Getting a Life (New City Series Book 1) Read online

  Getting a Life

  (New City Series, Book One)

  By Stefanie Simpson

  Hello to Jason Isaacs

  One. Options

  The courtroom had a harsh yellow light, it lit the dark wood that covered nearly all of the room, it was cold, and Rebecca shivered. Under her polyester suit jacket though, she sweated in anxiety. She’d put half a stick of deodorant on, but she still sweated through it.

  Her knee jiggled up and down, and her heart was in her throat.

  Rebecca was pretty, not that she ever thought so, in fact she had a very low opinion of herself. But she was pretty, a sweet delicate face, full mouth and blue eyes, she had honeyed blonde hair that curled prettily at the ends. She was five foot seven, with a good figure, yet she hid it. Rebecca hid everything about herself.

  For court that day, for the sentencing, she wore a cheap polyester trouser suit, and a white blouse. Flat clumpy shoes and a cheap handbag finished her ugly outfit.

  She caught her mother’s eye from the other side of the room, her cold stare made Rebecca sink lower into the seat.

  What Rebecca had done, what she had done to her mother could not be forgiven in the woman’s eyes, yet it was the right thing to do. As a result, her life was pretty much over in her hometown, a place where she could no longer live.

  When the judge delivered his verdict, and David Crest and his son Mark stood, Mark craned round to see Rebecca. His glare held her, and she remembered everything in a sudden wave. He used to call her Becky, and she hated it. There was a tattoo along his neck with her name on it, and every time she saw it, she was revolted. The look he sent her said that this wasn’t over.

  David Crest got six years, and his son got two. It was enough, enough time for Rebecca to vanish, to make a new life.

  Her first port of call was to change her last name, then to sell her house, and then move across country and begin again. It filled her with dread.

  She met Detective Inspector Edwards in the foyer outside the courtroom, and her family liaison officer, Kathy, was with her.

  “So, it’s all done with.” Edwards smiled.

  “For now, they’ll get out.”

  “You’ll have a new name, a new life. They won’t find you. You just have to be careful, that’s all. Try not to keep in contact with your past.”

  “Shouldn’t be hard. Not many people will miss me.” Rebecca shrugged and left the court. She heard the familiar call of her mother’s voice, but she ignored it. Never would she be pulled back into the past, she had worked so hard since she was fifteen to get out, to get out of Manderly estate, and everything that went with it.

  Rebecca ran for the bus she saw pulling up at the stop before her mother could catch up, she looked back out of the window as the woman that had failed her gained on her, Rebecca watched her and her sour face pour out a litany of names at Rebecca as she diminished with distance, how apt.

  The estate agent was still at the house when Rebecca returned. He was a short smarmy hard sell type that repulsed her.

  “Been good today, I‘ve had several very interested people. Two want to come back with their partners.”

  “That’s great.”

  “Yeah, this place is up and coming.” That’s what had been said to her when she was twenty. Her house had increased in value thanks in part to the ‘up and coming’ part, and to the hard work she had put into doing the place up. It wasn’t in Manderly itself, but a few miles out, breaching the line from it into civilisation.

  “Well thanks.” He stood awkwardly in his sharp suit and hideous pointy loafers, and wondering why people wore those things, she shuffled waiting for him to go.

  Men in general must have thought she was desperate, with her obvious low self-esteem and ugly clothes. She could see him calculating.

  “So, I’ve had a long day, I need to get on.” She held out her hand for the keys. He paused for a moment then gave them to her.

  “Sure thing. I’ll ring with any news.” He climbed into his flash car and revved. She had already turned away.

  She looked about her house, once her testament of success. She had taken apart her material life, all that was left was the impersonal clutter that filled a house, the impression that she gave others.

  She had little that mattered, material things seemed so unimportant to her now. All she needed to do was pack her clothes and the little jewellery she owned, and she’d be free. The thought gave her comfort.

  She had worked hard all her life. She’d done her A-levels, and worked two jobs at the same time. She’d moved out of her mum’s house when she was fifteen, after she had been let down by everyone in a position to help her.

  When she was eighteen, she landed a job at a private healthcare clinic as an administrator, at twenty-three she was regional healthcare co-ordinator, and at twenty-five, assistant national healthcare co-ordinator. She had loved her job, and it paid well. She was good at it, she was liked and respected.

  She made cakes to take in on Fridays, and was always invited out with the staff. She had even had a little flirtation with one of the consultants. It had never come to anything, but it was the closest she had become to something more, something beyond her past.

  It was always that which held her back. It was starting to grate, but now there was hope. She had to quit her job, sell her house, and move to where she didn’t know a soul to get it, but there it was, she hoped it was worth the sacrifice.

  Two. A path

  The train pulled into Anstal Road Station in the late afternoon, Anstal was a small station in the old side of the city, the bigger, and more expensive to travel to was Chadford Central, right in the middle of the new City. Rebecca struggled with two enormous roll along suitcases, a large backpack, and a holdall.

  Chadford City had been a small market town, but in the sixties, it had become a New Town, a large expanded one that gained city status in the nineties. It had a small university college, a second division football team, and had pockets of history amid large urban sprawl.

