The Liberation of Alice Love(19)
Author: Abby McDonald

Alice curled deeper in her chair. “I told them the names of some people we’d seen out,” she continued, her voice resigned, “‘work friends,’ Ella called them, but they all said the same thing: they’d met her at a party, or launch, and believed what she told them.”

“See?” Cassie gave a comforting smile. “You weren’t the only one.”

“I was the only one she ripped off, to the tune of about a hundred thousand pounds.” Alice exhaled. It still hurt to say it, to even think it, but she couldn’t escape from the truth: Ella—whoever she really was—had been lying all along. Everything she’d ever said, and all those anecdotes she’d dropped so casually into conversation—“My family was Italian, way back,” and “My first boyfriend had an awful little goatee,” and “I want to go and open a little bakery one day”—had all been untruths, spun out in the bigger fiction of their friendship.

And Alice had believed them all.

“She took my passport,” Alice added, forlorn. “My birth certificate, too. I checked my important papers file once I found out…Once I found it was her. I suppose that’s how she got all my bank details.”

“You labeled the box ‘important papers’?” Cassie raised one perfect eyebrow.

Alice flushed. “No, of course not.”

But it had been a special file, an elegant gray folder she’d bought especially to store all those vital pieces of information; not just passport and bank codes, but her National Insurance card, rental agreement. She hadn’t wanted to risk losing anything, but in the end, she’d offered up her entire identity, gift-wrapped with a smart cream ribbon.

“You know, I read last week about a woman who had her identity stolen.” Cassie’s forehead creased in a frown. “The thief didn’t just run up huge debts, she got a criminal record too—just gave the other person’s details every time she got caught. The poor victim couldn’t get a job and kept getting arrested. She lost her house and ended up on the streets. I think she’s still trying to clear her name!”

“Not that it will happen to you,” she added hurriedly, finally noticing Alice’s distress. “And see? There’s a silver lining. It could have been so much worse!”

***

That was little consolation. Despite her friends’ glass-is-half-full encouragement, Alice couldn’t see past the wreckage of what Ella had taken: her flat, her savings, her trust. Once she’d made the obligatory explanations to friends, family, and the police, Alice called into work sick and retreated to her tiny, makeshift bedroom at Cassie’s to despair. Slipping deeper into a melancholy haze, she couldn’t stop herself from poring over those few, awful questions.

Why had Ella done this to her? How could she have been so blind?

“Snap out of it, sweetie. You’re acting like you’ve been dumped,” Cassie remarked on the fifth day, when Alice emerged, bleary eyed, that morning to make some tea. She rummaged in the cabinets. Fuck herbal, soothing blends. She wanted the hard stuff. Earl Grey. “You’ve been moping around like this Ella girl broke your heart!”

“Maybe she did,” Alice answered quietly. Cassie’s mouth dropped. “Not like that,” Alice stopped her. “I just meant…She lied, she cheated—behind my back, for months. I trusted her, and then…” She swallowed, feeling the betrayal rise again, hot tears in the corner of her eyes. “I didn’t know. I didn’t see any of it.”

Maybe it would be better if she had. If she’d felt even an inkling of suspicion when it came to the other woman, then perhaps Alice wouldn’t be gripped with such despair. Even if she’d pushed it aside, she could tell herself now “Oh, I knew it all along.” She’d be kicking herself, of course, but at least then it would be frustration and anger clenching at her heart, and not such helpless misery.

“Want to come to Shoreditch House tonight?” Cassie asked, outlining her eyes in smoky gray liner to match the strange draped silk jumpsuit that clung to every bone. She peered in her professional makeup mirror. “I’m meeting some girls for drinks later, and then maybe a party?” She didn’t wait for a response before adding, “This guy is launching a new club night; he worked with Dakota on the last movie, so I’m thinking there’s a chance he could show up. He would, right? I mean, it’s a friend thing, so it wouldn’t look too weird if I was there, just casual, like I didn’t even know he was in town.” She paused to ruffle her fringe.

“No, thanks.” Alice shook her head slowly. “I’m not going anywhere right now.”

“Huh.” Cassie looked at her, surveying Alice’s unwashed hair, pasty face, and utter misery. “Well, can I borrow those black pumps of yours? I’m going to try out this deconstructed dress tonight, and I don’t have any shoes dull enough to work with it.”

“Sure, Cassie.” Alice exhaled, already exhausted. “You can borrow my boring shoes.”

When Cassie had waltzed off to a meeting, Alice shuffled to her room and slipped back beneath her covers, into the cocoon of warmth she’d imprinted there after days of solid wallowing. Her flatmate couldn’t understand why Alice was taking this so hard, she knew. To Cassie, betrayal was cause for anger, Internet stalking, and vicious calls to every mutual friend they had, not this empty sense of purposelessness that had seeped through Alice’s system. But no matter how much Alice knew, on an abstract, intellectual level, that she should be rising above this—shaking it off, and striding with her day planner in hand to set her life right again—she just couldn’t find the magical switch that would turn such sharp hurt into some purpose or direction.

She had taken it all for granted. Everything Ella had ever said: their coffee mornings and idle emails, the after-work drinks and in-jokes—Alice had believed it all, unquestioningly. And now, picking apart every casual conversation, she felt ill. Had Ella planned it from the very start? Would any of the weary professionals in that yoga class have done, or did she target Alice as an easy mark, trusting enough to fall for the act? Alice had been running through the questions ever since she saw that familiar face on the CCTV film, but she was no closer to answers. Ella’s performance had been flawless, and Alice had played her own part perfectly: the dupe.

***

She’d been staring at the same patch of exposed brick for over two hours when the buzzer rang, loud and insistent. Reluctantly, Alice hauled herself up and slouched over to the intercom.