So much makes sense now. Nina tried desperately to cling to the respectability of normality, hide behind society’s cruelly deceptive structures. Foundations can be ripped away. Marriage, mortgages, children. No matter how much she clung to the rules, she couldn’t shake off her guilt.
Strangely (or not?), Stuart and I get along well at times. When he’s a caring dad, when he and I have to make joint decisions for the benefit of our family, I can mentally push away the downsides. We ebb and flow, a perpetual work in progress involving endless compromises. Just like a real marriage, I guess.
Despite my own deliberate yet subtle targeting of Stuart, and his of me, I really can’t see how it could’ve worked out any other way. Did Nina deliberately plant the idea in his head? Mine, too? We’ll never know, and I’m surprisingly all right with that. Perhaps it was her way of protecting her children. On some level, I can now understand. I do honestly believe that Nina would approve of most of my actions.
I may have taken over Nina’s life, but in doing so, I’ve fulfilled my main promise to her: to protect her family. Because there was one thing that Nina knew she could rely on: my loyalty, however misplaced. Yet she was right to trust me, at the time.
Nina wanted Stuart to concentrate solely on the children for as long as possible.
Stuart means well, but if he makes noises about selling, Marie, move in! Make a mess to put off any potential buyers, get the kids on board, they’ll love it!
I smile at the memory.
I’ve had to make up my own version of what really happened on that fateful boat trip. I like and choose to believe that Camilla probably made a bitchy comment about me and it awoke some kind of buried loyalty in Charlie, which is then what motivated him to turn on her while they were on the boat. Nina knew how guilty I felt about Charlie and how I held my drunken jealousy (however provoked) partly responsible for the path that ultimately led to his death. I’d told him that he wasn’t good enough for me or whatever I could think of in my rage that would hurt him as much as possible. Nina heard every vicious word, knew how shameful my last words to him had made me feel, yet she never gave me even a hint that I wasn’t to blame for what happened. In her blind confidence of me in the end, Nina overlooked the fact that everyone has a breaking point.
Yet, still my feelings toward her ebb and flow. Affection, resentment, love, hate. But, right now, strangely, I miss her more than ever.
I retrace Nina’s footsteps for one of the last ever times. Winter cold clings to my coat as I walk round the garden with my camera, the strap slung around my neck. Goldie is sniffing and exploring. Jack is asleep in his buggy. I take photos of him, of Goldie, of the grounds. I snap the final pictures, memories for the children.
“Say goodbye to this place,” I say out loud. “We’re moving to a much better home.”
We are. It’s a cottage with a thatched roof and a smaller, more manageable garden filled with rhododendrons. It’s not so far away, Deborah can still visit. We’ll be away from the bad memories, as well as Tamsin and her constant comments:
Did you really not suspect a thing, Marie? I’ve never known a murderer before. I wouldn’t admit this to just anyone, but it’s really quite morbidly exciting! Not for Greg, obviously, that’s just awful. She pulled a sad face. Do you know I’ve had offers to sell my story? I’ve said no, of course, but when you think about it, she just used to sit there, in our book group as if butter wouldn’t melt!
If only she knew...
We are still awaiting Camilla’s trial.
Stuart stuck to his word. So far, he has been utterly convincing as my alibi. I’ll give him that.
I’ve promised Camilla that I will look after Louise to the utmost of my ability, despite her threats to drag me down, too, until I reminded her of our conversation, that she is the one with a violent history, not me.
It’s a shame I don’t know where she hid the knife. She’ll never tell me now.
“I’ll love Louise as my own,” I said. “She’ll want for nothing. I’ll treat her as if she was the daughter Charlie and I would’ve had.”
She gave me a strange look when I said that. I think it was then that the penny really dropped, that she knew or suspected what I’d done, but visiting hours came to an end. She had to return to her cell.
Really, what did she expect me to do? I’ll have to watch my back if and when she’s released. I can’t erase the look on her face during the moments she stabbed Greg or forget what she did to Charlie when he rejected her. Her ex in Canada had a lucky escape, it seems to me.
I walk around to the front of the house and lift Jack out of his buggy. Goldie barges ahead, pushing the front door open. I survey the empty rooms, full of cardboard boxes. Stuart took a lot of persuading to put the house on the market but eventually agreed to the ever-hopeful fresh start we all crave and need to believe exists.
All the boxes are, of course, labeled. Inside one marked Louise’s Bedroom is a gift, a framed picture. It is of me, Charlie and Camilla. I now have the power to reveal his true identity. I won’t be cruel, I won’t completely destroy the tale Camilla spun about her father: a whirlwind holiday romance. However, I can take charge of the narrative now.
I hear tires on the gravel. Still holding my precious Jack tightly, I open the door.
A woman in a trouser suit emerges from a black Audi.
“Mrs. Thompson?” she calls out.
“Please, call me Marie,” I call back. “You must be Jennifer, from the real estate agency?”
“Yes.”
I watch as she walks toward the entrance gate and replaces the For Sale sign with a Sold one.
Nina was right to rely on my loyalty because I never let her down. I promised her three things: I swore that I’d look out for her family and however possible, sabotage any new relationships and ensure that Stuart held on to their family home.
But I have no qualms about breaking one of my promises and selling the house—it’s just not the one I thought I’d break. After all, the house was her dream, not mine. I’m entitled to something of my own. This is my story now.