A Face in the Crowd: An absolutely unputdownable psychological thriller

by Kerry Wilkinson

  I should be tiring, but, as I get to the slope for the second time, I feel surprisingly fresh. As I clasp Billy’s lead tighter, I press on, knowing I should beat my best time. Everything is going fantastically until, from nowhere, my shoe comes off. I take two steps without it until I fully realise what’s happened. My socks are little protection against the scratchy scattering of small stones underfoot as I hop to a stop. Billy strains on the lead before turning to look back over his shoulder, giving me an angsty, Why-have-you-stopped? look.

  As soon as I retrieve my shoe, it becomes apparent why it came off. It’s not because the laces were too loose, or that one snapped, it’s because – somehow – the entire leather has split from the tongue at the top, through to the sole. I find myself staring at the wreckage, wondering quite how it could have happened. Runners start to overtake as Billy completes the humiliation by sitting on the grass. Even he’s given up on me.

  Something sinks within me. The trainers were a charity-shop find. A miracle of circumstance in that the cashier was putting out a new set of donations and I got hold of them before anyone else could. I paid £15 for something that should have been £140. I know that because I looked them up afterwards. It sounds pathetic – I know – but finding the bargain feels like one of my greatest achievements of recent years. I don’t really get to have nice things, not any more. If I need a new item of clothing – actually need – I’ll go through sale racks and hope to find something that isn’t either enormously huge or microscopically small. The £15 for these trainers were a stretch but I wear them for everything – work, getting around, and, of course, running.

  Karen slows as she passes, huffing ‘You okay?’ in my direction. I hold up my broken shoe for her to see – but she’s already past, perhaps on for a personal best herself. I don’t blame her.

  The grass is dewy and the water soaks through my sock as I set off to walk back towards the start line. I can hear myself wheezing – but it’s not from the exertion of running. Panic attacks used to come regularly, but it’s been a while since I’ve been overwhelmed by one. That’s not who I am any longer. I can control it.

  I stop and crouch, smoothing the hair on Billy’s back as he stares up at me with confusion. Breathe in through the nose, out through the mouth. Concentrate.

  It’s hard to describe the desolation. They’re only shoes and yet they represent so much more. I don’t know how I’m going to be able to replace them. The fact it’s all so stupid, that it’s shoes – of all things – that are getting me emotional, only makes it worse.

  I am almost back at the start line, one shoe on, one off, when I feel my gaze being pulled towards one of the benches over by the trees at the entrance to the park. A steady stream of runners are jogging past, but it’s not them I notice. It’s not any of them who are staring back at me. I spot the red anorak first and, before I know it, I’m drifting across to the woman whose eyes have not wavered from me.

  ‘Melanie,’ is the word I go with as I stand over her. Say what you see and all that. I don’t know what else to come out with.

  Her face is craggier than I remember, the wrinkles deeper, her hair a wiry scrubbing pad of grey and rusty brown. Some things never change, however. There was always spite and fury in her eyes – and, if anything, it burns brighter in the years since we last saw one another. Billy must feel it, too. He sits behind my legs, not daring to look at her.

  Melanie continues to stare but says nothing. Eventually, she twists away to gaze out towards the water on the far side of the park. Red-faced runners continue to bob past, huffing and puffing their way to the finish line.

  ‘I didn’t know you got to this end of town,’ I add. The silence between us is agonisingly awkward.

  Melanie tugs her red anorak away from her collar and gasps a loud gust of breath.

  ‘Are you, um…?’ I’m not sure what I’m asking; not even particularly certain why I’m continuing to talk to her. It’s been four years since we last saw one another. She was a venomous inferno of anger then. I’ve moved on and I suppose I’m wondering if she has.

  In a flash, she spins back to me, eyes blazing. ‘Oh, you’d like that, wouldn’t you?’

  She spits the words with such spite that I take half a step backwards, almost treading on poor Billy.

  ‘Like what?’ I manage.

