Never Close Your Eyes (15 page)

She knocked on Freya's door and entered. The room was pretty dark as Freya had only her desk light on. There were posters all round the walls, mostly of sickly-looking pop stars with big black hair and heaps of eyeliner. The blackout blind was down, so that you couldn't see the moon or any light from the streetlamps outside. She kept the blind down most of the time and the window closed. Evie thought the long, thin room felt like a coffin. She couldn't bear it, but Freya seemed to prefer it that way.

She was lying on her bed staring at her laptop. Her face, lit up by the screen, had a strange, bluish tinge.

‘Hello, darling,' Evie whispered.

Evie continued typing. ‘Hi.' She didn't look up. ‘How was the play?'

She was wearing her night gear: a grey vest top and baggy red drawstring bottoms. Her dyed black hair was tied up on top. Evie thought she looked very small and young and vulnerable. She felt a rush of love. She sat down on the end of her daughter's purple duvet.

‘Excellent,' she said. ‘Did Michael go to bed OK?'

‘Yeah, no probs.' Freya carried on typing.

‘Who are you talking to?' Evie asked, curious. Freya seemed very absorbed.

‘Just a friend,' she replied. ‘Cal.'

‘Who's he?'

Freya remembered something. ‘Dad called,' she said, looking up. ‘He asked me and Michael to go to lunch with him and Helen. I said I didn't want to.'

Evie's throat tightened. ‘You should go.' She tried to sound bright. ‘It'd be nice to get to know Helen better.'

‘I have absolutely no desire to get to know Helen better,' Freya said hotly. ‘I hate her, and I hate Dad too, for that matter.'

‘Shhh,' Evie replied, ‘you mustn't say that. It's nobody's fault what happened. It's just one of those things.'

Freya sat bolt upright, her blue eyes flashing. ‘Of course it's somebody's fault. That cow should never have even looked at him. He was a married man, for God's sake. She had no right.'

Evie swallowed. This was going to be even harder than she'd feared. ‘It takes two to have an affair,' she pointed out. She cleared her throat. ‘I think he wants to tell you something.'

Freya stared at her mother. ‘What sort of thing?' she said suspiciously. ‘God, they're not getting married, are they? Well, I'm definitely not going to the wedding. No way. How disgusting! She's practically young enough to be his daughter.'

Evie shook her head. ‘No, they're not getting married as far as I know.' She felt totally at sea. She had no idea how you were supposed to deal with a situation like this. There were no rules.

‘What then?' Freya demanded.

‘I can't tell you,' Evie said, staring down at her nails and pushing back the cuticles. ‘He'd be furious with me. He wants to tell you himself.'

Freya's mouth set in a thin, hard line. ‘Don't tell me then,' she hissed. ‘I don't want to know anyway.'

Evie started to cry; she couldn't help it. ‘Please don't be angry with me. It's hard enough as it is.'

Freya put her laptop on the floor and shuffled over to be beside her mother. She gave her a hug. ‘I'm sorry, Mum. I didn't mean to upset you.' She lay down and put her head on her mother's knees.

Evie sat there for several minutes, stroking her daughter's hair and staring into the blackness. She knew Freya was going to be shocked by the news. She wished she could absorb some of the misery.

At last, Freya sat up. ‘Are you OK now?'

Evie felt guilty. ‘I'm fine. You should go to bed. Will you ring your father tomorrow?'

‘If I have to,' Freya said. ‘But I'm not going to be pleased for him, whatever it is he's going to tell me.' She picked her laptop off the floor. ‘I just have to speak to someone for a second.'

‘It's late, you really must sleep,' Evie protested.

‘One minute more. I didn't say goodbye.'

Evie didn't stop her. She was glad Freya had plenty of friends, boys and girls. Friends could be crucial at a time like this. Evie remembered how much she'd relied on hers when she was locked in a battle with her parents about going to art school. She'd won in the end, but, boy, it had been a mammoth fight!

Yes, friends were good news, and Freya was going to need all the support she could get.

Nic ran herself a deep bath, poured in a generous dollop of her favourite orange-blossom bath oil and lit the candle in the special holder on the metal bath rack which Dominic had given her for her last birthday. There was also a useful slot for a glass of wine and she'd fixed herself a particularly large Sauvignon Blanc.

She took off her clothes and sank down in the warm water right up to her chin. She'd been shivery all afternoon since she'd had the braces put on. Her whole head and face felt supersensitive. She couldn't imagine that she'd ever get used to having a pile of metal in her poor sore mouth.

She lay right back, letting the water cover her hair, and closed her eyes. She'd planned to have a bath, take another painkiller and go to bed really early, as soon as Dominic's light was out. Alan had called to say he'd be extra late and not to wait up. Somehow now, though, it was nearly midnight.

After a few minutes she rose and took a sip of wine. She could hear noises in the bedroom next door: Alan getting changed? Bugger, he was earlier than expected. She stayed stock-still. Presently she heard him closing his wardrobe door and leaving the room. She slipped under the water again, relieved for once that he hadn't come to say hello.

When the water began to feel cold, she got out and wrapped herself in a big, mink-coloured towel. Then she padded next door and put on her brushed cotton, blue and pink spotty pyjamas. They were her comfort pyjamas: there wasn't a whiff of sensuality about them.

She folded down the green bedspread and started to read; she was halfway through a Jackie Collins romp. It helped to take her mind off things. She thought that she heard Alan come upstairs and was about to switch out the light when she realised that he'd gone the other way into his study. She squeezed her eyes shut. So he wasn't going to say goodnight? There again, she'd done her best not to alert him to her presence in the bathroom, either.

