Cut To The Bone

by Sally Spedding

  Want you? For fuck's sake. Want you?

  He tried to sound normal. To say nothing else that might push her away. He'd done that already. Syllable by syllable. Lou-is-is-ill…

  "There'll be a quick run-through at six thirty,” he said brightly. "Plenty of food, by the way. So save yourself."

  She eyed him, smiling with just one side of her mouth, while hooking her bag strap over her shoulder. He noticed downy underarm hair and wanted to stroke it, let his fingers travel into her clothes.

  "I will."

  He watched her leave and pass the window with a brief wave. His hand too, rose in the semi-darkness and stayed there, locked, like the rest of him in an abyss of despair.

  *

  Eight o'clock, and the hall phone was ringing. Dave leapt from the cloakroom, his fly still undone. Carla, he thought, with an extra heartbeat. But the moment he heard Louis' Head of Year at North Barton Boys’ School, that same heart sank.

  "Keith Wardle here. Sorry to disturb, but I'm tying up some loose ends before the end of term. Is this Mr Perelman?" He sounded less amenable than at the last parents’ evening when Jacquie had remarked he was like everyone’s favourite uncle.

  "Yes, unfortunately. And it's Doctor, not Mister." Zipping up with one hand, wincing in anticipation of a sharp nick.

  "Of course. Sorry about that. Couple of points, really..."

  Dave glanced up through the hallway’s banisters, then realised Louis was out swimming with the Patel boy. Of Jacquie there was no sign until he heard bath water running through the system.

  "What points?" he barked. The typical defensive parent. Wardle was turning pages. “About Louis fainting?”

  Pause.

  "I've collected some lesson registers..." This came with more rustling. More tension building up. Dave could see Jacquie in a bathrobe looking down from the landing. Her face unpleasantly pink. "Seems your son bunked off games first thing on Monday morning and then yesterday..."

  "Yesterday?"

  "Correct. Design Technology. A double lesson after lunch."

  "But that's his favourite subject," Dave protested. "I don't understand. My wife bought him a brand new designer's folder only last month. He was over the moon with it."

  "Look Dr. Perelman, we need to nip this in the bud before year 9. Remember our Parents’ and Children Charter? And the possible fines?"

  "Before you go," aware of Jacquie creeping closer, "are you sure he wasn't on the premises? He does get IBS, especially around exams"

  Wardle sighed.

  "We're sure, and if you recall, Dr. Perelman, examinations finished a fortnight ago. Besides," he added with almost a note of triumph. "He's on camera on both occasions, actually walking out of the school gates."

  "How can you tell it was him? Was his face shown?"

  "No, but…"

  "I suggest there must be plenty of boys of Louis' height and build leaving the premises for whatever reason, especially at this time of year. In a court of law, the school wouldn't have a leg to stand on."

  Jacquie made a small noise. Dave shot her a warning look.

  "Court of law?" Wardle, taken aback.

  "If necessary."

  "There’s still last Saturday…"

  "What about it?"

  "According to Mrs Barber, your son missed the final orchestra practice before the concert. The only absentee."

  Jacquie watched Dave hold the receiver away from his head. Wardle was trying to renew contact.

  "Dr. Perelman?” he persisted. “Are you still there?..."

  20

  "Come here, son." Dave beckoned the errant schoolboy into the yellow garden where he'd been listening to Delius to calm himself down after events at the Viva Cuba café, and Keith Wardle's news. Shielded by her sunglasses, Jacquie saw him resist the urge to place his arms around Louis’ shoulders as he advanced.

  Dave looked more than scruffy, and for some uncanny reason, also resembled Graham Lodge with that same shiftiness when she'd learned he and Tina the Temptress had used their very bed for sex.

  Louis hung back.

  "I said, come here." Dave's voice lowered. We don't want the Zellers listening in, do we?"

  "That's their fucking problem."

  Jacquie flinched, nevertheless let Dave press on.

