A little hiking wouldn’t kill her.
Chapter Fifty-Six
Three years ago...
They went dancing. Well, that was kind of an oversimplification. Tim had somehow convinced them all that dancing was in their futures, that dancing was inevitable, that going to the Huddersfield Brickwork was destiny. What’s more—it was their destiny for Edmund to drive because he had only had two pints and Tim didn’t want to wait around for a taxi.
So Edmund drove, and he didn’t drink too much more at the Brickwork, and walking back to the car at thirteen minutes past one in the morning, Edmund assessed how drunk he was. He’d had three pints—including the two at The Hamlet—and three shots that Tim had practically forced down his throat. He was over the limit; there was zero doubt about that and even zero-er—was that a word?—chance that if he got caught, he wouldn’t get his license taken away from him, but he thought he could manage getting the five of them home. Putting on the blowers in the car and playing some loud music would do wonders. He wasn’t a big drinker usually, so he was feeling the effects a bit more than a heavy drinker would have. It was the shots that were getting to him. He was halfway drunk. Every time he turned his head, it took a few seconds for his eyes to catch up. But you didn’t really whirl your head round when you were driving, and Edmund was a damn good driver.
This would be his first real foray into the criminal circle. But then, if no one knew, then no one knew. Who was to say he was over the limit, when no one was around to clarify. Maybe he somehow wasn’t over the limit—there was no way he could know for sure. And it wasn’t as if there’d be any police around anyway. The stretch between Marsden and Huddersfield was practically a ghost town. Sections of it didn’t even have streetlights, for God’s sake, let alone cameras. They would be absolutely fine.
His skills whilst drunk—playing video games, anyway—were unparalleled. One time, the group had got themselves shitfaced and challenged each other to competitive Surgeon Simulator—basically a motion-controlled digital game of Operation. Edmund had won comfortably and he’d been way further gone than he was now. He got the ruptured spleen out and the funny bone without even breaking a sweat. Super chill-like! He was going to do it—had to, really. If he backed down the five of them would be stranded in Huddersfield, and Tim would never let him hear the end of it.
Edmund picked up the pace and caught up with the others. None of them would have any objection to Edmund driving. They were all too far along to voice any kind of issue. Tim had bought even more shots for them, as if he was at least trying to keep Edmund in an acceptable frame of mind.
Edmund thought that the flashing lights and the loud music had probably affected him more than the drink. He was brewing a hell of a migraine, and wanted to get home and to bed as quickly as possible. And the car was the best way to make that happen.
The five of them rounded the corner to the parking lot, and at the sight of the car, Robert and Tim cheered. “Shotgun,” Tim said, and laughed, even though no one would have ever attempted to take the passenger seat. It seemed to be an unwritten rule that it belonged to Tim, and if Tim was driving, it belonged to Edmund.
Tim broke out in a haphazard run to the car, while the others laughed at his jerky movements. Robert and Pru were having a hushed conversation with each other, and Rachel was busy fiddling with something in her bag. No one saw Edmund stop and take a set of slow deep breaths.
He could do this; he’d driven for hundreds of hours in his life and never got so much as a speeding ticket. He didn’t even think anyone had ever beeped him.
He started toward the car.
What was the worst that could happen?
Chapter Fifty-Seven
Three years ago...
The future was dictated by an infinite number of variables. You could never predict the future because of this. And that was why the future was exciting. That was why people went on living—went outside and just didn’t give up and stay in bed. No one could even start to list the variables that led her, Samantha Ferringham, to that winding road that night.
Who knew when it was decided that she’d be here? Firstly, it was her decision to walk to the hotel. Then, it was her decision to get the late train. Then, it was her decision to come to Huddersfield a day early. Before, it was her decision to take the job lecturing at Huddersfield Uni. Going further back, she had to travel to Huddersfield because of her decision to live in London. And that was because of her decision to say yes to marrying Robin. And she met Robin because she decided to go to Emma Ferringham’s party at her house. There, the celestial red thread split even more: What possessed Emma Ferringham—her GP—to invite her to that party? What drove her to that meeting with Emma in that hardware store, where they struck up an unlikely friendship?
These strands wove a tapestry of a life. A tapestry no one would see. It would hang in the Museum of the Higher-Ups, the destiny makers—if there was such a thing. She didn’t believe in that—of course she didn’t. She was a psychologist. But sometimes, when her mind wandered, and she was overworked, it was warm to feel that everything was mapped out.
She guided her flashlight down the road. The blue line of Google Maps said she was almost there, maybe one more hill and she’d be able to see the hotel. The road she was walking on was very remote—there were no signs of life anywhere. Looking back, she could see the sprawling lights of Huddersfield, but they were far enough away to feel like they were in a different world.
Variables. A game of dominoes. Not always a game you wanted to win. And as she started to see the failing light of her flashlight, she wondered which variable was responsible for her forgetting to charge her phone before she had embarked on her trip. If she knew which one it was, she would curse it until she ran out of curses. Because her phone died and she was plunged into darkness.
