Day Fourteen
Sara
‘Sara?’ Dec sounds surprised to hear from me. Of course he would be. I never call him. He’s always the one that has made the effort to stay in touch. I’ve always been rubbish at that.
‘Dec…’ My words catch. ‘I need to talk to you about Jay, Lottie, me – everything. You were there with us the whole time. You saw it all. I need a fresh perspective.’
‘Oh.’ A pause and then he finally speaks. ‘I did wonder when this might happen…’
‘Why did Jay hurt us so much, Dec?’
The family across the lake have moved away now, probably to the little cafe across the bridge where they’ll buy ice creams and cold drinks. I am quite alone here now, apart from the birds and ducks and Dec’s disembodied voice on the other end of the phone.
‘Sara, I’m not sure I’m the best person to be talking to here. It doesn’t seem right, I’m not even in the country any more. It’s Jay you should be talking to. He was so upset when I spoke to him earlier, and you won’t listen to him and—’
‘I can’t talk to Jay. I’m not sure I believe him at the moment.’
‘Well, you should for once. Maybe all this would’ve never happened if you just trusted people.’
‘What’s going on, Dec?’ I snap.
I hate it when he goes on one of his desperate rambles like this. I can never make head or tail of what he’s trying to say. He used to be like this at school, turning bright red like a tomato and stuttering while he was trying to get his words out. It was endearing sometimes, except when you really wanted to find something out.
Dec sighs loudly. ‘It’s you that keeps hurting Jay, Sara, not the other way around. For once, you need to stop pushing him away.’
I shake my head. ‘That’s – that’s not true.’
He sighs. ‘Maybe it’s not, maybe it’s more complex than that, but I hate seeing my two dearest friends tear each other apart because they’re not listening to each other. There’s stuff you still don’t know.’
I draw a breath. ‘So, tell me. What is it? I know Lottie was trying to say something before but she couldn’t—’
‘I can’t, Sara. It’s not my place. You need to talk to Jay.’
‘Why should I?’ I demand, fury overtaking me. Maybe it’s the emotion of being at this place again – of thinking of Lottie – or perhaps it’s the frustration of years of not really knowing what was going on.
‘Why should I listen to a man who has spent his time hurting and cheating those closest to him,’ I continue, my heart pounding hard in my chest. ‘First me and then Lottie, treating us both like we don’t matter. Perhaps I could forgive him for messing me around, we were young and stupid after all, but Lottie? What did she do to deserve that?’
‘Lottie?’ Dec sounds confused. ‘What are you going on about?’
‘I know about Jay cheating on her. That’s why they split up,’ I say plainly. ‘It probably broke her heart even more.’
There is a pause and then Dec sighs loudly. ‘Sara, that’s not what happened. It wasn’t Jay that slept with someone else, it was Lottie.’
‘How do you know that?’ I demand.
Another pause. Longer this time.
‘Because she slept with me.’
It takes a few seconds for his statement to resonate. ‘You? She slept with you? How?’
‘I’m sure I don’t have to explain the details, Sara,’ he scoffs. ‘I was down visiting, and Lottie was a bit upset. Her and Jay weren’t getting anywhere. It was clear he just wanted to be friends, but she wanted more. We all got drunk and suddenly Lottie was all over me. I later worked out that it was an attempt to make him jealous, not that I really cared at the time. I always had a soft spot for Lottie and I guess I hoped she might have liked me a bit too.’ He laughs harshly. ‘Who was I kidding, eh?’
‘And did it work? Did it make Jay jealous?’
‘Of course it didn’t. Jay didn’t care what Lottie did. He was still getting over you. He was always getting over you.’
Still getting over me? That didn’t make any sense.
‘Dec – Jay was the one who decided he didn’t want to take things any further with me. I put my heart on the line for him. I wrote a letter telling him how I felt.’
‘The letter?’ Dec sounds confused. ‘But it was the letter that finally broke Jay’s heart.’
‘What? What do you mean?’
‘After he read it, he was devastated. It was a pretty low blow, Sara, writing him something so cold and uncaring. He said you clearly weren’t interested in him and then you went off travelling. To be honest I thought you were better than that. I wanted to say something to you at the time, but Jay told me not to. He just wanted you to be happy.’
I take a deep breath, my head is swimming with this new information and nothing is making sense. ‘No, Dec. No, that’s not what happened!’ I stand up, my heart is racing now. I start to pace the area around me. Why is Dec saying all of this stuff? It simply isn’t true… ‘Jay has told you it all wrong,’ I say as calmly as I can. ‘I never told him I wasn’t interested. After that night we got together, I was excited – a bit nervous, yes, but I was excited to see what might happen between us. But he was caught up with his dad being ill and I couldn’t text him because his stupid phone was broken, so I wrote him a letter. I told him exactly how I felt. It was meant to be romantic and sweet—’
‘Really?’ Dec’s voice has turned to ice. ‘I read it, Sara, after you left. I saw what you told him. It’s no wonder he was upset. It was like you didn’t care.’
