Page 18 of No Safe Place

Wednesday | Evening

Lily

Lily could hear Cal singing as he climbed the stairs to the upstairs toilet. She frowned to herself. It was hard to imagine him living in the house without her.

She picked up her glass, swilled the last few mouthfuls of whisky around in it.

One wall of the living room was covered by bookcases. Floor to ceiling.

They spent the night Lily officially moved in pulling all his books down from the shelves and unpacking hers from boxes. They’d eaten Chinese from the containers and arranged the books by theme.

The bottom shelves were the books they were both a little embarrassed to admit they owned. Dan Browns and Game of Thrones for him, the Twilights and Fifty Shades for her.

The vast Mills & Boon collection, which Callum’s nan had built over fifty years, had pride of place across the top shelves.

There was a whole section dedicated to children’s books – mostly hers. A sombre run of grey and dark green titles on First World War poetry of Callum’s, with a separate shelf for Edward Thomas.

He had a shelf of books about OCD that David had recommended over the years. Invariably he got a few chapters in, and then lost interest. Lily had read them all.

There were thin volumes of plays above those. Cookbooks on the right. Books about art on the left.

Lily bought Cal a stand for one particularly beautiful coffee-table book about the Sixties, and he had propped it open on a double-page spread about Woodstock.

Then their life together. Years and years of pulling books from shelves and shoving them back at random. More books bought and crammed wherever they would fit. Loaned to friends, while they could still visit.

Lily looked over her shoulder, then stepped up to one of Cal’s shelves. Took down his battered copy of Hamlet . The faded cream cover was well worn along the spine, and an illustrated theatre mask grimaced up at her. She opened it carefully, his most precious book.

On the inside, in looping handwriting, was the message Lily had seen so many times before:

Dear Callum,

I thought you should have a copy of this, as it’s my favourite.

Remember: ‘There is nothing either good or bad but thinking makes it so.’

All my love – P

Lily put the book back, tipped more whisky into her glass and took a step backwards from the shelves.

Tried to imagine them full of gaps.

‘It’s not funny,’ Lily protested, still laughing. ‘I have to teach that kid for the next two years.’

Cal threw his head back and laughed, almost knocking his whisky flying.

They’d moved to the dining room. It was in the middle of the house, between the living room at the front and the kitchen in the extension at the back. A large, square space with a round table in the centre and booming speakers, where the world was put to rights.

Callum hadn’t redecorated since his nan died. She’d left him the little two-up two-down six years ago, mortgage paid off. It had been a lifeline to both of them, especially as his OCD had got worse again over the past two years, and he’d stopped going out.

‘Incredible.’ Cal downed the rest of the whisky and winced, taking a swig of beer after.

‘I thought you liked whisky.’ Lily took a demure sip of wine, eyebrows raised.

‘I do.’ Cal pointed the bottle at her. ‘But I’m very proud of my Scottish heritage, and you , Lily Stewart. You bought Jameson’s.’

‘It all tastes like nail varnish remover to me, Scottish or Irish.’

‘Take that back,’ he exclaimed, mock outraged.

‘What if I don’t?’ She smiled.

He stared at her for a second, the breeze from the window ruffling the tablecloth.

‘What?’ she prompted.

‘Nothing,’ he said, eyes closed. ‘Just thinking about how much better we are at flirting, now we’re not a couple.’

Her stomach muscles clenched.

‘But either way, this is pretty spot on.’ He splashed more whisky into the tumbler. ‘Me, you, booze. It’s like the good old days.’

She got up and busied herself with the wilting spider plant in the corner, tipping stale water from a forgotten glass into the pot.

He surveyed her over his drink. ‘I’ve been writing again. Properly.’

She didn’t admit that she’d noticed.

‘Proper writing.’ His eyes lit up.

‘Picking up that second novel again?’ she asked, a little coolly. She scratched at a stain on the tablecloth with her thumbnail.

‘Nah, can’t be arsed with that pile of shit, although if I get sectioned again, I’d have a shot at the Booker.’ He cracked open a cider. ‘It’s a short story. It’s about you.’

Lily blinked. ‘Callum—’

‘It’s nothing like that, Lil. Do you remember—’ He shifted his weight on the dining chair, so he was crouching on it, looming over her a little. ‘When we went to that farm? In Wales?’

‘When we went camping?’

He nodded, eager.

It’d rained, incessantly. They were pretty much the only people at the farm’s open day. The owner gave them a personal tour. She and Cal held hands the whole way round, except to pet the animals. There was a lot of standing in the rain, gazing into each other’s eyes.

On the last night of the trip the weather had cleared up and they’d packed the tent away, back in the car. Slept under the stars. Cal counted them for her: 12, 24, 48—

‘It’s about the farm,’ he went on happily. He licked the Rizla of a cigarette that she hadn’t noticed him rolling, then handed it to her.

She took it, wincing inwardly. Scott had made her swear to start cutting down.

‘What’s there to say about the farm?’ she asked, voice a little unsteady.

He spread the tobacco along his own cigarette and didn’t look up at her as he spoke. ‘The story is about something you said, just before we left. Do you remember?’

She shook her head.

‘Well, I do. Right before we got back in the car, you said to me that we’d go back one day. To the farm. You promised we’d see it again. Remember?’

‘No,’ Lily lied.

He arched an eyebrow. ‘Yes, you do.’

She shrugged.

‘Anyway, that’s what the story is about.’ He lit the cigarette. ‘It’s about not going back.’

Lily felt woozy. She shouldn’t drink spirits.

‘I’m going to get better,’ Cal said, his eyes unfocused. ‘I am. I’m getting better. I feel better every day.’

