Someone is Lying, page 15
‘Yes, that sounds good.’ She smiles at me now as if to convey everything is fine, although it feels anything but. I gesture to a place over the road with outside bistro tables and a chalkboard advertising a range of coffees.
When she makes no move to go I tell her I’ll see her soon and cross over the road. On the other side I look behind me, but she is already gone.
In an instant, fear drives through me like a knife. It comes from nowhere and even though I try telling myself it is unnecessary, it is there. A feeling of dread that maybe she will disappear again.
I step forward, searching her out among the bustle, until I see her retreating into the distance and about to turn the corner. A flash of the night I arrived in Lisbon hits me hard. I had felt so hopeless as I arrived in this unfamiliar city with its labyrinthine streets and alleys, knowing deep in my heart I had no chance of finding her by scouring them for her.
She is out of sight again and it feels as if she has evaporated. I don’t know where the hostel is, and I am not secure in the thought that she will return. I barely think about what I am doing before I start to walk, quickly, in the direction in which she has gone. Living up to my part as the overbearing mother, I follow Issie, picking up my pace into a slow run, barely looking as I cross the road, and turning the corner as she had.
Relief smacks me as I glimpse her ahead of me. It is so like the days when she was a small child and I would scan the beach for her when she was momentarily out of my sight. The wonder of the moment you catch them, and don’t have to worry about them any longer.
I keep my distance from her now. She must not notice me following her. Am I really doing right by her when I do not trust her to go to her hostel on her own? Maybe, maybe not. But I daren’t take the risk because all I want is to keep her safe. I cannot let her go again when I have only just got her back.
I dip behind people as she ambles up a narrow cobbled street, for fear of her turning and seeing me. What would become of our relationship if she does? I can’t imagine, though I am certain she would clam up even more than she has been doing.
But Issie doesn’t look back as she turns another corner onto a street that looks more industrial than the Lisbon I am used to. The buildings are still imposing white structures but they are not as beautiful as the ones near our hotel. Graffiti is scrawled across wide expanses of wall on the other side of the street to where Issie has now stopped. Within a moment she disappears into a doorway.
I scurry up the pavement until I reach the spot where I last saw her. There is nothing but a black-doored entrance and a sign above it that reads Selena Guest House.
So this is where they had been staying. Tall black window frames on an ochre-painted building. I recognise the little café on its right from one of Issie’s last Instagram posts before she went missing. She and Dylan had been sitting outside it and had taken a selfie. I remember scrutinising his lack of a smile.
I hover for a minute before turning away and crossing the road where I wait in a doorway until she comes out. Just to be sure she does. Just to be sure she is safe.
She is in there for ten minutes before she reappears on the street, her backpack slung over her shoulder. I feel a flush of guilt now that I hadn’t trusted her to do what she said she was doing, but still I don’t race back to the café where we said we would meet. Instead, I wait for her to start walking so I can follow her back.
She is hesitating on the pavement and looks up the street the other way. I feel my heart thumping again at the prospect of why she isn’t walking this way. She turns in my direction but remains where she is.
I edge back though she cannot see me where I am hiding. What are you doing? I hiss to myself.
Now Issie spins around again until she is facing the guest house. She lifts up her free hand in a gesture and I realise she is talking to someone. She steps back as another figure emerges into the daylight.
Dylan.
My breaths come harder as he moves towards her, but Issie carries on talking, waving her arm with a flick of a motion up the street towards me.
I fight my instinct to rush over, to pull her away from him, and demand he tell me why he stopped my daughter from contacting me. To ask what the hell she is doing talking to him if she made a two-hour bus journey back to Lisbon yesterday to escape him. Did she escape him?
A weight of indecision drags me down. If I go over, will I make it worse? How do I expect her to confide in me if she knows I am watching her like a stalker?
It takes every piece of restraint I have to hold back, telling myself that, as long as she walks away, I am still here for her. Isn’t that the best thing I can do? They tell us we need to prepare ourselves to let our children live their own lives, after all. That they are never ours, we are only here to prepare them for the world. All of that fights every instinct I have.
But I continue to watch her. She is safe right in this moment and, if at any point she disappears back into the hostel with him, I will be there like a shot, banging the door down and pulling her out.
Issie’s gaze drifts down to the pavement. Her foot curls to the side as she listens to whatever he is telling her.
My blood rushes through me, vibrating in my ears in rhythm with the thud of my heart. Walk away, Issie, I want to scream. Why aren’t you walking away from him?
Because he has a hold on her. What I have always known. There is still something about him that keeps her there.
And then she looks up at him and I startle at the way she doesn’t look distressed or uncomfortable.
He reaches out a hand and holds on to her elbow, and I inch forward again as she smiles at him. Only briefly. But it is definitely a smile, one that tugs at me, because this isn’t right. This cannot be right.
Dylan leans forward, pulling her in for a hug before she draws away from him, and finally starts walking towards me, her expression blank, glancing over her shoulder once as she strides forward.
Everything inside me sinks, slowly, draining out of me as I step back into the shadows of the doorway I am hovering outside of. I realise that in a twisted way I liked that she was frightened of him because it meant she sees him for who he is.