  In a blink, Melanie is on her feet. She glares daggers and then turns with a swish and stomps off towards the park exit. I watch her go and it’s only as she disappears out of sight that I feel able to move again.

  I suppose I thought she might have moved away from here and found herself some peace elsewhere. A little place near the seaside, or a flat in a city centre where everything and anything is on the doorstep. It’s no surprise she’s still around, of course. It’s not like I moved; not like I found peace elsewhere. We live in the same big town, but it’s easy to get lost among so many people. To be invisible. Her in her space, me in mine.

  It’s only as I release a large rasp that I realise I’ve been holding my breath. I shiver with relief and, suddenly, it feels as if I’m still the shaky, traumatised woman I was in years gone by.

  The thing is, it’s not that I don’t see her point of view. There’s a part of me that understands exactly why she is how she is. Melanie doesn’t like me, which is completely reasonable given that she believes I killed both her sons.

  Chapter Five

  When it comes to fashion statements, shoes that are literally being held together by sticky tape certainly sends a message. Admittedly, the message is: ‘This person cannot afford to buy new shoes’, but it’s a clear statement nonetheless.

  My only other option of shoes to wear to work is a low pair of heels that are leftovers from my school days more than a decade ago. There’s no way I’ll be able to stand in those all day – so it’s my taped-up trainers or bare feet.

  I have to go to work but cannot resist opening the envelope of money to check it’s still there. It is, of course, precisely in the way I repacked it all with the neat, uncrimped notes at the top. The small voice telling me to take what I need for new shoes is starting to become louder. There’s still nothing online about missing or stolen money. If nobody’s missing it, then what would be wrong with taking a bit for myself…?

  I reluctantly put the envelope of money into the drawer underneath the television and then say goodbye to Billy. He’s used to being by himself while I’m at work – but it’s still hard to escape the guilt for leaving him alone. In between showering and changing, I’ve had another missed call from ‘unknown’. There is no number to call back, no clue as to who is trying to get in contact.

  After closing my door, I pause for a second, drawn to the flat opposite. Good or bad, Hamilton House is the type of block in which everyone recognises everyone else. There is a certain amount of all being in it together, as they say. We know it’s a bit of a crappy place to live – but it’s still ours. There are three floors of six flats and that creates a community. If someone has moved in opposite, there is a strangeness in that nobody has seemingly seen the person.

  I head downstairs and there are posters for Karen’s birthday party at the bottom with ‘all welcome’ written on each in felt tip. Karen’s written her flat number on there, inviting anyone who wants more details to knock on her door.

  Outside, and the chill is still clinging to the air. I pull my coat tighter and take a few steps towards the bus stop before halting. Before I know what I’m doing, I’m back inside and rushing up the stairs. I wrench my door open and almost fall inside with the speed of it all.

  Billy is lying on the sofa and his ears perk up with confusing expectation. I whisper a ‘sorry’ in his direction and then grab the envelope of money from the drawer. It’s comforting and feels like something I need to have close. I tuck it into my bag and then wrench the zipper shut. After another apology to Billy, I close the door and then I’m off again. This time I don’t change my mind.

  It’s only when I pass the low wal
l on Allen Street that I remember the feeling of first seeing the money in the envelope. The thrill of it all. It was nearly a day ago and yet I can still feel the buzz. There’s an urge to open my bag and check it over, but I force it away and continue on until I arrive at the stop just as the bus is pulling in.

  The difference between Saturday morning and Friday evening on the number 24 bus is ridiculous. Today, there are barely half-a-dozen people spread out among the seats. I show the driver my pass – my biggest monthly outgoing aside from rent – and then get a double space to myself. One of the other passengers is seemingly passed out across two seats, his beanie hat pulled low over his eyes as he rests his head in the crook of his elbow. Everyone else is on their respective phones and I copy their lead. There are still no hits for missing or stolen money. I would hand it in but, if I was to take it to the police, who’s to say it wouldn’t end up being divvied out among them? If anyone should get it, surely it should be me?

