The Ice Cream Girls (25 page)

‘Then of course, things always get that little bit worse for us when you do something.’

‘When
I
do something?’

‘Yeah. When you got married the first time, when you had Verity, when you moved to Brighton, then when you had Conrad, now this wedding. Every time something good happens to you, she starts to obsess that the police will find that missing piece of evidence that will send you to prison.’

‘But there’s no evidence to find.’ I am confused. ‘How can they find evidence that isn’t there? And why would . . .’ My words fail, drain right away as Adrian becomes flame-red from the line where his forehead meets his hair probably right down to his manicured toes in his expensive shoes. ‘She thinks I did it,’ I say. ‘She thinks I’m guilty.’

‘She worries about you. She just—’

‘She just thinks I’m a murderer
and
a liar.’

‘No, she thinks that you were scared and that it was self-defence and that you knew no one would believe you—’

‘So I lied.’

This is too much new and unsettling information for my brain to process at this current time. Medina, my sister, thinks I am a murderer. She’s always thought that. She thinks I have killed someone, that I have taken a life.

‘Sez,’ Adrian begins, sounding troubled at my silence.

I hold my hand up to stop him talking. ‘No, no, don’t say anything. This isn’t about me, we’re talking about you and Medina. If you’re right, and she has got these obsessions, then it sounds as if she’s traumatised, not crazy. And if you love her—’

‘Of course I love her. Even when it’s not easy to be around her, I love her.’

‘If you love her, you should be supporting her rather than running off with your mates all the time. Seriously, how is that going to help? And how do you think the kids are taking it? If, as you say, their mum won’t let them out of her sight and the rest of the time their dad’s not there, what are they supposed to think and feel?’

‘She won’t let me get involved with the kids,’ he says. ‘If I try to do something with them, she has so many things on the list of dos and don’ts it’s not worth it.’

‘Oh, don’t be so pathetic. These are your kids you’re talking about. Not worth it? Ades, are you seriously telling me that if you cancelled one of your “holidays” and took that time off work and every morning you said to Mez that you’d give the kids their breakfast and take them to school, she’d say no? Cos, you know, even when Verity and Conrad were really young and I was still convinced they would break if the wind blew too hard, on Saturday mornings when Evan would get them dressed and take them out, I thought it was a blessing. I mean, he’d give them chocolate pastries and juice drinks that were full of sugar for breakfast, and he’d dress them like they’d fallen into a pile of jumble, but that was just his way of doing things. And you could not get a more paranoid mother than me, but I could relax because they were with him, the only other person on earth I’d trust them with.’

Adrian says nothing, he is staring into the mid-distance, and ever so slightly sulking.

‘To be perfectly honest, the only reason I trusted Evan so much, bad as it sounds, is because he proved over and over that the kids are the most important people on earth to him. More important than me, even. I know he’d never let anything happen to them. Yes, yes, I should be able to entrust them with him because he’s their father, but the simple fact is I couldn’t at first. I was so worried and paranoid, but Evan reassured me that he cared about the kids as much as I did. How can you prove to Mez that you love the kids as much as she does and stop her being so paranoid if you’re always jetting off on your hols? How can that do anything but prove to her that she’s all alone in this and that she needs to be doubly vigilant because the person who’s meant to have her back hasn’t?’

‘You’re probably right,’ he mumbles.

‘Try to get her some help, too. Maybe get her to talk to someone? See if they can help her with her obsessions and her worries. But do it in a way that says you love her and you’re worried about her, not that she’s a crazy person you can’t bear to be around.’

‘I don’t think she’s a crazy person.’

‘You’ve got to prove that to her, not me.’ I stand up, ready to walk away from this meeting enlightened. I came to kick his ass – I am walking away knowing that he and my sister think I am a killer. ‘And stop feeding her paranoia by telling mean “jokes” about having criminals in the family.’