  "So why have you been mitching school? That's the word, isn't it? Let's start with yesterday. Design Technology."

  Louis placed a hand across his chest.

  "I had a bad pain. Here."

  Jacquie sat up, affording Louis a glimpse of pink knicker triangle between her upper thighs. She pressed her ear to his heart. She'd had an ice cream. Greedy cow. He also noticed wax lining her left ear.

  "Did you feel anything hurting down your arm"?" she asked him. "You've got to think."

  He nodded, thinking very hard indeed. "But I had to lie I wanted the toilet. They think you're a sissy unless you say you're crapping your pants..."

  "And your orchestra practice on Saturday?" The Maggot pressed on. "Mr. Wardle says you weren't there at all."

  "That's not true. He fucking knows it."

  Jacquie observed him in sick fear, wanting to believe the child she'd emptied her savings for, who'd brought her and Dave's relationship to breaking point, might have owned up.

  "I suppose Waddle went on about rabbits as well, did he?" Louis still glaring.

  "Mr. Wardle to you, son," snapped Dave. "And no, he didn't. Why?"

  "Nothing. It's just that when I went to feed Willy and Wonka yesterday, they didn't look too good. And today, they were found dead. In his car."

  "Oh, that's terrible," Jacquie gasped, while Dave appropriated the boy's shoulder.

  "I think, son, that instead of worrying about a couple of bloody rabbits, you might spare a thought for us," he said.

  "I will. Sorry Dad."

  *

  He was missing Black Dog Brook and everything it represented. Mystery, privacy, the strange, sweet smell when skin is torn from flesh. The triumph of death. He was also missing the lines of candy Jez had provided, but no way would he risk going down the pub in Scrub Lane to buy some. He felt morose and deflated. So he'd got Kayleigh Martin's photos to look at and other stuff, but creating fear, seeing fear was what whipped blood into his dick. He knew he wouldn't last long without it.

  He began cleaning the remaining Walton-on-Sea knife then fixed on his distorted reflection in the blade. Two slitty eyes, a pair of wide, wet lips. He then decided it was more likely, given the Martin's lack of cash, they'd bought the knives and box at some car boot sale. That scenario, rather than a family holiday in Walton-on-Sea, made him feel better.

  The steel against his skin, brought back the rest of the afternoon's biology lesson. How We Are Born, with diagrams of contractions, waters breaking - and most riveting of all - what Miss Udder called ‘Caesarean Sections’ projected on to the whiteboard.

  He'd sat mesmerised, while everyone else was doodling muffs and dicks getting together. The incision into the abdomen, the peeling back of the epidermis and tissue to where the shining foetus hides...

  After that, he'd asked the most questions because he'd needed to know more. How cells divide; how everyone starts off being female etcetera, which was not good news. Once the class had been dismissed, Miss Udder had actually informed him that she herself had been delivered by Caesarean section because her mother possessed small feet.

  "What's small feet got to do with it, Miss?" Louis had asked.

  "They can signify small hips."

  "Oh." Thinking if that
was the case, then most of the girls he'd seen down the Mall with their wiggly little bums, would be cut open just the same when it came to their turn.

  "Can you actually remember it happening?" he’d then probed.

  "What an odd question." She'd obviously been taken aback; stacking her books furiously together.

  "Well, I can." He’d announced. "Every night it’s muffled voices, gurgling liquids, and my air supply dwindling…“

  "Come along, Louis," she'd guided him to the classroom door. "You should give that head of yours a rest."

  *

  Now, at 7.30 p.m. with the Meadow Hill house quiet and the sky red from the dying sun, he Googled ‘Caesarian Sections’ and eventually found BIRTH TRENDS & PRACTICES FROM 1960 TO THE PRESENT DAY. By Professor Thomas Renshaw. B.Sc. F.R.A.C.S.