Obviously running the light and the Google Maps app at the same time was too much for her phone. The blue line had been following the road, so all she had to do was continue onward. Soon enough, she would be at the hotel, with light, comfortable beds and, most important, Wi-Fi and power outlets. She would be able to sleep, plan her lecture and charge her phone all at the same time. This was what compelled her forward. That and the fact that turning back now would take twice as long.
In the pitch black she felt comfort in feeling the road beneath her feet. The silence of the surroundings also. She heard some chirping of birds who should almost definitely be asleep by now, and some rustling of leaves as though the nighttime creatures were waking up.
She continued walking, with only the light of the moon to guide her, thinking that she had almost definitely walked as far as the Maps had told her it was to the hotel. And then she heard another sound. The sound of a motor growing louder and louder. She couldn’t tell if it was just some joyrider in Huddersfield gunning it way too hard, or if it was a vehicle actually approaching. A few seconds more and she decided it was the latter.
Okay, Google Maps screwed her over. She would flag down the car and ask if they knew where the hotel was and if she could get dropped off there. She stuck her thumb out in the direction she thought was the road, because she had only seen hitchhiking in films and that was how you did it, right?
The motor sound grew louder and she looked for the car’s lights, but there were no lights. Still the sound grew louder and louder. And eventually, she felt the presence of something—something coming at her fast and strong. She realized what was happening a second too late.
An indescribable pain in her side. She was whisked off her feet. And then her forehead crunched against something sharp and spiky. She felt her forehead glisten with running liquid.
And then she was flung. The world turned over like she was in a washing machine. Over and over and over and over. It was as if she was spiraling forever—and she wondered what was happening. What had hit her? And what was she doing? Where was she? Who was she? There was only
one constant—the face of a kind and sheepish man, with dots of stubble and electric eyes, who had once come up to her at a party and asked her to dance. His name was—
The ground—which somehow was above her—came to meet her. And the last thing she heard was a phenomenal crunch before the pain sent her under.
Chapter Fifty-Eight
Three years earlier...
They sat there, not believing what had just happened. It couldn’t have, right? This was fantasy. Things like this didn’t happen in real life. Things like this didn’t happen to them. Edmund was visibly shaking, and gagging on his tongue. Tim sat as still as he ever had in the passenger seat, shaken. In the back seat, Pru had buried herself in Rachel’s shoulder, silently sobbing. Robert was speechless and had closed his eyes as if that would help.
The windshield was smeared with blood.
They sat there, staring out of the cracked windshield, seeing only the ground in the path of the car headlights. All of their thoughts were muddled, indecipherable—but the one thing they were all thinking—“I hope it was a deer.”
“Oh God.” Pru gave a muffled wail into Rachel’s shoulder.
They had all sobered up in an instant. They had never felt less drunk.
“It was an animal. Don’t worry,” Tim said. “It was an animal, right?” To Edmund.
Edmund didn’t respond. He just kept looking ahead. He knew it wasn’t an animal. He was going too fast. He had just wanted to get home, go to sleep, carry on his life. He wanted to go to university, find a girl, get married, have kids. And now all that was gone. Because he had been going about twenty miles an hour too fast. And he hadn’t seen her. She had pretty much been invisible—no light, no sound, no sense she was there. She hadn’t even screamed when he’d hit her. She was mute, and now she had landed behind the car, ten or twenty feet behind them. And it was his fault.
His future evaporated in front of his eyes. He almost reached out for it, trying to grab it, but it disappeared like breath on a mirror.
“Holy shit, Ed,” Robert said, opening his eyes. He sounded smaller than he ever had. “What the hell have you done?”
“Hey, shut up,” Tim said. “It was an animal. Okay? We’re fine.”
“No, but shit,” Robert said, and he opened his door. And went out into the night.
Edmund was roused by the sound. They couldn’t see it—her—not before him, anyway. He needed that, to see her. Edmund took a shaky hand and fumbled with the car door handle. Tim reached out to put a hand on his shoulder but Edmund was out of the car before he made contact.
The night whipped around him, the wind icy cold. He knew he was crying because two tracks down his face felt freezing. On legs far more uncertain than before he had got in the car, he ran after Robert. Somewhere, he still hoped that he had mistaken an animal for a person, but as soon as he found his phone in his pocket, pulled it out and turned the torch on, that thought was dashed.
Robert saw her, and started to gag.
Edmund beat him to it, rushing over to the grass verge and throwing up the contents of his stomach, which at this point were mostly liquid. He forced himself to look at her. A woman lay there in the wake of his car. She was in a dark blue raincoat, her head to the side, bleeding onto the road. Her limbs were all strangely placed as though she were a marionette puppet someone had put down carelessly. Her left leg was jutting out at an angle that couldn’t be possible.
“We’re screwed,” Robert said, his eyes clapped on her. “We’re shitting screwed. Look at it. I mean. Look at her. It’s over. We’re screwed.”
Edmund suddenly felt white-hot anger, and launched himself at Robert. Robert was taken unawares and went sprawling on the road. Edmund scrambled after him and knelt over him. He got Robert by the scruff of the neck and pulled his face to his. “You’re thinking about us? You slimy little shit. We just ran someone over and you’re thinking about us?”
