“Sorry.”
“It’s okay. I like the smells of the outside world. Sometimes you smell a little bit like alcohol, too.”
I was shocked. I’d never come to work drunk. “I… Isabel, that can’t be right.”
“It is,” she said. “Only a little bit. You try to cover it up with chewing gum and body spray, but I can smell it a bit. Do you drink at night?”
There was nothing I could say. I glanced anxiously in both directions along the corridor. It was possible that there’d been a few days where I’d been hungover, but I would never have been over the limit when driving. But what if it’d been more than I thought? What if Chi had noticed the smell?
“It’s okay,” Isabel said. “I would never tell anyone. You’re my favourite nurse, you know. You’re the kindest nurse I’ve ever had. You helped me apply for the Koestler Award, you let me draw you, and you tell me all about yourself. You even care about my reassessment and the fact that I might go to big-girl prison. None of the others ever cared like that, not even Alesha. I like you too much to tell anyone.”
“I never drink at work,” I said quietly, paranoid that another patient might overhear.
“Oh, I know. It’s okay. I’ll never tell anyone.” She winked at me, before getting on with her drawing. After a short pause, she said. “I think magpies might be my favourite birds. They’re so clever. Pepsi brings me things for me to make my own nest. Sometimes I wish I could. It’d be a lot cosier than this room. Maybe I could make a little nest in the woods somewhere and live on my own. That way no one would bother me and I wouldn’t bother them.”
“Would you like that?” I asked.
“Maybe. As long as Owen could visit. He came today, actually. He’s disappointed in me for hurting myself.”
The mention of Owen worried me. What if he’d told Isabel that I’d visited her home? Would Isabel feel that I’d crossed a line? What if she went to Chi and told him what I’d done? I searched her face for any evidence that she knew, but Isabel’s expression was blank. I leaned back in my chair and tried to relax. Why would Isabel tell Chi anything? Then again, it was odd for her to bring up the drinking, too. She seemed off today. It wasn’t often she talked about anything as negative as this; usually she focused on the positives. Perhaps it was the wave of depression that had gripped her all week.
“It gets claustrophobic in this place sometimes,” she said. “There are too many people here. I can’t walk down the corridor unless there’s someone with me. The only time I’m alone is at night and in the bathroom. It’s suffocating.”
“I know it might feel like that,” I replied. “But it’s in your best interest for the time being.”
“My best interest? Or is it in the best interest for the rest of the world?” She rolled her eyes. “I am a murderer, after all. At least, that’s what the legal system decided when I was fourteen years old.” She tapped her pencil on the top of her desk and lowered her eyes.
“Have you been thinking about your conviction, Isabel?”
“More than usual, yes,” she said. “Maybe it’s because of those bitches out there stamping on my feet when I walk past. Pushing me into walls. Leaving notes in my room that tell me I’m the devil. Maybe it’s all piling up on top of me. I can’t breathe.” She tapped the pencil so hard I was worried it might break or hurt her wrist.
“I’m sorry that’s happening to you,” I said, and meant it.
“It’s not your fault.” She threw the pencil onto the desk and turned so that her body faced me, crossing one leg over the other. “I remember more about that day now.”
“You do?” Though I tried to play it cool, my heart responded to my excitement. She remembered?
“Not everything—a few little bits here and there. Can I tell you what I remember?”
I rubbed sweaty palms against my thighs. “Yes.”
“It was warm and sunny. I was wearing a white sundress that I didn’t like very much, but Mum wanted me to wear it because the Earnshaws were coming and they were important. I wanted to wear jeans and a t-shirt but that didn’t ‘convey the right image.’ Owen was forced into a smart shirt with buttons that he kept undoing. Mum wanted them done up right to the collar, but Owen felt like it was strangling him. When the Earnshaws arrived we were supposed to line up like tin soldiers and say hello. We were supposed to pretend we were a happy little family.”
