Rebound

by Aga Lesiewicz

‘To freedom,’ she says and raises her glass.

  ‘Well, to relative freedom,’ I correct her and we drink to that.

  ‘All well at your work?’

  ‘I’m not sure.’ I tell her about the Paris conference and Julian’s strange behaviour earlier today. She knows Julian from the past, when they both worked for a small production company in Soho.

  ‘Don’t worry about it. Julian is a cyborg, totally incapable of dealing with emotionally charged situations. I mean, look at him, he’s never even been in a proper relationship with another human being. He avoids feelings like the plague. And here you are, marching into his office, all raw and emotional. He simply didn’t know how to deal with it. But it’ll pass, believe me.’

  ‘I hope you’re right. I really don’t fancy looking for another job right now.’

  ‘Remember my gut instinct?’ Sue grins at me. ‘It’s never wrong.’

  I get back home, my spirit lifted by Sue’s youthful energy. But as soon as I close the door behind me and see the dark corridor, all the demons are back. Without turning on the light I go to the kitchen and open the fridge. Its light throws an eerily cold glow on the tiled floor. I reach for the Britta jug of filtered water and then I notice a half-empty bottle of Pinot Gris standing on the door shelf. I know straight away it was Bell who’d brought it in for herself, it was one of her favourites. I take it out and pour myself a glass.

  ‘Bell, Bell, you have no idea how much I miss you,’ I murmur and Wispa looks at me, startled by the sound.

  I raise the glass, imagine clinking it with her, as we always used to do, then take a sip. Its crisp, citrusy acidity hits my palate and I know that from this moment on it will always remind me of Bell.

  Ten Days Later

  I’m going for a morning run with Wispa. Whoever it is trying to destroy the serenity and normal daily rhythm of Hampstead is not going to succeed for much longer. Part of me feels guilty and sad, as if I’m betraying Bell’s memory. Am I selfish? Perhaps I am, but I need to pull myself out of the vortex of gloom and I can’t think of another way of doing it. I need my runner’s high, an injection of friendly endorphins, the natural morphine my body will produce to smother the pain and misery. Wispa, who’s been watching me carefully, senses my determination and jumps up from her bed, ready for action. It takes me a while to find my running gear, but eventually I’m out of the door, an excited Wispa at my heels. As I reach the end of my street, my determination weakens and instead of turning right towards the Heath I turn left and head in the direction of Waterlow Park. I can’t go to the Heath. I still can’t deal with being in a place that in my mind is somehow responsible for Bell’s death. It feels tainted, menacing, and I’m too weak to face its darkness.

  There are people already in the park: a few runners, someone pushing a pram purposefully, a handful of dog walkers and a solitary man reading a paper on one of the benches facing the main meadow. As I run past him the smell of freshly brewed coffee hits me and I notice a paper coffee cup perched on the bench beside him. This instantly awakens my own coffee craving and I’m already looking forward to the first sip of espresso at home. It feels good to be out and running. Morning sunshine bathes the trees and the grass in a soft light that makes everything look clean and bucolic. Nothing bad can ever happen in a place like this, I think to myself as I run up the hill, my lungs filling with fresh air, my heart pumping at a steady rate. I should go out tonight, get some positive energy from other people – it’s always been the best cure for sadness. I need someone who has a good vibe, someone who isn’t connected with all the shit that’s going on around me. Ray. A ray of sunshine, I smile to myself. I pull my mobile out of my bumbag and dial his number. Predictably, it goes straight to his voicemail. I leave him a short and breezy message, mentioning the possibility of meeting up for a drink tonight. This simple act of being proactive makes me feel even better. I continue my run. A small fluffy dog barks at Wispa and I exchange friendly smiles with its owner, a stumpy woman in a pink jogging suit. I do another small loop round the lake and head home through the Swain’s Lane gate. Wispa, clearly disappointed by the shortness of our run, falls behind sniffing at something, ignoring my calls. I have to go back, grab her by the collar and drag her away from her smelly find. As I approach my house, something outside it doesn’t seem right. The proportions are all wrong and when I get closer I notice that my car, parked in a lucky spot right in front of the house, is lower than usual. I stop and stare at it in disbelief. All four tyres are completely flat. As I take a closer look I realize this is not just some unlucky coincidence: someone has slashed all four of them. I circle the car slowly and when I reach the back a cold shiver runs through me. Someone has sprayed a word across the whole width of the rear window. Big, clumsy white letters spell out bitch. I shout at Wispa who’s dawdling again, wait for her to enter the house and slam the door behind us. I lean on the hall wall and slide down to the floor, unable to breathe. When I eventually manage to catch a breath it comes out as a sob. I sit on the floor until the coldness of the tiles makes me shiver, then get up and stumble to the kitchen. I rummage through bits of paper, old bills and mini-cab cards on the kitchen table until I find DCI Jones’s business card. I dial her number. She answers almost instantly. I’m not sure I make sense telling her about the car, but she sounds serious when she replies. She wants me to come down to the station and she’s sending DS Kapoor to pick me up in a car right now. I barely have time to have a quick shower and throw some clothes on before he rings my doorbell. I grab my phone and my bag, tell Wispa to be a good girl, lock the door and get into the police car. DS Kapoor smiles at me, but looks concerned. As he drives I leave a message for Claire telling her I’ll be late for work. For once I don’t even feel guilty about it. Perhaps I should’ve taken Julian’s offer of stress leave, maybe I’m not ready to go back to work yet, I think, as we drive through the streets waking up to the rush hour. But I would’ve been perfectly fine this morning if some arsehole hadn’t vandalized my BMW, I reason with my own doubt.

