Bad Friends (31 page)

‘Come back! Oh, stupid dog,’ I swore softly. I’d call him again when I reached the car: now I could see the door-handle glinting in the torch-light –it was only about twenty feet away – and then, behind it, I suddenly made out another vehicle, parked over by the barn. Alex’s old Land Rover.

There was no time to think any more, I just needed to escape before he returned.

I heard Digby bark and I hesitated. No doubt he’d disappeared into the undergrowth beside the stream to sniff out the mice and pointy-snouted voles who lived there still. Wherever the dog was, though, he was oblivious to my increasingly anxious shouts. Clambering down the bank, I could hear him now – and then through the hedge I saw a police car come down the drive. Thank God! I began to scramble up again but my cardigan got caught on the barbed wire that edged the stream. I was actually trapped in the ditch.

The police car was already at the house. ‘Hey,’ I yelled fruitlessly, my voice snatched up by the wind that was beginning to bluster busily through the garden. I struggled frantically, holding the torch under my chin as the wire clawed into my arm.

‘I’m here!’ I couldn’t see the car any more but I heard it stop and a door open and slam. ‘Hey, I’m down here!’ I was shrieking now, finally pulling my arm free, leaving half a skein of wool behind me on the wire as the torch went spinning out of my grasp into the water. I scrambled up the bank as the policeman got back in his vehicle and the car pulled straight off: straight out of the bottom gate.

‘Come back!’ I started to run down the lawn but it was too late: they were truly gone. ‘For fuck’s sake,’ I swore now, panting and sweaty and furious, and then I heard Digby’s happy bark as
a new set of headlights swept round the corner of the road, past the front gates, before the night fell like soot again, leaving only blackness behind.

And then I heard that car stop suddenly on the other side of the huge hedge and begin to reverse. I hurried toward the road.

Digby suddenly appeared now, bounding up towards the gate to check out this visitor, to greet them in his guileless way, and I heard his bark – and then he too disappeared from sight.

I started to sprint toward the car, hidden from view still by the hedge, the car that suddenly seemed like my salvation – when a shape swooped down through the night. I almost threw myself prostrate on the lawn. It flapped on up into the sky and I laughed shakily when I saw it was only the barn owl diving for his dinner.

A low whistle and a voice, an indistinguishable greeting as Digby barked again, his friendly kind of hello bark, the stupid mutt, and I was running now but I heard a car-door slam. I ran faster, I shouted ‘Wait for me’, but the car pulled off, and as I rounded the corner and saw the empty road, glimmering in the moonlight, I realised with a stony heart my dog had gone too.

An engine choked into life behind me. I turned to see Alex’s Land Rover pulling out of the far end of the drive, onto the village road. Hidden from his view on this side of the house, I fumbled now to switch my mobile on, sprinting to reach my own car, my bad foot really starting to throb. As I ran I felt the icy sweat of fear despite the cold night – but I could see my own car now and the phone was on, bleeping frantically with messages it had collected since it had died in the police’s keep.

I tried to phone 999 but the signal was so bad here I couldn’t get through, and then I dropped the phone. I stumbled as I bent to pick it up and nearly hit the floor, grazing my hand on the gravel, but I didn’t care. I reached the car and the door was unlocked – I always left the doors unlocked down here because I felt so safe, only now I felt the very opposite, quite terrified in
fact, and my hand was shaking as I thrust the key into the ignition. I kept missing the slot because of the shake, and then finally it went in and I turned the key and –

Nothing. The engine made a half-hearted stutter and died completely. I turned the key again; my worst nightmare was coming true.

The cottage was still in darkness, but through the trees I could see the pub’s twinkling lights. I tried 999 again but there was still no reception. A single text envelope had popped up on the screen.

DID YOU GET MESSAGES? PLEASE TAKE CARE. LOVE
YOUR FRIEND FAY XX

Oh Christ. Even Fay knew Alex was a nutter. I took a deep breath and slid back out of the car. My only option was to run to the pub for help.

My ears craned for sound as I walked as fast as I could towards the orchard, towards the small bridge that would lead me to the pub. All seemed quiet now: just my ragged breath and the old owl hooting all melancholy into the night, having devoured his prey. A sliver of laughter carried from the pub as the wind dropped again – the pub that seemed suddenly so very far away. Silence surrounded me here, though – so perhaps, please God –

Light arced across the garden, a greedy spoon of white catching me in its harsh beam. Bewildered by it, I crashed into a great naked rosebush, the bare branches snatching at me like Hansel’s bony fingers. I’d long celebrated my lack of neighbours, the solitude – but, God, I cursed it now.

The car was on the drive, heading straight for me: I’d finally been hunted down. I heard a noise – and then I realised it was me; I was actually whimpering with terror. The light swung back across the garden, holding me hard, the gap between me and my persecutor closing fast as the engine was gunned. I couldn’t outrun a car. I’d run back home. Turning, I went the other way.
I could see the door. I pounded the ground – my bad foot was so sore now as I panted with fear, and then, behind me, the car churned up the gravel, skidding to a halt, pinioning me between it and the house. Alex was going to get me. It was too late to flee.

