by J. M. Hewitt
Not heaven, but hell.
The intensity of the hues above her rippled and bled, and then she saw nothing at all.
* * *
Sight gone. Feeling nothing. But a sense that she was moving, a knowledge, a sensation almost akin to sleepwalking. And then… air. An icy blast that forced her eyes open, just narrow slits, but enough to see the lip of the ice, the new environment apparent as the last few flurries of snow landed on her lashes, obscuring her vision once again.
She drew breath, but the lower part of her face was still submerged, and the water burned down her throat. She shifted, throwing her weight up and forward, and then she felt it: cold wind on her face. Jagged inhalations, exhaled as part scream, part vomit. It floated past her, nestled against her neck, regurgitated food sticking to her sodden scarf. Tilting her face upwards, she laughed. It had a hysterical edge.
The colours were still there, those deep red and purple lights. Heavenly lights. Or hellish, maybe. She still wasn’t sure.
She gulped and passed a wet hand across her eyes. Blinking hard, she looked again.
The Northern Lights.
Tipping her head back, she began to laugh again. All this time, all the money spent on the trip to see the lights, all the evenings of disappointment, of gazing fruitlessly at cloudy skies, and now, here on the brink of death, they had come out to play.
The laugh she heard coming from her frozen lips loosened something in her, a fear that had been settled in her soul for a long time now. Before this trip, before she’d ever clapped eyes on Anna. Even before Tommy. She had smothered it throughout the years, kept it hidden like a dirty secret.
She saw the error in that now, the mistake she had made. Because to conceal it meant hiding the person she was. Stifling it had led to her being careless. In turn, that had led to danger.
She stopped laughing and groaned instead, a long, guttural moan, like an animal. She was still in the ice hole, couldn’t feel anything below her waist any more. She levered herself out with her arms, dragging her useless legs behind her, shuffling along like a commando until finally, after what seemed like hours, the texture beneath her forearms turned from ice to the cold, hard gravel of the land.
Drowning had almost been the end of her, but now hypothermia was the very real risk. As if to cement this fact, her teeth began to chatter, her jaw working painfully no matter how hard she tried to clench it.
Warmth.
Her brain sent her a single instruction, and obediently she pushed herself into a crouch and tried to jog. Her movements were jerky and awkward, and time and time again she fell face forward into the snow. But by the time she reached the edge of the forest, she realised that her legs, only minutes ago numb and seemingly paralysed, were working again. She balled her hands into fists and punched at her thighs as she staggered through the trees.
On she went, not noticing the branches that reached out to grab her, paying little heed to the ground beneath her feet that dipped and rose. She moved unseeingly, and the landscape around her blended into nothingness.
A rucksack.
It dimly registered, the deep green material of the bag standing out against the crisp white snow.
Anna’s bag.
She slowed and stooped to pick it up. The zip was open, and the bag was empty apart from a few euro notes in the bottom. With fingers that were increasingly stiff and painful, she grasped the money and shoved it in her pocket. Still holding the rucksack, she walked a few feet, scanning left and right now.
The waxed jacket.
It was caught on a low-hanging branch of a pine. She dropped the rucksack and ripped off her own sodden coat, putting the jacket on in its place. Even though her top and jeans were soaking wet, the single piece of dry material seemed to help.
She shook her head, droplets of water spraying around her, then tore her scarf off and draped it over the branch that she’d found the coat on. Above her, the Northern Lights seemed to be fading, and the forest around her settled into gloom. But before they disappeared completely, she saw the glint of metal a few feet off the path she had been following.
Keys.
The master keys to the Ruby Spirit, the ones Anna had stolen from someone called Mark. And… She pushed the leaves aside and picked up the next object. Her breathing sounded suddenly very loud in her ears.
Her own iPhone. The one that had gone missing.
She put it in her pocket to nestle alongside the money she had found in the bag, then stood up straight, rubbing at her breastbone as a strange ache began to spread and grow there.
Putting one foot in front of the other, she walked on.
* * *
‘Just here is fine.’ Paula leaned forward as the taxi rounded the corner of the harbour.
They were at the bow end of the ship, and the lights of the Ruby Spirit blazed out across the water.
She shoved some notes at the taxi driver and hauled herself out of the car.
She should find someone in authority, or ring the international number for the police. Or summon the captain. Tell him that one of his passengers had tried to kill her. She had to find Tommy, because Anna was after him now.
But not to kill him, though.
She nodded to herself. No, Tommy was safe for now.
The tips of her fingers itched. She rubbed them up and down the zip of the coat she wore, deep in thought.
Crowds of passengers stood in huddles on the deck at the top of the walkway. They parted for her, nobody looking at her, none of them realising that the person the ship was waiting for was in their midst.
In her pocket, she fingered the keys she had found in the forest.
Evidence.
‘Yes.’ She spoke the word quietly to herself, a confirmation that she knew what she had to do.
If she went to someone now and told them what had happened, Anna would be brought in and questioned. But she was clever, and everyone was charmed by her, and nobody would believe what she had done. Not even Paula’s own husband.
Especially him.
Her lips curled into a scowl at the thought.
