The Blame Game

by C. J. Cooke

  Right then I’m lost in a memory from years ago, in our first home in Edinburgh. We were only just married, barely a few months. I had had a nightmare about Luke’s death. I woke up screaming and the next morning he asked me why. I was broken, swollen eyed and snivelling over my coffee.

  ‘I loved Luke,’ I said. ‘I think maybe we owe it to him to tell the truth. About what happened.’

  ‘The truth?’ he said in a hard tone. ‘We both know the truth, Helen. We both know who was to blame.’

  His face softened and he sat down beside me, took my hand, but I pulled it away.

  ‘What do you mean by that?’ I snapped. He looked away, not wanting to answer. I got up and stormed out, slamming the door behind me. I was disgusted with him, and deeply hurt. Was he suggesting I was entirely at fault, that he and Theo played no part? Perhaps he was right. Perhaps it was all my fault. This thought settled into me like rain seeping into the earth, transforming it into mud.

  I wanted to leave. I wanted to run away to the ends of the earth with this new knowledge. I packed a bag, made it as far as the front door. But I couldn’t leave. Perhaps I’d misinterpreted what he’d meant. I decided not to act rashly but to discuss it with him when we’d both calmed down. Neither of us had fully recovered from what happened on Mont Blanc, I knew that.

  That night I woke up in the wee hours to the sound of banging. The space in the bed beside me was empty, the covers pulled back. I went out into the landing, saw the loft ladder was down. I looked up and could see a light was on up there, a rush of wind from the gap between the eaves that we’d never got around to fixing.

  I climbed up the ladder and saw Michael sitting on a chair in the middle of the room, the single naked lightbulb casting an orange glow over his body. He was completely naked. The sight of him sitting there like that was so bizarre I let out a nervous laugh.

  ‘Michael?’ I said. ‘What’s going on?’

  His face was contorted into an expression I’d never seen before. I saw he was holding something.

  ‘What’s that?’

  He lifted it slowly. It was an old rope, looped at one end.

  ‘A noose,’ he said.

  Why he should be sitting there holding something so peculiar was beyond me. I thought he’d found it up there and was waiting to show me.

  As I climbed up to the final rung he shouted for me to stop. It was then that I felt my skin crawl.

  ‘Michael, you’re scaring me. What’s going on?’

  His face was shining with tears and sweat, his hair ruffled, and there was something else in the air, wide in the room. Another presence.

  ‘When you started talking about what happened to Luke,’ he said, his voice breaking. ‘I just … I can’t take it.’

  I thought back to what I’d said. I felt appalled at myself for bringing it up so casually. I hadn’t meant to upset him.

  ‘Michael, I’m sorry. I’m really sorry …’

  ‘I’m not a killer!’ he yelled. It was a plea to be let loose from something, as though he was trapped in a cage and was begging for the key to be let out.

  He was sobbing and shaking, his head in his hands and his shoulders jerking up and down.

  ‘Please, Michael,’ I begged. ‘Please … I never meant to make you feel like that.’

  ‘It wasn’t my fault,’ he said, lifting the noose. ‘It wasn’t my fault, Helen.’

  My own screams echoed in my ears. ‘I know it wasn’t, Michael. It was my fault. Please just come down from here. Please.’

  Eventually he did. I never brought up Mont Blanc again. I didn’t leave him, either. I adored him, and somehow I understood that his insinuation that I was to blame was motivated by pain, a wound that was so deep it lay beneath reason, instinct – even love.

  And when the letters came, I made sure to hide them from him before persuading him we needed to move again.

  Google Earth pops up on the screen, showing the area around the hospital here in San Alvaro. I recognise it as the pot-holed road that runs outside, surrounded by trees and empty buildings.

  ‘We’re using satellite technology to locate Michael’s last whereabouts,’ DCI Lavery says. ‘We can see from this map that the exit he took out of the hospital leads directly to this road here, so we’ll focus on trying to get the police to speak to people who were around the area at the time he left. We’ll also try and get information about the owners of the cars parked at the time of Michael’s disappearance. We’re also working with the hospital chief to get all the data from the hospital’s security systems to see who was inside the hospital that day.’

