The taxi drives me away from New Hope rehab centre through narrow thread-like lanes. The animals in the surrounding farms have been shut up for the night. The houses lining the roads are concealed by thick hedges, red berries and ivy tangled up with thickets of holly. The glowing windows look warm and inviting. Protected. Safe.
We pull up at a junction and I see an old-fashioned road sign, black and white with small peeling letters: Ditchling. We are heading onto Ditchling Road, where I crashed. I didn’t realise that it is so close to where Andrew is staying. Will I recognise the place? Will being there help me remember the painful memories of that night?
We are going at speed and it’s difficult to see, only freckles of light sneaking through the trees. My eyes trawl the hedgerows for signs of damage. The winding road is slick with rain, glimmering and shiny in the glare of the headlights. We continue on, revving and slowing as the twists and turns close in. Then we slow almost to a stop as the road curves into a sharp one-eighty-degree chicane. I see the land fall away from the kerb as we approach, and there, flickering in the wind, is what remains of a white-and-blue police ticker tape.
Beyond it the trees are broken, snapped both left and right. I turn back, stare from the rear window as we pass, the area behind me bathed in a light as red as blood. I know without doubt that this is the place where I crashed.
‘You heard about it too, then?’ the taxi driver asks. ‘Terrible shame, wasn’t it?’
‘You mean the crash that happened here?’ I ask as I pull the seat belt tight across me.
‘Yeah, it’s been all over the news, that poor little boy losing his life. People are demanding crash barriers, but you know what the council’s like.’ He touches his thumb to his fingers and makes the sign for money. ‘Not enough of this, is there?’
When we pull up in Brighton, I get out of the car and hand over the notes that Andrew has given me. Ahead of me, underneath the two triangular peaked roofs of the ornate Victorian shelter, is the train station.
If I had enough money, I would purchase a ticket to Maidstone to go looking for Damien Treadstone. But I don’t, so instead I plan to bring him to me. I see a phone box and start to cross the road towards it, jumping back in shock when I hear a horn blaring, a car skidding past only inches away. And as the wheels race by, forcing me out of the road, I think of the night of the accident. Memories seem to slot into place. I see myself in a park, sitting on a bench. Then running, almost getting hit by a car. Where was I? What was I doing there? Was I meeting Damien Treadstone? I check both ways for traffic, take a breath, run towards the station. I reach the phone box, pull the door open and step inside.
A putrid smell rises from the sticky floor underfoot. I pick up the handset, hold it to my ear, listening for the sound of the dialling tone. I punch in the number for the operator and wait.
I give the woman Damien’s details, as much as I know at least, hoping that there aren’t any other Damien Treadstones in the directory. Will she be able to find him with just a name and town? I don’t have any money left, so I tell her I want to reverse the charges. I wait on the line, wondering whether he will accept the call. A moment later it sounds as if the line cuts out, but then I hear a click, followed by a voice.
‘Chloe?’ he asks. It’s a shock as he speaks, the soft tone gentle in pitch. ‘Chloe Daniels?’
‘Yes,’ I say, my fingers fiddling with the flex of the handset. Is this the voice of the man who killed my son? Who ran me off the road? The man with whom I was having an affair? What should I ask him first? There is so much I can’t put into words. ‘You’re Damien Treadstone, right?’
‘Yes.’ His voice is shaky. ‘You shouldn’t have called.’
‘I need to talk about that night. About what happened.’
‘We shouldn’t. They said not to contact you.’ His breathing is deep. ‘What we are doing now could destroy my case. But when the operator said it was you, I had to. I just had to.’ And then, after a moment of silence, he says, ‘Chloe, would you agree to meet me? You’re right that we have to talk about what happened that night. And if there’s any part of you that cares about what happens to me, before you take me to court, there is something you have to know.’