She pulled her hood up as she entered the corridor at the end of the ship and walked quickly along the hallway to the spiral stairs that would take her up to her suite. Her blood pumped freely now, and she patted at her face. She could feel both her fingers and her cheeks now, and she supposed the risk of hypothermia had passed.
On the floor where the first-class suites were, all was quiet. She walked past her own door, carried on until she came to the corner. She faced the door of the Arctic Suite and pulled the keys out of her pocket. Pushed one into the lock. A green light shone, a subtle click.
She put the keys away and slipped inside Anna’s room.
* * *
A weight at Anna’s back, crashing into her. Catching her foot on the step, she staggered out onto the balcony.
An attack, an intruder in her suite, and wasn’t that just so ironic given all the things she had done herself? But whoever was behind her was still coming, up close, shoving at her now, a painful push in her spine.
The knife – the vegetable knife for the lemons that went into the gin – where had she left it? She had cleaned it after she had used it on Mark. If she could just make her way back inside and pick it up…
The thoughts ran through her mind in a millisecond, and she put her hands out, an instinctive gesture to catch at the railing of the balcony and steady herself so she could turn and confront her attacker, dodge past and get back inside.
But something wasn’t right, and it took her precious seconds to realise as her hands searched blindly for support that the railing wasn’t there.
She threw her arms back, hands up, staring at the gaping hole in front of her. The pressure on her back lessened for a second before the intruder came at her again. This time the hands were on her shoulders, moving up to grip the back of her neck. She gasped as her head was pulled back, her body almost bent in two… and she found herself staring into Paula’
s face.
The world tilted strangely, and for a moment she wondered if this was a hallucination. How could Paula be here, in her suite? She was back in Ellidavatn, in the lake, frozen and dead under the ice.
Was it possible she had underestimated this woman?
‘Did you think you could take my life?’ Paula hissed in Anna’s face, and even now there was minimal anger showing; just what appeared to be a regretful mask of sadness.
She shook her, and an involuntary groan emerged as Anna’s bones seemed to rattle in her body. There, there was the fury. Not in Paula’s face, but in her body, in her strength.
Anna tried to still herself, to think clearly, to remember who this woman was in comparison to herself. She was nobody.
And in spite of the pain, she laughed. ‘You can’t hurt me,’ she said, a little of her old self coming back as she taunted her. ‘You’re not built for it. It’s not you. It’s not in you.’
Paula narrowed her eyes. Still, she spoke softly, quietly, almost conversationally. ‘You have no idea of who I am or what I can do.’
Anna felt herself shifting as Paula moved her arms. Suddenly that gap in the railing was an awful lot closer. She eyed it, uneasy now. Her hands crawled along the floor, seeking something – anything – that she could use to defend herself. Above her, Paula spotted the movement. She lifted her again, oh so easily, and Anna felt herself falling backwards, the world now upside down, the white-painted concrete floor rising up to meet her.
Her breath heaved out of her body as her head made contact with the ground. Something in her neck snagged and tore. Beyond the balcony, in the sky above the sea, she watched as the Northern Lights once more came out to play. No colours this time, just white flashes that zigzagged their way across the cloudless landscape.
Not the Northern Lights, she realised dimly. Nor was it the Leonid meteor shower. Rather, damage inside her own head, her own body. On the brink of unconsciousness, she tore her eyes away from the outside world and forced herself to look at Paula.
Yes, she thought. She had underestimated this woman.
And then Paula began to talk, and Anna listened as best she could.
Chapter 25
Before
On the doorstep of the house I’d hoped never to see again, I took a deep breath as I dug my key out of my pocket.
I’d not told anyone in Edinburgh that I had to return home. I’d not mentioned the phone call from Carl. I didn’t tell the girls I roomed with, not the boy I’d met, who I thought I could love, nor any of the teachers or staff.
In the dark hallway, I flicked the switch as I closed the front door softly behind me. I almost turned it off again straight away, wishing I didn’t have to see that no housework had been done since I’d left.
All was quiet, and there was an impending sense of something twisted and wrong as I took my coat off and hung it on the banister. Carl hadn’t said why I needed to come back. Just that it was my mother.
I took another deep breath and trudged slowly up the stairs.
They were in her room, my mother propped up on the floor with her back against the bed, her head hanging low. She wore just her underwear, and without the ever-present dressing gown, I was shocked to see how thin she was. I thought of my own new-found purging routine, and it was something of a wake-up call. I vowed that I would stop before I ever got to look like the emaciated woman in front of me.
Carl was in the bed, the dirty sheet pulled up to his chin, the telephone beside him. In the gloom of the room, the whites of his eyes watched me carefully.
‘Mum?’ I said, and when there was no response, I repeated it louder. ‘Mum.’
‘I don’t know what happened.’ Carl spoke for the first time.
‘What do you mean?’ I looked at him, because it was easier than looking at her.
He shrugged, his mouth downturned and sulky.
My heart began to beat faster. I put a hand on my chest, hoping to steady it, but already my body was preparing me for the blow that I didn’t even know had landed.