I tried to imagine what the Fieldings had looked like that day. Had they stood with forced smiles on their lips, cheeks straining with the effort? In my mind, the white house was so dazzling it created an eerie backdrop to their plastic perfection.
“Why did you have to pretend? Didn’t you live in a happy home?” I asked.
“It was okay,” she said with a shrug. “But Dad was always working, and Mum seemed spaced out a lot of the time. Neither of them was that bothered about spending time with us. That’s why we used to play on our own a lot. Owen liked to play hide-and-seek in the woods near the duck pond. Sometimes he used to pretend he was a wolf and I was Little Red Riding Hood. I even had a coat with a hood that I used to wear.”
A shudder worked its way through my body. I think I physically trembled, because Isabel gave me an odd look, as though she had noticed my revulsion.
“It was perfectly innocent,” she said defensively. “We liked the Grimm fairy tales. Sometimes we’d pretend we were Hansel and Gretel, leaving breadcrumbs through the trees. Owen believed in fairies for a while. He even built them little houses out of twigs and leaves.”
Was I reading too much into their innocent games? If I didn’t know a little girl had been brutally murdered on the Fielding property, would I think playing fairy tales was creepy?
“Did you play those games on the day Maisie died?” I asked.
“We didn’t go down to the duck pond right away,” she said. “I remember Mum had bought some finger food and laid it out on the kitchen table. The French doors were open, and Owen and I ran onto the patio with Maisie. She was eating a sausage roll and chasing us around with greasy pastry fingers. What was she wearing that day? Was it a yellow sundress? I seem to remember daisies, but I’m not sure. Maybe it was red. Or maybe I remember the red from… other things.” She was lost in her memories now, staring beyond me at the wall above my head. “When Mum opened a bottle of champagne, the adults moved onto the patio, and we got bored of the small space, so we chased each other around the lawn for a bit. They’d finished the bottle by the time we decided to show Maisie the duck pond. They were drinking those adult drinks with lots of spirits in them, and we were pretty bored by then. Plus, Mum was mad at me because I’d tumbled down the hill and had grass stains on my dress. When she took me into the bathroom to clean me up, she told me I was too old to be running around with my brother and that I should start acting like a lady. I had an image to uphold, and that image didn’t include grass stains.”
I thought about Isabel’s mother sitting at the dining table while her husband controlled everything. Maybe the woman felt she’d at least had one thing she could try and control: Isabel. But when Isabel was taken away from her, she cracked.
“Anyway, we took Maisie to see the duck pond. The previous owners had it built, apparently, and Dad let us buy some ducks to house there. It was a pretty big pond that stretched out where the lawn dipped. We’d never been allowed to go to the pond on our own. Not until I was twelve, anyway. From then on, I was deemed old enough to make sure my little brother didn’t drown. I always loved that pond. Dad used to take me when I was little. He’d hold my hand and carry a few slices of bread to feed the ducks.” She paused. “We didn’t go very often. Later, I’d go with our housekeeper, who was always reluctant to sit on the grass and feed the ducks. She was afraid of birds.”
“Do you remember what happened when you were at the pond? How did you end up in the woods?”
“It was Owen’s idea.” She turned her head to the left and stared at her bedroom wall.
I followed her gaze to see what sh
e was staring at. It was an image of a magpie.
“He wanted to play a game,” she said in a quiet voice. It was as though she was in a trance. Had she forgotten I was there?
“What sort of game, Isabel?” My heart was pounding now. I was so close to finding out the truth of what happened the day Maisie died. Isabel was the key to it all, I knew she was. If she would just tell me…
“I…” she started. “I think I remember.” In one swift motion, she dropped her head into her hands and began to groan.
“Isabel?” I stood up, alarmed at her reaction.
Isabel rose from her seat so that we were both standing face to face. Her cheeks were wet with tears, which she brushed away quickly.
“Do you remember?” I asked.
She nodded. Her shoulders were slumped and her mouth was slightly open, as if in shock. “I… I want to tell you.” Her bottom lip trembled as she spoke.
