💙🖤"The Widower's iLie" by J.A. Baker

Or maybe Phillip and Tom were both right and I’m losing my mind, slowly slipping away into a pit of total madness.

I stare down at my hands, a fleeting memory nudging at the edges of my brain – shouting and screaming. A gurgling sound, unseeing eyes staring up at me. Water. Lots of water. Then silence. No movement and no sound. Just the wild thrashing of my own heart. That wasn’t Jeanette, was it? I know it wasn’t. I’m certain of it. So who was it?

My legs are still weak as I head into the kitchen and pour myself a glass of chilled wine, sipping it at first, then tipping my head back and drinking it all in one go. It travels down my throat, icy and refreshing with a slight acidic kick. I refill it and sit at the table, drinking and reassessing the past few days, thinking about tomorrow and what it will bring. Thinking about the awful images that fill my mind. Everything seems unclear, murky and misty as if I really am losing my grip. I can’t allow that to happen. I have to stay sharp, alert. In control. No room for error. My life is a fine balancing act. I need to keep it that way.

I glance down, see that the bottle is empty and resist the temptation to open another one. A clear head for work tomorrow is a must. Facing Jack is no longer the easy, forgettable task it used to be. I have to keep my wits about me, be one step ahead. I need him to need me. And once I have his money, that need can be severed and I will be on my way. But not just yet. There is more to do. I got lucky with my chance finds in that house. Those items are a way out of that place, a way out of the daily grind. A way out of cleaning up after people who couldn’t give a shit about me. Like everybody else in my life, they trample over me and expect me to smile while they do it. But not for much longer.

The morning arrives with more of a squeak than a bang, with faint strips of amber light filtering in through the curtains. The wine had the desired affect and I slept soundly, dreaming of nothing, my mind flattened into submission by the alcohol.

I shower, dress and eat a slice of toast, swigging back a cup of tea before leaving the house, ready to make the mile and a half walk to the Downeys’ property. Our lives couldn’t be more different with their large, sprawling house compared to my average, three-bed semi. Do they know how I live now that I no longer have my husband’s income to help me get by? Do they have the faintest idea where I come from and who I really am? I think of Elizabeth at her spa, being pampered and massaged to alleviate the stress she doesn’t have to endure, and curl my fingers at my sides, my nails digging into my palms.

By the time I reach their house, fury has swollen and multiplied in my chest, a growing, spreading furnace, ready to burn everyone within its reach, to scorch and maim them. I imagine driving my fist into Jack’s face as he opens the door, kicking at his shins, telling him how much I loathe the sight of him, but that doesn’t happen. I keep it together. I maintain the illusion of being the perfect nanny and cleaner and am the person they expect me to be. With a slight edge of course. Always the edge. It’s what keeps me sane.

‘Morning, Jack,’ I say lightly, making sure my eyes reflect my measured yet pleasant tone. ‘Another day, another dollar, eh?’

I take off my shoes, smile and hold out my hand for his payment.

35LAUREN

I didn’t expect a reply. Jesus Christ, I didn’t want a reply. I should throw it away, pretend I haven’t seen it. Burn it. Do anything but open it. I did my bit, wrote the letter, kept a copy to show to anyone should they ever ask to see it.

Dad has left for work and I’ve got a later than usual start at college. I got lucky, getting to the post first. After my run-in with Alice on Sunday and the subsequent fall-out once Dad got back home after dropping her off, I don’t think him seeing this envelope would have helped matters any.

I stare at the letter, my fingers itching to open it, to grasp it tightly and tear it up into a thousand little pieces before I have chance to read his reply. I take a long breath, air concertinaed in my chest, then pick it up.

My hands are trembling as I tear open the envelope before stopping and placing it on the bed without removing its contents. My stomach is in knots, my skin prickling. I don’t know if I’ve got the nerve to do this. Writing a letter is one thing; receiving one back is another thing entirely. A whole new level of tension and terror. A reply from a convicted murderer. I’m pushing my luck here, running the risk of making a stupid mistake, ruining both mine and Dad’s lives.

I’m not ready for this. It was an impulsive, reckless idea writing it in the first place. My head is thumping. A pain travels up the back of my neck.

I swallow and tug at strands of my hair, waiting for my body to calm itself down, for my brain to start functioning properly. I focus on my breathing, telling myself that nothing bad is going to happen. The worst that could happen has already taken place. Everything else is just dust and detritus. It’s only a letter, for fuck’s sake, a message from a man I wrote to. A message from a prisoner. Somebody who is inside for killing my mother. Nothing he says is going to drastically alter the trajectory of my life. Whatever is written inside this envelope makes no difference; he’ll still be in prison, Mum will still be dead and Dad and I will still be here, me wondering how to best convince him that Alice is a toxic presence in our lives. Unwanted and a possible danger. I admit that I initially thought she was great – warm, generous and easy going but since last week, my opinion of her has altered. She has a dark side, a secretive other self that she is adept at keeping hidden. Maybe we’re just too alike, Alice and me.

I decided yesterday to do some digging around on her background – find out who she is, discover more about her dead partner. Car crashes are generally reported in newspapers, aren’t they? Especially when there’s a fatality, and the scary thing is, I found nothing. No car crashes involving somebody called Stuart. Not a bloody thing.

