The Rumor, page 26
He sits back down on the sofa. “He also said to tell you that Susan Marchant has changed her mind about selling her house. Apparently, her neighbor’s husband is an accountant, and when they found out she was donating the proceeds to charity he had a chat with her and, basically, she’s found out she can just donate the house without having to go through the rigmarole of selling it, save herself the agency fees, and gain a large tax credit to boot. Dave sounded truly pissed off.”
Oops. So Maddie must have picked up on what I said about Susan not wanting the money and talked to her about it. Oh well, the poor woman deserves all the luck she can get, after what she went through as a child. And if Maddie’s right and Anne Wilson really did post those pictures on Sonia Martins’s shop window, there’s a kind of justice there, too.
I snuggle up to Michael. Well, as much as I can snuggle with this damn sling on. “Michael, there’s one thing I haven’t asked you yet.”
“I know, and it’s about time.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Oh, sorry.” He grins. “I assumed you were going to propose.”
“No, you idiot! I was going to say, I don’t suppose you’ll be writing that book now.”
He laughs. “Probably not, all things considered.” He kisses me on the lips. “Some stories are best left untold, don’t you think?”
A different ocean this time. A warmer ocean. The waves are larger here, large enough to ride on a surfboard. I watch them sometimes, the surfing crowd, waiting to catch the waves at just the right point, riding on top of the breaking curl, knees bent, arms outstretched for balance.
Such grace and beauty.
Such courage and strength.
Sometimes I walk to one of the quieter bays to sit and read, to swim when I need to cool down. The sand is white and soft and hot on the soles of my feet. My size-six feet with their long, slender toes and their neatly filed nails—which, just recently, I’ve taken to painting in pastel colors. Pinks and mauves and baby blues.
There is safety in numbers here. The transient crowd of tourists. The surfing dudes and dudettes. The ever-changing bar workers and waitstaff. Nobody takes much notice of the pale-skinned older woman with pretty toes, the one with the large floppy sun hat and shades, her nose in a book.
I like to choose my spot with care. Not too near the water’s edge but far enough away from the cafés that line the beach so that I’m not bothered by the noise or the smell of barbecued meat. I like to sit near young families if I can, ones with little boys who look a bit like Alfie. Near enough to watch them dig holes in the sand. Near enough to catch their beach balls if the breeze blows them my way and to toss them back in return for one of their shy little-boy smiles.
She says they’ll come and visit soon, she and Alfie, and though I crave the sight and sound and touch of them, sometimes I wonder whether it might be too much. Too much for all of us. I wonder whether it might be better to leave things as they are and just communicate by email. Nice and anonymous. Nice and safe. Because if I see them again, if I hold them, I’ll never want to let them go, and I must. I must. There’s no way they’ll move here and I can’t go back. I can never go back. Not now.
I’m the hunted. I’ll always be the hunted. This is the price I pay for my past. That one fateful, fatal second I’d undo in a heartbeat if I could.
I close my eyes against the sun and I’m back there all over again. That cold, dark kitchen. The spores of mold on the wall. The filthy rag rug on the floor. Just me and Robbie Harris. All the others had gone. All the others had run away like they were supposed to, run away screaming. They were waiting for me to come after them. Expecting me to.
But Robbie kept on whining. “Let me be the bad guy. Let me have the knife.” And then he grabbed at it and cut his fingers and started screaming. I just wanted him to stop. I just wanted him to shut up and stand still for a minute so I could see how deep the cut was. I knew what to do when someone was bleeding. I knew you had to wrap the wound up tight. I was going to take my sweater off and use that. But he wouldn’t shut up. He wouldn’t stand still.
The rage engulfed me like a fire. A fire blazing in my brain.
So I let him have it. The knife. I let him have it.
To my parents, Harry and Doreen, with love
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
THERE ARE MANY PEOPLE WHO have helped me on my journey to publication and I want to thank them all.
My husband, Rashid Kara, for understanding my need to write and always believing in me and supporting me; my writing group (Deborah Klée, Paula Guyver, Anita Belli, Gerald Hornsby, Catherine Rendall, and Janine Swann) for their razor-sharp critiquing skills and supportive friendship; my Faber Academy tutors, Maggie Gee and Richard Skinner, and my fellow students (especially Peter Howard, Susan de Villiers, Hannah Cox, Richard O’Halloran, Brandon Cheevers, and Hanife Melbourne) for their encouragement and feedback on “the novels that came before”; my agent, Amanda Preston at LBA Books, for her wisdom, energy, and creative insight; my British editors, Sarah Adams and Natasha Barsby, and the rest of the hugely talented Transworld team for their enthusiasm and championing of The Rumor; and last, but by no means least, the wonderful Kate Miciak and her team at Ballantine Books, New York, for helping me “translate” The Rumor for an American readership.
PHOTO: CHRISTIAN DAVIES PHOTOGRAPHY
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Lesley Kara is an alumna of the Faber Academy Writing a Novel course. She completed an English degree and PGCE at Greenwich University in London, and has worked as a lecturer and manager in further education. She has now relocated to the small town of Frinton-on-Sea on the North Essex coast. The Rumor is her first novel.
lesleykara.com
Twitter: @LesleyKara
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Lesley Kara, The Rumor
