The Orchid Girls Page 7

  The noise is unbearable and I lean back against the wall, sweat gathering on my forehead. I put my eye to the spyhole, but all I can see is black and I realise she is leaning against the door.

  Eventually I give in, unable to bear the relentless ringing any more. Molly stumbles forward as I release the door, but I leave the chain on as the sweet smell of alcohol announces her arrival. Her eyes are wild, with black make-up smudged at the corners, and her face is white, making her loom like a ghost in the dark. The car is due in fifteen minutes, so I need to be swift and sharp, deal with her.

  ‘Tell me what you want, Molly, and then you need to go. I’ve got to be somewhere. I’m being picked up in five minutes.’ The less time I give her the better.

  She steps back, wavering slightly on her feet. Her smile is a weird slash that bites into her ghostly pallor.

  ‘What do you want?’ I repeat.

  ‘You know what I want. Us back again, friends, like before.’

  ‘That’s not going to happen. Look, I’ve got to go out, you said it was important.’

  ‘You didn’t turn up,’ she says, her voice rising into a wail. She rubs at her hand as she talks and it looks red and sore. Surely she can’t be a self-harmer too?

  I keep my voice low and level; I need to get through to her. ‘This is pointless, Molly. We lead different lives now.’

  ‘Stop saying that!’ Her eyes are bloodshot. In her black clothes she looks like she’s stepped out of a horror movie. The minute hand on the large clock moves in a relentless march and I expect my phone to go off any minute, announcing that the driver is here. I can picture him pacing around by the car, whistling puffs of breath into the cool evening air, ready to tip his hat at me as he holds the car door open, ever polite, attending to every detail like the true professional he is. But these thoughts are distractions from the matter in hand. I need to get Molly away from the flat. If I can persuade her to accompany me outside, I can probably reach the car park without the driver seeing her. It’s better if I go downstairs before he arrives, wait there. Yes, that’s a good idea.

  ‘Let me in, Grace, for fuck’s sake!’ As she speaks, she crumples down to the floor, head in her hands.

  Please don’t let her be sick over the floor. I move fast, grab my bag and wrap, unlock the chain, slip out into the corridor and slam the door behind me.

  ‘I’m leaving now, Molly, we can talk as we go down. Tell me what you want and I’ll see if I can help.’

  The beep from an incoming text alerts me to the driver’s arrival. ‘My car is here.’

  ‘Why did you never answer my letters?’

  ‘What letters?’

  ‘The letters I wrote to you after we moved, every week. I never gave up…’

  ‘I didn’t get any letters.’

  ‘So if you had received them, you would have replied?’ Hope flashes across her face.

  ‘This is pointless, Molly. I didn’t get your letters, OK? You should have left it alone. You need to leave it alone now.’

  As I look at her, it hits me how thin she is, her collarbones visible, jutting out of the top of her faded T-shirt. She’s so different from the muscular, strong, teenage Molly, who was ready to take on the world. The girl who swam the length of the bay when cramp seized my leg and I panicked, helping me back to the beach.

  My phone beeps again and I picture the driver, getting impatient, engine running downstairs. I should leave right now, but something stops me. I have to know.

  ‘You mentioned something you had on me.’

  A sly look crosses her face. ‘Remember what Charlotte had, in her bag?’

  My feet move of their own accord and I cross the space between us, grabbing her shirt with both hands. ‘Said she had, you mean. Never, ever mention that to me again. She was winding us up and you know it.’

  ‘What if she wasn’t?’

  Spittle hits me and I drop Molly’s shirt as if she’s burnt me. I step back, our faces so close I can feel her breath on my cheek.

  ‘What if I know something you don’t?’

  Before I can stop her she leans forward and kisses me hard on the lips. Then she steps back and smooths her hair away from her eyes.

  ‘I can destroy you, Grace. You run off to your posh dinner with your precious husband, and while you’re eating have a think about what Charlotte said. Why would she make it up?’

  My whole body is shaking and I run the back of my hands over my burning lips, trying to rub the memory of her kiss away. My phone rings. The lift is at the top of the building and I run down the stairs, desperate to escape. But when I reach the car park, I see the tail lights of a car disappearing into the distance. Another text arrives on my phone.

