.
or a graphic designer at least. While we went out, and when we were friends, too, he would make me little drawings and pass them to me in class. Of flowers, instead of giving me bouquets. Of chocolates, to tease me. Of myself, when he was feeling particularly brave. I was the only one he showed his sketchbook to.
The uncomfortable feeling at the pit of my stomach intensifies as I get closer to where his house should be. He was my friend. The first person I fell in love with. You don’t forget your first crush. I haven’t seen him in nineteen years, and even at seventeen, we’d been split up for a while. Goodness, we’d been so young when we got together, we didn’t even have sex. Even though we did do all sorts of other things. He wasn’t exactly shy about what he wanted, and neither was I. We weren’t in a healthy place, so we thought the more bruising it involved the better. I still remember how he’d sneered at me when I broke up with him, sneered and insulted me to hide how hurt he was, a teenager about to lose everything but unable to stop it.
Driving down the High Street has memories batting into me on every corner. About the first time that Anna, Teo, Jay and I tricked the goody machine, spilling sweets into our laps like a miniature version of Willy Wonka’s chocolate factory. The first time the three us scratched our names into a bench, Anna and Teo and I, in the small park by the graveyard. The first place I rode a bicycle, in the parking lot just behind the town sign, with Jay teaching me, already carrying around his box of crayons wherever he went, painting broad colourful patterns onto the pavement along the High Street and into their front garden.
I follow the road past the red parasols. Just behind the bend, that’s where it should be.
And then it comes into view.
It looks just the same. The door is still painted red, the stone still grey, the front garden filled with sad shrubbery and grey stone tiles, the front room hidden behind large artificial flowers. I don’t think they’ve even changed the curtains. They look like they’re straight from the Eighties.
After parking the car on the side of the road, I walk up to his house and ring the doorbell.
Something moves in the front room. I think the telly is running. Footsteps approach. Then the door is thrown open.
I don’t recognise the person I’m looking at. ‘Sorry,’ I say, instinctively smiling at the strange man. ‘I must have got the wrong door.’
The man looks at me, dark hair and bright eyes in a sunken face. He is wearing a sweaty Burberry shirt, and is still in the motion of throwing on a Barbour jacket, dark green with orange lining. I can tell it used to be fine once. A bad stain sits right on his lapels. His hair is too long for him, and the colour of his skin is paler even than his eyes. He looks like someone who worked out for a while but then gave up on it again, fat and muscles creating a threatening bulk. Even as he straightens his tie, hastily put together, his eyes are slightly unfocused.
‘I was just looking for an old friend, but he must have moved after all,’ I continue. ‘You wouldn’t happen to know where …’
His eyes narrow. Then they widen very suddenly. ‘It’s you! Caroline Wilson, as I fucking live and breathe!’
He’s grinning. I stare at him. Right into those bright, pale eyes. Right at that wide grin. The crooked incisor at the bottom on the right.
No.
This cannot be Jay. He cannot have changed so much. But he’s grinning, and I recognise that grin, as if this old, tired man has stolen it and put it on, stolen it from the young man who drew me flowers on pieces of paper he’d torn out of his books, who took me to a fine art museum on our first date, who’d laugh just as easily as he’d sneer. ‘You’re back! Bloody fucking hell,’ Jacob says and takes a step towards me. His voice sounds scratchy. There’s a smell coming off him.
‘Jacob,’ I say, suddenly out of breath. ‘Hi.’
His eyes are running all over my body. Like I am something he can hold on to. The first friendly face in years. ‘You are looking good, Linny.’
I wish there was any way that I could be saying that back. ‘I just wanted to see how you were,’ I say. My brain still cannot compute that this man could be Jay. ‘I’ve only got a minute, I got somewhere to be, but I thought we … we might … that you could …’
He watches me stammer. He is still smiling, but it is morphing into something smaller. Something bitter. ‘Somewhere to be?’
I don’t know what to say to that.
He steps closer. That must be whisky on his breath. ‘Do you want to come in, Linny?’
‘Listen,’ I say, still completely shocked. The mere thought of going into that house with that man to ask him questions, feeling that door close behind us with a final click, makes my stomach quiver. A public place would be better. A much more public place. ‘I would love to, but I can’t just now. I just wanted to let you know I was back, and that we should catch up some …’
‘Everybody knows already, Linny,’ he says, swaying on his feet, reaching for the doorframe to steady himself. It seems to be a practised gesture.
The moment he realises he’s done it, he straightens as quickly as if someone slapped him, letting go of the doorframe. Trying to stand on his own two feet. He tries for a smile. It is supposed to look harmless, I think. ‘Kait’s texted the whole village. It was a wild night at the pub last night, let me tell you.’
For a moment, I see his eyes clear, see a shrewdness return to his features. He takes another step towards me. ‘The Detective Inspector was all over the place. You should have seen him. Didn’t even have time to stick his hand down some poor young thing’s pants in front of the ladies’.’
My throat is dry. He’s too close. His breath smells sharp. My mouth twitches. I hope he doesn’t realise. ‘Listen, Jacob, I am sorry I made you get up. I really do have to run now, but we should definitely catch up. Maybe in a couple of weeks? Definitely coffee …’
His hand shoots out before I can stop him. His fingers wrap around my wrist. ‘You don’t have to lie, Linn.’
I try to shake off his hand. My throat is closing up. ‘Let me go.’
His gaze goes right through me. His voice drops to a whisper. ‘Is it so bad? Do I really look so bad, Caroline?’
‘Jacob, let me go,’ I say.
He puts on another smile. It tries for jovial but ends up desperate. With a jolt, I remember that expression. That is what he looked like when he had been hurt. When he was about to lash out in return. ‘You are looking lovely, Linn, you really are,’ he says. ‘I hope you don’t swing the other way any more?’
I grit my teeth. ‘What on earth do you mean?’
‘Remember what a good party we had. At mine. That night, before it … you know. Happened.’ His fingers are wrapped so tightly around my skin that his knuckles are turning white. His eyes are going in and out of focus. ‘What a comfort to finally find out why you had broken up with me, wasn’t it, when I saw you with your tongue down Anna Bohacz’s throat for the better part of the night.’
All the air is punched from my lungs. ‘Fuck off,’ I say, pulling my arm away in earnest now.
It doesn’t even seem to register with him. He is still stronger than me. ‘Just checking. Gave me a right shock. And the big O, too, you know. Oliver Dawson. He had even let you pick his perfume, remember? He smelled like something out of Mum’s Chilcott catalogue that night. I think he thought he would marry you one day.’
‘We are married. Let me go!’ Finally, I manage to tear my arm out of his grip. With shaking hands, I turn on my heels and rush to the car. I force myself not to look back even once, my nerves taut as rabbit wire, trying to get out of there as fast as possible. My legs are trembling as I push down the clutch.
When I drive past the house, Jacob is still standing in the doorway. Staring