Releasing his grip unexpectedly, the knife fell to the floor and Matthew stood open-mouthed. Fingering the wound on his shoulder, he recoiled from the fierce pain, but it brought him back to the present with a biting jar.
“Who the fuck are you!”
Matthew heard the yell before he felt the force. Hitting the ground hard, he cowed as he looked up at his attacker. Debbie stood behind the large bulk of Mr Kennedy, Rugby shirt flapping as he flexed his thick shoulders.
“He’s crazy, Glyn. Keeps saying I’ve stolen his money from Bristol, or something. He was trying to get to Chloe! Nuts, he is. Really crackers!”
Lunging forward, Glyn threw a massive fist in Matthew’s direction. Dodging the blow, the weight of the assailing hand propelled Glyn tumbling forward. His inebriation obvious, he crashed to the floor beside Matthew.
Wriggling free from the flailing arms, Matthew jumped up in time to see Debbie grab at the knife on the floor. Scrambling for the door, Matthew fumbled the key from his pocket and unlocked it.
Debbie stood brandishing the blade, content the threat would see him off. Matthew ran into the garden and leapt over the fence.
“I’m calling the police, you nutter!” Debbie screamed after him. Slamming the door, she bolted it top and bottom before collapsing to the floor in huge sobbing tears.
Chapter Forty-nine
Matthew ran. He didn’t even know where to until he found himself back at the train station. The miles had disappeared in a fog of despair. Looking around, he realised he’d forgotten his rucksack. No tent. No coat. And bleeding from the nasty wound.
Where would he stay? Collapsing against the wall, he didn’t even care. What was the point? What was the point in anything anymore?
Abi. She was his only hope; his only chance at a life worth living. How could Debbie be so callous? She must have switched off her love when they almost lost her. Matthew knew what that was like, sometimes withdrawing had been the only way to cope. Chloe and Mr Incredible must have been a coping strategy that hatched into a plan to fleece Matthew and destroy him.
He didn’t understand why he’d been the butt of blame, the place where the buck stopped. But he’d been defeated—so busy with work and with Abi, he hadn’t noticed his wife hating him.
Sliding down the wall, he hid his face with the hood of his sweatshirt and sobbed. His body shook as he pictured all the moments of closeness that had been a lie. The rock he’d been for her when her dad died. All the tears shed. Where had they come from? She was a bloody good actress that was for sure.
Mandy and his mum; surely they weren’t in on it as well? They’d never shown they shared alliance with his wife over him, and he thought they were proud of him. They never said so, but he knew… His eyes turning to slits, he sighed; he thought he knew.
Tears turned to steely determination. The business had suffered in his absence. Debbie must have taken his shares from Brian and somehow threatened him to make him keep quiet. And his mum and dad? Their marriage had always seemed strong, but was his disappearance a test too far? Or did Debbie have a hand in that too?
What had she told them? After what you did… his dad’s words echoed around his mind. He knew what he had to do: go back to Bristol, back to the internet cafés and back to searching. He’d find Mandy and Mum and Abi. Then he’d get the best lawyers and wreak his revenge on his conniving wife.
It was a plan without conviction. He’d lost faith in his ability to achieve anything. He was cold. He was tired, and he was unconvinced when he found them they wouldn’t be just another obstacle. How many more could he take?
Ideas jumbled in his head as the new theory of his terrible circumstance clashed with the old. If Debbie is behind all this, how did she move new people into their house on Christmas Day? And why would they say they’d lived there for ten years?
If the blame was all Debbie’s, and not government agencies as he’d assumed all along, how had she persuaded the mental hospital to take him and tell him such lies about never having had a wife and child?
There were more questions, rising up like terrifying faces in Night of the Living Dead. Every corner his thoughts turned for solace, another crushing question loomed. Why had old Tom King not recognised him? Why was Mandy not in their apartment? How had Brian taken down the extension they’d built at Marsden-Morrissey Marine?
