The House at the End of Hope Street Page 21

  It was nearly two o’clock in the morning when Zoë finally finished and, just as Alba had fallen for Dr. Skinner’s words, so Zoë fell for Alba’s. Reading that story tipped Zoë off the cliff of superficial attraction onto the rocks of complete adoration. In Alba’s scrawl she found a mind that mirrored her own, a soul that spoke the same words, a heart that kept the same beat. In Alba’s secret thoughts and feelings, Zoë found herself. Some of Alba’s sentences were so lyrical that Zoë spoke them aloud just to hear the words. She didn’t understand it all—the references to the colors of sounds and smells were particularly strange and intriguing—and Zoë wished she could ask Alba to explain, but of course she couldn’t. Not then, not now, not ever.

  In the years of private longing that followed, Zoë has often wondered whether or not she’d have fallen for Alba without the story. She thinks probably not, that without it she would just have lusted, rather than loved. So she’s got her comeuppance for this moral lapse, suffering a prison sentence of unrequited love for three years, four months, two weeks, twelve days and counting…

  —

  Carmen sits at the piano, absently trailing her fingers up and down the keys. She’s supposed to be practicing the first verse of Alba’s song but she can barely keep her eyes open. Since opening the box, Carmen has been out every night trying to dispose of it. But when she buries the ring it pushes up through the dirt, when she hurls it into rivers it surfaces again, floating up as soon as Carmen turns her back. Only in the house or garden does the ring stay where it’s put, but even then Carmen can’t wash the drop of blood away, not if she scrubs until her nails bleed and her fingers are raw. She wishes it were possible to burn gold and knows that, even if she had the ring transformed into something else, its smell would never leave.

  For a moment she forgets Tiago and thinks instead of Blake and what she’s going to do now that he’s starting to want what she doesn’t want to give. Memory-obliterating sex is all well and good but she won’t let it get in the way of her survival and her song. She needs to focus, completely and without distraction. She’ll tell him tonight.

  In twenty-one days she has to leave Hope Street to find another home, one that won’t protect her or hide the evidence connecting her to Tiago’s murder. Fear pollutes her blood, infusing her bones—until she begins to play. A little Tchaikovsky, then Beethoven and Mozart. She plays with a gusto that overtakes her entirely, her fingers moving faster than she could ever speak or sing or run; sometimes soft, sometimes strong, filling the room with a heavy smoke that sinks into her lungs. Carmen swallows the music until the sound is all she can taste, hear and feel. It’s the best medicine she’s ever had, able to banish memories, sorrow, sleepless nights, and leave only the notes.

  —

  Having failed to force the door open, Peggy simply stares at it, trying to shame it into submission. She stands at the stove, peeling chocolate biscuits off a tray. The sweet scent of cooked sugar and melted chocolate rises into the air, briefly soothing her nerves. The first time she made these biscuits was in the downstairs kitchen, and she slowly consumed the entire batch while chatting with Mary Somerville and Caroline Herschel, who had just spotted each other from opposing walls.

  “I was just extolling the virtues of love to this young lady,” Mary said, “though she’s not heeding a word I say.”

  “If you’re appealing for support,” Caroline replied, “I can’t give it. I was never in love, and I never missed it. I always preferred mathematical equations to men.”

  “How ridiculous.” Mary laughed. “There’s nothing like marriage and motherhood, it’s quite the best thing in the world.”

  “Oh, well.” Caroline shrugged. “I suppose small things amuse small minds.”

  “I have a magnificent mind,” Mary snapped, “and you know it.”

  “Mary.” Caroline smiled. “You always were too easy to tease.”

  “I’ve missed you, you old bat.” Mary said. “I can’t believe you never noticed me before, all those comets you spotted over the years. You’ve probably been too busy staring out of the window.”

  “And you’ve been too preoccupied reminiscing about babies while doing complex algebra.”

