Wall of Silence

by Tracy Buchanan

  ‘Melissa,’ the detective said in a low voice, ‘don’t make this more difficult than it needs to be for your daughter.’

  ‘It’s okay, Mum,’ a voice said from the stairs. Melissa looked up to see Grace standing on the landing, wiping sleep from her eyes.

  Detective Crawford gave a sad sigh. ‘Hello, Grace.’

  Melissa climbed the stairs and hugged Grace tight, every fibre of her body yearning to just run away with her daughter. But there could be no hiding any more. Patrick had confirmed it.

  She crouched down, looking into Grace’s eyes. ‘Dad just confirmed what happened, darling, so the police want to take you somewhere to ask a few more questions.’

  Grace placed her hand on her mother’s cheek. ‘Don’t cry, Mummy.’

  Melissa pursed her lips to stop herself from sobbing. ‘I love you SO much, no matter what, do you understand? Mummy is always, always here for you.’

  ‘What’s going on?’ Lewis said as he walked down the hallway.

  ‘Your father confirmed it was Grace,’ Bill said.

  ‘No!’ Lewis cried out.

  He went to go to his little sister, but Bill stopped him. ‘Come on, son, you don’t need to see this.’

  He took Lewis into the kitchen and shut the door behind them.

  ‘The place we’re taking you is great, Grace,’ Detective Crawford said. ‘Lots of books, and the staff there are brilliant too,’ he added, looking at Melissa.

  ‘What about all her stuff, her clothes?’ Melissa said, wrapping her arms around herself as she started to shake.

  ‘Don’t worry, Mum, I packed some stuff yesterday,’ Grace said, gesturing to the Harry Potter rucksack Melissa had only just noticed on her back.

  That made Melissa want to cry even more. Grace had known this was coming.

  Oh, her little Grace. Her wise, clever, knowing little Grace.

  ‘Aren’t you clever?’ Melissa said, wiping her tears away as she tried to smile. She gave Grace another quick hug. ‘I will visit you as soon as I can. Is that possible?’ Melissa asked the detective.

  He nodded. ‘Yes. I’ll be in touch about the details.’

  ‘I love you,’ Melissa said to Grace.

  ‘Love you too.’

  She gave her mum a peck on the cheek then took Detective Crawford’s hand and they walked off down the path.

  As the front door shut, Melissa finally allowed herself to sob, leaning against the wall and letting it all out.

  ‘What happened, Mum?’ Lilly said, appearing on the landing. ‘Where was Grace going?’

  Melissa slid down to the floor. ‘The police have taken her to St Fiacre’s. Your dad gave a statement confirming what happened.’

  Lilly blinked rapidly. Then she walked back into the attic room, gently closing the door behind her.

  Bill peered out of the kitchen then and it occurred to Melissa: he hadn’t even said goodbye to Grace. Was it as easy as that, cutting off his granddaughter because she had stabbed his son?

  ‘Oh, Melissa,’ he said, walking over to her and helping her back up.

  ‘Where’s Lewis?’ she asked.

  ‘Listening to his music. He didn’t want to hear it all.’

  Melissa grabbed her car keys. ‘I want to see Patrick.’

  ‘I don’t think it’s a good idea, Melissa. He needs to rest.’

  ‘I’m going, Bill,’ she said, grabbing her car keys.

  Bill sighed. ‘Fine. But be gentle with him, Melissa, he’s still fragile.’

  She left the house, her sights on the hospital.

  Chapter Forty-Nine

  Saturday 27th April, 2019

  12.45 p.m.

  I look at the picture Mum drew as a kid of eyes staring out of the old oak tree. There’s a hollow inside that tree big enough for a child to cower in, hidden away from anyone who passes. The people of Forest Grove are like that old oak, dark places within where they hide stuff.

  I’m the worst of them.

  It’s my fault Grace has been arrested. It’s my fault Dad’s lying in hospital. And it’s my fault Mum’s falling apart all over again. That was the whole reason we never told her. We didn’t want her to try to kill herself again. We tried so hard, but I can see her breaking to pieces because I see it in myself too when I look in the mirror.

  So that’s it, game over. I ought to go down to the police station now. But I’m such a bloody coward. I heard what happened to Jacob Simms at St Fiacre’s! And yet how can I leave Grace in there for something she didn’t do?

