There was something about this time of year – past mistakes a weight on the mind before the promise of a new year offered the shine of a clean slate – that always made Luke think of an old associate. That thought, and its attendant guilt, would lead to an almost automatic trudge to a certain graveside.
So here he was.
And so was Jenna – and what a shock to his heart it was to see her.
Luke stared at her, struggling to deal with the clamour in his head and heart. Jenna had been Danny’s lover? Even in death the man was able to ruin his life.
Jenna had been Danny’s girlfriend?
How anyone could willingly enter into a relationship with that man was beyond him. And what did this say about the woman he was in love with? He turned slightly, enough to see that her arms were crossed and she was now staring at her feet, as if unable to comprehend what she had just learned.
‘What the hell? Danny was the guy you went to prison for killing in the car?’ she asked as she took a step away from him. ‘You were friends? But how did we never meet? He never mentioned you, not once in all the time…’ A light came on in her eyes. ‘I was a junior reporter at the time. When the case went to…’ She stared at him. ‘The guy changed his plea to guilty so the case didn’t go to trial, but I’m certain his name wasn’t Luke Forrest. It was Duncan something.’ She stared off into space as if rifling through some mental files.
‘Robertson,’ Luke replied.
Her mouth fell open in shock. ‘Oh my God,’ she said. ‘Who changes their name?’
‘Somebody who wants to rebuild—’
‘He never mentioned you,’ she repeated, talking over him. ‘When I got the details from the court official that day the name of the…’ her voice came out in a whisper ‘…accused, was a complete unknown to me, and the gossip that day was that they … you … were the best of friends.’ Her eyes were an essay in confusion. ‘How can someone you love not know who your oldest friends are?’ she asked Luke as she shook her head slowly.
Someone you love. The words hit Luke with the power of a sledgehammer.
He took a breath, felt the chill air fill his lungs and stamped his feet against the cold.
Luke needed to know, desperately, how Jenna came to be with Danny and if she was holding on to any feelings for him, but he could tell from the clamp of her jaw that she wasn’t going to speak anytime soon. It was down to him to get the conversation going. And he didn’t know if he wanted to. Now that he knew she’d been with Danny.
It was long minutes later that they spoke, and they did it at the same time.
‘How—?’
‘What—?’
‘You go first,’ Jenna said quietly, all but shrinking into her coat, as if she really didn’t want to hear what was about to come from Luke’s mouth. As if she couldn’t wait to get away from him. As if she was judging him for his part in Danny’s death.
‘It all began as a laugh, a way of getting extra money.’ Luke spoke looking straight ahead. ‘We were young and daft. Or so I thought. When I think back to what Danny was like … There was always a calculation in what he did. Anyway. It was a chance to buy some good clothes, buy lots of drink and impress the girls, aye? Dealing a wee bit of hash here, some contraband fags there. The odd bit of stolen goods.’ Luke saw Danny in his mind’s eye, the glow in his expression as another deal went down and he made another load of cash. ‘I’m not proud of who I was back then. Despite everything with my mum, the lies she told about Dad, I had a good upbringing. I was the only one of my friends where there was no drink or drugs in the house, and Mum had proper work. A decent job for the council, so we were comparatively well off.’
‘Why did you go off the rails, then?
Luke gazed into the distance. ‘I was so fucking angry with Mum, lying about Dad. If you grow up thinking one of your parents has no interest in you it’s like a wrecking ball to your growing psyche. Those circumstances provided fertile ground for the influence of a friend like Danny.’ As Luke spoke he recognised that the training in psychology and counselling he had undertaken in prison was bleeding into his speech, making the explanation of his life sound like an oral essay. He needed to use more everyday language here.
‘That just doesn’t sound like the man I knew,’ Jenna said.
‘You know, I’m fed up thinking about him. Fed up having him in my head.’ Luke popped the heel of his right hand against his forehead. ‘He’s had way too much time in here.’ He caught himself and dropped his hand. Then said, making an effort at a more conciliatory tone, ‘I think we knew very different men. I got the worst of him, and it sounds like you got the best.’
Jenna didn’t reply for a moment. She simply looked into his eyes as if assessing him and his words. ‘I don’t understand how our paths didn’t cross. He didn’t mention you while we were together. Not once. Then the week after we split up he’s in a car with you, his oldest friend, apparently, and dies in a crash.’ She shrugged and held both hands out in a what the hell gesture.
Again, Luke considered carefully what he should say. Which truth he needed to detail.
‘I decided to leave Glasgow. Stayed away for a couple of years. Without a word to anyone, I went up to Aberdeen to stay with my dad. Got a job on the rigs, changed my phone, completely cut myself off from my old life. Even my mum didn’t have my contact details.’
‘What? That’s a bit extreme.’
‘I knew Danny would go and see her. Turn on the charm. And next thing he’d be knocking on my door, demanding I come back to Glasgow. I stayed in touch with Mum, of course I did. I phoned every time I could, and I sent her cash to come up and visit me. It was a bit of a risk, knowing that Danny could easily follow her. But, you know, I couldn’t cut off contact with her altogether.’ Luke felt a brief smile form on his face as he thought about those times. ‘I was earning plenty, to be fair, so I put Mum up in a different posh hotel each visit. She loved Skibo Castle.’ He paused. ‘It was so nice to be able to spoil her. In spite of what happened when I was a boy, I knew she did her very best for me.’
‘But why stay away from Danny?’ Jenna asked.
‘He was toxic,’ Luke replied instantly. ‘He may have been able to hide it with you, but I knew if I stayed, one of us would end up dead.’
‘Which is what happened as soon as you came back,’ Jenna said. She looked as if she was making a mental calculation. ‘Less than a week after I left him, you guys were in that crash.’ She paused. ‘Why did you come back?’
‘Mum’s funeral,’ Luke replied. ‘Even that was a worry,’ he recalled. ‘Cos I knew Danny would seek me out, but what kind of son would I have been if I stayed away for that?’
‘Did you know he was seeing someone while you were away?’
‘Joe might have mentioned it on one of the few times we spoke, but I didn’t pay much attention. Danny was dead to me. I had no interest in him whatsoever.’
‘Whenever he was drunk he would talk about you. Kinda. Without naming you,’ she said, as if the memory had just popped into her head.
‘What did he say?’
‘Just about the people who’d abandoned him. Good friends who’d walked out, after all the time and effort he’d invested in their friendship.’
Luke fell to silence; he’d run out of words for the moment. He was unsure how to convince Jenna who the real Danny was, and watched as she burrowed her chin into the collar of her coat.
‘I’m struggling,’ she admitted. ‘The man you’ve just described in no way matches the one in my head.’ She crossed her arms, tucking her hands under them. ‘He could be so kind. Vulnerable.’
‘Was he really?’ he challenged. ‘Or did you see what you wanted to see?’
‘I’m not an idiot, Luke,’ she snapped.
‘I didn’t say you were. When we fall in love with someone we’re blind to who they really are. Because, if we’ve fallen in love with a bad human being, what does that say about us?’
‘You mean, what does that say about me?’ Her eyes were laden with regret – and anger.
‘Listen, I’m not one to criticise when it comes to Danny. I let that man control me for years.’
‘Why? It’s not like you were in love with him or anything. Or were you?’
Luke snorted a dismissal of her question.
‘So, what, then? If he was such a horrible human being why did you hang around? What hold did he have over you?’
One punch.
All it took was one punch and one of his friends died.
Luke studied Jenna’s expression. She looked like she couldn’t wait to get away from him. She knew that he was responsible for her ex’s death. And now the future of their relationship was at stake. Could she take the knowledge that he was responsible for another?