Finding Jennifer Jones

by Anne Cassidy

  The sight of them made Kate smile.

  It made her think again of the letter she had sent. So far there had been no reply. Had she expected one? She’d taken a chance sending it at all. Every part of her knew that. It was part of the conditions of her release that she should never contact any of the people involved in that terrible day eight years ago. Julia had reiterated this from time to time. Under no circumstances must you make any contact either physically or by any other means with a person or persons involved in the events at Berwick Waters.

  Kate thought of the names of those involved.

  Lucy Bussell; Michelle’s parents – Donna and Frank Livingstone.

  But Kate had had things she needed to say so she had written Dear Lucy and signed it Yours, Jennifer Jones.

  She started to pack up her stuff. She decided to walk further up the coastal path and find a place on the top of the cliffs to sit and watch the sun go down. She had her book and the rest of the wine and some fruit.

  She’d have a solitary picnic.

  She spent a lot of time alone; it suited her.

  Three

  On Saturday, at just after ten, Kate walked into the tourist information office for her shift. Aimee was talking to an elderly couple, pointing at a map she had unfolded. She stopped for a minute and smiled. Kate headed behind the counter.

  “Oh, Kate,” Aimee said, breaking off from her explanation, “Those arrived early this morning. It’s the fliers for the attractions. Could you take them into the storeroom and unpack them?”

  “Sure.”

  Kate saw two small brown cardboard boxes one on top of the other by the door. She picked them up and carried them round the counter into the small staff kitchen and put them down on the table. She opened her locker and took out the hanger which held her work blouse. It was pale blue and had the words Exmouth Tourist Information imprinted on the fabric. She peeled off her T-shirt and put it on. She buttoned it up and then wriggled around a bit, pulling it straight. Even though it was her size it didn’t quite fit and she never felt very comfortable in it. She looked for the new child-friendly badge that Aimee insisted they all wore. It wasn’t in her locker. She tutted and plucked up one of the others that were there and pinned it on.

  A bell sounded from the shop. Kate headed out in case more holidaymakers had come in and were waiting. It was just the elderly couple leaving though. Aimee was folding up a map she had been using to show them places to go.

  “Would it kill those people to pay a pound for a map? Would it? Why come on holiday to a place if you don’t want to explore it? Mind you, why come on holiday here at all? When you could go to Spain. Beats me!”

  “Then we’d be out of a job,” Kate said. ‘Has it been busy?’

  “So, so. But we have a number of coach parties visiting later today and I was hoping you would display those fliers,” Aimee said, pointing to a wall of brown wood pockets which held wads of leaflets for local attractions.

  “Sure.”

  Kate went into the staff area and picked up handfuls of leaflets. She took them back into the shop and began to sort through them.

  “You heard about the drowning?” Aimee said.

  “No. When? Where? What happened?”

  “Last night. It was on the local news website this morning and I heard some people talking about it in the paper shop. Some teenagers going swimming at Sandy Bay. That’s all I know.”

  “I was over at Sandy Bay last night. I didn’t see any sign of trouble.”

  She was frowning though. The tides could be dangerous and the sea bed dropped away quickly in places. She loved swimming in the sea but she knew she had to treat it with respect.

  “It’s not good for the town,” Aimee added.

  Kate nodded. In June a man had fallen from the Starcross ferry. It was a terrible thing to happen and it upset everyone for ages. The people who worked in the town seemed to take it personally, as though it was one of their own family who had died. It happened the Saturday before she started work at the tourist information office.

  She began to file the leaflets into the wooden pockets. She did it automatically, without concentrating, musing on what she had just heard.

  The man’s body had washed up near Starcross days later. It gave her a bad feeling to think about it. She remembered how people had said he’d had a suit, shirt and tie on, as though he was dressed smartly to go out somewhere. She exhaled. Now someone else had drowned, but they didn’t know who or how. She ruffled her fingers through her hair and felt some knots in it. She pulled at them. She knew she had to shake these thoughts from her mind. Every counsellor she’d ever seen had told her not to dwell on morbid subjects. She had enough of her own dark places to keep clear of.

