Someone Else's Son (24 page)

With Brody things were different. It was as though he wanted everyone close to him to be blind too, she concluded. He was like a toddler playing hide and seek, she decided one day, as she ate her usual sandwich while Brody sat in his office hunched over his keyboard.

‘Eyes tight shut and you believe the rest of the world can’t see you either,’ she said to herself.

‘Second sign,’ a colleague called out from the adjoining desk. The maths department was unusually quiet this lunchtime.

‘What is?’

‘Talking to yourself. Second sign of madness.’

‘What’s the first?’ Fiona laughed. Pete always cheered her up.

‘Working for
him
.’ Pete was grinning.

‘All these years,’ Fiona said, ‘and I haven’t any more of a clue about him than the day I started working here.’ A bit of cheese dropped on her trousers. She picked it up, wiping the mayonnaise off with a napkin. ‘He never talks about how he went . . . you know, how he went blind.’ It was hard even for Fiona to say the words. University staff and students alike knew to keep quiet.

‘They say it might have been an accident,’ Pete said.

‘I heard that too,’ Fiona agreed. She kept watch over her boss through the glass wall of his private office. The door was closed, a sign he was working on something confidential. She would be allowed in, but only after knocking and Brody confirming it was her. She wasn’t interested in spying on his work, she just wanted to get inside her boss’s mind.

She saw Brody pick up his phone. A second later, her phone rang. ‘We’re going out,’ he said.

‘Where?’

‘To the country.’

Bemused, Fiona watched as Brody shut down his laptop and put on his navy wool coat. He knew exactly where everything was. He wrapped a checked scarf round his neck and came out to Fiona’s desk. It was cold for the end of October and Fiona had left her flat that morning with only a light mac. She shrugged into it and grabbed her purse and keys. ‘See you later, Pete. I’m off on another mystery tour.’ She pulled a face but found she’d been talking to herself. Pete wasn’t there. ‘Definitely going mad, then,’ she concluded, taking her boss’s arm and guiding him to the lift.

The drive to Cambridgeshire was pleasant. Being inside the car with Brody, the drizzle outside, made Fiona feel cosy and special – a feeling she relished while also being somewhat wary of. The hot coffee Brody insisted they buy at a service station lightened her introspective mood and took her mind off the fact that the man she’d known longest in her life – longer than the disaster of a relationship which had ended badly just before she took the job with Brody – would never notice her. In over ten years, he hadn’t given her a second glance.

‘You going to tell me yet?’ Fiona braked. Red tail lights flashed on and off ahead. All he’d given her was a postcode for the satnav.

‘Ah, Fiona,’ he said as part sigh and part what she thought sounded a lot like despair. ‘It’s complicated.’

‘Isn’t everything?’ She imagined he was thinking of their relationship, working it all out. He wasn’t, of course.

‘Not in mathematics, no.’

She decided to stay silent, just in case.

‘You’ve never been married, have you, Fiona?’ he continued.

Her heart skidded and she gripped the wheel tightly. How could he know about Daniel? He’d never asked anything about her personal life before, apart from the cursory ‘What are you doing for Christmas?’ or ‘How was your long weekend?’ and she’d never divulged anything to him about her previous disastrous relationship. Too much detail and he was more than likely to lose interest. That she didn’t want.

‘No,’ she managed to say. ‘I don’t think I’m the marrying sort.’ She wanted to kick herself for that.

The level of polite familiarity they shared was not exponential to the intimacy of her place in his life. She was often in his bedroom, for Christ’s sake, sorting out his personal stuff. She chose his underwear, cleaned out his fridge, filtered his emails and watched him grow older. None of these things were in her job description, yet she didn’t begrudge any of it.

‘If you’re ever tempted,’ he finished, ‘then don’t.’

She dug her nails into the steering wheel for the rest of the journey and remained silent, just the way Brody liked things.

It was only when the dual carriageway gave way to country roads slipping narrowly through pretty villages, only when they passed beneath the golden shroud of the autumn trees lining the college driveway, only when Fiona read the navy and gold sign that welcomed them to Denningham College that she realised their mission was all about Max again.

