The Rose Petal Beach

  Tami stands uncomfortably in her own living room and stares at me.

  ‘Did I hear the phone?’ she asks.

  I say nothing, but my eyes dart to the phone in its cradle, the image of Scott’s face evaporated but the memory of hearing his voice, discovering the way he really spoke to her, really felt about her, lingering like a heavy, cloying perfume that will take time to disappear. I press harder at the scar, at where the weight of the world lives, at where the guilt has started.

  Her eyes go from me to the phone then back to me before moving on, like they always do eventually. She knows.

  She knows I picked up the phone and it was Scott. She’s probably wondering what I told him, if I begged him to come back to me. If it’s only a matter of time before he is at the door claiming me. ‘Don’t answer my phone,’ she says calmly and not unpleasantly.

  ‘Sorry,’ I mumble. ‘Sorry for answering your phone. Sorry for sleeping with your husband. Sorry for trying to manipulate you into leaving him. Sorry for ruining your life. Sorry for everything. I am truly, truly sorry.’ Except I don’t say those things. I don’t say the single word. I don’t say those sentences. I’m not sorry enough to breathe in her presence right now. I’m not even sure I’m sorry enough to carry on living.

  Tami

  Something is different about her. I noticed it when I walked into the living room and she was standing there, clutching her chest, her body so rigid it seemed capable of shattering if I breathed too hard in her direction, looking as if she had just been diagnosed with cancer all over again.

  She’d been talking to Scott, I realised when I asked about the phone. He’s the only one with that number, so she must have been. I don’t know what he said to her, I don’t know if he told her off, or said he’d never loved her, but it’s as if her spirit – whatever it is that has kept her going so far – has been peeled away by a sharp knife, leaving her with nothing. Leaving her with the shell of the person who doesn’t make it down to breakfast or any other meals any more, and barely raises her head when I take meals up to her.

  I think she’s given up.

  That selfishness, that denial about what their affair was about, that constant arguing we were doing was driving her. It’s evaporated. All I can see is a person who is sorry, a person disintegrating under the weight of her guilt.

  She’s given up.

  I need to speak to Scott, to find out what he said, but that would mean speaking to Scott. I still can’t manage that. We text and email about the girls, but we don’t speak. I can’t talk to him. His voice would sound the same, and he’d call me TB and arrange his words in sentences that I found so familiar and comforting, and normal, I’d only have the truck-smash sensation all over again when I put the phone down. Anyway, who rings her husband to find out what he said to his mistress to make her give up on life? Me, apparently. Because this is the life I have been placed in. This is the life I’ve got since Mirabelle died and I have been battling with my own guilt demons.

  I think she’s given up on life.

  And I don’t know if I’m strong enough to find out how to make her live again.

  The Rose Petal Beach picture is in front of me. The way Mirabelle said she knew the artist makes me think now that they were probably lovers. That’s why the picture is so intimate, the shape of her body so accurate, so precise. The person who had captured Mirabelle on this canvas knew her so well, had loved her so completely, they could put into the image something unique and precious. Every stroke is an act of love, a sonnet to the perfection they saw as Mirabelle.

  The ache of missing her unfolds inside and I have to close my eyes as the suddenness, the enormity of it yawns throughout my body.

  Mirabelle would have wanted to live. She would have given anything to live. The split fingernails, the state of the bathroom, the bruising on her body that DS Harvan told me about say that she fought as hard as she could to live. Her terror at what was coming must have been huge, insurmountable. Drowning, her lungs filling up with water each time she was submerged, the pain of fighting, the horror of knowing that she couldn’t stop what was happening to her.

  Knowing, as she died, that she would never see her daughter again. She would be permanently leaving behind her baby girl.

  Her face becomes clear in my mind, in the space where the chasm of missing her is, and I see her smile, I see her skin, the curls of her black hair, the look in her eyes that made her Mirabelle. Gone. It’s gone. She’s gone.

  And now we have Beatrix.