‘Hang on…’ I shake my head, trying to make sense of this. ‘You read my letter, the one where I told him I wanted to give our relationship a go? Where I told him that I wanted something more and that if he wanted the same thing, he should call me? I waited and waited, Dec, and that call never came. When I got back, I found Jay with Lottie and he was so distant, so I just assumed—’ The words are choking up in my throat. ‘Dec, what is it you’re telling me?’
‘I–I don’t think Jay got your letter. Not the one you wrote anyway.’ He pauses. ‘Who gave him the letter, Sara?’
‘Lottie,’ I whisper. ‘She did it as a favour. She told me…’ I wobble a little on the spot. How could I have been so stupid? It’s all making total sense now. ‘When I was here – with her before – she told me she hadn’t been a good friend. She told me there were things I needed to know, but I just dismissed her. This was it, wasn’t it? She wanted to tell me what she’d done. She’d pushed me away from Jay.’
‘I think so.’ Dec sounds sad. ‘She was very confused, Sara, and a bit lost. I think she just wanted what you had.’
‘But I had nothing in the end.’ I can hear my heartbeat thudding in my ears. My breath is shaky. I stop pacing. ‘She even encouraged me to go travelling, she told me it would be good for me. But she just wanted me out of the picture. I thought she was my friend, Dec, and all the time…’
‘I’m sorry, Sara, but you needed to know the truth,’ he says gently. ‘For what it’s worth, I do think Lottie loved you, but she was very mixed up. She thought she could be happier if she could have a life more like yours. She thought the answer was with Jay.’
‘So, in pursuit of her own happiness, she destroyed mine,’ I say frostily.
Her latest message is still in my pocket. I pull it out and scrunch it up between my fingers and then toss it into the water.
All her bloody Jar of Joy has done has caused more pain. I want nothing more to do with it.
‘I’m sorry to have thrown all this at you,’ Dec says. ‘I wish I was there to help you guys sort it all out. I couldn’t leave you in the dark, though, thinking that Jay was this bad person. He has been beating himself up for too long. He deserves better.’
‘Yes,’ I reply quietly. ‘He does.’
He deserves so much more.
I walk home in a trance, trying to process everything Dec told me. For some reason, things aren’t settling properly in my head. I feel like a jigsaw where all the pieces have been shaken up – nothing makes sense any more.
Why did Lottie lie to me for so long? Why did she push me and Jay apart? What letter did she even give him, and how could she have done that to me knowing how much I liked him? I think of all the times I sat with her during her illness, holding her hand, nursing her through the bad times, and bitterness floods me.
Could she have really done this? Or had Dec – strong, reliable Dec – made a mistake somehow?
‘What was I to you, Lottie?’ I mutter aloud. ‘I was never really your friend, was I? You just used me when there was no one better around.’
For once I can’t hear her reply. All I hear is an icy silence echoing around me. It’s like my friend was never there at all.
And what was the Jar of Joy – was it something to make her feel better about the pain she caused? Or was it a final laugh in my face?
Did I ever really know her at all?
As soon as I get back into the flat, I stride past my welcoming cats, pick up the stupid jar and smash it in the sink, well away from their delicate paws. I stare numbly at the shattered pieces that are left, the sprinkles of glitter and the naff stickers that Lottie had stuck on. Regret and bitterness spike in my veins.
‘I never wanted you,’ I hiss. ‘I never wanted any of this.’
The last message still remains, stuck to the base of the glass. I walk away leaving it there. I don’t want to read it. I don’t think I ever will.
Later, after I’d forced myself to eat and allowed Fifi and Goose to curl up next to me and comfort me, I pick up Lottie’s diary. Once again, I leaf through the pages, staring blankly at her curved, loopy writing, wondering if I can bring myself to read her words. Surely it would be more lies and delusions. Who knew what went through Lottie’s head.
And then I spot it. Nestled in the middle of the diary is a folded piece of paper. I tug it out, my heart beating fast, but I know what it is before I even open it. I remember how I’d folded this pale sheet over and over, how my hands had shaken writing the words. I open it, my breath ragged and my eyes damp.
It’s my letter to Jay. The final proof. She did take it. So then what on earth did she replace it with? Any tiny doubts I had quickly fade away.
Lottie had destroyed the one good thing I had in my life. The only man I had ever loved.
I need answers. My hands are still shaking. I flick through her diary searching until I find the right date, the day that she started at our school.
And then slowly, I begin to read, once again hearing her voice flood my mind.
‘I just need a few more seconds, OK? Just a few more…’
This was it. My first day at this sixth form college and I was absolutely terrified. What if it was a big mistake? What if I didn’t fit in – again!