Page 57 of The Retreat
Talia laughed. ‘Wow.’ She sighed. ‘Then what?’
‘Things went on for a while. And I thought we were in love. But then she got that offer from The Vespar. I assumed at first I’d be going with her.’ Imogen had to laugh at how fucking stupid she’d been. ‘But she said she needed to go there alone. She wasn’t sure who she was anymore, that she’d jumped into things with me too fast.’ Imogen groaned. ‘She just couldn’t wait to bang a load of Parisian women. Hell, she was probably already at it locally, right?’
Talia shrugged. ‘I don’t know that.’
‘You do. We both do.’
‘The only thing I ever really learned about her was that she’d never let go of one thing until there was something else to go to. And she wasn’t exactly passive about finding the next thing.’
Another shitty truth occurred to Imogen. ‘She told me The Vespar headhunted her. I bet that wasn’t true either. I bet she went after that with everything she had.’
‘She liked to act like things just happened to her,’ Talia agreed. ‘Like she was just a tumbleweed caught in the wind, surprised that everyone wanted her. Like the gallery…’
Imogen blinked. ‘What about the gallery?’
‘You know how it was funded, right?’ Talia asked.
‘She got funding through the Arts Council…’ Imogen stopped. ‘Didn’t she?’
‘Yes, I remember hearing that story. She spun it like the Arts Council came knocking because of some brilliant exhibition she’d curated. Like they’d seen her genius and couldn’t wait to throw money at her. She loved that story. Made her sound like the underdog who got her due.’
Imogen stared at the grass. ‘But it wasn’t true.’
‘I believed it too,’ Talia assured her. ‘But the gallery was funded by her parents. She made this whole thing about how they were emotionally withholding, how they didn’t understand art, how she had to fight for every scrap of validation. But when it came time to open the gallery, they wrote a cheque. A big one.’
Imogen frowned. ‘I thought she hated them.’
‘She did. But she didn’t hate their money.’ Talia hesitated, then added, ‘They made it in arms manufacturing, you know that?’
Imogen was gobsmacked. ‘What?’
‘Yeah. She used to dodge it in conversation, but she admitted it to me eventually. She wasso ashamed. But she still took the money.’
Imogen stared at her. ‘How do you know all this?’
Talia looked down at her hands. ‘I only found out because I was helping her with some paperwork. She was hopeless with admin, and I found a scanned letter from their accountant, breaking down the trust transfer. The whole setup was designed to look like a third-party grant, but the money came straight from them. Half a million quid. Disguised as an “arts development endowment”.’
‘Did you say anything?’
‘Of course. And she wept with shame.’
Imogen nodded, recognising the move. ‘Of course she did.’
‘She begged me not to tell anyone,’ Talia explained. ‘And I didn’t. Well, until now.’
Imogen was quiet for a long moment. ‘God, she was exhausting.’
Talia let out a soft, bitter chuckle. ‘And magnetic. Unfortunately.’
Silence stretched between them. A bird chirped obliviously in the hedge nearby.
Imogen stepped closer. ‘I wouldn’t have touched her if I’d known. If I’d even suspected what the real situation was. Whoshewas.’ Imogen couldn’t ever really know if that was true; she’d never be given the chance to find out. But she believed it. She felt in her bones that she was better than that. She hoped Talia could believe that, too. She hoped that more than she expected it.
Talia was quiet for a long time. Then, softly said: ‘I know. Now.’
Imogen nodded once, throat tight. She’d run out of words.
They stood there, letting it hang. Not forgiveness. Not resolution. But maybe the beginning of something less terrible than the misunderstanding they’d been living in.