  DS Kapoor parks the car right in front of the station and takes me straight to DCI Jones’s office. She greets me with a smile and offers me coffee, which I gratefully accept. She asks me to repeat the story of the car, then nods slowly.

  ‘It may be just a case of random vandalism, but it could also be the work of someone who has a grudge against you, Anna. And you have to tell me who that person may be.’

  I look at her, uncomprehending.

  ‘Anna, I have a feeling you haven’t been entirely honest with me so far. No, maybe not dishonest, but you haven’t made an effort to tell me everything. Please help me, walk me through your life. Give me a chance to understand what’s really going on.’

  I feel a hot flush rising to my cheeks. The last time I felt like this was in the headmistress’s office at school. DCI Jones has a way of making me feel naive and guilty at the same time. I take a deep breath.

  ‘There was a stalker who was obsessed with me and used to go through my rubbish bins and send me weird notes, but that was ages ago. The guy got sectioned in the end, I think.’

  She nods. ‘He died at Rampton Hospital five years ago.’

  ‘Oh.’ I can’t believe she has managed to dig that up. ‘Well, you obviously know about my ex-husband, Andrew . . .’

  ‘Andrew Price,’ she leafs through the printouts on her desk, ‘lives in New York, for the past three months has been lecturing at the University of Buenos Aires. Politics and Management of Science and Technology,’ she reads out from her notes.

  ‘Oh well, you know more about my exes than I do.’ I can’t keep the sarcasm out of my voice. ‘How is James, then?’

  She picks up another printout.

  ‘According to his place of work he’s taken six months’ unpaid leave to go travelling. South-East Asia I’m told. We’re confirming with Border Control whether he’s left the country.’

  I try to hide my surprise. James had talked about taking some time off to travel, but I
always thought he was too obsessed with his work to actually do it. Oh well, it turns out even overachievers can change. I wonder if he’s taken the blonde with him.

  ‘Anyone else?’ DCI Jones watches me closely.

  She knows I haven’t told her the whole truth and I have to give her something she doesn’t know about to get her off my back. So I tell her about Tom’s wife, the seemingly innocuous encounter that started my acquaintance with her husband, their party, and how she came knocking on my door. I say nothing about my visit to the clinic.

  ‘Is this behaviour still going on?’

  ‘No, I haven’t seen her for a while, actually.’

  ‘Do you know why it’s stopped?’

  I shrug my shoulders. DCI Jones looks at me for a while, then nods.

  ‘How would you describe your relationship with Michael Oliver?’

  ‘With Michael?’ I let out a small laugh. ‘I’ve known him for ages. He’s my best friend. Patient, reliable, understanding. Better than any girlfriend I’ve ever had . . .’ I stumble over my words. ‘Except Bell.’

  DCI Jones gives me time to compose myself, then presses on.

  ‘Anyone else you can think of?’

  ‘There’s Alden . . .’

  I tell her about his strange visit to my place and how Tom came to the rescue.

  ‘Tom again?’

