‘I’d love to read them,’ I said. ‘Thank you.’
I’m now holding the bag tight, almost hugging it. My mobile phone rings.
It’s Sally Munroe.
‘Hi Anna. I’ve got some news, but it’s not what I thought it’d be.’ She sighs loudly down the phone. ‘I found there were two unidentified bodies found on the island. One of those was female, but was aged between fifty and sixty. The other was male. It’d been in the water for about twenty years before it was discovered. They found a silver St Christopher in the skin of his neck. I think it might be—’
‘Nathan. Sally, I’m sorry. I should’ve texted you as soon as I saw her.’
‘Saw who?’
‘My mother. She was just – there – in the pub for Robert’s birthday. Her friend must’ve told her where the party was.’
‘What? Just there? I don’t understand.’
‘I don’t understand either, not really. I think she had a nervous breakdown, or post-natal depression, or psychosis, I don’t know. I’ve read so much about different conditions – but no one person is the same.’ I look behind me, and luckily Sophie is playing on her beloved game console. ‘When they – we – were on holiday, she said there was an accident – that Nathan fell.’
‘Has she gone to the police about the accident?’
I don’t think so. ‘What would happen to her if she did?’
‘I don’t know,’ she says. ‘There might be a trial – depends what the coroner says.’ There’s a brief pause. ‘I didn’t think it would end like this.’
‘No,’ I say. ‘Me neither.’
‘Oh, before I go … Ellen wasn’t hard to find – she uses her maiden name now. She was sent to prison in 1990 for the murder of her husband, Alan. She pleaded self-defence, but the prosecution went for her.’
‘Was it self-defence? No … sorry, I shouldn’t ask.’
‘From what I read in the reports from the time, it seemed so.’
There’s too much to take in. I need to sleep, to process all of this.
‘Thank you, Sally. For all you’ve done.’
‘You’re welcome. My bill’s in the post.’ She laughs. ‘I’m glad it worked out for the best for you, Anna.’
We say our goodbyes, and I throw my phone into my bag in the footwell.
‘I still can’t believe it,’ I say to Jack. ‘I started the day thinking my mother was dead, yet she was living in England all of this time.’
‘I don’t think she’s had a happy life, though. Are you okay? It must’ve been a shock.’
‘I’m still in shock to be honest.’
Mum said I was lying on her chest while we were on a lilo in the hotel swimming pool. She fell asleep, and I slipped from her, almost drowning. She asked if there were any lasting effects – was I afraid of water, but I lied. I said no.
She said Monica saved me that day.
I know, I wanted to say. She’s been saving me for years.
‘I thought Robert would be angry with Debbie,’ says Jack.
‘I suppose, when you think about it, all that matters is that she’s back, she’s alive.’ The anxiety, that knot in the pit of my stomach that I’ve lived with for years, has vanished. I look out of the window. ‘Thank God she’s alive.’
I have been waiting for this moment all day. Jack is reading to Sophie upstairs, and I’m settled on the sofa with Debbie’s journals. Some are like school exercise books, others are notebooks with different designs. It might feel as though I’m prying when I read them, like Dad and Monica would have felt listening to the messages I left for Debbie when I was a child. Perhaps if Dad still has the phone, he could give it to her, so she can hear all the calls she missed.
Before reading them all from cover to cover, I flick through the different books. Her handwriting is sometimes neat, at other times, erratic. There’s a sentence crossed out too.
12 September 1987
I’ve been told – or rather, it has been suggested to me – that I should start writing in this journal. I haven’t written in a diary since I was about fourteen years old. They assure me no one will read it, that my thoughts will be private, but I don’t believe them. It’s weird, though, I seem to be able to think a bit more clearly when I’m writing.
I’m in a secure ward – I’ve been here for nearly a year, under S3 of the MHA (because, apparently, I’m a risk to myself. Which is ridiculous because I’d be doing everyone a favour if I were to succeed. At any time, the police could come in and take me away for what I did last year.
Prison might be better than this place, though. It’s so noisy here – especially at night. Everyone must have bad dreams. I know I do. I see his face, so close to mine, as he let go of my hand. When I close my eyes during the day, too. They used to say I shouted his name in my sleep – that I saw people in the corner of the room. ‘I hear things,’ I told them. ‘I’ve never seen things.’ But what if they’re right? I could’ve seen lots of things and they felt real to me. I’ve no idea, really.
Sometimes, I can’t remember what I look like. They’re not big on mirrors in this place. Some days I push my food away; other days I eat everything they put in front of me – even taking food others don’t want.
I must be fat right now because my clothes feel snug around my belly. I think I was skinny three months ago. When I look down at what I’m wearing, I don’t recognise the top and the jeans. No wonder they don’t fit properly.
Depression with postnatal psychosis is what they say I have now. At first, they thought I was schizophrenic after I told them God – or my dead uncle – was talking to me. But I don’t hear anyone any more.
They won’t tell me why that is. They must think they’ve cured me. They can’t explain much, if you ask me, just prescribed different pills after the first time I tried to … Well, they just keep giving me different ones. I’ve no choice.
