Next of Kin

by TL Dyer

  Weathered features attempt to loosen, but the brow is too tightly knotted. ‘You’re welcome, love.’ He looks to the keys in his hands, twists them between his fingers. ‘You know, if I could take you all with me… If you’d come…’

  I slump against the frame, eyelids heavy. He already knows that’s not something that will ever happen. My life is here, my job. Jake’s school, his friends. Shaun’s work. Our whole lives. His life, until now.

  ‘Tomorrow, Dad, alright?’ I say softly. ‘We’ll talk about it tomorrow.’

  He nods, puts his key in the lock and lets himself out.

  After he leaves, re-locking the door behind him for the walk down the lane beside my house on Marne Street, through to the back garden of his on Chapel Farm Terrace in the next street over, I retrieve the bin bag from under the stairs and quietly close the kitchen door. I need to get to work on the bloodstains, removing all traces before my son gets up for school and sees them.

  Chapter 2

  We get to the school gates just as the last of the stragglers in the yard are making their way inside the building. I wait until Jake pauses at the door to wave, then once he’s disappeared inside I start back for home. Except I haven’t gone far when there’s a shout.

  ‘Wait a second! Miss Sanderson?’

  One of the young teaching assistants is calling from the entrance and holding a palm skyward. A moment later, Jake reappears in the doorway.

  I jog down the steps into the yard. ‘What is it, darling?’

  He comes running over, bag bouncing on his back, cheeks flushed and fair hair flapping in the morning breeze. ‘I forgot,’ he says, wide-eyed.

  ‘Forgot what?’ I crouch to his level, mentally running through the possibilities. Is it mufti day? Was I supposed to give him money for whatever charity we’re supporting this week? Or are all the kids dressed in costumes and he’s the only one in his uniform?

  ‘Declan’s birthday,’ he says, hand dropping with a leaden thud against his side to show this is a disaster of colossal proportions. ‘It’s today. His party’s after school.’

  Declan, Declan…

  ‘You remember,’ Jake insists. ‘It’s at his house, tonight. They’re doing an Easter egg hunt and everything, even though Easter was ages ago.’

  ‘Right. Course I remember,’ I say, though this is all news to me. ‘That’s fine, darling, I’ll take you. We just need to know where Declan lives.’

  ‘But we have to get him a present and everything,’ he says, out of breath.

  ‘Duh. That’s what I’m doing today, isn’t it?’

  ‘You are?’

  ‘Course I am. Chill out, dude, I’ve got it covered.’

  His shoulders ease down an inch from his ears. ‘And a birthday card, though.’

  ‘Covered.’

  ‘And party hats. And cake.’

  I tilt my head to one side. ‘Mm, I think his mam’s got that bit covered.’

  ‘Good,’ he confirms. And with the panic over, he turns so fast his backpack is only inches from clouting me in the face. ‘Gotta go,’ he yells to the wind, before tripping over the step back into the school.

  I get to my feet and exchange a roll of the eyes with the teaching assistant before she closes the door behind them.

  ‘Sodding shit,’ I mutter to myself, as I trudge back up the steps to the school gates. And there I was hoping I could go straight home and under the duvet.

  *

  The good news is I find Declan’s party invitation, and thus Declan’s address, pinned to the fridge in the kitchen with a LazyTown magnet. The bad news is I still have to get him a card and a present. But the worse news is that Dad’s sent a text asking if I can pop round. I’m on the verge of wriggling out of it by using the excellent excuse I now have of Declan’s imminent birthday party when I get a second text, this time from Shaun, telling me the coast is clear. So in the spirit of ripping the plaster off in one go, I head out of the back garden, across the lane, and into my first ever home to face the inevitable. I can always deploy the Declan tactic if emergency withdrawal is required.

  ‘Fucking hell, you look like death reheated,’ my brother says as I step in through the back door and into the kitchen. He’s perched on the edge of the breakfast counter in nothing but a pair of joggers, munching from a bowl of cereal.

  ‘I think the phrase you’re looking for, Shaun, is death warmed up.’ I tug my hair around my neck to cover the marks that have unfortunately become a faint bruise this morning, then pinch a slice of buttered toast from the plate beside him on the counter.

