Fractured (30 page)

His suggestion did have a degree of rational credibility, I had to grant him that. But it didn’t seem to fit, not in the way my own idea did.

I could go two ways with this: keep on insisting there was something more supernatural – for want of a better word – going on here, and risk losing his support completely, or be the bigger person and let it go. I chose wisely.

‘So I’m unique then, am I?’ I said with the beginnings of a smile. ‘One of a kind?’

‘I’ve never doubted that for a single minute of my life.’

I couldn’t help it: my smile just kept getting broader and broader, until I was in danger of resembling some demented version of the Cheshire Cat. I also couldn’t help noticing that he looked more than a little pleased by my response.

A few more miles down the grey ribbon of motorway, I brought up the topic again. ‘But what if we never get to the bottom of it? If we
never
find out the answers? What do we do then?’

Jimmy was quiet for a long moment. ‘Well,’ he said finally on a long and considering tone, ‘you remember the first eighteen years of your life just fine, don’t you?’

‘Yes. Right up to the night of the car accident.’

‘So, in the grand scheme of things, we’re really only talking about having inexplicably…
lost
… a small piece of your past. I guess what you have to ask yourself is how much time and energy you want to spend on looking backwards.’ His voice changed then, the timbre becoming softer and lower. ‘But speaking personally, it’s not your past that interests me so much as your future.’

And those were the words that I kept replaying in my head for the rest of the journey back home.

My father’s eyes lit up with pleasure as I crossed the threshold with the large packing boxes and a suitcase full of my belongings.

‘You don’t mind if I wind up staying here with you for a little bit longer, do you?’ I asked as I entered the house. An unnecessary question really, but even I was surprised to see his eyes glisten unexpectedly at my request.

‘Are you feeling OK, Dad?’

He rubbed his hand roughly over his eyes. ‘Just getting a cold, I think,’ he muttered brusquely, bending to pick up the boxes. ‘I’ll just take these upstairs for you. And of course I don’t mind. You stay here as long as you want.’

I watched his retreating back as he climbed the stairs, suddenly overcome by a wave of love for the only parent I had ever known, mixed with an enormous gratitude that here and now he was so fit and well. Perhaps it had been talking to Joe once more about his wife’s illness that suddenly made me really appreciate that life here was in many ways a great deal better than the one I remembered. Well, aside from the unfortunate incident with Matt. But maybe that too would turn out to be not such a bad thing either. Better to know now that he couldn’t remain faithful and get out while I could, before making the mistake of marrying him.

The following day I finally got around to answering one of his numerous phone calls. I had to really; he’d been continually calling both my mobile and the house phone, so I didn’t have much of a choice in the matter. It wasn’t a pleasant conversation, and I said some things that I’m not particularly proud of. Not that he didn’t deserve it, perhaps, but I had hoped we might at least have been able to remain civil. But any phone conversation that ends with one of you yelling at the other ‘Have a nice life!’ can’t exactly be deemed a success.

The next few days should have been pleasant enough, Christmas was almost upon us and although I didn’t seem to have my normal enthusiasm for the holiday season, I tried to put on a good show for my father’s sake. Not that I think I fooled him much, not when my first question upon returning home from a walk or a visit to the shops was ‘Did anyone drop by or phone while I was out?’

I guess he thought I might be waiting to hear from Matt again, and I didn’t bother correcting that assumption. But it wasn’t the absence of contact from my ex-fiancé that was troubling me, it was not hearing from Jimmy. From the things that had been said recently, I’d thought, well, hoped really, that he was going to be a more frequent visitor to our house, but in reality I hadn’t seen or heard anything at all of him since he’d driven me back from London.

Of course he could just be busy at work, but
really
, how long does it take to pick up a phone? Could he already be regretting having spent so much of his spare time with me? Or had I once again totally misinterpreted the words and actions of a close friend for something else entirely?

To fill the hours, I made a concerted effort to keep myself really busy each day, finding that physical exhaustion gave me far less thinking and brooding time. So I reorganised my old bedroom. Twice. And even cleaned the house to never-before-seen perfection. I also took up baking – which was a dubious pursuit, given the fact I had scarcely baked anything before in my life. As I produced tray after tray of food in varying degrees of edibility I saw the question in my father’s eyes, even though it was never voiced. And he was right. What was I doing baking enough food to feed an army when it would just be the two of us on Christmas Day?

