Five Stories High

by Jonathan Oliver

  Would that I could simply stand on the threshold of Irongrove Lodge, turn the handle, and find the door open to me.

  But no – a sacrifice is required.

  I have joined a community, a church if you will. It is not close to where I live, which means I’m unlikely to be recognised. Yet by moving again within such circles, I am risking arrest. I immediately recognised the archetypes usually to be found at such gatherings.

  The woman with the curly hair and thick glasses which do little to focus her gaze; she lives primarily on the ethereal plain, and will go from this church to the next, and the next, finding no philosophy that truly works for her, and so ending up a spiritual vagrant. The man with the aggressively firm handshake, who likes to take charge of everything, including the after-service refreshments; he clearly likes to think of himself as a Master. No doubt most weekends he is to be found dogging in rubbish-strewn car parks, painted with symbols and banging on about the magical properties of sexual energies. Naturally there is also the disenchanted Anglican; he has found that the whole Jesus thing isn’t really for him, and anyway, he has heard that this community has not been tainted by the creeping liberalism that had ruined his last church. He will soon discover how wrong he is.

  And then there is the young man who reads a lot. He reminds me of me. He is the only one to question ‘the Master’; he is the one who suggests that rather than slavishly obey rituals described in texts now centuries old, we should feel free to adapt the magical observations and so reach an outcome more suited to our era.

  He is perfect for my needs. In ending him, I will be saving him from a world of pain. I can see the path he is on, for it is one I once walked myself. Perhaps in his final moments he will take comfort in the fact that he is playing a part in something greater than himself.

  It is easy enough to persuade him – I have not forgotten the old techniques and tricks – and so I turn on the charisma for which I was once so well known, and introduce myself to my key.

  SKIN DEEP

  SARAH LOTZ

  The Estate Agent

  WHEN WE FIRST heard about the murder my branch manager warned me not to say anything to the press. Barb, he said, it’s vital our clients know we take confidentiality seriously. Well of course he had to say that, most of our clients were... let’s just say cash buyers who didn’t necessarily have UK residency. But now I’ve moved onto pastures greener, I can do what I please. So yes, I am the agent who sold the Irongrove Lodge property to The Butcher.

  Is it true she’s trying to change her defence for the appeal?

  Really?

  God. “A ghost did it.” Insanity. What kind of judge is going to buy that?

  Anyway, before The Bu – before Ms Weston and Mr Yates made their offer, I was having a hell of a job selling the flat. I literally couldn’t understand why it wouldn’t shift. That postcode is basically teeming with oligarchs and the Rich Kids of Instagram, and we had a waiting list of clients gagging to invest in the area. And I was good at my job. I sold that garage in Croydon last year – you know the one, it was all over the Daily Mail. It went for almost a mil, but you couldn’t have fitted a Mini Cooper inside it. But Flat Three, Irongrove Lodge had sat on my books for three months, and I only had two weeks left on my sole mandate. I’d been throwing myself into the marketing, held three open house days, but Not. One. Offer.

  Did I think there was something ‘off’ about the place when I first saw it? Well, there was that godawful décor of course. We had to be very careful when we took the pics for the Zoopla and Rightmove sites. Soft focus and lots of floor plans. Apart from that, no, I didn’t detect any bad vibes or whatever. Mind you, I’m used to valuing places that are literally horrendous, and I don’t mean just buy-to-let tenements or ex council properties – quite often it’s our more moneyed vendors who are the filthiest. Melody, my co-worker, once found a bucket of dried human shit hidden in a wall unit when she was valuing a penthouse in Kensington. So Flat Three may have looked a little odd, but it was as clean as a pin, and you only needed a competent interior decorator and a smidgen of imagination to see how it could become glorious again.

  Then, just as I’d resigned myself to losing the mandate, I got the call from Ms Weston. Cash buyer, just sold a house in Cobham – four bedrooms if you please – and said she was in the market for a fixer-upper. This is it, Barb, I told myself. The big fish you’ve been waiting for. Cast the line and reel her in.

