The Woman in the Dark

by Vanessa Savage

  I’m imagining Patrick seeing Joe on the beach with a boy and what his reaction would be. I look at his hands and I’m looking for blood on his knuckles, on his shirt. Joe’s blood.

  But his hands are clean.

  Out in the corridor, Mia is asleep, stretched across three chairs with my jacket over her. Patrick reaches down and strokes her cheek, his hand brushing hair off her face.

  I hold my hands behind my back because my instinct is to drag him away from her. He moves away from Mia and comes over to me, standing too close. The wall is behind me and I can’t step away.

  “What happened?” he asks again.

  “I don’t know. Joe told the police he doesn’t remember. He didn’t see who attacked him.” I’m pressed against the wall and he’s facing me, his arm next to me on the wall, leaning in to kiss my forehead.

  “I rushed here as soon as I got your message. I’m sorry I missed your call before.”

  I turn my face away and duck from his kiss. “I thought it was Ian Hooper.”

  “This again? Sarah, why the hell would Ian Hooper attack Joe?”

  He’s right. But if not Ian Hooper…

  “Was it you?” I whisper.

  He steps back and his face shuts down. I shouldn’t have said it. “You think I’d do this to my own son?” His voice rises as he looks down at his hands and I wonder if he sees the same thing I do: his anger as he turned toward Joe.

  “He’s been self-harming,” I say. “His arms are scarred and Mia says he’s been doing it for months.”

  “I know. I saw the doctor. I think—”

  “Mia says it’s my fault, because of what I did—the pills and—”

  “Don’t, Sarah. Don’t blame yourself. Don’t start that again. He’s acting up, punishing you, looking for attention.”

  “He’s not a toddler throwing a tantrum, he’s cutting himself. We have to address this, Patrick.”

  Patrick shakes his head. “You’re making too much of it. He needs to be grounded, not indulged.”

  “I’m going to make that appointment with the therapist.”

  “No.”

  I reach for Patrick’s arm to stop him from marching away. “Yes. We’re not going to pretend this isn’t happening. We’re not going to pretend everything’s fine while Joe is locked in his room, slicing his arms open.”

  I’m speaking too loudly, but Patrick turns to face me.

  “He’s going to get the help he needs,” I say. “And I don’t think this move has been good for either of them. I don’t think it’s been good for us.”

  “Didn’t take you long to find another reason to leave, did it?”

  “I’m not using our son as a fucking excuse.”

  There’s a silence that lasts too long.

  “But you’re saying we should move? Give up after a month and sell the house I’ve waited half my life to get back?”

  I make myself stand straight and look him in the eye. “Yes.”

  “No,” he says. “No. Those scars on his arms are old. Moving here was the right thing to do, you’ll see. The murders are nothing but bad history. Ian Hooper is not hanging around watching the house. Whatever is troubling Joe got left behind when we moved. I wish you’d do the same and let it go. If you insist, he can see the damn therapist, but honestly? Whatever is worrying him, it’s not the house. And we are not moving. Ever.”

  But not all the scars are old.

  “Hey, Sarah.”

  I recognize her voice right away but don’t believe she’s really here. I’ve picked up my phone so many times to call her and put it down again in the last two days, since Mia told me about the affair. I turn and my mind paints guilt and deceit on her face.

  “How did you know?”

  “Patrick called me,” Caroline says.

  The taste of vomit rises in my throat, sour and bitter.

  “How is Joe?” she says.

  I take a deep breath. “Physically, he’ll be fine—a lot of bruising, a few breaks.”

  “But?”

  I flinch. That awful, rusty knife of a but. “He’s been self-harming. For months, maybe longer, the doctor thinks.”

  Caroline looks shaken as she steps away from me. “God. Fuck. Fuck, Sarah, I’m sorry.”

  “I didn’t know—I didn’t have a clue.” I blurt it out like I expect Caroline to accuse me of letting it happen. But is it any better not to have known? Not to have noticed my son bleeding? I’m crying again. I’m trying to be so damn strong, but I can’t stop the tears.

