“Are you trying to make a point?”
“You’ve been very busy recently.”
“You know how important this is to me. To us. Please don’t have a go.”
“I’m not having a go, Alison. I just said it would be nice. That’s all.”
Traffic slowing at the top of Holloway, and the turnoff before Archway. Home. Where the heart is. I reach into my pocket to make sure that my phone’s still there, but stop myself from checking to see if Patrick has texted. I get out of the car and turn to Matilda, a smile firmly on my face. She takes my hand as we walk into the house.
I shower, scrubbing all traces of Patrick from me. I try not to think about my head pushed against the desk, him insistent above me, the pressure that drove hard edges into all of my soft surfaces. I eat the bacon sandwich that Carl leaves congealing for me on the kitchen counter, focusing on the sounds of Matilda playing in the garden, kicking through leaves and scooting round the lawn, back and forth, fort, da. She is a pendulum chiming between this reality and the other one that still isn’t texting me, however firmly I tell myself to stop checking. I start to open the murder file, then close it. The temptation to hide in the brief is almost irresistible, to retreat behind statement and summary rather than confront the reality of my own life and the mess I keep making of it, the ways I upset Carl and Tilly. But I know I’ll only make matters worse if I start working now. Later.
Friends for lunch, Carl cooking—nothing but the best for these people he’s known since university. A leg of lamb spluttering in the oven, the tang of rosemary sharp in the air. The kitchen scrubbed clean, a frame waiting for its picture. Carl has laid the table already, napkins folded rigid on the side plates that crowd into the knives and forks. The blackboard in the corner is wiped clean of the week’s activities—no longer a litany of swimming, shopping, and the times for Carl’s men’s group meetings, it now simply says Love the weekend! in Matilda’s careful print, with a drawing of two stick people holding hands, one tall, one small.
The kitchen counters are clear, the cupboard doors closed, an array of white surfaces blank against me. I attempt to rearrange a bunch of white lilies that Carl has put in a vase but fat splotches of yellow pollen fall on the table. I wipe them up with my sleeve and move away quickly.
I join Matilda in the garden, admire the spider’s web that covers the blackcurrant bush and the collection of twigs in the holly tree that’s definitely a nest, Mummy, you can see that. Maybe a robin lives there? Maybe.
“We’ll have to get some food, Mummy. For the bird so she can feed her children.”
“All right, sweetie. We’ll go and buy some peanuts.”
“Not peanuts. They told us about it at school. Birds like balls of fat with things stuck in them.”
“That sounds revolting. What kind of things?”
“I don’t know, seeds, worms maybe?”
“Let’s ask Daddy, sweetie. Maybe he’ll know. Or we can look it up.”
Carl calls us in. The guests have arrived, and he’s taking the lamb out of the oven. I admire it and move to the fridge to sort out drinks, both of us falling naturally into the roles we always play when Dave and Louisa come round. We’ve weekend-lunched with them since before the children, days when light falls to dark as we sit at the table drinking bottle on bottle, stuffed on Carl’s cooking. I give a glass of juice to Flora, their daughter, and uncork the wine.
“Dave is driving. I’ll have some, though.” Louisa holds out her hand for the glass that I’ve just poured.
“Are you drinking, Alison?” Carl puts some crisps in a bowl, having covered the lamb with foil.
“Yes. Why not? It’s Saturday.”
“I’d just have thought, after last night…” He doesn’t need to finish the sentence.
“After last night what?”
“You might have had enough? Anyway, it was just a thought. Don’t worry about it.”
“I’m not.” I pour myself more than I mean to, splashing sauvignon blanc over the sides of the glass. Louisa crooks her head to one side, intrigued.
“What happened last night?”
I look at her face, hoping I’m imagining the edge in her tone. “Nothing, it was Friday, you know…”
“Mummy was so tired she fell asleep in her chair in chambers! We had to go and collect her this morning. Daddy said we needed to look after her,” Matilda pipes up. I cover my face with my hands, rub my eyes.
“Mummy fell asleep in chambers? She must have been very tired. Why don’t you and Flora take some of these crisps through to the other room?” Louisa says, pushing a bowl of crisps into Matilda’s hand and ushering them to the door.
Yes, tired, that’s all. Tired to the bone.
“So they finally gave you a murder? That’s great news. You must have had to do some massive favor for that clerk of yours to pull it off.” Dave smirks.
“All earned through her own hard work, Dave. I’m sure she deserves this.” Louisa glares at him, raises her glass to me.
“What’s it about? Lots of blood and gore? Go on, give us the juicy details.”
“Dave, not in front of the children…” Louisa says.
“To be honest, I haven’t had the chance to look at it in detail. I’m going to start tomorrow, try and get to grips with whatever it’s about.” I raise my glass back to Louisa and down its contents.
“I thought we might go out for the day tomorrow,” Carl says, face downcast. “Tilly, didn’t I say we’d all go out for the day?”
“Yes, I want to visit that castle, the one with the maze. You promised we’d all go, Daddy.” Matilda’s bottom lip sticks out, her treat disappearing before her.
“I wish you’d checked what I was doing first…” I swallow the words. I can always work when we get home, after she goes to bed. It’ll be fun. She’ll run round the maze and I’ll follow, turning right, left, right until we know we’re lost and shout for help, laughing all the while. “Of course we’ll go to the castle, darling.” The more we play happy families, the more it’ll come to pass.
Dave’s work. Lou’s work. Carl’s therapy clients—no names, only some vague details about his new weekly group meetings for sex-addicted men that make Dave and Louisa laugh nervously. I half listen—I deal with enough sex cases at work to be that interested. No more talk of my murder. Holding my glass by the stem I take one drink, another, hoping I’ll drown the anxious voices muttering in my ear about the trial and how long it’ll take to prepare.
“Shall we do some karaoke?” I say.
“Let’s have some cheese. I bought some port.” Carl, the host with the most. He keeps house better than I ever could.
“Brie?” I offer as I cut off a chunk.
“Alison, look what you did. You cut off the nose,” Carl says.
I look at the brie, then at the piece on my knife. My throat closes and I put the cheese back on the board, pushing the pieces back together. I can hear Carl sigh but I’m too tired to deal with it.
“Seriously, anyone want to do some karaoke?” Singing will lift my mood. I’ll do Adele.