Tell Me No Secrets (3 page)

‘Great stuff.' I feel him nodding. ‘You're becoming quite the local celebrity.'

‘Maybe. But, Euan—' I stop, balance the phone on my shoulder and fold my arms over my chest. ‘Remember Orla?' I say in a rush.

‘Yeah?'

Tears collect behind my eyes and I press my fingers against them until I see stars. ‘She called me earlier.'

‘Shit.' He whistles. ‘What did she want?'

‘I don't know. I cut her off before she had a chance to tell me.' I try to rub out a pen mark on the wall with my fingertip. ‘The sound of her voice, it freaked me out. I thought I'd never hear from her again. I
hoped
I'd never hear from her again.'

‘Do you think she'll call back?'

‘I don't know.'

He turns from the mouthpiece and I hear him talking to Monica, his wife. ‘She's down at the beach. Okay, you go. Yup.' He speaks back into the receiver. ‘I wonder why she would call you after all this time.'

‘Twenty-four years bar six days,' I say. ‘I counted.'

‘Grace. Don't,' he says. ‘Don't go over old ground.'

‘Do you remember when we were kids?' I'm whispering now. ‘Do you remember how Orla always managed to get her own way, no matter what?'

‘Yes, I remember.' He's silent for several seconds and I wonder whether he's thinking what I'm thinking. ‘Are you coming into work tomorrow?'

‘Yeah.'

‘See you then . . . and Grace?'

‘Yeah?'

‘Don't worry.'

I don't answer. How can I not worry?

‘Grace?'

‘What?'

‘We can sort this. Chances are she was feeling a bit nostalgic, spur-of-the-moment call and she won't repeat it.'

I wish I could believe that. ‘How did she get my number? Do you think she's been talking to Monica?'

‘Monica hasn't mentioned it and I think she would have. She never liked Orla. She would have asked you before giving out your number.'

I'm sure he's right. As children they were out-and-out enemies. It is unlikely that Monica would be willing to say hello to Orla never mind help her out by giving her my number. I finish speaking to Euan and stand by the door watching Ed and Paul play Scrabble. They don't notice me. They are locked into the game, father and son, enjoying time together. Paul is playing to win but, as ever, he is free of vanity and he laughs along with Ed, entering into the spirit of their supposed rivalry. He is a good man, an excellent husband and father and I love him more than I am able to express. The thought of living life without him is unthinkable. I wonder how much he could take before he was unwilling to stand by me. I wonder just exactly how far and wide his love for me stretches. I wonder but I don't want to find out.

Rose shoves her way to the front, digging pointy fingers into the other girls' ribs. They don't grumble. They move out of her way because Rose's mother recently died and Miss Parkin has ordered us all to be extra kind to her. ‘Rose is in your patrol, Grace, because I know I can rely on you,' she tells me.

I'm bored but trying not to show it. Almost sixteen and desperate to leave the Guides, I promised to go on one last camping trip. There are five girls in my patrol, all of them under twelve and Rose, the youngest, has just had her ninth birthday. That makes her a year too young for the Guides but Miss Parkin is her primary school teacher and has allowed her to join early.

The girls are all staring up at me, mouths agape, waiting for their instructions. ‘Go and find some sticks,' I tell them. ‘And make sure they're dry. Hang on, Rose.' I catch her arm before she scuttles off with the rest and point to her laces trailing on the ground. ‘You need to tie those up before you trip over them.'

Her eyes look anxiously towards the other girls who are disappearing into the trees.

‘Don't worry, you can catch them up in a minute.' I bend down to help her.

‘Thank you, Grace.' She smiles, gap-toothed and tentative. ‘I can't do double knots.'

‘You'll learn.' I stroke her hair and give her a gentle nudge. ‘Off you go then.'

‘Have you got rid of your shadow at last?' Orla comes over to join me. Her hands are in the pockets of her shorts and she is chewing gum, her mouth slightly open.

‘She's not so bad. Just desperate to get everything right. We were like that once.'

‘You maybe! I never was.' She pulls cigarettes and a lighter out of her pocket. ‘Her dad's a bit of all right though, isn't he?'

