CHAPTER
THIRTY-SIX
“A baby?” I said. “But we took precautions!”
“The pill’s only ninety-eight percent reliable.”
I didn’t believe it. Said so.
“See for yourself.”
The thin blue line was unwavering. So was I.
I didn’t want a baby.
There were options, of course, but I was made to feel like a monster for even suggesting them.
“How could you?”
“It’s a collection of cells.”
“It’s a baby. Our baby.”
Our parents were delighted. They met each other over an awkward afternoon tea and discovered they got on famously. It was time we settled down—they’d been respectively worried about our “wild ways,” suspicious of our London lifestyles. How wonderful we’d found each other; what a miracle this baby was!
It had all been taken out of my hands.
A shotgun wedding. A new house (“Much more family-friendly than that dreadful flat”), a new job (“So much less cutthroat than the City”), a move to the fucking sea (“The air’s so much cleaner!”) . . .
I’d never felt so trapped in my life.
Yet it was impossible not to love Anna when she arrived. She was bright and beautiful and filled with curiosity. But it was impossible, too, not to resent her. There was a whole life out there, waiting for me, and instead of running at it with both hands I was standing still with a baby in my arms. I fantasized about leaving. Told myself an absent parent was better than one who didn’t want to be there. But I didn’t leave. I did what I’d always done when life was hard.
I drank.
CHAPTER
THIRTY-SEVEN
MURRAY
Boxing Day was always an anticlimax. When Murray had been in uniform, Boxing Day had meant one domestic after another, as hangovers were assuaged with more booze, familial tension exploding after twenty-four hours reined in for Christmas.
For someone like Sarah, who felt everything so keenly, the comedown was even worse. It was midday before she came downstairs, and then only to take the tea Murray made her and retreat back to bed. Murray tidied the kitchen, made himself some lunch, and wondered what to do. He didn’t want to leave Sarah alone when she was like this, but the house was beginning to close in on him.
He got out the Johnson file and spread it on the kitchen table. Tom Johnson had made several Google searches relating to suicide, Beachy Head, and tide times. All had been made between midnight on 17 May and nine the following morning. Perfectly plausible for a man contemplating suicide—which was presumably what the investigating officers had decided—but in the context of the picture Murray had now built up, the searches were too careful. Too convenient. They had clearly been made by whoever had murdered the Johnsons and engineered the fake suicides.
Who would have had access to Tom’s phone? It was an impossible question, without knowing where the man had been the morning prior to his death. CID had made attempts to retrace his steps, but once the Audi had been picked up on the ANPR camera sited near Beachy Head, nothing more had been done. There had been no need.
Where had Tom been overnight? Who had he been with that morning? Murray covered three pages of his notebook with possible lines of inquiry, frustrated by the holiday period, which meant no one was at work for him to speak to.
It was early evening when Murray put a hand on the mound of tangled duvet and suggested that Sarah might feel better if she had a shower and got dressed. The air in the bedroom was stale, and the cup of tea he’d pressed into Sarah’s hand had gone untouched, a shiny film across the surface.
“I just want to go back to Highfield.”
“You’re seeing Mr. Chaudhury on Friday.”
Sarah was crying, burying herself beneath the duvet so her words were muffled. “I don’t want to be here. I want to be at Highfield.”
“Shall I bring the duvet downstairs? We can veg out on the sofa and watch black-and-white movies.”
“Go away!”
Had Sarah been visible, Murray would have hidden the hurt on his face beneath the smile of a supportive husband. And indeed he put a hand where he imagined Sarah’s shoulder was and began to form the words he needed. The words she needed. Only, he suddenly felt overwhelmingly, bone-crushingly tired. None of it made a difference. Whatever he said, whatever he did, it wouldn’t help Sarah. Nothing could help Sarah.
He stood up and left the room, closing the bedroom door behind him. He stood on the landing and looked across the street, where houses were adorned with Christmas lights, and inside families were playing board games and arguing over the remote.
“Snap out of it, Mackenzie,” he muttered.
Downstairs he put two slices of cheese on toast under the grill. He would ring Anna Johnson. To hell with public holidays. The woman was mourning her parents; she’d had a brick through her window. These were hardly normal times. She’d been desperate for him to reopen the investigation, and—mindful of his chewing out from Leo Griffiths—Murray knew CID would soon be taking the lead. It was time to tell Anna Johnson what he knew.
He turned the grill to low and picked up the phone.
“Hello?”
“Hello. It’s Murray Mackenzie. From the police,” he added, when Anna didn’t speak.
“Right. Actually, it’s not a great time—”
“I’m sorry to disturb you on Boxing Day. I just wanted to tell you that I think you’re right. There’s more to your parents’ deaths than meets the eye.” It came out in a rush, as much for Murray’s own benefit as for Anna’s. A little of the tightness eased from his chest. He imagined Anna’s hand at her throat; perhaps even tears of relief that finally someone had listened to her. He waited. There was the tiniest sound on the other end of the line and then silence.
Murray rang back.
“I think the line dropped out. I thought we might meet tomorrow, perhaps. If you’re free? I can fill you in on what I’ve found out, and we can discuss—”
“No!”