  While the two women bickered pleasantly, Peggy had eaten the entire batch of biscuits. Now she’s staring down at a full tray, remembering. It’s funny, she thinks, how she spent eighty-two years believing she was just like Caroline Herschel, not needing love in her life, except on Sunday afternoons. And now, in the light of death, she sees how wrong she was. She didn’t know herself at all. How could she have seen into the hearts of more than a thousand residents over sixty-one years and not seen her own? Which isn’t actually funny, Peggy thinks as she bites into a biscuit, but quite the opposite.

  —

  Greer stands in the shower, engaged in the time-consuming process of washing her long, tangled hair. Now that each evening brings her closer to the day she’ll have to leave the house, she can’t help thinking about the future. Her job at the bar is clearly a dead end, her acting career is at something of a standstill, Blake is growing ever more distant. Greer is seriously contemplating giving up men and acting altogether, finding a real job and a flat and trying to adopt a child.

  She steps out of the shower. Perhaps she could train to be a teacher; the government is always desperate for them, hurling generous grants at anyone foolish enough to think long holidays and short hours mean an easy life. But although it isn’t something she’d love to do, if it means finally becoming a mother, Greer thinks she could handle it.

  She wraps a towel into a bright blue beehive around her head and pads over to the bathroom mirror to examine her wrinkles. She still looks fine, though faint lines remain on her forehead, even when she isn’t frowning—as she is now. Greer thinks again about the potential job and the potential child. But she’s torn. Is it right to give up on one dream in order to fulfill another?

  —

  Alba dawdles along Trinity Street, on her way to the library. Since reading Chocolates for Breakfast, she’s been feeling rather embarrassed at the thought of seeing Zoë again. What if she starts discussing specific paragraphs? By the time Alba finally reaches the counter, she’s too nervous to say hello. And then the look on Zoë’s face stops her short.

  “Hey.” Zoë nods in the direction of the doors. “That man’s been waiting for you three days in a row. He asked for your address.”

  Alba turns to see her father sitting on the wooden bench under the notice board. Slowly he stands, then walks toward her one slow step at a time, as if she might at any moment turn and run. He stops a few feet from his daughter. “Were you ever going to come back? I didn’t, I’m sorry… I’m afraid I had to know.”

  Yes, of course, Alba thinks, of course I was. I just needed time. But she can’t speak the words.

  “Do you want to punish me?” he asks, in a tone that suggests it’s no more than he deserves. “I know how much you must hate me—”

  “No, I don’t,” Alba manages to say. “I just, I couldn’t…”

  Feeling dazed, she stumbles over to the bench where Albert was sitting. He follows and sits a few feet away from her, close enough to speak softly and still be heard. Zoë watches from behind her computer screen.

  “Alba,” he whispers, “I loved your mother more than anything and… I’ve thought about you every day of your life. I didn’t—”

  “Then why have you never even spoken to me”—tears fall into her lap—“when all this time you were living right next to me?”

  “I wanted to, every single day, but I couldn’t, in case…” Albert says, wishing he could wipe away her tears and hold her. “It would have been selfish, it wouldn’t have been fair.”

  “How did you know I was here?” Alba asks. He wanted her. He really did. She was loved.

  “You were the youngest undergraduate at King’s College. You made the news.”
Albert bows his head, momentarily exposing his bald spot. “I’m sorry, so sorry you had to go through all this. I wish it hadn’t happened, I’d give anything if it hadn’t.”

  “She named me after you.” Alba stares at the stone floor. “Didn’t she?”

  Albert nods. “Liz was always generous. I gave her nothing and she gave me you.”

  “Well, not exactly—she made you go away.”

  “She did what she thought best.” Albert longs to reach out to Alba, just a fingertip on the cuff of her shirt. “Even though it broke her heart, and mine.”

  Alba sees his words in the air: royal blue edged with silver: sorrow and hope.

  “Why didn’t you come back, after he left, why didn’t you come back?”

  “I wrote to Liz, but she never replied. I thought she didn’t want me anymore, what could I do? I only discovered she died when you went missing.”