But this? There is no sign of the suffering I would imagine and this is even more frightening. The thought that he has the ability to pull her back into his web. He still has a hold over her and I don’t know how I begin to fight this.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
10 July
I hold my breath as Issie walks past, but she doesn’t see me as she strides forward, her gaze fixed ahead. I have no choice but to follow her back to the café and pretend I have been there all along instead of hiding in the shadows. She wouldn’t understand my fear, she would only mistake it for the mistrust it also is.
I keep close and stay out of sight and, when she goes into the café we agreed to meet in, I cross over the road and head into a pharmacy and buy a bottle of face cream.
Issie quickly reappears on the pavement looking for me and so I step out of the shop and wave it in the air when she spots me. ‘I needed to buy this,’ I tell her. I smile and she smiles back, and I wait for her to tell me Dylan was at the hostel.
‘Shall we get a coffee then?’ she asks.
‘Yes, sure.’ I gesture to an outside table where she pulls the rucksack off her back and drops it at her feet. A tram whistles past and she looks up, her mind seemingly a million miles away. It makes me wonder where her head was when she stepped out in front of one only yesterday morning.
I study her face now for any sign of emotion, but I see none. ‘How did it go?’ I ask. ‘Did you get everything you needed?’
‘Yes.’ She kicks at the rucksack. ‘I got it all.’
‘That’s good. And it all went well?’
‘Yeah, fine,’ she shrugs and pulls out a menu that is stuck between a salt and pepper pot. ‘What would you like? Latte?’
‘Yes. But Issie?’ I can’t help my prompt. ‘What happened back at the hotel?’
She laughs. ‘It’s hardly a hotel, Mum.’
‘You know what I mean,’ I snap.
‘I don’t. What do you mean what happened?’
‘Oh, Issie,’ I say, because I cannot help myself from asking when it’s apparent she isn’t going to tell me. ‘I know you saw Dylan. I was there.’ I can’t let her get away with lying to me but, more than that, I need to know if she knew he would be there.
Issie stares at me, a flush of colour painting her cheeks. ‘What do you mean, you were there?’
‘I followed you to the hostel.’
‘What? Why would you do that?’ Her face is a picture of genuine shock and it’s hard to see whether it’s my betrayal or the idea that she hasn’t been honest about Dylan that is worrying her the most.
‘I’m sorry,’ I say. ‘I truly am sorry for following you, because I hate that I did. But honestly I was worried that if I let you out of my sight I might lose you again. That’s all it was.’ I hold up my hands, hoping and expecting she might see it from my side. How a mother’s love pushes you to do anything to protect your child. ‘But then I saw you talking to him and apparently it looks like you weren’t going to tell me. And I have to be honest, Issie, that’s worrying me too.’
‘I was going to tell you,’ she says, looking abashed. ‘I didn’t know what you would say.’
‘What I would say?’ I repeat.
‘I didn’t want you going off on one. I didn’t want it to become a bigger deal. I didn’t know he was going to be there.’
‘Didn’t you?’
‘No.’ She tells me this adamantly, but the way she swallows makes me think this isn’t the case, and the idea she could have arranged to meet him there frightens me.
‘So what did he talk to you about?’ I ask.
‘I don’t know, nothing.’
I glare at her, waiting for more.
‘He tried telling me he was sorry.’
‘Sorry for what?’ I press, leaning forward in my chair, urging her to tell me.
‘For everything, I guess.’
‘I can’t help my mind going to places I don’t want it to, Issie. You must realise what I’m thinking.’
‘Then don’t,’ she says, her voice quivering. ‘I asked you to give me time but you won’t.’
I let out a shallow laugh, shaking my head as a waiter appears at the table. Maybe it is something no one can appreciate until they are a parent themselves – that you do not switch off from worrying, and the fears that nag and tug at you into the night will never stop when it is your child you are fretting over.
I order the coffees, and our conversation is momentarily halted, which gives Issie the opportunity to change the subject and talk about going back to my hotel because she didn’t have a shower earlier.
I lean back, biting my lip and maybe she notices because she says then, ‘When can we go home? You said you would look into a flight today.’
‘I haven’t done it yet,’ I say. ‘I will.’ I’m still pleased that she wants to come home with me, but I can’t help thinking she’s only said it to get me back on side.
Issie smiles and we pause as our coffees are placed on the table. She fingers the tiny handle on her cappuccino cup, prodding the froth with a spoon.
‘Did you really not know he was going to be there, Issie?’ I ask her again, more gently this time.
‘No,’ she tells me, avoiding any eye contact.
‘Or even in Lisbon?’
‘I told you, Mum, I didn’t know where he was.’
‘Because you left him,’ I say.
‘Yes. Because I left him,’ she repeats.
I do not believe her. This is what I keep coming to. I don’t trust what she is saying, and cannot comprehend why she is telling me so little.
But I can’t keep forcing it because I fear I will push her away. And so, for now, I change tack completely and say, ‘I do know how hard it is for you. It takes time to accept and process when someone you love has done something awful to you.’
She looks up at me.
