Escaping Life Read Online Free PDF Page A

Elizabeth took to heart, immediately
realising that she may have found another being who could understand her. 
Nancy hadn’t known Elizabeth before.  She hadn’t been there when they buried
her mother or when they stood around the black and heavy stone and pretended to
have a funeral for Rebecca.  Sure, she knew that they were both dead, but she
didn’t know any of the details.  They were details that at the time were so
painful she couldn’t share them, so had covered up the truth with simple lies. 
Her lies were the ribbons and bows on the gift of death that had been delivered
painfully to her door.  As time passed, there had been no need to change the
story.  Yet now, to talk about the notice in the newspaper, the published
letter that somewhere in her heart, as much as she tried to push it deep into
storage, she couldn’t help but believe to be from her dead sister, she needed
to clear away the mistruths.  She had to reveal to Nancy the events from the
past.  She had to somehow unfold the facts that had been assimilated into more
digestible pieces back into their original form.  As she told the story, firstly,
of her mother’s death and then of the burnt-out car, she could feel her own
discomfort, but no matter how hard she looked, she found none on Nancy’s face
before her.  She spelt it all out.  She didn’t leave out the details.  Now was
not the time for a cover story.  Nancy sat and listened; her response was
simple.
    “So, your
sister didn’t die.”

Four
    As she walked
back through the streets of Haven, Elizabeth couldn’t shake off Nancy’s final
words.  ‘ So, your sister didn’t die’.  She passed the ice cream stand,
now closed as the sun passed over the cliffs and into the next village where it
would bring folk out into the gardens to enjoy the evening sun.  The words
rolled over and over in her head.  She tried to focus on the few people still on
the beach, probably those who were only staying for the day and so would light
a fire to make the most of it.  They
would throw on their jumpers and grill sausages to eat hot off the stick.  They
would wrap themselves up in blankets, and the mothers would worry about the
children still paddling in the ocean once it had got dark, but not seriously
enough to call them back.  These were the days that a family remembered after
the summer had passed, once the days became short and the winter announced its
arrival.  These were the days that would get stored up, forming memories ready
to be brought out on a cold and gloomier day.  These were the memories that
they would take with them to bolster them through the longer nights.  Elizabeth
and Nancy had sat and talked for hours before she had left, but it was still
her first response that she kept returning to.  ‘ So, your sister didn’t die’.
   She repeated it over and over in her head as she had with the words from
the newspaper two days before.  Nancy didn’t look for a coincidence like Graham
had.  She looked clearly at the facts, and with the open-mindedness that made
her not only a great confidant but also a friend.  Maybe Rebecca wasn’t dead.
    As she
approached the gate, she could see Graham’s BMW parked around the corner of the
house.  He must be home early tonight , she thought, as she closed the
latch of the white picket fence behind her.  Passing the rows of ornate trumpet
shaped purple flowers of the Hebe bushes that she had planted in rows along the
pathway, her wild thoughts of the sister still living somewhere waiting to be
found had managed somehow to become rather frivolous.  Her musings and her
discussion with Nancy had, by the time she reached her own sensible home,
managed to seem childish somehow.  Silly even.  She was certain if she told
Graham about it, that he would roll his eyes and wonder what had happened to
his sensible wife.  It wasn’t that Graham was unsupportive, and he had indeed
loved Rebecca and would rejoice at her return.  He