  Mia is still sleeping across the chairs, so I turn away in case she wakes up and sees me crying. “What exactly do you want, Caroline?”

  Her turn to have tears in her eyes. “I couldn’t stand seeing you like that anymore,” she says. “You were dying way before you took those damn pills. Fading away right in front of my eyes. I couldn’t stand it anymore when you wouldn’t listen to me. I’m so sorry I got angry with you at the hospital, but it’s because I love you. Surely you know that.”

  “I’m not fading anymore.”

  She looks at me, my fighting stance, my windswept hair, whatever expression is showing on my face. “No. No, you’re not. I guess Patrick was right about the house, about the move being a good thing.”

  I gasp. No, no, that’s not what she’s meant to see. “It’s not the house.” I say it louder than I intended and Mia stirs on her chairs. I hold my breath, but she doesn’t wake.

  “Listen,” Caroline says. “I know… I know we have our issues, stuff to sort out, but why doesn’t Mia come home with me?”

  “What, now?”

  “Yes. You need time with Joe. Let her come and stay with me for the weekend so you can concentrate on Joe’s recovery.”

  “She won’t want to,” I say. “You know why.”

  She looks wary. “Sarah, I don’t know what you mean. Did something happen with Mia? I could stay tonight, take Mia home for you?”

  Caroline, Patrick, and Mia in the house, playing happy family. I grit my teeth. “I know,” I say.

  “Know what?”

  “About you and Patrick. Mia saw you.”

  Her face drains of color. So it’s true.

  “No, Sarah. Listen—”

  “No. I don’t need this now. I don’t want to hear your excuses and lies. You were supposed to be my friend. My best friend.”

  “It’s not what you think.”

  “Oh, please.” I pause as Mia stirs again. “I can’t talk to you about this now while my son is lying in a hospital bed. You and Patrick—it’s insignificant, unimportant. Now, please go. Leave us alone.”

  “Sarah?” Caroline calls as I turn away. “There’s something you need to know. About…” She looks at Mia.

  “Whatever it is, this is not the moment, Caroline.”

  But she continues: “I’m sorry, but I asked Sean to look up Eve and where she was in care.”

  “Don’t say it,” I hiss.

  I can see fear in her face. My own fear rises as I glance back at Joe’s closed door. On top of everything else, she’s bringing up Eve? Now? How long until the secret comes out? How long until Joe finds out? He’s going to be eighteen in seven months. I think of the scars on his arms and picture him finding out and cutting and cutting and cutting… My shoulders stiffen. “I told you to leave it alone.”

  She’s chewing the inside of her cheek, her face twisted. “Sean found something else, though—”

  No. I can’t bear to hear anything more or to see her standing here any longer. “Get out!” I hear it come out of me as almost a scream. “Leave! And don’t you dare—don’t you bloody dare—mention a word to anyone about any of this.”

  CHAPTER 19

  I’m putting on my shoes when Mia appears in the doorway.

  “Don’t come,” she says.

  I let go of my laces and look up at her. Patrick is waiting downstairs for us all to go and collect Joe from the hospital.

  “You’ll stress him out.” When she sees my face
, her tone softens. “Even without meaning to.”

  I shake my head. “I won’t. I won’t do anything to upset him—that’s the last thing I want.”

  She folds her arms and frowns. “Bloody hell, Mum, even I can see it. You’re so wound up. I know it’s… Look, I’m sorry I said it was your fault at the hospital. Him cutting. It’s more than you, more than your overdose. But if you go in there this stressy, he’s going to worry again. He needs to be able to focus on himself, not you.”

  “I need to be there. Caroline said—”

  “Caroline?”

  “She was at the hospital. Your dad called her.”

  Mia frowns. “Fuck’s sake,” she mutters, nibbling the edge of a nail. “Did you… does Dad know I saw them together?”

  I shake my head. “I haven’t been able to—”

  “Don’t. I shouldn’t have said anything. I wish I hadn’t.”

  “Of course you should have told me.”

