by Sarah Till
I find the strength from somewhere to say my piece. I dredge it up from inside, in a dark place where it’s been hiding for years.
‘You’re someone to talk. I’ve seen your texts and emails. You and Sam. How much you love each other. Is that where you were last night? With Sam? Are you leaving me for her?’
He pulls out his phone and throws it at me. It bounces off the table and hits me hard on the shoulder, falling into my lap.
‘What texts? What fucking texts? You’re a psycho. I stayed at a hotel last night, the place I’ve paid for to get away from you and your crazy stalking. In the school remember, and today again? All this? Here’s the address.’ He throws a crumpled piece of paper at me. ‘I’ll be back for my things. And get the house up for sale. I want you out of here.’
It’s too much for me and I’m shaking more now.
‘No. I won’t. I paid for this place and I’m not moving out. I’m staying here and finishing my work. You go if you like, but you have no rights. We’re not married, remember?’
‘Yeah. I remember. Too upset to get married, weren’t you, because you missed your mother’s funeral? And your father’s? And why was that, Patti? Because you preferred to whore about, not telling them where you were. Laughing at your own face on the side of a milk carton, too busy getting wasted to know that they’d died. Too stoned for it to register. I remember, alright. I just thought you’d be grateful to me for putting a stop to it. But I was obviously fucking wrong.’
‘Grateful? Is that how you really saw it? Even though I told you why I ran away? Why I went? Even though I told you that it started over nothing, a stupid argument about a night away, and it went too far, so I could never go back? And you still think it was my choice? To miss my own parent’s funeral?’
I sit down now, winded and upset.
‘You knew how devastated I was, still am in fact. I told you that we’d get married, when I was ready. When I’d finished my research and we would have children. This house was perfect for a family, wasn’t it, David? But you were never here. I was alone all the time. I can’t be a family on my own. I needed you and you weren’t there. If anyone’s been living a lie, it’s you, coming home every night, pretending that you’ve been working late. I’ve been too scared, all this time, to tell you I knew for sure. I was too scared of this. Because even now you won’t admit it.’ I hold my hand up and point at the bracelet. ‘You’re still trying to blame everything on me. You’re still trying to keep up the pretence, even though I know you’ve had a vasectomy.’
He’s staring out of the window, a slight breeze lifting his hair. Minutes pass and he doesn’t speak. Then he goes for me. He’s on top of me, the glass on the floor pressing at my back, and I can feel his hands around my throat. He’s kicking at my legs, a madman, as I lie still and don’t even try to fight. He’s pulling at my wrist, trying to get the bracelets off, but they’re tangled together and twisted on my arm. The seconds stretch to an eon as my throat closes and my scream won’t come. I open my eyes and I can see his eyes, manic and shiny, a sick grin on his face. He’s pressing hard on my neck and banging my head against the wooden floor, and I somehow register the hollow sound it makes, and see each familiar flash on contact.
Suddenly he’s gone. He’s dangling above me, his clothes tight against him. I sit up and Gabriel’s dragging him back through the door, the wood splintering against his legs. I jump up and run towards Gabriel. David stands still for a moment and they are locked in a stare. A tiny bee falls through the window and crashes its head against the glass, over and over, almost reaching the gap but falling. David lifts his arm up and swots the bee, and it falls to the sill, legs in the air and one wing bent back double. He looks at it for a moment and then squashes it with his hand. The result is grotesque, and I know now for sure that he’s never loved me.
He points at Gabriel and, through heavy breath, he growls.
‘I haven’t finished with you yet.’
Gabriel takes a step towards him.
‘OK. OK David. I haven’t finished with you either. I’ve found out a few things about you since I’ve been here. A few things Patti might like to know.’
I snort.
‘I think I know pretty much everything.’
He lowers his hand and pushes it into his pocket. They’re locked in a stare and for a moment I’m excluded from whatever knowledge they share. David caves first.