  “Do you want a coffee?” she asked.

  “Sure. And see if there are any of those chocolate digestives left.”

  “I thought you were on a diet?” Kate said, smiling, trying to make a joke.

  “Just a couple. See me through to lunch. That reminds me. Two weeks today is your last day at work so we’ll have to get a cake of some sort. Maybe I’ll bake it!”

  Kate brought the drinks and biscuits out to Aimee in the shop and then spent some time on the computer identifying accommodation vacancies and looking through emails and enquiries. Aimee preferred it if Kate did this work. She liked to talk to customers and hated working on the computer. Kate didn’t mind. This was the latest in a long line of jobs she had done since coming to Exeter University. She’d been a waitress, a postal worker, a shelf stacker and a cleaner. She liked working. It meant that holiday time was filled up and it gave her some money in the bank. When she finished updating the computer she made some phone calls and looked at the rotas for the following week.

  Later a couple of police cars went by, their sirens on. Kate frowned and went on to the local news website. Her face fell when she saw the headline. It had been updated an hour before.

  Child Feared Drowned at Sandy Bay

  A nine-year-old girl is missing in the Sandy Bay area. The incident happened between nine and midnight on Friday evening. Her teenage brother and friends were partying on the beach and the child joined them. Witnesses say that she went into the water by herself. The alarm was not raised until after midnight when the girl was missed. Holidaymakers have been helping in the search. The police have an open mind about this case and say they are not yet looking for a body. “There is every chance that this little girl will be found alive,” a police spokesperson said.

  Kate logged off, the story giving her a shiver. A child had died. It made it ten times worse. The loss of a child with a lifetime ahead of her. Kate found herself staring at the computer screen with her hands clasped tightly. She knew what that meant only too well.

  Later on, when it was quiet, Aimee talked about her daughter, Louise. She’d had her sixth birthday party the previous Sunday.

  “Her dad said he’d come. He promised her faithfully he’d come with a huge surprise. Well, the surprise was he didn’t show up. No surprise to me, of course, but Louise was so upset and tearful. It’s not fair. Do you think it’s fair? It’s not fair.”

  Aimee wasn’t really expecting an answer so Kate didn’t give one.

  “And then he rings me this morning and says he wants to take her away this weekend to make up for it. He’s going to take her to Croyde. Well, I know what that means. He’s got a surfing weekend with his mates and he will take Louise and dump her with a load of other surfers’ kids while he goes off enjoying himself. That’s not right. Is it? Do you think that’s right?”

  There was silence and Kate realised that this time Aimee did expect an answer.

  “Not if that’s what he does,” Kate said. What was she supposed to say?

  “Last time he took her – Easter I think it was – she told me she woke up in the middle of the night and there was a lady standing in the hallway with just her knickers on! See, he doesn’t mind his daughter witnessing his goings-on!”

  The doo
r opened and some people came into the shop. Aimee broke into a big smile and began to talk to them. Kate spent some time helping a young couple find accommodation in a youth hostel. Outside she noticed another police car passing. It didn’t have its siren on but still it looked ominous.

  Kate spent the rest of her shift making theatre reservations for holidaymakers who had booked through their hotels to see shows in Exeter and Newton Abbot. She sent out the daily newsletter highlighting the events that would happen in the next couple of days, Sunday and Monday. Aimee left just after three thirty and it was up to her to sort out the office and get ready for Monday, then lock up at four.

  The house was quiet when she got home. She went straight upstairs to her room and pulled her clothes off. She was hot and sticky so she had a shower. Afterwards she sat in her room with the towel tied around her. The evening lay ahead of her. Tomorrow was Sunday so no work, no need to get up early. She looked around her room. There was washing and ironing she could do. She could watch a movie with Ruth and Robbie. Or see what Sally was doing. Or she could listen to some music in her room.

