by Ali Knight
The phone rings. ‘Mrs Forman? Are you coming to get your children?’
‘What?’
‘It’s the school reception here. Josh and Ava are waiting in the welfare room. I presume you’re near by?’ Her tone is crisp and accusing.
It’s 3.45 p.m. I have completely forgotten the time, have spent the entire day on Paul’s email grubbing around in his work life. I have not eaten or moved from the study. I spring into harassed-mother mode. ‘Of course, I’m nearly there, I got terribly delayed, the traffic—’
‘Make haste, my dear.’
She cuts off my tired excuses. She’s heard them every day for years from women juggling too many balls. For a mad moment I consider telling her how it really is. ‘I think my husband is a murderer.’ She probably wouldn’t even bat an eyelid. ‘Be that as it may, my dear, make haste,’ she’d say, and click the phone down.
18
That evening the police come back for Paul’s account. I’m unnerved they’re working so quickly and ticking so many boxes. A dull ache starts in my stomach; the slow churn of fear and misgiving. They hover in the hallway, adjusting bags and shedding coats. I’m about to explain that Paul is out on his run and that he won’t be long when he clatters in the front door. He stands before them, hands on hips and half bent double, panting heavily. Paul does nothing by halves.
‘Mr Forman?’ asks O’Shea.
Paul nods, trying to catch his breath. He’s wearing a long-sleeved breathable top and shorts, and a dark stain of sweat is spread over his chest. ‘Please . . . come in here,’ he pushes past us and opens the living-room door, politely gesturing for us all to enter, and we pass inches from his ramped testosterone. He holds on to the door handle for support as the policewomen cast around for somewhere to sit. ‘Sorry,’ Paul tries to joke, ‘I’m not the . . . man I was.’ He brushes the sweat from his neck and I see the outline of his stomach muscles through the sports fabric. White starts fidgeting.
‘We need to ask you some questions about Melody Graham,’ O’Shea begins, hovering on the edge of the sofa, refusing to be enticed into its relaxing depths unless she gets too comfortable and misses something.
‘Of course. Umm, do you mind,’ he starts, a bit embarrassed, ‘if I have a shower first?’
‘OK, if you’re quick,’ O’Shea replies.
Paul disappears. ‘Do I need to leave the room?’ I offer nervously.
They look surprised. ‘No, stay here if you want.’ I console myself that they think this lead is cold, that their real suspicions are directed elsewhere. I’d watched earlier on television as Gerry Bonacorsi was released from custody. He’d stood on the steps of the police station, his head sandwiched between the shoulders of men in good suits. I couldn’t make out if he was very small or they were very tall, but the effect was to make Gerry look like a prematurely aged child in a tracksuit. The voice-over had sniffily mentioned ‘insufficient evidence’ as the reason for his release and the viewer was left in no doubt that this was not to be believed.
A man in a suit who was probably Bonacorsi’s lawyer was trying to hurry him past the cameras, but Gerry falteringly began to talk, stroking his white hair. ‘It felt a bit like home being back in there, to be honest.’ Gerry squinted against the white light of the flashes. He looked as though he couldn’t understand why people were interested. ‘The police have been very friendly, to be sure. I wish I had someone who could back up my story about where I was on the night the young girl was murdered, but I’m afraid I don’t. I just had a nice walk about, you see. It’s been a long time since I could walk.’ He held his hand up to his face as questions flew from every angle. He didn’t know which way to turn. ‘I’m sad that someone might be copying what I did. It’s not right. She seemed a very nice girl. Such a shame.’
We wait in silence as the hissing sound of a shower starts up near by. I catch White’s eye and explain that we’ve got a bathroom downstairs because the pressure’s better. It feels surprisingly intimate to hear water splashing over a naked body and I look away embarrassed. White scratches her nose.
A few moments later Paul reappears, his hair tousled and his skin glowing. ‘Sorry about that,’ he says, collapsing into a chair and pulling one foot up into his lap to put on a sock.
O’Shea gets down to business. ‘What was your relationship with Melody Graham?’
‘I worked with her on a documentary we made recently. She did research for the programme.’