  There’s panic on her face. “But if you tell him now, with Joe, with everything going so wrong—”

  We both jump as Patrick calls up the stairs. “Sarah, Mia, we need to go.”

  Mia backs out onto the landing. “Please, Mum,” she says. “Stay here and work on being less… less everything.”

  I follow her downstairs. Patrick’s in the hall, car keys in hand.

  “I’ll stay here,” I say. “Get dinner ready. The chicken will be cooked by the time you get back if I stay at home.”

  So Mia goes with Patrick to collect Joe from the hospital and I wait here. Is Mia right? Or is Joe going to see my absence as another rejection? I can’t get it right. I’m either getting too close or stepping back too far. Everything that’s been going on with them I’ve missed, and my punishment for that is evident in the scars patterning Joe’s arms.

  I pick up my phone to call Anna, but it goes straight to voicemail. The chicken’s cooked and cooling on the table, the vegetables drying out in dishes in the oven. I should have gone with them. I look at the time—they’ll be at least another hour. The house is too quiet. I walk through, switching on lights, avoiding looking at the cellar door, the marks of the height chart on the living room wall.

  I shiver as I pass through the hall and the temperature seems to drop. God, I want a pill. I need something to quell the building panic in my stomach. It’s rising and I can’t stop the panicked voice in my head that’s screaming at me to get out, get out, run away. I pull a bottle of wine out of the cupboard and pour a glass, spilling it down myself in my haste to drink it.

  It’s getting dark outside. They’re late. Should I have let Patrick go to get him? No, stop. I won’t go there. It wouldn’t have been Patrick—it couldn’t. I’m being paranoid, letting my fears get to me. This is why Mia asked me to stay at home. She’s right: I wouldn’t have helped Joe turning up like this. I switch on the television, pace the room flicking through the channels, unable to stay still.

  Oh, God, there’s the car. I go out into the hall. Joe comes in first and I gasp, my hand flying to my stomach as the knot of panic grows. He looks worse out of the hospital, pale and fragile and broken. He ignores the hand I reach out to him, holds on to Mia instead as she hovers next to him. He shrinks away from Patrick coming in behind him.

  “I’ve got dinner ready—your favorite roast chicken,” I say, wanting to hug him but unable to move.

  “I’m not hungry,” he mutters, still looking at the floor. “I just want to go to bed.”

  “The hospital gave us some medication to bring home,” Patrick says, and the rustle of the hospital pharmacy bag acts like the chink of a bottle to a recovering alcoholic—my mouth goes dry and I want, so desperately want, to feed the panic with a little white pill. Joe limps upstairs with Mia trailing after him, and I’m left to follow Patrick into the kitchen, where we eat cold, dry chicken, then head silently to bed.

  “Joe?” I knock on his door, hovering outside with a mug of tea for him. It’s Tuesday morning and Patrick and Mia have left for work and school, Mia clearly relieved to be getting out of the house after a bank holiday weekend spent tiptoeing around, all of us hiding in separate rooms. Joe has barely spoken, barely eaten. But this is the first time in an awful lot of years it’s just been me and him in the house for a whole day and maybe he’ll talk to me.

  He doesn’t answer, so I knock again, louder. I remember the days when the children were little and there were no closed doors. When Joe would spend hours at the table with me, coloring and painting and sticking and gluing, talking nonstop, filling me in on every little detail of his day at school.

  That’s not the Joe who opens the door, though. This is hidden Joe, the boy who one day started shutting me out, who’s been cutting his arms and living a life I know nothing about. I hate to think of him locked in there by himself, in that terrible old room of Patrick’s with the peeling walls.

  He opens the door a crack and I summon all my cheer, hold up the mug I’m carrying. “Tea?”

  I think he’s going to slam the door in my face.

  “The police called earlier, to see if you’ve remembered anything else.”

  “I told them: I was mugged. They came up behind me—I didn’t see anything.”

  “But they didn’t…” They didn’t take anything. Joe still had his phone and his wallet on him.