  She and Mr Yates were waiting outside the building, staring up at it when I arrived. The exterior is what I’d term ‘elegant, substantial and with real kerb appeal’ and I could tell they were both smitten with it.

  My first impressions of them? Honestly, I assumed they were mother and son. She looked her age, and he was decades younger, gangly, seemed to defer to her. I almost blurted, “Oh how lovely, are you buying this for your son?” then caught myself in time when I saw the way he danced his fingers down her spine. Her clothes were good. An Orla Kiely bag. She could have done more with her hair. That shade of blonde did nothing for her skin. I’ve seen pictures of her now and she looks better grey. That’s just my opinion. The papers keep parading that shot of him, the one where he’s posing for that fitness video thing he did on the cruise ship, but in the flesh he wasn’t that attractive. A good body, but his skin wasn’t great. And there was something – oh God, I’m going to sound like an awful snob here – chavvy about him. Tattoos, trainers, that kind of thing. What is it the kids say? ‘Street’. That’s it. He looked ‘Street’. And he towered over her. That’s why I was so stunned when I heard what she’d done to him. Didn’t look like she’d have the strength for that. But what do I know? Rose West was hardly a giant, was she?

  Neither of them said much as I waved them inside. You have to remember that the shared hallway and the stairs reflect the building’s grandeur. Whoever gutted the place in the Fifties had the good sense to leave them alone, at least. Then you reach the third floor, open the door and it’s like walking into the flat that time forgot. Before they could speak I said, “The décor could do with some updating, but the square meterage is to die for.” Ladling it on, you know.

  She scrunched up her nose, but he said, “Bloody hell, Mally, it’s effing perfect.” He wandered away to check out the dining room, touching the walls delicately, lovingly, as if they were a woman’s skin.

  She made a beeline for the kitchen. I’d figured out immediately that she was the one with the cash, so I followed her. “Your other half seems quite taken with it,” I said. And she said something like, “Yes, he’s hardly been discrete about that, has he?” Formal, stiff, cold. Careful with her words. I could feel the sale slipping through my fingers. She wasn’t someone who’d fall for a spiel.

  She asked me about the flat’s history and I fudged the truth a little. I hadn’t spoken personally to the vendor, just the solicitor. I said something like, “It’s been in the same family for thirty years.”

  “Did someone die here?” she asked. And I thought, what an odd question: someone’s died everywhere, haven’t they? Unless you get a new build of course. Before I could answer she said, “Because it’s got a strange feel to it, hasn’t it?”

  “It’s just the décor,” I said. “Surface issues, really.” She asked how long it had been on the market and I told her, adding, “It’s the amount of work that needs doing to upgrade it that’s putting buyers off. People just don’t have the imagination or the vision. Not like you two obviously do.”

  She gave me a ‘you can do better than that’ look and we shared a smile. It’s strange to say this now, considering that she’s literally a monster, but at that moment, I liked her.

  Mr Yates joined us then. “We could do so much with this, Mally,” he said to her. He had a dreamy, yet desperate look in his eyes. I’ve seen that look countless times. It was pure lust, pure longing. Sometimes I think people have more capacity to fall for houses and belongings than they do for other people.

  Her face softened. She turne
d to me and said, “Thanks. We’ll let you know.”

  You know in your gut when you have a sale. She was smitten with him. He was smitten with the flat. Ka-ching, I said in my head.

  After a good viewing, I like to go and browse the Hermes bags in Harvey Nics. You can have one of those if this comes through, Barb, I promised myself. Well of course they cost the Earth, but handbags are a better investment that real estate.

  I was trying on a Stella McCartney jacket when she phoned through the offer. Ten grand under the asking price. I called the vendor’s solicitor and it was accepted within the hour.

  I bought the bag. And the jacket.

  I’ve heard that Savills has the sole mandate to sell it now. Good luck to them. They’ll need it. I mean, God, they even found bits of him in the light fittings didn’t they?