One theory excluded the other. His mind screwed, desperate to find something to cling on to. But even Pollyanna would succumb to blow after brutal blow. Unfailing optimism and grit couldn’t overcome everything, could it?
“Are you okay, sir?”
Matthew looked up at the smiling face of a railway guard. Grateful it wasn’t a policeman, he hauled himself from the floor, wincing as his shoulder cramped. Nodding, he squeezed “Family bereavement,” from his dry lips as explanation for his emotional state. And it was in a way. He’d lost everything he ever cared about.
But just like those suffering grief for loved ones they’d lost. Matthew had to carry on for those who needed him. He might not have the answers, but until he knew Abi was safe, he would never rest. “I’m heading back to Bristol,” he said with a decisive glint as he felt around in his pocket, mentally totting up the coins.
“Okay, sir,” the guard said with disbelieving eyes. Swallowing down guilt at his assumption that this scruffy, stained individual was homeless, he added cheerily, “Let me know if you need anything.”
Matthew shuffled to the ticket office and handed over the last of his money. “Single to Bristol, please.”
“Temple Meads, or Clifton Down?” the lady asked from an unsmiling mouth.
Clifton Down! How appropriate. If he were to get the answers he so desperately yearned for, where better to begin than where it had all started?
“Clifton Down, please,” he said with a smirk. “I’ll go back to Clifton Down.”
Chapter Fifty
“Is that the last of them?” Matthew laughed as the fifth bag was loaded into the taxi. “I can see why you didn’t want to walk now. These are going to be a nightmare when we change at Paddington, you know.”
“Trollies. Heard of those?” Debbie snapped with a stressed smile. “And porters. I’m sure they’ll help us on the train.”
“I’m sure. It’s just funny that you and Abi have more suitcases than me, Mum, Dad and Mandy and Charlotte put together!”
“And..?” she challenged with a grin.
There was no need to panic. They were early. Very early. Alan had been in charge of logistics and had tagged an hour on to be safe. He smiled to himself as the taxi pulled them outside Clifton Down Railway station, that they’d eaten into fifteen minutes of it already. He’d done the right thing.
They had no need to go to the ticket office. The tickets had been delivered to their door weeks ago, but Debbie still insisted the railway guard peruse them just to make sure they were in the right place.
“Yes that’s right. You could have saved yourself a change if you’d gone from Temple Meads.”
“We live just up there,” she pointed towards Clifton Down Road and the Avon Gorge.
“Oohh. Posh!” he grinned. “Everything is in order. You’ll be in Paris before seven!” Glancing down at Abi’s glowing face, he bent down. “I bet I know why you’re excited, young lady? Disney Land, am I right?”
Abi nodded delightedly. “We were supposed to go in the summer, but my daddy wasn’t very well. But now we’re going at Christmas which is even better!”
“I’ve heard it’s great at Christmas. You give Mickey a wave from me then, won’t you?”
Abi nodded.
“Have a lovely time.”
“We will, thank you,” Debbie and Matthew answered in unison.
“I’m starving. Can I get something?”
“You’re always starving, Mandy,” Matthew said. And just the familiarity that he knew his sister’s eating habits crafted such a feeling of joy, a laugh soon followed.
“All right, Mr Skinny ribs!” Mand
y said patting a burgeoning belly on her brother. He quite liked it. It was a paunch of prosperity! He’d work on it in the New Year, though, of course.
“In there, look. ‘Roo Bar.’ You can get some crisps or something.”
“Oo, look. Scampi!”
“You’ve only just had a sandwich for lunch. It’s three o’clock. They’ve probably stopped doing food now, and we don’t have time for scampi anyway!” Alan stepped in. “Get some crisps or nuts, like Matthew said.”
Matthew smiled. He still had no recollection of the past they shared. What he could remember was a constant nightmare, but it was fading. This was his family, and his lack of memories would soon be a moot point as the years rolled on and they made new ones.
