by J. A. Baker
Clambering back up, Audrey runs forward, terrified by the look on Peggy’s tiny, elf-like face. She turns and stares at her mother and mouths something, her small teeth perfectly white as she speaks. Audrey widens her eyes. She can’t hear her. She needs to find out what her daughter is saying. She needs help. Audrey steps forward. She will spread-eagle herself over the bonnet if she has to. But before she can do anything at all, the car starts to reverse once more. It continues on, the wheels turning the wrong way.
‘Your right lock!’ Audrey screams, ‘You need to put your right lock on. You’re going the wrong way!’
Audrey steps forward again, her legs wobbling as she tries to grab the driver’s side door handle. It’s locked. She hammers on the window, her fists pummelling the glass and bouncing off soundlessly. What is Peggy thinking? They are so close to sorting this thing out. All she has to do is turn the steering wheel around and back the car up. But before Audrey can do anything, the old fence begins to crumple and disintegrate, splintering into a thousand tiny fragments as it is hit by the sheer force of Peggy’s vehicle. Audrey watches, fear gripping her as the fence slowly disappears under its wheels. It’s too late. She knows it. Too late to do anything except stand by and watch as her daughter disappears over the edge of the cliff.
53
Audrey
The rain splatters against the windows and bounces off the skylights; a horribly grey day to match the ambience in the room. It’s full of people, a blur of grey faces, most of whom she doesn’t recognise. Heads dipped, they all avoid her gaze, murmuring to one another how dreadful it is, how unthinkable this whole situation is. She knows none of them; a sea of alien expressions, dark and condemnatory. Apart, that is, from a couple who are deeply familiar to her. Audrey stares ahead and can see her in the distance, head down, holding hands with a tall, good-looking man. They both have a Californian tan, incongruous against the mass of pale, washed out faces surrounding them. She tried to speak to her earlier but Beatrice ducked away, slid into the crowd and disappeared. No more than a perfectly groomed head, bobbing in and out of the gathering of people outside the crematorium. Since then she has done her best to divert her eyes every time Audrey looks her way. She has burnt her bridges now with her only remaining child but then she knew that when she made her decision. It didn’t take her long to work out what she was going to do. It was the only option left open to her and one that anybody in her position would have done, she feels certain of that.
‘You okay there, love?’
Audrey nods and stares ahead, too proud to answer. She has been quite helpful has this lady; this Lorna who is half her age. As helpful as one can be in a situation as peculiar and surreal as the one finds herself in. Still - it was Audrey’s choice; all her doing, and there’s no going back now. It’s all too far down the line to unsay what has been said. She has no regrets.
The service is brief. Insulting, really. How can you possibly encapsulate a person’s life in half an hour; sum up all of their deeds and actions, all of their achievements in such a short space of time? Tears prick the back of Audrey’s eyes. She blinks them away. She won’t cry. She will not let them see her cry, all of these people, all of these voyeurs, sitting here watching her, waiting for her to crack. It won’t happen. She will do all her crying in private, away from the prying eyes of the public. Away from the snapping shutters of the press. Keep what little shred of dignity she has left, intact.
Alec passes her on the way and rapidly diverts his gaze to the pew behind her, his eyes flickering as he accidentally catches her eye then quickly looks away. Just as she expected. She has lived for many years without speaking to him so having no further contact will be of no great loss to her. She watches as Beatrice and the tall man sidle over to him and become engaged in deep conversation. About her probably; about how they always knew this would happen and how she has always been slightly deranged. Well, let them. None of it matters anymore. People can think whatever they like about her. Call her a freak, a psychopath, the mother from hell. The papers are already doing it anyway. Lorna has tried to protect her from the bulk of it, but she has eyes and ears. She knows exactly what’s going on in the world around her. Despite what everybody thinks, she isn’t completely mad. She has a purpose, a plan, and intends to see it through. She cannot live the rest of her life thinking that all of this happened for nothing.
The crowds slowly filter out past her as she and Lorna wait till the end to stand up.
‘You ready?’ Lorna asks, her lashes fluttering as she speaks. She has lovely skin, this young lady, and beautiful, azure eyes that twinkle in the sunlight.
‘As I’ll ever be,’ Audrey replies softly as they stand up and edge their way out of their seats and into the aisle.
The press will be outside. She was told there wasn’t any way to stop them attending. Alec and the police appealed to them for some privacy but, at the end of the day, this is a public place and funerals don’t come with invitations. She hopes there won’t be as many here as there were at Sheryl’s funeral but you never can tell with these things, can you? She saw snippets of that particular event on the television and it made her want to weep. Swarms of reporters, snapping away, screaming a stream of endless questions at the grieving family as her coffin was being carried into the church. The audacity of these people knows no bounds. They live to prey on the vulnerable; feeding off their misery. All in the name of news. News indeed. Audrey exhales deeply. It’s no more than gutter gossip dressed up as a human interest story. They disgust her, these people, with their probing questions and foul mouths, hollering things at her as she dives in and out of the car. Pond life is what they are. Lorna has told her to ignore them, save her energy for what she is about to go through, but it’s so difficult when lies are being spread around about you - splashed all over the newspapers, bandied about on the television. Writers putting things down in print, claiming they have the story of your life sussed, when in actual fact they couldn’t be any further from the truth. But she supposes that’s to be expected, considering the situation she’s in and what she has told them. One of the newspapers even printed a story about a local lady who reckoned her mother witnessed it all, the whole attack and subsequent burial of Sheryl’s body. The story was made even more implausible and ludicrous by the fact that the same lady is now in a care home with advanced dementia, barely able to sit up in bed, let alone remember the details of a crime scene.