  ‘Oy! Dad…’ he whines, as our father enters the kitchen. ‘She pinched my breakfast.’

  ‘Children,’ Dad says, in the same non-committal, weary, couldn’t-give-a-toss way he would have done twenty years back. Automated discipline.

  I lean my hip against the counter while I polish off my second breakfast this morning, albeit Shaun’s rendition a little plainer and colder than my own was. My brother’s motto when it comes to food is keep it simple. For a twenty-eight-year-old he has a limited range of foods he likes and rarely deviates from those unless he really has to. It’s a trait of his Asperger’s. Swearing profusely and inappropriately is another. All things considered, he’s not too far along the spectrum, which means for the most part he functions in a way that would be described as neurotypical. Of course he also comes with many refreshingly positive neurodiverse attributes as well. Such as always telling the truth.

  ‘Shirley’s hiding from you,’ he says now, scraping the last of the cereal from the bowl.

  ‘She’s not hiding.’ Dad glances across the room at me as he sits at the kitchen table. ‘She’s gone shopping.’

  ‘That’s what I said. Hiding.’ Shaun picks up his last remaining slice of toast and tears off a quarter of it in one bite while curling his lip up at me.

  ‘What are you doing home on a Friday, anyway?’ I ask, taking a mug from beside the sink and half filling it with water from the tap. ‘Shouldn’t you be at work?’

  ‘Between contracts. Start a new one Monday. In the big fucking smoke.’

  By which he means Cardiff. As a site manager for a solar panel firm, he’s rarely in the same place for long. The jobs are not small either, their client base is the big firms, the corporations and institutions, all those who need to be seen to be embracing alternative energy and taking climate change seriously. It’s a good job, pays well, and it’s satisfying that he makes a difference; not that he says as much, but it’s clear in the way he talks about his work, the commitment he gives it, the quiet pride that emanates from him whenever his team get praised for their efforts, and the bonuses he receives as thanks. It’s a long way from where he could have ended up. A long way from where he once was.

  ‘So,’ Dad says, thumping his clasped hands against the tabletop. He looks about as excited at the prospect of this conversation as we are to hear it. I glance at Shaun who slurps from his coffee, not a care in the world. Okay, so one of us at least doesn’t want to hear it. For some reason, this idea of his father upping sticks to leave Wales for a country hundreds of miles and no quick train ride away, doesn’t seem to faze him one bit. But then, neither did Dad’s shacking up with Shirley so soon after Mam left us. Sometimes it would be nice to have his backing now and then, but he can be so frustratingly bloody neutral.

  ‘If we go,’ Dad starts; then emphasises, ‘If we go, and if it becomes permanent, then I’ll be signing the deeds of this house over to the both of you.’

  I glance again at Shaun. He nods, listening carefully, tongue digging the toast from his teeth.

  ‘I don’t care who lives here. If none of you do, or if all of you do. But this was your mam’s house too, and I know she’d want you both to have it.’ I sense he’s looking at me when he says this, but my eyes are on the water in the mug. ‘You can come to that arrangement between you.’

  ‘What do you mean, if you go,’ Shaun pipes up. ‘Thought this was fucking sorted.’

&nbs
p; ‘Aye, well. Few things to iron out, son.’

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘Anyone would think you were trying to get rid of them, Shaun.’ I fold my arm across my body and prop the mug near my mouth.

  ‘Huh? What have I bastard done?’

  ‘Nothing, son.’ Dad raises his hands, elbows propped on the table. ‘You’ve done nothing. Your sister’s teasing.’

  Shaun looks at me with his eyebrows creased as if he’s about to unleash something else. But then his expression changes and all that confusion slips away. ‘And you are trying not to get rid of them,’ he says, with the same smug grin he’s always used as a weapon, and that still manages to get under my skin. ‘Because if you do get rid of them, who’ll look after Little Man then?’

  I tut and turn to rinse the mug in the sink, while behind me Dad says, ‘There are lots of things to think about.’

  ‘No, there’s not.’ Shaun’s bare feet land on the tiles with a thump as he drops from the counter. ‘She’ll have to get a proper job, that’s all. Then she can have a babysitter.’

  I turn from the sink. ‘A childminder. And, proper job, Shaun? I’ve already got one.’

