The Girl With The Hazel Eyes.

1

Chapter 1

15th May, 2015

Lia was nervous. Abnormally so. She lifted her tattered carpet bag from the back seat of the yellow cab. Instead of charging into the breach, inertia held her stubbornly in place. She felt numb, the intense fear of failure and embarrassment weighing on her.

There are times in everyone’s life when a singular moment, an instant at the crossroads of your existence, defines you and makes you either a somebody or a nobody. This was Lia’s.

Here she stood on the neat green lawn of a Mediterranean style house in Doral, Florida, thousands of miles away from her island home wondering why the hell she had thought this was a good idea.

Just two weeks earlier, she had gotten a phone call from a strange woman who had offered her the single greatest opportunity any novice writer could dream of – and she had jumped on it. It had led her here. Lia had fantasized that this would be the beginning of an extraordinary career for her. She dreamt of book signings, major publishing deals and a luxuriant lifestyle. Instead, there she stood, immobilized on a quiet street in the middle of a Florida suburb.

Hailing from the small Caribbean island of Barbados, Lia and many of her peers had grown accustomed to living obscure lives. There were only a handful of Barbadians who had broken into the nucleus of international fame, embracing the limelight and reveling in it. Like Rihanna and Sir Garfield Sobers and Austin Tom Clarke, Lia wanted to be one of them. But Susan Taylor didn’t.

A New York Times best-selling author, Susan Taylor’s seminal novel, ‘The Unspeakable Truth’ went down in history as the most famous novel by any Caribbean author. More than four decades later it was still in print, an enviable feat for any author.

The beautiful little island that was beloved for its white sand beaches, tranquil blue seas, lush tropical foliage and friendly people became the scene of an international crime. Long rumoured to be a slightly altered tale of an actual murderous political scandal that rocked the Caribbean, her book was thought to be the reason she had never returned to Barbados after it was published. Barbados had endured its very own Watergate: the fallout from her novel had led to a shakedown in the political system, the disappearance of Susan’s family and a well-known politician had also vanished into thin air.

Her name was now synonymous in Barbados and other Caribbean islands for whistleblowers and squealers – whenever people labeled someone as a “Pretty-Eyed Susan” you knew they meant that person couldn’t be trusted.

And so Susan Taylor got her book published, people were outraged and she never returned to Barbados.

But what had made her even more intriguing was the fact that she never wrote again.

Nothing. Not a limerick or greetings inside a birthday card were credited to her ever since ‘The Unspeakable Truth’. Susan had lived her life cloaked in a haze of mystery since then.

Until now.

The call that had started this journey had come from a lady Lia had never met named Ancill Adams. When Lia had answered the phone, Ancill wasted no time in telling her that Susan Taylor had chosen Lia to co-author Susan’s memoir and wanted to start right away. Susan Taylor would arrange for Lia to meet important people in the industry to secure a publishing deal for her. And to sweeten the deal, Susan Taylor had agreed to pay all of Lia’s travel expenses. The poor girl hadn’t been able to sleep at all that night.

The next morning Lia told her mother everything as she scarfed down a cup of oats. Her mother, bleary-eyed and yawning, listened while she took off her work shoes. Her eyes grew wide when Lia mentioned Susan Taylor’s name and she instantly proclaimed that she was fully against it. Lia was an only child and she often opined that her mother liked the idea of having her tethered to her apron strings at all times. Too often, Lia’s innate sense of adventure and grabbing life by the balls were at odds with her mother’s laid back nature. Her mother’s resistance was due to the fact that Lia was only twenty-five and shouldn’t give up a job she had only had for two months. Lia listened quietly and, at the end of it all, the young woman admitted that her mother had a point.

Still, there was no way she was going to pass up an opportunity like this.

Lia and her mother were poor. And not in a charming “we-grow-our-own-vegetables-for-fun” kind of way. They were honest-to-goodness poor, complete with Salvation Army clothes and everything. And Lia was tired of it.

And so, like the stubborn wretch she was, Lia quit her job and made arrangements to leave the next week.

Lia wanted more than anything to be a writer – any kind of writer, it didn’t matter –and the chance to write Susan Taylor’s biography was something that could open massive doors for her.

Now, more than three thousand miles away from home, Lia looked around the beautiful middle-classed neighbourhood, trying to drink in everything that had happened to her in the past two weeks. It was her first time in America, the first time anywhere outside of Barbados, for that matter. Her first time on a plane, even her first time in a taxi. This new surreal experience had engulfed Lia in an unexplainable and unimaginable way…it was just a lot.

The young woman had looked wide-eyed at practically everything that morning and tried to match her expectations – based on years of television watching – with reality.

“Excuse me…,” the taxi driver alighted from the car and was now standing next to her. He jabbed his thumb over his shoulder. “The metre is still running and I’ve got to go.”