  After half an hour’s total immersion in all things uterine, he decided to check The Gazette online. Apart from an attack on a teenage girl near the bus station and a drugs haul in Ditch Hollow, nothing of interest until he clicked on page 2 and gasped.

  LOCAL SCHOOLBOY MISSING

  He first thought Lakey, until the small, grainy photo popped up, followed by text…

  Jez Martin, a twelve year-old pupil of Scrub Lane Comprehensive School has been reported missing since yesterday afternoon having failed to return home after a cancelled Homework Club. Mother of three, Mrs Rita Martin of Wort Passage on the Scrub End Estate, told police her son had recently become something of a loner, while the school's Acting Head Mr. Carl Dobbs admitted that repeated truanting during the term had hampered the boy's progress. Jez is described as 4' 8" tall, of slim build with cropped red hair, and was last seen wearing black jeans and blue, short-sleeved shirt. According to his mother, he'd taken his green mountain bike and her Nokia mobile phone with him. Anyone who knows his whereabouts or recalls seeing anything suspicious at that time in the area, should contact the Briar Bank police station on at the earliest opportunity, where their information will be treated in the strictest confidence...

  What did he feel? Louis asked himself, staring at the familiar face. Absolutely nothing. But there was something he could do to help the enquiry along.

  First he checked outside his door, then locked it, but not quick enough to keep the oven meal smell from wafting in. Then, after dialling 141 and the number he'd seen in Blanchard's file, asked the recorded message to send the Police careers info to his address. Next, 141 again, plus that police Freephone number.

  "Sergeant Crooker speaking, Briar Bank Police station." A man's voice answered "How can I help?"

  "It's about that Jez Martin boy in today’s Gazette..." Louis used his poshest vowels. "He was walking up Radford Road. Near the railway bridge."

  "That's three and a half miles north from Scrub End. What time?"

  About five o'clock. I was returning home from a business meeting."

  "Was he alone?"

  "Yes, and looked pretty upset."

  "How?"

  Louis almost mentioned the bike.

  "As if there’d been a row at home. Or a lovers' tiff..."

  "Your name and address please sir. Confidential, of course."

  A second's panic.

  "Sorry, officer, I can't risk it. I'm in a new job, and we’ve a baby on the way. I'm sure you understand..."

  Without giving the pig a chance to pester him further, Louis hung up, smiling. That'll show them, he thought. Send them away from the brook. Give them something to do.

  He then scanned the rest of The Gazette until the STOP PRESS section on page 6. Anyone could have missed its smaller font.

  MAN FOUND DEAD

  The corpse of a man believed to be in his late sixties has been found stabbed to death near Black Dog Brook in Greythorn Wood. A passing cyclist who discovered him, then called the police who have cordoned off the area but not released any further details.

  Jesus.

  His heart was like The Maggot's metronome. Thud, thud, thud...

  "Louis?"

  He opened his bedroom door. Legs unsteady.

  Talk of the Devil…

  "What?"

  "Supper's ready."

  "I'm not hungry."

  "Please yourself then."

  I fucking will.

  His door slammed. Then came silence. Just the heat and the smoke from someone's barbecue drifting in through the window. More dead meat, Louis thought. More uncalled-for memories.

  21

  The Ishmael's were moving furniture overhead, Rita could tell. Scrape, drag, scrape and the occasional raised voice. They'd woken her up, and now she sat on her bed, blurred by tears, not caring that the kids hadn’t eaten anything cooked since Tuesday evening or that both now fretted for attention. Freddie in his cot in the back bedroom, Kayleigh by a cold TV.

  She couldn't move. Didn't want to. What was the point? Nothing was, any more.

  Suddenly a knock at the front door made her cry out in surprise. Who the heck? Straightaway she thought police - they'd already been round twice, and that reporter from The Gazette. This sounded different though. Even more urgent.

  "Mrs Martin? Please answer."

  Rita forced herself upright and went to the window. Her neighbours from upstairs were on the point of turning away from her front door when she tapped the glass. She'd never seen them before without their umbrellas. They looked old and shabby. Weary of life, just like her.

