‘Frank?’
Her voice. Like a blast of cold water that stopped me in my tracks. I had been shuffling towards the front door, vaguely wondering who was knocking.
‘Can I come in? I need to see you.’
I inched forward.
‘Please. I know you’re there.’
My hand wrapped itself around the doorknob, but I didn’t turn it.
‘Frank? It’s me, Jessica. Let me in.’
I leaned my forehead against the door, listening to her breathing on the other side, and closed my eyes for a moment. She knocked again and the sound rattled through me. Straightening up, I took a deep breath, turned the knob and very slowly opened the door. She was still the most beautiful thing I had ever seen, even after so many years, even with those tiny tell-tale signs of age.
‘Hello, Frank. Can I come in?’
I shivered, stood aside to let her walk past me and shut the door behind her. The sound echoed in the barely furnished room. She stopped by the sofa and turned towards me.
‘You look older. Worn. How have you been since you got out?’ She glanced around the dingy bedsit. ‘Your place is nice.’
‘No. It isn’t. It’s anything but nice. But it’s a step up compared to my last place.’ I replied gruffly. ‘What are you doing here? What do you want from me?’
‘I had to see you. One last time.’ Jessica smiled sadly. ‘I’m ill, you know. I don’t have long now and I want to make things right between us. Can we sit down and have a chat? Maybe have a coffee together?’
I snorted in disbelief. ‘You make it sound friendly and casual. Dropping in for a chat and a coffee. Do you realise how many years I was away for?’
‘Of course. Twenty to be exact. Coffee’s over here, is it?’ she asked, heading over to the kitchen corner. After opening and shutting various cupboards, Jessica located two mugs and the no-brand instant. She put the kettle on and leant back against the worktop, studying me, until the water boiled.
I still hadn’t moved from my spot near the front door, arms folded over my chest, as upright as I could manage without my back playing up. I wanted to resist the effect she still had on me. It wasn’t right after all I had gone through. She added coffee to the mugs, poured in the hot water and gave them both a quick stir. Picking the mugs up, Jessica carried them over to the coffee table.
‘Do you take milk and sugar these days?’
I shook my head.
‘Me neither. Why don’t we sit down?’ she asked, doing so herself.
Taking my time, I walked over to my armchair and sat down. I chose one of the mugs and nursed it between my hands, looking at Jessica curiously. Life had been good to her, it would seem. She still had that effortless elegance that had blown me away when we first met. I wondered how she had spent all that money. ‘What do you want from me?’ I asked warily.
‘Oh, Frank.’ She reached out as if to touch me, but changed her mind and pulled her hand back. ‘As I said, I wanted to see you again. I’m dying. Soon. And I feel terrible about what we did.’
I raised my brows. ‘What we did?’
She had the grace to look ashamed. ‘And especially about what I did. To you. Can you forgive me?’
I let the silence lie heavily between us and thought about that for a moment. What did it mean exactly? That I could pretend nothing had happened? That I still had hopes and dreams and a life to live? My mother had disowned me. My wife had divorced me. My children had changed their names and my friends had abandoned me. I had no career, no money and no reputation left. I was nothing but an old jailbird, guilty in the eyes of the world, who had served his minimum time and should feel lucky to be given a second chance at all. I shook my head slowly. No, I could never forgive her. ‘What sort of question is that? Are you asking me to give you a clear conscience? Why on earth would I want to do that?’
‘I don’t know. Because you loved me? Because you want me to go in peace? I know I treated you badly. If I could change the past, I would. But what’s done is done.’
‘I loved you. I did the most terrible thing. For you. And because I thought you loved me too. I still have your dead husband’s blood on my hands.’ I paused for a long moment. ‘Was the inheritance worth it? Did you buy yourself some real good times? Shame that even so much money can’t buy you good health.’
Jessica winced at that.
‘You said he hit you. I thought I was saving you from abuse.’
‘I know. It wasn’t true, though.’
‘I was beaten every day for the first few years.’
‘It must have been hard.’
‘You said he raped you. When you lay there in my arms, sobbing, while I stroked your hair and comforted you.’
‘I lied. I’m sorry.’
I stood up abruptly, walked to the window and looked out on the run-down street below. The grey skies and rain made it all the more depressing. ‘I was raped. It’s terrible. The shame of it. And the pain. And then they start all over again. Over and over again.’ I turned around and looked at her, hard. ‘Sorry just doesn’t cut it.’