I went down on my knees next to her, scanning the floor first for stains or needles. In a dim part of my mind it registered that I was wearing my newest jeans and I didn’t want them ruined.
I put my hands on her shoulders, ready to get her up and onto the bed, where she could sleep it off. The same way I had done hundreds of times in the past.
Her skin was like marble; cold and unyielding. I snatched my hands away before forcing them back, my fingers working upwards to the side of her neck.
I knew there would be no pulse; I knew she was dead.
I’d known it, deep inside, when I got the phone call from Carl, though I hadn’t admitted it.
‘How long has she been like this?’ My voice was a breathy whisper, filled with the horror of what was in front of me.
Carl shifted in the bed. I looked up at him, at this pathetic man. The sheet slipped down, and he grabbed at it.
‘I don’t remember,’ he said. His voice was dull and heavy. He looked at me suddenly, a frown crossing his face. ‘When did I call you?’
I didn’t answer him. I turned my attention back to my mother. I had known that one day this would happen, I’d imagined it and, horribly, sometimes I had wished for it. But now that time had come, I found myself beset with a deep, dark sadness.
I tilted her face so she was looking at me. Her eyes were cloudy, unseeing, and her mouth was partially open in a painful grimace. What had her last words been? What had she thought about as she slipped away?
Could I have done more?
I clapped my hand to my mouth. At eighteen years old, kneeling next to my mother’s corpse in that filthy house where I had grown up, I knew that question had the potential to haunt me for the rest of my life.
I couldn’t let it. I wouldn’t. I had only just begun to live. I was starting to find out who I was. People in Edinburgh liked me. And yet it all came back to this.
Around her left arm was that old pink belt that used to belong to me. It was a brownish-grey now, years old, and it made me even sadder to look at it. Why was she still using it? In some warped, horrible way, did it remind her of me? Or had it originally just been the closest thing to hand and was simply now a habit, part of her kit, like the tablespoon she favoured?
Gently, I unclasped the buckle and removed it from her arm.
Behind me, Carl shifted. As if the belt had awoken something in him, he shuffled to sit on the edge of the bed.
‘I need my stuff,’ he said.
In an instant, my strange sadness turned to hate and anger. It felt pure as it ran through me, cold as ice in my veins, like the brown stuff was in theirs.
Him.
It had always been him who was to blame.
I looked around the room, my eyes landing on their paraphernalia. Why had this happened now? Despite what people thought, it was difficult to overdose from heroin if you were a long-term continuous user. Something must have happened. Had they mixed it with alcohol or another drug? I could ask him, I supposed, but I’d never get the truth.
‘Stay there,’ I instructed him.
He looked resigned, weary and shattered as he leaned back on the pillow.
Downstairs, I moved around the kitchen. I touched nothing but looked carefully at the boxes and bowls and needles that covered the worktop.
I peered closely at a box. Fentanyl. I knew about this. I’d read an article only last week about heroin users in Glasgow dropping dead after using this opioid painkiller to cut their powder.
I looked in the dining room. I recalled the time I had orchestrated the meeting between my teacher and my mother, and the hope that had bloomed in me when I realised how close I was to getting out. Mum had been proud of me, and had tried to behave and present herself as a normal mother living in a clean and tidy house. All under my instruction. Then there was the deceit. The words I had spoken to Miss Hayle about Rebecca Lavery, my scholarship competitor. My lie had been bad and wrong, and though I had jus
tified it for my own means, was this my punishment?
Outside, the garden seemed lighter than normal. I glanced up and a smile almost reached my face at the sight of the white and blue tail in the sky. The Hale-Bopp comet. We had been taught about it in school, a full year before it arrived in the sky visible to our naked eyes. I had loved hearing about it; it was even better the few times I had seen it. One night, Carl had come to find out why I was in the garden so late. I told him about the comet as I strained to see it through the clouds. For a moment we observed it in silence, and I wondered if it could be a starting point for the two of us.
Seconds later, he broke the companionable silence with a laugh, a rasping, wheezing sound. Then he told me about a group in America called Heaven’s Gate. Thirty-nine people had believed that the Hale-Bopp was actually a UFO; they had killed themselves in a mass suicide, believing their souls would enter the craft as a direct link to God.
He sneered as he left me in the dark of the garden. I sat for a little while longer before returning inside.
He had ruined it for me; the magic was gone.
I had never looked at the skies again, until now.
During that small, seemingly insignificant episode that lasted no longer than a few minutes, my mother had been elsewhere.
Like she always was.
I closed my eyes and remembered her. I thought of what she could have been.
* * *
Upstairs, Carl hadn’t moved. He didn’t look at my mother. He scratched at the side of his face and I heard his long nails as they rubbed over the coarse unshaven hair on his cheeks. He needed the stuff.
‘Do you want me to…?’ I trailed off, holding up the syringe I had prepared.
His dark eyes flashed briefly, and he stretched out his arm.
I shook my head and gestured. ‘No, that one.’
He looked at his tattoo. ‘It’s got scar tissue. I had an accident; it’s why I got the tat, to cover it, see? It’s not as good for me in that arm. It’s not got as much sensitivity.’