  I take a breath and nod, reassured by the confident tone of her voice. She strikes me as someone who works quickly and efficiently, which is exactly what we need.

  ‘The one thing that’s a bit of a concern is this,’ she says, dragging the arrow to the side of the room. A pixelated image of a shelter comes into view.

  ‘What is it?’ I ask.

  ‘It’s a bus stop. We’ve checked it out and it’s a pretty major route, going all the way to Belize City and even the airport. Is there a chance that Michael had his passport with him?’

  I swallow hard. ‘I … I don’t know.’

  ‘What about cash? Or credit cards?’

  The police probably stole them, I think, but say nothing. I began to type all the sort codes and account numbers for the business account and our personal accounts. Luckily I knew them off by heart.

  Great, DCI Lavery types back in the chat box. We will keep a close eye on this. We are gathering resources here and hope to launch a thorough inquiry with the Belizean police tomorrow afternoon.

  20

  Helen

  3rd September 2017

  ‘Hello, Helen. How are you this morning?’

  A woman is standing above me. I have no idea what day it is. Slowly the woman becomes familiar – she’s the lady from the High Commission, Vanessa? – and the knowledge of why I’m in hospital arrives like a juggernaut, carrying me outside my body and landing me with a crack of bones back into the white noise fever dream that is my current reality.

  Vanessa looks different today. No suit. A white strappy dress, white Converse, her black hair pulled into a ponytail. She holds up a cotton bag with some food supplies sticking out – bottled water, bread rolls, apples. I look around quickly, hating myself for falling asleep. When I can’t spot Reuben I start to scramble painfully out of bed until I remember that Jeannie and Shane took him back to their hotel last night.

  ‘I wanted to check you were alright,’ Vanessa explains as I crawl back on to the bed. ‘I live only two miles away so I thought I would come by.’

  She opens a bottle of water for me, which I drink in one go. It’s scorching hot in here, like being slowly baked alive. It was forty degrees when we were at the beach hut but the sea breeze made the temperature bearable. Here, in the city, it’s as though the heat is melting everything. Even the insects look like they’re wilting.

  I can’t imagine Vanessa living somewhere as impoverished as San Alvaro. She always looks so smart, with her sparkling earrings, pristine suit and glossy red nails. I can well imagine her going out with a group of friends to a nightclub after work, a Pilates class. Not walking along the dirt path lined with shacks and stray dogs that makes up the town of San Alvaro.

  ‘My parents are both blind,’ she says, opening a packet of biscuits. ‘Trust me, I pleaded with them to move to the city so I could look after them. But they’ve lived in San Alvaro their whole lives and refuse to move. Here, would you like a Johnny cake? They’re a Belizean specialty.’

  I take one so as not to offend her and nibble at the corners. ‘I’m sorry about your parents.’

  ‘Oh, they’re fine. I still have my own place in Belize City but when my mother lost her sight last year I moved home to make sure they were both looked after. My father only retired a few years before the river became polluted. Many people went blind in that year.’

  ‘What river?’ I
say, and she tells me about a river that runs the whole way through the country that is used by big corporations as a dumping ground for toxic waste. They were well aware that many rural towns in Belize still use the river for washing, drinking, and cooking, as they had done for generations, but it didn’t stop them polluting it.

  ‘Is that what why your mum went blind, too?’

  She gives a sad smile. ‘My father insists that she was just feeling left out so her eyes stopped working. But in truth, it’s most likely that the river caused her blindness. My parents never got treated.’

  I reel at this. ‘Why not?’

  ‘By the time I persuaded them to go to the hospital it was too late. Babies went blind, too. Many children left with … how do you say it … disabilities? Nobody has the money to prove that it was the pollution, or that the corporations did it.’ She sighs and opens another bottle of water for me. ‘Everywhere has its problems, I guess. Belize has incredible riches in terms of her ecosystems, her cayes, her barrier reef, her rainforests. And of course, archaeological treasures. But we have problems with pollution. And corruption.’