  She’s given up on life.

  If I had believed Mirabelle, would her death still have happened?

  ‘Get off me! Don’t touch me!’

  There’s nothing I can do realistically to ‘save’ Beatrix. But I can help her. The question is, do I want to help her? She has helped me. Having her here, in my life, in my house, has held back the devastation, like Moses holding back the mighty, raging waters of the Red Sea. The pain and horror and sorrow, the deep wound is still there, but they are transmuted, frozen, waiting for the time they will be allowed to flow again. There is a time limit, of course, on how long I can defer the crash, but at the moment it is a divine luxury to be able to think, feel, breathe without being mentally and emotionally devastated.

  Beatrix has given up on life. If I do nothing, it will be me who helped to kill her. It will be another death on my conscience; another splash of blood on my soul.

  The shaking is back as I reach for the phone.

  A second after I hit the dial button the line clicks to connect.

  ‘Hello, Scott,’ I say before he can speak. I need to delay hearing his voice for as long as possible because as soon as I do, I will become undone, like the threads of my life that have already been unwoven, I will come apart. ‘I think we need to talk.’

  ‘Hi, TB,’ he replies.

  And I am undone.

  Tami

  ‘Beatrix.’ How many times have I said her name since I found out? I’ve avoided saying it because her name was synonymous with the role she had in cleaving our lives apart.

  I can tell I haven’t said her name too often because she stops staring at the window and refocuses on me. This room is a pit now. She has left it to go to the toilet, to go for a shower and to come back. She has been wallowing in bed, staring at the window, sometimes with the television on, sometimes with the radio on, mostly there is silence. I don’t know if she has been surfing the internet on her phone, but I know that mostly it is quiet in here. As quiet and still and darkened as you would imagine a mausoleum.

  The blinds are always closed, firmly shut against the outside world. Light seeps in, of course, light is like life, it will not give up until it absolutely has no choice, but this room is dark, and it is quiet and it is still. The air has not moved in a long time, it has become stained, infected with the smell of sleeping bodies and food. It is stagnant. And I’m not going to put up with it for a moment longer.

  Even though I have her attention, I stand and go to the window. I tug on the blinds cords to let in light, to let in the outside world, and then my fingers fumble for the catch, to open it, to let in some air, some new life.

  ‘Nggghhhh,’ she groans from the bed. ‘Don’t.’ She moves in bed, shies away from the light, pulling the covers over her head, disappearing from the freshness that has instantly started to wake up the room. There are security latches stopping the windows opening more than an inch or two, and if I didn’t have to go back to the bedside table to get the key, I would throw them wide open letting the world around us cleanse this room of the staleness within.

  ‘Beatrix,’ I say again, the word mottling on my tongue, as I return to my seat beside the bed.

  She slowly lowers her barrier of covers, to look at me again. Surprised that I have said that word, her name, again.

  ‘He loved you,’ I say. I don’t lie. I don’t lie unless … ‘I, erm, spoke to him. And he loved you. That doesn’t mean he didn’t love me as well, but you know … Scott. You know
he’s complicated. He loved you. I know he did.’ Unless I have to. Unless I have this huge, terrible thing that I need to make up for in any way I can.

  Moving as if she is in great pain, she eases herself upright in bed until her upper half – covered in a grubby, off-white top that I recognise as her yoga kit – is completely exposed. ‘Why are you saying this shit to me?’ she asks.

  ‘Because … because it’s the truth.’

  ‘No it’s not,’ she says, her face twisted in disgust. ‘Of course it’s not. What are you doing?’

  ‘I’m …’ I begin.

  ‘I fucked your husband, remember? For nearly two years. In this bed. I fucked your husband and I fucked you over, and I know it wasn’t because he loved me. It was because he could and I would. So why are you saying this shit to me?’