‘How long have you employed her for?’
‘I don’t. She worked freelance. Probably for about six months in all.’
‘How well did you know her?’
‘I’m not sure I understand.’
‘Did you socialise together, that sort of thing?’
Paul shrugs. ‘A bit. Well, not really. I’m very busy but there was the odd evening drink and she was at the wrap party for the programme. I wouldn’t say that I know her, exactly. That would be too strong a word.’ White scribbles something in her notebook. Paul’s foot goes down to the floor and he crosses the other one over his knee. The second sock goes on.
‘How did you meet?’
‘She came into the office because she had some programme ideas. I run a TV production company, I meet lots of people; it’s important to know who’s out there and what they can do. It’s a way of trying to stay ahead of the competition.’
‘So she wanted to make programmes?’
‘Yes.’ He stands to tuck in his T-shirt with quick, agile movements and picks up his watch, pushing it over his hand and clipping it closed on his wrist.
‘But she ended up working as a researcher for you?’
I sit motionless in my chair, looking at my hands. My cuticles are dry and the ends of my fingers chapped. Too much scrubbing things clean.
Paul tucks a label in and, fully dressed now, shifts his focus to the interview. He puts his feet flat on the floor and his forearms on the chair wings, his fingers hanging over the front. It’s the position you take a lie-detector test in. ‘That’s often how things are. She had done in-depth interviews with lots of different types of people. My business partner Lex Wood recommended her to the producer and he hired her.’
White frowns, there’s something she’s not getting. ‘Did Lex ever interview her?’
‘Not that I know of.’
‘It was nice of him to give her a job then.’
‘She had impeccable credentials, otherwise she wouldn’t have got the gig, but she was also good-looking. That’s important to Lex. He noticed her when she was meeting me – the office is open plan. He likes having pretty girls in the mix, so to speak. It might not be right but it’s how TV works.’ Paul doesn’t hesitate as he says all this. He’s defiant, challenging them to find fault with this reflection of the world. O’Shea’s lips thin and my heart sinks. Paul’s not choosing the easy route and I wonder as I look at the tramlines of effort that run from her nose to her lips what protracted battles O’Shea has fought over the decades, how many years of overtime she’s had to put in to be where she is now. Physical advantage is not a pleasure she’s ever experienced, like me. ‘And for the record she did a very good job, she was full of ideas.’
‘What exactly was that job?’
‘She did a lot of background research on Gerry Bonacorsi’ – O’Shea grimaces at the mention of his name – ‘set up some to-camera interviews with his family, and she was present at some of the filming sessions that we did in jail.’ O’Shea sighs as if irritated. ‘Maybe I’m speaking out of turn,’ Paul continues, ‘but am I right in thinking you didn’t agree with the Parole Board’s decision? In your line of work I imagine you normally don’t when they let people out.’
‘You can say that again,’ White interjects, becoming animated. ‘Life should mean life, otherwise why am I getting up in the morning?’
O’Shea shakes her head. ‘At least the public know what we’re up against now.’
‘I’ll take that as a compliment, if I may,’ says Paul. His s
mile is mirrored by the policewomen. He’s won them over. ‘Melody also devised the concept for Crime Time, which is on air at the moment. We had a series of meetings with her to discuss all that.’
Two heads nod on the sofa. ‘What were you doing last Monday night?’
‘I went for a drink with some work colleagues and then I came home.’ He names Lex, Astrid, Sergei and John and the bar they went to. ‘Lex left first at about nine-thirty, I guess, and we left a while later.’
‘Did you drive your car?’
‘Yes.’
‘What time were you back?’
Paul pauses and gives me a glance. His face betrays nothing, its angular planes the same as they always are. I see White’s tired eyes waiting and watching. His foot twitches. ‘I was back by ten.’
A friend of mine works as an addiction counsellor at a hospital. Her job description includes words like ‘alcoholism’, ‘prescription drug dependency’, ‘obsessive compulsive disorder’, ‘depression’, but she says her job is all about shame. The shame women feel about their failures and shortcomings, which means they hide their drink and drug problems from their partners and children, often for years, and they hide them very well. Their secrets are walled up inside their relationships, the fear of the consequences of admitting the truth stalking their every waking hour. My friend’s job is to unpick the fear and shame and secrets. Just like a police officer’s. At this moment I am so ashamed at what we are doing my chest is like lead. For the first time I think about Melody, not as my husband’s lover, as a threat to my family, but as victim.
