Twenty-five years earlier
Our opportunity comes sooner than expected. I hear Nick telling Mum he’s got a “work thing” on Tuesday night, so he probably won’t be round. Becca says I should make myself scarce, let her handle things, so I tell Mum I’m going to a friend’s house to work on a homework project after school. Part of me feels jealous that Mum might open up to Becca rather than me, but hope overrides it. This could be our only chance.
Actually, I don’t have many friends at school. People don’t want to partner with me because they think I’m a daydreamer: I melt into my own thoughts too often. They don’t realize that when I’m one to one with somebody—like Becca, say—it’s as if my on switch has been pressed. Sometimes Becca and I laugh until we cry at pretty much nothing. And when we put our minds to it, like now, we can achieve things too.
I leave school and walk in the opposite direction from home, wandering through the area with all the colorful fabric shops, spicy smells, sari-clad women fluttering through the streets. Soon I’m crossing green fields rimmed by broken fences, the grass cool through my thin soles. When buildings loom in the distance, I realize I’m on the outskirts of the airport. A plane takes off on the horizon, silhouetted in the orangey twilight; another follows and I imagine them queued up, waiting to launch themselves into the sky.
I think about what might be happening back home, and cross my fingers tight. For a second I waver: Can I trust her? Becca’s been so nice to Nick’s face these last few days, but when he turns his back, her eyes are like steel. The switch is kind of unnerving. But I have to trust her. I do trust her. Aside from Mum, she’s my best friend in the world.
The next plane seems to be heading a different way. As it rises I see both its wings, spanned as if to hug me, and I realize it’s going to sweep right over my head. I feel the gust and hear the roar, and then I’m craning my neck as it cloaks me in its shadow. Just as I’m thinking that’s the first time I’ve seen the belly of a plane, something crazy happens. There’s a crackling noise and the sky seems to ripple, to churn. It’s like there’s an earthquake up above rather than on the ground, or like I’m inside one of those balls of electricity we experimented with in science. A sensible part of my brain tells me it must be turbulence, or the plane interfering with the atmosphere, or something. But another part thinks this is what the end of the world feels like.
Then, abruptly, it’s over, like a storm that’s passed so quickly you think you’ve imagined it, and calm settles, like a clean sheet.
When I get home I’m cold and tired, but my head sings with what I’ve seen. The way that plane tore up the sky, the way everything was normal again seconds later. How can the atmosphere stay intact if it gets thrown around like that every time a plane blasts through?
As soon as I walk into the flat, I realize something’s changed the atmosphere in here too. There’s tension in the air. I backtrack through my memory: I’d been lost in thought approaching the tower block, but had I seen Nick’s car parked outside? What if he came back unexpectedly and heard Becca talking to Mum about him? My breath quickens: Why didn’t I pay attention? Daydreaming again, Kate.
I look at the spot where he normally leaves his sneakers. They aren’t there. Hearing sounds from my room, I hurry through to see Becca aggressively rolling up her sleeping bag. Her rucksack sits by her feet, bulging with clothes.
“Are you going?” I ask, with a spark of panic.
“No choice.” She tries to bully the sleeping bag into its impossibly small cover but it keeps unraveling, won’t be tamed.
“Why?”
“She didn’t like my interfering.”
I blink at her. “Mum’s making you leave?”
“Fuck’s sake . . . How did this ever fit in here?” Becca punches the polyester while it balloons out the other side. “I said we were worried about her. We thought she didn’t seem herself . . .”
“Did you mention the bruises?”
“I hinted. She went all pale and said she often bangs herself at work.”
“She only works in a post office!”
“I don’t think she realizes you’ve seen them all over her body.”
“What else did . . . ?” I trail off and glance behind me as I remember that Mum might be nearby.
“She’s on the balcony,” Becca whispers.
I tiptoe to check she’s still outside, and see her profile in the dark, framed by curls of smoke.
Back in my room, Becca’s given up with the sleeping bag and is sitting on my bed. When I sink down beside her she grabs my arm. “We need to help her, Kate. I could see she wanted to tell me something, but it was like she was afraid. So instead she got mad, said I’d got a bloody cheek . . .”
“Did you mention Nick?”
She flushes. “I might’ve got a bit carried away there.”
“What d’you mean?”
“I wasn’t going to push it, just ask if he was treating her right and hope she’d realize what I was getting at. But she wouldn’t take the bait. She just clammed up. So I said I got bad vibes from Nick. I said he made me uncomfortable . . . I might’ve called him sleazy . . .”
“I thought you were going to be subtle, Bec!”
“I tried. But she was so fucking careful in what she was saying. She won’t hear a bad word against him. And I just know it’s because she’s scared. I could see it in her face.”
The thought is unbearable. My brave mum who used to protect me from nightmares, from nasty kids in the playground, from monsters under the bed.
“You can’t leave,” I say desperately. “I’ll talk to her.”
“She’s mad with both of us.”
My heart plummets. I hate Mum being angry with me, hate when disappointment pulls at the corners of her mouth. I’ll do or say almost anything to make her smile at me again.
“We’ll apologize,” I say. “We’ll act like we didn’t mean any of it and think of a new plan.”
Becca shrugs. “Worth a shot.”
“I’ll go to her now.”
I venture into the living room, looking through the smeary glass at my mum still outside, cigarette finished. She turns and our eyes lock. There it is: disappointment, anger. But something else too. I feel those eyes are pleading with me.
She slides back the door and steps into the room, slow as a moonwalker.
“What’s all this about, Kate? Honestly!” But it’s like she’s just playing the part of a stern mum, confident in her crossness. The hollow ring of her telling off frightens me even more.
“I’m sorry, Mum. We obviously got the wrong end of the stick.”
“I’ve told you not to worry, Kate. I know things feel stressy round here sometimes, and me and Nick have the odd . . .” She pauses as if selecting the right phrase. “. . . tiff. But you need to keep that imagination in check. And stop letting Becca encourage you.”
“It wasn’t her fault. Please don’t make her go.”
“She gets you all wound up. Puts these ideas in your head. I know you idolize her”—she glances at the wall, drops her voice—“but I don’t think she’s the best influence. She’s going to cause trouble if she keeps saying . . . well, things that just shouldn’t be said.”
“We made a mistake.”
Mum rests her hands on my upper arms. Her own arms are covered by her cardigan. I can’t remember the last time she wore a short-sleeved top. “I don’t need you to rescue me or worry about me, Kate. That’s the wrong way round! I want you to focus on school and your exams, make more friends . . .” Her fingers squeeze. “I want you to have all the chances I never did. To get out of this place one day.”
I look down at my feet. My shoes are bobbled with clumps of wet grass. “Just let Becca stay a bit longer. Please.”
Mum sighs and hoops me in her arms. “I’ll think about it. If you promise to drop all this.”
I creep my hands round her waist, wanting to cling on. If I hugged her forever, he’d never be able to push his way between us.
“And one more thing,” she murmurs into my hair. “One more promise you need to make.”
“What?”
“Don’t . . .” Her arms tighten and her voice vibrates at the side of my head. “Don’t mention any of this to Nick. You mustn’t . . . He’d be upset.”
I feel my heart swooping again, her muscles tensing as our hug stretches on.
“Promise me you won’t accuse him of anything, Kate.”
Gently I flatten my palm against her back, listening for her stifled gasp of pain. She stiffens and I know the bruises are still there. I can sense them beneath her clothes, urging me not to give up.