Matilda Wren

by When Ravens Fall

  “I do not believe we have met. I am Benjamin Marshall-Howard. Please let me offer my sincere condolences for your recent loss.”

  While turning away from Sean and introducing himself to Rachel, Sean looked down at the card.

  Allen & Marshall-Howard

  Criminal Defence Lawyers 9 Carmelite Street - London - EC4Y 0DR Benjamin Marshall-Howard. Senior Partner

  Tel: (020) 7222 1234 Fax: 020 794 5333 The articulate and eloquent voice denoted the poles-apart difference between Sean and Ben. It demonstrated not only the class distinction but the variations in social status and social confidence. Ben took centre stage in a room. He commanded attention, but not in the aggressive, volatile way that Sean would, more in an authoritive, holding court way. It wasn’t something that could be forged. It showed years of grooming, prepping and moulding; a life that was consumed with brushing shoulders with society’s elite. Ben’s natural grace threw Sean off guard completely. Already wary of his sister, he now had to contend with her upper-class significant other. He didn’t like it when he felt threatened and although Ben’s demeanour was friendly enough, he felt out of his depth with this man. His eloquent speech conveyed the intelligence he possessed and it was that which scared Sean more than anything.

  Alice noticed Sean’s discomfort and it pleased her that Ben had that effect. She had hoped he would and, as usual, her fiancé did not disappoint her. She thought about letting him squirm under the awkwardness for a little while longer, enjoying the scene before her, but decided it could wait for another time.

  She had been around her brother for far longer than she had originally planned and now all she wanted was to go home, back to her world and wash off the stench of her past.“We really should be going dear,” She said to Ben, lightly touching him on the arm. “If we want to get back to Chelsea before it is dark.”

  “Right-o.” Ben replied “It was nice to see you again Rachel. We must meet for lunch or something soon. Maybe you could come up to London for a day.” Alice directed to Rachel.

  The invitation wasn’t as fake as it sounded. She said it partly to wind her brother up and the quick twitch of his eyes showed her that she had succeeded, but she really did want a chance to spend some time with the woman on her own. Why, she wasn’t too sure of, but she felt a connection with her and that was something which didn’t happen very often in Alice’s life.

  Rachel just smiled and returned the hug that was offered before Alice and Ben left the kitchen, leaving her with Sean.

  His familiar stance was restored, as soon as they had left.

  Giving her a quick kiss on top of her head, he walked out of the kitchen, yelling at Adam that he was ready for their re-match.

  Rachel stood alone and mulled over the last half an hour.

  There was something definitely going on between brother and sister that much was evident, but it was the way Alice had been with her that had been unsettling. Rachel knew her from when she was first with Sean but they had never been friends. The urgency with which Alice had grabbed hold of her had left a panicky feeling inside her chest. But she did not understand what it was.

  * * *

  Mick was suffering more than anybody. He had just lost his entire universe. Maureen had been his constant, throughout his whole life. She was such a pretty young thing when he had met her; vibrant, effervescent and pulsating.

  She loved life, always laughed and dressed in outrageous bright clothes; that was the swinging sixties.

  She was a big girl even back then, but Mick had loved it; something to get his hands around and grab on to. When the paramedics had told him his wife was already gone and that there was nothing they could do, he thought his heart would stop beating. The tightness that had clenched it felt so hard; like it would squeeze the life out of it.

  He looked at his wife’s bulky frame, on the floor of the bedroom where she had collapsed and over to his daughter and granddaughter, who looked like they were sleeping.

  Then his brain switched off. The psychiatrist had said it was a coping mechanism. PTSD it was called; Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. They were told is it caused by the experience of a traumatic event but one of the nurses at the institute, where Mick was now staying, had explained it better to Sean and Rachel.

  “A traumatic event, such as experiencing the death of someone, can in turn overwhelm the individual’s ability to cope; producing severe negative feelings of helplessness or horror. Your father is displaying all the classic signs.”

  Sean laughed at this. When it came to the Fergus family, crazy loony toons behaviour was unquestionably ‘classic’.

  Chapter 16

  November 2006

  Dear Rachel,

  I am not entirely sure as to why I have chosen you to be

  the one I bear my soul to. I do not feel as if we have ever had a

  bond of any kind, so you may be a little perplexed as so am I.

  However, it seems to be that you are indeed the one I need to

  tell my story to because, you see I am now safe, whereas you are

  defi nitely not. In fact, you are probably in the biggest danger

  of your entire life.

  I know this doesn’t make much sense but please let me start

  at the beginning and I hope then you will start to understand.

  My brother abused me from as far back as I can remember.

  He isn’t the sweet gentle giant you think he is. You couldn’t be

  further from the truth. He is a monster. He was born this way

  and he will never ever change.

  He completely manipulated me, made me believe that he

  was the only one that would ever love me. He made me do sick

  things to him, that a brother should never make a sister do.

  He kissed me in a way that was wrong, eventual y all the

  touching and kissing led to him raping me for the first time

  when I was eleven. After that, it was something that would

  happen quite frequently, until he met you.

