From behind me I heard the voices shouting frantically as masonry and rubble began to be moved and I realised that people were trying to reach us. Us. Not just me; of course not just me. Jimmy had been there when the car came through the window. Jimmy, who had left his position of safety and had come back to save me.
Ignoring the way the blood began to flow even faster when I turned my head, I managed to lift my neck an inch or two off the glass to look for him. The haze of dust and smoke was still too thick, but I thought I could just make out a shape some feet away to one side. There were huge broken masonry blocks and some long twisted piece of metal, which I guessed had been wrenched from the car, and they were all lying at a strangely skewed angle on top of a long white board. As my vision began to clear further, I realised that it wasn’t a board at all; it was what was left of our table. And the reason why it wasn’t lying flat against the floor, but was canted at that strange angle, was that something, or someone, was beneath it.
Mindless of anything else, I flung out my arm, raking it in a desperate arc towards the crushed table and what must be beneath it. At first I felt nothing, and then the very tips of my fingers brushed, just for a moment, against something soft.
‘Jimmy!’ I croaked hoarsely. ‘Jimmy, is that you, can you hear me?’ No reply. ‘Jimmy.’ I started to cry, the tears cutting small rivulets through the dirt and blood on my face. ‘Jimmy, oh no, Jimmy. Say something…’
The dust and debris had begun to settle a little and I could just make out what it was I had been able to reach. Jimmy’s forearm protruded at a strange angle from beneath what was left of the table. That was all I could see of him, just his forearm. The arm still looked strong and tanned, as it had a few moments before, when it had somehow found the strength to pull me away from danger. Only now it wasn’t moving. Long before the ambulances reached us, I realised that it would never be moving again.
2
December 2013
Five Years Later…
The wedding invitation was propped up on the mantelpiece, almost hidden by a small bundle of bills and fast-food delivery circulars. I suppose I was trying to bury it, or something. Perhaps I’d thought that by not seeing it, I could then claim to have accidentally forgotten about it and somehow missed the date. As if that was ever going to happen. Of course I’d replied with an acceptance card when the invitation had arrived a few months earlier, but that had been easy, when the thought of going back to Great Bishopsford had seemed like something abstract that was going to happen so far ahead in the future that I didn’t need to really think about it. But now, when the date was only two days away; when I was standing in my tiny flat with an open overnight suitcase before me, I didn’t know why I’d ever felt that I would be strong enough to do this. To go back.
Abandoning my packing for a moment, I went to retrieve the small embossed card from the mantelpiece. Mr and Mrs Sam Johnson request the pleasure of your company at the marriage of their daughter Sarah to David…’ I ran my finger lightly over the raised scrolled handwriting of her name and knew then, as I had always known, that I had to go; that I couldn’t make some pathetic excuse and not be at the wedding of my best friend just because it was taking place in my old home town. And was it really the town I was scared of, or the memories that I knew were waiting for me there? Memories I’d schooled myself to bury deep and never allow to surface.
Still clutching the thick cream-coloured invitation, I raised my head to look at my reflection in the mirror above the mantelpiece. In my eyes I saw the truth; returning to the town was only half the problem. The greatest fear was how I would cope with seeing everyone all together in one place again for the first time in years. Well, almost everyone. A haunted look fell over my face and that seemed appropriate, for I knew it wasn’t a reunion with the living that was going to be so hard to deal with.
I packed my bag mindlessly, not really concerned about what I took. It was only for three days, and then I’d be back in my own flat, able to lose myself once again in the anonymity of a big city. To many, I’m sure, it might sound peculiar but I’d actually come to relish living somewhere where ‘everybody didn’t know your name’. The only items I took more care in packing were my outfit for the hen-night dinner and the deep burgundy velvet dress I had bought to wear for the wedding itself. Thank God Sarah had eventually given in and accepted my refusal to be her bridesmaid.
‘But you have to,’ she had pleaded, and for a second it could have been the old schooldays Sarah, imploring me to become involved in some crackpot scheme or caper she had cooked up. Only this time I had held fast in my refusal. I’d felt bad, of course. But then I’d known what she was going to ask me, even before the words had left her lips.