Lily didn’t say anything. She picked at the label on the edge of a wine bottle, trying to scrape off the sticky adhesive.

Callum licked his lips. ‘I’ve been doing more exposure therapy. I’ve been carrying this phone around. Look.’

He pulled it out of his back pocket and threw it down on the table between them. Drank deeply from his can.

His OCD had always manifested in numbers. Even when it cropped up in other forms – contamination during the pandemic, harm OCD after his nan died – the numbers and the counting were always there.

Number six? Good.

Number nine? Bad bad bad.

Lily blinked, trying to pay attention.

‘I will work on leaving the house, but if I can concentrate enough to write – if I can get back on a computer.’

Lily made a noise of agreement.

Some of the sticky on the side of the bottle came off under her nail.

‘Look at Andy, look at Sam.’ He licked his lips again. ‘If they can do it, I can.’

Lily didn’t rise to the bait of that sentiment.

Callum nodded, firmly. ‘I’m getting there, I really am. Aren’t I?’

Lily looked past him, to the patch of darker wallpaper where the clock used to be, and didn’t answer. ‘I need to go to bed.’

She pushed herself to standing, swayed a little.

Detour to the kitchen. She glugged a pint of water, refilled the glass.

She could hear Callum yelling at Alexa, cursing her for misunderstanding his song choice.

They’d given up on playing records, because they were too pissed to get up and change them. Cal had finally shut the windows, so they could blare music through Alexa.

Alexa was a godsend as Callum’s fear of numbers got worse. It was how he searched Google, got the news, played music, the radio – all without ever seeing a keypad.

She was on her way to say goodnight, when the song finally played.

Lily froze in the dining room doorway, her stomach plummeting into her socks.

‘Remember this?’ he asked, smiling.

It was an old song.

A song they’d sing on summer road trips with the windows down. Their song.

‘Cal—’

He didn’t hear her. He had his eyes closed, swaying and mouthing the words.

Those familiar chords tore something open in her chest.

‘Alexa – next,’ she snapped. The song changed, to something she didn’t recognise.

Cal looked down at his hands, pulling a face that suggested he found the exchange comically awkward.

Anger, always close to the surface when she was pissed.

‘Don’t play that,’ Lily said, wanting him to react. Wanting listening to it to hurt him, like it hurt her.

Cal stretched, eyeing the empty Jameson’s bottle. ‘We’re going to have to start on the Advocaat.’

The happy bubble of the evening had burst. She was tired, woozy and she wanted to fade into sleep.

‘I’m going to bed.’ She gathered her stuff, spewed from the pockets of her jacket as she hunted for spare Rizla. ‘I need to get up early tomorrow, I’m meeting Scott for lunch.’

The corner of Cal’s mouth twitched.

‘What?’

He shrugged, stifling a laugh.

Drunk Cal could be your best friend. He’d listen intently to you while you talked about your dreams, make you believe they were just within your grasp.

He’d listen to songs from your childhood with you.

Lie on the floor of the living room and hold your hand, staring up at the ceiling like it was the Northern Lights.

But Lily knew all too well that, more often than not, he ended up mean. Maybe it was the writer in him, but drunk Cal knew how to phrase his joke so that it stung. How to inflict wounds in an argument.

‘Goodnight, Callum.’

She had one foot on the bottom step when he called out to her.

‘Has he made you come yet?’

She was glad she wasn’t in the room, so he couldn’t see how deeply red her cheeks went.

Going upstairs was an option. Ignoring him, not rising to it, was an option. Not giving him the satisfaction.

He was in self-destruct mode, and he wanted to blow up a really nice evening.

‘ He’s just deeply unhappy, babe, ’ Scott would say to her. ‘He’s sad and he wants to make you sad too.’

But Cal knew her, and he knew that she couldn’t leave it.

‘I told you that in confidence.’

He hadn’t moved from the table, but he was smoking again. After her brief respite in the hallway, she realised the room stank of smoke.

‘I’ll take that as a no then.’ Cal’s grin widened.

Lily drummed her fingers against her thigh. Trying to think of something to say and failing.

‘It’s not an issue you ever had with me,’ he said, putting his hands behind his head.

‘Don’t fucking tell him,’ she snapped.

Cal pulled a sympathetic expression. ‘Still faking it then? I thought so. I heard you the other night when I got up for a piss. Can he really not tell you’re putting that on?’

She wanted to pick something up and throw it, but she was working hard, really hard, not to do shit like that anymore.

It was good. They’d had a lovely evening, but she needed this reminder. It was good to keep this side of him fresh in her mind.

‘That’s enough, Cal.’

‘Again, not something you used to say to me very often,’ he said, smirking.

Her hands were fists at her sides, and there were angry tears in her eyes. The dining room suddenly felt hot, like the heating had been turned up to full whack.

‘I always knew Scotty wouldn’t be up to much.’ Callum sighed. ‘It’s not his fault. He’s only, you know, got a—’

He held up the limp, half-smoked cigarette.

‘No, Callum.’ Lily’s cheeks were still red, but her voice was steady. ‘You can’t fucking talk about him like that.’

He still smiled, but his eyes were fixed on hers, his jaw set. ‘Why not, Lil?’

‘Because you left me .’ She was breathing heavily. ‘And Scott is nice and he’s there for me, and he’s—’

‘He’s what, Lil?’ Cal tapped the volume button on the Alexa, six times, so the music was barely audible.

He got to his feet, slowly, deliberately. Stubbed his cigarette out in an old yoghurt pot that no one had binned.

On his way out of the room, Cal stopped next to her. He smelled of smoke and washing powder and familiarity.

He leaned in, the stubble on his jaw millimetres from her cheek. She could feel his breath as he spoke.

‘Fuck you.’