On a train to the London suburbs
Subconsciously I’ve dressed up for this. I’m on a train whirring towards the suburbs. Part burglar, part sleuth. Black jeans and leather boots, a black jumper hugging me, and a beanie hat. It’s wintry enough, October has tilted the earth on its axis, nights draw drastically shorter as the mercury drops drastically lower. Wrapped around me is a Burberry mackintosh. It’s one from the old days. I’d handed over £90 cash to the Camden Market salesman and it felt like a fortune slipping through my fingers. It felt like a fortune again now, after years of liquidity.
I’d muttered an apology, cheeks cherry-red from more than the cold, when my first card payment was declined at the train barrier and I fumbled, jostling customers behind me as I pulled out another card, from among seven or so options. I wore designer clothes I’d been given as gifts with handwritten notes from some of the most famous names in fashion, but had less money in some of my accounts than a single Underground fare. I wished Zanna was here, to tap on the contactless card sensor and beam at me with an “I’ll get it” like she so often used to do when she sensed that uptight panic in me.
This is why I need to do this documentary, I remind myself. This is why it’s all going to be worth it.
I marvel at how fast this humming beast is zipping into deepest darkest suburbia, almost as far as Romford. It’s been a long time since I’ve taken an overground train like this one (why would I ever need to leave London besides in a taxi to one of its airports?), but I couldn’t hire a car. It wasn’t inconspicuous enough, and it turns out I can’t afford it. We race towards the documentary launch date with certainty and I hurtle towards my own personal mystery — who wrote that email? Now, two suspects top my list. Gianna, and Zanna’s mother. Angela’s words at the charity event echoed the second message but, for today, I’m trying to rule out the first, using my admittedly limited means.
I managed to find the address among thousands of WhatsApp messages. It was one of those sent after Zanna’s death, but back when we were hanging on to the myth we were all close. Would stay close. Before, I suspect, Maggie, Sara and Gianna created a new group without me and the messages all dried up. Her excited update had come: “Guys, we bought a house. Here’s the address. Housewarming soon!”
It was soon enough after Zanna died for us to still be going through the motions of friendship. But I didn’t go to Maggie’s housewarming. I was invited to a high street fast fashion event instead and, well, work is work. This is the first time I’ve visited Maggie’s home, bought with an ex. She now lives in it alone. She was pleasantly surprised to receive my text suggesting I finally cross that boundary between London and Greater London to visit. It’s a shame it has to be under false pretences, but here we are.
I’ve always considered moving to the Outer Boroughs as a sort of bowing out. Living in London is a battle of wills between you and the city. As you try to achieve your dreams, London is trying to run you out with rising prices, dating disasters, overcrowded Tubes and a general air of grey misery. Moving out is a surrender. Maggie’s two-bed mid-terrace is somewhere I’d never live, both geographically and in terms of the architecture. A terrace-lined street, it reminds me of home. These houses side by side, squeezed so tight the brick might burst out into the front garden. The echoes of my parents’ fights linger. I drag my fingers over the fluted glass of the front porch windows, and it makes me shiver.
The doorbell chimes with a synthetic seventies bell. My host pulls the door open, smiling and holding her arms out in excitement, ready for a hug. I let myself be pulled into it, although I’m sure we both taste the anticipation in the air. The strangeness of this — that I would announce a visit after so long — leaves a tang. We both wear lobotomised smiles to fend off that awkwardness. The nice bottle of wine I bought as a gift is heavy under my arm. I waggle it in front of her. She presses her palms to her chest.
“Oh Paige, that’s so nice. You shouldn’t have.”
She takes it from me as I shrug and say, “Well, it’s belated.”
She leads me through a beige hallway into a front room painted a fashionable dark blue. That sort of carrot-hued, autumnal light comes in through the large window, lighting up velvet sofas in teal. Up one side of the room are shelves. A photo of Maggie and Zanna from uni hangs in a gold, gilded frame. On a low coffee table is a teapot and madeleines. Maggie pours the tea into cups that match the room. It’s hideously kitsch, awfully basic.
“Wow, it’s so beautifully decorated,” I say. Maggie smiles. “And what a great location, really,” I add. That’s a lie too, but it’s what you’re supposed to say.
“So nice to move out of London proper,” Maggie says. “It’s so relaxing. Much greener and people are much nicer.”
She talks like it’s the Cotswolds, rather than a settlement focused around one of the Tube’s most obscure stops.
“I don’t think I could ever live so centrally now,” she says. Of course she says this. No, she couldn’t continue to live centrally in a hovel barely appropriate for students. Would she live centrally in a flat like mine, with river views and a Charcoal Mist kitchen? We both know she would.
“So, how are things going?” I ask, obligatorily.
“Great!” Maggie says. “Only a few months till the documentary comes out really.”
Eleven weeks, I think. Seventy-seven days. It sounds like so many, but it feels like so few.
“Oh gosh, I know.” I rub my cheek. “I’ll be so relieved when it’s all over.”
Maggie begins to tell me about her work, freelance graphic design stuff, which is picking up, she’s happy to report. I keep my breathing steady. While her words fade in and out, I try to smile at the right points.
“You’ve not touched your tea.”