  But when you left him, it started all over again, until

  you final y came back. Then he became scared that you would

  find out, that’s why I guess he stopped. But he still continued

  tormenting me and making me hurt myself.

  Have you not guessed yet? My awful secret. His awful

  secret.

  Katie is Sean’s daughter. She is his blood. Another innocent

  life created and destroyed by the same person. An evil, wicked,

  malicious and sinful being.

  It is not just this I need to tell you though. He may have

  stopped having sex with me, but he hadn’t stopped creeping into

  my room in the middle of the night, climbing into my bed and

  whispering nasty disgusting words into my ears.

  Most of it would be utter filth, the kind of stuff he wished he

  could do with me but was no longer able to because of you. He

  saw that as betraying you. But he said some other things too.

  Like how he sliced your boyfriends’ throat and then burnt

  him alive; Greg was his name was wasn’t it? He was in the way

  you see, of you and Sean. Sean will exterminate any obstacle

  that he believes is in his way. Greg was in his way.

  Sean has a friend; his only friend come to think of it. His

  name is Kenny Maltrowitz. He was there the night Greg was

  murdered.

  Kenny was also the one that found you. He had been

  watching you for quite a while by all accounts. He told Sean

  where you were. I don’t think he would have come looking if

  it wasn’t for this man. In a way I am grateful to Kenny for

  that, because once Sean had you again, he stopped wanting me.

  Just like when we were kids. When you were around he never

  wanted to do the bad things to me.


  I am warning you my brother will end up kil ing you;

  either directly or indirectly. All the same it will happen.

  He executes everything he sees as an obstacle. Annihilating

  and eradicating. Mark my words my girl, you will die at his

  hands unless you GET OUT NOW!

  It is not just you that you have to think about. You have

  a son as wel . Sean will see him as a threat soon enough. How

  long before he turns?

  It is up to you now. You are the only one that knows the

  truth. The whole beastly account.

  Take care and good luck,

  Maisy It must have been the hundredth time Rachel had read the letter. The first time none of what Maisy had written went in. The second time she threw up and the third time she slowly begun to absorb and comprehend the dead girl’s words.

  The more times she read the letter, the more it had all begun to make sense; the things that she was saying happened to her. Sean? It couldn’t be; running it through in her head. Sean wasn’t that monster; was he?

  The more she read the more she tried to find logic in Maisy’s letter. He had raped his own sister, had been doing so for years. He shattered and crushed everything around him. He had murdered Greg. Why? She didn’t understand; she had left him, she had chosen Sean. Why kill Greg?

  All her instincts were screaming that she knew what Maisy was saying was true, but she still continued to search for hidden indications that the girl was well and truly off her rocker. But the letter was so concise and had been written involving details that just couldn’t be made up or imagined.

  It didn’t sound like the ramblings of a mad woman. It sounded too sincere and raw.

  She ran into Adam’s room and started to throw clothes into a small rucksack. Grabbing Greg’s T- Shirt that he had taken to sleeping with at night from the bed, she snatched her keys up and ran out of her tiny flat. She jumped into the car and headed straight over to Adam’s school. She wasn’t really sure what she was doing, but she needed time to think; to process. Above all, she needed to get herself and Adam as far away from Essex as she could.

  Sean found Maisy’s letter on the table where Rachel had left it. He didn’t need to read it; already knowing what it would contain. His brainless and weak sister was having the last laugh, from beyond the grave. Only she wasn’t so brainless; that’s what really galled him. She had planned all of this for god knows how long; to kill herself, to take Katie with her, to make sure Rachel found out everything.

  He cursed her and himself. Why had he acted the big ‘I am’ and boasted to Maisy about what he saw as achievements?

  He wanted to scare her, to show her what he could do. That people could just disappear if he wanted them to.

  Once he became conscious that some of Rachel’s and Adam’s belongings were missing, he knew he was running out of time. He grabbed his phone. The call to Kenny was quick and concise; he was coming to pick him up.

  He knew where she was heading; the only place she had left to run to. Only, she didn’t know that Sean knew all about it.

  Chapter 17

  In Plato’s ‘The Symposium’ Aristophanes narrates a story about soul mates. Aristophanes describes how humans initially had four arms, four legs and a single head made of two faces, but Zeus was anxious their power could destroy him so he divided them all in half, denouncing them to spend their lives searching for the other half to complete them.

  Rachel had learnt about it at school. She remembered thinking how stupid it all sounded. Th at there was one person destined to be with another, seemed to her a little farfetched. Then she had fallen in love with Sean Fergus; the minute she first met him. It had only taken a few moments and she was smitten.

  It was a love that had lasted a whole decade of being apart. He completed her. They were still kids when they had first met; their whole lives ahead of them. She had caught him staring at her a few times, before she decided to confront the boy that made her feel awkward and self-conscious.