  I’m shaking. I thought I could do this and I thought I could be strong. But the shaking is back. The need for a drink is back. The feeling of fear at what I think I have done is back. ‘Because it’s enough. There’s been enough loss and I want it to stop. You’ve given up because you think he didn’t love you. I need you to go back to fighting and looking after yourself and believing you can get through this. Mirabelle … She had no choice in what happened to her. But you do. You need to … just live, Beatrix, don’t give up. I can’t lose you, too.’

  She stares at me, her forefinger and middle finger pressed against her trembling lips. ‘What is wrong with you?’ she snaps. ‘Why can’t you just hate me and be done with it? I did a horrible, horrible thing to you and to your family. If it was me, I would have put my foot down when I saw you in the road, not slowed down. I would have ripped out every hair on your head and scratched your face off. I remember how much I raged when I found out what my husband had been up to. I remember the unquenchable anger I had in me. But you … You won’t hate me. WHY DON’T YOU HATE ME?’

  She thinks I’m being a saint. I am not a saint. I am a person who is scared. I am scared of what I’m capable of. I am scared of the memories that are being pieced together from that night. I am not a saint, I am simply scared.

  ‘I do hate you and I hate what you did,’ I say to her. ‘But I hate the thought of you dying more. It really is that simple.’

  She stares at me for a few long, tense seconds. But it isn’t until she disintegrates in tears that I realise that, without even trying, I’ve hurt her more than I thought possible.

  Beatrix

  ‘I do hate you and I hate what you did,’ she says to me. ‘But I hate the thought of you dying more. It really is that simple.’

  The thing is, I am meant to pass away peacefully in my sleep from natural causes aged 99. I am meant to be surrounded by my beautiful brood; I am meant to be holding the hand of the man I love, who will pass away within days of me because he can’t contemplate remaining on earth without me. I am meant to be a mother and a grandmother and I am meant to have lived a fabulous, fulfilling life.

  They caught it early. I know this. The prognosis is EXCELLENT, (even though there are no certainties in this world). I know this, too. I am almost fully recovered from surgery. I am fit. I am young.

  In the grand scheme of things, I am doing well, better than a lot of others with my condition.

  In the small scheme of things that is my life, I am sitting in a bed bent so far forwards my forehead is almost making contact with my outstretched knees, my arms around my waist, and I am sobbing. My body is rocking as it is racked with agonised sobs. Five little letters have done this to me. Five letters beginning with D.

  That is the first time anyone has used the D word about me in relation to this. They talk around it, they use words like ‘prognosis’ and ‘mortality’ and ‘stages’ and ‘grades’, all to avoid using the range of D words that mean the same final thing. I am dying. My body is attacking itself and I am dying.

  I am dying.

  I. AM. DYING.

  I haven’t accepted that. Why would I when we don’t talk about it? When we can’t stand up and look that word in the eye. Not in this context. How many times have I disrespected the range of D words by merely throwing it in with a jumble of phrases about something frivolous and unimportant: ‘I was so embarrassed I could have died.’ ‘I’d die for another piece of cake.’ ‘I looked like death warmed up.’ I never meant it. I never understood it. It was never truly relevant to me. Why would it be when I am young and healthy? When things like that, you know, the D stuff, happen to other people. People like me do not get these sort of test results other unfortunates do. They’re the people whose misfortune and misery you absolutely understand and feel for; their pain and hurt churns you inside because you completely understand what they are going through. And, you’re so deeply affected by their plight you keep them in your thoughts; you say a prayer if you’re that way inclined; you cross your fingers and hope that it all works out for them to beat the odds no matter how slim.

  BULL SHIT that you understand. You have no idea.

  I had no idea.

  I had no idea until it happened to me.

  And even then, even then, the D words were off limits. They were caged away from me, everyone careful not to use them, everyone stopping their sentences rather than utter the ultimate taboo to me. It wasn’t going to happen as long as no one spoke of it.

  Now she has spoken it. She has said it. And everything is falling apart.

  ‘I’m sorry, God, I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean … I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.’

