Every Touch (40 page)

   When the door opened at the third floor, she was so relieved to see Denny sitting on the doormat outside their flat that she almost ran up to him and hugged him.  His knees were pulled up to his chest, his back to the door and his head down.  But when he looked up as she stepped from the lift, her joy turned instantly to sadness.  His expression of hopelessness almost broke her heart.

   “I don’t have a key,” he said.  “I’m sorry I took your car.  I think I need help and I don’t know where else to go.”

   She crouched in front of him and, without thinking, took his hand.  He looked at their hands together and, for an instant, she thought she saw a glimmer of recognition in his eyes, but then it was gone and she wasn’t sure if she’d imagined it.  She let go.

   “Let’s go inside,” she said, standing.

   “My foot’s bleeding,” he said, standing with her but holding one bare foot off the floor.  “I think I stood on some broken glass on the way back in.  I don’t want to get blood all over my... all over your floor.”

   She smiled up at him and opened the door.  “It’s okay, I’ll just clean it up.”  He followed her inside.  “Go and put your feet in the bath and I’ll get supplies and be right in.”

   “Thank you,” he said, hobbling into the bedroom.

   When she joined him, bringing with her an assortment of medical supplies, he was sitting sideways on the toilet lid, his feet in the bath, rinsing the dirt off with the shower attachment.  He looked up as she entered and smiled slightly.  She pulled a chair up next to the other end of the bath and set her supplies down, handing him a towel and draping another over her lap.

   “Give me your foot and I’ll make sure there’s no glass left in it,” she said, patting her lap as he dried himself off.

   “You don’t have to,” he said, “I can do that.”

   “I know,” she answered, “but it will be easier for me.”

   He dropped his eyes.  “Thank you.”

   After drying his feet carefully, he lifted the left one and rested it on the towel on her lap.  The ball of his foot had several painful looking cuts, a couple of which were slowly oozing blood.  Laila picked up a tissue, some tweezers and a magnifying glass and went to work.

   “Your name is Laila?” Denny said after a while.

   “Yes.  Laila Smith.”

   “How do you spell that?”

   Without missing a beat she said, “S-M-I-T-H.” 

   She glanced up when he snorted and his smile made her heart flip.  She smiled back and their eyes locked for just a second, then he looked down again.  She returned her attention to his foot and tried to get her heart rate under control. 

   “L-A-I-L-A,” she said, pulling a tiny shard of glass from one of the cuts and dropping it onto the tissue on the side of the bath next to her.

   “It’s a pretty name,” he said.

   “Thank you.” 

   She hated her common surname, but liked her first.  She had often thought lately how much better it would sound attached to ‘Carpenter’.

   “Why are you being so nice to me?” he said.  “I don’t even know you.  And I called the police on you and stole your car.”

   “I understand why you did all that,” she said, extracting another, larger piece of glass.  She heard his sharp intake of breath.  “I’m sorry, am I hurting you?”

   He shook his head.  “Just a little.  It’s okay.”

   “When you woke up,” she said, peering through the magnifying glass again, “I never for a second thought you wouldn’t remember.  I would have made sure it was less traumatising if I’d known that was going to happen.”  She carefully extracted a third glass splinter then dabbed at the blood still seeping from the lacerations.  “I think that’s the last of it,” she said, holding the tissue firmly onto the wounds to staunch the blood flow.  “I can imagine how shocked you must have been to find yourself in bed attached to a drip and a catheter next to a woman you didn’t know.”

   “Yeah,” he said, “shocked is an understatement.”

   “Where did you go in the car?”

   He sighed and she looked up at him.  “I went to my sister’s house.”

   Laila began to panic.  “Did you go in?”

   “I was going to.  But as I was about to get out of the car, my brother-in-law and nephew came out of the house.  That’s when I knew that you had to be telling the truth about what year it is.”  He closed his eyes as if to shut out what he had seen.  “Jay looked so different.  He’s grown up so much.”  His eyes opened again and he wiped at them.  “So I left without getting out.  On the way back I stopped at a newsagent to check the date on the newspapers.”  He lapsed into silence, staring into the bath.

   She looked away, blinking rapidly, and turned her attention back to his foot.  “I’m sorry,” she said softly.

   The blood had stopped so she gently applied antiseptic cream to the cuts and covered them with a pad of gauze, the area being too big for a plaster.

   “So why are you being so nice to me?” he repeated.

   She finished taping the gauze in place and looked up at him.  “Because I love you,” she said.

   Denny’s jaw dropped.

   She lifted his foot from her lap and placed it on the floor, then put the towel on the bath.  “Stay here,” she said, “and I’ll get you something to wear on your feet.  I’ll go out and buy you some shoes later.”

   He was still gaping at her as she stood and turned away, walking from the bathroom.  As soon as she was through the door and away from his line of sight she sagged against the wall.

  Retaining her composure was becoming more and more difficult.  She was teetering between bursting into tears and throwing herself into his arms and right now she didn’t know which would be worse.  He was here, he was with her, he was alive.  It was everything she’d dreamed of and now he had no idea who she was. 

   How could this have happened?  Had they got something wrong in the ritual?  Or was this always going to be the result?  She would call Crystal later, but she didn’t expect her to be any help.  Surely if this was going to happen she would have warned her.  Even Crystal, annoying as she was, wouldn’t have kept her in the dark about this.

   Laila pushed herself away from the wall.  One thing at a time, that’s how she was going to deal with this, and the first thing to do was find Denny something to put on his feet.  The second, she suspected, was to stop him from freaking out because a complete stranger had just told him she loved him.

   “These should fit,” Laila said, handing Denny a pair of thermal socks when she returned to the bathroom. They were men’s that she’d bought to fit over her own socks to keep her feet warm in the winter. 

