The Liberation of Alice Love(84)
Author: Abby McDonald

Dialing, Alice settled into what she thought of as the person Carl knew: shy, sweet, and just as awkward as he was. “Hi…Hello?” she asked hesitantly, when he answered on the second ring. “Carl? It’s Ella. From Starbucks,” she added, as if she weren’t sure he’d remember.

“Ella, ah, hi.” Carl sounded flustered.

“Is it OK I called? Is this a bad time?”

“No! No, it’s fine,” Carl reassured her. “Uh, how are you?”

“I’m good.” Alice left an awkward pause. “And you?”

“I’m fine.”

Another pause.

“I, um, I was wondering if you were free this weekend at all.” Alice spoke quickly, running her words together. “There’s a Lord of the Rings showing at the BFI. If you want,” she added hurriedly. “But…it’s fine, if you have plans, or you just…don’t want to.”

“Oh, that sounds great.” Carl sounded conflicted. “But I’m actually down in Cornwall right now, for the weekend. A friend of mine is getting married, so we’re all here for the bachelor party, and…” He trailed off.

“That sounds fun!” Alice tried to seem as if she were masking disappointment. “A whole group’s there?”

“Yeah, my flatmates and our school friends…But maybe when I get back?”

“Absolutely!” Alice agreed. “You just call me, and, we’ll set something up.”

“OK, you have a nice weekend.”

Alice hung up. Pushing aside her pile of work, she wandered restlessly through the house, her frustration growing. She was so close—at the agency, and with Carl too, but she just kept hitting this wall. What would it take to get where she needed to be?

She was staring absently into the fridge, hoping for a satisfying answer to materialize in front of her, when the doorbell rang.

“Hi, sweetie!” Cassie was waiting on the doorstep, dressed in a chic tube of tight black fabric. She beamed at Alice with what must be freshly whitened teeth, such were their luminescent glow. “I wasn’t sure if you’d be in! There’s a big launch thing in town; want to come with me? Get drunk on free champagne?”

Alice gazed at her evenly. “That depends,” she replied, a little coolly. “Will I be treated to three hours of moaning about the fact that Dakota has left you again?”

Cassie’s smile slipped. “No. I mean, yes, we’re finished, but…It was my doing, this time.”

Of course it was. Alice shook her head, still impatient. “Cassie…I’m really not in the mood for this.”

“But I’m sorry!” A flicker of sincerity shadowed her face. “You were right, I…I just couldn’t let him go. But I needed to hear it.” Cassie gave a sharp nod, as if still trying to convince herself. “So, what do you say?” She gave Alice a hopeful smile. “Come out, party with me. We’ll have fun, I promise!”

“Fine,” she conceded at last, shooting Cassie a warning look. “But the minute you start sobbing into the cava, I’m leaving, you understand?”

“And you won’t have to!” Cassie insisted brightly, her vivid confidence back again. “I’m done, cold turkey. Going on three weeks now!”

“Congratulations,” Alice murmured, still dubious. “Now, this party of yours…Wannabe football wives or indie wankers?”

“Go short, tight, and trashy.” Cassie grinned, striking a pose to illustrate. “Come on, it’ll be fun.”

***

And it was. The slick party was crammed with feuding minor celebrities, gazing balefully from their separate corners in patent heels and designer suits while Cassie, Flavia, and the rest of the group grew louder and more raucous with every new bottle of free champagne. Soon, thanks to Petros’s scuffle over the affections of a British girl-band member, they were summarily ejected from the bar and decamped en masse to a cramped, sweaty shack of a bar in the depths of Dalston, where a trio of stern-faced Jamaicans slung drinks from a vat of potent cocktails, and Alice’s scrap of bright red Lycra stood out like a flaring neon sign among the scruffy plaid shirts and skinny jeans in attendance.

She didn’t care. Between her friends’ constant theatrics and Alice’s own breathless flirtations, she was having a wonderful time. Alice became Ella became Juliet became Angelique as she whipped through what felt like an avalanche of pickups and come-ons. Even when a drunken, desperate Dakota made a surprise appearance, begging for Cassie to give him another try, the night wasn’t ruined. Cassie simply told him to f**k off and show some self-respect—they were finished.

She was almost giddy from the power of it for the rest of the night. “I can’t believe I did that!” Cassie exclaimed, on more than one occasion. “You just have to do it, Aly. You’ve got to say ‘fuck them’ and take what you want.”

***

Alice wished it were so easy. What she wanted were the deep, intimate details of Kate Jackson’s life—complete with photos and fingerprints to compare with Ella so that she could know, for certain, if this was even that right track she was pursuing, but with Carl off in Cornwall for the weekend, she had nothing left to do but wait. Again. Alice had already spent too much of her life waiting, she decided the next afternoon, resisting the urge to rip up Vivienne’s contract notes and feed them through her shredder. Waiting never won her anything at all; it hadn’t taken her to Italy, for excitement and adventure, or helped her finally claw her way up at the agency. It certainly wouldn’t yield the information about Kate Jackson that would let Alice know, once and for all, if there was more to be found on Ella’s trail or if she had disappeared for good.

She sighed, trying to quell the impatience that raced through her. The most frustrating part was, she didn’t even need Carl to confirm her theory. She needed him for access to his flat and whatever anecdotes or background he could offer to explain why his sister had decided to leave her old life behind and become the woman Alice knew as Ella; but as for the proof itself? All the photos and clippings she needed were probably stashed away in some shoebox under his bed or framed in small prints in the flat. His currently unoccupied flat.

Alice paused, the idea taking shape with breathtaking speed. Carl was gone for the weekend, and so were all his flatmates. Thanks to her early experiments in the subtle art of stalking, she knew where the spare key was kept, and who was to say she’d even need to stay that long? She could simply slip in, find some photos of Kate, and slip out again. Ten minutes, perhaps, to secure the firm answer she needed. Otherwise…Alice thought of weeks more spent gaining Carl’s confidence, probing him about all the distressing details of his sister’s possible death. This was surely the better, more decent option, she told herself. She would prevent so many more lies.