‘I hadn't really noticed.'

‘Liar!'

‘For God's sake!' I hiss, looking around to make sure no one is listening. ‘His wife's not long dead.'

‘So?' She gives a careless shrug. ‘That doesn't stop him being attractive. You coming?' She waves the cigarettes at me.

I shake my head.

‘Suit yourself.' She throws me a dirty look. ‘Some friend you are.'

She stomps off, her boots kicking up the dirt and I hesitate, almost go after her but decide not to. For the last few weeks she's been acting weird. I don't know what's wrong with her and she won't tell me. I suspect it might be to do with her parents. They are having marriage problems and Orla, as an only child, ends up in the middle of it. I wish I could do something to help, but whenever I try I get a mouthful of bitchy mind-your-own-business comments.

I walk through the trees towards the campfire. Acorns and pine cones litter the ground and as I step, they spring back under my boots. The air smells sweeter than newly baked bread or Euan's baby nephew when he's been bathed and talcumed, and a cool breeze is blowing through the branches. The other patrol leaders are gathered in the clearing and we stand chatting for ten minutes before Miss Parkin comes to give us our orders. She looks harassed. Her hair is sticking up all over her head and her blouse is crushed like she's spent weeks sleeping in it.

Orla is back looking cheerful again. She sidles up to me and speaks into my ear: ‘Give her another day or so and she'll be completely demented.'

‘Always talking, Orla!' Miss Parkin barks, her glance including me. ‘Both of you, see to the sausages.'

The sausages are wrapped in greaseproof paper, more than a hundred of them, tight and shiny in their skins. I tip the bundle out on to the tray. They are linked to each other and I swing them around my head like a cowboy with a lasso. Orla catches my eye and we start to giggle. Miss Parkin's antennae snap back in our direction. She shouts our names and we straighten up, rigid as telegraph poles. I hold the sausages steady and Orla cuts them into singles with the knife.

‘What does this remind you of?' Orla asks me. She positions one of them in front of her shorts, points it upwards and waves it around.

‘Callum when Miss Fraser bends over at the blackboard,' I say at once and we dissolve into hysterics, a sloppy tangle of weak legs and arms.

Miss Parkin slaps the backs of our bare legs as we fall. ‘You should be setting an example to the younger ones,' she tells us. ‘Now get on with it or there will be no marks for either of your patrols.'

We pull ourselves upright again and I squash bubbles of laughter with thoughts of starving children in Biafra and people who lose their toes to frostbite or dogs that are beaten and cowed.

The fire is lit and we place the sausages over the makeshift grill. My job is to turn them and I do so carefully, shaking off burning sparks that fly up on to my arms. Orla works around me, organising plates and cutlery. Every so often, when Miss Parkin's eyes are elsewhere, she lunges towards me and pokes me hard in the kidneys. The fourth time she does this, I push her backwards and she crashes to the ground, scattering a pile of sticks. She lies perfectly still, limbs twisted in a parody of death. I pay no attention. I've recently won my first-aid badge and I know pretend when I see it.

The sausages are almost done and I move some of them off to the side. The smell draws saliva into my mouth faster than I can swallow and I want to spit like a boy but Miss Parkin is watching, her eyes fixing on each of us in turn.

Monica and Faye, heads together, are deep in concentrated effort. One splits oblong rolls with a bread knife, the other pours wavy lines of ketchup along the spines. As usual, Monica looks perfectly groomed as if she's just stepped out of the hairdresser's. I wonder how she does it.

Orla is back on her feet. ‘I could have been dead,' she says with a huffy pout.

‘I should be so lucky,' I mouth back at her.

She takes one of the sausages and bites the end off it. ‘How about we sneak off and join the boys tonight?'

I don't answer. The youth club is camping about three hundred yards away, through the trees and beyond the pond. Several boys from our school are there, including Euan whom I've been going out with for five weeks and six days. He's my next-door neighbour and we've known each other for ever but that hasn't stopped me falling for him. The thought of joining him in his tent sends my heart racing but I don't want Orla there as an audience. Euan is mine and I'm not about to share time with him.

