Page 14 of Wanting Daisy Dead

Lauren

‘After all this time, do people still care who killed Daisy?’ Maddie suddenly asks.

‘Of course they care. There’s still a lot of interest— concern,’ I correct myself quickly, to sound more sincere.

I don’t want anyone here to know yet that the subject of my next book is them.

When I’ve finally written my account of this weekend, I’m sure they’ll be pissed off.

Georgie will probably attempt to kill me, and I’m only half joking about that.

Looking at them as we sit around the table eating dessert, I reckon Maddie is the only one who might be coerced into doing interviews to support the book launch. I could pay her a fee – she probably needs the money. Though Dan might help out too.

‘Maddie – and the thing to remember is this – we all know this is just an exercise,’ I say. ‘Professor M did it, none of us did, and hopefully that will be proven this weekend. And when it is, that’s our opportunity to finally clear our names once and for all. This thing has haunted us for years.’

‘So true,’ Dan says. ‘I can’t go through that again. I was hounded by the press, and now, with social media so much bigger, it would be even worse.’

I nod vigorously. ‘Exactly. Let’s use this weekend to show the listeners that we’re real, that we’re good people. We know that none of us killed Daisy, so let’s prove it by sticking this out until the end of the weekend. We can all walk out of here with our heads held high.’

This is a call to arms –and I’m scared and excited. I want everyone to stay the weekend, and I want those two million people to read my book. But I don’t want them to know what I did.

What I’ve just said about us all being innocent does not justify the hate emanating from Georgie across the table right now.

She sips her wine through tight lips, and her bitterness taints the chocolate mousse we’re having for dessert (Daisy’s favourite, apparently).

I wonder again what Dan sees in her. Their sex life must be so vanilla; he probably has to disinfect himself before and after because she’s such a germophobe.

She and I never bonded, but then she never bonded with anyone except Dan, and sometimes Maddie – but then Maddie’s easy to bond with, she’s such a people-pleaser.

Georgie was a loner – too obsessed with playing house to join in with the rest of us.

Tonight, the look on her face if anyone even mentions my book is enough to curdle milk!

She’s so jealous of what she thinks I have, and loves to take me down.

I was glad she read the note I wrote: My favourite memory of Daisy is seeing her lying on the floor, trickles of blood coming from her head, her beautiful blue eyes wide in wonder.

I smile to myself. It was brilliant, though I say it myself.

I was going to say that my favourite memory was watching Mean Girls on her laptop together.

But that would have been boring; real life often is.

This was so much better – after all, I am a writer of fiction.

And when by chance Georgie was the one who had to read it out – well, that was the icing on the cake, and a gift to moi!

To Georgie, I’m the human embodiment of success, and a reminder of her failure, her lack of career and her disappointing marriage.

She believed her degree in business studies would turn her into a millionaire entrepreneur, but she doesn’t have the talent or the ideas.

All she can do is stalk her husband and scrub their home, and I’m no expert but that’s not a recipe for success.

‘Where are you living now?’ Georgie’s asking Maddie.

‘Dagenham.’

‘Oh, you’re not too far from us then?’ She glances at Dan, but he ignores her.

‘I’m not far from you,’ I say. ‘I’m in Crouch End.’

‘It’s quite the celebrity hub there. I bet you fit right in, Lauren.’ Dan gives me a wink. He’s been fawning over me all evening; it’s quite uncomfortable, especially as Georgie seems to flinch every time he speaks to me.

‘Is that your real home, or the one you use for TV interviews?’ Georgie asks, unable to hide her resentment.

‘Oh, you saw the TV interview then, at my home in Sandbanks?’ Gotcha.

She bristles. ‘No, I just saw a picture of it somewhere.’

‘Yes, we have the house in Sandbanks, the one in London and one in LA. I hate listing them. It sounds like I’m bragging.’

‘Yes, it does,’ she replies.

God, she brings out the worst in me. She’s assuming I still live in that big house overlooking the sea in Sandbanks that was featured in all the magazines.

Presumably she also thinks I hop on planes to my place in LA every couple of days, but that couldn’t be further from the truth.

It’s my fault, because I can’t bring myself to tell anyone, even Dan – who I’m sure wouldn’t judge – but it’s all long gone.

