,” I said. “No bag.” He was quiet long enough for me to half turn back to the telly. Some poor cow was weeping in a front of a wrap-around mirror in her underwear, her belly jiggling up and down.

“I was going to save the stick,” he said. “If it was in there. The test stick, you know.” He was staring at the telly too now.

“I didn’t notice.”

“Only… that’s all there is of that wee baby now,” said Gus. “That’s all there ever will be. No photos, no footprint, nothing. Just one blue line.”

“God, I’m sorry,” I said.

“We could tip it out and look through.”

“I suppose so.”

At last, he turned and looked at me. Beamed at me. “Thanks,” he said.

“Thanks?” I said. “You want me to do it?”

“I’m not bothered,” said Gus. “You do it if you’d rather.” He turned back to the telly again and it felt weird looking at the side of his head, so I did too. The poor cow had her clothes back on now, really bad ones, and they were starting on how dry her hair was and what crap teeth she had.

“Will I get you a torch?” said Gus. I looked up at the centre light of the living room, one of those cloudy glass bowls that hangs down on three chains that flies always die in. I seriously thought he was asking me if I needed some extra light for watching the telly by. Then I twigged.

“You want me to get it tonight?”

“Of course not,” said Gus. “I thought you meant tonight.”

I turned and looked out of the window-the curtains weren’t drawn-at the perfect square of black out there. “Thought I meant tonight when?” I asked him. “I didn’t say anything.”

“Okay,” he said, and his voice was that kind of extra patient that’s covering up being dead annoyed.

“I’ll get it first thing in the morning,” I said. “Easier in the daylight.”

“Smellier the longer you leave it, though,” said Gus. “I’ll get the torch and get it now.”

I stood up and he stood up, and we just looked at each other.

“I’m confused,” I said. He dropped back into his chair like someone had cut his strings. His head went down. His arms came up. I knelt down beside him. “I’m sorry,” I said. “I don’t know what’s happening.”

“It’s me,” he said, his voice thick and low. “I just assumed you meant right now when you said you’d do it. It doesn’t matter.”

But that was wrong. It does matter. The order things happen in makes all the difference in the world. I said I’d do it after he assumed I was going to. Totally different from the other way round. And if I started messing with what came first and what came second, I’d be right back at square one again.

“Jessie?”

I blinked and there he was, closer than he’d been a minute ago. He leaned closer still until he was resting against me, forehead to forehead, and it was like a Geiger counter. As soon as he touched me, something unrolled inside me like ink in water and I had to take a big breath.

Then he turned at looked at the telly screen. “Local news,” he said. “There might be a bit about Becky.”

So we sat through the speed-trap budget scandal-hypocrisy and cronyism-and the even bigger Peter Pan scandal-embezzlement and corruption-and all I learned was that someone in the newsroom at Look North had a thesaurus. We watched the same grainy film of the cops and divers at the Nith as they’d shown the night before-dead, drowned, body; no dressing that up-and then the bit where a senior copper stood in front of the railings saying the man was unidentified and calling for witnesses. Then, right at the end, just before the weather, suddenly there was a shot of the Wanlockhead road and the newsreader’s voice was saying mother of two, Rebecca King, inquiry on Tuesday, post-mortem completed, and police “not seeking any individual in connection with the incident.”

“That means they’re sure it’s suicide,” said Gus, sitting back in his chair and looking straight up at the ceiling. “They’ll never investigate now.”

“I don’t believe it,” I said.

“What?” said Gus, rolling his head forward slowly to look at me. His face was drained and grey.

“I just can’t believe it,” I said. “You’re lovely. And the kids are great. This house is gorgeous and the beach and everything. And your work… that pram… and the garden and the cabbages… ”

“What the hell are you talking about, Jessie?” said Gus. “What cabbages?”

“In the garden,” I said. “In rows. Weeded and everything. I can’t believe there was any reason for her to kill herself. It’s insane. There’s abortion and divorce and Prozac. Even if the perfect life wasn’t good enough for her, how could she think she wanted no life at all?”

“I really need to stop talking about this,” Gus said. “Stop thinking about it, if I can. I need to go to bed.”

No arguing with any of that. So he went to bed and I went to bed. It wasn’t a decision. More like, we’d done it the night before, and what was different now? And things happened, like they had the night before, and why not again? Except it was different. It was worse. It wasn’t shock and raw grief and living in a dream this time. Tonight there was no excuse for it at all.