They found her by accident. The small puddle of what they thought was a child curled up beneath a tree at the edge of the Gorse Vale estate – pretty much the
only
tree in the area – turned out to be a cocky-looking teenage girl when she unfurled herself at the sound of their voices. They asked if they knew where Dayna Ray lived.

‘You being funny, or what?’ She prickled with defensiveness – a girl clearly used to fending off. She glanced up at them. Her heavily made-up eyes were smudged and wet with tears. Snot bubbled at her nose.

‘No,’ Carrie replied more gently than she’d intended. ‘We just need to find her. The other kids said she lived at this end of the estate.’

The girl squinted at Carrie. A glimmer of recognition, although outweighed by sorrow, flickered in her eyes. She turned to Brody, gave him the once over, and then dropped her forehead on to her knees again. ‘She lives over there.’ Her arm came up and pointed behind her.

‘Thank you,’ Carrie replied, walking off.

‘She’s not home.’

Carrie stopped and turned back. The girl was standing now – a skinny thing in a black leather jacket and grey jeans. Her hair was frazzled at the ends from too much dye, but pale and childlike at the roots. Carrie reckoned that she was trying to look eighteen or nineteen but in reality was probably fifteen. The same as Max. She felt her stomach cramp.

‘What do you want her for?’ The girl wiped her nose on her sleeve. She hiccupped back some sobs.

Brody spoke, his suddenly loud voice causing the girl to recoil. ‘We want to talk to her.’

Carrie’s hand latched on to Brody’s arm. She wasn’t sure if it was to guide him or take some comfort. ‘Just to ask her a few things.’ Carrie felt herself swallowing back sobs. Nothing felt real.

‘What things?’ The girl pulled a packet of Superkings from her pocket and lit one with shaking fingers. She exhaled through tight lips.

‘It doesn’t matter.’ Carrie bowed her head. She was hardly capable of talking, let alone telling a stranger everything. ‘Thanks.’ She turned and led Brody away.

‘Wait.’ The girl was suddenly in front of them. ‘Aren’t you that woman off the telly?’

Carrie offered a minimal nod. In truth, she didn’t know who she was any more.

‘I saw you.’

‘Yes.’ Carrie smiled weakly – a foreign feeling – and continued walking. She was shocked when the girl’s hand clamped round her arm. ‘A lot of people do.’

‘No. I
saw
you.’ She sucked hard on the cigarette and exhaled. ‘Yesterday at the school when it was closed after . . .’

Carrie shook her head. ‘We have to go.’ She tugged at Brody’s arm but he was reluctant to move.

‘I was walking past and you were getting out of your car with someone. You . . . you looked sad.’ The girl chucked the remaining half of her cigarette a few feet away. ‘Are you making a show about . . . what happened there?’

A pause, but then Carrie replied. ‘About what?’ If she’d been thinking clearly, she’d have realised that it wasn’t odd for this girl to know about the stabbing. The school was local and she probably went to it. The whole area would be buzzing with the news.

‘About Max. About the stabbing,’ the girl finished.

The name hung thickly between them, as if her son was actually there. A car revved along the street. Some kids wailed on the other side of the road.

‘You knew him?’ Carrie’s hand came up, grasping at the air between her and the girl. There was a thread, a tiny wisp of a connection and it hurt so deep she felt as though she’d been stabbed in the heart herself.

 

The café was empty apart from them and one old man sitting in the corner. They were seated with coffees and a Coke that no one really wanted. This girl knew her son. She wasn’t going to let her go.

‘It’s me. I’m Dayna,’ she said.

By then it should have come as no surprise to Carrie, but she became still, her fingers hooked through the mug handle. She gave a small nod.

Then, when the waitress walked by their table, stopped and backed up, offered a familiar greeting to Brody, it should have made her ask: how come she knows you? But it was taking all Carrie’s concentration to piece together what the schoolgirl opposite was saying.

‘It’s empty,’ Dayna commented. She glanced up at the clock. ‘There’d always be a group of kids in here on a Saturday morning.’

Carrie frowned. The girl was staring at her feet. ‘What do you mean?’

‘It’s like everything’s dead now.’

‘Shit.’ Brody’s voice was deep and resonant and broke the word into two syllables. The coffee machine behind them steamed and hissed.