‘Your father,’ I tell her. ‘You don’t think he hurt me beyond belief? He walked out on us. He went back to his ex-wife. It was a total shock to think that the person you’ve been married to and who you love could do something like he did. It made me think I didn’t know him at all. I never thought the man I married was capable of hurting me the way he did.’
‘You always said it was the best thing to happen to you,’ Issie points out, though not as coldly as her words could have sounded.
I frown. Had I said that? I suppose I had told her as much in the days when I didn’t want her ever believing a man could destroy her life. It didn’t mean I believed it.
‘Iz, I had to be strong,’ I say. ‘For you and for me, and the thing is I know you are too. And you will move on from Dylan and what has happened to you because you have your whole life ahead of you. You have university and your art. You’re the most talented person I know.’ I reach for her hand to take it in my own.
She lets me hold it for a moment before pulling away. She looks like she is about to say something, but then dips her gaze.
‘You’re strong enough to walk away from him, I know you are,’ I say. I smile at her, and for a moment I think I have said the right thing and that at least some of my words have gone in.
But then she drops her spoon on the saucer and screeches back in her chair. ‘I’m going back to the hotel. You don’t have to follow me because I promise you that’s where I’m going. I’ll see you there whenever you want to come back.’
‘Issie?’ I call after her as she hauls her rucksack over one shoulder and starts to cross the road. But she doesn’t turn back.
I finish my coffee, and pay the bill. Then, ten minutes after Issie, I’m on my own way back to the hotel, only I stop outside the police station en route. Despite my earlier concern that I shouldn’t trust Melo, I push open the heavy door and step inside before asking for him.
He appears in the lobby and I tell him Dylan is staying in the Selena Guest House. Melo raises his eyes, signalling that he didn’t know. Hopeful visions of the police storming down there, arresting Dylan for stealing a car and leaving me and Issie in peace flood into my head.
I ask him to update me on what happens and he promises me he will, and then I say, ‘Is there anything I don’t know?’
‘How do you mean?’
‘Is there any more information you’re holding back for some reason? Anything that affects Issie.’
‘There is nothing,’ he tells me, though I don’t know if this is the case as he cocks his head and looks like he is trying to work out what more to say. In the end he tells me, ‘You have her with you. This is the main thing. Whatever happened to her, it will come out, Mrs Adams.’
‘I’m trying my best not to push her,’ I admit, ‘but I’m not sure how well I’m doing.’ Unexpected tears fill my eyes and I brush them away as they catch Melo’s attention. ‘I’m frightened. What if she still wants to be in touch with him? She tells me she doesn’t, but I’ve always known he has a hold on her. I don’t know what to do if he still has one now.’ Because what would that mean? That she is so blinded by him he can do anything to her and she still won’t walk away?
‘You hear about it, don’t you?’ I go on. ‘The girls who won’t leave? It can happen to the ones who come from loving families too. How do you stop that?’
Inspector Melo looks at me, like he doesn’t quite know how to answer before saying, ‘I believe you make sure she knows you are there.’ There is a look in his eyes, though, that suggests he doesn’t really believe this is enough. He must have seen too many horror stories first-hand over the years of controlling relationships that have gone too far. Is he really so sure it is all he would do if it were his own daughter instead of Issie? Does he expect me to sit back and hope it won’t get to the point it’s too late?
An hour later, I am back in the hotel room and Issie is lying on the bed. I won’t tell her I spoke to Melo about Dylan because I don’t want anything to rock the boat between us further. Instead, I make small talk about work, and Lois, leaving out other important things like her fallout with her friends because, for the moment, that can wait.
‘I’m sorry about earlier,’ she says, when we are lying side by side on the bed, watching a cookery programme with English subtitles on the television.
I glance over at her. She isn’t looking at me, but straight ahead at the TV as if she hasn’t spoken.
‘I’m not going back to Dylan, whatever you might think. That’s not the case.’
Immediately a wave of relief washes over me. I try to keep my voice level when I say, ‘That’s good, Issie.’ She looks so sure about it too, so much so that I believe her.
When my phone starts ringing, and I see Inspector Melo is calling again, I switch it off. As much as I want to know what he is phoning about, I don’t want to take the call in front of her.
She asks who it is and I tell her it was a work call. Issie’s attention returns to the TV and, while I try not to think of what the inspector wants to talk to me about, I can’t help myself. After five minutes, I tell her I should probably return the call, and that I’ll do so outside.
I feel her watching me as I leave the room, closing the door behind me. Maybe she is wondering what I am keeping from her and whether it is as bad as the things she is keeping from me. I don’t lie, and never to her, so can she tell I am now? I could never have imagined a day when both of us would be keeping secrets from each other.
‘It’s Jess Adams,’ I say when Melo answers. I walk down the winding staircase and into the reception area on the ground floor, stepping outside into the heat of the midday sun.
‘Mrs Adams, I have spoken to Dylan Whiting,’ he tells me.
‘Oh yes?’
‘He says the car was stolen a few days ago. Apparently he has not got around to reporting it.’
‘He’s lying!’ I say.
‘Yes,’ Melo agrees. ‘I am sure this is the case. But we will find out. I am certain he must know this.’
