“Why didn’t you call me?” Jess asks, kneeling on the cardboard floor of the storage unit, looking into the same box that we found the diary in. She asked me to help search the rest of Holly’s things, and I couldn’t come up with a good enough reason not to. “I thought maybe I wasn’t going to hear from you again.”
“Sorry. I caught a bug from Beau. It totally knocked me out.”
That’s partially true, but I overplayed my symptoms so I could lie low. I couldn’t face school, not after what happened with Saffron. I was worried that the science teacher would report the incident and things would escalate; yet when I returned yesterday, nothing was said.
Jess doesn’t look convinced. After all, I could have texted, yet saying what? Begging her not to contact Nicky’s friends? Nothing I said would have changed that. She was always going to contact them, despite what she said about being a team and needing Stephanie’s approval. She needs the truth more—can’t help herself. And maybe I wanted her to go ahead. I don’t know. It doesn’t appear to have led anywhere anyhow, after all that fuss.
It’s Tuesday the third of November; exactly one month since Holly’s letter arrived, and we’re still no closer to knowing what to do. At least, I’m not. All I can think about is what Stephanie said at the café about destroying lives and tearing our families apart. Every time I think about her—her eyes filling with tears, her sad little list of questions—I feel terrible. We shouldn’t have let her walk away like that. But Jess is a strange mix of compassion and determination; and I think that’s what worries me the most.
“I thought maybe you had cold feet,” she says, removing a large envelope from the box. “Wonder what’s in here...?”
“I don’t think I’ll ever have warm feet about this. You know that.” I perch on the edge of an upturned tea crate, watching as she opens the envelope, pulls out a newspaper cutting.
She reads it, then shakes the envelope, others fluttering to the floor. “What are they about?” I ask.
“Come and take a look.”
Crouching beside her, I pick up one with the headline Young Grad Opens for Business, dated 4th April 1994. It’s about Kim Turner and her father, who helped her set up a business management consultancy. With long dark hair and a pronounced gap between her front teeth, I recognize her. “Isn’t that her there?” I point to the paintings by the mini-fridge. “The one on the left?”
“Looks like it.” She takes the cutting from me. “Nasty piece of work.”
“Why?”
“I told you—she wasn’t very nice on the phone. And Lucy said she was jealous of Nicky.”
“Really? I’m surprised to hear that. Look at everything she achieved...”
“Yeah, must have taken a lot of hard work and talent, asking Daddy for the money.” She picks up another cutting, holding it at arm’s length to read it. “Trust me, she was jealous.”
Most of the articles are about Kim. Cutting the ribbon for a hospital ward; business success; employment growth. “Do you think Nicky collected these?”
“I’m guessing so,” Jess says.
“But why?”
“To torture herself?” She hands me an article about a different woman. “That’s Lucy.”
She has full lips, bobbed hair, a friendly expression. Local Businesswoman Wins Award for Best Newcomer. I compare her photo to the face in the painting beside Kim’s. “The hair’s different, but it’s definitely her. Look at the mouth.”
“I agree.” She spreads out the cuttings, then places her hands on her knees.
I watch her, wondering what she’s thinking. She’s so invested in this, in a way that I could never be. There are too many things I’m scared of. I don’t know how she copes with all the worry, the fake alibis.
I told Andy I’m at a cheese-and-wine function, but I’ve not been to one of those in years. When I first joined St. Saviour’s, I decided that the best way to be a woman in a boys’ school was to keep a professional front at all times. No cheese on cocktail sticks, no wine.
“This must have killed her, seeing these,” Jess says. “Just think...year after year, clipping articles about her peers—her own life unraveling by the day...wondering where she went wrong, why it wasn’t her in place of them. Knowing all along that it was never going to be her.”
Looking dejected, she collects the scraps of paper, putting them back into the envelope.
“Is that why you’re doing this, Jess—for her?” I ask. “Or Holly?”