  The Best Friend

  LOOK, OF COURSE I’m going to be on her side. I’ve known Malika all my life. We met when we were three. Our parents lived next door to each other in Bradford; we went to the same school, grew up together. No one knows Mal like I know her. There’s been a lot said about how she was cold, controlling, up her arse, rich, posh et cetera et cetera – the tabloids milked those angles for all they were worth – but we came from nothing. And I mean nothing. She worked for what she had. No one ever gave her a penny.

  We were inseparable. Came down to London together, lived in a squat together, odd-jobbed together to pay our way while I was at art college and she studied to be an actuary. We worked in a laundry, waitressed, and then there was that job with Firkin & Sons’ Meats. That bastard for the Crown went on and on about that, didn’t he? And for one year Malika Weston worked in a butcher’s shop. She knew how to cut up a body, ladies and gentlemen. How many of you can say that? But it was thirty years ago and she only worked behind the counter.

  And yeah, she does have a temper, and could be a mardy cow sometimes. So what? Who isn’t grumpy occasionally? They made a big thing about that as well, didn’t they?

  It’s my fault. If I hadn’t encouraged her to do that bloody bloody fitness class, she never would’ve met Robin. She wouldn’t have bought the flat, she wouldn’t be in prison, and he’d be alive. They’d both be alive, because how she’s living now is worse than death.

  I heard about the class from a friend of mine. It was some kind of Zumba thing that was all the rage for about three weeks. It had been six months since Malika’s divorce from Vile Gerry and I was worried that she was depressed and wasn’t getting out and about enough. “I’m fine, Helena,” she said whenever I phoned to check up on her. “You don’t need to worry about me. I’m enjoying eating sausages straight out of the pan and leaving my clothes on the bedroom floor.” But I convinced her to join me. “Come on, it’ll be a laugh,” I said.

  The class was fun in its way, and I hadn’t thought anything much about the instructor other than, He’s not bad looking. Then, after the class he and Mal got talking, which wasn’t like her – she’s an introvert and tends to avoid chit-chat with strangers. He had a south London accent, tinged with something else. Mal told me his history later on. Care homes, foster homes, a couple of minor brushes with the law, dropped out of college, became a personal trainer, worked on cruise ships for a while. The defence barrister did his best to prove that Robin was a loser with mental health issues, but there was no proof of that. He’s looking for a family, I thought back then. Looking for permanence, stability. And obviously, considering the age difference, I assumed he was looking for a mother figure, maybe a meal ticket. Cynical of me, but after all the crap Mal had been through with Vile Gerry, the last thing she needed was to get involved with another manipulative arsehole.

  After the class, I kept silent until we reached the car. “You were flirting, Malika,” I said.

  “So?” she said.

  “He could be your son.”

  “And if it was the other way around? If he was two decades older than me?”

  “Yeah. I know. It’s unfair, isn’t it? But what if he wants kids?”

  She laughed. “Jesus, Helena, that’s a bit of a jump. We haven’t even had a coffee yet.”

  She hid the relationship from me at first. Changed the subject whenever I asked about him. So I had no idea that two weeks after they met, he’d moved into her rented duplex, the one in Shoreditch. She was fifty-two. He was twenty-eight. You do the maths. But I could see something was up with her. Being in love makes you glow; a cliché, but it does. And she was glowing. I confronted her about him and she finally admitted it. “I’m happy, Helena,” she said. “And you should be happy for me too.”

  I lied and said that of course I was. It wasn’t just the age difference that had set off the warning bells; the whole thing had happened so fast. Too fast. But like my husband Nikesh said to me, it can happen like that, and we’re living proof. I fell in love with Nikesh the second I saw him – boom – and he said he felt the same. Look, I’ll admit that I was also embarrassed for her. A middle-aged, divorced woman falling for a younger man, and a bloody personal trainer to boot, is an even bigger cliché, isn’t it? Nikesh is far more level-headed than I am. “You have to trust that she knows what she wants, Hel,” he’d say to me over and over whenever I harped on about the relationship. Nikesh likes Malika. Always has. He used to play golf with Vile Gerry, even though he, like me, thought he was a monumental arsehole.