Give it a few months, they say. ‘A few months?’ I want to scream. I don’t think I have a few months. I’ve got nothing to live for, and I’m absolutely no use to anyone else. Why don’t they let me just do what I want to do? It’d save them a fortune in fucking medication.
6 January 1988
I’ve realised they don’t actually read my diary. I’ve been keeping this one in my packet of sanitary towels (and no one likes to pry in there). To test this, I made up some disturbing thoughts about nurse Adrian and they haven’t kept him away from me so far. And that was two months ago.
They say I’ve been ‘doing well’ for a few months now – that this new medication must be working after all. (Doing well – what a shit description of a life.) Now they say I’m nearly ready to leave. I’m not under constant obs any more, which is a relief because that was like being haunted.
I don’t think I’m ready to leave, but I don’t want to be in here any more. I feel so very, very low. Sometimes my thoughts are so dark, I constantly think of ways to end all of this. Which would be the least painful method? I’ve no blade – they give us plastic cutlery, and we don’t get enough pills to save. I want to talk to Karen in the next bed – she’s always talking about it – but when I want to speak, she just looks at the picture opposite us. It’s the one with the fucking sheep in a fucking meadow. The bastards probably hung that picture there to remind us of what we are.
I’d be able to get what I want outside. That’s what I need. To get out and have my freedom. Freedom of choice. Here, I’m like a child being babysat.
Would I do it somewhere no one would find me – or somewhere I’d be found? It’s a constant chatter in my head. One that I tell no one about. I’d not want to involve anyone else directly by stepping or jumping in front of their car or train. No, it has to be clean. I wish I could look up ways, talk to people, but there is nothing. The books on our paltry shelf are all stupid novels by privileged people.
What else could I do if I get out of this place? People will know what I’ve done just by seeing the guilt and shame in my eyes. I won’t be able to make friends
– you have to be honest with friends, don’t you? How could I tell them I’m a mother, but haven’t seen my children for nearly a year and a half? Not to mention the fact I killed someone and have misplaced my mind. They’d think I’m a monster. They’d probably be right.
5 November 1990
I’ve been out for one year, seven months and thirty-two days.
I’m still alive.
The thought of seeing my children is stopping me from doing anything ‘stupid’ again. Bobby and Annie are out in the world and they are getting older. Soon they will be old enough to want to come and find me. It’s a hope I must cling to.
I’m starting a new job tomorrow. When I say job, I mean volunteering in a soup kitchen (not sure they call them that these days). When I went for the interview, it was humbling seeing people without a place to eat or somewhere to sleep. At least I have my benefits, a room (which is pretty grotty, but … ).
So why do I still feel so fucking low?
Sleep. I need sleep.
Another pill. About the fiftieth bloody pill I’ve taken today.
When will this end?
19 January 1998
I can’t believe it. I thought she would live forever. I thought we’d have a chance to meet again. That’s been wiped away. I don’t know if I can [words illegible] always thought I’d have the time. They’ll never want me back now. [words illegible]
[words illegible] showed me how to work the internet, and I typed in my mother’s name first and her death was what came up!
Six months ago.
Why am I writing in here? I should be going to see my dad.
I’m fucking useless.
Useless and I don’t deserve to be on this fucking earth.
I’m going to go to the registry office tomorrow to get a copy of the death certificate. It might not even be real. This Internet thing might all be made up – hardly anywhere has it.
My name was listed as her daughter. My children as her grandchildren.
I can’t fucking bear it. My mother is dead.
What use is writing when [ends]
24 June 2002
It’s Annie’s birthday today – she’s sixteen years old. I wonder what she’s doing to celebrate it. Having a party with all of her friends, I guess. I bet she has loads of friends.
She probably doesn’t know I exist. It’s easier for them if they never mention me, I imagine. I’m a dark stain they want to blot out. The only thing that keeps me going is the thought that I created two beautiful children and no one can take that from me: the only useful thing that I’ve done. One day, I might even see them again. Though they won’t want to see me. Why would they?
I’m back here again. I didn’t get very far, did I?
I still can’t believe my lovely mother is dead.
She was so far away, yet I knew she loved me. I hurt her by leaving. I might have killed her. It was her heart, got too much for her.
It’s been six years since she died, but I wake up thinking it’s just happened.
Why do I keep going? Is it the thought of one day seeing my children again?
It must be.
The theme tune to ‘Mistral’s Daughter’ is blaring out from the communal area. It’s fucking annoying and that series is so bloody old! If I knew anyone outside, I’d ask them to bring in ‘The Exorcist’. That would give them something to take their minds off their problems. Dad is out there somewhere. Bobby, Annie and Peter, too. How is Monica dealing with Nathan being gone? Does she think we’re together living the high life? How much more wrong could she be?
I remember after I had Annie, there was another mum on the ward. We would watch ‘Coronation Street’ in the lounge. I can’t remember her name, though – it began with an S. I bet she’s having a good life.