‘Yes she does. She knows everything. Everything she needs to. I wondered about you, mate, right from the start. I wondered.’ Gabriel relaxes a little and David stands down. ‘I’ll be back for my things.’
Gabriel steps forward.
‘Make sure you make arrangements to do that. With me. If you lay a finger on her, I’ll have you. Right?’
David’s face is thunderous as he leaves, knocking the music box off its perch and smashing it into a million pieces. But the ballerina spins still, attached to the naked motor, and the music still plays very slowly, echoing through the silence. Gabriel turns around and looks at me.
‘Are you OK?’
‘Yes. I’m used to it. But thanks. He’s gone now.’
‘I wouldn’t bet on it. I wouldn’t be too sure. He’s dangerous.’
I stare at him.
‘Why are you here, Gabriel? It’s not because of you splitting up with your partner, is it? What do you know about him?’
He looks at the ceiling.
‘I don’t know anything for sure. Not yet. Don’t worry about it. I’m staying around, Patti, because whatever I came here for, I’m staying for you.’
‘But I thought you and Sarah...’
He smiles and puts his hands on my shoulders.
‘No. That was a mistake. I just want to make sure you are safe.’
He starts to clear up and I go upstairs and lie on my bed. I try to sleep but I’m too tense. I get undressed and lie in bed, warm and safe with Gabriel downstairs. I’m grateful to him for pulling David off me, but I know something’s wrong. I’m no psychologist, but I could see the bitterness between David and Gabriel. They’re not friends at all. One thing is sure, despite what he’s been telling me, Gabriel’s definitely not here for me.
Vera’s envelope is sticking out of my jeans pocket, and I pull it out and start to read before I give it back to Gabriel.
Long Days and Longer Nights
The inquest was eighteen months later. That was because all the ‘findings’ had to be catalogued and sorted through and identified. During that eighteen months I was on autopilot. I worked, ate, slept and was in a trance most of the time.
But I did take some flowers round to Annie’s. She had aged ten years. She let me in but she didn’t smile or speak. She took the flowers and put them in a vase and stood, back to the sink, until I left. I wanted to ask her things. I wanted to ask her if they’d found his stuff. His brown boots. Then I thought that he’d be wearing them wouldn’t he? He wouldn’t be wearing his best shoes on a plane, would he? His overcoat. His suit. These things consumed my thoughts. But I didn’t ask. I watched her, back to me as she worked at the table. She’s lost weight, her bones pushing at her dress. I couldn’t ask her. I just couldn’t.
I expected to be invited to the inquest. A thousand things ran through my head. Hadn’t I been the last person he spoke to? On the phone from round here, anyway? I started to develop a jealousy of Annie. Would she go? Would I be stopped from going? Why wouldn’t she let me have something of his. Just something small? I knew really. Because she was in the same state I was. Worse. But I couldn’t get it through my thick skull because I was selfish.
I wasn’t invited to the inquest. I was indignant and went anyway. It was at Huddersfield Town Hall and I sat in the gallery. I expected Jack and Annie to turn up and sit in the main part of the room. But they didn’t. And I soon found out why. The clerk read out the names of all their people who had died. One by one. Their families sat below me, crying and hurting and all I could think was that I wished it was me down there. He
aring a name.
I stayed for the whole inquest. I sat in the gallery after some of the families left and heard things I shouldn’t have heard. Body parts. Bodies part-eaten by animals by the time they were found. Children were on that plane. One survived and saw the carnage. I didn’t realise; the truth is I had only thought about myself and Jimmy. I felt a mixture of shame and horror, but I needed to hear what had happened so I had all the information. So I could make an informed decision about what I thought had happened to him. Had he got on the plane? Had he died? Or had he walked away?
I waited for Jimmy’s name to be called but it wasn’t. I felt all funny inside, like I was going to be sick. They hadn’t included him. Or me. From that day I felt like an outsider. The survivors survived. The victims died. But Jimmy? He was just hanging there, in mid-air, with no closure. No funeral. No inquest.