‘Over here!’ A voice screams at her as she and Lorna try to make their way past the crowds gathering outside. Cameras are held high as Audrey appears in the small courtyard, her head dipped.
‘Look away. Don’t give them any eye contact,’ Lorna hisses at her as they file past, their arms locked together, ‘Keep walking. The car is just over there.’
Audrey complies, her eyes fixed firmly on the ground, her heart thrashing around her chest in a wild, uncontrollable frenzy. She needs to get used to this. This is her life from here on in. This is the life she has chosen for herself.
The car door swings open and Audrey and Lorna bend down and practically throw themselves headlong inside, leaving the swarms of reporters and a handful of the angry, chanting mob behind them. They sit side by side, Audrey panting for breath as the driver starts up the engine and they head out of the car park, leaving them all in the distance, the crowds of people, all baying for her blood.
‘Well done Audrey. You handled that really well,’ Lorna says as she twists about in her seat adjusting her black skirt with her free hand.
Audrey nods gratefully and stares down at her right hand that’s attached to the police officer sitting next to her. A wee slip of a girl, handcuffed to an older lady - a woman old enough to be her grandmother. But this is her choice. Audrey has to keep telling herself that. It’s still new to her and she will take some time to adjust to it all. She is going to have to alter her way of thinking, change her behaviour, adapt her outlook. She is now going to have to think carefully about every single word that comes
out of her mouth. Because it’s not easy this lying business. Not half as easy as everyone thinks it is. The idea came to her after Peggy’s accident. A sudden dawning, a route out of it all. There was no way she would let her daughter take the blame for what was, after all, a dreadful accident. No way at all. Audrey knew what that would entail, what the aftermath of such a confession would be. There would be a barrage of questions, forensics to answer to, an inquest into the whole sorry affair. Her daughter’s life paraded all over the front pages of every newspaper far and wide. Death doesn’t stop these people. If anything, it fuels their interest. They would sully her good name, splash her beautiful face all over the internet, turn her into a demon.
So, Audrey stepped in, did what any decent mother would do and took responsibility for it, told them that she was the one who killed Sheryl. After all, she may as well spend the rest of her life in prison for all she has left going for her. The only difference between the life she had and the one she now faces, is the bars in a prison cell. Her life is worthless. No family, no friends, nothing to live for. Prison will be her penance for all she has done - ruining her daughter’s gorgeous face, subjecting her to a life where she was forced to hide away, to retreat into her own well of misery.
She stares out of the window, concentrating on getting her story straight. Everything she tells them is put under the microscope, her every word scrutinised, shaken up, stirred about and thrown back at her. She has to stay alert, be ready for their reverse psychology, their need to catch her out. She hoped they would simply take her word for it, be glad the perpetrator of such a horrific deed had at last owned up, but it would appear it’s not quite as simple as that. The questions the police fire at her are endless, day in and day out,
‘Where was Peggy when it happened?’
‘How did you know about the tunnel?’
‘Was your daughter involved?’
She told them it all in as much detail she could - that she had gone to visit her daughter and caught her arguing on the doorstep with this woman who simply wouldn’t leave Peggy alone. She was being abusive, trying to rekindle a friendship that Peggy had ended. Audrey had taken her daughter inside, told her to ignore the woman and Peggy had gone for a lie down to calm her nerves. While she was asleep, Audrey had tried to reason with Sheryl, tell her to leave but she was having none of it and had tried to get inside the house, pushing and shoving Audrey around with force. Audrey had pushed back and Sheryl had fallen and banged her head on the step, smacking it against the corner of the concrete.
‘Why didn’t you just call an ambulance? How did you know about the tunnel under the house?’
Endless questions. In the end, she chose to ignore a lot of them. Especially the one about Peggy and why her car went over the cliff. Did she think it was suicide or an accident? That was one of the questions she could answer truthfully. She had no idea. She hoped it was a gross error of judgement, a slip of her foot on the pedal, but Peggy’s mental health was well known throughout their social circle. The rumour mill didn’t take long to get going, to spew out its venom. The truth is, none of them will ever know.
She thinks of Alec and what he will do now. That sad little boy from the council estate, who she spent so long hating, now despises her in return. What goes around comes around.
The car pulls up outside the huge gates; elongated, spiky claws that tear at the cloudless sky. Audrey uses her free hand to straighten her clothes out and smooth her hair back into place. This is her home now. She needs to make a good impression. Appearances are still important.
‘Ready?’ Lorna asks, her smile bright enough to light up an entire room.
‘As I’ll ever be,’ Audrey replies as they step out of the car and head inside.
Acknowledgments
As always, I am eternally grateful to the people who helped this book get into print. Thank you to my brilliant husband Richard for his never-ending patience and countless cups of tea, as well as some fairly unique ideas when my muse decided to up and leave me. I am blessed with the most supportive family and friends, who are always ready with kind words and a ready ear.
A huge thank you to my editor Emma Mitchell who never fails to spot the cracks and holes in my stories and is there ready to plug them with her amazing suggestions and ideas. I cannot thank Fred Freeman and Betsy Reavley enough. They believed in me when others didn’t and gave me the chance to fulfil my lifelong dream of becoming a published author. You guys are the best. I would also like to extend my gratitude to the team at Bloodhound Books - Alexina Golding, Sumaira Wilson and Sarah Hardy - you folks are dynamite and always there when needed!
A final thank you to all my children and grandchildren. You all mean the world to me - I just don’t tell you often enough xx