Chapter Seventy-Five

Havermouth, Five Years Before

Aislen could hear her parents arguing in the kitchen through the too-thin walls of the house.

“It’s been three days, Patrick!” Tiffany was furious. “She barely talks, barely eats, and, although she leaves the house every morning in her school uniform, she’s not going to school – they’ve been calling to ask where she is.”

“I don’t know what you want me to do, Tiff,” Patrick snapped back. “We’ve both tried talking to her. She won’t even look us in the eyes. She flinches every time I go near her.”

“You did give her a black eye,” Tiffany reminded him. “And that’s why you won’t do anything about it now. You’re afraid that she’ll report you. When did we lose control of this situation?”

“If my mother was still with us…” Patrick said in a softer tone of voice.

“I blame your mother for this. Aislen changed once she started going to stay with her over the school holidays. I thought it was just… hormones. But what if… What if she was abused?”

“She wasn’t abused,” Patrick was exasperated. “She stayed with an old lady for a few weeks during the school holidays for three years. They gardened, talking about family history, and cooked together.”

“I don’t know,” Tiffany replied. “She was never the same after…And they say that abuse victims become promiscuous as a way of dealing with their experiences…”

“Tiff,” Patrick groaned. “I am going to be late for work.”

Aislen heard his car start and reverse down the driveway a moment before her bedroom door opened.

“Get up and get dressed,” Tiffany said. “I’m driving you to school this morning.”

“I can walk,” Aislen said automatically, getting out of the bed.

“Yes, but I am offering to drive you. On the subject of driving, Aislen… You are eighteen now. You can get your licence…” She looked pained. “Monday did not go to plan, what with… one thing or another. And we are sorry about that. We’d like to help you to buy a car. There’s that little bit of money that your grandmother left you in trust, and we’re willing to sign for you to access some of it to buy your first car.”

“So,” Aislen paused in the process of getting her clothing from the cupboard. “My eighteenth birthday present from you and dad is that you’ll let me spend my own money to buy myself a car?” She rolled her eyes. “Gee, thanks.”

“Aislen,” Tiffany was wounded. “That’s…”

“I need to have a shower,” Aislen brushed past and closed the bathroom door behind her before Tiffany could respond. She showered and then applied her makeup carefully. The hickeys that the Triquetra had placed on her neck during the weekend at the river house had faded into a yellow that was easily hidden, and her black eye had taken on a subtle green and yellow pallor.

She went heavy on the eyeliner and mascara, and left her hair free, the heavy curls falling over her face.

“Oh, you look nice with a bit of makeup on. Very pretty,” Tiffany said with approval. “And a little tailoring on the school uniform makes such a difference. It gives you a really nice silhouette and shows off your lovely legs.”

“I look like a whore,” Aislen replied quietly. “In a too-tight, too-thin shirt and too-short skirt. But that’s fine, because that’s what everyone thinks I am, so why fight it?”

“Aislen,” Tiffany’s face melted. “Oh, darling…”

Aislen shook her head and swallowed hard, pushing away her mother’s sympathy. “It doesn’t even matter,” she said, picking up her school bag on the way to the door. “Let’s go.”

As she reversed out of the driveway, Tiffany flicked worried glances at Aislen. “Bad reputations can be… hard to deal with,” she said. “Believe me, I know. I was only a year older than you are, Aislen, when I got pregnant with you…”

“I know,” Aislen was sour with it. “You were a beauty pageant contestant and had to drop out of the finals because of me.”

Tiffany sighed and tapped her nails against the steering wheel. “I wanted better for you, Aislen,” she murmured. “I wanted you to get an education. To marry a successful man that you loved, and to be happy…”

“Because that would have made you happy?” Aislen looked out the window. “I am not you. I am not a do-over for you.”

“What is going on, Aislen?” Tiffany’s temper snapped. “Are you pregnant?”

“What?” Aislen sent her daggers. “No. No. I’m on the pill, mum.”

“Accidents happen. If you’re pregnant, Aislen… Your father doesn’t have to know. We can… There’s a place in Trayrock that…”

“I’m not pregnant, mum.”

“It’s this fucking town, isn’t it?” Tiffany cursed angrily. “There’s something poisonous about this place.”

“Yes,” Aislen agreed. “It’s this fucking town.”

“Then go to school, you still have time to get good grades and graduate… Leave this town.”

“How, mum?” Aislen demanded. “How am I to afford to go to university or to an art school? You and dad can’t pay for me to study away from here. Even were I to get the grades to get into a course, I could only apply to a local university, and I’ll still be in this fucking town with the same fucking people with their fucking double standards…”

“It was a mistake to move here,” Tiffany agreed, as she pulled up out front of the school. “It seemed like a good opportunity at the time…”

“Thanks for the lift,” Aislen reached for the door handle.

“Aislen,” Tiffany caught her wrist and Aislen felt a wash of her mother’s pain and frustration. “After school, go and do your driver’s test and we’ll get you a car. That will… it will give you some freedom and control over your life. You might be able to get a job over summer in another town and put some money away to help with university next year… Get your license. Trust me, a woman needs to be able to drive.”

“Sure thing. Because a license will solve all my problems,” Aislen grimaced and tugged free. She closed the door behind her. It was a good suggestion, however, she thought, as she watched Tiffany pull away into traffic. A license would open the doors to the pubs around town.

She saw Heath’s car pull up in the car park near her, and the Triquetra got out, the wind catching their hair, and their eyes going to her as if pulled. She stared at them for a long moment, and then began walking towards them. She saw Heath reach out and grab Rhett’s wrist as he said something under his breath.

She walked so close to the bonnet that the hem of her skirt brushed over the slick paint and kept walking past them. She could feel their eyes following her as she continued past the entrance to the school and down the road.

She walked to the motor registration office and joined the queue to sit the test for her examination. Three hours later, she left clutching a newly minted license. She took her new license and spent some of the carefully hoarded money in her bank – earned through interest on the money her grandmother had left her – on a packet of cigarettes and a bottle of wine.

She took both to the cemetery and sat on the table in the pretty gazebo, smoking and drinking. “Happy fucking late birthday to me,” she saluted the gravestones. “Ah, fuck,” she added when she saw the police car pull up in the car park and met the police officer’s eyes through the windscreen. “Just fucking perfect.”