  Much of that sprawl had begun to decay, and reinvestment was taking place. It was the perfect place for her. The hotchpotch of history and migratory past meant that she could blend into the background of a life there.

  The black cab took her the few miles out of the old part of the city and into the centre, which was one of uniform grey utilitarianism, it had a strange appeal to Rebecca, all straight lines and wide roads. She’d booked a hotel online at a discount for two weeks, and hoped it would be enough time to find somewhere to live.

  When she began researching places to live, Chadford had stood out, high wages and affordable living meant it was popular and attainable, as it wasn’t a picturesque old town. More important than any of this was the fact that Chadford City was one hundred and fifty two miles from her hometown, Manderly estate, and her mother.

  She had already applied for seven jobs before she left, and hoped her transitory situation wouldn’t be a problem.

  Her money hadn’t come through yet from the sale of the house, but it was only a matter of time. She’d actually sold it for over the asking price when she received a barrage of offers all at once and had a healthy pot from the proceeds. She was going to be all right.

  Only she wasn’t.

  She didn’t hear back from any of the jobs, and had taken up residence in the job centre, which wouldn’t help her, as she had no permanent address.

  She hauled a bag of washing to the launderette she found in the old end of the city centre, and sat in silence, thinking over what the hell she was going to do with herself.

  All the flats, bedsits, studios, and house shares she looked at were hovels. The
cheap living she was promised didn’t materialise. She read the week old paper left in the laundrette where she was oddly comforted by the smell of detergent, heat from the dryers, and low slumping noise of washing and whirring of the machines, as she looked through the classifieds.

  She noted one advert for a lodger, in Nattleton, not far from Anstal train station. Elderly lady requiring polite professional woman to lodge and undertake some light housework.

  Rebecca pulled out her new phone, the cheapest pay-as-you-go she could find, and dialled the number.

  The woman, Mrs Hulston, sounded frail and vulnerable, and Rebecca wondered at her advertising in the paper. Rebecca would go tomorrow. She hauled her holdall back to the hotel, dumped her clothes, and looked about for a place to eat.

  There was a small café not far, it was prettily decorated, and the woman who ran it was friendly and made cakes.

  Rebecca looked out into nothing, a grey concrete sprawl beyond. She watched the traffic meander by, not paying attention.

  “Are you okay?”

  Rebecca looked up at the woman, about forty, pretty, and full figured.

  “I just moved here, it’s a bit overwhelming.”

  She looked down at her cake and finished it.

  She chatted a little with the woman, about her divorce, her children, and her shih-poo named Baldrick.

  Rebecca left feeling a little better, and tried not to think of the past. She fell asleep watching TV.

  She looked over her clothes, she went with a pretty pale blue blouse and skinny jeans as she got ready in the morning. She second-guessed herself, but the stubborn resolute side of her wouldn’t let her cave. She was safe here, there was no need to hide anymore.

  When she was packing her clothes to come here, she made a point to clear out all of the ugly clothes she used to hide herself. She could start afresh and try to be normal.

  She walked most of the way, and caught the bus for some of it, there was a bus stop at the end of the street. It was a nice suburb, unlike much of the housing nearby, these were large pretty houses from the thirties, before the expansion. They had gabled roofs, stained glass in the windows, parts of the buildings were rendered and beamed in an arts and crafts style. Each one was different. She found Mrs Hulston’s, about half way up, immaculate garden, and a well-maintained house.

  She rang the bell and a few minutes later a tiny elderly lady answered the door. She had long white hair in a loose plait. She smiled up at Rebecca and in her frail voice asked her to come in. Rebecca noticed her gnarled hands, and the house, though tidy was in need of a good clean. It must be hard to keep up a large house like that alone.

  Rebecca followed her into the kitchen and watched her try to make tea.

  “Mrs Hulston, let me, please.”

  “Thank you, I do struggle with these things these days.” She had finely wrinkled skin, a string of pearls and slightly wonky lipstick. Her pink and white striped dress was from another era.

  “Tell me of yourself my dear.”

  “Well, there are things you should know about me, but they are things that I don’t really want to talk about or be known.”

  “What do you mean?” her concern was palpable and Rebecca sat opposite Mrs Hulston at the kitchen table. It was a solid well-kept kitchen from the eighties, all solid wood, but Rebecca noticed the dullness to the nets, and the grease on the tiles.

  She ran her hand over the battered wood of the table. There was history to it, unlike so much of her life, there was no anchor to her own tale.

  “My mother, no, um, my childhood was an unhappy one.” She stalled.

  “Are you running from someone?”

  “Yes. I had to give evidence, in court, about someone. My mother’s boyfriend and his son. I’ve had to leave my life behind. Silverton isn’t my last name.”

  “You don’t have to tell me my dear.”

  “Thank you. Well, I find myself here, living in a hotel trying to find a job. Which isn’t easy when you have no address. I have some money, or I will in a week. I can pay six months upfront.”