  Unable to complete pick-up as nobody at home

  One more flicker and the lights vanish, leaving me alone in a deserted car park.

  Eight

  MOLLY

  It’s late when I wake. My knuckles hurt and I’m trying to remember why when it hits me. Bashing on the door of her flat, Grace talking to me through the chain, keeping me out. Me kissing her. Sweat pours down my body as I hold my arms around myself and try to stop the shakes.

  I think about Ellis, her words, the sense of calm that surrounded her, her wide grin. I wish I could be like her. I need a drink.

  I feel better once my hands are wrapped around the glass. Sorting my head out will have to wait another day. Just for today, Ellis said. More like Just for tomorrow. Concentrate on the present, she meant. I can try, at least. I won’t drink tomorrow.

  There’s a missed call from Ellis on my phone. She’s left me a voicemail. Her voice is confident and calming. She tells me not to beat myself up if I’m struggling. I’m not sure how to manage that; beating myself up is my default. I look at her name on the screen: Ellis. Unusual name for a girl. I think about Jodie as I rub my palm. I don’t need her any more. Then I think about Grace. As if on cue my phone rings, but it’s neither of them. It’s Ellis. I watch her name flash on and off. Ellis. It’s a good name. But I don’t answer, I’m too ashamed.

  Out in the street the wind blows my hair into my eyes and makes them smart. My bike isn’t tied to the railing where I usually leave it, and for a moment I try and work out where I left it when I was last in a drunken stupor. I decide it’s been stolen and kick the wall, before I recall having seen it in the hallway at home. The bottle in my pocket is empty and I stick it in the recycling bin, enjoying the crash as it drops. I go to ring Jodie but then I remember ending it. It’s not lust I want, but someone to put her arms around me and hold me tight. Jodie’s not enough any more. I want to call Grace, but I stop myself. I don’t know what to do and I don’t want to go home. I’m standing in front of a Starbucks and I have a fiver in my pocket, so I go inside, order a tea and head for an armchair tucked away in the corner, turning it so that I’m facing the wall. I let myself fall asleep.

  A loud cough wakes me up and it takes me a moment to work out where I am. I stop off in the ladies’ and drench my face in cold water, feeling better. It’s nearly six o’clock and my shift doesn’t start until nine. Gavin has left me a voicemail, which I don’t want to listen to. I sit on the stairs outside the loo and finish the contents of my hip flask before playing the message. His nasally voice gets my nerves screaming.

  ‘Gavin here, Molly. You didn’t turn up to work on Tuesday and you were on a final warning. I’m sorry to have to do this but I can’t keep you on the staff any more. You don’t need to come in today, you’ll receive any wages we owe you at the end of the week.’

  He doesn’t bother to say goodbye. Bile rises in my throat and I swallow hard. Stuff him and his stupid job.

  Grace’s husband’s picture is plastered on the front of the Evening Standard, a copy of which I pick up on the way home. My face flushes hot when I give in and dial her number. The disconnected tone sounds in my ear.

  Why won’t she talk to me? How can she forget everything so easily?

  Back in my flat, my thoughts won�
�t stop. I throw my duvet onto the floor, kicking a cushion after it which sends a can clattering over the lino. She didn’t receive my letters. How dare he? How dare he hide them from her? Grace’s dad, Michael, it had to be him who kept them from her; Grace’s mum wasn’t well enough to do anything as devious as that. Did he read them? Did he laugh at them? I used to hate being around him, with his cold, judging eyes, his disapproving expression. The lectures he used to give us, as if he was in church where he got to preach as much as he liked. Me and Grace would sit so close together in the pews that I could feel her shaking. She was always scared he’d hit her again. He always terrified me. I was relieved I wasn’t the daughter of a vicar. Nobody could ever live up to his expectations. No wonder Grace rebelled. My heart pounds with embarrassment as I try not to remember the words I wrote to her, the hurt and rage. I can’t believe she never even got them. All those years of waiting, for nothing.

