‘I’m not shouting!’ Remy shouted. ‘But you think it’seasyfor me, trying every day to make it up to Mum and Dad? Not being able to tell them that, actually’ – her voice wobbled – ‘I didn’t let them down, I didn’t rip up the raffle ticket to win at life that had been offered me! I bloody won! I won the bloody raffle! I just gave you the prize. And I don’t want your life, none of it! I wantmylife, my cosy life in my pretty cottage with my Midge. That’s all I want. And I know you want me to come clean, which, ironically, might just cause the one thing that scares me, the one thing I want to avoid – putting a dent in my lovely, lovely life!’
‘This is what I’m talking about!’ Ashleigh laughed. ‘Small lies and big lies, we all do it every day in so many ways. “How are you?”“Oh, I’m fine!” We smile, fix our hair and say,I’m fine!Even when our hearts are broken, or we’re keeping shit to ourselves, even when we’re lonely.’
‘Do you get lonely? Is this what this is about?’ Remy held her gaze.
‘A bit, but again, doesn’t everyone?’ She shrugged. ‘And it doesn’t feel like a lie though, does it, when we say those things? It feels like self-preservation and a lot like consideration as you say it, to spare the feelings of the person who’s asking, knowing they can do very little to mend the situation anyway, and so why offload? I’ve done it for years! Presented myself as this capable, smart, go-getting businesswoman, when the whole time I feel like it could be snatched from me at any moment because I don’t bloody deserve it!’ She clicked her fingers.
‘You do deserve it. You deserve all good things, Ash!’
‘So you say.’ She took a beat, and they were quiet for a moment, both calming, as the night air cooled them.
‘I guess I don’t always tell Midge how I’m feeling, don’t want to worry him. Particularly if I’m concerned about Harps. I don’t see the point in both of us lying awake until the early hours. I prefer that he, at least, gets some sleep.’
It was heartrending to hear of her niece’s struggles and how it affected her twin.
‘I understand. I keep things in. There’s lots I don’t talk about.’ Aware now that she was really delving into the honesty pot, she was more than a little nervous about how to proceed.
‘Like what?’ Remy sat down hard on the step that ran along the back of the patio, and Ashleigh joined her.
‘Like ...’ She slumped, aware her posture was slovenly. ‘I yell at random strangers in the car. I do it a lot. I’ve sworn at someone on the crossing who didn’t say thank you. I called them a fuckingtwat, just shouted it, randomly, at this bloke who ignored me when I stopped to let him cross.’
‘That’s not nice, but there are worse crimes. I think if you were sent to hell it’d be an interesting conversation, you standing there with warmongers and murderers, having to explain that you once swore at a man who didn’t thank you at a crossing.’
‘I’ve done it more than once. I can’t help it. I don’t plan it, it just comes burbling out ... and then I cringe at myself, I feel so bad,’ she admitted.
‘So don’t do it. Stop yourself. Think before you speak! Isn’t that what they say?’ Remy offered the cliché, and Ashleigh smiled.
‘Yes, they do, and they make it sound so easy, but it’s not. I don’t know why I do it.’
‘Well, I’m no psychologist, but it sounds like you have latent anger that is waiting for an opportunity to show its face.’
‘Latent anger?’ Ashleigh laughed, partly at her sister’s earlier outburst. ‘There’s nothing latent about it – I’mangry!’
‘What are you angry about?’ Remy asked with barely disguised incredulity, as if trying to figure out what her sister, who had been given the prize, had to be angry about.
Was she not listening?
‘Where to start ... The way Archie’s parents treated me, viewed me, as if I just wasn’t good enough. They never wanted to spend time with me.’
‘That was a long time ago, and actually, having met them, I think that’s a blessing.’
Ashleigh ignored her, not in the mood for her humour right now.
‘I’m angry with Archie too, angry that we built a life, and I imagined a future that was never going to be mine. And Guy, our business –mybusiness – all that work, all those dreams.’ Sheclicked her tongue on the roof of her mouth. ‘I still feel very angry about how it was all taken away from me, even after all this time.’
‘That’s sad.’
‘I know!’ she fired, not wanting anyone to find her sad, especially not Remy. ‘And I’m angry at Evie for not picking me more often, for lying to me rather than just saying, “I don’t want to spend time with you, Mum!” And I’m angry at myself for not ... for not being the best mother on the planet. For not figuring it all out sooner.’
‘Well, no, because that award went to me. Have you spoken to Harper? I don’t know where I went wrong.’ Remy rubbed her face.
‘Rem, I see how you are with your kids. They love you, and you love them, you all get on so well, and it’s something I just can’t emulate, although God knows I’ve tried.’ Her voice, she knew, carried the falter of imminent tears. It was as her sister opened her mouth to comment that Ashleigh felt a surge of wine-fuelled confidence and the contents of that pot of honesty came pouring out, quicker than she could consider the consequences. ‘And I’m angry with you. I’ve always been angry with you, I think.’
‘Withme?’ Remy half laughed, as if trying to mask her surprise and embarrassment. ‘Really?’
‘Yes, really.’ Ashleigh paused and drew her verbal dagger from its sheath. ‘I’m angry because I’m a fraud. You made me a fraud. Complicit in a crime I knew nothing about but a crime with my dabs all over it!’
‘For the love of God, Ash!’ Remy laughed – actually laughed!