  Maybe there’s another way. A way that means I don’t have to go to that place. A way that means Grace doesn’t have to stay there either.

  Tell the truth in a letter, get Grace off the hook and then . . . nothing. A stop to the darkness inside, a stop to the itch of guilt and grief.

  I hear the door slam and look outside.

  Mum’s going. Good. I don’t want her to be the one to find me.

  I look out of the window towards the woods where Mum tried to take her life after Joel died . . . and where Grandma Quail took her last breath.

  I pick up a notepad and pen, then I walk downstairs, slipping out and going to the forest.

  Chapter Fifty

  Saturday 27th April, 2019

  2 p.m.

  Melissa walked towards Patrick’s ward to find him sitting up in bed, Rosemary feeding him some porridge as Peter Mileham read the newspaper to him. Patrick was already looking brighter, with some colour in his olive cheeks. Rosemary had even given him a shave, brushing his hair to the side; it gleamed dark brown in the sunlight streaming through the window.

  He really was so handsome.

  Patrick looked up as Melissa entered, lips trying to form a smile as he saw her. ‘Mel,’ he croaked.

  But she stayed where she was, wrapping her arms around herself. ‘They’ve just taken Grace.’

  Rosemary sighed. ‘Yes, I thought they would.’

  ‘What happened, Patrick?’ Melissa said. ‘Why did our daughter do that to you?’

  ‘Argument,’ Patrick said. ‘Watch.’

  ‘I’ll leave you guys alone,’ Peter said, placing the newspaper down and walking from the room.

  ‘Watch?’ Melissa asked. ‘I don’t understand.’

  ‘He’s struggling to speak, Melissa,’ Rosemary said. ‘The police had to use flash cards.’

  ‘He managed to say enough to have our daughter arrested, though,’ Melissa shot back.

  Rosemary flinched. ‘Melissa, honestly. He was the one who was stabbed, you know.’

  ‘I need to know, Patrick,’ Melissa said, ignoring Rosemary.

  Patrick held her gaze, his dark eyes filling with tears. She felt her resolve weaken slightly. He did look upset.

  ‘Shall I tell Melissa, darling?’ Rosemary suggested to Patrick. ‘Saves you struggling to speak again.’

  Patrick nodded and tried to lift his hand out to Melissa.

  ‘Go to him, Melissa,’ Rosemary said. ‘He’s been asking for you.’

  Melissa swallowed and went to him, taking his hand. His touch sent a bolt through her, so familiar and warm, her darling Patrick.

  Her darling cheating Patrick.

  ‘Grace accidentally broke Patrick’s watch,’ Rosemary said. ‘The one we found in her rucksack.’

  Melissa nodded. That bloody Byatt heirloom, she wanted to say.

  ‘Not sure how it happened,’ Rosemary said. ‘Obviously Patrick can’t go into detail, but he told her off, as you would if someone broke a family heirloom. I presume she wasn’t paying attention or something – you know how Grace is sometimes.’ Melissa felt like saying, Actually, no, she pays attention to everything. But she wanted to hear what had happened. ‘Anyway,’ Rosemary said with a sigh, ‘Grace shouted back, the argument escalated, and – well, she stabbed her own father.’ Her voice trembled as though she were still trying to comprehend it herself.

  Patrick nodded, a tear falling down his cheek.

  Melissa took the seat beside him,
leaning close and exploring his face. ‘It doesn’t make sense, though. Grace doesn’t lose her temper like that.’

  ‘Sometimes children just snap, Melissa,’ Rosemary said. ‘You see it on the news all the time. Take all those kids from ordinary families who go into classrooms and start shooting people.’

  Melissa looked at her in surprise. ‘Grace didn’t shoot anyone, Rosemary. And actually, there is usually something going on when you dig deeper.’

  ‘Well, then, maybe there is with Grace?’ Rosemary said.

  ‘I know Grace. Look, can Patrick and I have some time alone, please?’

  Rosemary frowned, clearly reluctant to leave her son.

  Patrick nodded at his mother and she sighed. ‘Fine, but call me if you need me. Be gentle with him, okay?’ she said to Melissa as she left the room.

  As the door closed, Patrick squeezed her hand. ‘Love you,’ he whispered.

  She couldn’t bring herself to say it back. His gaze faltered.

  ‘I know everything, Patrick,’ she said as tears gathered in her eyes. ‘I know about all your affairs.’