It was Murray’s turn to fall silent. He wasn’t even sure if this sudden, loud command had been directed at him or at someone in Anna’s house. Her partner? A dog? The baby?
“I’ve changed my mind.” There was a tremor in Anna’s voice, but she pressed on, getting louder as though she was having to force the words out. “I need to move on. Accept what happened. Accept the verdicts.”
“That’s what I’m saying, though, Anna. I think you’re right. I think your parents were murdered.”
Anna made a sound of frustration. “You’re not listening to me. Look, I’m sorry I wasted your time, but I don’t want this. I don’t want you digging up the past. I don’t want you doing anything.” The timbre of her voice changed and Murray realized she was crying. “Please just drop it!”
This time the click at the end of the line was louder. Anna Johnson had hung up.
The tightness in Murray’s chest returned, and he swallowed the ridiculous urge to cry. He stood without moving, the phone in his hand, and it was only when the smoke alarm pierced through the still air that he realized his supper was burning.
CHAPTER
THIRTY-EIGHT
ANNA
On Wednesday, the day after Boxing Day, Joan goes home. There are parcels of leftovers and promises to go up and see her, and several assertions that it’s been lovely to spend time as a family, but eventually she is in her car and we’re standing in the driveway, waving her off.
It is that curious time between Christmas and New Year, when you have to look on the calendar to check the date, and every day seems to be a bank holiday. Mark takes out the recycling, and I lie with Ella on the floor of the sitting room. She is enthralled by the crinkly pages of a black-and-white book we gave her for Christmas, and I turn them over for her, one by one, repeating the name
s of the animals on each page. Dog. Cat. Sheep.
It has been three days since Mum came back. I promised myself that, after Christmas—after Joan left—I would tell Mark, and we would go to the police together.
And now Christmas is over.
I wonder if my failure to come clean is a criminal act, and whether such an offense becomes progressively serious over time. Is twenty-four hours acceptable, but seventy-two a matter for the courts? Is there mitigation for whatever offense this is I’m committing? I mentally tick off the reasons I’m keeping this secret.
I’m scared. Of the newspaper headlines, the harassment by the press, the looks from the neighbors. The Internet means there’s no such thing as tomorrow’s fish wrappers; Ella will deal with the aftermath of this forever.
There’s a more immediate, more urgent fear, too. Fear of my father. I have heard from Mum what he’s capable of; glimpsed enough of it myself to take it seriously. If I go to the police with everything I know, I need them to move fast: to arrest Dad and make sure he can’t hurt us. But what if they can’t find him? What might he do to us?
I worry about what Mark will say. What he’ll do. He loves me, but our relationship is still new, still fragile. What if this is too much? I try to imagine what I’d do if the tables were turned, but the thought of sensible, straight Joan faking her own death is too ludicrous to consider. But I’d stay, wouldn’t I? I’d never leave Mark because of something his parents did. Still, I worry. For all the time Mark and I have been together, my grief has been as present as another person in our lives. Mark has worked around it, made allowances. If we take that away . . . I finally pinpoint what I’m scared of. That without the grief that brought us together, we might start to pull apart.
I turn the page for Ella. She grabs a corner in a tightly clenched fist and brings it to her mouth. There’s another reason I haven’t been to the police.
Mum.
I can’t condone what she’s done, but I can understand why she left. I wish with all my heart she had done it differently, but going to the police won’t change that. The choice I make now will either send her to prison or keep her out of it.
I can’t put my own mother in jail.
In the last few days I’ve watched Joan with Ella and seen the joy of a relationship that crosses generations. We’ve bathed Ella, walked through the park, and taken it in turns to push the pram. I want to do those things with my own mother. I want Ella to know both her grandmothers.
My mum has come back, and I want so much to keep her in my life.
I need to clear my head. I find Mark.
“I’m going to take Ella for a walk.”
“Good idea. If you can wait five minutes I’ll come with you.”
I hesitate. “Would you mind if we went on our own? What with Joan here, and the party at Robert’s, I feel like I’ve not had a second to myself.”
His face tells me he’s weighing up my request. Do I need time out because I want some peace and quiet, or because I’m cracking up?
Despite how I feel inside, evidently I don’t look like I’m a danger to myself—or to Ella—because he smiles. “Sure. See you later.”
* * *
• • •
I walk to town. The wind—hardly noticeable inland—picks up and whips along the seafront. I stop to clip the plastic cover across the front of the pram. The shingle is dark and shiny from overnight rain, and it’s quiet, with most of the shops still closed for the holidays, but there are people out walking on the beach and the esplanade. Everyone seems in a good mood—filled with festive cheer and the joy of an extra day off work—but perhaps it only feels like that because of the turmoil in my own head. Everyone has troubles, I remind myself, although I think it’s unlikely anyone else is wrestling with parents who have come back from the dead right now.
I don’t mean to go to the Hope, although I suspect it was inevitable. My feet find their way there, and I don’t fight them.
It’s an unprepossessing house, rubble-rendered in gray, and wider than it is tall. I ring the bell.