At last we sit down to eat and for the first time that day we are all quiet. The sausages, wrapped in white bread rolls, taste like a small piece of heaven. Bread melts on to my tongue, hot sausage breaks open and slides salty, succulent pork to the back of my throat. We each have three fat helpings and lounge back against rocks softened by sweaters and compare the size of our stomachs.

Dusk is creeping through the trees, casting shadows behind us and blowing a cold wind over our tired bodies. When Miss Parkin's back is turned, Orla reaches for the ketchup bottle, tips it up and makes words on the tray, slowly and deliberately, letter by letter as if she is icing a cake. I sit up to read what she's written:
Rose! Mummy wants to talk to you.

I meet her stare. She is bold and brazen as a wolf on the hunt. Without shifting her eyes from mine, she nudges Rose with her feet. Rose, already half asleep, is curled up like a kitten at my side. She rouses into a sitting position, one eye still closed.

‘What?' she says, rubbing at her cheek.

‘There's a message for you, Rose!' Orla shakes her fully awake. ‘Look! It's from the spirit world.'

I grab an overcooked, blackened sausage and before Rose reads the words, I swirl it through the ketchup until all that's left is a mix of half shapes and splodges.

‘Aw!' Rose wails and I pull her towards me.

‘Just go back to sleep,' I tell her, settling her back at my side.

‘But what's the spirit world and what did it say?' she asks.

‘Nothing.' I glare at Orla.

She glares back. ‘Spoilsport,' she says.

2

Next day I stay in bed until almost seven, hugging into Paul's back, lingering in the intimacy of the night before. After Orla's call, I was watchful and anxious, but by the time I fell asleep, the phone call was pushed to the back of my mind. As soon as the game of Scrabble was over and Ed went through to organise himself for bed, I told Paul about finding out that Ella was on the pill. His reaction was, as I expected, more measured and less fearful than mine. He reminded me that she is, after all, being responsible and is days away from turning sixteen: not quite an adult but most definitely not a child. Nothing would be gained by taking a hard line but something could be gained by quietly chatting about how she is feeling and what her plans might be. We agreed that I would speak to her after school, including Daisy in the conversation so that Ella doesn't feel like I'm picking on her.

Then the girls came home from their evenings out and we all retired to bed. Paul and I lay side by side talking about the possibility of a sabbatical in Australia. For the last fourteen years, Paul has been professor of marine biology at St Andrews University but he is due some research time and has applied for a position at the University of Melbourne. Fingers crossed he will be successful and in two months' time we will up sticks and move to Victoria. Paul's sister and family have lived there for over fifteen years and are looking forward to welcoming us all.

Paul and I spent time planning and imagining where we'll live and how we'll enjoy the holidays – scuba diving or horse riding? The Barrier Reef or the Blue Mountains? – and then, moments later, we were making love, the sort of married sex that takes ten minutes but leaves behind a residue of sweetness that endures for days.

Daisy is out of bed first and then I follow, prepare breakfast and see them all out of the door before I set off myself. I'm lucky. I can walk to work. I call on Murphy and walk to the end of our street and down to the waterfront. The harbour is empty this morning and the tide is going out. The fishing boats have already left for the deeper waters of the North Sea where they catch shellfish and crabs. The harbour wall stretches for over two hundred yards; its top is almost four feet thick and I walk along the inside edge of it, enjoying the strength of the wind that comes in off the sea and tries to blow me backward. Every so often Murphy finds a smell irresistible and stops for a longer sniff and I turn around to look back at our house. It's painted a duck-egg blue and sits basking in the summer sunshine. The front garden could do with some tidying up and the gravel driveway spills on to the road but to me it looks perfect.

When the wall ends, I drop back down on to a single-track road with yellow gorse on one side and a sandy beach on the other. The sea is grey and heavy and it moves rhythmically beside me like a timeless, soothing companion. I breathe in a lungful of salty air then look up to the sky where clouds scud across the blue towards the far horizon.