  Was that her mistake right there? If she had never spoken to him that day, would that have prevented everything which had happened since? It may not have helped Maisy, but Greg would still be alive, they may have been able to be happy together.

  He had hypnotised her; captivating any common sense she may have held. She had the same affect on him too. They were so young; so adolescent and naive to the power that existed between them.

  Rachel tried to shake the thoughts of old memories out of her head. They weren’t helping her to think clearly.

  She had to see him for what he was. She had to. She tried to concentrate on the road ahead. It felt like she had been driving for days; her whole body felt drained and unattached somehow.

  She didn’t want to deal with any of it. She knew she had to though, but her first priority was getting Adam somewhere safe. She needed to make sure she took him as far away from the situation as possible. She wasn’t ready to deal with the repercussions of Maisy’s letter; she wasn’t ready for what she was about to do either.

  She had always decided that she would let Adam choose when he wanted to meet his real father; never expecting to just turn up on his doorstep unannounced. No warning. So she didn’t think about it. She pushed further thoughts out of her mind. Sean wandered back in though, no matter how hard she tried not to think about him.

  An image or his voice. His smile or those irresistible eyes. The thing about suppressed thoughts is that the more you try not to think about something, the more the thought will enter your head. It is a rebound effect. While part of the brain will try to think of anything but the thought it’s supposed to be suppressing, another part is searching for information that will enable the suppressed thought to re-emerge. This constant loop-like action was what was happening in Rachel’s brain right now.

  The journey was taking its toll on her and she rubbed her eyes. She had been driving for four hours solid and had made not one stop since she had frantically collected Adam from school; telling them there was a family emergency and that he needed to leave right now. They were almost there.

  They had left the elongated and far-reaching M6 a while ago. Rachel had only been here once, when James had first moved there. She didn’t even know if he was still at the same address. It had been eight years. But it was the only option she could think of.

  She looked in the mirror at her sleeping son on the back seat. He didn’t deserve any of this. She had let Sean into his world, when she should have been protecting him. But how could she have known. The Sean Fergus she knew, the one she had been exposed to, wasn’t the person that had done such dreadful things, ruined so many lives.

  The Sean that had held her in his arms, that made her feel safe and complete. The Sean that made her laugh and showed her the sensitive side of him he kept reserved only for her. That Sean was her world; had always been her world. That Sean, Rachel wasn’t so sure she could turn her back on.

  Stopping the car outside James’ rented house she shuddered silently. She never thought she would be back here again. She had to admit to herself, she wasn’t looking forward to this; to all the questions and accusations. She didn’t really have time, to give the answers she knew he would want.

  Gently shaking Adam awake, it slowly begun to dawn on her that she had made some pretty wrong decisions in the past ten years. Hindsight is a funny thing. But then so is fate, if you believe in that, Rachel reasoned with herself. If fate and destiny exists then her decisions made no impact.

  This day was always predetermined. It was always going to happen because someone, or something, somewhere had already decided. From Rachel’s knowledge of fate and destiny, which was derived from films and soppy romance novels, believers subscribe to the idea of an event in one’s life that is preordained; inevitable and unavoidable.

  Fate lays emphasis on the illogicality and inhospitable nature of events, whereas destiny focuses on the concept of an irreversible direction of those events. Fate and
Destiny conclude ultimately in Doom. This is especially relevant to the final ending, always unhappy or terrible, all directed by fate and destiny.

  She blocked that thought instantly. Had Maisy possessed free will? Rachel’s mind was working overtime. Her letter sounded like she had liberally made the decision in what she did. It was almost as if she was at peace with herself; or was it all inescapable and necessary?

  Necessary for what though? Why had she met Sean, fallen for him? Why had Maisy told her what she did?

  Rachel just couldn’t think straight anymore. It was all just too confusing. She had to get Adam settled and safe and then try to unpick the huge, wrangled knot her life had found itself.

  Standing at the door, she hesitated to knock. Adam looked up at his mother, still a little dazed from being woken.

  She smiled but he sensed her uncertainness. Grinning back at her, he knocked on the door himself. Was that fate; her seven year old son knocking on his father’s door? Was that his destiny or did he freely choose to do so.

  Adam was a child. He did not understand any of what was running through her head. He was quite used to his mother behaving irrationally, if not quite so erratically, before now. He had always had Greg though, to explain it all too him. He didn’t know what to make of being taken out of his classroom and going on a very long car ride with his mum.

  She had told him they were going on a little trip, that he was going to stay with her old friend for a few days and then she would be back to get him. Adam, being quite a laid back child, thought it was all quite exciting; especially when he discovered that Rachel had packed his favourite backpack.

  He thought he was going on an adventure.

  James had doubt his legs weren’t about to give way underneath him when he opened the front door. They felt as if they had turned into two pieces of string, dangling under his upper body.

  “Hello James. Can I come in?”

  He stepped aside the door to let her pass; all done automatically and unconsciously. Rachel walked into the house. The front door led into a small living room. There was a young woman curled up on the sofa reading a magazine.