  He squeezed his eyes shut and started shaking his head. ‘Sorry,’ he rasped. ‘Sorry.’

  She gently put her fingers under his chin and made him look at her. ‘You lied to me. What else have you lied about?’

  He looked at her in surprise. ‘No . . . lies.’

  ‘But how can I ever trust you again?’ She explored his dark eyes. ‘Did Grace really stab you, Patrick?’

  ‘Why would I lie?’ he managed to get out.

  Patrick was right. Why would he lie about Grace stabbing him?

  ‘They’ve taken her to St Fiacre’s, Patrick! If you’re lying . . .’

  She bent over, crying into her hands. She felt Patrick’s hand on her back.

  ‘Forgive me,’ Patrick said. ‘Please.’

  She looked up at him, trying to find the man she’d married there. ‘I don’t know, Patrick, I just don’t know.’

  Her phone rang in her pocket. She sighed, taking it out. It was Bill.

  She put it to her ear. ‘Bill?’

  ‘Lewis and Lilly have gone AWOL,’ he said hurriedly. ‘I went to check on them and they’ve both gone. Tried calling them, have been searching the village with some others too. Nothing.’

  ‘When’s the last time you saw them?’ Melissa asked, giving Patrick a panicked look.

  ‘After you left.’

  ‘Shit.’ She put her hand over the mouthpiece. ‘The twins have disappeared.’

  Patrick’s eyes widened in alarm.

  ‘You know the forest better than anyone, Melissa.’ Bill said. ‘I think they might have headed in there.’

  ‘Right, I’m coming back.’

  She put her phone down and Patrick reached out for her, his fingers grazing hers. ‘Find them,’ he said.

  ‘I will.’

  Ten minutes later, she arrived at Bill and Rosemary’s to find Bill outside with Tommy Mileham and Ross Shillingford.

  ‘We’ve searched the whole village,’ Tommy said when she approached them. ‘No sign.’

  ‘Okay, let’s go and look in the forest, Bill,’ Melissa said. ‘I’m sure they’ll be fine. Tommy, Ross, you stay here in case they come back.’

  The men nodded and Melissa and Bill headed to the forest, pushing branches out of the way to enter it. It felt dense and dark beneath the canopy of trees, the sun shrouded now by clouds, making it seem like night inside.

  Melissa quickened her step, eyes scouring the trees. She had a sudden flashback to leaving her home all those years ago after Joel died, the distant sound of a three-year-old Lilly crying and calling out for her. Melissa had felt weightless, slightly unhinged, as if she could just lift her feet off the ground and fly.

  She imagined feeling that way now.

  She imagined Lewis or Lilly feeling that way now.

  Her stomach dropped.

  She started jogging, legs pumping, almost stumbling over roots and rocks as she flung branches out of the way. Bill ran beside her, panting, frantic too, until they finally got to the tree she was looking for.

  The great ancient oak, right in the gnarly heart of the forest.

  The place where she’d nearly died and her mother had died.

  And there, hanging from it, a body.

  Chapter Fifty-One

  Saturday 27th April, 2019

  2.45 p.m.

  ‘Oh my God, it’s Lilly!’ Melissa screamed.

  She ran to her daughter, holding her legs up as Bill jumped on to the bench to untie the rope, which was tangled around a branch.

  ‘Hold on, darling, hold on,’ Melissa said as she trembled beneath the weight of her daughter, stroking her leg as she looked up at her pale face.

  ‘Lilly, oh God, not Lilly!’ Bill shouted as he frantically tried to unknot the rope. ‘It won’t bloody budge.’

  There was a sound from behind them and they turned to see Lewis sprinting over with Ryan.

  ‘No!’ Lewis screamed. He ran to his sister as Ryan jumped on the bench, helping Bill untie the knot and release Lilly.

  They gently lowered her to the ground as Melissa started CPR, her tears spilling on to Lilly’s skin.

  ‘Is she gone?’ Lewis asked as he sobbed. ‘Is she dead?’

  Lilly suddenly gasped a breath, her eyes opening and looking right into Melissa’s. ‘Sorry,’ she wheezed.

  Melissa sat watching Lilly in her hospital bed, Lewis curled up asleep on the chair nearby. Her caramel hair was spread out on the blue pillow and she was sleeping soundly. Bar a few torn ligaments in her neck, she was fine, thank God. They’d found her just in time. Lewis had noticed his sister missing and had headed into the forest to look for her, bumping into Ryan on the way.

