The road twisted ahead, a blur of heat shimmering above it. I looked away, my eyes dazzled by the fields flashing past: bright green, pale green, dark green, brown, brown, acid yellow, and green again.
Alice changed gear into what must have been fifth, and I gripped the edge of my seat. ‘OK, Clare? Won’t be long now.’ She reached across to flip open the glove compartment. ‘There’s some water in there.’
It was fizzy and tasted harsh, drying my mouth even more. I closed my eyes. And here it was again: that other road. A dark road, flickering with shadows of trees and cloud. Then the stab of light and the chaos of jolting, screeching, and skidding. Oh, God.
I jerked upright and saw we were approaching the turn off for Wadhurst. Something pulled hard on my insides and my foot pressed an imaginary brake. ‘Alice, do you think …’ My voice cracked.
She looked over at me and slowed the car, then pulled into a lay-by. Her blue eyes were clouded. ‘We can’t, Clare. I haven’t told him it’s today. And you said yourself it was better to wait. Get settled first.’
I nodded: she was right. She squeezed my hand, giving me a wobbly smile. ‘OK?’ I managed another nod, and Alice drove on, as I looked back down the road and that tug came again, so strong this time it felt like pain.
Another swig from the bottle; the gassy stuff stinging my throat. Alice twisted a dial and a draught of cold air blew into my face and around my ankles. ‘Any better?’ she asked.
‘I’m sorry, can we stop again?’
She pulled into a pub car park and I got out, tugging at the jeans and shirt that clung too tight. Alice walked round to open the boot.
‘Look, why don’t you put on something cooler?’
All I wanted now was to get back to the safety of the car, away from the wide sky and the fields, but I pulled out the holdall and followed her. The toilets were just inside the main door, and Alice led me into the Ladies, leaning on a sink and talking to my reflection, her own distorted by the mirror.
‘I’ll leave you to it then.’ She rubbed my back. ‘I’ll get us some lunch. You should eat something.’
The place was cool and clean, a bowl of potpourri between the two sinks, but as I rifled through my clothes I could smell the stench of prison on them: strong enough to overwhelm the faint scent of lavender. My face in the mirror was bleached stone beneath the dark curls, and the fluorescent light revealed lines around my eyes that I’d never noticed before. Thirty-three wasn’t that old, was it? I pinched my cheeks, running my fingers through my hair.
Locked in a cubicle, I stripped off. The floor was cool under my bare feet, and I rested my head on the metal door. Then put on a thin blouse and cotton trousers.
I felt better for the change, but as I stood in front of the sinks again, staring at my white face, I couldn’t imagine how I would get through the door. Come on; come on, just do it. A woman and child burst in, the little girl holding the door for me, and I found myself in the bar.
I stood, with the conspicuous holdall on the floor beside me, scanning the room. The worn floorboards stretched away to open French windows, a babble of voices echoing all around.
I couldn’t see Alice.
‘Don’t look so worried, darling. If you can’t find your friend, you can sit with me.’
I recognised that look. You get it even in prison. The one that imagines fucking you, making you squirm. I wanted to tell him what I was – to take that smirk off his face – but instead I clenched my teeth and headed for the French windows.
She was sitting by a stream, her blue dress hanging over the edge of her chair, pale legs stretched out before her, strappy sandals on her feet. I forced a smile as I sat and she motioned to the drinks.
‘I got you still water.’ She raised her own glass, full of white bubbles. ‘Ordered us some sandwiches too.’
I took a sip, grateful for an excuse not to speak or to look at the girl who approached with two plates.
‘Tuna, or cheese and tomato?’
Alice smiled at her, then back at me. ‘We’ll share shall we, Clare?’
For all the world as if we were friends out for a jaunt in the country. Two men glanced over at us as they brought their pints to the next table: the younger giving Alice’s long legs an appreciative look up and down. She tucked them under her chair and his glance flickered to me, before returning to his drink.
We were nothing like sisters, of course, and I wondered if we even passed for friends.
Alice’s blue dress was crisp and her blonde hair dropped like pale water to her shoulders. Looking at her, I couldn’t help pulling at my creased trousers and moving my feet behind my holdall to hide my trainers.
She pushed some keys across the table at me. ‘I hope the flat’s OK. It was three months’ rent in advance, so no need to worry about that for a bit.’
We ate for a while in silence, but I didn’t have much appetite, and Alice soon stopped eating too. She looked into her glass, twisting it so the bubbles swirled and sparkled.
‘I’ve mentioned you to a friend who owns a florist’s shop near the flat. She might have some work for you, if you’re interested. Just don’t rush it.’
‘Who is she?’
‘Don’t worry; it’s no one you know. Stella’s the sister of an old boyfriend.’ She laughed. ‘I realised I didn’t like him much, but Stella and I hit it off and we’ve stayed in touch.’
‘What did you tell her … about me I mean?’
‘The truth – more or less.’
She would have done it perfectly. Even as a little girl, five years my junior, I remembered her watching my tantrums with puzzled eyes.
‘Your little sister’s nothing like you,’ people would say and, depending on my mood, I might laugh and say it was just as well. In my darker moments, I would shout, ‘She’s not my real sister, that’s why. I’m adopted. I’m not even English.’ I told people my mother was a Romanian princess, knowing she must really have been a peasant who couldn’t, or didn’t want to, support a child.
‘Oh look, aren’t they lovely,’ Alice said, as a flotilla of grey cygnets appeared around the bend in the stream and she began tearing pieces of crust from her sandwich and tossing them into the water. Soon the cygnets were jostling and squabbling for the bread, as the parent swans glided in, their wings arched behind them. ‘That’s a threat you know. They’re warning us not to hurt their babies.’ She cast a few more crumbs at the birds, as the parents’ tiny black eyes watched.
I hoisted my bag onto my shoulder. ‘Shall we go?’ I wanted the journey over. I needed to be alone.
As we got closer to the sea, small grey clouds drifted across the sun, reminding me of the little cygnet siblings. Poor Alice, she had stuck by me through it all, and yet, I had never said more than the odd, gruff, thank you.
‘You’re still my sister, and I know how sorry you are for what happened,’ was all she said, when I asked her why she was so good to me in spite of everything.
By the time we got to Hastings, and turned onto the seafront road, the sky had changed from blue to white, the water grey and almost still. There was some kind of hold up and the traffic stretched ahead, unmoving. The layer of cloud covering the sun had trapped the heat and stifled the breeze so it was hotter than