  ‘Yes – I didn’t know what to do with Alden. He was completely drunk. Some girlfriend problems.’ I remember what Tom had told me about him. ‘That’s a bit strange, actually. Alden talks about his girlfriend as if they are still together. But Tom told me that she’d left him ages ago.’

  ‘It seems you’ve spent quite a lot of time chatting to Tom.’

  She still doesn’t believe a word I’m saying.

  ‘It was mostly Tom doing the chatting. But I haven’t seen him, or his wife, for a while.’

  She looks at me as if waiting for me to continue. I shrug and regret the gesture almost instantly.

  ‘Thank you, you’ve been very helpful,’ she says at last and I’m not sure if she’s being sarcastic or not. ‘DS Kapoor will take you back home. Or would you rather he took you straight to work?’

  ‘Home will be fine. I need to pick up a few things before I go to work.’

  Not to mention sorting out my car.

  As if on cue, DS Kapoor knocks and opens the door, and DCI Jones gives him a small nod. She gets up and shakes my hand. The interview is clearly over and she has no more time for me. DS Kapoor leads me through the station’s corridors back to the main entrance.

  We are heading towards the exit when a small group of men enters the building. I can’t see their faces clearly against the light, but there are two uniformed policemen flanking a couple of civilians. As they approach us I gasp when I recognize one of the men in plain clothes and DS Kapoor looks at me in surprise. It’s the Dior Man. The group passes us in silence, just as DS Kapoor touches my arm and asks me if I’m all right. I must look really bad because he directs me to a plastic chair in the reception and rushes over to a water dispenser. As I sip the lukewarm water from a plastic cup, disjointed thoughts frantically cross my head. What is the Dior Man doing at the station? Is this why DCI Jones has brought me here? I half-expect DS Kapoor to take me back to DCI Jones’s office. Or worse, straight to some dingy interrogation room. But he just stands there patiently by my side, the concerned look back on his face. I finish the water and decide to see what happens if I try to leave the station. DS Kapoor follows me closely as I approach the door. The fresh air hits me and I realize I’ve been holding my breath for far too long. As I breathe deeply the colour seems to come back to the world around me.

  ‘Are you feeling better?’

  ‘Yes, thank you.’ For some reason the concerned face of DS Kapoor makes me want to giggle. But I know the whole situation is no laughing matter.

  ‘Let’s take you home then,’ he says awkwardly and opens the car door for me. He doesn’t say anything else and I’m grateful for his silence. As we are moving slowly through the streets clogged with traffic I try to understand what has just happened. Has DCI Jones arranged the whole situation to see my reaction? Could the Dior Man be the killer after all? Is he under arrest? How did they catch him? Has he noticed me? What is going to happen now?

  DS Kapoor offers to walk me to my front door, but I thank him and send him on his way. He drives off and I’m left standing on my doorstep, still unable to understand what is going on. If the scene at the station had been arranged by DCI Jones, they wouldn’t let me out of their sight, I decide. Which means they haven’t made the connection between me and the Dior Man. But what was he doing at the station? Is he a suspect? I have no answers to the questions buzzing around in my head.

  I open the front door and am greeted by an overexcited Wispa. I go straight to the sitting room and throw myself on the sofa. I feel almost catatonic, unable to face the outside world. I open my laptop and write a short email to Claire, inventing a story about the police needing my assistance for the rest of the day, then curl up and close my eyes, Wispa stretched on the floor beside the sofa. Sleep comes instantaneously, heavy and dreamless, as if someone has switched off the world.