  The medical staff suspected that Lilly had had a psychotic breakdown, considering she was barely saying a word. So once they were sure the damage to her neck wasn’t too serious and there were no other complications from having her airways suppressed, they told Melissa she’d be moved to the hospital’s psych ward.

  Melissa was horrified at the thought. Her confident, vivacious girl had been so horribly affected by recent events that her mind simply couldn’t take it. And while she was officially conscious, Lilly chose to just sleep, moaning in sadness whenever she opened her eyes and promptly closing them again, as if she was too scared to be present in the world as it was.

  Bill entered the room now, going to his granddaughter’s bed and stroking her hair. He’d been there all afternoon with Melissa, allowing her to take breaks every now and again. Rosemary had arrived soon afterwards and the three of them had sobbed quietly in the corridor outside. They agreed not to tell Patrick yet.

  ‘God, what a mess,’ Bill said quietly, so as not to wake Lewis, slumping down on the chair opposite Melissa. ‘Why would our Lilly do this?’

  ‘I don’t know. None of this seems real.’

  ‘It’s no coincidence she chose that tree, though, is it, Melissa?’

  Melissa examined his face, heartbeat pulsing in her ears. ‘What do you mean?’

  He sighed, pressing his palm over his bald head. ‘We know you attempted suicide there, Melissa. The twins told us.’

  She reeled back, putting her hand to her mouth. ‘No! How do they know?’

  In her mind, she ran through who knew. Ryan. No, he wouldn’t say anything. Debbie? Maybe, but why tell the twins?

  Unless someone else saw her that day?

  ‘They wouldn’t say,’ Bill said. ‘Maybe that’s why the kids didn’t tell you what Grace did. They were scared you’d try to take your life again.’

  Nausea worked its way up to Melissa’s throat. She jumped up, running to the small bathroom and shutting the door, leaning over the toilet as she spat out bile. Then she stood up and wiped her mouth with trembling fingers, looking into the mirror at her haunted face.

  ‘You did this,’ she whispered to herself. ‘You did all of this. It’s your mess and you need to sort it out.’
/>   ‘Melissa?’ Bill knocked softly at the door. ‘You okay in there?’

  She took a deep breath and opened the door.

  His face softened as he looked at her. ‘Come here,’ he said, opening his arms to her. She fell into them, just as she had as a child. ‘It’ll be okay,’ he whispered in her ear. ‘We’ll make it all okay again, I promise.’

  ‘How?’ she asked as she looked at her sleeping daughter, the rope marks still present on her neck. ‘How can we come back from all this?’

  ‘You’re their mother,’ he said firmly. ‘You’re Patrick’s wife. You need to pull yourself together, Melissa, for the sake of your kids. You can’t fall apart like you did when Joel died. You need to do what’s right.’

  ‘But what’s right, Bill?’ she asked, honestly wanting to know the answer because she didn’t have a clue how to fix things any more.

  ‘Stick by Patrick,’ Bill replied. ‘Show the kids you’re a family. Otherwise, you’re right, the twins never will come back from this.’

  ‘And Grace?’

  ‘We can’t control that now, but she will get the help she needs. What we can control is what happens to these two,’ he said, peering towards the sleeping twins. ‘You have a chance to make things right for them, and you won’t be alone. Rosemary and I will help you do that, Melissa. We’ll fix things like we have before.’

  He pulled her into a hug and she felt like that little girl again, standing in his kitchen in a nightdress. Melissa pressed her face back against his shoulder. Yes, they would fix things. Rosemary and Bill always did.

  Chapter Fifty-Two

  Friday 3rd May, 2019

  8.15 a.m.

  Melissa tried to smile as she watched Patrick shuffle along with a Zimmer frame, his nurse behind him. It had been nearly a week since he’d woken from his coma, and it was a gradual process. But Patrick was his usual determined self, convinced he’d return home in time for his birthday at the end of June. Rosemary and Bill were delighted by his quick recovery, but Melissa was finding it hard to feel the same enthusiasm when her younger daughter was currently incarcerated in St Fiacre’s a few miles away and her other daughter was spending her days in a ward for the mentally vulnerable. Not to mention Lewis, who’d sunk into a pit of silence and despair, just sitting in his grandparents’ attic room whenever he wasn’t with his twin sister in hospital.