Each night I fell into bed totally shattered, hoping I would be so worn out that I could ignore both Jimmy’s silence as well as the reoccurrence of the strange dreams and night-time hallucinations that had returned to haunt me.

A few evenings before Christmas Eve my father came into the lounge, dragging behind him an overly large pine tree.

I looked up from my place at the fireside, where I had been making small but steady progress with my father’s aloof cat. At least she now tolerated me touching her for as long as five seconds at a time before bolting away at speed.

‘I thought we weren’t going to bother with a tree this year?’

‘I know,’ he said, struggling to drag the giant redwood wannabe across the carpet. ‘But I thought we could do with a little brightening up in here. Make it nice and festive.’

I hurried to clear a space in the corner, ducking out of the way of the approaching branches that looked sharp enough to take out an eye or two if you weren’t careful. The tree was actually so big its topmost branches bowed over heavily against the ceiling, and it was roughly as wide as it was tall.

‘Couldn’t you find a bigger one?’ I teased.

‘It looked much smaller at the garden centre,’ Dad explained.

‘Leave your poor dad alone. You should have seen him struggling up the hill to carry it back.’

I swivelled around with enough speed to actually crick my neck. I’d been so busy examining the tree, I hadn’t seen Jimmy walk into the lounge.

‘Thanks for the lift, lad,’ said my father. ‘I knew I should have taken the car.’

‘Don’t mention it,’ Jimmy assured, his words directed to my father but his eyes never leaving my face.

There was a long moment of silence which was just this side of awkward.

‘Anyone fancy a cup of tea?’ asked my father, already half out the door to make it.

I waited until we were alone before speaking. ‘Hello, stranger. I was beginning to wonder if we’d ever see you again.’

He had the grace to look abashed. ‘I’m sorry I’ve not been in touch. I got your texts, I’ve been meaning to call but…’ His voice trailed off.

‘You’ve been busy. I get that.’

‘No. It’s not that. It’s just…’

This was getting tiresome. Was he
ever
going to finish a sentence?

‘Nice tree,’ he commented instead, studying the fir with unwarranted concentration.

If I didn’t know better I would have thought he was nervous. But I couldn’t for the life of me think why.

As my Dad passed out the tea, I took the opportunity to study Jimmy unobserved. It looked as though I might not be the only one who hadn’t been sleeping well recently, not if the dark smudges beneath his eyes were anything to go by.

‘Do you have any decorations for this tree then?’ Jimmy asked, after draining his cup.

‘Are you volunteering to help us?’

‘Oh no,’ interjected my father. ‘I’ve done my bit as far as the tree is concerned. You two can take over from here.’

I got to my feet.

‘I’ll get the box, it’s still in the attic, right?’

I had expected one or both of them to get up at that point and offer to get the box of decorations for me, but strangely when my dad looked just about to do that, Jimmy stopped him with a meaningful look, which I probably wasn’t meant to see. But I did.

‘You can manage that by yourself, can’t you?’ Jimmy asked confidently.

‘Sure,’ I replied, taking the very obvious hint and leaving the room.

I wasn’t aware I was muttering under my breath as I pulled down the loft ladder and began clicking the struts in place, until I observed Kizzy staring at me curiously from the top of the banisters.

‘And you’re just as bad,’ I said to the disdainful feline, who took off from her vantage point in a flurry of indignant fur.

Jimmy had obviously wanted to get rid of me so he could speak to my father alone. No doubt he was, even at that moment, recounting to him my own slightly eccentric theory. Proving that Rachel was still far from well. This really was great. My dad had just started treating me normally again, now he believed my ‘amnesia’ might soon be cured, but if Jimmy told him everything I had said in the car the other day, I’d be right back to square one.

I felt angry and more than a little betrayed, and though I’d never actually told Jimmy I didn’t want my dad to know what I was thinking, I’d just assumed he knew me well enough to understand that information had been for his ears only.