  "Hold on. I'm coming."

  "It's your husband on the telephone,” said Mr Ishmael. “He wants to speak to you."

  "Tell him from me to bog off." She began to close the door.

  "He sounded very worried." Her neighbour frowned. "Very worried indeed."

  Rita gave a wry laugh. "Give us a break. 'He can go and boil his head and the rest of him, for that matter. Thanks anyway."

  She closed the door and instantly felt better, but Kayleigh had heard every word.

  "I want me Dad. Where is he?"

  "I don't know and I don't care. Just leave it, will you?"

  "Freddie's sicked up again. I can smell it."

  "He'll have to wait."

  "But Mu-um... "

  Then Rita did something she'd never done before in her life. She clipped the child round the head and sent her squealing into what had been Jez and Freddie's room, slamming the door behind her.

  She gripped that same door handle unable to go in, as new tears hurtled down her cheeks. It was as if a great, black void had opened and was swallowing them up into its bleak nothingness. Those who were left, that is. On their way to Hell.

  *

  “You know that Pete Brown boy wot called for Jez," Kayleigh said, spreading Value margarine on her white sliced bread half an hour later, as if nothing had happened. "He 'ad the weirdest eyes. I'll never forget them."

  The Marmite sandwich Rita had made for herself, suddenly tasted weird in her mouth. She got up and spat it into the bin.

  "Sorry. Go on..."

  "It was just the really scary way he gawped at me. And then all of a sudden, Jip goes missing don't he? I've been thinking about it loads."

  "Jip shouldn't have gone wandering off like that. Maybe he had a lady friend, who knows." Rita rinsed out her mouth under the kitchen tap, an idea forming. "Tell you what, though. If I fetch your crayons, can you make a drawing of that lad's face? Like you get on Crime Watch?"

  “Course.”

  *

  Her daughter duly laid out her colours and, as the minutes passed, Rita watched that same, strange boy reappear. The brown and yellow crayons
had to be sharpened for his untidy hair, also white which made a good base for the skin tone.

  "Don't forget his specs and that grubby PE shirt." Rita said. 'He looked a right mess."

  “I won’t." Kayleigh resolutely crayoned in the outline, then got to work. When she’d finished, Rita held it up in front of the old mirror in her bedroom. A sudden chill coursed through her clothes and she accidentally let the drawing fall to the lino from where that cruel mouth seemed to be smiling up at her.

  *

  It took twenty minutes to sort Freddie out and push his buggy with Kayleigh alongside to the Police Station. She had to get new nappies anyhow, seeing as her youngest had suddenly forgotten all his potty training. Nevertheless, he watched other kids of Jez's age cycling, mooching around – things his brother would do – which she found too much to bear. So, to spare herself more anguish, she focussed instead on the top of his head.

  Like a spilt, rogue egg, the sun lay in its own scarlet pool in the sky, turning both kids’ faces an eerie colour, making giants of their shadows. Rita stood by the Police Station’s outer door and gave her details to the intercom. It was here that she'd first met Sergeant Fraser, and she was just wondering if she should contact him about Jez, when a young, uniformed police woman with scraped-back hair looked up from the main desk and asked if she could help.

  From her patchwork bag, Rita produced Kayleigh's vivid drawing, smoothing it down on the ledge. "Constable Jarvis might like to see this,” she began. “But I'd appreciate a colour copy of it first, if that's possible."

  "Who is it then?" The officer whose ID said PC Jane Truelove, stared at the image.

  "Pete Brown. The boy who called on my Jez last Monday morning. Kayleigh here just drew it. I’m sure he’s something to do with Jez being missing and our dog drowned..." She pressed an outspread hand where she thought her heart was.

  "I must say, she's a proper little artist." The policewoman gave Kayleigh an admiring smile then tapped into the switchboard and asked for Constable Jarvis.