‘I don’t know what to say to make it better.’
‘You can’t make it better. When we sat in that courtroom and my life was trashed, you said you didn’t even know me.’ I closed my eyes and allowed the memories and the hurt to flood back. She had denied everything. My whole defence had fallen apart. How we had met and fallen head over heels in love. How we had kept our love secret because she had been so afraid of her violent husband. I had booked all the hotel rooms, sneaking her in and out. Burnt all her letters. Called her only from a phone box. It had been such a well-kept secret that there had been no trace of our affair for my lawyers to find. As though I had invented the whole sorry tale. All that had remained for the prosecution and grieving widow to do was convince the jury that I was a lying thief who had brutally killed a good man. I had buried my anger for years but now it surged, overwhelming me. I picked up the nearest thing, a heavy glass ashtray, and hurled it across the room. Jessica started in fright.
‘Frank! For goodness’ sake! What’s wrong with you?’
‘Twenty years, Jessica!’ I yelled at her. ‘What the hell were you thinking when you knocked on my door? I’ve been to hell and back. I’ve lost everything. Look at me! I’m broken.’
She looked. And then looked away. ‘I never thought the sentence would be so harsh. I thought you’d get out after a few years. That maybe we’d hook up again. Or something.’ She sighed.
‘Hook up again? Are you out of your tiny mind?’ And yet it was exactly what I had dreamed of. I had fantasised about her coming to see me, explaining why. That maybe she had been coerced, blackmailed into betraying me. Anything to excuse her actions. Even then, I still loved her. And I hated myself for being so weak.
She stood up. ‘I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have come.’
I crossed the room in a couple of strides and grabbed her by the arms. ‘Tell me why.’ I shook her roughly. ‘Why? You surely owe me that.’
‘Stop it, Frank. You’re hurting me.’
I could so easily have pulled her into my arms and held her once again. But I pushed her away and sank back into my chair. Dropping my head into my hands, I whispered hoarsely. ‘I just want to know why.’
‘I wish there was some explanation that doesn’t make me look like the most heartless bitch alive.’ Jessica sat down opposite me. ‘But there isn’t. I wanted out of an unhappy marriage. And I wanted out with it all. The house. The money. The cars. Only I’d signed a pre-nuptial agreement and if I divorced, I’d have had to start all over again from scratch. It just seemed so unfair. And then I bumped into you. It was just a bit of fun, to begin with. You know, just a fling, I guess.’
I couldn’t be hearing her properly. It didn’t any make sense to me. ‘A fling?’
‘My husband was getting suspicious and I was scared he’d find out. Divorce me, maybe. And then the idea came to me. You were so in love. You said you’d do anything for me. And I’d told you all those stories about how horrible he was to me. They made me feel less guilty about being unfaithful. You just sort of played into my hands.’
So I had just been her pawn. A guileless fool that she had used for her own ends. I looked at her as though seeing her for the first time. ‘He wasn’t supposed to be home that night. You told me he was away. Then when he turned up out of the blue, you were so scared of him. He came rushing at you with a bat in his hand, for God’s sake. If I hadn’t hit him with that poker, what would he have done to you?’
‘Nothing. It was you he was rushing at. He thought you were a burglar.’
‘But why?’
‘Because I called him and said someone had broken in and to come home quickly. Then after you had killed him, it was me who called the police.’
My worst imaginings hadn’t prepared me for this. She hadn’t panicked after the event and lied to save herself. She had actually planned it all from the start.
‘You set me up and then you dropped me like a piece of shit.’ I should kill her for what she had done to me. She was dying anyway. I could just wrap my hands around her neck and squeeze the last breath of life out of her. But I was better than that. At least, I needed to believe I was. ‘Leave. Get out now. Before I do something else I’ll regret for the rest of my life.’
I didn’t watch her leave but heaved a huge sigh of relief when I heard the door close softly behind her. Maybe now I could finally move on with my life.
A few months later, I received a letter from a firm of solicitors whose name I didn’t recognise. I opened it with a sinking feeling. Good things didn’t usually happen to me so I naturally feared the worst. They were writing to inform me that Jessica had passed away and had left me sole beneficiary of her will. But more to the point, they sent me a copy of a letter that she had written to the police. In it, she told the pathetic truth of our story. She said that after visiting me, she had found the guilt was too much to bear. And that she hoped I would find it in me to forgive her. I think perhaps I have.
© 2014 Lesley Price