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Chapter 16
Monday 8th February
Monday morning is cold and frosty, the clouds steel grey. Yet again, my sleep over the weekend was sporadic at best, the now depressingly regular, terrifying, flame-filled dreams – yes, they’re always about fire – leaving me exhausted, hating the night. I’m struggling to switch off at all, my mind running repeatedly over everything that’s happened in the past few weeks. IthinkI know what I need to do now – if I dare – but I’m driving myself to distraction trying to work out how to do it, my thoughts a jumble. It’s all too big, too scary, and if I get it wrong …
I tried to take a break from my own head with a wander round the shops in town followed by a meet-up with Eleanor for coffee and cake on Saturday afternoon, and then a few drinks and a film at home with Pete and Megan in the evening. They headed over to her place yesterday afternoon, though, leaving me to spend a restless night alone, but Saturday was pleasant enough, with lots of wine and a Thai takeaway. If I’m honest, though, I am increasingly finding Megan a bit … well, a bitannoying, I suppose. Maybe it’s just my current anxious state of mind, and more my fault than hers, but I’m getting a sense that she’s feeling a little differently about me too; I actually think she’s started becoming a little jealous of mine and Pete’s friendship, that she’s not quite sure if there’s more to it than us just being old mates. She hasn’t said anything, not exactly; it’s just the odd look, the occasional slightly sarcastic comment. And yet, she’s always friendly enough when she’s here, always makes an effort to include me, and that makes me feel bad for sometimes wishing shewasn’taround, and guilty for thinking that actually I’d rather be sitting in our cosy lounge with just Pete, my feet on his lap. Because Pete does really seem to be very fond of her, and she makes him happy, and that makes me happy. So, it’s all a little confusing really. But this weekend, I kind of wanted to chat to Pete properly, and I couldn’t, not with her here.
There’s just so much in my head right now. I’ve been thinking more and more about Edward and Satish at work, not just about New Year’s Eve but about how they always seem to be chatting together in low voices these days. Am I imagining that often, when they do that, they glance my way, looking at me for a moment before resuming their quiet conversation? I just can’t decide if I’m being paranoid. I mean, they’re friends, after all. And I have chats just like that with Eleanor, when we’re exchanging bits of silly office gossip and don’t want anyone else to hear, don’t I? And Satish really does seem genuinely nice; I enjoyed his company very much when he joined me and Ellie for lunch. And so I probablyambeing paranoid, but I still feel as if I need to talk it through with somebody. I nearly did on Saturday, deciding to run it past Pete when Megan went downstairs to the kitchen for a few minutes to make a phone call. Just as I was about to tell him, though, she came back into the room, complaining that her mobile was dead and that she’d have to charge it up before she could phone anyone. I was about to point out that she could plug it in and make the callwhileit was charging, but she’d already moved on to another topic, shivering theatrically.
‘I’m so chilly. Why don’t you light the fire?’ she asked, snuggling up to Pete and pulling the sleeves of her grey hoodie down over her hands. ‘It seems such a shame to have a lovely open fireplace like that and not use it.’
Over her head, Pete looked at me and grimaced, an apologetic expression on his face, and I shrugged.
‘It’s me, Megan. I don’t like fires. Or fireworks, or anything like that really. You know, because of …’
I gestured vaguely at my left ear, and for a moment she looked at me a little strangely, and then her eyes widened.
‘Oh … Oh GOD, Mary, I’m so sorry! I just didn’t think, that’s so insensitive of me, I’m mortified. Sorry. Urgh, I can besuchan idiot!’
She sounded so genuinely horrified that I laughed.
‘Don’t worry. Just don’t ever give me a candle as a birthday present. I can’t be aroundthemeither. The local charity shops are always happy to take them luckily.’
I winked at her, and she clapped her hands over her face and groaned again.
‘There was one in that pamper hamper I gave you for Christmas, wasn’t there?’ she mumbled through her fingers. ‘I amsothoughtless. I’m really, really sorry. I’ll remember in future.’
‘Honestly, don’t worry. It was a lovely hamper,’ I say as Pete rolls his eyes. ‘It’s fine, Megan. Stop it. Go and pour me another glass of wine and I’ll let you off.’
I waved my empty wine glass at her and she uncovered her face and leapt off the sofa, still muttering apologies, and I felt guilty again then, wishing I’d just made up some excuse about why our lounge fireplace holds a glass vase filled with fairy lights instead of a pile of brightly burning logs. Although shedoesknow about the fire of course, and about what happened to me. Pete told me he explained it all to her in the early days of their relationship, when she asked him about my scars after the first time we met. Maybe she just forgot when she gave me that candle, because to be fair, I’ve never really talked to her about it, or about the fears and the nightmares it left me with. I don’t speak about it to anyone really, partly because I don’t really need to; as I’ve said before, it’s all there on the internet for anyone who wants to read about it.
At the time, it was in every newspaper, both here and in the US, for weeks; the famous American writer Gregor Ellis, dead in a massive house fire in the Cotswolds, perishing along with his teenage daughter’s best friend. It was a huge story, a tragedy and a miracle all in one. My survival was the bit dubbed the miracle – the daughter who survived, despite being dragged unconscious from the flames with severe burns. I spent a few weeks in the burns unit at Southmead Hospital in Bristol and then, when I was deemed stable enough to travel, was flown to the US, to my grandmother in New York. There, she arranged for me to have treatment at one of the best trauma and burns facilities in the city; not only that, but she took me in, taking care of me, giving me the stability I’d long craved: a lovely home, a routine, an ordered life. She was a clever and practical woman too, helping me to manage my father’s estate for the next four years until I graduated, keeping me out of the spotlight, away from the journalists who initially clamoured for an interview and then, eventually, when it was clear I wasn’t interested, leaving me alone. Added to all that, she was funny, quirky, and glamorous, and I loved her and the time I spent with her dearly. She made it to my graduation ceremony at Columbia University, a vision in a white designer trouser suit and a wide-brimmed hat, and then died from a massive stroke just three weeks later. It was after that that I decided to come back to the UK. It’s home, for some reason. And despite the fact that with my inheritance money I could live pretty much anywhere, and even despite everything that’s happened since I opened thatbloodydiary, I know this is where I want to be. I’m content here. I have good friends and work that I enjoy; I love the history and culture and sense of humour; I even like the weather, the changing seasons. Although today, I think, as I glance out of the kitchen window at the glowering sky, isnotmy favourite kind of winter morning. There’s no sign of any sun to melt away the white frosting on the pavements and the icy jackets on the leaves of the London plane trees that line the street outside.
It’s nearly 11am, and I should head into The Hub really, but I’m just debating whether to have one more coffee before I go when I hear the clang of the letter box. I walk into the hall and pick up a small handful of mail: our electricity bill, what looks like a bank statement for Pete, a flyer about a new pizza delivery place, and a brown envelope addressed to me. Back in the kitchen, I flick the kettle on –I think I will have that last coffee after all– and open my letter. There’s a single plain white sheet of paper inside the envelope, just a few lines handwritten in block capitals in the centre of the page. Frowning, I read them, and my stomach flips.
What? What the hell …?
I stare at the words, my heartrate speeding up, and suddenly I feel dizzy and grab onto the kitchen counter for support. Blinking to clear the spots before my eyes, I read the note again.
TWO DOWN, TWO TO GO.
DON’T TRY AND RUN, MARY ELLIS.
I’M WATCHING YOUR EVERY MOVE.
YOU CAN’T HIDE FROM ME, NO MATTER WHERE YOU ARE.
TWO DOWN, TWO TO GO …