And it was different other ways too. It was better. I don’t know what kind of cold bitch I had been the night before, rating him, thinking to myself how he measured up. Bloody miracle he was still in one piece at all, was what I thought that second night. And anyway, it was more like therapy, really. Afterwards he was totally different, slumped half over me half under me like a… what it made me think of was a deflated dinghy, a tent with the guy-ropes down. I didn’t tell him. Couldn’t make that sound like sweet nothings, but it was the best thing I’d ever known.

“Hey?” I said. “Are you asleep?” He shook his head against my neck. “I meant to say earlier. I’ve got a job.”

“I know,” he said. “At the Free Clothing Project.”

“No, another one,” I said. “Here, actually.”

“Where?” He was still holding me, but he didn’t weigh so much now.

“Campsite,” I said. “Becky’s old job. With Gizzy. The hours suit-more or less-and I was needing something else as well.” Now it felt as if he was a tree and I was climbing him. Arms and legs rigid around mine. Head up off the pillow on his stiff neck, and I could tell he was staring at me. Even through the dark, I knew he was staring hard.

“Ros,” he said. “Not Becky.”

“Oh Jesus Christ,” I said. “I am so sorry. That’s the second time I’ve done that today.” Then I remembered that the first time was talking to Kazek, who Gus didn’t want to think about (and who could blame him?), or who I didn’t want to talk about (although I couldn’t have said why to save my life), so I bit off my words and hoped he wouldn’t ask me.

He didn’t. He just softened against me and lay back down, shifting me right into the hollow of his body, all four limbs wrapping me.

“Brilliant,” he said. “That’s perfect.”

We breathed in time with each other for a while. Drifting. Only I didn’t like where I was drifting to.

Love needs trust, and trust needs honesty. I can’t remember which one of the therapists told me that, but I believed her. Kazek wasn’t Becky’s other guy, and there was no excuse for keeping quiet about him. If I got it in the neck for putting Ruby and Dillon in danger, it was no more than I deserved. I opened my mouth to start speaking, but he beat me to it.

“Can I ask you a great big favour?” he said. I nodded. “I know it’s a lie, but could you not tell Gizzy we only met on Tuesday? Tell her we’re friends from Dumfries. Or tell her we’ve been seeing each other for months. Whatever. Tell her something she’ll understand, though eh?”

“It would be quite hard to explain,” I said. “I’m having a bit of trouble with it myself.”

“I’m not,” said Gus. He shifted his weight on top of me again, pushing my knees open with one of his. “I don’t care. I don’t even really care what Gizzy MacInstry thinks either.” He lifted himself up away from me and manoeuvred to the right spot. “Nobody else had to live with Becky but me.” And as he said Becky, he pushed inside me, all the way in, slick as I was from last time, and my stomach turned at the same time as everything south of it melted. “This would have happened whenever I met you. Just because I met you on the worst day of my life, it makes no difference.”

I wrapped my legs around his back and my arms around his neck, and I didn’t ask why he wanted me to lie to Gizzy if he didn’t care what she thought of him. Just enjoyed the feeling of his skin against mine-I’d never done it without a condom before. And thinking about that, imagining what was happening inside me, looking forward to him crying out, looking forward so much to that moment when I was the most important thing in the world to another person, one split second when you can be sure they wouldn’t be without you, no matter what came after, and then remembering that it wasn’t a split second-Gus cared and even the worst day of his life didn’t get in the way-and I felt everything that had melted start to burn, and then I was shaking and making a noise like a camping kettle and Gus was laughing and shushing me and my whole body bulged and then burst like a boil (except nice, though) and I yelled, and Ruby shouted “Dad?” from her room, and Gus shouted back “Wait a minute!” and then I started laughing and we stopped. Breathing like bulls, the pair of us, giggling like kids.

“Ruby?” Gus called softly. There was silence except for our breaths. “She’s dropped right off again,” he said and settled his head into the crook of my neck.

“That’s the first time that’s ever happened,” I told him.

“Ever ever?”

“Ever… like that.” I hoped he wouldn’t need details. I was shy now and I had a bit of a feeling I’d farted.

“Me too,” he said. “First time I’ve ever done it… ” He was shy too. “Without any… ”

“Fiddling,” I said, making him laugh again.

“We’re meant to be, Jessie C.” And then he said it. That word. “Love at first sight,” he said.

And so even though I knew it was love at fourth sight, really-he hadn’t thought much of me at all the day of the Disney cakes, and he had barely noticed me in the Project and the library-I didn’t tell him. And I told myself that word only counted when it was a verb and it came between I and you. What he’d just said was just something people say.

“Night-night, Gus,” I said.

“Night-night, Jessie-cakes. Sweet dreams.”