No news stories, no mention of any accidents around the same time Mum died. In fact, I couldn’t find anything on her at all – no Alice Godwins that match her on any of the social media sites, which isn’t so strange as many people of Alice’s age shun having an online presence, but what is odd is the fact I couldn’t find anything at all. It’s as if she doesn’t actually exist. Everyone has some sort of online footprint, yet Alice seems to be invisible. I paid to view some names and addresses on 192.com and the electoral register but again, came up with zilch. She’s a ghost, an intruder in our lives. I’ve come to the conclusion that Alice Godwin is a bloody big fat liar.

Maybe she really is some sort of gold digger? She’s onto the wrong family if that’s case. Dad doesn’t have a lot of money but we’re not exactly poor either. I know he got some insurance money after Mum died which paid off the remainder of the mortgage; the rest he split, putting some away into his pension and some in a trust account for me which will help fund me through university, so although we’re not poor, we certainly don’t have lots of cash which we can splash about. If we did, Dad would have retired from his shitty job by now and would be pottering around the garden rather than dashing up and down the motorway in his car day after day to see customers and his managers at the other end of the country.

Maybe she saw him at the grief sessions at church and thought he seemed like a catch? Handsome widower with a nice car and a hefty insurance pay-out? It’s possible, even though it sounds like some flimsy plot from some stupid, shitty, second-rate movie. And if she isn’t after his money, what exactly does she want?

I’ve tried to think of loads of ways in which I can raise it with him again but there seems like no easy option without him blowing a head gasket. After the conversation last week, everything is still too raw. He would react badly if I were to start throwing accusations around without any solid evidence to back them up. And anyway, he’s been really busy at work all week so we haven’t had chance to discuss much at all. He stayed overnight at a conference in Birmingham and has been driving to see customers in Northumberland and Sheffield so he’s been too tired to engage in any sort of conversation about anything really. It’s no big deal. I’m more than prepared to do this thing on my own. I will dig and dig and dig until I strike gold. And once I find Alice’s hidden treasure, I’ll present it to him, see what he says. Because there is definitely something disturbing going on with that woman. We all have hidden secrets and I am going to dig up hers, see what her motive is, what it is she really wants.

The envelope seems to glow hot. I pick it up again and slip the letter out, opening it and scanning the words written there. As expected, it’s a bland, non-committal reply, acknowledging my original letter but not actually saying anything at all. Except that he is innocent. A wrongly accused man. A huge miscarriage of justice. Blah, blah, blah. I set it down next to me, then read it again.

Hello Lauren,

Thank you for your letter. I don’t really have anything to add to my initial statement. I am terribly sorry about what happened to your mum but you have to believe me when I say that I did not kill her.

I admit that I was having an affair and she broke it off. I admit that I was angry but I do not admit to killing her because I didn’t. I have been wrongly imprisoned and will fight to clear my name. My being here is a huge miscarriage of justice.

You lost your mother; I have lost my freedom. We are both prisoners of fate.

Yours sincerely,

Phillip Kennedy.

I roll my eyes, tear up his reply, and then thinking better of it, pick up the pieces and place them in a drawer for safekeeping. For the future. My future.

I get ready and tidy my room, ready to go to college where I’ll listen to teachers and hang out with my friends and act all normal and stuff, as if everything is right with the world when in reality, it’s far from that. Not with having Alice around. Not until I find out who she is. And what it is she wants from us.

Even going out and seeing Josh didn’t make me feel any better. We might see one another again or we might not. My heart isn’t in it right now. The timing is all wrong. I’m losing the relationship I had built up with Dad. I’m losing him to Alice and I’m not prepared to sit back and let that happen. Not now. Not ever. And not to her. We need to stick together, Dad and me. We have a bond. Something that ties us together. It’s just that he doesn’t know it.

I pack up my bag and stop for a second, looking around at my room, before closing the door and heading off to college.

36ALICE

In the last few days, Jack has handed me just short of £1,500. I have told him that it’s not enough for me to keep silent about his little habit and yesterday, I threatened to pay the headteacher a visit, telling him that if they didn’t take me seriously then I would alert social services to what goes on behind the closed doors of this purportedly decent house.

Today, I am expecting a larger payment, something substantial that will keep me from passing on the photograph to the relevant authorities.

‘Still no Mrs Downey, eh?’ I smile as he opens the door and I bustle my way inside. ‘Or is she back from her little break and is resting up after all the stress of packing and unpacking? She must be exhausted, poor thing.’

He glares at me, hatred oozing out of every pore. I’m pushing my luck now. I know it but can’t seem to help myself. Naughty me. We are past the social niceties phase now, beyond being pleasant and enduring forced conversations that go nowhere. There is little point in pretending we are anything other than arch enemies.

‘Elizabeth is still away. She has extended her stay which is probably for the best given your presence in the house and your unreasonable demands. I want you gone when she arrives back. We’ll manage just fine without you.’

Fionn comes running through, throwing his arms around me and pushing his face into my midriff as I bend down to greet him.