The woman who comes to the door is still and gentle. She stands like a ballerina, with her feet in first position and her hands together at her waist.
“I was wondering if I could see Caroline . . .” I hesitate, deciding not to use her surname. “She’s staying with you.”
“Wait here, please.” She smiles and closes the door again, gently but firmly.
I wonder if bad people come here. Abusive husbands, wanting their wives back home. I doubt this woman smiles then. I wonder if Dad’s looked for Mum here. I look around. Has he been watching me? He must have done, to know that I went to the police. I start to shake, my fingers gripping the handle of Ella’s pram.
“I’m afraid there’s no one of that name here.” She’s back so quickly I wonder if she went at all, or whether she simply stood behind the door for a moment. Perhaps this is a stock answer, delivered regardless of whether the owner of the name is in residence.
It’s only when the door closes again that I realize my mistake. Mum wouldn’t use her real name—first or last—not when she’s supposed to be dead. I walk away, wondering if I should go back and describe her; wondering if it is a good thing I didn’t find her here. If it’s meant to be this way.
“Anna!” I turn around. Mum is stepping out of the door, wearing the same clothes she wore on Christmas Eve. She pulls the hood of her coat over her head. “Sister Mary said someone was looking for Caroline.”
“She’s a nun?”
“She’s amazing. Fiercely protective—she’d have said no, whatever name you’d given.”
“I did wonder. I’m sorry—I didn’t think.”
“It doesn’t matter.” We’ve fallen into step, walking back toward the seafront. “Angela.”
I look at her, momentarily confused.
“The name I use now. It’s Angela.”
“Right.”
We walk on in silence. I didn’t go to the Hope with a prepared speech or plan. I feel awkward. Tongue-tied. I take my hands off the pram handle and move to the side and, wordlessly, Mum takes over, and it’s so easy—so right—that I could cry.
I can’t send her to prison. I want her—need her—in my life. In Ella’s life.
There are people on the pier. Children race up and down, letting off steam after days cooped up inside. I see Mum pull her hood tighter and keep her head down low. We should have walked somewhere quieter—what if we see someone we know?
The giant spiral slide is covered over, the coconut toss boarded up for winter. We walk to the end and look out at the sea. Gray waves throw themselves against the legs of the pier.
We are both trying to think of something to say.
Mum goes first. “How was your Christmas?”
It’s so ridiculously mundane, I feel laughter welling up inside me. I catch Mum’s eye, and she starts to laugh, too, and suddenly we’re crying and laughing and her arms are wrapped tightly around me. Her smell is achingly familiar. How many embraces have I had from my mother? Not enough. It could never be enough.
When our sobs have subsided, we sit on a bench and pull Ella’s pram close.
“Are you going to tell the police?” Mum speaks quietly.
“I don’t know.”
She says nothing for a while. When she speaks, it comes out in a rush. “Give me a few days. Till the New Year. Let me spend some time with Ella—let me get to know her. Don’t decide until then. Please.”
It’s easy to say yes. To delay my decision. We sit in silence, watching the sea.
Mum puts her arm through mine. “Tell me about your pregnancy.”
I smile. It seems like a lifetime ago. “I had awful morning sickness.”
“Runs in the family, I’m afraid. I was sick as a dog with you. And the heartburn . . .”
“Horrendous! I w
as swigging Gaviscon from the bottle by the end.”
“Any cravings?”
“Carrot sticks dipped in chocolate spread.” The look on her face makes me laugh. “Don’t knock it till you try it.” There’s a warm glow inside me, despite the wind that whistles across the pier. When the women in our NCT group moaned about the unwanted advice from their mothers, I thought how much I longed for pearls of wisdom from my own. How I wouldn’t care how much she interfered; how I’d value every visit, every call, every offer of help.
“All I wanted when I was pregnant with you was olives. Couldn’t get enough of them. Dad said you’d come out looking like one.”
My laugh dies on my lips, and Mum quickly changes the subject.
“And Mark—is he good to you?”
“He’s a great dad.”
Mum looks at me curiously. I haven’t answered the question. I’m not sure I can. Is he good to me? He’s kind and thoughtful. He listens; he helps out around the house. Yes, he’s good to me.
“I’m very lucky,” I tell her. Mark didn’t have to stick by me when I fell pregnant. Lots of men wouldn’t have done.
“I’d love to meet him.”
I’m about to say how wonderful that would be if only she could, when I see her face. She’s deadly serious. “You can’t be . . . It isn’t possible.”
“Isn’t it? We could tell him I’m a distant cousin. That we lost touch, or fell out, or . . .” She trails off, giving up on the idea.
In the choppy water below the pier I see a flash of movement. An arm. A head. Someone’s in the water. I’m half standing when I realize they’re swimming, not drowning. I shiver on their behalf; sink back down on the bench.
My self-imposed deadline gives me four days left with Mum before I either tell the police or let Mum disappear to somewhere she won’t be recognized. Either way, I have four days before I have to say good-bye to my mother for the second time.
Four days to have what I’ve longed for since Ella was born. Family. Mark and Ella and Mum and me.
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