  I kept telling myself that it wouldn’t last. A few months of great sex and then she’d get bored, or figure out that he was just after her cash and a bit of mothering.

  But weeks ran into months, and I only saw her once or twice during that period. The boys were going off to uni, and with my daughter Saira going back to work full-time I was helping out with Meera, our first grandchild.

  Then Mal invited me round for dinner “to get to know Robin properly”. Nikesh was on call so he couldn’t come along. Robin wasn’t exactly a great conversationalist, but, I’ll admit, they were sweet together, and he seemed to have genuine feelings for her. Still, whenever Malika left us alone I couldn’t shake the feeling that I was talking to one of the children. Zane, my youngest, can’t decide what he wants to do in life, and it drives Nikesh and me crazy. Working in a gym didn’t seem to float Robin’s boat, and he said Malika was encouraging him to take night classes.

  There was something lost about him.

  More warning bells.

  The thing is, Malika liked to fix people. Her history was littered with lame ducks, among them Vile Gerry. She’d tried and failed to fix that bastard, threw money at him, made excuses for him, backed him in all his ridiculous business ventures, but you can’t fix something that’s smashed to begin with. They lasted fifteen years, and he walked off with half her assets and straight into a marriage with a thirty-year-old. Now, at the age of sixty, he has three children under five. He looked ten years older when I saw him in court. Good. I hope he has a bloody heart attack.

  Robin couldn’t have been more different than Vile Gerry, but I so badly wanted to say, You can’t fix this one either, Mal.

  Then she dropped the bombshell, and told me she’d made an offer on a property. This seemed to wake Robin up, as if he’d had a caffeine injection. “It’s awesome,” he kept saying. “Most amazing place I’ve ever seen.” It was he, not Mal, who invited me to see it.

  If the offer hadn’t already been accepted, I would have encouraged her not to buy it. Robin showed me round, full of that same enthusiasm, but I was uncomfortable in there from the get-go. It wasn’t just the dated furnishings and wallpaper. That didn’t bother me. When Nikesh and I bought our place it looked like the fifties had thrown up all over it. No. There was a... a heaviness in the air. Like that feeling you get just before a thunderstorm. When Robin was out of earshot Mal confided that she felt it too. She said it was like someone was watching her all the time. An awkward atmosphere, like when you’ve overstayed your welcome at a dinner party and the hosts start clearing up and making you coffee in the hopes that you’ll get the message and leave
. She told me Robin wanted to renovate it himself. “He wants a project to do, Helena,” she said. “But I’m not sure he’s up to the job.” It was the one and only time I heard her say anything negative about him.

  I got the impression something else was bothering her too. After the divorce, she’d left her firm and downsized to a few choice clients to keep her ticking over, and planned to convert the second bedroom into an office. We never discussed cash-flow, but Vile Gerry had taken half of her assets, and I suspected she’d paid a bit more for the place than she was really comfortable with.

  I want to say that her new defence is crazy. Nikesh says any right-thinking solicitor wouldn’t dream of taking it on, but now I know the flat’s history, I’m not sure what to think about it. And I trust my friend. No one is more rational than Mal. If she believes it, then it has to be true, because the alternative, that she killed him, is impossible. She didn’t do it. She didn’t do what they say she did. She wasn’t the controlling, jealous person the press and that bloody barrister made her out to be.

  She loved him. She loved him even when it became unbearable.

  The Interior Decorator

  I ALMOST DIED when I heard about it. Died. I honestly couldn’t breathe. Adesh, my PA – he’s morbidly obese but amazing – had to Uber back to the house to get me a Valium. I’m not joking, it really did shake me that badly.

  I’d re-done Malika Weston’s old house seven years ago, the one in Cobham, and my dear, let me tell you, she was a dream client. “Louis,” she said, “I trust you. Do whatever you want.” And I did. I gutted it. We went for a mid-century feel, just touches here and there, you know. Nothing vulgar. I’m very sensitive when it comes to my clients’ spaces. I don’t just want to create a show piece, it’s important to me that the client is able to feel she can –