  I glance towards the front of the bus, eyeing the spot near the pole where I was standing last night. There’s nobody there now, but there can’t really be any doubt that this is where the envelope appeared in my bag. Could it really have been by accident? Surely the alternative is weirder – that someone gave me this money? But who? And, if it was deliberate, why not simply hand it to me?

  So many questions.

  I open the zip of my bag and finger the top of the envelope, craving to touch what’s inside. I know it’s strange – I know, I know – but I can’t help myself. I picture those poor, hungry people that appear on television appeals every time it’s Comic Relief, Children In Need, or whatever. If someone gives them food, it gets eaten. There’s no need for politeness or reticence. The amount of money in the envelope is close to three months of wages for me – why shouldn’t I treat it in the same way that hungry people treat food? I’ve not stolen it.

  For some, it’s pocket change. I read once that if Bill Gates was to drop a $20 note, it wouldn’t be worth the time it would take him to pick it up. He earns more from carrying on with his day. For someone like that, this money is nothing. For me, it can change my life.

  I’m so lost in the dilemma that I almost miss my stop. It’s only when the lad with the beanie hat jumps up in alarm that I notice where we are. The driver has started to move, but I call a ‘hang on’ and he stops once more for me to get off. From here, I only need to cross the road to get to work.

  Crosstown Supermarket is something of a throwback to times that are almost gone. Somehow, the owners have held out against the giant superstores and are still running a singular, medium-sized, independent shop. Nobody – most of all the people who work there – can quite believe it’s not been bought out yet.

  When I get into the staff changing room at the back of the store, Daff – who does not like being called Daphne – is arguing with someone on her phone. She nods at me in acknowledgement as I get my uniform out of my locker and then she continues to ask whoever’s on the phone quite why they’ve charged her interest on a credit card payment she says she’s already made. I listen in without making it obvious and inspect my taped-together trainers, which have held together remarkably well.

  Daff finishes her call with a flourish of, ‘Yeah, well, you can whistle for it, darling’, and then tosses her phone into her bag.

  I ask if everything’s all right and she snorts what is probably the filthiest laugh I’ve ever heard.

  ‘Can’t let ’em grind you down,’ she says, before taking an envelope out of her locker. There’s a moment in which I’m confused, as if everyone I know has been delivered an envelope of cash, but it’s not that at all. She waggles it towards me.

  ‘You got a pound for the lottery?’ she asks.

  It’s hard not to sigh at this. I’ve never been interested in gambling – even a pound twice a week for the lottery. The problem is that everybody else who works here – literally every single person – does chip in two pounds a week for the syndicate. Rationality tells me we’ll never win and yet I know I couldn’t face seeing all these people around me sharing out the millions as I rue hanging onto my two pounds. I don’t know how anyone could ever deal with that. I know I couldn’t – and so I go along with it all. It’s lose-lose, of course – because if I was to count the number of weeks I’ve been chucking in two quid and add it all up, I’d only depress myself at the money lost. We once won ten pounds, but that went back into ‘the pot’ and was, of course, lost in the following draw.

  I pass Daff a pound coin and she drops it into her envelope, before writing my name on the front.

  ‘Cheer up,’ she says with an enthusiastic grin.

  I return hers with a forced smile of my own, wondering what precisely people think might happen when they tell others to ‘cheer up’. Oh, great, all the things I was dealing with are solved because someone told me to be a bit happier.

  Daff starts wittering about some night out she’s planning this evening. ‘Everyone’s coming,’ she promises, presumably referring to the people with whom we work. It’s little incentive for me. These are the people with whom I’ve been thrown together. It isn’t as if we chose to work with actual friends, not that I have many of them either. Even though I never left the town in which I went to school, I have no real friends left over from those times. I gave that up when I moved in with Ben all those years ago.