“Sorry?” I’m yanked out of my panicked trance.
“You haven’t had any of your tea?” Her inflection rises at the end as she gestures at the cup.
“Oh right. Yeah.”
I breathe out heavily, flustered, trying to stop my hand shaking as I sip from the bland, hot drink. I try to gather my thoughts. What am I even doing here? I don’t really know, except that I suspect Gianna of something. I’m trying to gather evidence to support my suspicions, but I’m floundering around. I know it full well, I’m horribly powerless.
“Did you have a nice time at the charity event?” I ask.
Maggie nods. “Oh yes, it was lovely. Well done for organising it again.”
I nod and smile. It’s not really me who organises it. It’s all the charities. I turn up and do a little talk. I don’t correct her, though — what would be the point? Let her believe it. I smile, nod and swallow.
“So,” I say, putting my mug down. “I heard something at the event.”
Maggie’s brow wrinkles. It’s so nice to speak to someone who hasn’t used Botox to freeze their forehead. You get to miss those little expression lines in the world of influencers and PR girls.
“Oh?” she says.
“Yeah. Sheryl says Gianna’s taking part?”
Now it’s Maggie’s turn to swallow. She puts her own mug down and adopts a smooth, meditation voice. “Yeah,” she says, breathing out the word.
“I just thought she would tell us, if she was taking part. Or me,” I add. “I guess you knew?”
Maggie nodded.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” I ask.
Maggie sighs and leans back on her chair. “It just feels very difficult, Paige. I mean, after we all grew apart after Zanna—”
I cut her off. “We didn’t grow apart, you guys started leaving me out.”
I cringe as I say it. She blinks nervously. I sound like I’m eleven years old again, being bullied in the school playground.
Maggie’s eyes widen, in a genuine sympathy. “It wasn’t like that, Paige, really. I mean, I tried to stay in touch, didn’t I? It was just hard with Gianna. She felt really strongly about stuff, you know, after Zanna died.”
My pulse quickens.
“You know, there was speculation after Zanna . . . about me? Horrible stuff, like I had something to do with it?” I say, mouth thick — and not from grease and madeleine crumbs alone.
She nods and then shakes her head, showing an overt disapproval for the suspicion of me. I take a breath. “Well.” My voice rattles. “I always wondered, got the impression, maybe, that Gianna thought that maybe there was some truth to it.”
Maggie raises a hand to her chest and begins vigorously shaking her head.
“No, no, she doesn’t. I promise you that, Paige.”
I wipe my hair away from my face with a shaky hand. I had never thought I would find myself talking about all this, with Maggie of all people. Going live on my Instagram to millions of followers was easy compared to this real-life scenario.
“I’m so sorry you think that, Paige, it’s not that at all.”
“Then why? Why does she hate me so much?”
“Well, you know, you did sometimes butt heads; it didn’t get off to a good start when you called her stupid at Sushi Samba.”
I fight, hard, the urge to roll my eyes.
“But mostly, she thinks it’s not right the way you and Shane got together after Zanna died. She thinks it’s weird, like, morally questionable.”
I open my mouth to defend myself, but Maggie interrupts.
“I don’t, Paige. You know, a lot of people don’t. But Gianna’s like that. But I’m sorry it all got fucked up with the four of us. I am.”
I nod. “It’s okay. I mean, it happens. Life happens.”
Possibly longing for respite from this conversation, Maggie goes to make another pot of tea.
“Are you okay?” Maggie asks, when she has again returned from the recess of her kitchen. “Besides this stress with the documentary, and everything. How are things with Shane?”
Why does her voice sound like that? Perhaps I shake my head too fast, too panicked, because I seem to wordlessly confirm something for Maggie, who looks down and swallows.
“Perfect,” I say.
“That’s good.” She has the tone of a counsellor now, as she puts her teacup gently down. “Zanna told me, sometimes . . .” Maggie says, every word a foot on ever thinner ice.
I take a deep breath.
“Zanna told me, sometimes, Shane could be . . .”
Could be . . .
“Volatile.”
Volatile, is that the word Zanna used?
“Oh.”
My syllable hangs there, between my mouth and Maggie’s concern-creased brow.
“I guess everyone has their moments,” I say. I regret agreeing to stay for this second pot of tea.
“Are you two happy, though?” Maggie asks. She’s not asking exactly what she wants to ask. She means, does he shout? Does he break things? Does he hit?
“We are.” I smile. “We really are.”
She nods, satisfied.
I go on, perhaps for my benefit. “I don’t know what Zanna told you, but I suppose, relationships can be different, with different people. Don’t worry about Shane and me, we are good. Great.”
*
On the train, on the way home, I sit bundled into the corner of a four-seat cluster at the very back of a carriage, broken by the day. I forgot having friends meant you are expected to open up, crack like a nut. I’m smashed right now. Pulverised. If it’s true, what Maggie said about Gianna, that she didn’t suspect me of anything to do with Zanna’s death, then she would have no reason to send the note. I can’t be sure. But then, I try one more thing. Out of desperation. In case.
I hit reply to the last email.
Gianna, is this you?
My hands shake. A response comes back immediately.
You wish, bitch.