She fumbled for a moment before hurriedly pulling out some money. She stared at the strange looking bills she fished out of her pocket. At home, each monetary note was designated its own colour. In America, they were all the same – a strange pea green colour with lots of drawings on them. She paid the taxi driver who wasted no time in leaving.

Moments later, Lia ambled down the path toward the beautifully painted house clutching her carpet bag and a duffel bag filled with books. She raised her hand to knock but there was no need. The door swung open revealing a plump, smiling, middle-aged lady wearing a pink blouse and a floral skirt.

Her eyes met Lia’s and for a moment she regarded Lia in shock before a look of comprehension dawned on her face. She smiled again and leaned toward Lia, grabbing the carpet bag in her left hand before reaching out to shake Lia’s right hand with own plump damp one.

“Mornin’,” she said cheerfully. Her Barbadian accent had lost only a little of its island lilt, slightly nullified by years of living in a foreign country, but there was no hiding where she was from. “You is Cordelia, right? So nice to meet you!” she exclaimed jovially.

Lia smiled warmly. “Yes, ma’am. But everyone calls me Lia.”

The other lady’s smile deepened, showcasing two glistening rows of straight white teeth. “I is Ancill; it is me who called. Come right in, dear.”

Ancill ushered Lia down a pristine hallway, painted an elegant greyish-green that beautifully complimented the dark brown hardwood floors. Lia sniffed hungrily as she recognized the smell of chicken roti that wafted through the house. As she hustled along in Ancill’s wake, the young woman looked in awe at the marvelous home, but was only able to take a quick glimpse at a sunlit living room painted in a lively teal and an elegant dining room painted in a hue that she could only describe as “eggplant”. She had never seen a more beautiful – and tidy house –in her life.

But the bright, effusive manner with which Ancill greeted her gave way to something entirely different as they reached the end of the hallway. There, she turned so abruptly that Lia almost bumped into her. The tone of her voice quickly went from ‘chirpy air hostess’ to ‘depressed mortician’.

“Just one minute,” she said in a low voice. Knocking lightly on the polished wooden door, she said softly and soberly, “Excuse me, Susan, but the young lady is here to see you.”

“Good.” came the muffled response.

Ancill looked at Lia before reaching for her small duffel bag. Lia smiled and said politely, “That’s okay. I’ll carry these with me.”

“Oh, alright. I know you had a long flight so I gonna come back and see if you want some drinks and snacks after I put this bag in your room,” Ancill said quietly as she turned away to put away the threadbare carpet bag.

“Thank you very…”

“What would happen…” the muffled voice asked, “if she came in here instead of jabbering out there with you?”

Ancill lowered her voice even further and placed a gentle hand on Lia’s shoulder. “She a l’il rough ‘round the edges, but she alright. You goin’ see.”

Lia hadn’t even met Susan Taylor yet and she had already formed an unpleasant opinion about her. She looked askance at the door as the sound of the housekeeper’s bare feet eased up the stairs to the second story. She wasn’t sure she wanted to go in without an escort, yet she knew better than to do anything else that would increase the author’s ire. She drew a deep breath and pushed open the door.

As soon as Lia entered the room, it was instantly clear to her that this was Susan’s inner sanctum. Golden sunshine streamed through a wide picture window into the large room illuminating the light grey walls; a colour that merely set the stage to highlight the distinctive artifacts that harkened back to a historic Barbadian plantation house.

On one wall hung three large paintings – a group of field workers cutting sugar cane with sharp scythes and cutlasses; another with dramatic strokes and bright colours showed a pair of children playing marbles in a chattel village and the last was a marvelously realistic looking rendition of waves breaking on the rugged East Coast of the island. Beneath the paintings, a charming set of polished mahogany chairs with latticed cane seats were next to a small table stacked with a collection of novels. A large bookcase filled with an eclectic mix of books stood next to the french doors that opened out to the expansive garden beyond it. On the other side of the room stood another bookcase with various wooden figurines of cricketers posed with bat and ball, steel pan players and – odd, but looking like it was in its rightful place – a bottle of rum. The room was a sharp contrast to the contemporary style that pervaded the rest of the house.

And there, sitting right in the middle of the room in a mahogany rocking chair holding a cup of ginger tea, sat the lady herself.

Lia was surprised. Light-skinned and long-limbed, Susan Taylor was remarkably unremarkable in many ways, her otherwise delicate features incalculably strengthened by her striking hazel eyes. It was easy to see why those eyes had been the catalyst for the less-than-flattering sobriquet. The power that reverberated from them was almost hypnotic. Lia wasn’t sure what she expected, but somehow this waif of a woman clad in a beige cardigan wasn’t it.

“Cordelia Davis,” she said quietly, her eyes glued to Lia’s eyes.

Lia’s inertia broke and she hurried forward, hand outstretched, intending to make a good first impression with Susan Taylor. “It’s so nice to meet you, Miss Taylor. You can call me Lia.”

“I don’t shake hands,” Susan said crisply. “That’s how you catch things.”

