I looked back down at our plates. Wondered whether I should switch or let fate intervene.
‘He’s my boyfriend, Elle.’
‘Of course. But it can’t be that serious if you haven’t even done the deed. I mean, aren’t you worried he’ll find someone else to scratch that itch if you won’t?’
I hadn’t been. Not until she planted the doubt in my mind. Watered it with the imaginings that were creeping around inside of me.
I had never wanted to hurt her before that moment, but one glance from her and it was unravelling so fast I had no idea how to try and put it back the way it was supposed to be. One glance from her and all of my darkness came spinning back to the surface. All of the whispers, the insecurities, the desire to cause harm that had dissipated whenever I was around him, came flying back into my consciousness and I was overcome with the urge to make her scream.
‘So where is he now?’ I picked up my own cupcake, waited for her to see me do so, then watched as she wrapped her lips around one, head dropping backwards as sweetness slid down her throat.
‘I think he’s talking to your mum,’ she said in between mouthfuls.
Good. There was time.
Have another.
‘So have you decided what you’re going to do?’ I had to keep her talking. Keep her eating.
‘No idea. Dad says I can take my time, help out with the business, but can you imagine how dull that would be?’
Yes, I can. But no worse than online shopping and days at the spa, which is how Elle had spent her summer thus far.
‘You could always teach.’ Because those that can’t, can.
‘Funny you should say that.’
‘Funny ha, ha, or funny, that’s so ridiculous I can’t quite believe what you’re suggesting?’
‘Don’t be a bitch. Just because I’m not as clever as you doesn’t mean I can’t do something worthwhile with my life.’ Her hand reached out for the second cake, then stilled, eyes stretching wide before the same hand scratched at her neck.
‘What is it?’ I offered her a drink and she swiped it away, the glass shattering on the tiled surround of the pool. ‘What’s the matter?’ I knew what the matter was, but folded confusion into my face just the same.
She pointed at her throat, tongue slowly filling the space created by her fish-like mouth. Fingers seized my arm, pressing down hard on skin that would show the outlines of her fear in days to come.
‘The cake.’ My hands came up to my mouth in a caricature of shock. ‘But you had one too, so it can’t be.’ But it can. All too easy to pretend I didn’t know which cupcakes had toffee and which had peanut icing. Silly mistake to make. Silly old me.
The hand of fate had decided, held me back from switching the plates. Made me choose him over her. A defining moment, you could call it; the first time I realised the full extent of my feelings, understood he had taken her place in my heart.
Still clutching at my arm, Elle’s lips began to swell. I imagined the sensation of her ballooning from the inside out. Flesh pressing against her skull, skin stretching tight in preparation to split wide, her beauty destroyed by one tiny nut.
‘Jane, what’s going on?’ Patrick asked. Where the fuck did he come from? Only a second ago it was just her and me, then suddenly he popped up behind us like some veritable boy scout.
Four words from him and everything was annulled.
‘She’s in anaphylactic shock.’ I leapt up, her nails leaving behind accusatory lines. ‘Lie her down, find something to prop up her head.’
‘Is she going to be all right?’
I turned away, couldn’t risk him seeing the guilt leaking from my pores. Didn’t want to witness his concern for her. There was a cabinet on the wall behind the bar, a cabinet I’d been shown by Elle’s mother the first time I was invited round for a swim.
‘Just in case,’ she had told me. ‘I need you to know what to do.’
Just in case her child was dying, she thought someone would be there to save her.
People choose what they want to see, what they want to believe. Jackie wanted to believe I wasn’t capable of hurting her child. That I didn’t hesitate before stabbing Elle in the thigh with an EpiPen as she ran screaming across the lawn. She blamed the caterers for not labelling the food correctly, despite their protestations of innocence. Because if she’d known I had even considered the possibility of hurting Elle, she would have had to ask herself not only why, but how it was that she’d invited me into their lives in the first place.
The only person who noticed the danger, the only one who stood at the edge of the crowd, with arms crossed and eyes silent, was my mother.
* * *
I kept my promise to Elle’s mother after that fateful day; to always be her friend, to protect her no matter what, but I came to hate the weight of it. By swearing allegiance to her family, by accepting her mother’s terms, I was tied to them, my conscience forever torn between what I wanted and what I had promised to be.
Elle wouldn’t have done the same. She would have waited for me to leave this world behind, made sure there was no one who could change the course of her own fate with the man she loved. In a way, this was exactly what she did the moment my back was turned, and I was a fool to ever believe otherwise.
Sometimes I think my own darkness might devour me. But I wanted to do it, to watch her choke out her last breaths, wondering why I wasn’t saving her. I still do, don’t I? It was him that stopped me, him that forever stops me from becoming what I fear. I have to be good, on the outside at least, because inside is a turmoil I battle against every day.
But I know that, however much I ignore it, it’s always there. My desire, my pain, sits coiled and tight; desperate to escape, to run free.
Yellow Rose: Joy, protection against envious lovers
London, seven years ago
‘Where are you?’
Patrick sounded annoyed. Furious even, and it took me a moment to figure out why.
‘I’m on my way.’
‘Are you? You know what, never mind.’ And he hung up. Didn’t wait for an explanation as to why I was still at work instead of by his side at the fundraising dinner he had asked me to attend only the previous week.
I checked my watch. Looked over to where my boss was still at his computer screen, decided it was worth the risk. Patrick was worth the risk, because we were turning into strangers and I needed to make things right.
Fifteen minutes later and I was beginning to regret my choice of dress. And shoes. And of not remembering to wash my hair that morning when I left before Patrick woke. Before he could accuse me once more of putting the job first.
But it was exhilarating, being in that environment. Surrounded by people who were just as ruthless, just as ambitious as I. Always competing for first place, for the nod from your superior that said you were the one they wanted with them when they presented the idea to their client. People who worked harder than they played, because there was always, always, someone willing to take their place.
And I was bloody good at it.
At first Patrick had understood, so immersed was he in his own new adventure. We would swap