  She stood up and looked out of the bay window towards the sea. The house was in a backstreet, but because of the incline and the fact that it was on the end of a terrace Kate had a partial sea view. She stared at the surface which looked blue and calm, a flat sheet of water.

  Someone had drowned in it, though.

  Kate flipped open her laptop and glanced over the reports. The child’s body had not washed up but the girl had been named, Jodie Mills. Nine years old.

  Eight years before she had seen Lucy Bussell almost drown in the lake at Berwick Waters. Kate had saved her life that day, but that was only fair because it was she who had pushed her into the water in the first place. The memory made her restless, unhappy. She got up and paced up and down her room. The whole day had been like this. Ever since she’d heard about the drowning her mind had been pulled back to the past and it was not a place where she liked to dwell. Then she had been Jennifer Jones. Then she had stood looking down at the body of her best friend. In her head she tried to close it off and focus on something else, but the only other thing she could think of was the girl in the water at Sandy Bay

  Her body would wash up onto one of the beaches. Then the police sirens would sing out mournfully along the esplanade and the people in the town would speak in quiet tones and look towards Sandy Bay with sorrow. How long would it take? Would it be tonight? Tomorrow? Or days later, like the man who fell off the ferry?

  It was making Kate feel fearful. She couldn’t stay in.

  She rummaged about in her wardrobe for a clean skirt and top. She brushed her hair roughly, but it was too tangled and the bristles kept catching on knotted bits. She flung the brush down, picked up her bag and her phone and went out of her room.

  The front door opened as she went downstairs. It was Sally, holding a bag of shopping in one hand.

  “Hi,” she said, “I was going to cook…”

  “Not for me, Sal, thanks,” Kate said.

  “Where are you going?”

  Kate didn’t know. She just had to get out.

  “Not sure. Might meet up with some friends. See you later.”

  The door closed behind her. She felt lighter immediately. The smell of the sea was strong and she headed towards it.

  Four

  Kate woke up the next morning. The room was in semi darkness. A single shaft of light split the gloom. She let her eyes travel along it. It took her a few moments to realise that her mouth was dry and her head felt heavy. The clock showed that it was 09:51. She pulled the pillow to the side to get comfortable and closed her eyes again. If she could just sleep for a couple more hours then she would feel fine, the effects of the booze would wear off. It always did.

  At her back she felt something move and her eyes shot open.

  She turned and saw that she wasn’t alone in the bed. She opened her eyes wide and looked around. The room was small and untidy. There was a rail alongside the bed crammed with clothes and the beam of light came from the door which was ajar. It wasn’t her bedroom.

  Where was she?

  She sat up. She was wearing just her pants and vest top. She rubbed her eyes and felt the crustiness of mascara that hadn’t been taken off before she went to bed. She looked at the shape under the duvet beside her.

  Who was it?

  The tall lad who worked behind the bar?

  The lad with the big earphones who bought that extra bottle of wine as the pub was closing? Or was it someone entirely different?

  She slipped out of the bed and pulled her skirt and top on. She picked up her bag from the floor and walked barefoot across the room to the door. She peeked out into a hallway. The room was on the ground floor. The sun blazed in through the glass front door and she felt its warmth as she tiptoed across the hall looking for the toilet. There were three steps down to a long kitchen. She went there and stood for a moment looking round. The work surface was littered with empty beer cans and polystyrene dishes with a few remnants of uneaten chips. There was a wok on the cooker, its spoon still resting on the side. Dirty bowls sat nearby close to a half-empty bottle of vodka.

  It was a student house. She’d seen enough of them.

  She turned the tap on and rinsed a glass. Then she filled it with water and drank most of it down.

  At the far end of the kitchen was a door and she pushed it open into a small bathroom. She used the toilet and stood at the sink to wash her hands. Looking at herself in the mirror she saw that her eye make-up was smudged underneath, making her look like a Goth. Most of her hair was still up in a ponytail but huge strands of it had fallen down at the sides and the back. She looked a wreck.