The train rumbled out of Cardiff central and Matthew had a seat to himself, his agitated fidgeting gaining him solitude. His closest comrade was a girl who kept dropping her smartphone on the seat beside her and jolting awake to continue crushing candies.
Fingers drumming his disquiet on his thigh, he tried to focus. He’d need money again. Begging had worked well, and it felt more honest than stealing. Tomorrow he would be back online. Tomorrow he’d start the long haul to find his mum, sister and daughter. He just had to stay calm until then.
If only he’d been able to get a phone. He could search the web for anything that struck him, at once moving forward or discarding.
The bright screen caught his attention as sleepy woman dropped it for the hundredth time in ten minutes.
Edging closer, the similarity to his attempts to gain Malcolm’s phone transported his mind to a place he didn’t want to go. But this would be so easy. She was asleep. If she caught him, he could smile and assure her he was saving it from falling. He wouldn’t keep it, but he’d use it for a while.
Shuffling in his seat, Matthew waited for the inevitable plop of the phone-on-fabric. When it happened and the woman didn’t wake, he leaned across the aisle and scooped it up. He’d sat back and opened the internet browser before any other passenger registered their objection.
Staring confidently at the screen, Matthew ignored the angry stare from an elderly lady three seats away. She might say something, but he could get done as much as possible before she did.
Furious thumbs probed the internet for all it knew about Mandy and Mary Morrissey. Amongst the suggestions filling the phone’s screen was ancestry.co.uk. Evidently the sleeping woman was a regular to the site. Reluctantly, Matthew tapped the screen. Heart pounding, his dad’s words of disdain ringing in his ears, he entered his sister’s date of birth.
Ancestry asked for date of death, but of course Matthew didn’t believe she was dead, so he couldn’t fill that in. He completed all the other family members, and their dates of birth, where they were born, and where they had lived, and ancestry did its thing.
His hands trembled so much he could barely hold the phone, but as he managed to complete the process for his mother, ancestry proved its mettle by directing him to information that had escaped all his other efforts.
Searching for the dead afforded subtle changes to his answers which in turn brought new questions. With the different perspective, it was with alarming promptness that ancestry.co.uk directed his attention to a news article/obituary in The Bristol Post.
Tragedy strikes again for bereft local family.
Christmas Day has not been a time to celebrate for the Morrissey family of Wexford Road, Bristol having lost their young daughter, Amanda, in a tragic accident last Christmas. Little Mandy was only two years old when she fell to her death at the family’s home after an argument with her elder brother, Matthew.
Mrs Mary Morrissey suffered terribly with the loss, and it is with great sadness that I have to write she could cope no longer and took her own life by taking an overdose of sleeping tablets, also on Christmas Day.
She is survived by her son, Matthew already mentioned, and her husband, Alan…
Matthew’s hand dropped and the phone crashed to the floor. The battery compartment lid flew across the carriage and the screen shattered into a million pieces.
“You broke my phone, you bloody idiot!” The woman jolted awake at the noise. “Oh, for fuck sake.”
Her voice rattled on, but Matthew didn’t hear a word. Falling to the floor, his head in his hands, he wailed, “No! No, no, no, no, no!”
The aching, in the depths of his being, twisted him inside out. How? Why? He had too many questions. The agony of them combined with the pain in his shoulder and they spewed from him in a wretched Technicolor torrent coating the seats and floor. Grasping at the edge of the seat, he hauled himself to his knees.
“Oh, you disgusting fucking pig!” The girl left her broken mobile, now further ruined in a puddle of puke. “You owe me a new phone, you do!”
A guard entering the carriage took in the situation at once. “Fill in a form at the desk, madam. You should be able to make a claim.”
“How long will that bloody take, then? You shouldn’t let people like him on trains, you shouldn’t! Bloody disgrace.”
“I understand, madam. If you’d rather take the phone with you…” he gestured towards the steaming mess.
“No, ‘course I fucking don’t, you moron!”
