by Sant, Sharon
‘Are we going to be much longer?’ I ask, trying to set my expression to something acceptably neutral.
‘A couple more and you can get back inside your cosy little house.’
A few more clicks and he puts the cap back on his lens. ‘I think that should do it. Do you want to take a look through before I head back, make sure you’re happy with them?’
I shake my head. I don’t particularly care what they look like and all I want to do is get back into the safety of my house. Luckily, it’s the middle of the day and lots of my neighbours must be out at work so I haven’t attracted the attention I was dreading, but I don’t want to push it. ‘I’m sure they’re fine.’ I push the front door open and the cat sidles out, rubbing against my legs. The photographer’s gaze is drawn downwards.
‘Well… would you look at that? It seems you have a little friend after all.’ He stoops down to stroke it and the cat immediately backs away, shooting down the hallway to the kitchen. The photographer stands again and shrugs.
‘A bit shy, eh?’
I nod. But as I watch him smile and turn to go, I believe it has nothing to do with shyness. There’s a bit of me that thinks the cat gets exactly the same vibes from this guy as I do. And if I was a cat I’d bolt down the hall to get away from him too.
‘Why were you able to reveal this much information to a journalist but not to me?’
Helen holds the newspaper open at the page that my story fills. There’s no anger or accusation in her question, just a need to know.
‘I don’t know. He had a way of getting it out of me. And,’ I add, trying to bite back the tone of irritation but knowing I’ve failed, ‘I didn’t get turfed out by him after forty five minutes in the chair.’
She regards me steadily for a moment. ‘Would double sessions help? We’d have to get the say-so from your GP –’
‘I didn’t mean it was your fault.’
She pauses. ‘So, how do you feel about the article now? About what telling the journalist has done for you?’
‘I… I’m not sure.’
‘Have you read it yourself?’
I shake my head. I haven’t even bought a copy.
‘Would you like to read it through now? Seeing it in print might give you a fresh perspective. It’s a way of externalising your thoughts, really, in much the same way a journal would. I was going to suggest you might start a journal to note down your thoughts and feelings. This seems like a good start.’ She gives me what she must think is a reassuring smile. But somehow, her smiles seem less encouraging, more something she was trained to do with her patients. What she doesn’t add, though I’m sure she wants to, is that it’s a very public, attention-seeking kind of start.
‘I don’t. I don’t want to read it. I know what’s in there so I don’t need to.’
‘Cassie,’ she begins slowly, ‘this is exactly what I mean. As soon as I offer you a corner of the paper to rip, you back away. Sooner or later you have to unwrap the gift or it will rot away to nothing.’
‘I’ll keep the journal,’ I say, just to shut her up. ‘How much do I have to write?’
She sighs. ‘It’s not an exam. Just write what you want when you want to. It’s up to you to make it into something useful.’
‘Sometimes, I wish you’d actually tell me what to do instead of throwing it back to me all the time.’
‘It doesn’t work like that; I’ve already explained it to you. I’m here to facilitate your self-recovery. You do the work, I just hand you the tools to get started.’
‘What if I can’t get started?’
She gives me that smile again and runs a hand along the now folded newspaper on her lap. ‘I think you already have.’
Already the deepest parts of winter are moving aside to let the spring arrive and it’s a tiny bit lighter outside than it was last week as I leave the clinic building. But it won’t stay light until I get home and I need to hurry before the cars come with their needle-like beams. Not only that, but now I have a new task and I need to get home to it. This morning, as I woke with my little friend on my bed again, I realised that I really need to settle once and for all whether I can keep it or not. I’m getting too attached to this cat and I suppose if someone is missing it, the longer I keep it the harder it will be to give it up when they come forward. I could just keep it anyway; I know that cats often have more than one home, but somehow it doesn’t seem right if a loving family is out looking for it, to keep it hidden from them.
For now, the road is still quiet, just the odd car whooshing past and a sprinkling of pedestrians wrapped up in their own lives, oblivious to the freak waiting outside the clinic for the right moment to start home. My breath curls into the air as the cold hits me and I survey the street. I shake myself. I have to go so I force myself to start walking. As the door closes behind me, my bag catches on the handle and flips off my shoulder, scattering its contents over the wet pavement.
‘Shit!’
A quick glance up and down the street and I scrabble to retrieve everything. There’s my pen, just rolling out of reach towards a storm drain. Not that… Tish gave it to me one Christmas. I lunge for it and a slender hand comes into view and picks it up.