I went to see a solicitor. He explained to me, as gently as he could, that because there was no evidence, there could be no inquest. That was how the law worked. He showed me the police enquiries. The list of things they had done to find Jimmy. It didn’t look enough to me so I went to Ireland. I had the address of the boarding house he’d been staying at from a card he sent me.
I stood outside trying to imagine what had happened. Where he had gone when he had left. I knocked on the door. A brassy blonde opened it.
‘Yeah?’
I gulped. She was hard as nails.
‘I’m Polly. Jimmy Jones’ girl.’
She stared hard at me.
‘I thought all that was over. I had loads of people here asking questions. What’d he done?’
I laughed. For the first time in ages. She asked me in. She made tea, in cups not a pot and sat down.
‘He hadn’t done anything. He just went to catch a plane.’
She lit a cigarette and pointed it at the chair next to me.
‘I’m Jessie, by the way. Oh aye, he was a beauty!’ I felt a tingle of annoyance. ‘Knew it too. But he was coming back to you. He told me all about you. You’re not what I expected though.’
I looked at the empty chair next to me. He’d been there. Right there.
‘Oh, why?’
She cocked her head to one side.
‘He said you were one of a kind. Strong. Got on with things when other people would have crumbled.’
Jessie was older than me by about five years. I don’t know if she was telling the truth about what Jimmy said or not, and these days I think not, but right then and there I knew what I had to do. I had to stop bloody moping around and get on with my life. It wasn’t that simple, obviously, but in my grief-demented state I thought it was a message from him. Maybe it was. Or maybe Jessie had been through it herself. But I left that house a different person.
She’d told me that he had left intending to catch the plane and hadn’t said anything to make her think he wouldn’t. I caught the train to the airport and tried to think what could have happened on the way. I even went to the police and asked if any bodies had been found. They looked up a referencing a file and handed me a report. It had all been investigated. There was no body.
I heard it over and over again. There was no body. But Jimmy couldn’t have just disappeared. I would have been really stupid if the fact that he might have had another girl hadn’t gone through my mind. Of course it did. But why never contact his parents? None of it made sense, but now I had this message, that I was strong, that I wouldn’t crumble, I told myself I had to get on with it. Like he said. Make him proud.
So I became, like Annie said, more like my mother, I started to go out dancing with Connie. Even though I said I never would, I started drinking. Because drink numbed the pain. I started buying clothes and shoes and while other girls had to pay board at home, my parents were too drunk to notice I wasn’t. I fed myself. I was an isolated unit.
I shut all thoughts of Jimmy out, except that my life no was to make him proud. To do what he said. What I hadn’t reckoned on was Colin Bradshaw. I would never fall in love again and I knew full well that other people didn’t have the same relationship that me and Jimmy had. I did dance with other men. I even went out for lunch with one of them, but somehow the conversation always came around to Jimmy. Needless to say, I never saw them again. In my conscious mind I wasn’t looking for a man at all. No. Quite the opposite. I was dead set on keeping Jimmy’s memory sacred.
But gradually, over about three years, I found myself smiling again. I found myself going out more and I started smoking as well as drinking. There was no point staying in with them two at each other’s throats all the time so I spent every waking hour either walking or going out. I just went home to get washed and get ready.
It was one ordinary night when nothing was really going on that me and Connie were walking down High Street and two blokes stopped us. I was dithering with my gloves, not even remotely interested when one of them laughed really loudly. It startled me and I looked up at him and his eyes were really green. I swear I felt something, just a spark of attraction but it had been so long since I’d felt anything properly that it knocked me straight off my feet. Literally.
I stumbled and almost fell into some bushes. Connie laughed but he made a big deal of it. Checking of I was OK. Steadying my arm. Feeling my forehead. She’s got a fever. Guiding me into a café where he quickly organised some tea and cakes. Before I knew it we were all sat around talking.