  They sit in silence, as tears run down Alba’s cheeks. When her father can’t take it anymore, he slips his fingers tentatively over her hand. Tears fall down his own cheeks and, never taking his eyes off Alba, Albert pulls her into a hug, finally holding his daughter for the first time since she was a baby.

  Chapter Twenty-one

  Hi, Mum.”

  “Hello, my darling.”

  Alba takes her mother’s hand and they walk together across the rooftops of King’s College, clambering over chimneys and stepping over loose tiles. They talk as the sun, hot at first on their faces, sinks lower and illuminates the edges of the stone spires rising up all around them. Alba and Elizabeth sit overlooking the meadows at the students punting in the river, laughing bubbles of champagne as they bump into each other. Behind them the fields are lined with oaks and scattered with geese. Halos of soft light around the trees dim and eventually disappear, and then everything is dark.

  Elizabeth slips her arm over her daughter’s shoulder. Alba smiles at the tingling on her skin and the warmth that slowly seeps into her body, hoping she’ll be able to feel the sensation when she wakes.

  “Now, my dearest girl,” Elizabeth says, “I have something for you to tell your father.”

  When Alba opens her eyes she remembers, for the first time, every word her mother said. An hour later, after trying in vain to forget again, she called Albert. Two hours after that she’s sitting with him in the back of a small café on King’s Parade, dreading the moment of spilling her mother’s secret, torn between hoping he believes her and hoping he doesn’t. It’s a choice between his being devastated or thinking her mad. Neither of which Alba wants. She fiddles with the cinnamon bun in front of her, picking out the raisins and scattering them around the plate. Albert watches, rather wishing that he, too, had a cinnamon bun to fiddle with and take the edge off his nerves.

  “So, um,” he begins, not looking up from his teacup, “why did you leave King’s?”

  When he sees the look on Alba’s face he instantly regrets the question. “But, anyway,” he quickly backtracks, “what are you doing at the moment?”

  “I’m writing a song. But it isn’t quite finished, there’s something missing, I don’t know how…” She shrugs it off, not really wanting to explain. She trawls her mind for topics that might impress her father and make him proud, but comes up blank.

  “Well, the most important thing is to have fun.” Albert takes a gulp of his tea. “In the end, it’s all that really matters.”

  Alba is so surprised she laughs. A few moments later she can’t stop, and starts spluttering. She grips the edge of the table, trying to catch her breath.

  “Are you all right? Shall I get a glass of water?”

  “It’s okay,” she gasps between words, “I’m okay. It’s just so funny.” She giggles. “All my life, everything I’ve ever done, it’s always been so… sensible. The idea of doing something just for fun seemed ridiculous. And now my father is telling me that enjoying myself is all that really matters. It’s like I’ve stepped into an alternative universe, and I’ve got no idea what to do next.”

  “Oh.”

  Alba shrugs. “It’s just a little hilarious, that’s all.”

  “I wonder if you’ll find all of my fatherly advice hilarious,” he smiles. “I hope so.”

  Alba catches her father’s eye and this time she doesn’t blink or glance away. They look at each other, two pairs of matching blue eyes, for a long time. And as they do, something deep inside Alba, some torn little piece of her, heals.

  —

  Carmen stumbles down the stairs, heading for the bathrooms and hoping she makes it in time. It’s been a really busy shift at the bar and she hasn’t had a chance until now. All night she’s been avoiding Blake, who’s been trying to catch her attention, and sneaking sips of vodka to give herself courage. When she reaches the last step she stops to steady herself against the wall. The door to the Men’s opens and Blake walks out. He sees her and grins. “Hey, sugar.”

  “Ola.” Carmen swallows a sigh.

  Blake moves toward her. “You look especially stunning tonight.”

  “No.” Carmen steps back against the wall. But it’s too late; before she can say anything else he’s pressing up against her, his lips on her neck.

  When Greer opens the door at the top of the stairs, she doesn’t immediately realize whom she’s looking at. She’d popped into the bar to surprise Blake, to take him out to dinner and sit him down for a proper talk about their future. And then, she sees Blake’s face buried in Carmen’s black hair. Greer screams.

