Snippets from the new book

Chapter 4
Kevin and I swap up to date phone numbers and I make my way back to the nursing home. There’s an alarm sounding and it seems to be emanating from the black hearse that has arrived to collect my grandmother. As I draw closer I see it’s my beloved car that has been attacked. The door has been blatantly forced open with a something like a crow bar, leaving it hanging limply scraping across the bare road.
I’m torn between watching the covered body of Gran being loaded into the hearse and investigating the damage when terror strikes me.
I have a plan. A plan to return to Vince’s good books, to convince him I was wrong to leave. I’ve not completely thought this through. I’ve imagined what sex would be like with a man I hate, how many excuses I can fathom to keep it at bay for a least a little while, it’s a small price to pay for my guilt of not doing something about this sooner, I haven’t, however, planned on him not being pleased to see me.
Through all the affairs, many I probably still don’t know about, the one fact that kept me by Vince’s side was his love. His complete shame in himself, his begging for help, his apologies and his promises to never do it again. His obsession with me. An obsession I had mistaken for care, for adoration, but Kevin was right, I was just a possession. What if I’ve been replaced? I feel sick. Not with butterflies, not out of jealousy, but because if I have it will be nigh on impossible to reintegrate myself into his arms again. I’ve not thought this through.
These thoughts take only seconds when I realise I will be safe around people. I may have difficult questions to answer with my family, but if my cars anything to go by, that won’t be half as difficult as having Vince listen before he acts.
I make a quick scan of the car and see without a shadow of a doubt, it is undrivable. The vandals were looking for something. The receipts I keep are scattered, the seats upturned as if I’m loading for a car boot. The driver’s door won’t close and loose wires are hanging from the steering wheel. I feel a touch of nauseous sentimentality when I remember being sixteen years old.
Vince had picked me up in a Porsche. My father had frowned, but being quite a wide boy himself in his day was pleased to see me leaving with someone with drive and ambition. As per standard in any car Vince drove he had a CB radio remote cello taped to the dashboard. I seriously, in my naivety, thought he was a naturally nosey person. A small seaside town, we knew everyone, if someone was to be arrested they almost adopted celebrity status as their name came over the speaker.
“Got you the red Porsche with pop up lights babe, your favourite, just the way you like it.” smiles Vince. He has a twinkle in his eye that makes me wriggle in my leather seat.
“Is it yours?” I ask.
“For tonight babe. Just for tonight, a favour from a friend. I thought I’d take us up to the lookout point. I brought champagne, food, a blanket. We could watch the moon over the sea, you’d like that gorgeous wouldn’t you?”
I beam with pride. How many just turned sixteen year olds would be picked up in their favourite car for a moonlit champagne picnic?
Vince and I had been dating on and off for a couple of years by this point. I lied about my age at a party. He repaid the favour by dazzling me with ecstasy and taking my virginity.
I felt so grown up. The ecstasy had given the event a magical glow. As I look back I see it was a seedy act under an oak tree in a dog walkers park. I shudder with disgust.
I returned to the party that night with an acorn stuck underneath my stripy tights. As Lindsay noticed so did everyone else, from then on in my childhood was behind me. I was thrust into the world of sex and drugs. One day in my life I’d happily live over. A reason I never want a daughter. I would never rest knowing that was to come.
Sixteen year old I am brought back to the interior of the Porsche as The cb crackles and a name I’m all familiar with buzzes through.
“We’re trailing Vincent Carter through the old town. He’s driving a stolen vehicle, registration, November 29 Uniform Golf Echo.”
I look at Vince but know better than to say anything. The car speeds up and I am thrust back into my seat. Sirens sound behind us as Vince swerves in and out of traffic, sometimes on the wrong side of the road. He escapes the town and takes us on the long country road out of Withernsea all the time laughing and swearing simultaneously. He’s enjoying this as much as a rollercoaster enthusiast. This is how Vincent gets his kicks.
As he speeds along, sometimes it feels like we’re flying, the sirens disappear and Vince drives onto a beach, hides the car behind a sandwich hut. The beach is deserted. He uses the gears and the brakes to make the car shudder so it comes to a stop and the engine dies. Only then do I see the wires hanging from the base of the steering wheel.
Vince turns to me in his seat, his hand already stroking my body, my heart is thumping in my chest, and as I feel I know his is the same.
“Sorry babe. What a rush though eh?”
I’m shocked, but also, if I’m being a more than a little honest I’m also extremely invigorated. I’ve just had one of the most exciting times of my life.