  She thought back to the evening before. Saturday night. Why had she got so drunk? Then it came to her. It was because of the drowned girl.

  When she headed out for the evening there had been a lot of police on the esplanade. It had unnerved her seeing the cars pulling up and screeching away, police officers walking with purpose, holding phones to their ears. Even though the child had gone missing at Sandy Bay the police seemed to be searching all the way along the seafront right up to the harbour and the ferry point. Dismayed, Kate had turned her back on it and hurried away, walking towards the outskirts of the town. There was a pub she’d gone to a few times over the last year. It had a garden and the booze was cheap. At the weekends it was always noisy and crowded and there were always lots of people to talk to and drink with.

  She’d spent most of the evening there and somehow she’d ended up here in some stranger’s house.

  A whole night had passed. She wondered if the child’s body had surfaced.

  She peeled off some toilet paper, wet it and tried to get the make-up off from under her eyes. Then she pulled the tie out of her hair and rummaged in her make-up bag to search for a comb. Instead she found the small packet of condoms that she kept there. It was still covered in cellophane. Unused.

  Who was it that she’d spent the night with? She stood very still for a moment and tried hard to remember. The tall lad behind the bar had been making eye contact with her all evening. Do you fancy a drink after we close? he’d said to her, when she went up to buy some beers. Maybe, she’d said, blowing him a kiss. The lad with the earphones had been cheeky. He’d come over to her when she was with the others and insisted he sat next to her, making other people budge up. He bought her a drink and rested the earphones on his collar. Then, when people in the pub headed off back to someone’s house he bought a bottle of wine from behind the bar and they had followed along. From time to time she felt the touch of his fingers on her arm and when they got to the house he stuck with her. Then the lad from the bar had turned up. They all watched a film but there’d been a lot of wine and someone was smoking dope and rest of the evening just faded into blackness for her.

  Was this the house? Or had they gone on somewhere else?

  She splashed her face with water. Then she returned through the
kitchen and crept back into the bedroom. She looked round, her eyes becoming accustomed to the darkness. It had once been someone’s living room but like a lot of the houses in this area it had been turned into a bedroom. There was a bay window with blinds which cut out most of the light. On the floor, up against a wall, were piles of DVDs and CDs. Hundreds of them. In the bay window was a desk with an open laptop. There were books on it and on top of one of them was a pair of headphones. She smiled. That solved the mystery. Maybe it would be nice if she could remember his name. Bob? Steve? Or Tony? But maybe one of those belonged to the tall guy behind the bar.

  She walked into the room and looked for her shoes. They were underneath the bed and she squatted down and pulled them out. She put them on and looked around in case she’d left anything else. A jacket or cardi? Had she been wearing one? It had been warm last night, she remembered that much.

  She made her way quietly to the door.

  There was movement from behind her. She stood very still. If he was just turning over she might still get away without any conversation.

  “Hi,” a voice said, huskily.

  She turned round. He was sitting up, his chest pale in the darkened room.

  “Would you pull one of the blinds up?”

  She stepped over to the window and pulled on one of the roller blinds so that the sun trickled into the room and lightened it enough to see around.

  “You’re not going?” he said.

  “I have to,” she said. “I’ve got to see someone.”

  “Where do you live?”

  “Near. Fifteen minutes’ walk.”

  “But you don’t have to go right this minute. I could get dressed, walk you home?”

  “No, don’t worry. I can make my own way. Like I said, I’ve got someone to see.”

  “Can I have your number?” he said.

  “I don’t know.”

  “Go on. I’ll give you a call. We can get a drink or a bite to eat.”

  She didn’t answer. She could just walk out. It wouldn’t be rude. She hardly knew him. He sat up though, his legs swinging out of the bed. She looked away, afraid that he might be naked. He picked his phone off the floor and held it out at her. She couldn’t refuse it. She took it and stood over by the light, pressing buttons, feeding her number into his phone. She put her name, Kate, in. Then she handed it back.