Читать книгу Who Killed Ruby? онлайн | страница 30
And then, entirely out of the blue, or so it had seemed at the time, Vivienne, now twenty-two, had fallen into a darkness so thick and bottomless that she could find no way of dragging herself out. For weeks she’d stayed at home, sinking lower and lower, a sadness pressing on her chest that made her unable to eat or wash or countenance the world outside her flat. When she slept her dreams were plagued by horrors from which she’d wake breathless with fear, tears in her eyes, her sister’s name on her lips.
Finally, wanting to build bridges and concerned when she didn’t answer her phone, Samar had called around, using his old key to gain entry when there was no response to his knock. Within minutes he’d bundled Viv into a cab and taken her straight to Stella’s, and over the next year the two of them slowly helped put Vivienne back together. When Viv thinks back to that time she shudders to think what would have happened if Samar hadn’t rescued her, if her mum hadn’t been there to take charge.
It was a time in her life she never wanted to return to, especially since having Cleo. Sometimes though she feels the darkness like a black beast circling her, waiting for its chance to pounce. Only her need for alcohol remains from those dark days and nights of sex and booze and drugs; wine was the one thing she’d not managed to relinquish, not while her nightmares continued to haunt her.
The chicken out of the oven, Viv is about to call Cleo down to eat when Samar says quietly, ‘It’s the anniversary on Monday, isn’t it?’
She nods, touched that he remembers every year.
‘How’re you feeling?’
‘Oh, you know. I’ve no idea why I still get so upset every time. Why I can’t just move on. She died thirty-two years ago, for God’s sake.’
‘Have you never had therapy for it?’ Ted asks.
She glances at him. ‘No, but I’ve always had my mum to talk to, and you know how brilliant she is.’ Even as Viv makes this remark it occurs to her that Ted, in fact, hasn’t met Stella yet. Before he came on the scene she, Stella and Cleo would enjoy frequent Sunday lunches around at Samar’s flat, but that hadn’t happened in months. Again the worrying thought occurs to her that Ted, though perfectly polite to her face, might not quite approve of her and Samar’s closeness and she feels a lingering disquiet that the friendship that had survived since their schooldays might not endure if he tried to come between them.