She chews her lip pensively. “I think it’s for both of them. I mean, I was raised to care about this kind of thing, to look out for the people around me.” Frowning, she glances about the room. “And all along there were two women living right under our noses without us even knowing. That has to matter, doesn’t it? There has to be some kind of justice, doesn’t there?”
I nod. I feel for them too, especially Nicky. I could have written something similar to her diary myself. Not about assault, but how it feels not to be able to say no, to want to be loved, handpicked.
But justice is still a word that terrifies me.
It’s that that I’m frightened of, not Jess’s determination. That’s just an excuse.
“Do you want to carry on?” she asks.
I check the time on my phone. “Okay.”
She digs deep inside the box without looking, as though it’s a lucky random draw—the worst one in the world. She removes a photo album. It rustles as she opens it, the plastic pages stiff.
Together, we survey the pictures—faded Polaroids of a time long gone when homemade haircuts were uneven and trousers flared. “Is that Nicky?”
Aged five or six, hair in pigtails, Nicky is wearing a sundress with a pineapple motif. I think of her mother buying the dress, setting it out for a special day, brushing her hair, making her stand still for the photo.
Jess turns the pages, unsticking them. Nicky at primary school, senior school; with two friends in little black dresses: Lucy and Kim. “She was beautiful, poor girl.”
She’s the prettiest by far, standing between them, her hands draped on their shoulders. It reminds me of the photo that Jess found of the men in the Montague Club. Three friends, yet not friends. Friends who let each other down when it came to it.
Right at the back, there’s a photo of Nicky holding a baby girl. Reaching underneath the plastic film, Jess prys out the picture, reading the writing on the reverse. “‘Holly, Victoria Park, Bath.’”
The photo isn’t great quality. Whoever took it didn’t know about shooting into the sun, and no one’s smiling. Nicky looks completely different—straggly, emaciated. Holly has a daunted expression that toddlers don’t often have.
At the thought of Beau, I don’t want to be here any longer. Getting up, I fasten my parka, stamping my feet, which are numb from squatting.
“You okay?” Jess asks.
“Not really. I’d like to call it a night, if that’s all right. Don’t you have to get to your mum’s?”
“I’m fine for another five minutes.” Opening her rucksack, she places the press cuttings and photo album inside. She’s taking them and I want to ask why, but daren’t. I’ve a feeling all of this is building to something I’m not going to like. But what? Hasn’t she explored all avenues already?
“Can you help me check out the rest of the box?” She looks up at me appealingly.
Somehow, I can’t deny her. I know her heart’s in the right place.
Sighing, I crouch again. “Quickly, then. I don’t know how much more of this I can take.”
“I’m sorry.” She squeezes my hand. “Thanks, Pree.”
“Gosh, you’re freezing.”
“I know.”
The bottom of the box is filled with library books—battered hardbacks with catalog numbers on the spines. She selects one at random. Empowerment for Women.
I flick through another, the smell of old paper meeting my nose. Six Steps to Success. “Do you think these were Nicky’s?”
“Dunno.” She turns to the front page to examine the date of the last stamp. “No, I don’t think so. It says 2012.” She checks another. “This one is 2013. I think she was dead by then.”
“So, they were Holly’s, then. She was ambitious?”
“Seems so, yes.” She stacks the books into leaning towers, then hugs her legs ponderingly, chin on knees. “I reckon she must have stolen them. Can’t see her having a library card, can you?... God, it’s all so tragic.”
I think of the sketches then, glancing over my shoulder at the book, still lying near the door where we left it. “What about the drawings of the doors? Where do they fit into all this?”
“Not sure.” She scratches her nose.
“Do you think maybe she wanted to be part of us?”
“What, like, family?”
I nod, even though that’s not precisely what I meant.
I try again. “Do you think she was hoping one of our husbands would claim her as their daughter—give her a lucky break? She must have stood outside our houses to sketch them—must have seen Stephanie’s beautiful home. Why not knock on the door and introduce herself?”
She shrugs loosely. “Maybe she was too scared to do that.”
“So why not be underhand instead, blackmail them? If she wanted success so badly, she could have got a decent sum from the three men combined. That’s what I’d have done.”