  ‘Alright, that’s enough,’ Dad tries, but Shaun’s voice is louder than either of ours.

  ‘A nine-to-five. In an office or a shop or something. Like most mothers with kids do.’

  My mouth drops open. Dad covers his eyes with his hand.

  ‘Bloody hell, Shaun,’ I say, trying to keep my voice on an even keel, because despite where this is going, he struggles with confrontation. But after the night I’ve had and the lack of shuteye, that’s not easy. ‘What sodding century did you crawl out from?’

  ‘What?’ he says, his hands outstretched. ‘It makes perfect sense. He’s your son, not Dad’s—’

  ‘Shaun…’ The chair grates over the floor when Dad gets up to issue his warning.

  ‘And don’t fucking look at me neither, sis. Sometimes I’ve got to be away for days at a time, I can’t have him.’

  ‘Son, I’m sure Sacha wouldn’t expect you to.’

  ‘No, I bloody wouldn’t.’

  ‘Or maybe you’d prefer it if Shirley went to the fucking farmhouse in the Highlands while Dad stayed here to mind Jake. That would suit you, wouldn’t it?’

  ‘Enough!’ Dad shouts, thumping his fist on the table.

  It’s so unlike him, we both shut up immediately. But whatever is on the tip of his tongue, or wherever he had wanted this conversation to go, he reels it in, sucking his lower lip into his mouth. He crosses the room to the back door, yanks on the handle, and is about to leave when he hesitates. Shaun and I both watch him in silence. After a second he turns back. Looking to the tiled floor, he asks, ‘Are we having him tonight?’

  My hip sags against the sink. Tempering my voice, I say quietly, ‘No. Thanks, Dad. I’m off for a few days.’

  He nods once and goes out of the door. Through the kitchen window I watch him retreat up the path to the workshop, his head dipped to the floor, those things he wanted to talk about no more sorted than they were five minutes ago.

  ‘Shit,’ I mumble, rubbing at my tired eyes. There’d be no point going after him. Once he’s in his workshop, he’ll want to be left alone. After Mam died, he slept in there every night for a month. The only person he allows across the threshold is his grandson.

  ‘That went well.’ Shaun comes up beside me to put his dishes in the sink.

  ‘You’re wrong,’ I say, dropping my hands from my face. ‘This isn’t all about Jake. I’m not that selfish.’

  ‘I know,’ he says, opening the window and taking a packet of cigarettes from the pocket of his joggers. ‘It’s about Shirley.’

  ‘No. Not that either.’

  I watch him light up, take the first puff and blow the smoke through the side of his mouth towards the window. When he catches me looking, he holds the cigarette out. Fuck it. It’s been that kind of night. I take a few quick drags, peering over his shoulder to make sure Dad’s not coming back for something he’s forgotten. Shaun quietly laughs as I hand it back to him.

  ‘You think Dad doesn’t know you smoke by now, Sach?’

  I shrug his comment away, but waft at the air around my clothes. ‘It’s five hundred miles away. He’s barely left the village. He was born here, for god’s sake.’

  ‘All the more reason to get out.’

  ‘And what if he hates it?’

  ‘Then he comes home again,’ Shaun says, and just for once I wish I saw things as simply as he does. But I don’t. I see my dad, a man in his mid-fifties, uprooting his entire life – a life he’s been perfectly happy with until now, surrounded by his friends and family, everyone who loves and cares about him – to live on a remote and ancient stone-built farm in the middle of nowhere with barely any central heating, a patchy phone signal, never mind an internet connection, and none of the things he’s familiar with. It’s not just something different, it’s a radical change of lifestyle. Shirley’s even talking about livestock. Livestock? My dad? He couldn’t keep Archie alive, and he was just a sodding rabbit.

  ‘What if something happens to him up there, Shaun? Think about it. How quickly can we get to him? What medical care will he have access to? What if he gets ill—’

  ‘And what if he doesn’t?’ Shaun butts in, talking over me. ‘What if he’s healthier up there than he’s ever been? What if he loves the outdoors, the fresh air, the miles between him and everyone else? What if he’s happy because it’s just him and Shirl and his woodwork and no other stress?’