My greatest fear is the death of my children. I am fully aware that this is a grinding cliché, the least imaginative thing a mother can think, but it doesn’t make it any less true. The dank weight of a body as I pull if from a villa swimming pool, the scratch of the material covering an armchair that I sink into when a policewoman tells me one of them is gone, the backup officer hovering on her shoulder. When I conjure this image my eyes fill with tears and my nose blocks and the panic starts to expand across my chest, and then a moment later I force a happy thought in to break up the unbearable images. All in all it takes about thirty seconds and I get on with my life. How are Melody’s parents continuing? One minute, two minutes, five, ten, an hour, a day, a week, a lifetime. The police really walked up their path, brought the horror down on their heads. Has my husband done that to them? I swallow the saliva that has gathered in my mouth.
‘So you were back home by ten at the latest,’ O’Shea repeats.
‘That’s correct,’ says Paul. There is no hesitation, no sign that he thought he stood on any kind of threshold before he crossed over.
For a mad moment I think of getting to my feet and shouting that he’s lying and pointing my finger in accusation. Images of Paul being thrown over the coffee table by White, handcuffs shining as they are brought down upon him, flash through my mind, but I remain mute. I look at my wedding ring, feel the way it digs into the flesh of the fingers that surround it.
White turns her pen over and jabs it into her pad, sending the nib retreating into its cheap plastic cover. ‘OK, I think we’re done here.’
I’m surprised I can get to my feet, that I can open the lock without my fingers shaking. Paul stands behind me on the doorstep of our home as we watch the policewomen walk away down the path. He puts his hand on my shoulder, a controlling weight. I shut the door and we are facing each other. The first time we came to this house we trailed around after the estate agent, the rain pounding outside, the canal a misty smudge beyond thick trees. He went to wait in the car at the end of the tour through a series of bare and bedraggled rooms to “give us a little minute together” and we stood just here on the pile of junk mail, sniffing the damp. I knew then and there that this was our house, that we could transform it and live out our happy future here. ‘You love it, don’t you?’ he’d said, seeing my eyes dart excitedly round the high ceilings and come to rest on his expectant face. And I did. But not now.
He puts a forefinger to his lips and then he winks, slowly and deliberately. He strides into the kitchen and pops the top on a bottle of beer as if he’s celebrating the end of a trying week at work.
Paul and I have a secret language, most couples do. Not just words and expressions, but gestures. In Miami we once saw a woman whose hair was shaped in such a way that it looked like she had a duck sitting on her head. There were sections dyed all sorts of shades of brown that flicked out like tail feathers over one ear, a black clip above the other ear formed the beak. Now, if one of us sees a strange hairdo, we’ll turn to the other and flap our elbows by our sides and they’ll either nod in agreement or shake their head. We also have his wink.
About two years ago we had a bunch of people round for a bite to eat. I guess other people would call such an evening a dinner party, but I wince at using that phrase, it sounds so formal, too grand for me and my humble background. And I can’t cook, I am more familiar with the freezer aisle of the supermarket than the farmers’ market. So I cobbled together a cottage pie and tried to keep it casual so as not to raise expectations.
Lex came, enticed by Paul with the innuendo that my tennis partner Ellen was ‘right up his street’. Ben, Paul’s actor friend who was back from LA, put in a rare appearance; Sarah and her husband, Phil, walked up from few streets away; John came armed with a New Zealand health drink containing algae; and Jessie turned up two hours late. I’m glad I didn’t bother to cook because Ben was on a special diet to be ‘screen fit’ for a role he’d won in a US sitcom: no carbs after six, no booze, two hours a day with a personal trainer. Jessie refused to eat anything and just drank, Phil had three helpings of everything, proclaiming it all delicious as Sarah rolled her eyes, and I’d forgotten that Ellen was a vegetarian.