I nod; Vince exits the car, opens my door and holds his hand out to guide me somewhere. He picks me up in his strong twenty two year old arms and lays me on the bonnet of the Porsche. We make love bathed in moonlight with the sound of the waves around us; afterwards we have a champagne picnic on the beach. We make love again on the sand, with the tide lapping at our toes, all the time Vincent declares his love for me, he’s not quiet for a second, telling me he loves me, how he can’t live without me, how beautiful I am, and I feel it. I really believe it. Something changes in me that day. At that moment I know I never want to live without this man by my side.
Fourteen years on and I’m not nostalgic for those days. I don’t need to relive them, if I could live them over I would choose a completely different path, but that’s only knowing what I know now. Without standing here, terrified, seeing what I saw all those months ago, in all honesty, I’d probably do exactly the same again. I loved him. I don’t know, thinking about that day, the day I completely fell for my husband brings back one thought only.
I wish he’d taught me how to hotwire a car.

From the Mg I look to the bay window of the nursing home, my family are peering out but watching the body being loaded up, nothing more. In their tears and frustrated faces I feel safe. Leaving the car where it is, the door still hanging off, I use the back entrance to the nursing home. The door closes with a heavy thud and instead of instilling fear it comforts me. I walk past the entrance to the kitchen, on jade green plates the care assistants are placing up mash potato with an ice cream scoop. It smells disgusting and fills the whole house. I follow the seventies style carpet to the stairs. A man approaches me on a walking stick. He’s drooling and wobbling in quick succession.
“Ooo we don’t get much of your type here love, give us a cuddle. Go on!”
He licks the side of my face and I recoil as a nurse with spuds comes round the corner.
“Ernie, now then you randy old bugger, what would Gracie say?” She shouts so loud I have an urge to cover my ears.
Ernie has the grace to look ashamed; he bows his head a little more than his natural osteoporosis bones allow him, and walks back to his viewing point in the hall.
The nurse turns to me, “Oh, it’s you. Never thought we’d see you again. Too good for the likes of us were you?”
Tears prick my eyes but I’m determined not to show a weakness to this woman.
“Amazing what the death of your grandma can do, before and after.”
I begin to walk up the wide steps to the day room.
“Maybe if you’d stuck around you wouldn’t be here so early, eh Ant-oin-ette?”
She spits the last syllables of my name; I descend the steps in a swift jump. My anger has risen to the surface for the first time since I left. I grab the closest part of her I can catch, as she backs away seeing the fire in my eyes.
With a tight grip of her hair, through gritted teeth I spit back,
“What exactly are you saying? If you’re implying what I think you are, shouldn’t the police be here by now?”
She tries her best not to be afraid, after all, I no longer have the power of Vincent behind me. This much is obvious by the way she spoke. No one, child to elderly would have dared to speak like that to Vincent’s wife in the past, no matter how foolish they thought I was. Whether it was out of respect or fear only time will tell.
“We don’t have much in the way of police round here anymore. Didn’t you know, your ex husband pretty much runs everything in this town.”
“You’re wrong. So wrong.”
“Am I? Just wait until you see him, he’s been looking for you for a long time, already sent the boys to do your car. I saw them. Bloody posh cow, who the hell do you think you are driving here in your suits and your sports car, rubbing it all in our faces. You deserve exactly what’s coming to ya!”
“No, you’re wrong about Vince. He’s not my ex husband. He refused to divorce me. Seems he may just hold a candle yet. I’ll send him your regards when he gets here shall I?”
I loosen my grip and walk away as the care assistant runs to her supervisor. I hear her murmuring she has a headache and take a little sick satisfaction from it. Maybe I’m not such a nice person after all. Maybe Vince and I were meant to be. No. Not after what I saw. I would never, ever condone that. Running away however, and making feeble attempts with police visits to clean up the mess, that is cowardice.
I knew as soon as I entered the police station that they either wouldn’t believe me, or do nothing about it. I knew all this. Yet somehow I thought just making an anonymous statement would be enough. If truth be told, it was enough to ease my conscience for a few months, nothing more. A completely selfish act so I could sleep a little easier at night knowing I’d tried, no matter how pathetically. I am completely ashamed of myself, my selfishness, my own ego, only cowards do nothing, and that’s exactly what I’d done.
I still didn’t believe Vincent had murdered my grandmother. She was a formidable character to the wrong person, or even on the wrong day, but old and frail there’s little harm she could have done. Whilst living with Vincent there were times when he’d returned with blood on his clothes, but that was all part and parcel of his business. I used to be in awe of his businesses, he monopolises Withernsea, owns the nightclub, the amusement arcades, the jewellers, the shops, everything, yet from the outside looking in he now seems like a big fish in a small pond. In any busy city Vincent would be swallowed whole.
The more I learn however, the more it seems that pond has grown into an ocean.