This weekend I leased a new Mercedes, hired my designer clothes and bought a few second-hand.

Despite A Day in the Life and Death earning me more money than we’d ever dreamed of, there’s nothing left.

We assumed I’d write more and the gravy train would continue.

But I couldn’t write any more, we made some bad investments, and then Richard lost his job.

That’s why I have to turn this weekend into something Finty can sell.

But the closer I get to the flame, the more I realise I might get burned.

After dessert we all leave to go back to Apartment 101. Georgie goes into her room, and Dan into his, while I make coffee for me and Maddie.

‘Bit weird, their marriage, don’t you think?’ I say to her.

She shrugs. ‘I don’t know.’

‘Well, I don’t either, but just from being with them tonight you could feel the tension.’

She smiles. ‘I guess.’

Maddie obviously doesn’t want to bitch about our fellow guests, which is fair enough. But I wonder if she doesn’t trust me because of who I was back then? ‘Why do you and Daisy beat up on Maddie all the time?’ Alex once asked me.

‘Because she’s boring,’ was all I could offer.

I didn’t really know her, just followed Daisy’s lead.

And that’s when I decided I wasn’t going to even try to be friends with Alex.

He saw too much; he was always watching, and judging.

Dan told me once that Alex said Daisy and I were mean girls.

But Daisy always picked on Maddie, who just seemed to take it, and I let it happen.

Later, though, around the time Daisy was killed, she and Maddie seemed to have bonded, and I was the one out in the cold.

Mum always said three didn’t work, that there was always someone left out – it was never Daisy, though.

Maddie seems quiet now, so as I make our coffee I try to make conversation. ‘Do you sometimes wish you’d stayed at ballet school, and chased the dream? You didn’t have a great time at uni, did you?’

She shrugs, which she does a lot – it’s irritating, like she’s pushing the conversation away.

I join her in the seating area, where she’s flopped on to the sofa, and hand her a mug.

‘Your book is great,’ she says, presumably trying to shift the focus from her.

‘Thanks.’ I smile, but I know she hasn’t read it. I can tell because she’s flushed, a sign she’s not telling the truth. Daisy used to tease her about that.

‘You can never tell a lie, Maddie, because your face gives you away,’ she would say, which would just cause Maddie’s blush to deepen.

‘Are those your chocolate wrappers hidden at the back of the cupboard, Maddie?’ she’d ask.

‘You are a Miss Piggy, aren’t you?’ Then she’d poke her in the tummy and I’d laugh; it all seemed quite harmless, affectionate almost, but Maddie’s face would redden.

‘Ooh, look, Lauren, she’s lying again,’ Daisy would say, and fall about laughing.

To me and Daisy it was harmless teasing, but I realise now that Maddie was fragile and neither of us realised the harm we might have been causing.

‘If you ever need someone to talk to, I’m always on the end of the phone, Maddie.’

‘Thanks. Same here, if ever you need to talk.’

Oh, I see. So she doesn’t appreciate my offer of help, and thinks I might need it too?

Suddenly Dan’s bedroom door opens, and without addressing us he storms into Georgie’s room. We both widen our eyes questioningly at each other.

‘I wonder what’s going on there?’ she says.

‘The same that was going on there twenty years ago. Can’t live with each other, can’t live without each other.’

‘Do you think Dan loves Georgie?’ she asks.

‘Hard to imagine, eh?’ I shrug. ‘I doubt it. I always thought she was a convenient girlfriend. Now she’s a convenient wife.’

‘She went out with Alex before Dan, didn’t she?’ Maddie says.

‘Yeah, until she was seduced by Dan’s car.’

‘Was she?’ She seems surprised.

‘Don’t you remember his car?’

She shakes her head.

‘He drove a cherry-red MG Convertible – he was a student and he drove an MG.’

‘Oh, is that fancy?’

‘Yeah. Weren’t you with us? Maybe not. We’d only been at uni a few weeks.

I’ll never forget Georgie’s face when she saw the car.

“I’m riding shotgun,” she said, and basically knocked everyone else out of the way to sit in the front with him.

She carried on seeing Alex for the first term, but once she got her claws into Dan, Alex was unceremoniously dumped. I bet she regrets that now.’

‘Why?’ she asks.