She took another swallow of wine from beside her bed, draining the glass. The second bottle downstairs was empty now. That, and the heavy-duty painkiller from the orthodontist, should knock her out. She started to read another page but her eyes were blurry. She put her book face down on the duvet. At last, oblivion beckoned.

‘You're up late. I thought you said you were having an early night?'

She started, looking up. Alan was at the end of the bed. He'd changed out of his suit into his striped pyjamas and burgundy dressing gown. She smiled. In a flash, she realised what she'd done and closed her mouth again but it was too late. Her heart fluttered.

‘Good day?' he asked, tightening his dressing-gown belt.

‘Fine. You?'

‘Not bad,' he said, scratching his head. ‘Busy, you know. How's Dom?'

She licked her lips, which felt as if they stuck right out with the metal behind them. ‘Great. He had piano after school.'

Alan shifted slightly. ‘That's nice.'

She put a finger in her mouth, bared her lips slightly and picked at some imaginary particle of food. ‘Ow.' The bedside light was quite bright; he'd surely notice now.

‘I've got to go in early tomorrow,' he said, turning to leave.

She couldn't believe it. ‘Alan?'

‘Yes.'

‘I've had braces put on.'

There was a pause. ‘What did you do that for?'

Nic sniffed. ‘I've always hated my crooked tooth . . .' She wanted him to come and sit beside her and listen while she explained everything: how long it would take for the treatment to work, what it cost, why having straight teeth was important to her. How much her mouth hurt tonight.

Instead he moved to her side of the bed, bent down and pecked her on the forehead. His lips were dry. ‘I have to finish some work.'

She waited until he'd left the room before turning out the light.

‘Goodnight,' she called softly.

He didn't hear.

Chapter Fourteen

‘I have something exciting to tell you!' Tristram looked really pleased with himself.

Evie, Nic and Becca exchanged glances. ‘He's been asked to give a talk at his bloody boarding school?' Nic whispered. ‘That'll give the pupils a thrill – not.' She smiled, revealing a mass of turquoise and metal in her mouth. Evie was shocked.

‘What . . . ?'

Nic looked embarrassed. ‘I'll tell you later.'

‘I have the forms here for a national writing competition,' Tristram went on. It was the October meeting of the Creative Writing Group and he was standing at the front of the class, clutching a pile of papers. The room fell silent.

‘The winner will receive five hundred pounds and the guarantee of being taken on by top agent, Palmer Brooke.'

There was a murmur of excitement.

‘I think we should all enter,' Tristram said. ‘It'll be a good incentive to finish our manuscripts. What do you say?'

Nic put her hand up. ‘It sounds great but I'm not nearly finished yet. When's the closing date for applications?'

Tristram nodded. ‘Good question.' He peered at the small print on the top sheet of paper. ‘It says here the first of June. It might seem tight but that actually gives us nearly eight months. Ian Fleming used to produce the first drafts of his Bond books in just six weeks.'

Several people groaned.

‘Yeah, but I bet he didn't have children to pick up from school and a house to run,' Evie muttered.

Tristram ignored her. ‘The winner will be announced sometime around December next year,' he added with a flourish.

Pamela was clearly desperate to speak. She was sitting right at the front, as usual, and her helmet of immaculate grey hair was bobbing up and down in excitement.

‘I think it's a marvellous idea,' she announced, turning to face the others. ‘I can easily get my manuscript in by then. In fact I'm just about to begin the first edit.' She gave a smug little smile.

Carol, sitting beside Evie, yawned theatrically. ‘Old clever clogs,' she whispered. She grinned, exposing her stained teeth.

She's a one-off, Evie thought. She liked her. Carol said what everyone else was thinking. Evie nudged her. ‘Shhh.'

‘I'll leave the forms on the chair here,' said Tristram. ‘You can collect them at the end of the meeting.' He cleared his throat. ‘Now, this month I thought we should talk about “Show Don't Tell”.'

‘What's that?' Carol asked.

Tristram looked at her sternly. ‘I'm coming to it. This is a very common writing problem,' he went on. ‘I'm going to read a passage to you here from a well-known book on creative writing.' He pulled a slim paperback from the pocket of his tweed jacket and straightened his tie.

‘“Show Don't Tell is one of the fundamental rules of writing,”' he read. ‘“Picture yourself, for a moment, in the cinema watching a film. There's a battle scene and two knights are going at it like hammer and tongs. It's so effective that you feel as if you're actually there, experiencing every thrust of the sword, every punch, every blow. That's showing. You're with the characters, smelling their sweat, feeling their fear.

‘“Now imagine that a narrator is standing in front of the screen describing what is happening: ‘Sir Hector lashed out with his fists and Sir Guillaume swayed for a moment, before drawing his sword and plunging it in his opponent's side.' That's telling. Here the narrator is describing the events to the reader rather than letting them experience things for themselves.”'

He finished the passage and looked up. ‘Now, who's going to volunteer to read from their manuscript?'

Pamela's hand shot up. Carol shuffled noisily in her seat but as no one else offered, Pamela it was.

She stood at the front of the class and cleared her throat. ‘“A car drew up outside Serena's gate,”' she read. ‘“Her husband got out from behind the wheel. Her sister's frustration evaporated immediately. She breathed out a long gasp. But Serena held her feelings in. She was full of pent up anger and frustration.”'

‘Can you stop there?' Tristram said. Pamela's eyelids fluttered in irritation. ‘There are several examples of Show Don't Tell,' he went on. ‘Can anyone identify them?'

There was an embarrassed silence. No one, except Pamela, much liked pointing out other peoples' mistakes.

Finally, Carol stood up. ‘“Her sister's frustration evaporated immediately,'” she said, plonking herself down again.