  “That’s all right then. But, I can lower the rent if you help me, I need someone who doesn’t mind doing some housework for me, and cooking. I have a gardener, and I suppose I could hire a housekeeper. But to be honest, I’m alone, and lonely. I’d like someone who’ll sit with me in the evening. I mean I would want you to have your own life, but, well, I miss family.”

  She emphasised the last word and sat back, she was slight and bony.

  “Do you not have any?”

  “Yes. Well, there’s my son. He comes perhaps once a week, for a few minutes, brings me a little shopping. I had him late in life, we never expected to have children you see, and then, well, I thought I was finally going through the change and well, poof, there he was.”

  Rebecca smiled as Mrs Hulston shook her head.

  “I think we were too old sometimes. He’s a good man, but, distant. He’s very busy, runs a business, he’s on all sorts of business committees and charity boards and the like. He really doesn’t have much time for his mother. I don’t blame him really.”

  Rebecca didn’t know what to say. She turned the pretty cup in her hands.

  “Tell me more of yourself.”

  “Well, I was a medical administrator and I hope to do that again. I’ve just sold my house, hence the money. I’d rather save it or buy another one, but I need a job first. I want somewhere to be for now, somewhere nice. I like the idea of someone else in that, I don’t have anyone anymore. I like domestic things. I like to bake. I was very house-proud. When I bought it, it needed so much doing to it. It was an auctioned drug squat. It took me a really long time, but it was lovely when I finished it. So I made a fair bit. That’s it.”

  “No one to miss you?”

  “Nope. Not a soul. The people I worked with were lovely, and they wish me well, but I had no real friends there.”

  Mrs Hulston looked at Rebecca oddly.

  “You find it strange. I understand. I suppose you should know all.”

  Rebecca frowned into the cup, the last of her tea was cold and was starting to get that milky separation on top.

  When she was four, her mother found her crying in a cupboard. She pulled her child out by the hair, which did nothing to halt the sobbing girl.

  A large red welt was on her face. David, her mother’s boyfriend sat on his arse, in nothing but his underpants, watching the TV. It was a hot sticky day, and Rebecca wore a grimy white sundress, and nothing else. Her mother pulled up her dress and spanked her bottom.

  She didn’t even know what she had done wrong.

  That memory, true or not, always stayed with Rebecca. It was indicative of her life then. She was smacked, humiliated, and starved. Food was strictly controlled in the house. It wasn’t always like that, her mother had met David in the pub, older than she, had a son himself, and they bonded over single parenthood. At first, it was okay, but Rebecca became a bone of contention in the house. As a child, she did not understand why.

  For a little while, she lived at her maternal nan’s. She was strict but loving, and it had been better, but suddenly she was back with her mother.

  Rebecca never knew why, and knew not to ask. She was seven when she went ‘home’, not that it ever was home to her. It was the place she lived.

  Her mother struggled financially, and Rebecca became the recipient of the poverty. She never had new clothes, school supplies, or food to eat.

  At primary school she was shielded in a way, the school never helped her in any important capacity, but they made sure she ate, and had a pencil to use.

  Rebecca had some friends, she was a quiet but nice child, and their families helped a little, she would stay overnight, and be fed and safe.

  When she looked back, the signs were there, but that no one did a single thing officially to help was beyond her. Once, she had a black bruise across her back, and she knew Kate Cartwright’s mum saw it.

  Rebecca was never invited ba
ck.

  She came to the conclusion pretty early in life that some people just didn’t count. She was from Manderly, and though she didn’t realise it then, it meant something. Nothing good.

  It was a large housing estate, where every house probably had asbestos and there was always a barking dog somewhere. Rough didn’t cover it. The only shops were off licences and police were a regular sight. There was always a house on fire, being robbed, or raided.

  Her mother was institutional non-working poor. That’s how Rebecca saw it, conditioned to stay put, apathetic, careless with her mind and body, trapped in what she knew. The idea of betterment was alien. Hate and ignorance and suspicion were the only things her mother knew.

  Not everyone in Manderly was like that, but there were some. They floated downward into criminality, not entirely their fault, but unwilling or unable to do anything about it.

  Rebecca had nothing but contempt for her mother, even from that age. She hated her, she hated her life and all the adults who let her down. She asked for help more than once. She had said the words, ‘mummy’s boyfriend hurts me’, but no one acted. She was a Manderly girl. There was no one to help her, she had to do that herself.

  After a while, she stopped asking for help, a little after that she was virtually mute. When it came time to go to secondary school, her mother didn’t care, so Rebecca went to school in clothes that didn’t fit, and with a pen she had stolen. It was all she had.

  It was no surprise her life was nearly as bad at school as it was at home.

  Justin Patrick punched her in the face at break time on a Monday during the second week of school, and she just stood there. She looked him in the eye, hers were absent and distant, his were mean, and she did not flinch, or go down. She did not cry, she just looked up at him.

  Where there had been jeering and goading, the circle around her was quiet. His courage failed under her stare, and she waited for the next one.

  It never came.

  Mrs Phipps broke up the circle and took one look at Rebecca’s face and hers changed colour. She expected to be in trouble, it was the order of things. But most of those kids were Manderly kids, and she wasn’t special. Justin was hauled away in one direction, and she was left there forgotten. She went to maths.