Our House(32)

‘So is everyone when you’ve only spoken to them for two minutes,’ she said. ‘So was Bram once, probably.’

‘Bram was never uncomplicated,’ I said. ‘In fact, he was acting a bit weird the other night. Have you seen much of him on his days at the house?’

‘No.’ She pulled a face. ‘You know what weekends are like.’

Comments like this brought me up short: I was no longer at home at the weekends, at least not till Sunday afternoon, because we had chosen to do things differently from other people. Yes, our friends were supportive, but there was an element of spectacle to the dynamic, as if they were watching us from the stalls, any show of faith provisional.

‘Teething problems with the bird’s nest?’ she suggested on cue.

‘I don’t think it was that. I don’t know what it was.’

We looked at each other and I sensed what was coming.

‘So, listen, we haven’t really talked about how this is going to work.’

I watched her stir her cocktail with the straw, I hoped Bram wasn’t drinking on duty at the house.

Stop thinking about him!

‘For instance, can I invite you both to the same thing? I mean, I wouldn’t be so insensitive,’ she added, hastily, ‘but what about things that I’ve already invited you both to?’

‘Alison,’ I said. ‘I told you before – you don’t have to pick sides. You can invite whoever you like to whatever you like and I’ll be nothing but courteous to all concerned.’

‘I’m sorry, but no one can be this forgiving,’ she said.

‘I’m not forgiving, I’m just doing my best to control the impact events have on me. If I have to make adjustments to my life, then I’ll be damned if anyone else decides what they’ll be.’

I let my eyes drift to Toby, still standing alone at the bar and now in possession of a drink. Perhaps he was early meeting someone for dinner – her choice, then, since he was a newcomer to Alder Rise. An online date, no doubt. As if sensing my attention, he rotated slowly, missing me in his surveillance before returning to his drink.


Bram, Word document

I was with the kids at the farmers’ market on Sunday morning when I first saw Wendy. It was nine days after the Silver Road incident and frequent checks online at the internet café, as well as of the various local papers left on the train, had yielded no further news on the victims. I continued to function in a state of high agitation; as I surveyed the stalls of cheeses and honeys and wild boar burgers, it was as if I had never seen such a spectacle before, had been stripped of my middle-class credentials. My citizenship.

I didn’t fancy her that day. I was in a different mode (the mode of father trying to act normally, feel normally, while looking over his shoulder for the squad car at the kerb), but I noticed her noticing me. Fi used to say that a huge part of attraction was simply being made aware that the other person is interested in you, that deep down we didn’t develop much from our teenage selves, flattered by the first head to turn our way. In other words, we’ll take anyone who’ll take us. True, of course. This woman was interested and had she caught my eye two weeks ago I might have been interested in return.

Ten minutes of queueing for artisan fudge made with popping candy later, when I next looked, she’d gone. After that it was all about whose mouth explosion was the more violent and whether a piece should be saved for Rocky, the Osbornes’ dog, or would that be cruelty to animals and if it was cruelty to animals then didn’t that mean it was cruelty to humans too, since Mrs Carver in Year Three said humans were animals too, and maybe they should call the police and get Dad arrested.

‘Nine-nine-nine, you have to phone,’ Harry said.

‘No, one-oh-one if it’s not an emergency,’ Leo corrected him, with a tone of moral superiority he often used with his brother.

‘But it is an emergency. Someone could choke to death!’ Now Harry began chanting – ‘Dad’s going to pri-son, Dad’s going to pri-son!’ – loudly enough for people to look.

‘Don’t joke,’ I said and I made a passable job of finding the whole thing funny, as opposed to wanting to lean into the nearest bin and vomit up breakfast.


‘Fi’s Story’ > 01:18:44

In a way, I didn’t care if Toby phoned me or not. The feeling that I might like to sleep with him was enough, a feeling matched only by the exhilaration of knowing I was free to choose either way. I was no longer loving and cherishing and being faithful to Bram as long as we both shall live.

According to Polly, I had been institutionalized by my marriage. I’d laboured under a form of Stockholm syndrome.

Still, I was a free woman now – at least I thought I was.

# VictimFi

@Tracey_Harrisuk LOL Stockholm syndrome!

@crimeaddict @Tracey_Harrisuk She’s not free if she’s still legally married #justsaying





Bram, Word document

Tuesday brought my semi-regular slot with Rog Osborne at the Two Brewers and I headed there straight from the station, even though we weren’t meeting for another hour. It was becoming obvious that I could deal better with the crushing weight of guilt and uncertainty if I avoided time alone and spent my idle hours with a drink in my hand.

Rog managed roughly half the number of pints I did before calling time on the grounds of being middle-aged and/or under his wife’s thumb, and he was just draining his last when, glancing past him, I saw her again: the woman from the farmers’ market. As I say, I’d had a bit to drink and I started making some connections: the flat was mine and, God, it was eleven days since the horror and it had been such a strain to be my usual self at work and with the kids and even here with Rog and I suppose I thought I deserved something to take my mind off it. (Even I wouldn’t use the word ‘reward’.)