I knew it!
I have to stand on a chair from the kitchen to reach it. But once it’s in my fingers, I know that I’ve got something significant. Something that will allow me an insight into what he was up to.
I have to get home, get my computer. See what he has here.
I’m about to gather up my belongings when the buzzer sounds. And, ‘It’s me,’ Bella says into the intercom.
I sigh. I don’t want to talk to her. We haven’t properly talked in days and I still don’t want to talk to her. What I want to do is go home, get my computer, put this USB into it and hope it’s not password-protected. Hope that it will tell me something about my brother and what he was up to and how he got together with Verity Gillmare in the first place.
I don’t say anything, but do buzz Bella in. I have to cope with her for now. I don’t like that we’re not friends. We’ve already lost so much time, I don’t like that we’re losing more like this.
She throws her arms around me the second she enters Logan’s flat. ‘I’msorryI’msorryI’msorryI’msorryI’msorry.’ She doesn’t give me a chance to do anything else except stand there and accept and experience this full-body apology.
After a few minutes of ‘I’msorry’ing me, she finally lets me go. ‘I’m so stressed, so upset, I lashed out at you. You, of all people, don’t deserve it.’
‘How did you know I was here?’ I ask because I’m not sure what to say. It’s not OK, and I’m not prepared to say it is OK. At some point, I have to do what Tina was always trying to tell me to do: stand up for myself; rescue myself.
‘A-Lane told me. I went by your place and he said you were here, cleaning up. As if I couldn’t be any more ashamed.’ As she speaks, she walks into the corridor and then straight into the living room. ‘Wow, you’ve done an amazing job. I don’t think my clean-freak brother has ever had it this clean!’
Our clean-freak brother, I want to say, but it’s a small thing. An unintentional slip of the tongue.
‘The question on everyone’s lips, though’ – she spins on her heels to look at me – ‘is does the boy have any booze in the house?’
‘Oh yes, if there’s one thing our brother has, it’s booze.’ I indicate for her to sit down. ‘Sit and I’ll get a selection of stuff.’
When I return with a tray full of bottles and glasses and carefully settle it on the floor beside her, before sitting down on the other side, Bella looks distressed. I pour her a glass of white wine in a short water tumbler and hand it to her.
She takes the glass, still looking distressed. Eventually she spills: ‘Do you think this is a bit morbid? I mean, he’s on the other side of town in a coma with our parents keeping vigil and we’re here in his house drinking his alcohol.’
I drink the wine and it is good. Light, fruity, the right type of tart. Is it morbid? Is it? ‘Probably,’ I say with a shrug. ‘But he’s not drinking it, is he?’
She spits out the wine and stares wide-eyed at me.
‘What?’ I ask her. ‘Oh, come on, it’s true.’
‘I’ve messed up,’ Bella suddenly says. ‘I’ve really, really messed up. This is all my fault. That’s why I was trying to blame you. It’s my fault Logan’s lying in a hospital bed. That he may never wake up.’
‘How is it your fault?’
‘I should have . . . I should have stopped him. He told me what he was going to do. How he was going to track down Serena Gorringe and get her to confess. I mean, we both knew it was a batshit plan. The woman has lied for over thirty years, how is Logan talking to her going to change it? I should have stopped him. I tried. I thought, I convinced myself I’d talked him out of it, but you know Logan, it’ll take more than a couple of chats to stop him.’
Do I know Logan? Do any of us?
‘It’s not your fault,’ I tell my sister. I’m staring at the array of drinks that sits on the wooden tray between us. I’m wondering what to go for next. I’m not enjoying the wine any more. It’s taking too long. I want the hit and buzz thirty minutes ago, I do not want intoxication to stroll up to me and offer me a nice meander into its embrace. I want a smack-bang ‘AND NOW YOU’RE DRUNK!’ feeling. That is the best kind of drunk nowadays. It means the crying only comes once I’m too out of it to care. With the slow type of drunk, there are far too many tearful avenues to take myself down, numerous cul-de-sacs of sobbing to visit before face-down, care-about-nothing drunk arrives.
‘You have to say that, you’re my big sister,’ Bella says.
‘I really don’t have to say that. I’m not sure what I’m supposed to say most of the time, Bella. I spend so much time not knowing what to say, I stop talking. I just sit there chewing the inside of my mouth, biting my tongue and fuming. I do a lot of fuming.’
‘What was prison like?’
I stop scoping out the booze on the tray and look at her. She’s never asked. Neither of them has ever asked. Not directly. Logan has asked more questions that lead into conversations about prison than Bella, but neither of them has ever asked what it was like.
‘Horrible,’ I state. ‘It was horrible. And even though I met Tina, who I loved more than life itself, even though I got time to read, even though I learnt stuff and I met great people, prison was horrible. I wouldn’t wish it on anyone.’ Except Serena. I think I’m at that stage where I would wish it on her. And her daughter, if she did this. They need to go to prison if she did this.
‘Not even the person who did this to Logan?’
‘I would totally wish it on them.’
‘Do you think Verity Gillmare did it?’
‘Can we not talk about it? I’m not in the place to talk about that. I just want to forget about it for a while. OK?’
‘OK.’
I pour myself a huge tumbler of Bailey’s, then top up Bella’s glass with wine. She’s not on my drunk-fast road yet and I’m trying to respect that while making sure I don’t slow down at all. ‘How come you were here this weekend?’ That’s been bothering me for days. Saturday night, she got the call first and she met me at the hospital. ‘I thought you were in London with the fella this weekend.’
‘Yeah, well,’ she replies. ‘You thought wrong.’
‘OK, then. I’ll just remind myself never to ask you anything again and shut myself up, shall I?’
‘No, no, sorry. I just hate that I’ve joined you and Logan in the messed-up stakes.’
‘How do you mean?’
‘Myron and I had a huge falling-out and decided not to see each other this weekend. I mean, come Saturday, I was all kinds of pissed off and did not need the Logan situation heaped on top.’
‘What was the falling-out about?’
‘He wants to move here sooner. He thinks it’s ridiculous to wait another eight months. Eight months is practically no months as far as he’s concerned so he’s all for putting his place on the market and then moving as soon as possible.’
‘What’s wrong with that? It sounds like he can’t wait to be with you. That’s nice. That’s the very definition of not messed-up as far as I can see.’