We played Wink Murder, but first we downed a bottle of champagne to celebrate us all getting together. I remember John’s tongue turning moss-coloured from his health drink. At some point Lex and Ellen started playing Rock Paper Scissors. I thought it was a way for Lex to slap her hand and get touchy-feely but it looked like fun so I played with Phil, and Ben and Jessie’s game soon descended to poking each other in the ribs. The empty wine bottles began piling up, Ben moaned about being starving and started drinking, and to celebrate something else I can’t recall Paul pulled out more champagne. We all got louder, things got funnier the way they do when you’re pissed; Lex showed Ellen some dance move teenagers were doing and Phil began eating my underdone broccoli. John and Ben had an intense conversation about personal trainers and started showing each other their lats, or maybe it was quads. Sarah and I clapped when they lifted their shirts.
‘Let’s play something else,’ Ellen suggested.
‘Poker,’ said Lex and was drowned out by groans.
‘Let’s play Wink Murder,’ said Paul.
‘I can’t wink,’ said Jessie, pulling her face downwards and blinking at Ben.
‘Don’t use that face if you want to pull, is my advice,’ Lex taunted as Jessie threw a napkin at him.
‘This game’s all about acting, so, Ben, you don’t stand a chance obviously,’ ribbed Paul.
‘God I’m starving,’ moaned Ben, nibbling one of Ava’s rice cakes.
‘Have you ever seen children play that game?’ asked Sarah. ‘It’s hilarious, they can’t lie, they just point and say, “Jonny’s killed me,” or some such.’
‘They can’t keep a secret, they have no artifice,’ added Phil.
‘Unlike us,’ said John.
‘It’s a child’s game only adults can finesse,’ said Paul.
‘Decided!’ shouted Ellen.
‘Kate has to guess which of us is the murderer,’ Paul said. ‘You get three goes.’
Sarah laughed. ‘Three is loads! There’s only how many of us . . .’ she glanced round the table, ‘. . . nine of us!’
‘Kate’s pissed, she’ll never guess,’ said Paul.
‘Bet you she will,’ said Jessie, ‘she’s very observant.’
‘Good idea!’ said Paul, getting excited. ‘Forty quid she doesn’t get it.’
‘You’re on!’ shouted Lex, digging in his back pocket for his wallet. ‘You’d better bloody win, Kate.’
‘Oh stop,’ I remember saying. I don’t like it when Paul wants to get money involved, it makes things more serious than they should be. It takes away the lightness.
‘You need to leave the room so we can choose the killer,’ said Ellen.
‘I’ll get you assassins dessert.’ I weaved into the kitchen, a burst of laughter chasing me down the corridor. I pulled the lemon tart from its box, dug about in the freezer for the ice cream, piled plates and cutlery in my arms and headed back to the dining room.
The atmosphere had changed. The group was quiet, their conspiring looks cutting me out. I sat for a moment looking about. ‘Have we started?’ I said as Ellen suddenly grabbed her throat and rolled her eyes and slumped forward on to her empty plate, arms flailing.
Phil began clapping. I watched Ellen’s back shudder as she giggled. ‘One down,’ said Paul, smiling.
‘Come on, Kate, my money’s at stake!’ said Lex.
I didn’t have a clue who’d done it. Our dining-room table is round, so I could in theory see everyone, but this didn’t make it easier. ‘It’s Ben,’ I said.
‘He’s not that good an actor!’ scoffed Lex. Ben smiled his ‘Hollywood’, turning two-thirds of his face towards me and showing all his perfect chiclet teeth, but he shook his head.
Two long minutes passed, until Jessie suddenly said, ‘Oh! Was I supposed to die then?’
‘Jessie, for fuck’s sake!’ Lex barked. He is competitive to the end.
A low strangle started in John’s throat before he tipped his chair all the way back, gripping the table edge with white fingers. He lost his hold and the chair toppled backwards, sending him slamming into the ceramic tiles. I actually heard his head hit the floor with a crack. ‘Are you OK?’ John’s body was twitching awkwardly, eyes closed.
‘Crikey,’ said Phil.