“Would you, though?” She narrows her eyes at me skeptically. “It’s one thing to say it, but would you really blackmail someone? It would take some balls, when you think about it.”
“I suppose it would depend how desperate I was.”
“Besides...” She shifts position, sitting cross-legged. “...You’re equating success with money, but maybe that’s not what she was after. And she couldn’t have wanted a lucky break either, because she was about to die.”
“Then what? Why bother writing to us?” I say despondently. “Why put us through this? What did we ever do to her?”
She doesn’t reply. She’s too busy fishing something out of the bottom of the box.
“What is it?”
“Just this.” She holds up a tatty twine bracelet. “It’s nothing.” She’s about to put it back and then changes her mind, dropping it into the pocket of her puffer.
We pack away the books, putting everything back the way it was.
“Well, I think we’re done.” She motions to the door, sweeping her hands dramatically. “Shall we?”
At last. I smile, relieved.
But then, just as she’s about to turn off the light, she looks at me with that hard-to-deny expression again. “Pree...can I ask you something?”
I feel weightless, as though I’m levitating.
What now? What?
She touches my coat sleeve, leaves her hand there. It’s like a thin little bird claw, pinning me in place. “Would you do something for me?” My face must be a picture, because she adds, “I promise I won’t ask for anything else.”
Oh, God. No.
“What is it, Jess?”
“I want to get some legal advice and need you to come with me.”
“Legal advice?” It comes out as a croak.
“Yes. I’ve found a great lawyer who’ll give us a free consultation. She’s brilliant, Pree, part of a women in law organization. If anyone can help us, it’s her. And she’s based in Bath.” Her grip tightens. “What do you think?”
What do I think?
The cardboard underneath me seems to wobble as though it’s all that’s holding me up and I’m about to crash through the floorboards to my death. “I...”
“I know it’s a lot to ask, but it’ll give us some clarity. That’s what you want, isn’t it?” She bends her knees to look in my eyes; Andy often does the same thing. “You told Stephanie you wanted clarity, right?”
I don’t know what I said or why. Clarity doesn’t sound all that appealing anymore.
“Oh, Jess. This is really hard... I mean, Andy knows about the letter. If he was to find out I’d consulted a lawyer, well, you can imagine...” I trail off, unable to imagine it myself.
“But it would be completely confidential and we’d be very discreet... Please... I can’t do this alone.” She presses her palms together. “Say yes, Pree. I need you.”
“No, you don’t. You’re the strongest person I’ve ever met.”
She gazes at me and then blinks, looks away. “You know what? Forget I asked.” She doesn’t sound angry, more disappointed. “I can’t keep begging people to do the right thing. It’s exhausting. No wonder Holly was an alcoholic... Let’s go.”
I stay where I am, reeling with indecision. “Wait, Jess...”
She looks over her shoulder expectantly.
I can’t believe I’m about to say this. “Okay.”
She exhales, shoulders sinking. “Thanks, Pree. You’re a star. I can’t tell you how much I appreciate it.” Then she frowns, looms closer. “You look exhausted. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have kept you so long. Come on—let’s go.” And she turns out the light.
“So, when are you meeting this woman?” I say, following her out of the door.
“We, Pree. We.”
“Okay...when are we meeting her?”
“Saturday afternoon. I’ll text you the details.”
“What about Stephanie?” I ask. “Are you going to include her?”
She knits her lips as we go along the corridor. “No. I think we should give her a little time to come around. Because she will.”
Really? Nothing about Steffie’s attitude so far has hinted at acquiescence, but if Jess wants to believe we’re all going to hold hands and do this together, then I’m not going to be the one to point out the obvious defects.
We say brief goodbyes, Jess not hanging around, perhaps in case I change my mind.
Inside the car, I take Andy’s hip flask from the glove compartment and swallow a mouthful of whiskey, shuddering. I hate the stuff, but if I’ve been to a cheese-and-wine night, then I should smell of something other than Holly’s storage unit.
I drive home, praying the world will end on Saturday and I won’t have to show up.