  There’s a drop of Jodie’s whisky in a bottle in the kitchen and I add some to my coffee, sitting on my bed with my back against the wall. I’ve done it this time; actually lost my job, messed up big.

  I read about Richard Sutherland in the newspaper and his connection with Ash Fenton. The village the missing girl is from. He’s quoted, explaining it’s the place he grew up in and that his parents still live there, as well as his father-in-law who is in sheltered housing nearby. That gets me up, wandering round and round the flat, thinking. Grace’s dad, Michael. If he opened my letters then he owes me an explanation. I’m not scared of him. Not any more. This fires me up again and I stick some music on and settle down on the floor. I wish the whisky hadn’t all gone. I keep my mobile close, in case Grace calls. I don’t believe she’s angry, not really. She can’t be. Not at me. When she has a proper think about us she’ll be in touch, I know she will.

  In my old battered coffee tin I have one hundred pounds, plus another twenty and some cash in my purse. I go through all my pockets and find another fifty pence, plus a few pennies. I do a few sums in my head to work out how much I can get by on in a day. Abdul let me run up a tab last time I lost my job. Maybe I can get Tom to write me a reference. I give him a ring and he picks up straight away.

  ‘Gavin’s fired you, hasn’t he? He rang me earlier. I’m sorry, I tried to cover for you, but he saw through it. I warned you, Moll, after last time.’

  ‘Yeah. Thanks for trying, Tom, you’ve been a good mate.’ I ask him about a reference.

  ‘Sure thing. Stay in touch, Molly, and listen, maybe try and sort out the drinking, now that it’s starting to mess with your life.’

  If only he knew. The messing started way back before I ever moved to London, once the trial got underway, before Mum and Dad gave up on me. Drink seemed the answer back then, after Grace and I were separated and I blamed myself for everything. It was the only thing I could rely on.

  My phone rings. It’s Ellis, but I don’t pick up. Canned laughter mocks me from the television. Later when the walls are blurred and I’m promising myself that I won’t drink tomorrow, I listen to her message.

  Ellis’s voicemail explains how she reached ‘rock-bottom’ and I realise something. Slumped here on the bathroom floor, jobless and hung-over, rejected by Grace, staring at a blob of crusty toothpaste stuck to the side of the bath, this is what rock-bottom looks like.

  The tone rings into my ear, each sound a shriek in my head escalating the fear that she may not answer. But then I hear her voice and I can’t get my words out, something sharp is lodged in my throat. I don’t know what to say. But somehow she understands and I manage to tell her that I am at home and she tells me to sit tight as she’s coming over. ‘Sit tight’ reminds me of ‘sleep tight’, which Mum used to say to me at night, and then the tears start. I hate myself for crying, hate myself for no longer being in control of my feelings.

  Splashing cold water on my face helps me feel a little better and I try to make the bathroom look respectable. I stash the whisky bottle in the overflowing bin; I haven’t got the energy to empty it. By the time Ellis arrives I’m wearing a clean pair of jogging bottoms and my favourite T-shirt, which I’ve had forever and gives me the kind of comfort my toy rabbit used to until his ear fell off. Ellis fusses around the kitchen and I cringe at the thought that she might realise I’ve been crying. God, I’m a mess.

  She makes herself a coffee.

  ‘I lost my job.’

  ‘Do you want to talk about it?’

  ‘Not much to tell. I overslept.’

  ‘Had you been drinking?’

  Memories flash at me. Jodie’s twisted face, the bathroom floor. Bashing at Grace’s door like a madwoman; sleeping it off in Starbucks.

  ‘Yes. Pretty much all day. It’s crap living like this.’ Shame tears through me.

  ‘I’ll help you. Have you eaten this morning?’

  I shake my head. ‘I can’t.’

  ‘How about I make you some tea and you can try one of these?’ She produces a packet of Rich Tea biscuits from her bag. ‘They used to be the only thing I could keep down. I hate to see you in so much pain. It’s not much of a way to live, is it?’

  ‘Why are you being so nice? You don’t even know me.’

  She shrugs. ‘I need someone to laugh at my jokes. And I’d like to get to know you.’