  She glances to check that nobody can overhear us before pulling her chair closer to me. ‘My father was a cop for thirty-five years. I spoke to him about the police here, about what they said to you.’

  I sit up straighter. ‘Go on.’

  ‘My father says he is almost certain the police took a bribe. From the man who hit your vehicle.’ She’s barely whispering, and I have to stare at her full lips to make out what she is saying. ‘It happens often. And you are not local, you understand. Nobody knows you. Nobody will challenge them if the blame is put on you.’

  ‘They took a bribe,’ I say, as if saying it out loud will make it easier to stomach.

  She leans closer. ‘My father said he remembered a case, eight or nine years ago, just before he retired. A British couple were murdered about ten miles from here. My father was a Detective Sergeant then. The cops had the murderer, they all knew they did, but he offered a bribe. It wasn’t even a lot of money but they let him go.’

  Her words colour my surroundings, painting vivid possibilities for the reason I am here, the reason we’re in this nightmare. It’s at once terrifying and absurd, but my body reacts to the possibility that the police are trying to set us up. Vanessa flicks her eyes at a nurse who had come in to check my charts. We both wait until the nurse’s footsteps vanish down the corridor before Vanessa turns back to me.

  ‘I will try to find out the van driver’s name,’ she says. ‘But I can’t promise anything.’

  ‘What should I do?’

  ‘The British police may be able to put pressure on our police,’ she says. ‘But I wouldn’t count on it. Many of the police officers in San Alvaro are only interested in what’s in it for them. If they don’t have to do something, they won’t.’ A beat. ‘Not all of them will be that way, though. My father was a good cop. He never took the bribes. He believes in karma. You know this word?’

  I nod. ‘Karma, yes.’

  ‘“What goes around, comes around.” That’s why he isn’t bothered about fighting the big corporations. This will come back to them. If you continue to do good things for other people, sooner or later good will come to you.’

  She opens a brown bag of sea grapes and lets me devour them. I don’t know how long it’s been since I ate properly. My clothes feel loose.

  ‘Tell me about where you come from,’ she says, smiling. ‘I’ve never been to London. What is it like?’

  I tell her that I used to live in London, but now live about three hundred miles north.

  ‘There’s a place in London I’ve always wanted to go to,’ she says. ‘And I hope you’ve been there at least so you can tell me what it’s like and I live the dream through you.’

  ‘Where’s that?’

  ‘Harrods,’ she says, dreamily. ‘It looks like heaven. I think if I ever go to London I’ll need to take a trillion dollars with me just for shopping.’

  I explain to her that there are lots of shopping malls all over England, many of them every bit as nice as Harrods, but she doesn’t seem convinced. Finally, I say, ‘If you can find my husband and get me out of here, I’ll take you to Harrods. I promise.’

  Her eyes light up. ‘You would take me to Harrods?’

  ‘I’ll even pay your airfare.’

  She laughs and claps her hands. ‘Now I’m the one accepting a bribe,’ she whispers, and a shiver runs up my spine.

  ‘You live in San Alvaro,’ I say. ‘Do you think the locals might know the man who crashed into our car?’

  ‘I will try and find out.’ A pause. ‘The thing you have to remember though, is that if the police have taken a bribe, they will be extra vigilant about making sure blame is pointed at you. You’re a tourist, you understand. They will try and say you were drunk, or driving dangerously.’ Another pause, longer this time. ‘This is why I’m concerned about the claim against your husband.’

  ‘But it’s a complete lie,’ I say, and she nods.

  ‘Yes, but it complicates things. It technically creates more work for the police.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Usually they would just take a bribe and that would be that. By stating that the driver made this claim, they have an obligation to search for your husband to question him.’

  Surely they have an obligation to search for him as a missing person, I think, and Vanessa clarifies her meaning. ‘What I’m saying is, if someone paid a man to hit a vehicle for whatever reason, the police would have a possible manslaughter or murder case on their hands. As the named perpetrator, Michael is someone they have a responsibility to look for. They could have taken the bribe, not mentioned the accusation, and avoided having to do anything at all. Brush off the crash as an accident.’