  ‘It’s not your fault,’ I sob.

  ‘I’m so sorry.’

  She’s sobbing now, horrified she has broken the taboo.

  ‘God,’ she is digging the heels of her hands into her eyes, ‘what is wrong with me? I’m sorry, I’m so sorry.’

  ‘Tami, I ruined your life, please stop saying sorry.’ I can’t bear it, you know? I can’t bear how noble and kind she is. Kindness is so underrated. She has sacrificed so much of herself to help me out and she still has the decency to be devastated. I can’t bear it.

  ‘Do you know why you and Scott hurt so much?’ she says suddenly, her sobs subsiding.

  I don’t want to talk about Scott, especially not now. Especially when I’ve just realised I. AM. DYING. But do I get to choose what I do and don’t want to talk about? Maybe I would if I hadn’t been such a selfish bitch pretty much my whole life. I shake my head.

  ‘It,’ she inhales deeply, drawing on her courage, ‘it was because I wondered if you were the type of woman he’s always actually wanted.’ Her tear-stained eyes are heavy and tired. Without warning she stands and then climbs onto the bed, resting her head on the pillow next to me as she curls up and faces me. ‘It made sense that you and him were having an … affair. I’ve wondered on and off for years when he was going to find someone else.’ She inhales and exhales deeply again. ‘Scott was never my type. The policeman who’s been investigating what happened to Mirabelle? He’s more my type. But I got swept up with Scott. Not by him. Just with him. I’d known him so long, he was such a good friend. He cared about me, I cared about him. I fell in love with him over time despite him not being my type. I’ve always wondered if it was the same for him.

  ‘And then you came into our lives. All cool and free and into football and the same music. And white, of course. Like the girls he used to go out with. His family wouldn’t have had an issue with you. Your family wouldn’t have had a problem with him because they wouldn’t know he comes from a family of criminals, like my family knew and had issues with.

  ‘Me and Scott, we were Romeo and Juliet. Which meant it was always bound to go wrong, no matter how much we believed we could rewrite the ending. So, it made a horrible kind of sense he went with someone he found it easy to be with.’

  ‘You. Scott. The pair of you obviously chose each other because you wanted to be together,’ I admit.

  ‘And he chose someone else. You.’

  I rest my head back and stare at the ceiling. I’ve been doing a lot of thinking since that conversation wit
h Tami in the hospital, since I heard his voice, since he tried to tell Tami he missed her, and I’ve come to the conclusion that I have been deluding myself.

  I have been lying to myself that he loved me, that what he felt was anything other than finding another person to fuck because his wife was sick of being used. Please believe me, it didn’t feel like that. Not all the time. Sometimes, yes. But isn’t that what relationships are about? They aren’t always about equality and respect. Or are they? Is that what a good relationship is about all the time? Don’t people sometimes behave badly? Don’t you have to sacrifice a little of who you are to make the person you love happy?

  I have been in denial, lying to myself so I could believe him. Whether I loved him or not, I accepted his version of their relationship because it suited me to believe him. It made it OK because he wasn’t getting much sex at home, and what he did get was nothing beyond missionary. I often quietly acknowledged that he was probably exaggerating, that in conversations we had she would mention things she’d done in the bedroom, and since she’d been with him so long, she must have tried them with him. His story didn’t work if I examined it too closely, so I was always careful to leave it alone.

  Denial. I have become incredibly well-versed in denial, don’t you think?

  That’s why I ignored how tired I felt. The inexplicable weight loss – nothing major – just enough to notice that I wasn’t in good condition.

  That’s why I ignored the lentil-sized lump I’d noticed in my breast a long time ago. It was a cyst, it was my imagination, it was nothing to worry about.

  Until it’s the size of a large blueberry and mostly visible on my cleavage.

  Until it’s cancer.

  I’m excellent at denial. And it’s almost cost me my life. It’s absolutely cost me my best friend. She’s taken the time to get to know me. To understand me. And I …