Chapter 44 Miles
Miles
‘Miles,’ Jessie repeats. ‘What is it you haven’t been honest with me about?’
Miles runs his hands over his face. Not for the first time this year, he wishes he could slip off into another dimension. Things weren’t supposed to turn out like this. Everything is going wrong. Jessie’s eyes are burning into him, demanding answers. ‘Let’s go to the bedroom and talk,’ he says.
‘No, it’s pitch-dark in there.’
‘I just think it would be better if we discussed it in private.’
‘And I think we should talk here.’ She folds her arms. ‘Whatever it is, these guys already seem to know about it. So, what’s going on?’
Miles bunches up his lips. He’s thought about this for days, how he’s going to explain it to Jessie, but now that the time has come, his mind has gone blank.
‘I was planning on telling you, but this’ – he gestures in no particular direction – ‘is literally the worst possible context in which to bring it up.’
‘Bring what up?’
The silence is deafening. Even the rain has backed off, down to a light patter, as if the universe is straining to hear.
Miles exhales audibly. ‘There was a court case. Okay? I was accused of something, I didn’t do it, and I was acquitted.
But it was recent, and I didn’t want you to judge me on it at first impressions, so I held off having this .
. . conversation. I just wanted to go a few weeks where life was normal and—’
‘You were accused of something. What was the something?’
Silence. Jessie’s face has taken on a dreadful gravity. She asks again. ‘What was the something you were accused of?’
‘Murder,’ Polly says, matter-of-factly.
Jessie looks at Polly, and when her eyes turn back to Miles, they are wide with shock and then, in an instant, they gleam with something desperate – haunted, even – that seems to bore into the darkest part of Miles’s soul.
Her chin shudders. ‘Oh my God.’ She fans her face with her hands. ‘Are you for real? Who are you?’
Miles places a hand on her leg. ‘I’m the same person you—’
‘Don’t touch me.’ She stands. ‘Get away from me.’
Faith leaps to her feet, puts an arm around Jessie and shoots Miles an angry look before leading Jessie down to the front of the bus.
‘Jessie, let me explain.’
Faith responds by lurching at him. ‘Stay where you are.’
Miles retreats and sits back down. He doesn’t look at Jessie, but he can hear her all right.
She’s wailing, now. Letting it all out. There’s no attempt to conceal her distress.
Faith is stroking Jessie’s arm – a soothing motion.
‘You better start from the beginning,’ she says, her eyes lasered on Miles. ‘Leave nothing out.’
Miles sits, head bowed. And, for the next half an hour, he explains it all, in a gloomy monotone: who Caira was, where and when she was killed, how he became the accused.
The whole thing sounds unreal, even to him, and, under the shadow cast by Elis’s death, he’s aware that the story seems even more sinister.
Faith stares at him impassively as he tells the story, but Jessie only takes occasional glances as she sobs.
And each time she does, she quickly averts her eyes, as if he’s too hideous to look at for more than a second.
Faith questions him on Jessie’s behalf, and he has that feeling once again of being on trial.
To his left, Polly, George and Reubyn say nothing.
Several times, Miles stands and attempts to approach, to get close to Jessie, to comfort her. Each time, Faith warns him off.
Eventually, when Faith runs out of questions, Miles ceases his explaining. For a while, no one speaks. The explosive secret Miles has been carrying so heavily for the last few days is no longer contained, and now all they can do is sit among the rubble and consider the fallout.
For maybe twenty minutes, the only sounds are the light tapping of rain and Jessie’s occasional sobs.
Although she’s calmed slightly, Jessie still won’t look at him.
Whatever fondness was growing between the two of them, it’s over.
If he’d volunteered this information himself, maybe it would have been different.
Miles remembers what Polly told him on the beach.
You’ll tie yourself in knots, deceiving people like this.
Well, now the knots are tied. Good and tight.
In the context of Elis’s death, their short-lived romance seems an absurdly trivial thing to get upset about.
But, even if the seeds of their relationship have been crushed, he has an overwhelming desire to try to get her to see his point of view.
It’s so exhausting being hated, especially by someone he really likes.
Whatever it takes, he needs her to forgive him.
Miles stands and takes tentative steps towards Jessie and Faith.
He’s only managed a few yards before Faith blocks the way. ‘Keep away from her. She needs space.’
‘I just want to talk to her.’
‘And I’m just telling you that she needs space.’
Miles grits his teeth. ‘Surely it’s up to her, if she needs space?’ He cranes his head to the side to see past Faith. ‘Jessie, please, I just want to talk.’
‘Guys.’ George is on his feet now. ‘Can you both chill out a bit? This isn’t helping.’
‘And you,’ Faith says, jabbing a finger at George. ‘I don’t trust you, either.’
‘Me?’ George scowls. ‘What have I done?’
‘If no one else is going to say it, then I will. He’ – Faith is pointing at Miles – ‘might be a lying arsehole, but he had no reason to kill Elis. There’s only one person here with a motive. And that’s George.’