Taken aback by the prospect of giving Susan “things”, Lia’s hand fell back to her side and she smiled wanly. “That’s fine, I understand; can’t be too careful after all. Actually, I read in an online health journal…”

“I requested a biographer, not a fawning sycophant,” interrupted Susan as she set down her teacup on the coffee table. “Now listen; if I want to know something, I’ll ask you.” She eyed Lia up and down, eyes passing over the tall, lanky frame, the little freckles on her nose and her bright eyes. Susan huffed. “What did you say I could call you?”

The young woman pursed her lips uncomfortably. “Lia?” she replied, saying it like a question.

“Your mother gave you a perfectly good name. I have no idea why you would try to dismantle it. I’ll continue to call you Cordelia. Now sit down.” Susan jutted her chin to the chair on Lia’s left.

Unnerved, Lia bit her lip and sat in the vintage mahogany chair. This is not going how I thought it would, she reflected worriedly as she busied herself unpacking a notebook and pencils from her duffel bag.

“What’s your story?”

“Pardon me?”

Susan eyed Lia shrewdly. “I asked ‘what’s your story?” In other words, tell me about yourself.”

“Oh…well I’m twenty-five years old and I recently finished a degree in journalism. I’ve been writing short stories in…”

“I know how to use the Internet, young lady, “Susan interjected. “You have all of that fluff on your f*******: page. Tell me about you.”

Lia shifted in her chair. Susan Taylor was a crotchety, cantankerous old woman with bile running through her veins and it was all Lia could do to keep her nerves in check. The older woman picked up her teacup again and took a sip before she started talking. “I’m not sure why you assumed you would be given license to come here and pepper me with questions without preamble. I’m not entirely certain that you’re fit for this undertaking as yet.”

Lia took a deep breath, racked her brain and started again. “Well, what do you want to know?”

Susan huffed impatiently. “Did you have a happy childhood?”

Lia smiled. “Yes, I did. It was filled with lots of happy memories.”

Susan scoffed and lifted an eyebrow skeptically, “Oh really? No embarrassing moments?”

Lia’s face fell. The course of the conversation had veered sharply from “generic and harmless” to “discomforting and difficult.”

She shook her head quickly. “Nothing really. I see everything in my life as a stepping stone, a chance to learn.”

“Oh really? What did you learn when you were caught shoplifting? And exactly how did you use the stepping stone your mother provided when she lost her job because she had an affair with her boss’ husband?”

Lia’s face went blank. How did she know those things? Lia shot up from her chair, her body trembling. “You know what Miss Taylor? I left my job to come here. I fought with my mother to come here. I spent a quarter of my salary – which I can ill-afford to spend on clothes – on this outfit because I wanted to make a good impression on you.” She snatched up her belongings. “Short of weeping tears of blood, I really don’t know what it is you expected me to do, but I don’t even want to know anymore.”

A smirk lit Susan’s face. “Finally, a little fire. You came in here pretending to be timid and weak; all I want is honesty. You expect me to share the most embarrassing, intimate details of my life with you and you come in here telling me lies? Start wrong and you’ll end wrong.”

Susan raised an eyebrow at Lia. “You seem to forget that Barbados is a very small island; everybody knows everything about everyone else. ‘Yuh cuh’ hide and buy land but yuh can’t hide and work it’ as the old saying goes.” Susan said, slipping easily into Barbadian dialect.

“Is that why you chose me?” Lia asked, her defiance making her voice a little louder than necessary. “Because you figure that I’ve got dirty laundry?”

“I want somebody with a real life to tell my story; somebody who might understand me properly. I sense that you’ll do.”

Shame wormed its way into Lia’s stomach. Lia eyed Susan suspiciously, a sharp jolt of comprehension jarring her pride at the realization she had just made. “But why me? There are tons of other journalists; far more experienced and influential ones – what about someone from CNN or the BBC?”

“Bah.” Susan dismissed the thought with a wave of her bony hand. “They have their biases about ‘island’ people – they’d never get it…”

The older woman glared at Lia. “…and neither will the old ones at home in the Caribbean. They too have their prejudices about me. No…,” she said lazily as she sipped her tea again. “…you’re nice and green and that suits me just fine. Sit back down.”

Lia’s cheeks burned furiously as an internal battle waged within her. Her carefully planned speech about her writing trophies, her exhausting internships at local media houses and her zest for writing were all for naught. She thought fleetingly – very fleetingly – that she couldn’t endure this woman for another minute, but then she snapped back to reality. The sound of her mother saying “I tell yuh so” screeched like nails on a chalkboard inside her head. Biting the inside of her lip, she sat back down, determined to see it through with the indomitable Susan Taylor. Barbados was “the rock” and Susan Taylor was obviously “the hard place”. Never before had that old adage seemed more apropos. Lia knew she was firmly entrenched between both of them.

Susan flashed yet another infuriating smirk at Lia. “Good. I’ll tell you everything you want to know about me. The good, the bad and - the reason you’re really here - the scandal that rocked the Caribbean.”