  For a moment Blake’s paralyzed, then he springs away from Carmen and starts to sprint up the stairs. Greer turns, pushing through the small crowd that has collected, and disappears. Carmen gazes after them before she suddenly understands what’s happening. Huge brown eyes wide with fury, she shouts after him. “Foda! Foda! Tu mais que foda estas a fazer? Tu e a Greer, e ele esta apaixonada por ti? Mais que foda que fizes-te?!”

  Blake runs through the bar after Greer. He finds her slumped against the wall outside, staring at the pavement. Blake hurries to her.

  “Fuck you.” Greer looks up. “And fuck off.”

  “She didn’t know,” Blake says. “So you shouldn’t hate her, only me.”

  “Oh, I will,” Greer snaps, “don’t worry about that. Now fuck off.”

  “I’m sorry,” he whispers. And he’s shocked to discover he actually means it. Seeing her here like this, on a public pavement with her heart exposed again, makes Blake wish he were a different man, one capable of taking care of someone other than himself. But he isn’t. So the kindest thing he can do now, after all his cruelty, is remove himself from her sight and her life.

  “I’m sorry.”

  After he’s gone Greer sits for a long time. She rests her head on her knees and weeps— not because she loved Blake and not because she’s lost him. But because she didn’t take care of herself. She knew Blake’s nature the moment she met him, just as she knew the philandering fiancé. She knew them and she knew herself. Greer thinks of the story of the scorpion and the frog, and she knows that she cannot blame these men for her messy life; they only did what she always knew they would do. No, this is not about crushed hopes and broken dreams. This is about trusting her own heart. Hope doesn’t even enter into it.

  —

  Two days after their café meeting, Alba and Albert meet again at the Fitzwilliam Museum. For the last two nights Elizabeth hasn’t visited her daughter’s dreams, and Alba, feeling a little guilty that she hasn’t yet passed on her mother’s message, hasn’t slept much anyway. Now they’re at the Vermeer exhibition, squeezing between the crowds. Alba is babbling incoherently about Dutch painters and Albert is trying to make sense of what she’s saying while also wondering what’s wrong with her.

  When they’re standing in front of Girl with a Pearl Earring, Alba, quoting passages from the book with the same title, starts fiddling with her frayed sle
eves and chewing the ends of her fingernails. When he notices her missing her fingers and biting the air instead, he has to ask.

  “Are you all right?”

  She studies the painting. “I’m fine.”

  “Are you sure?”

  Alba nods. “Beautiful, isn’t it?” She wanders over to The Milkmaid and feigns absorption in it too. An hour later, in front of The Music Lesson, Alba turns to face her father.

  “Okay. I have to tell you something.” Conscious of the crowds, she whispers. “It’s going to sound a little strange, you might not believe me, but—”

  “If you tell me,” he says, “I’ll believe you.”

  “I had a dream about my mother,” Alba says. “That’s to say, she visited me; well, anyway… She told me to tell you she replied to your last letter. She wrote to you every week for a year, asking you to come back. She thinks Charles had them destroyed, so they never reached you.”

  Albert stares at Alba, unable to move or speak. He starts to shake.

  “She never stopped loving you,” Alba says softly. “She loved you right up to the day she died, and even after that.”

  Albert nods, tears falling down his face. Alba rests her hand on her father’s sleeve and gives him a small, hopeful smile. And, when she slips her hand into his, his heart swells until it fills his whole chest.

  —

  That night Albert sits on the sofa in his small, dingy flat, staring at the flickering television, but not really watching it. Next to him, on a scuffed cushion, is a TV dinner he’s barely touched. The overcooked carrots and slightly burned sliver of white chicken glisten with congealed gravy. He plucks at the cuffs of his cardigan, widening the holes in the wool. He misses Alba already. If he loved his daughter before, it’s nothing to how he feels now. The feeling is so deep, so infinite, so strong that it never fails to shock him. Albert thinks how lucky he is, that this love for his daughter fills the jagged hole inside him left by the loss of Liz.