I stepped closer. “You can trust me.”
“I know I can.” She moved towards me. “Please, hear my story.”
“I will,” I said.
And before I knew it, I was moving into her room.
Part Two
Sometime in the middle of the night, the alarm sounded out through Hutton village. The high-pitched blare woke many from their peaceful slumber.
Not once in fifty-two years had the alarm rung out. Some didn’t even know what it was about, but many others did, and they knew it meant only one, terrible thing.
A patient had escaped from Crowmont Hospital.
Chapter Twenty
Let me check that again.
One. Two. Three. Rattle. Rattle. Rattle.
The door is definitely locked, but as I turn away from it, my skin itches so badly that I want to check one more time. I allow my fingers to run over the heavy-duty locks that have been installed on the thick wooden door. No one is getting in through that door.
But what about the windows? I have this issue before I go to bed every night. The ground floor windows are the perfect way to break in. One large brick, and the single pane of glass would smash with ease. I pull the woollen blanket around my shoulders and try to ignore the seeping, cold dread in my veins. It’s time to go to bed.
These days I take a mug of Ovaltine to bed with me. The boxes of wine are gone. They don’t mix well with my medication. I’m on medication now. That’s part of my life.
Six months ago, Crowmont Hospital security found me half-unconscious and delirious on the floor of Isabel Fielding’s room. The door was locked and Isabel was gone. Sometime in the night I’d swallowed eighteen 100-mg clozapine tablets; after the medical professionals pumped my stomach at York Hospital, I spent two hours hallucinating that a flock of birds was attacking me. The doctors were forced to restrain me, which only allowed the birds to peck out my eyes while I remained immobilised on the bed.
Sometimes, when I drift into sleep at night, I still feel the sensation of their beaks pecking against my eyelids.
The six months that have carried me kicking and screaming to this moment—checking the locks, closing the curtains, barricading myself into my bedroom—have been a period of revelation and realisation. Perhaps I should begin with what I remember, because there’s a lot that I don’t.
After recovering from my overdose, I was told by the police that Isabel Fielding had escaped Crowmont Hospital wearing my clothes and using my pass. At first, I didn’t understand what they were saying to me. I wasn’t even sure it was real. How did Isabel leave the hospital impersonating me? How did she get past the gates? But the police told me it was late—after midnight—and Isabel kept her head down through the corridors, flashed my pass to the receptionist, collected my car keys from my locker, and drove my car out of the front gate.
The guard saw my unique yellow and green Fiat Punto and automatically opened the gate. Why would he suspect that the woman inside, with the same colour hair and same build, would in actual fact be someone else? She had on my clothes and wore my pass around her neck.
How did she have my clothes?
How did she have my pass?
How did she know which car was mine?
How did she know which locker was mine?
The police asked me these questions over and over again, but I couldn’t answer any of them. The last thing I remembered was sitting outside Isabel’s room. She’d told me that she remembered more about Maisie’s death. I was about to go into her room.
And then nothing.
Then birds pecking at my face, their clawed feet landing on my chest. Beaks tearing at my skin. Claws scratching. Feathers flying. It was furious and painful, and I never want to go through anything like that again. Why would I take the clozapine? Why would I have done that to myself? I know the potential side effects, and I understand exactly how dangerous such a large dose would be. I don’t understand anything. All I know is that a patient had escaped on my watch, and now I don’t know what to believe.
The revelations kept coming. A few days after Isabel’s escape, after I’d recovered from the overdose, I was interviewed by a detective, DCI Murphy, who clearly believed I’d allowed Isabel to leave before taking an overdose out of remorse for my actions. The stubborn part of me scorned this theory, because I would never take an overdose, not after witnessing first-hand what it could do to a person.
But then I was admitted to Oakton Hospital, a psychiatric facility in Harrogate.
