Bring Me Back (B.A. Paris)(54)

It’s the word Layla that does it, the word Layla that triggers desire in me, that makes me crush her to me, that makes me pick her up in my arms and lie her down on the bed. It’s the word Layla that drives me to make love to her in a way that I never have before, not even that first time, when I had imagined she was Layla. It’s the name that I murmur, the name I cry out, the name that beats in my brain when it’s all over.

And it’s the sound of Ellen crying quietly beside me that brings me back from where I disappeared to.

Burning with shame, I get out of bed, grab the boxers from the floor, and go heavily downstairs to the kitchen. I want to tell Layla that she has won, that I’ve done as she asked, that I’ve killed Ellen, because that’s how it feels. I open the back door and cross the garden to my office. Opening my computer, I see that there’s a message waiting for me, from Layla.





Come to the cottage


When?





Now


Relief washes over me – I have somewhere to go. I can’t stay here, not after what I’ve done. If I leave now, I won’t have to face Ellen. If I go now, Layla will be waiting for me.

Except that my clothes are upstairs, in the bedroom. I cast my mind around, wondering if there are any downstairs that I can wear. But I need my car keys and they’re in the pocket of my jeans.

I go back to the house, hoping that Ellen will be asleep. In the moonlight coming through the window I see her curled up on the bed in a foetal position. Layla used to sleep like that and I would unfold her and take her in my arms, hold her body against mine. Layla. No need to banish her from my mind any more. Soon, I will see her. Soon we’ll be together.

I dress quickly, trying to make as little sound as possible. I feel in the pocket of my jeans – my keys are there. I take my mobile from where I left it on the side.

‘Where are you going?’

I freeze. Ellen sits up, turns on her lamp. A soft light bathes the room and red-hot shame floods my body. I want to say something, apologise, tell her how sorry I am. But how can sorry make up for what I did, for making love to her as if I was making love to Layla, for calling out for Layla? I think about turning and leaving without saying anything. But she deserves more than that.

‘Out,’ I say, my voice thick with secrets.

‘To Layla?’

My heart thumps. I don’t want to lie but I can’t tell the truth either.

‘Why do you say that?’

She opens the drawer in her bedside table, scoops something out with both hands. There’s the sound of wood on wood as she throws a pile of little Russian dolls onto the bed.

‘I found these in your office.’

Anger surfaces. ‘You went rooting around in my office?’

‘I wanted to know why you spent so much time in there. What else have you been keeping from me?’

‘Nothing! I kept finding dolls, I didn’t tell you about them because I didn’t want you to worry.’

Her voice rises an octave ‘No, you didn’t tell me about them because you wanted to keep Layla to yourself!’

‘No!’ I yell. ‘It wasn’t like that!’

‘Have you been in contact with her?’ Unable to answer, I start to leave the room. ‘Finn, come back!’ But I’m already running down the stairs. ‘Finn!’ Her voice follows me down to the hall and out of the front door. ‘Don’t go!’

There’s a light on in Mick’s house, from one of the upstairs windows, and I wonder if he heard us arguing. Voices carry at night.

I use the drive to Devon to push my anger aside. There’s hardly anyone on the road, just a lone traveller or two, like me. I drive fast, but not faster than I should. Come to the cottage, Layla had said, which means she’s already there, waiting. When did she arrive? Did she go there as soon as she’d posted the last little doll to me?

It’s just gone three in the morning when I arrive in St Mary’s. I had expected to see a light on in the cottage but it’s in darkness. It doesn’t mean anything, I tell myself, it doesn’t mean she isn’t there. But there is a sense of foreboding as I get out of the car which increases when I see the garden. Even in the darkness I can see that the flowers Thomas so carefully planted are dead, as are the ones in the window-boxes. Another omen. Even to my desperate eye, the cottage looks deserted.

No one opens the front door at the sound of the gate scraping on the ground, no one comes running down the stairs in answer to my heavy knock. It’s then that I realise I don’t have my keys. I’d believed so completely that Layla would be waiting for me that it hadn’t mattered.

I take off my jumper, wrap it round my fist and punch a hole in the kitchen window, snap off the remaining glass and use the light from my mobile to look around the room. Everything looks just as it did last time I was here. I stick my head inside, listen. There’s nothing to tell me anyone is there.

I don’t want to believe I’ve been brought all the way here for nothing. I check my phone for emails – Layla might have been delayed, she might be on her way. But there’s nothing from her, so I send a message.

I’m here, at the cottage.

Where are you?

I’m here

Where?





IN SIMONSBRIDGE