‘Where have you been, Maddie? Alex is a hot-shot tech guy – he’s a billionaire.’

‘Oh, that .’

‘Yeah, that . He’s not some hapless junkie anymore.’

‘He never was,’ she says defensively, like a lovesick teenager defending her boyfriend.

‘No wonder Georgie’s still in touch. Probably wants to rekindle the old flame. She’ll be all over him when he arrives.’

‘But she’s with Dan, and Alex is married now too.’

‘Is he? I didn’t realise. That won’t stop her. I heard she once slept with Alex and Dan at the same time.’

She doesn’t seem surprised by this. ‘Daisy always said they were the two best-looking men on campus.’

‘Yeah, Alex had that lovely long, dark curly hair, and Dan was good-looking, in a boyish way. Still is. God, it was all a bit free and easy back then, wasn’t it?

A pint of cider and a couple of tabs, someone would have a big row and split, only for a new couple to emerge from the ashes the next day,’ I recall wistfully.

‘Yeah, Georgie and Dan were always breaking up and making up. Then there was the time he and Daisy got together without Georgie knowing. She was so angry.’

This is a surprise to me. ‘I bet Georgie was raging, but I didn’t realise Daisy and Dan ... ?’

‘Yeah, just before she died.’

‘But ... I thought Daisy was seeing David Montgomery then?’

‘No ... I ... think she was seeing them both for a while, but she was definitely seeing Dan.’

‘How do you know?’

‘She told me.’

She never told me , but that was probably because we weren’t really talking by then. ‘I don’t remember this. I must have missed it in the fog of student weed. I thought she only had eyes for Professor M.’

‘I don’t know, she kept a lot to herself those last few months.’ Maddie pauses, as if she’s thinking, then says, ‘I think David Montgomery killed her because he loved her too much, and he didn’t want anyone else to have her.’

She makes it sound almost romantic with her dreamy faraway look.

‘My understanding from the trial was that Daisy was too much in love with him ,’ I say. ‘I mean, she sent his wife a letter telling her about the affair. I know Daisy denied it, but who else would do that?’

Maddie shrugs. ‘All I know is that David was angry about the letter. I think he broke up with her, and she started seeing Dan.’

‘That sounds like Daisy, but I just can’t imagine her with Dan. He was rich, but not very sophisticated back then – not compared to Professor Montgomery, anyway.’

‘I think Dan was there for her. She didn’t tell me much, but I remember seeing him sneak into her room once when Georgie was asleep, and when Georgie went home for weekends they’d spend a lot of time together.

I think Georgie must have found out, because she and Daisy stopped talking to each other.

’ Maddie leans closer to me and lowers her voice.

‘And then, a couple of nights before Daisy died, Georgie and Dan had this big row. There was only me at home, so they just let rip, they didn’t care that I heard it all.

Georgie was screaming at him – she said horrible things about Daisy. ’

‘Shit ... Did you ever tell the police?’

Maddie shakes her head.

‘That’s pretty damning, Maddie. You should have told someone .’

‘Dan and Georgie were always arguing.’

‘Yeah, but if Georgie was saying terrible things about someone and a couple of nights later Daisy was dead ... I mean, that sounds like a motive.’ I make sure I say this loud enough for the recording.

‘There was no point telling anyone. It wouldn’t have changed anything.

’ She’s still talking quietly, but I’m sure the mic will pick it up.

Those two million armchair detectives will love this scoop.

‘Lots of people were angry with Daisy. That doesn’t change the fact that David Montgomery was the one who battered her head in with his own hammer that night. ’

She says this so matter-of-factly, I wonder if we’ve all become desensitised to murder?

But I’m still surprised that Dan and Daisy had a thing.

Daisy loved older men. Hearing about her and Dan makes me wonder what else I missed that was staring me in the face.

I’d hoped that this weekend I could lay some ghosts to rest, but all it’s done so far is open up the wound, and posed more questions.

And what’s fascinating and terrifying is that we all know different things about different people, and have different perspectives on what happened back then.

Having been apart for so long, we’re remembering things differently, and stuff is coming out that we didn’t all see before.

Perhaps that’s what the podcast keys into – it unlocks the past, releases the jumble of our memories into this confined space, and waits for the truth to emerge.