“Coo-ee! Just me! Claire, are you home? What are you doing sitting in the dark?”
Liz reaches around the door and flicks the light switch. I blink as the kitchen fills with fluorescent light.
“Claire?” She crosses the kitchen and pulls out the chair opposite me. “Are you okay? I saw your car in the drive. You didn’t tell me you were coming back today.”
I sent Liz a text from Mum and Dad’s the day after my session with Sonia. I told her that things were stressful at home and that I needed a few days’ peace and quiet. She responded immediately, asking if I needed to talk. I said no, but that I’d ring her in a couple of days.
“I didn’t know I was coming back today either,” I say.
I want to tell her everything. I want to let every last worry and fear spill out but I haven’t got the energy. I need to save what little I have left for my conversation with Mark.
“Liz,” I say instead, “did Caleb ever mention anything to you about Billy being in love with someone? Maybe Jake told him—”
I’m interrupted by the sound of the back door opening.
“Claire!” Kira says. “You’re back.”
“For now.” I keep the smile fixed on my face. “How’s college? It must be your exhibition soon.”
“Yeah.” She lowers the art folder she’s carrying to the floor and wiggles the fingers of her left hand.
“Can we come and see it?” Liz asks. “Is there any nudity? I can’t remember the last time I saw a naked man.”
The base of Kira’s throat turns red as Liz laughs raucously. “No, not really,” she says.
“So what’s it about then?”
Kira’s tongue moves back and forward in her mouth as she clacks her piercing against her teeth. “Tattoos.”
Tattoos? Jake told me Kira wouldn’t let him go to her exhibition because it was too personal. What’s so personal about photos of tattoos?
“Hey, Kira!” Liz lifts her top and flashes her tummy. “You could have taken a photo of my dolphin. Although I’m such a fat fucker now it looks more like a whale.”
“Do you regret it?” Kira asks as she peers at it.
“Cheeky bitch!”
“No, no. That’s what my project is about. Tattoos and regrets. I’ve been taking photos of tattoos that people regret and then interviewing them. The project’s a mixture of photos and words. It’s all anonymous. There are no faces and no names.”
“Then you should have given Lloyd a ring. He’s got a fuckload of tattoos, most of them grim. Apart from the one of my name. Obviously that’s a beauty although I bet he bloody regrets it now! Oh, that reminds me, Claire. Guess who texted me yesterday?”
“Lloyd?”
“Yep. He’s coming to Bristol this weekend.”
“To your house?” Kira asks. She looks as horrified as Liz does.
“Mmm-hmm.” Liz nods. “I said I’d meet him in Charlie’s Bar but he wouldn’t have it. He’s insisting on coming to the house.”
“Why?”
“Maybe he wants to get back with you?” Kira says.
“No chance. I wouldn’t take him back even if he begged. No, my guess is that he wants to meet at home because he doesn’t want a row in public. Or tears,” she adds quickly. “I think he’s going to ask for a divorce.”
“Why not tell you that over the phone?”
“Because he’s a sadist?”
“Will he be coming around here?” Kira asks. Considering she normally takes the first opportunity to escape from the kitchen and go up to her room she seems unusually interested in this conversation.
“Yeah.” Liz laughs. “I thought we’d throw a welcome-home celebration for him and parade him around the streets. The prodigal fuckhead returns! Why the hell would he come around here?”
Kira shrugs. “To see Mark?”
“Yeah, like they’re the best of friends. I think they only tolerated each other because Claire and I are such good mates.” She looks at me. “Isn’t that right?”
“Yes.” It’s a lie, but only to spare her feelings. It took our husbands a while to warm to each other but they did get on and by the time Liz and Lloyd’s marriage was on its last legs they were definitely friends. Not that Mark has heard much from Lloyd since he walked out on Liz; a couple of replies to his texts but never more than a terse I’m good, mate or I’m living up north.
“Kira, are you okay? You look a bit pale, sweetheart.” Liz pulls out a chair. “Have a seat.”
“I do feel a bit light-headed.” She presses a hand to the side of her head. “I think I’ll have a lie-down upstairs.”
She makes a move toward the hallway but I move to intercept her.
“Kira, before you go. Could I talk to you about something?”
“Um . . .” She touches the side of her head again. “I’m really not feeling very—”
“I know what happened in the Lodekka last year. I know why Jake hit Billy.”
She says nothing, but her gaze flicks from left to right as though she’s looking at each of my eyes in turn. She’s trying to work out how I’m feeling.
“It was about Mark, wasn’t it?” I say. “About him kissing Billy’s form tutor.”
I hear Liz inhale sharply behind me but don’t turn around.
Kira looks down at her feet. “Yes,” she breathes.
“Jake told you?”
“Um . . . yeah. He said it was bullshit and Billy was shit-stirring because he had nothing better to do. He said Billy wanted to fuck everyone else’s lives up because he couldn’t stand anyone else being happy.”
“Did Jake ask Mark if it was true?”
She chews on the side of her lip and says nothing.
“Kira? Did Jake ask Mark if it was true?”
She nods, her eyes still downcast.
“And? Did Mark admit it?”
Her gaze flickers up and her eyes meet mine. “Yes,” she whispers. “Yes, he did but—”
“One more question,” I add quickly, before she can leave. “Did Billy ever tell you that he was in love with someone?”
Her gaze flits toward Liz, still sitting at the kitchen table with a shocked expression on her face, then returns to me. “I heard Caleb and Jake talking once, about a girl Billy liked. Jess, I think her name was. Is that who you mean?”
“Did he love her?”
She shrugs. “I don’t know.”