“Any more of that language, and I won’t process your claim at all,” he instructed sternly.
Mumbling, the woman edged around the mess and stepped off the train leaving the guard to deal with Matthew. “Now then, sir. You need to get off the train.”
Procedure called for him to take the man’s details so they could bill him for the damage, but it was obvious there would be little point. It was a wonder he’d had the money to travel in the first place. “Come on,” he said leaning over Matthew.
Matthew objected to the movement towards him but had no fight in him. Staggering to the front of the train, he hobbled off, hood up to disguise his shame, and lurched down the platform.
He didn’t know where to head. He didn’t even know who he was. The only people who seemed to know him were back on the ward of the mental hospital. He couldn’t go back there, could he?
He didn’t know what happened all those years ago when his mum and sister lost their lives, but it was traumatic. Devastating. And he had made up a life for himself in his head. A wonderful life where he had a loving family, so much more than his mum and dad had offered in his own childhood.
He thought he’d got over their rejection of him in favour of his cute little sister. He thought he’d overcome the odds of a difficult childhood to build something. But it had all been in his crazy head.
Like any other nutter with a Napoleon complex, he’d convinced himself he was more than he was. They knew—the doctors and nurses on the ward—they knew what he was capable of. They knew him better than he knew himself. The place he’d detested months ago; the place he’d tried so desperately to escape was the only place familiar to him now.
His only hope? If it was, what sort of hope was that?
He’d never find Mandy. He’d never find his mum. They were long dead. And he’d never find Abi. Dear, sweet Abi. Because she’d never even existed!
Allowing the thought crushed the last breath of courage from him. A boulder of dereliction held back by a twig of hope that had finally snapped.
He couldn’t think his way out of this. He could never trust his thoughts again.
Punching through the pain in his shoulder, Matthew struck himself in the head. Whack! Whack! Whack! He snarled. “You stupid, crazy fucking bastard. You made it all up. Made it all up in your stupid crazy fucking head!”
What about Debbie? The thought attacked. How had he come up with her as the focus of his fantasy when she didn’t even know who he was? Shaking his head, it didn’t even matter anymore. He must have seen her sometime during this whole lifetime he couldn’t remember. Maybe he’d even glimpsed her with Mr Kennedy and Chloe, who didn’t look unlike the fantasy of Abi he had created.
He’d never know. She didn’t recognise him. He didn�
��t recognise himself. And she certainly didn’t love him.
If the delusions had manifested to protect him, where were they now? They’d make no difference. He could never go back. He could never again convince himself it was okay.
Even with the words of the newspaper flashing in his head, he still couldn’t remember… He still had no recollection of killing his sister—no memory of finding his mum dead having taken her own life the following year, and for that at least, he was grateful.
It wouldn’t be long though. It couldn’t. Not now he knew. Those terrible memories would return to torment him like a wolf worrying sheep; waiting to devour him when he was at his weakest.
He wouldn’t go back to the hospital. What could they offer him? The truth? He’d had enough of that. They’d be kind and understanding and they’d explain it all to him. They’d keep him safe.
But he didn’t want to be safe.
As his toes edged across the platform to the rusting iron tracks, safe was the very last thing he wanted to be.
Chapter Fifty-one
“Here it comes. Here’s our train!” Mary was as excited as Abi. She’d always dreamed of going to Paris.
The train pulled in, and they heaved as one towards it. Waiting for the door to swish open and looking around for a button to press when it didn’t, they shared glances of anxious anticipation like runners in the blocks.
“Come on. Paris awaits!” Alan chided the denying doors. “Is there a problem?” he asked a passing guard.
Stopping in his stride, he smiled sheepishly. “Just needs a bit of cleaning, I’m afraid. One of the passengers was taken ill and er… made a mess.” Catching Matthew’s eye, he did a double take before dismissing the mistake.
Blurred Lines: A box-set of reality bending supernatural fiction (Paranormal Tales from Wales Book 9) Page 27