We’re heading north: that’s as much as Mum will say for the moment, that and the weird clucking noise she’s making with her tongue whenever she has to change gear. And it’s not clear if she’s pissed off with her driving skills, which are at, like, seventy-eight percent dangerous, or me because I’m twitching with my phone, writing then erasing messages to Grace – nothing to tell her really except Jacob’s ruined me and Mum’s gone mental, taking me to ‘a secret place’, like I’m five and she’s conning me into a haircut under the guise of a mystery adventure.
‘I need to focus, Isabel,’ she says and no kidding, right, cos she’s already jumped one red light and we’re not even out of town. ‘Once we’re on the motorway, I’ll –’ She goes quiet then clucks as we approach a roundabout, one hand on the wheel, the other on her chin, nail between her teeth, eyes flicking to the mirror like she’s heard sirens. ‘I’ll explain,’ she says but, honestly, I’d rather she concentrate on the road. I’m all for sharing, but I’m all for living too, and we might not be doing either the rate Mum’s going: the speed she’s driving and the way her knuckles are stretched tight, like we’re on an actual roller coaster and she’s anticipating the dip.
My phone beeps. She jumps. And I laugh this laugh that’s not even funny, cos whatever we have to be scared of, it sure isn’t my mobile.
It’s Max. What are we gonna talk about exactly? About his feelings for Grace? My mistakes with Jacob? How it’s all my fault for being too drunk and too stupid to stop him?
Jacob’s a dick, Izzy.
And yeah, he’s totally on to something there, but what of it? Because saying it changes nothing. Not the photos. Not the blackmail. Not the hold Jacob still has over me no matter how far Mum drives. M2. M20. M26. M25. All these roads do is take me further from Jacob and closer, then, to exposure. Because what if Mum keeps on going? What if I can’t deliver on my end of the bargain? What if everyone sees those photos? You want to talk about that, Max? Because, you know what, the words mean crap all, and so I’ve got nothing to say.
‘We’re not going home.’ Mum’s voice is a fairground mirror – whatever it’s telling me is too wobbly to trust.
‘Tonight?’
‘Maybe ever.’
And she’s got to be joking, right? We can’t just up and leave. I’ve got college. I’ve got Grace. But worse, I’ve got that kaleidoscope of photos and a blackmailing dick who’ll spread a trail of dirt about me if I don’t show.
She reaches over and puts a hand on my knee, but the touch comes a little too late. Those other hands that have been there by now.
Can I call you?
‘Isabel, please. Can you just leave your phone alone for one bloody minute.’
After everything that’s happened, this is the thing that makes her angry?
And she must get it, my frustration, because she’s softer then, ‘It’s not safe there.’ Mum’s voice is pathetic.
No shit, I think, like, did you seriously only just realise the danger?
It’s clear she wants me to look at her, but I can’t cos when I do there are all of these too many words. And I can’t say any of them.
‘He’s only going to get worse.’
Daniel. Jacob. She could mean either of them, talking so slowly, like it’s not just me who needs to take in all these things she’s suddenly saying.
‘I have to be there.’ My whispers are nothing like my heart, which is pumping. ‘I have to be there. My exams,’ I say. But what I really want to say is ‘Jacob’. My body will be everywhere. All spread. Ugly. Seen. And Grace. I’ll lose even more of Grace to Nell if I’m gone.
‘It’s too risky.’
‘Why now though?’ I want to ask. ‘Have you spotted it? The way Daniel’s hands have been like ivy.’
We’re pulling in for petrol, so she stops the car and shifts to look right at me. ‘They’ve said it’ll only get worse.’
‘Who?’
‘Refuge.’
I must look at her like, what?
‘It’s a charity. For…’ She breathes so deep she practically sucks me up through her inhale. ‘For domestic violence.’
I hadn’t realised the weight of the unspoken until Mum speaks it, or how the weight of the unspoken isn’t just a metaphor but an actual physical thing, a thing that pulses lighter, if only for a moment, just by saying it aloud.
‘I’ve been calling their helpline.’ The ten-pound notes she pulls from her purse shake so hard I can literally hear them. ‘They say it’s common for the abuse to get much worse when a woman is pregnant.’
‘But you’re not pregna—’ And I think about it, the look on her face when Daniel said that stupid pregnancy test was none of her business. Her relief wasn’t that he was picking on me, warning me not to get pregnant. It was that he didn’t know she already was.