Adrian colours up again and looks down at his desk in shame. Or is it embarrassment? Shame would mean he feels bad and knows he was wrong; embarrassment would mean that he feels bad because I’d been told what he said – he meant it, but I wasn’t meant to know. ‘Serena, I—’

I shake my head at him and hold my hand up again to halt his words. ‘Sorry’ isn’t going to change this, or make either of us feel any better. ‘I’ll see ya, Adrian. I’ll see you soon.’

‘Yeah, bye, Serena.’

Don’t you mean, ‘Bye, Murderer’?
I think as I walk out of his office.

I am having trouble walking to my car.

My legs will not move one in front of the other as they are supposed to; they feel like they are on springs and that my body is bouncing and swaying as I move.

My entire family think I am capable of committing the ultimate crime.

If Medina thinks that, then Faye definitely does. And so do my parents, because they are the only people who could convince them that their sister is innocent. If they haven’t managed it, then they must think it too.

Four of the seven people I care about most in this world think I am a murderer. Four of the seven people I care about most in this world think that I should have spent the last twenty years rotting away in a prison cell.

poppy

It’s Fate.

It’s meant to be. I am supposed to clear my name. That’s the only way I can explain the fact that she is living down here, too. The two of us are still linked and we will be until I have made her confess.

First though, I need to find out everything I can about her so that I can work out how to approach her. What to say that will get her to tell the truth. And when that happens, Dad will be able to look at me,
talk
to me – I will come back to life and he will love me again; Mum will stop looking so nervous around me, as if she is waiting for the time when she will catch me sneaking into her room to put a pillow over her face. When Serena confesses, I’ll be a free woman. I might even get a special letter from the Queen, apologising for my lost years.

I’ll get my life back. This part of it, anyway. No probation appointments, no having to tick the previous convictions box. I could even commit a petty crime and not worry about being sent back to prison for the rest of my days. And I can finally,
finally
stop waiting for my new life to begin.

‘Ms Argyle, room five,’ says the voice over the tannoy system. ‘Ms Argyle, room five.’

I rise from my seat and carefully replace the magazine I have been flicking through back on the low wooden table in front of me. That’s what Penelope Argyle is like: neat and tidy; doesn’t like to make a mess, doesn’t like to cause a fuss.

I walk along the narrow corridor and check the numbers on the doors until I reach room five. I knock and enter without waiting for an answer.

The man inside stands and smiles. It’s a warm, friendly smile and I almost falter. Then the picture on the desk catches my eye: husband, wife, two children. All grinning.

‘Hello there, I’m Doctor Evan Gillmare. Take a seat and tell me how I can help you.’

I had to come here, because this is another piece in the jigsaw of the life she stole from me. I could have married a good-looking doctor. I could have had two children. If she hadn’t done what she did, all this could have been mine. And I need to get as close as possible to this life before I speak to her.

Dr Gillmare is reading the form I filled in so I take the opportunity to scrutinise his room. It is crammed with books on oak shelves, and all around the room are dotted photos of his family. Him and his wife. Him and his children. The wife and the children. My eyes keep coming back to the photo on the desk. For some reason, it is the one that needles me the most. The four of them, the parents with one arm locked around each other, one around the shoulder of a child, are all laughing –
laughing
not merely smiling – at the camera. Maybe it’s because they look so complete. As if nothing can tear them apart because they are four and they are perfect that way.

‘So, Ms Argyle, it says on the form that you’ve just moved to the area.’ Dr Gillmare makes me jump by speaking to me.

‘Yes.’

‘Are you from here originally?’ His voice is rich, warm, deep. I could bathe in his voice, float in its beauty and never come out.

‘No, I’m from London. I have family living down here, I need to be near them.’