I turned again quickly. I had to face my hunter; I couldn’t stand unseeing, exposed. The car door swung open as the moon slid out from the fingers of cloud, an oily disc of moonshine that lit up everything.

‘Oh God,’ I laughed with relief, though I felt more like crying. ‘It’s you. Oh God, I’m so pleased to see you. I was so scared. Have you got Digby with you?’ I lifted my hand to my chest as if to still my beating heart and my hand was trembling, properly shaking, and I took a step towards him.

‘I’ve never been so glad to see anyone,’ I started to say, and then I caught his eye and my smile died. I stared at him and his smile met mine – a traitor’s smile. And now he took a measured step towards me as I reeled in shock like I’d been punched, gut-punched where it most hurt. Mortally punched.

‘Why are you looking at me like that?’ I said numbly. ‘It
can’t
be you.’

‘But it is me, Maggie.’ And that smile, it was a flat smile, a smile of utter malice. ‘Weren’t you expecting me?’

In retrospect, perhaps it was all my own fault. I shouldn’t have rushed so; I should have stuck to my instincts, should have let my sore heart heal; let sleeping dogs snore and not enticed them to tell lies.

But of course I wasn’t thinking any of that right now. I was simply panicking as he marched me into my own house, grasping my upper arm as if he’d like to sink his fingertips right through it.

‘You’re hurting me,’ I pleaded. ‘What are you doing? You’re scaring me. Let me go.’

‘Just shut up and walk,’ he commanded, as I stumbled across the woven rug on the old slate floor.

‘But I can’t see properly, it’s so dark,’ I mumbled, scared now – really wholeheartedly terrified. His response was to push me forwards so I tripped again and went hurtling into the wall, banging my forehead on the corner of a picture-frame that swung wildly before me.

‘Ow.’ I clutched my head as I was propelled into the sitting room, still dark except for the fire now dying in the grate.

‘Light the candles,’ he ordered, gesturing to the old brass sticks on the mantelpiece. He pulled back the curtains to let in the moonlight and turned, his teeth bared in a triumphant kind of grin. ‘It’s dark because I cut the electric, babe. Clever, aren’t I?’

And it was now I realised the severity of the situation; that he really wasn’t messing around.

I took a deep breath and crossed the room, picking up the squashed box of cook’s matches. The first three all fizzled out as I tried desperately to steady my hand, to hide this palpable fear. The only thing I knew with any clarity was that I must stay calm. I had to stay calm or he would win.

‘What’s wrong, Seb?’ I asked quietly as the first wick finally took, glancing back at him. ‘Why are you so very upset?’

‘You said you didn’t want to see me,’ Sebastian muttered, and his twisted grin died then, the grin I’d thought was charming. His voice was very strained, and his face was very pale in the moonlight that tumbled through the window now, two spots of high colour on his cheeks. ‘No one says that to me. Not when I – I love them.’ He clenched his fists. ‘I said I loved you, Maggie. That should have been enough.’

A small figure of Sebastian, an image from an edit all sped up, flitted through my head. What did this remind me of?

‘Enough?’ I repeated slowly, wracking my brain.

‘I would have stopped then.’

‘Stopped what?’ I asked, shaking my head in confusion. I had to handle him right …

‘I just needed some time,’ I implored, risking a tiny step towards him. ‘It wasn’t an insult to you, honestly. It’s just about where I am at the moment. A bit all over the place, you know. I didn’t want to mess it up. That’s all. Please, Seb …’ I reached out a hand to him.

‘Shut up,’ Seb snapped, and my thudding heart plummeted. ‘Just shut up and let me think.’ He turned his back on me and leaned his forehead against the window, staring blindly out into the dark garden.

‘I –’ I forced myself to say it, ‘I love you too.’

‘Not enough,’ he intoned. ‘It’s never enough. I thought – after a while, I thought you were going to be different.’

‘Different?’

‘I mean, I only chose you in the first place to punish you. And because I thought you’d be useful for my career. So it’s not your place to end it, is it, babe?’

‘Chose me?’ My stomach rolled over again. ‘To punish me? For what?’

‘Yes, punish you, you stupid cow. For interfering.’ He turned round again, staring at me like I was a stranger in his home.

‘What are you talking about?’ I whispered urgently. ‘Interfering with what?’

‘And then – then there was just something about you.’ He was lost in his own reverie now. In the candlelight his dark eyes looked demonic. ‘But in the end you’re all the same. You tricked me, Maggie.’

‘You’ve lost me now, Sebastian,’ I pleaded, suppressing my terror almost physically, trying to shove it down. ‘I thought things were good between us, honestly. I never meant to – to trick you in any way, I swear.’

‘Didn’t you?’ he sneered. ‘My mother warned me about women like you. If things were so good, why didn’t you want to see me this weekend?’

I cast around frantically for something to bring him down a little, to bring him back to now.

‘Digby’ll be so pleased to see you,’ I said stupidly, and God I tried so hard to smile. ‘We both are, honestly. I’m really glad you’re here now. I was missing you.’