The rooms were locked at night, and I was forced to wear clothing without any buttons, zips, or draw strings, exactly like the patients at Crowmont. I padded around in slippers and was only allowed in the communal area if I behaved appropriately.
After being the nurse for so long, I discovered what it was like to be the patient.
It was in this new hospital that I was introduced to a therapist, Dr Ibbotson, who remains my doctor to this day. Now, however, the sessions are weekly and I don’t live on the ward anymore. During our sessions, he sits with his long pianist’s fingers idling on his knees as he listens attentively. Even as I think about him now I become nauseated, not because he is an unpleasant man, but because of the shameful things he has forced me to realise during our therapy sessions.
On my way up the stairs I close my eyes tightly to try and block out the memories of his patient, vacant expression as I gradually realised the lies I’d been telling myself ever since moving away from Hackney. It was Dr Ibbotson who had finally forced me to confront the truth, and I think I’ll always hate him for that, despite how it has helped me in the long run.
It’s cold tonight. September brings with it the promise of winter; the cold bite of the wind seeps in through the single-paned windows. I’m alone in the cottage. Tom was taken to a foster family while I was under psychiatric care. Even at the time, I knew it was for the best, because I want Tom to be safe, and being around me isn’t safe anymore. But the lack of his presence in the house is vast, and if I dwell on how much I miss him, I begin to feel myself spiral down into the kind of despair that only a box of wine can fix. At least now I understand that the wine doesn’t fix anything. It’s a masking-tape patch that only works until the corners begin to peel again.
Every night at nine pm I call Tom’s mobile to check he’s safe, and then I inspect the windows and doors to be sure they are all locked, take my Ovaltine upstairs, turn off all the lights, and get into bed. It’s not much of a life, but the routine helps me feel somewhat protected from whatever is out there lurking in wait.
I’m not sure what I’m waiting for. I’m not even sure if I’m in danger. I’m not sure if I know what’s real and what isn’t. All I know is that I need to feel safe. I need to know she—or he—isn’t coming for me. I don’t know which Fielding is the most dangerous—perhaps they’re all as dangerous as each other—but I know they’re all out there and at least one of them is a murderer.
Back when I was in the psychiatric ward, Dr Ibbotson worked hard to confront the white lies and delusions I’d been telling myself. In a clean, white r
oom with a desk more like a school table than the kind of desks you see in movies about therapists, he coaxed out of me the truth that I’d locked away for a long time.
“What do you remember about the funeral?” he’d asked as he sat cross-legged with a small notebook balanced on his knee. His long face was relaxed and neutral. His eyes blinked every now and then, which was the only movement of his inert form.
“I held Tom’s hand next to the grave. My father’s aftershave travelled downwind and smelled so strong that my stomach flipped over and I felt sick. I was crying a lot. I remember the wind on my wet cheeks. Everyone was in black.”
“You smelled your father’s aftershave,” Ibbotson said. “But you told me it was a funeral for both of your parents.”
“That’s right,” I said. “But I sensed that my father was there. I don’t understand why. I’ve never believed in ghosts. I… I’m not crazy, I swear.” I recognised the irony of my words, given where I was, but I was convinced that it’d been the drugs in my system after being found in Isabel’s room that had made me crazy. Everything before was… It was hard and stressful and I’d made mistakes, but I hadn’t been crazy. Had I?
“I need to go through what you’ve told me about the crime your father committed,” Dr Ibbotson said, followed by a slow blink. “Your father stabbed your mother before killing himself. Both your parents died in the murder-suicide crime. Later, you attended the funeral of both your parents, where you sensed your father’s presence.”
“That’s right. I don’t understand why we’re talking about this again.” I ran my fingers through my hair, pulling at the ends in frustration. Therapy isn’t supposed to be easy, but rehashing my parents’ violent deaths didn’t seem to be helping me. It was simply dredging up my old feelings of grief and guilt, despair and darkness.
“Leah, I need to show you something, and it’s going to be difficult for you to see.”
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