  I struggle to follow this. ‘So … why you do think they haven’t done that?’

  She sighs. ‘I’m very confused by it. I will speak to my father again. He will work it out.’

  At the hospital in Belize City Vanessa wheels me to the ward and there is a child lying completely still and silent on a bed surrounded by foreign tubes and machinery. Saskia.

  I move close and take her hand in mine, speaking to her softly, telling her I’m here. One of her fingers jerks, flooding me with hope that she’s about to wake. But she doesn’t, and for a long time I sit pleading for her to open her eyes.

  Was it really only days ago that she was laughing and shrieking on the sand at the beach hut? I press her hand to my face and send silent prayers to the universe that she’ll be OK. That somehow she’ll recover from this. That somehow she’ll still dance and laugh and play exactly as she used to. And then fear sets in that the future I want for her has been erased for ever and I feel like my heart might break.

  Reuben produces a small Bluetooth speaker, sets it on the table next to her bed. ‘I’ve made you a podcast, Saskia. Check it out.’

  He presses a button on the MP3 player, and after a moment or two the sound of waves rolling across the beach arises from the speaker. Voices in the background. My own voice, calling Kids! Come and get some food!

  ‘I thought she’d like to remember what a fun time we had,’ he explains.

  Another voice, female and high-pitched. ‘Come and look at this!’

  It’s Saskia’s voice. She is laughing, her voice dipping in and out of audibility as she runs across the sand.

  ‘No, no, not like that,’ she says, ‘like this.’ My own voice is somewhere in the background, asking her questions. I remember she was showing me how to build her sand theatre. We were making a stage with columns, then seats and an orchestra pit, and she was directing me how she wanted them done. Always so precise, so particular. She has such a strong, wilful character and as I watch her on the bed, impossibly still, I will that dimension of her personality to help her through this.

  Then Michael’s voice. Shall we go in now, kids?

  I hear him chatting to Reuben about whether or n
ot there are great white sharks out there, what they would do if they spot one. What if, he asks him over and over. What if you saw a fin? What if you couldn’t get away? It strikes me that since Reuben’s diagnosis we’ve lived in the future, always wondering what lies ahead for our boy. When we learned Reuben had autism the consultant told us to prepare ourselves for what he wouldn’t do. He wouldn’t be able to live independently, wouldn’t have a career, wouldn’t get married, may never speak. Suddenly we were mourning a future that we’d imagined for our son. There is no cure for autism, they said, and the boy we’d held in our mind graduating, travelling, scaling his life’s dreams, was swept away in an instant.

  Eventually, of course, we came to terms with it, but that sense of always looking forward, always living in the future tense – it has never changed. Until now. Now the future looks very different indeed. Now I think that living in a constant state of ‘what if?’ was utterly pointless. In fact, it angers me that I have spent so long living like that.

  Reuben presses pause on the iPad and looks at me with a confused expression, and I remember: he has no idea that Michael is missing.

  ‘I’m fine,’ I say, clearing my voice. ‘It’s just … Saskia’s voice, that’s all. It makes me very emotional.’

  Reuben considers this, then skips to another file. This time it is his own voice laced with another man’s voice as they chat about ancient ruins. It takes me a moment or two to place the voice. Shane. Reuben’s asking him questions.

  ‘Are you a policeman?’ he asks.

  Shane laughs. ‘Why do you think that?’

  ‘Your hair is silver and you have policeman boots.’

  ‘Do I? Well no, I’m not a policeman, actually. I’m an academic.’

  ‘An epidemic? Isn’t that where you make loads of people sick?’

  ‘Um … I lead research on political theory and work in middle management at a university.’

  ‘What’s political theory?’

  ‘Um, well, it encompasses discourses on human rights, justice, government, ethics, what protection ought to be in place for minorities in majoritarian democracies …’