“From where I was sitting,” Robert spit, “I think it was you who ran her over.”
Edmund saw red, and raised a fist to him, fully intending to bring it down with as much force as he could. But then Tim was grasping him by the shoulders and pulling him up off Robert.
“Oh my God.” Rachel.
“What have we done?” Pru.
Edmund looked around. They were all there, standing far enough from the woman to accept it might be a mirage, but close enough to really know that it wasn’t. Edmund couldn’t think. It was as if his mind had seized up and thoughts actively hurt.
“Is she dead?” Someone. Pru, he thought. He couldn’t look away from the woman.
“She has a suitcase,” Rachel said, gesturing with an uncertain hand past the body. A suitcase was lying, slightly exploded, leaking clothes onto the ground.
Tim stepped forward, closer to her.
“What are you doing?” Robert, who was awkwardly getting up from the road, said.
“Someone has to check,” Tim said, almost calmly. “If she’s still alive, we have to get her to a hospital.” Tim walked to her, crossing the scene into reality. The woman’s face was mercifully pointed away from them, but now Tim’s eyes lit up—not in a good way—as he rounded her and looked down upon her in all her rotten glory. “Jesus,” he muttered. He crouched down and took a finger and placed it on her neck.
That moment seemed to last forever. Edmund watched as Tim waited, his finger perched under her chin. Edmund hoped against hope. This couldn’t be happening. He had so much he was going to achieve. He would lose the world and the world would lose him.
Tim withdrew his hand and stood up. “She’s dead.”
A fresh sob escaped Pru, Robert let out a distinct moan, and Edmund’s world started to spin. Only Tim and Rachel remained totally silent, regarding each other in the way they often did. They were having a silent conversation, communicating in the way only twins could do.
Edmund’s legs failed him, and he fell backward onto his arse with a whump. Dead. She was dead. He had run over someone and she was dead. He was a murderer. He clawed his way to the roadside and threw up again. There was nothing anymore. What happened in that split second would define him forever. A slight slip in concentration and a life was gone, and another life was ruined. What was he going to do now? Wherever could he go? He would forever be the man who killed a woman while he was drunk.
“Get up,” Tim said, and Edmund looked up. Tim was standing over him with his hand outstretched. The same hand he had used to touch the woman. Edmund shook his head, so Tim reached out and grabbed him by the wrist and pulled him to a standing position again. “Keep it together.”
Edmund scoffed. “Keep it together? Don’t you get what’s just happened? Or are you still five parts pissed?”
Tim breathed in and out. He exuded a sense of silence and calmness that was almost infectious. “I know what happened. And I’m sorry it did. But we need to think about what happens now. And we need to think quickly. This road is hardly the busiest ever, but someone’ll be along sooner or later.”
“What the hell are you talking about?” Robert said.
“What happens now?” Pru said, breaking away from Rachel. “What happens now? Edmund just ran someone over. He’s like three times over the limit, and we let him drive. We’re all culpable. What happens now is we all go to prison for a very long time.”
“What?” Robert said. “It was Edmund driving, not us.”
“Shut up, you idiot,” Edmund said.
“Yeah, you’re right, Robert,” Pru said. “But you didn’t exactly stop him driving, did you? You were happy to let him drive when you just wanted to get home.”
“We’re all in this together,” Rachel said.
“Yes,” Robert said, rounding on Edmund, “but some of us are more in it than others.”
Tim stepped between them and shoved Robert away. “We can’t start turning on each other. We all want
ed Ed to drive us, which means we all...have blood on our hands. What we need to think about is how we want this to play out. Do we really want this to be the end? Because it will be. This will be the end for all of us. Whatever our hopes, whatever our dreams, none of that matters anymore. Because a woman thought it was wise to walk on a narrow country road without any light or distinction as to where she was placed. You understand?”
Rachel nodded. But she seemed the only one who got it.
“What the hell are you talking about, Tim?” Pru said, throwing her hands toward the woman on the ground. She wasn’t a person anymore; she was a dead body. “Don’t you understand the shit that’s coming out of your mouth? This is serious.”
Tim looked around at her. “I know it’s serious. And I promise you I’m meeting it with an equal amount of sincerity.”
“Sincerity,” Robert said, “or insanity?”
Tim wheeled around to him. “I’ve found that sometimes they’re the same thing.”
Edmund stepped forward to meet Tim. “Tim, I understand what you’re trying to say, but this happened. And we’re not criminals—at least not deliberate ones. I don’t know what you’re planning, but I don’t think we can ignore this—I can’t ignore this. I killed that woman, and that’s going to be with me forever. I have to turn myself in, and I have to face the consequences. And even then, I don’t know how I’m going to live with myself.”
Tim looked at them all in turn, stopping on Rachel. Rachel went to Edmund and took him aside. Tim gathered the other two together and started talking in a hushed tone that Edmund couldn’t hear.
Now You See Me Page 21