  I’m woken up by Wispa’s growling, a low and menacing rumble I always forget she’s capable of. She’s still lying by the sofa, her head up, her ears pricked, staring in the direction of the hallway. I reach out and touch her neck. She growls again. I raise my head and listen for any sound that may have disturbed her. There’s nothing for a while and then she growls again and I hear a slight creaking of the staircase, nothing more than a sigh of the old wood. Fear creeps up my chest and throat, the thumping of my heart roaring in my ears. There it is again. Wispa growls and I close my fist on the thick fur on her neck. Without moving my head I cast a look around, searching for something I could use as a weapon. There is a heavy candlestick on the mantelpiece, but it’s on the other side of the room. Wispa gets to her feet and takes a couple of steps towards the sitting-room door, her movements slow and precise, her tail down between her legs. I hear another sound, the soft patter of feet and a delicate click, as if the front-door latch was quietly closing. I jump up, leap for the mantelpiece and, armed with the candlestick, rush out to the hallway. Wispa follows me closely. There is no one in the hallway and the front door is closed. I dash to the door and open it wide, the candlestick still in my hand. The street outside is empty, no passers-by, no moving cars. The neighbour’s cat, who’s been licking its paw on their windowsill, freezes with the paw up, staring at me contemptuously. I shut the door and turn the key in the mortice lock. With Wispa at my heels and candlestick in hand, I go upstairs and check every room, looking into wardrobes and the airing cupboard under the stairs. There is no one there and nothing looks out of place. I walk down to the kitchen and put the kettle on. As the sound of the boiling water fills the room, I sit heavily at the kitchen table, looking at the candlestick I’ve brought with me. Am I overreacting? Wispa was probably growling at the neighbour’s cat and my house, as any old Victorian building, is full of strange noises. I need to pull myself together, sort out the car, think of work, face the world. I resist the temptation to call Michael. He’s been helping me far too much, I have to start dealing with my life on my own.

  Calling my car insurance is a start. I have a long discussion with ‘John’ from the insurance company about their definition of vandalism and what I need to do to arrange for the repair. ‘John’ assures me their damage assessor will come this afternoon and the car will be fixed by the end of today. I check my work emails, but there isn’t much that needs immediate attention. It almost looks as if they’ve rerouted all the important emails for someone else to deal with. I feel a tiny sting of paranoia, briefly consider whether I’m on my way out, then decide I have more important things to worry about than losing my job.

  My heart skips a beat when I hear someone at the front door. Wispa dashes to the door, wagging her tail. It’s Chiara, unable to get in because of
the key in the mortice lock. I open the door and an overjoyed Wispa greets her with so much enthusiasm I almost feel jealous. I tell her I’m working from home and I’ll take Wispa for her daily walk. As I close the door behind Chiara a sudden thought hits me. Bell had a set of my front-door keys. They weren’t in the pile of her possessions the police have shown me. Where are they? I pick up my phone to call DCI Jones, then put it down. If making me bump into the Dior Man at the station was some clever ruse, she’d be expecting me to call her at some point, to try to find out what’s going on. Which is exactly what I’m tempted to do. Which is what I should avoid doing at all cost.

  The Dior Man. My thoughts go back to him. I simply can’t imagine he could be the Heath killer. Or maybe I just don’t want him to be the one. I’m confused, unable to trust my own judgement. What is worse, there is no one I can confide in. Oh, Bell, I miss you! Michael knows about my Heath encounters, but there is a huge difference between having anonymous sex al fresco and having sex with someone who could be a rapist and a killer. He hasn’t brought the subject up since I told him about it and it’s best to leave it that way. I still don’t know who the Dior Man is and I don’t want to know. Or do I? I feel I’m going round in circles. I need to clear my head. I grab Wispa’s leash and for the second time today we are heading towards Waterlow Park. The Heath still feels out of bounds.

  It’s a glorious afternoon and the park is filled with people who are not at work. Whenever I have a day off I’m amazed how many people are out and about when the rest of us are behind our desks. I walk round the lake, then choose a bench in a quiet, shady spot. There is a brass plaque attached to it that reads, ‘To Adrian, who hated this park and all the people in it.’ How refreshing, compared with all the people ‘who loved this place’. I wonder what must have happened to Adrian in this park for him to hate it so much. In my present frame of mind I understand the sentiment totally. I hate the Heath and, maybe not all the people in it, but that one person who has poisoned it. My thoughts go back to the Dior Man and the unexpected encounter with him at the police station. Why am I so vehemently refusing to believe he could be the Heath killer? Because I trust my instinct? Perhaps I’ve developed some weird kind of bonding with him, a strange variant of Stockholm syndrome, and mistakenly interpret the fact that he hasn’t killed me yet as an act of kindness? I should be telling DCI Jones about him and no one else, instead of wasting police time and spinning tales about other guys who I know have nothing to do with the attacks. But how can I be certain they are innocent? James is out of the country and out of the picture, but Samantha’s behaviour has been suspicious. I could tell DCI Jones was interested in her and Tom. But my gut instinct tells me Tom isn’t capable of prowling the Heath and attacking women. Could he be my stalker? I don’t think so. I know the type.