Typically it took much longer than it should have done to find the blasted box of decorations, and by the time I had eventually located them and packed away the ladder, whatever discussion Jimmy and my father had been engaged upon was clearly finished.

And if I needed further proof that there was something funny going on, there it was when I walked back into the lounge and found both men deeply involved in some pseudo-conversation about football, a subject neither of them were particularly interested in.

Even as I began to rip the sealing tape from the box, Dad got to his feet and gave a huge exaggerated yawn.

‘I think I might just turn in now.’

I looked at the clock above the fireplace in amazement.

‘It’s not even nine o’clock!’

Was that a blush on his cheeks, or was he just flushed from the heat of the fire?

‘It isn’t? Oh well. Never mind. It never hurts to get an early night every so often. G’night, Rachel. See you soon, Jimmy.’

I waited until I had safely heard the creak of the stairs as he climbed them, before rounding angrily on Jimmy.

‘I know what you two were discussing when I was out of the room!’

And that’s when everything got weird, because instead of replying, Jimmy just looked strangely uncomfortable and was that… yes, it was… the colour in his cheeks was clearly heightened. I actually took my eyes from his face to glance over at the fire burning merrily in the grate. Either it was really
really
hot in here, or something highly suspicious was going on.

‘You told him. Didn’t you?’ I continued, when it seemed unlikely Jimmy was going to say anything in his own defence. ‘You told him what I thought had happened to me?’

Relief flooded over his features as swiftly as the raised colour had done. ‘Is that what you think? No, of course I didn’t. I wouldn’t
do
that.’

He was so earnest in his denial that I knew instantly he was telling the truth.

‘Then why did you send me out the room?’

His eyes gave a flicker, which betrayed his discomfort, but his voice was smooth enough as he replied. ‘No one sent you out the room. You went to get the decorations.’

I gave him a long narrowed-eyed stare, which I knew he would remember from our past. It was the look I had always given him when I was unhappy with something he had said. However, Jimmy wasn’t going to let me go any further with this one.

‘Come on then. Let’s get started. It’s a big tree and we haven’t got all night.’

It’s impossible to stay in a bad mood when you’re decorating a Christmas tree. There’s something about the twinkling of fairy lights and the glint of fragile glass baubles reflected in the light from the fire that simply sucks all feelings of negativity from you, however hard you try to hold on to them.

At Jimmy’s request I had even found a CD of Christmas tunes in my dad’s collection and had them playing softly in the background as we worked together, mostly in silence, dressing the tree. It was comfortable and companionable; our heads bent low over the box of decorations, sometimes fingers colliding as we both reached for a particular ornament at exactly the same instant. Either we shared the same taste in gaudy baubles or it was another confirmation of just how in tune we were with each other.

The tree was starting to look really good. Nothing refined and understated here; this was a real Las Vegas style tree! It just needed the tinsel to finish it off. Careful of the spiky pine needles, I wriggled halfway behind the main trunk and asked Jimmy to pass me the long strand of sparkling decoration so I could thread it through the branches. I held out my hand through the dense foliage, waiting to take the glittering streamer. But instead of passing me the tinsel, I felt Jimmy’s fingertips lightly graze my own.

‘I can’t do this any more.’

His voice sounded almost desperate, as though the words had been torn out of him against his will.

The tree branches obscured my view of him, so I directed my voice in his general direction.

‘That’s all right. We’re almost done here. I can finish it off myself.’

‘I’m not talking about the damned tree!’ There was no mistaking the tone this time, there was genuine anguish there.

I struggled to get out from the imprisoning branches, but stopped as he went on to add, ‘I’m talking about us. You and me. Our friendship.’

I felt my heart freeze over. Every last fear I’d ever had in my life was crystallised in that one moment. It was as devastating to hear now as it would have been when I was five years old. Jimmy didn’t want to be my friend any more. Suddenly I was in no hurry to emerge from the tree’s protective cover. He shouldn’t see the effect his words had on me. I’d brought this on myself. I’d neglected something precious for far too long and then tried to lean on him more than I should have. I deserved whatever was coming.