How many times did she take Lottie up to her study, show her these photographs, tell her that Ollie was her dad and not Paddy?
‘She used to say, “In this room, everything we want to make happen has already happened. It’s already true.”’ Ollie’s voice pierces my numb shock. ‘There were so many of the Photoshopped pictures, covering every shelf. Why did there need to be so many? I’d have been able to believe so much more in the future happy family we talked so much about if those awful pictures hadn’t been distributed all over the room, looking so obviously like hideous fakes. Everything else we did and said was real – I didn’t get why there had to be this … creepy fake stufftoo. But Marianne obviously loved the photos, and I didn’t want to … I don’t know, upset her or spoil anything for her, I suppose.’
‘Sweetheart?’ says Dad. ‘While we’re on the subject of photographs …’ I feel something against the skin of my hand, and turn. He’s trying to pass me something.
Please, not more twisted, fabricated pictures.I half expect the ones I’m holding to turn out to be all of us replaced – five happy Ollie-faces, each one at the top of a different body, standing underneath a tree in Devey House’s garden.
I gasp when I see what Dad’s given me: the three pictures of Mum I used to keep tucked into my mirror when I was much younger: the ones that disappeared from my bedroom soon after Dad and Marianne got together. I’ve been convinced, all these years, that she stole them.
‘Did you find them in her things somewhere?’ I ask Dad, unable to stop the tears that are rolling down my face. Ollie puts his arm round me, and I allow him to half hold me up. I press the photos against my chest. No one is ever separating me from these again.
‘No,’ says Dad. ‘They were in the same place where I stored all the other photos when Marianne asked me to hide them.’
‘But … are you saying …?’ It’s too much. I can’t trust what I think I’m hearing, in case it turns out to be wrong.
‘Yes, sweetheart. I took your photos of Mum,’ Dad tells me. ‘I know you thought it was Marianne, but it was me. I was worried she might … I don’t know. React badly if she saw them. Destroy them, maybe. So I stashed them away to keep them safe for you.’
‘What do you mean, “for me”? I haven’t had them, Dad. If Marianne hadn’t died, I still wouldn’t have them now.’
‘I know. I’ve handled everything terribly.’ Dad looks downat his feet. ‘I know that. Believe me, I know. I’m trying to make up for it now by telling you everything, if you’ll let me.’
‘There’s more?’ I’m not sure I can take in anything else. I know there are questions I ought to be asking, but I can’t think clearly.
‘There’s a letter,’ says Dad. ‘Marianne wrote you a letter.’
‘I never got it,’ I tell him.
‘No, she didn’t send it. It’s … well, I put it in the same hiding place. She gave it to me.’
‘She wrote Jemma a letter and sent it to you?’ Ollie says, to check Dad hasn’t got mixed up.
‘Yes.’ Dad sounds uncertain now. ‘DC Waterhouse, perhaps you could …?’
‘This hiding place,’ says Simon, looking at me. ‘Where your dad put these … doctored family photos, the photos of your mum that he’d taken from your bedroom, the letter Marianne wrote you. Other things were hidden there too.’
‘What do you mean?’ asks Ollie.
‘It’s where the person who killed Marianne hid the bloody clothes, the murder weapon, their blood-spattered shoes.’
‘They used the same … So they saw what Dad had hidden there?’ I ask.
Simon looks very serious, all of a sudden. ‘Not quite. I mean—’ He’s looking at Dad as if waiting for him to say something.
And he does. ‘I think we all need a little break,’ he says, sounding as nervous as he used to when Marianne was grilling him about something he hadn’t done to her satisfaction, or strictly according to her orders. ‘Who fancies some lunch?’
No one is in the mood for eating, but we sit in the kitchen with our plates and bowls of hard-boiled eggs, salad, sliced ham and cucumber between us for nearly half an hour, drinkingfrom our water glasses and talking about anything we can think of that isn’t Marianne or who killed her. None of us wants this break to end, except perhaps Simon – but he doesn’t rush us.
Dad apologises for the inadequacies of the meal. Ollie says, ‘Actually this is a very good lunch,’ and I shoot him a puzzled look. ‘I keep hearing people say it,’ he explains. ‘The healthiest kind of meal is when everything on your plate has only one ingredient. An orange, for instance, or a boiled egg.’
Dad looks so much thinner and older than he did before Marianne died, but Ollie’s praise brings a smile to his face.Another reason I’ll never stop loving Ollie: his kindness.
I’ve decided to stop questioning my love for him – to stop forever. And I’m aware of it growing bigger and more powerful inside me every day, whether he’s just done something silly or something brilliant. I love how thoughtful he is, and that he’s quite weird too. I’ve found out a lot I didn’t know about him since last Friday. He really does believe that the future is already decided – completely pre-determined – and that nobody has free will. He’s twice mentioned a book I ought to read that proves it and explains why it’s great news for humanity. I asked him to summarise the book’s main theory, which he did straight away and at great length, because – and this is a huge difference between him and Paddy – Ollie is someone who loves, wherever possible, to say yes and make people happy. Paddy feels more comfortable if he’s saying no to something, or he’s not sure, or he doesn’t really think so. His yeses take a long time to coax out of him, after initial refusals.
The theory in the book Ollie wants me to read sounds completely insane – as insane as some of his more neurotic messages (‘I’m probably going to be three minutes late’,‘No, sorry, I’m likely to be a bit early, in fact – maybe two or three minutes’, ‘Me again, sorry – turns out I’ll be exactly on time’)and his take on religion. ‘I’m agnostic, I guess,’ he told me as he drove us to Dad’s today. ‘Though I seriously considered joining the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints last year. I wanted to be part of something bigger than myself, and Mormonism’s my favourite of all the faiths I know of. Or is it Mormonhood?’
I told him I had no idea and asked why it was his favourite.
Deadly serious, he said, ‘WhenThe Book of Mormonthe musical came out, the Latter-day Saints bought advertising space in the theatre programmes: “You’ve seen the musical – now come and discover the realBook of Mormon, which is even better.” So clever. Also, I love the origin story, with the gold plates.’