He stared at me blankly. ‘He wasn’t pleased. He wasn’t pleased at all, the little shit.’

His tone was utterly unnerving. I stared at him. ‘What do you mean?’ I whispered, my voice cracking in the darkness.

He smiled and it was a mad smile; a truly mad and malicious smile. My phone chirped then, and my fingers almost went to my pocket – but I just stopped myself in time.

‘Give me that,’ he demanded, holding out his hand.

I played dumb. ‘Sorry – what?’

‘The phone, you stupid bitch. I heard it beep. Give it to me.’

How could I have got it so terribly wrong? How could I have considered actually falling in love with this monster that stood before me? The candles flickered and danced above us on the ceiling as I pointed into the dark depths of the room.

‘It’s over there.’ I indicated the table piled up with cookbooks and photos and old folders of recipes my mother and Gar had collected. ‘I put it on to charge.’

Frowning, he went to check. I made a lunge for the poker lying discarded against the fireguard and I thought about whacking him then but I chose escape instead. I ran for it like a woman possessed. Down the hall, into the kitchen – the back door was open still – out into the night again. Seb was behind me already; I could sense him closing on me although I pushed myself fast, but he was taller, fitter, stronger, and he brought me down in a rugby tackle that knocked every bit of wind from my lungs. The poker went skidding across the grass.

‘Oh God,’ I moaned in anguish, ‘my ankle.’

And before I could even try to move he was over me now, grinning under the white haze of the moon, and I lashed out at him, catching his lip with my fingernails so that he slapped me across the face so hard I thought he’d broken my nose.

‘You ungrateful bitch. Didn’t you like all the attention? I thought you were enjoying it.’ He wiped the blood from his mouth with the back of his hand and sat astride me, pinning my arms to the ground. ‘You liked being on that TV programme, didn’t you? I saw your smug little face. That’s why I sent you the flowers; to congratulate you for fucking everything up. You liked telling everyone what to do, didn’t you? Messing with our lives.’

With a massive surge of adrenaline, I realised I had to fight or die here, here on the lawn of my grandmother’s cottage, here where I’d played so happily as a child. I remembered the lilies, the graffiti, the text messages, the sheer petrifying fear, and I
summoned every ounce of hatred I’d felt for the mysterious person trying to terrify me so and I propelled it into the knee that I brought up with all my might into Seb’s groin.

‘Oh Christ,’ he bellowed, toppling off me in surprised agony. ‘You fucking whore.’

Up and running now, I didn’t hang around to commiserate – only this time my ankle was throbbing like it had in the hospital after the crash and I knew I didn’t have long before it gave way for good.

I’d head back towards the pub; it was the only place I’d definitely find help. Seb was still grunting in pain somewhere behind me on the lawn and I ran like I used to run when I loved life; when I was twelve and really good; when both my parents were still on the side of the school track. ‘Run, Mag,’ I heard a whispering sigh through the tall dark trees. ‘Run for your life, Maggie. Don’t stop now.’

I was panting, gasping for breath as I came beside Seb’s car. He’d left the door open in his haste to get to me, and as I passed I glanced in and oh my God the keys were actually in the ignition. I didn’t look back, I climbed inside and I turned the key and the engine fired –

Feet crunched on the gravel, nearer, nearer …

‘Oh come
on
, Mag –’ I fumbled with the unfamiliar gearstick, slamming it into reverse by mistake. I heard his curse and I prayed I’d run him over. And then the car was moving forward and I was trying to slam the door, but he’d wrenched it open again, and then I heard a muffled yelp and Seb was leaning over me grappling with the steering wheel, but we were still moving, faster now, and I realised it was my heroic dog on the back seat, sinking his teeth into Sebastian’s arm.

‘You little fucker,’ Seb spat, and I almost laughed but Digby’s head was wet and shiny as I looked down, and I realised it was blood, my little dog’s blood, and then Seb swung him out of the car in one smooth action, and before I could move, before I
could stop him, he twisted Digby around, and the brave dog snarled with all his broken might but he was badly hurt already, he didn’t stand a chance. Before I could stop him, Seb threw the dog against the tree right there with all his force. With a sigh and a small whimper, my scruffy little dog slumped down the trunk into the undergrowth.

‘No,’ I screamed, too late. ‘Noooo!’ I looked up at Seb, still looming over me. ‘You fucking nutter,’ I hissed. ‘What did he ever do to you?’

‘I should have done it ages ago,’ Seb grinned, and, reaching down into the bushes, he retrieved Digby’s limp form and flung him callously onto the drive.

For a second I’d been frozen with horror, but now I came to. ‘You’re mad,’ I yelled, tears of fury flooding down my face, ‘absolutely fucking mad’, and I revved the engine, backed the car up. I would get him now, the crazy bastard. I put my foot down and I drove at Seb fast; I floored the car and I couldn’t see anything any more, just red, just anger at this man who had ruined my life for a reason I didn’t understand. And I nearly got him, I nearly did, but he threw himself out of the way just in time, and then there was the old chestnut tree right in front of me and that was it; it was too late to brake – and then it all went black.