White Bodies(24)
Two young women in front of us hug each other.
“Let us welcome Chloey’s loving brother, Brandon, who has kindly agreed to share some memories of Chloey.”
I whisper to Belle: “She’s not dead yet.”
Everyone claps, and a woman calls out: “Bless you, Brandon!” We can see that he’s a skinny teenager in jeans and trainers and a hoodie. His face is deathly pale, his eyes so tired he can barely open them. Brandon mumbles into the microphone, reading from a scrap of paper:
“My mum and dad and I would like to tell you some things about Chloey. My sister is a normal girl. She likes shopping, going out to clubs, buying makeup. Her favorite song is the Lumineers’ ‘Ho Hey.’?” Here someone shouts out “Ho! Hey!” “She likes Taylor Swift and she doesn’t rate Justin Bieber or One Direction.” We laugh politely. “Her favorite film is Bridesmaids, and her favorite James Bond is Daniel Craig.”
I feel like whispering “Predictable.” But I don’t, because Belle might think I’m disrespectful, which I’m not.
“Chloey is brave. When Travis Scott made threats, she said she wouldn’t hide like a scared animal, and she carried on going out with her friends and going to work. But now my sister is fighting for her life. We believe Travis is damaged and dangerous, and we would like to make a plea. Someone somewhere must know where he is. Please tell the police.”
The vicar puts his arm round Brandon, and the vigil part of the evening begins with helpers handing out candles that we light, one from the next. Then, in a pompous voice, the vicar reads out a bunch of statistics that Belle and I are already familiar with. Two British women a week are murdered by their male partners, he tells us. In America three women and one man are murdered by their partners every single day.
When he’s finished, the Flicks run onto the stage, and a guy with black eyeliner starts singing about death and rage, pouting his lips at the microphone in a way that Belle thinks is sexy. I don’t like their music, though; it’s too loud, and I think about going back to London. But Belle says, “Do come and stay. I’ve bought food for breakfast, croissants and strawberry jam and real coffee.” She’s so sweet and kind that I say okay, and we shuffle through the crowd and catch the bus to Dringhouses.
At Belle’s flat, she shows me the bedroom I can use, which is prepared for Lavender and her children. The bed is made up with a shiny bedspread with sequin edges, and fluffy cushions, and folded-up pink towels that look new. On the dressing table, she’s placed plastic bottles of Boots rose-scented shampoo, bubble bath, face cream and eau de cologne, laid out in a crescent shape; and next to them the presents for Alfie and Saskia, wrapped in yellow paper and tied with ribbon. I tell Belle she’s being a brilliant friend, and then we watch the BBC News, learning that, after we left York Minster, Travis Scott was arrested. A local news report shows a small crowd at the police station, yelling abuse. A woman with a baby in a buggy is screaming: “Hang the filthy bastard!”
“They shouldn’t behave like that,” I say. “It’s ugly.”
Belle makes hot chocolate and I’m impressed that she has a box of sprinkles in her cupboard to go on top. Belle says as she heads off to bed, “Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep.”
In the morning she has to leave for work at six thirty, even though it’s a Saturday, and she comes to my bedroom to say good-bye. I’m half-asleep, but I roll over to say thank you for everything, and I see her in her nurse’s uniform, all clean and pressed. “You’re the angel,” I say, and she laughs quietly and leaves me to go back to sleep. Later, I find the croissants and jam on the dining table, nicely set out on plates next to a small vase of tulips and some white cloth napkins. I eat breakfast, then let myself out of the flat and catch the bus to the station.
13
I think about the way Belle’s caring for Lavender and it makes me realize that I should be more proactive on behalf of Tilda. So, as soon as I get home, I phone Tilda’s cleaning lady.
Eva obviously isn’t expecting my call because she keeps saying “Huh? Huh?” in an irritated voice. It seems that Tilda forgot to tell her that I might need the spare key to the flat, and at first she doesn’t believe that we are sisters because she doesn’t even know that Tilda has a sister, and she wants to text Tilda to make sure. I tell her not to, that Tilda won’t want to be disturbed while she’s lying on a beach in Martinique. Eventually Eva agrees to meet me at the flat, and I offer to bring a photo of Tilda and me when we were children, to prove who I am. “Don’t bother,” she says grumpily. “I remember something now about Callie.” (She pronounces my name Collie.) So she’d known all along about me and was being difficult. Even so, I copy Belle and when I arrive I have a bottle of lilac bath soak with me. Eva takes it without saying thank you, dropping it straight into her bag. “It’s not my cleaning day,” she says. Then she gives me the key and leaves me alone.
I haven’t seen Tilda’s flat since Felix’s builders were there, doing their work. “Nothing drastic,” Felix had said. But the place is transformed, hardly recognizable, and for an instant I’m disorientated, as though I’ve come to the wrong place. Before the builders, Tilda’s main room had been in three distinct parts—kitchen and dining and sitting—all of them different colors, with cobbled-together, makeshift furniture, acquired before she became successful. It was messy and cluttered. But now the place is a single minimalist shell in shades of white and pale gray. A nearly white stone floor instead of painted boards. Two white leather sofas where the old sofa with the mangled springs had been. The squashy comfy chair is gone, along with the pine table and the kitchen units, all replaced by white furniture. I guess that the paint on the walls is called soft baby fawn or bare buff or something else equally anemic. The brightest presences are the pale yellow blinds and a wan lemon-colored orchid.