  Either way, I have numerous issues with going out that involve, but are not limited to:

  I have no money

  I like being in bed early

  I have no going-out clothes

  No group can ever make a decision as to a venue

  I’m too old for morning-after hangovers

  I make small talk with Daff and give a non-committal ‘maybe’ when she asks if I fancy coming out with ‘the girls’ later. If I was honest, I’d tell her, ‘Not a chance’.

  As the clock ticks around to the start of our shift, Daff puts her bag in her locker – as-per company policy – but I know I can’t do the same. Not with the envelope of money inside. I need to feel it close. I stuff mine under my arm and head to the tills, before burying it in the space underneath the conveyor belt.

  A person can learn a lot about others when working on a supermarket checkout. It’s a bit like sharing a bus, I suppose: there’s a bit of everything – of everyone. Everybody needs to eat and so everyone uses a supermarket sooner or later. Most go about their business as quickly as they can – a swift in and out and they’re done until the next time. There’s always a minority, of course. Those who drop something like milk on the floor, watch it splat and spread, and then walk off as if nothing has happened. It happens almost every day. Then there are people who scatter trolleys here, there and everywhere in the car park because a short walk from their car to the front of the store is seemingly too much.

  Some ignore the ‘10 items or fewer’ and wheel through full trolleys but then act incredulously when told they need to check out in a different place. A surprising amount try to use coupons meant for one product to try to get money off another – and then there is the thing that makes it clear to absolutely everyone that the person involved is a horrendous human being. It’s not as if I want a lengthy conversation with the people who pass by my till. A nod and a ‘hello’ is usually enough. Sometimes people ask about my day (how do you think it’s going, seeing as I’m working at a checkout?) – or I’ll ask about theirs. It’s all fine. What is really hard to stomach, though, are those people who spend the entire process talking into their phone, ignoring me as if I’m some sort of robot at their beck and call. I want to slap their phones away, to stare into their eyes and remind them that I’m an actual, real human being. To let them know that I have feelings and that it’s really not that much to ask that they acknowledge me in the merest way imaginable. A good start is actually looking at me, or muttering ‘hi’ – even if they don’t mean it.

  I don’t do any of that, of course. I scan their shopping, take the money, and let it simmer.

>   Time always seems like it passes quicker on Saturdays, mainly because there are more people trying to get their shopping done. At times, it is a stream of one person after another. Through it all, I think of the seven pounds and fifty pence I’m making every hour. With my lunch break, it is £52.50 a day and it’s hard not to calculate how many days of work there are sitting in my bag at my feet. How I could remove three twenty-pound notes right now and be better off than I am spending seven-and-a-half hours in this job.

  I’m lost in those thoughts as a young woman arrives at the till cradling a baby in one arm and pushing a trolley with the other. Her dark hair is dirty and there are some murky-looking stains on her top. She has to be twenty at the most and struggles to make eye contact as she places her items on the conveyor belt. Her child has no such worries, gazing at me with deep blue eyes that haunt and charm in equal measure. The mother is so gaunt, so small.

  There is a packet of formula, a box of rusks, a bottle of lotion and a bag of nappies. Everything is the cheap, own-brand items that we sell. Other than that, there are four packets of ten-pence noodles and a large bag of porridge oats.

  We share a look that lasts barely a second, but, in that moment, it’s as if we are sisters. Out of everything, we’ve bonded over porridge oats.

  She pulls out a tattered shopping bag and waits at the end of the conveyor belt, still balancing her child with one arm.

  ‘I’ll pack,’ I tell her and she nods. There is acne around her mouth and unfilled piercings in her ears. I wonder when she last ate.

  I pass the rusks over the scanner, waiting for the beep and the price: £2. The girl stares at the amount and then her eyes give her away as she glances back to the trolley. It’s impossible to miss now: there are two further packets of nappies sitting on the rail underneath the main trolley. I look at them and then at her. She holds my eyes and we’re still sisters.