  I’m about to ask what stress, when it comes to me. ‘Meaning me and Jake.’

  ‘Meaning Mam.’

  I flinch. I wasn’t expecting that. ‘How is she a stress? She’s not even here.’

  ‘Exactly.’ He flicks the ash from the cigarette through the open window. ‘She’s gone but he’s still here, in the same house he shared with her. She’s everywhere he looks.’

  I snort. ‘Hardly,’ I say, glancing round at the newly fitted kitchen barely a year old, the fresh paint on the walls, Shirley’s ornaments over the windowsill.

  ‘The memories of her,’ he clarifies. ‘That’s not nice for Shirley, is it?’

  I open my mouth to respond, but he doesn’t give me the chance.

  ‘So it’s not nice for Dad either.’

  ‘Bloody hell. You been watching Oprah?’

  He screws up his face, bewildered. ‘Should I?’

  I blow out a sigh, pushing myself away from the counter. ‘I’m going home.’

  ‘Good idea, you’re a fucking nightmare when you’re like this.’

  ‘Oh fuck off, Shaun,’ I say, pausing in the doorway. ‘I’ve just done a fourteen-hour shift and haven’t been to bed yet, and now I’ve got to buy a birthday gift for some kid I know nothing about.’

  ‘Hang on, wait,’ he says, as I’m about to leave. ‘I’ll do that.’

  ‘Do what?’

  He shrugs one shoulder. ‘Get the present. How old is she?’

  ‘He. And I dunno. Six, I assume.’

  He taps the cigarette against the window frame. ‘I’ve got all day. You get home to bed. You can pay me later.’

  I hesitate. Not because I wonder what he’s after – this is Shaun all over, to assess a situation and apply a practical solution – but just because guilt is now chewing me up from the inside out for being the worst sister and daughter known to man. Well…

  ‘Thing is, I need a card as well.’

  He flips his hands like it goes without saying. ‘How hard can it be?’ He turns his back to finish his cigarette as if it’s already agreed. ‘So you can fuck off home now,’ he mumbles, with the cigarette between his lips. ‘You need as much beauty sleep as you can get.’

  ‘Right,’ I mutter. And leave while I’m ahead of the curve. I think.

  Chapter 3

  I’ve been a response police officer for South East Wales Police for the past three years. In that time, it’s safe to say I’ve se
en the arse end of what life has to offer. And I don’t just mean criminals – they come in all varieties, from all backgrounds, and break the law for any number of reasons. No, what I really mean is what is done to us, what we do to others, and what we do to ourselves.

  We are just flesh, blood and bone, a fragile package wrapped in skin. But you wouldn’t think so, the way we treat it. We ingest or inject ourselves with chemicals, torture our minds with self-loathing, and our bodies with a blade or with the foods we consume. We drive vehicles at speed, which on impact are only metal shells that crumple and won’t protect us. We develop attachments to those we shouldn’t, take praise where we can get it, even if that takes us to the wrong places and with the wrong people. We despair and take it out on someone else. We stare so long and so hard at others, we lose sight of our own selves altogether. We stand on the wrong side of the bridge, and we wish for it all to be over.

  The one and only arse end of life.

  I’ve seen it all. Tried to educate and advise those in the early stages, assisted in the middle when the wheels are coming off, and cleared away the aftermath when it’s all gone to hell. It’s not everyone’s idea of a career, not even everyone’s idea of what policing really is, but it’s my career. One I never thought I’d be capable of doing. One I may never have even tried if not for Mam and her dying wish that as soon as Jake was old enough I think about myself. Because being just a mam, she’d said, would consume me so completely that I’d forget that Sacha was still in here at all.

  Maybe she was right.

  Only, now I think perhaps I’ve gone too far the other way. Because for all the down-and-dirty grimness that comes with the job, I’ve never felt more uneasy than I do right now with my back to the wall and twenty-plus kids tearing around the giant lawn of a stranger’s garden, shredding their lungs and my ears to pieces with their screams. I’m told there’ll be an Easter egg hunt shortly, which may quieten the party-goers down. But for now, the extreme excitement of this rare after-school event is fuelling the adrenaline and blood bolting at breakneck speed through tiny little bodies with no thought for the all-mighty energy crash that’s coming their way later.