  The tea warms me up and the biscuit stays down. ‘Do you think there’s any chance you can get your job back?’

  ‘No. I need to work, though. I’ll have to get out there, see if there’s anything around. Pubs always want staff.’

  ‘Maybe not the best job for someone who’s trying not drink?’ She grins as she speaks.

  ‘I don’t have a choice.’

  ‘Is there anything else you’d like to do?’

  ‘Take photographs.’ My response surprises me. I haven’t touched a camera in years. Not since what happened.

  ‘That’s interesting. Do you have a camera?’

  I’m thrown for a second; I don’t want to think about what happened to my favourite camera.

  ‘Only my phone. My uncle will lend me one, though – he’s a professional photographer. But that would mean going back to Dorset, seeing my mum.’

  ‘Well, no rush. Use your phone for now. Get snapping! It would be great, even as a hobby, if it’s what you like doing. Making clothes for a living really helps me. It’s so important to have something to do when you first stop drinking, to keep yourself busy. Go and borrow your uncle’s camera if you manage to get back into it.’

  ‘I haven’t seen my mum for ages. I’ll think about it.’

  ‘Why don’t you sign on for a while? Take a bit of time to look after yourself. Take the pressure off. Getting sober takes energy. I wasn’t knocking up my own creations straight away, you know.’

  She waves her scarf at me and I can’t help smiling. Her eyes dance with life and I wish some of her vitality would rub off on me.

  ‘That would be worse. Having nothing to do all day. Although if I was taking photos…’ Plus it would give me more time to spend with Grace, wouldn’t it? Perhaps I could get her to open up to me. That’s exactly what I need. Ellis makes me another cup of tea.

  ‘Today is a fresh start in another way. I’ve finished with my girlfriend.’

  An expression I can’t read flickers across Ellis’s face.

  ‘Are you OK with that?’

  ‘She lives with someone else, so it wasn’t going anywhere.’

  ‘You deserve better than that. It sounds like you’ve lost your self-respect, drinking does that. I was the same, believe me. Try giving it up for a while, look after yourself, that will be a start. I’ll help you. How about we get out of here, go for a walk, maybe get something to eat later, on me?’

  We walk around the park and Ellis asks me where I grew up. I tell her about Lyme and how we never used to go on holiday but it didn’t matter to me because the sea was where I wanted to be. Just thinking about the deep water makes me shudder now.

  ‘How come you left? It sounds like you w
ere happy there.’

  ‘I was.’ I pull my jacket around me, suddenly cold. ‘Usual teenage stuff, I fell out with my parents and left home when I was sixteen.’ It’s not a total lie.

  ‘And are they both still around?’

  ‘There’s only my mum and my brother left now, Dad died five years ago. Mum would probably forgive me, but I’m too ashamed to go back.’

  ‘I’m sorry.’ She squeezes my arm, taking me by surprise. Strangely, I don’t mind.

  I shrug. ‘I hadn’t seen him since I left home.’ I screw up my eyes, blink away tears that I didn’t expect. I remember holding his hand in the queue at Boots, hopping from one foot to the other at the excitement of getting my first photos developed. We’d look at them together, laughing at the shot where I’d chopped his head off, our heads so close that the smell of tobacco on his hair made me sneeze. He was a quiet, kind man. He’d do anything for me and Mum. Happiest outdoors, hunting orchids, or fussing around the garden. My favourite times were when it was just me and him, out on the cliffs, hunting the wild flowers in my flower book, him kneeling down to point them out to me.

  ‘I went back for the funeral. I was so pleased to see Mum but I couldn’t show it, eaten up by guilt at what I’d put them through. I drank so much that day I don’t know what I did or said. It was one of the last times I saw my brother, too. He was too embarrassed to tell me what I’d done. Like I said, it's difficult.’

  Ellis’s expression is filled with sympathy. ‘How old’s your brother?’

  ‘He’s eight years younger than me. Darren. He lives in Manchester – well, he did five years ago. I’ve only seen him once since then.’ Just thinking about it makes me cringe. ‘We speak occasionally.’