That’s how Colin was. Quick as a flash. He had everything under control and he liked to organise. Which completely suited me because I was just coasting along in my life. Him and his mate Teddy came dancing with us afterward. He was ever so polite, just the right amount of attention. No crowding. It was as if he knew where my invisible line was, where not to go.
The next week we all met up again, and the week after. It was a lot of fun, I admit, and no one ever said that we were a couple but soon we were going everywhere together. He’d meet me from work and come home with me. He’d sit in our foul-smelling front room with them two almost passed out. He never said a bad word about them, just treated it as a necessary part of life.
On it went, me and Colin and Connie and Teddy then next time I looked up we were bridesmaid and best man at Connie and Teddy’s wedding. I’d kissed him, aye, but it was a strange kind of kiss, gentle but strained, as if the big man on the outside was scared on the inside. It wasn’t the same for me. Not at all. But I didn’t mind. I got used to it. And when he got down on one knee at Connie and teddy’s reception I said yes. Jimmy was gone. I was almost sure of that. I still saw him everywhere in the corner of my vision. I still lay awake and pined for him alternated with anger in case he didn’t get on the plane.
In my darkest moments I thought about going looking for him again. But last time I hit dead ends and Annie clearly hated me. I couldn’t risk upsetting anyone else – I was alone enough as it was. So I said yes. It would get me away from me mam and dad and I’d have some peace. Colin had never mentioned kids. We hadn’t planned anything or really even talked about becoming an item.
But things speeded up and three months later we were in the town hall, married.
Making Enquiries
I didn’t have a proper wedding dress. It was my choice. I had a grey suit and Colin had a black suit and a purple tie. It was just us with Connie and Teddy as witnesses. Me mam and dad knew about it but weren’t bothered when I said it would be a quiet do. Dad just made a comment about not paying for it but it was water off a duck’s back by then. I was used to the silent treatment and got used to the fact that I was obviously a mistake and they couldn’t wait for me to be gone.
Now they had their way. Colin had been renting a room, but two weeks before the wedding he took me to a smart terraced house on the outskirts of Oldham. It was neat and fully furnished – I never asked how – and he told me he had bought it for me. I had no say, but I wasn’t bothered because it meant I was closer to Jimmy. I’d lived in Stockport before which was a long way from the moor, but Oldham was a lot nearer. I could
see the gentle slope of the hills from the back-bedroom window and, after we married, I sat there for hours on end gazing at it.
Colin went out to work at eight and came home at six. I kept up my end of the bargain and his tea was on the table. Women didn’t work once they were married and we silently expected kiddies to come along. They never did, and I thought back then it was because my kids were for Jimmy and not Colin. I cleaned the house and kept it exactly as Colin had arranged it, but in the long daytime hours I caught the bus up to the outlying villages that nestled amongst the hills.
I told Colin I was exploring. Shopping with the generous allowance he gave me. I would buy posh clothes from the village milliner and go for fittings. We went out every Saturday for a meal and a show and he always said I was a credit to him. Did I love him? I think I did in a way. I was grateful to him. And he was to me. We rubbed along together and made a handsome couple. We even had a really good laugh now and again, especially as the years rolled by. But did I love him?
There are different kinds of love, aren’t there? There’s that all-consuming romantic love where your heart is bursting out of your chest and you can’t wait to see them. Where you feel sick at the thought of them leaving and think about only them until they come back. Then there is steady love. Like a friendship but a little bit more. A reliance on someone, a bargain. I did love Colin, but it was never romantic love.
I don’t think it was for him either. I’d been thrown out of life. I was an outsider with no one I could trust. No one. The one thing I thought was right in my life had been destroyed and I didn’t even have an answer. The victims’ families had the inquest outcome. The survivors had their loved one back. All I had was doubt and questions and it had isolated me. Colin recognised that and ran with it. He accepted it. I don’t know if he knew about Jimmy. Not the full story. Some people mentioned it in passing but he just looked away, a distant respect for something that didn’t concern him. He never asked me and I never told him.