‘Do you know who I am? Really am?’ Carrie asked before adding, ‘Know who
we
are?’

Dayna shook her head. ‘You’re that woman off the telly.’

That she was sitting in a café with one of the most famous women in the country should have at least ruffled the teenager enough for her to be texting some friends or asking for her autograph. As it was, they sat awkwardly as if Carrie was an impatient aunt or teacher that Dayna had bumped into while out shopping.

‘I’m Max’s mother, Dayna. This is his father.’

Slowly, the girl’s eyes narrowed as she took it in, wondering, Carrie thought, why Max hadn’t introduced her or brought her home. Did she even know that Max was the son of a celebrity? A tiny patch of fog cleared in Carrie’s mind before the mess in her head occluded her thoughts again: Max hadn’t
wanted
his friends to meet her.

‘You’re . . . you’re Max’s mother?’

‘Yes.’ Carrie held her hand out across the table. Dayna tentatively pressed her fingers against the older woman’s – the teen’s nicotine-stained skin and bitten-down nails a contrast to the milky whiteness of Carrie’s pampered hands and French manicured fingertips.

‘But . . .’

‘I know.’ They stared at each other, each caught up in the realisation of who the other was.

‘I . . . but he said . . .’ Dayna let out a little hiccup, stunned by the legacy Max had left them. ‘It’s all been so horrid. Like life’s just been blown out.’

Carrie reeled from the girl’s honest words. She nodded and briefly shut her eyes. ‘It only happens to other people,’ she whispered in return. The irony was lost on Dayna, Carrie knew, as her entire career filled her head at the speed of light. Just as fast, it was gone, and there was a void so terrifying she didn’t know how she would cope.
Other people
, she thought, refusing to acknowledge that as of yesterday morning that was exactly what she had become.

 

Brody was convinced she was the same girl that Max had brought to his flat on several occasions. He’d already visualised her from the traces she’d left in his bedroom – a faint scent of hairspray, a touch of leather from a jacket or some heavy boots perhaps, and the unmistakable aroma of teen lust; nothing that could be smelt exactly, he thought, rather
felt
. A vibe left lingering in his bedroom. He’d been transported back to his own boyhood, suddenly envious of his son’s age and opportunity.

‘Did he ever talk about his old school?’ Brody asked.

‘He didn’t like it,’ Dayna said. ‘We had that in common. Not liking school.’

Brody heard the fizz of her can as she sipped and put it back on the table.

‘Were you . . . you know, going out?’ Carrie asked. Brody could have answered that.

‘No. Yes. I dunno. Doesn’t matter now, does it?’ She let out a snort, one that told the world she didn’t care what it threw at her because nothing could be worse than this.

‘He mentioned you a couple of times.’ Brody knew that whatever colour the girl’s eyes were, they would now be wide as saucers. ‘He was fond of you.’

‘Yeah,’ was all she said. Brody sensed the judder in the word; how it was filled with desolation.

‘Dayna, do you know who could have done . . . it?’ Carrie’s voice, on the other hand, cut insensitively through the café buzz. A group of four young mums had come in with pushchairs and whining toddlers.

‘It’s not fucking show time, Carrie.’

‘Brody, please.’ Then the predictable hand on arm. He shrugged it away. ‘Dayna, if you know anything, you have to speak up,’ she continued.

‘No one liked us,’ was all she said. Brody imagined all the anger and depression strung up behind those few words. Kids these days battled for acceptance, and hearing coldly, truthfully, that his own son hadn’t been liked hurt badly. Carrie just didn’t get it.

‘Why?’ Carrie demanded. ‘What was wrong with you? What was wrong with my son?’

Brody heard the scrape of the chair opposite.

‘No, wait . . .’ Desperate words from Carrie.

‘
Wrong
with us?’ Dayna said from somewhere near the door. ‘What’s wrong with you, more like, that your own son never once mentioned who his mother was?’

And she was gone, leaving both of them reeling from the truth that neither of them was ready to face.

 

Dayna went back to the tree. There was nowhere else to go. She rested her back against the bark of its narrow trunk and slid down, not caring if it ripped her jacket. Her bum hit the ground hard, sending shock waves up her spine and into her skull. She liked the feeling of controlling the pain.