‘OK. You know it’s a little unusual for me to see patients without their notes or without them being registered here, but you said it was an emergency and you asked for me by name.’ He is good looking, of course.
Of course
. Serena wouldn’t go for anyone ordinary or plain. First it was Marcus, now it’s Dr Gillmare, and I’m sure in between there have been a host of men who have all been tall and handsome, if not dark. Dr Gillmare has empathy to top off his looks. If I was a real patient, I would feel comfortable talking to him about virtually anything. He has that kind of face, that kind of manner. No wonder he wears the widest wedding ring I have ever seen on a man and has a picture of his family on every free inch of space – he wants patients to know he is very married because I’m sure they fall in love with him with alarming regularity.

Even though I know who he is, I could easily see myself joining the Dr Gillmare fan club. And if Serena gets sent down . . .

‘Ms Argyle?’ he asks.

I jump slightly because that’s me, isn’t it? ‘Yes?’ I ask, flushing slightly at the thought that was unwinding in my mind.

‘You asked for me by name.’

‘Erm, yes. Someone I met a while back said you were the doctor to see.’

‘OK. As I said, it’s unusual to see a patient without their notes or them being fully registered here, but as it’s an emergency, I’ve made an exception. What is your emergency?’

‘Oh, yes, I . . . um . . . I . . . need the morning-after pill,’ I stutter. That’s the best emergency I can come up with.

‘OK,’ he says, swivelling back to his desk and tapping on his computer. ‘When did you have the unprotected sex?’

Damn it! How long is it before it’s too long
?
Forty-eight hours? Seventy-two? Ninety-six? I can’t remember.
I spent so much time convincing the receptionist to let me see him that I forgot to do the other part of the research.

‘Um . . . yesterday? Yesterday morning.’

‘OK.’

‘At about eight o’clock.’

‘Right.’

‘Well, eight till about eight-thirty.’

‘OK.’

‘Actually, eight-forty-five.’

‘Uh-huh.’

‘Actually, you know what? Let’s just call it nine. It was virtually nine. So let’s just call it nine.’

‘All right, nine it is. We could even say nine-thirty if it makes you any happier?’

‘No, no, nine’s fine.’

‘Good. But you do know that you can get it from most chemists now?’

‘You didn’t have to wait to see a doctor.’

‘Oh, um, right, yeah. It’s just, that I . . . I mean, of course I knew that. I just . . . I just wanted to see a doctor to be sure. You know?’

‘Better to be safe than sorry,’ he says.

‘Yeah.’

‘Right. If you roll up your sleeve, I’ll check your blood pressure before I give you the prescription.’

He has soft, gentle hands that brush my skin as he slips the armband around my bicep. I watch his hands, with their square nails and fine wrinkles eased into the smooth, dark brown skin.

‘Your blood pressure is a little high,’ he says. ‘Nothing to be worried about, though.’

‘I get nervous around doctors,’ I explain.
Especially ones married to people who had me sent to prison.

‘I understand. OK, I’ll prescribe you one dose of emergency contraception. It is only one pill now, so take it as soon as possible. If you are sick or vomit, the pill may not work so you should come back and see us. Your period should arrive as normal, but if you are late do come back as there is a chance – a small one, but still a chance – that you may be pregnant. Is that OK?’ He has been typing away while talking and then printing out the prescription rather than writing it, but he’s managed to make me feel as if I am the most important person in the whole of the surgery.

‘Yeah, that all sounds fine,’ I say, feeling mollified. I have taken advantage of the good nature of this man; it’s not his fault he is married to a murderer. He probably doesn’t even know.

‘Is there anything else you wanted to discuss, Ms Argyle?’ he asks in a kindly voice.

‘No, why should there be?’ I wave the prescription at him to show that I have everything I need.

‘I couldn’t help but notice the cuts on your arm,’ he says.

I’d almost forgotten they were there. They are from such a long time ago and the scars have faded, almost blended in to my skin. Or so I thought. I hadn’t even noticed that he had seen them. He certainly didn’t react to them. And now I have to dream up some more lies.

‘Don’t feel you have to explain. Or talk about it,’ he says before I further add to my list of misdemeanours. ‘But if you do want to talk about it, about anything, you can always come back to us here, or we’ll help you find a counsellor.’