God. I couldn’t do it. However hard I tried out there, the memories and the nightmares always caught up with me. They still do. I don’t know what I can do to stop them.
I’m seeing a new doctor tomorrow: Jemima O’Keefe. Her first name makes me think of that kids’ programme ‘Play School’ – Bobby used to watch it. I’m going to have to be sensible and keep those thoughts to myself.
Stacy. The woman in the maternity ward was called Stacy.
28 August 2013
Patrick’s finished with me.
It’s stupid when I re-read that.
I’m forty-nine years old for God’s sake.
Talking about a man who’s dumped me.
Why do I always write in here when things turn to shit? I’ve no happy memories written down. It’s always about things gone wrong.
It’s because of Nathan.
Karma, probably.
Perhaps it’s because I don’t deserve happiness. I have tried so hard to get better. I even took up jogging. Endorphins, my doctor said.
And I felt great for ages – my longest time yet.
But then Patrick said he couldn’t be with someone like me.
I didn’t open up enough to him.
Every time I laughed I felt guilty: remembering my children I never see; picturing Nathan’s face as he fell.
Who’d want to be with a murderer who abandoned her children, anyway?
Not that Patrick ever knew about that. The murderer part, I mean. I’d shown him pictures of my children, but Annie was a baby and Bobby was six. The picture was so …
Four years we were together, yet we lived separately. We met at the café I was working in. He had an engineering contract with some technology group – something to do with pumps or hoses or something. God, I didn’t listen, did I?
Patrick was so kind. Physically, he wasn’t someone I was normally attracted to (though I couldn’t be bothered with all of that shit for years), but he was so kind, and he liked me back. He was divorced, had three grown-up children he saw every other weekend. He liked Chelsea FC, cooking for us on a Saturday while listening to Queen (‘Still classics, Deb,’ he said. ‘No one will ever come close to Freddie Mercury.’).
Why am I talking about him in the past tense? He’s still alive – just not with me.
He taught me to drive, was so patient with me. He said I could achieve anything if I wanted it enough … even bought me a car when I passed my test. He was so pleased … said I was on my way to becoming the person I could be.
But I already was the person I could be.
He mustn’t have been happy with that.
And I wasn’t happy with him trying to change me, to fix me. I don’t want a carer – I want someone who accepts me the way I am.
I’ll never find that person, will I? Maybe I’m too broken.
It’s for me to fix, not him.
I’ve asked for more shifts at the café. I’m someone else when I’m there. I pretend I’m a jolly soul to the customers, and after being on my feet all day, I collapse, exhausted, at night. When I sleep, I dream I’m someone else.
It’s like having two lives.
Neither are mine.
At least the nightmares have stopped.
12 December 2016
Blast from the horrible past. I have heard from Ellen. It feels so wrong that she’s been in prison for killing her husband, yet I’ve been free after killing Nathan.
She said it wasn’t killing, though.
We didn’t kill him.
He fell.
She’s so kind. She tells me that it was on her mind for years when she was in there (though she says that, I’m sure she would’ve had internet in there and known how to contact me before this).
She couldn’t believe it when I told her I hadn’t seen my family. If it were her son, she would never have let him go.
Easy for you to say, I said.
This whole thing hasn’t been easy for anyone, she said. Damn that Nathan, the crazy bastard. Gave me all sorts of confidence.
I have no idea what she meant by that.
30 June 2017
My darling Annie has replied. I was expecting Monica to send a message back, but my original one
was probably too cryptic. I had to test the water – needed to know if they’d actually want to hear from me.
Annie’s message was only one line (it was amazingly lifting to hear from her), but mine was only a couple. I wish Annie would have told me about her life. I guess that’s selfish of me. She owes me nothing. She probably hates me. I know I would if I were her.
I only had half an hour on the computer at the library and there was a queue. I didn’t know what to write back.
This B & B is pretty cheap, but it’s basic. The television is an old-style portable. I switched it on one night when I couldn’t sleep, but the reception was so crap I turned it off.
There are some people who actually live here. I know that feeling. Of homelessness, hopelessness. Never having roots. Simply existing from one day to the next. Not wanting to die, but not having a life either. Such a fine line.
From just flicking through Debbie’s words, I don’t know if I can read every entry. Those few pages were so raw, so honest. I so wish she hadn’t have left that night in Tenerife. We could have made it better for her. Couldn’t we?
Chapter Forty-Eight
Present Day
Debbie
It’s strange standing outside Monica and Nathan’s house, knowing my children were brought up in it. I used to spend so much time here. We – Peter and I – would come round on sunny afternoons to have barbecues in the back garden. Leo and Bobby were so close, but it’s not like that now. When I visited Robert yesterday, he said that since they were teenagers, they didn’t get on as well. They barely speak now. If they hadn’t been made to live together, would it have been different?
But I can’t change the past. It is what it is.
Monica opens the door. She’s still as slim as she always was – food must be of no comfort to her.
We stand there, just looking at each other.
Her face is so familiar to me, yet different at the same time.
She takes me by the hand and pulls me inside the house.
11 Missed Calls Page 32