   He was still sitting on the toilet seat when she got back and seemed reluctant to look her in the eye.  She couldn’t blame him.

   “Thanks,” he said, starting to pull the socks on, carefully manoeuvring the left one over the bandage.  “Where do I live?”

   “I’m sorry?”

   “Everything in here is yours.  There are no men’s toiletries, so I obviously don’t live here.  Where do I live?”  He stood and hobbled after her into the bedroom, only putting weight onto the heel of his wounded foot.

   “You live here,” Laila answered, leading the way to the living room, “we live together.”

   “Nothing here belongs to me,” he said, his voice rising in frustration, “not even the men’s clothes you have hanging in your wardrobe.  How is it I live here?”

   She was dreading this.  How was she possibly going to tell him the truth without him thinking she belonged in an institution?  She couldn’t even think how she would be able to explain how he’d been a ghost for the past five years.  Where did you even begin with something like that?

   “Are you hungry?  I can make you something to eat.”

   “I’d rather hear what’s going on,” he said, grasping her arm.

   She turned to look at him and he let her go, lowering his eyes.  “I’m sorry,” he said.

   Her eyes brimmed with tears.  She could see how confused and afraid he was and she longed to hold him and comfort him the way he had for her so many times.  But she was afraid that all she could do was make him feel worse. 

   “Come and sit down,” she said, leading him to the sofa.  She took her laptop from the dining table and sat next to him.  “I know you’re confused,” she said, switching on the computer and finding the document she needed, “and what I’m going to tell you is the truth.  But I need to warn you, you are going to find it very hard to believe.”  She handed the computer to him and stood.  “Read that and I’ll make us some sandwiches.”

   Leaving Denny to look at the article she’d saved about his death, she walked over to the kitchen, wiping at the tears that had escaped down her cheeks as she went. 

   She kept darting glances at him while she prepared the sandwiches, watching his reaction as he focused on the laptop.  After she’d finished their breakfast and he was still reading, she knew he must have gone through the article several times.

   Carrying the plates of food to the sofa, she sat and placed them onto the coffee table.

   “I don’t understand,” he said, still staring at the screen, “was my death faked or something?”

   This was it, the moment of truth, literally.  “No, it wasn’t.”

   “So the article was a mistake?”

   “No.”

   He looked straight at her.  “What, you’re saying I died?”  He was smiling, as if the thought was too ridiculous to take seriously.  Which it was.

   “Yes, you died.”

   He looked at her for a few seconds then shook his head and closed the laptop, picking it up from his lap and placing it onto the coffee table. 

   “But I’m not dead.  I’m right here.”

   “This is going to sound insane, I know that, but I swear it is the truth.”  She took a deep breath and blurted it out.  “You died and you became a ghost.”

   He stared at her for a few seconds then burst into laughter.  Laila watched him helplessly.  She could tell him the truth, she could answer every question he had, but she had no clue what to do if he just flat out didn’t believe her. 

   “You can’t be seriously telling me I’m a ghost,” he said.

   “Not now, no, but you were.  For almost five years.” 

   “I just can’t...” He stopped and shook his head.  Standing abruptly, he limped to the window and stared out.  “This is insane.”  He turned back to her.  “You couldn’t think I would believe this.”

   She stood, moving forward a couple of steps, but stopping when he backed away.  Terrified he would leave again, she stepped back. 

   “Please,” she said, holding her hands out, palms up, “I’m not going to hurt you.”

   “I’m sorry, you seem like a very nice person, it’s just...” He sighed. “I don’t know you and...”

   “And I sound crazy?”

   He nodded.

   The intercom buzzed and Laila went to answer it, glad for the brief reprieve to gather her thoughts.  She almost cried when Trish’s frantic voice answered her “hello”.

   “I only got your message when I got out of a meeting twenty minutes ago and then I drove straight home, but no-one was in so I came here.  What happened?  How’s Denny?  He didn’t go to my house, did he?  They didn’t see him, did they?  Please tell me he’s okay?”

   Laila grabbed the opportunity to speak as Trish paused for breath.

   “Everything’s okay, Trish, they didn’t see him.  He’s fine, just a bit confused.  He’s right here.  Come up.”

   “Oh, thank goodness,” Laila said when she’d buzzed Trish in.

   “Is that really her?” Denny said.  The same expression he’d had when she had found him sitting on the floor outside the flat was on his face, vulnerable and afraid.

   She tried to encourage him with her smile.  “Yes, it’s her.”

   Relief flooded his face and her chest flooded with pain.  She understood why he didn’t trust her, but after all they’d been through, after all the love they had shared, it was like a knife was twisting in her heart.  She turned away before he saw her tears and walked to the door, opening it and walking into the corridor, wrapping her arms around her body to keep herself from falling apart.

   When Trish emerged from the lift, she immediately came to a halt at the sight of Laila’s tear streaked face. 

   Laila shook her head, wiping her eyes.

   “It’s okay, he’s in here,” she said, stepping aside to let her in. 

   She gave Laila’s hand an encouraging squeeze as she passed.

   As soon as they saw each other, Trish flew into Denny’s arms.  Laila watched as they stood holding each other for a long time as Trish cried, feeling a little like a voyeur, but with no choice but to wait.

   “Trish?” Denny said, looking at her uncertainly when she loosened her hold on him.

   “It’s so glad to see you awake,” she said, smiling through her tears.

   He frowned.  “Trish, what’s going on?”

   She took his hand and led him back to the sofa. 

   “I’m just going to leave you alone,” Laila said quickly, feeling the need to get away.  “I’ll go and buy you some shoes.”