  He looks down at his feet. “They must have been scared off before they robbed me.”

  Scared off by what?

  “They want you to come into the station to give your statement. I told them you’re not well enough yet. And I called the school,” I say. “I’ve told them you won’t be back until next week. I thought we could have a quiet few days and do something together.”

  He stares at me and I have to look away. I sometimes think, when Joe looks at me, that he’ll see it all. And if he did, he’d hate me and I couldn’t stand that. I’d do anything to stop it. So I step back and he laughs.

  “Together?” he says. “What—will we go to the park so you can push me on the swings?”

  “I thought we could paint…” My voice trails off as I look at his swollen, bruised hand. God, could I get this more wrong? It’ll be weeks before he’s able to pick up a brush.

  “And you can forget about school,” he says. “I’m not going back to school. I’m never going back to school.”

  I take a breath and hold it to stop more stupid words from coming out. What about college? What about your exams? “Can I come in?” I say instead.

  He opens his door wider and I follow him inside, perching on the end of his bed.

  “I’m sorry,” he mutters.

  “For what?”

  He gestures down at his arms, hidden under the sleeves of his hoodie. “This.”

  “You don’t need to be sorry. But I do. I should have seen, should have known.”

  “It doesn’t have anything to do with you. I heard Mia shouting at you at the hospital, saying it was your fault. It’s not.”

  “But would you have talked to me—if I hadn’t fallen apart after your grandmother died? If I hadn’t taken those pills?”

  He leans back on his bed. “I don’t know.”

  I reach for his uninjured hand and squeeze it. “But now, Joe, will you talk to me now? You used to. Couldn’t we get that back?”

  He looks at me, his eyes full. “You stopped being there. You stopped hearing me. Dad found out. He caught me with a boy the day Nan died. The things he said… It’s why I took his fucking car. All that was going on and you knew nothing about it.”

  “Oh, God, Joe, I’m sorry.”

  “You never have room for anything but yourself and Dad, and it’s gotten so much worse since we moved here.”

  I can tell myself over and over that this move was down to Patrick, this house is Patrick’s dream… but I gave him that money. I took those pills—or, at least, everyone says I did. Us being here is down to me too. And now we’re stuck because Patrick will never agree to leave and no one else would ever
buy this house anyway. They’d walk through the door and feel the cold spots, sense what was behind the butterfly wallpaper. They’d see the history burned into the walls and they’d run like we should have. We’re stuck in the Murder House, and I can see Mia drifting away and Joe self-destructing and Patrick losing control, and I know it’s down to me and I’m overwhelmed by it. I can’t see past it all to find a way out.

  “You tell me to talk to you,” Joe says, “but will you listen? Will you see?” He leans toward me. “You want to know what happened? I lied when I said I didn’t remember. I was so angry with Dad I went out and… I picked someone up. He bought booze and we went to the beach to… I was so mad I was ready to have sex with some stranger right there on the beach. But I changed my mind.”

  “And he beat you up? God, Joe, you have to tell the police, you have to—”

  “No, you don’t get it. I started it. I had a go at him—I started the fight. I pushed him, provoked him. I said the things to him that Dad said to me. I’d gotten drunk and I was angry and hurting and wanting to hurt but, Jesus, what did I think was going to happen? Look at me—did I think I was going to win? Did I think he wouldn’t fight back?”

  He shakes his head. “If the police find him, he’ll tell them I started it. I’ll be the one arrested. He got angry and fought back, started hitting me and kicking me, and I thought I was going to die. I thought he was going to kill me. He was off his head on something and he wouldn’t stop… but someone else was there.”

  I pull him toward me, not letting go when he resists. I pull him into my arms and hold him, not tight, careful of his injuries, but I don’t let go. I hold him until he relaxes and lets his head drop onto my shoulder.

  “Someone was watching us,” he says, and my shoulder stiffens under him. “It was dark and… But I’m sure I saw someone. He watched this boy kicking me. He watched him stamp on me and scream at me and he watched me crawl back up onto the street and he did nothing.”