‘Did you drop this?’ Dante asks, holding it out to me. Straight away I pick up on his accent. A lilting, lazy stretching of his vowels that belies the angst written on his face. I’m trying to place it and I think maybe Irish.
‘Yeah, thanks,’ I say, taking it from him.
He holds my gaze and, just for a fleeting moment, I see the whole of him. Vulnerable and damaged but something else, something compelling and I can’t tear myself away. Gran says the eyes are the windows to the soul but his are like portals to another world. Just as suddenly, his head goes down, breaking the connection, as if he feels me delving into a place where I shouldn’t be. He stands up.
‘No problem. Is all this stuff yours?’ he asks, sweeping his hand across the pavement at the detritus of my life.
‘For what it’s worth,’ I say, trying to force a smile.
He stoops to retrieve my phone and hands it to me. I nod and take it from him before scooping up the rest of what I can see. What I can’t see now will have to stay behind. I have the most important stuff anyway.
‘You’re ok now?’ he asks, chewing on a finger end.
‘Thanks,’ I say again, not knowing what else to say.
He shrugs. ‘It’s fine.’
I watch as he enters the clinic building, hands deep in his pockets, shuffling.
Dante, like the painter. What’s your problem, Dante?
The quest to find the cat’s owners ended up with me knocking on pretty much every door on the street and a couple beyond. I had to psyche myself for quite a while before I headed out, but knowing that this little kitty was depending on me forced me to go in the end. It’s the first time since the accident that I’ve spoken to most of them and certainly the first time in my life I’ve voluntarily knocked on their doors for anything. I’ve always been a keep myself to myself kind of girl and even when my family were still alive I wasn’t into mixing with the neighbours. Tish did. Tish and my mum wouldn’t think twice about joining in impromptu chats on street corners, heading around with gifts for newcomers, joining in back garden firework displays or rushing out with everyone else to see Santa on the Rotary Club sled at Christmas. Tish could charm the birds from the trees, or so everyone said, whereas she used to laugh that I could kill them stone dead with a cynical look.
There were a few confused glances today and some downright shocked ones, but nobody seemed to know about my mysterious cat. The old lady at number five said it looked as though it needed fumigating and did I know whether it was a male or female? It made me feel a little neglectful that I still haven’t found out. As it looks as though I’m going to be keeping it, I hopped on Google to work out how to sex it. And from what I can tell it’s a girl. So now I need a name. There’s also a load of other stuff online about what cats need to take c
are of them – worming, flea extermination, injections for diseases – and looking at my cat it seems to want pretty much all of it. There’s so much to do that I’m almost excited by the idea. It’s certainly going to shake up my daily routine. But first, the greedy little sod wants feeding again.
I don’t have a notebook but I’m pretty sure Tish will have a stash somewhere. She was a stationery nut and she bought bags of this stuff that she never opened. I haven’t really been into her room since I got home, only poked my head in occasionally when I really needed to. I did the same with Mum and Dad’s room. I know I’ll have to deal with what’s in there one day. Just not yet.
For now, I push open the door to Tish’s room. The curtains are closed and the glow from the streetlamp outside struggles in through the heavy fabric. There’s that musty smell you get in a place where no one has breathed for a long time. I reach for the switch by the door and yellow light floods the room.
For a moment I hover at the threshold. Tish has a massive family of teddies and stuffed toys congregated at the end of her bed – glassy-eyed with stitched on smiles, bright bows and waistcoats. A macabre committee waiting to welcome her home, now covered in a thin layer of dust. Dress jewellery and rejected outfits are slung on the bed, still unmade from the morning she left in a rush because Dad was hassling to get going. The cupboard doors are still open and inside, lying on the floor, are a couple of bulging carrier bags.
I’m suddenly aware of pain in my fingers and I realise that I’m gripping the door handle as though it’s electrified and I can’t let go. The roar of rushing blood in my ears. Deep breaths, counting heartbeats, I prise myself away. In the bags, that’s where I’ll find what I’m looking for. I need to get in, grab a bag, get away. Then I can shut the door, shut out the pain forever. I force one foot forward. Then the other, and again, and somehow I’m across the room. As I reach for a bag, the handle slips from my grasp and the contents slide out. Notebooks, letter writing paper, pens – all covered in flowers and teddies and intricate patterns. Mum and Dad used to laugh about how they had managed to have two such wildly different daughters. I pull a notebook from the pile, turn and run. Light off, door slams, and I slide down it panting and shaking. This is my house, a house full of dead people’s things. A house full of ghosts.
I sit nursing a lukewarm cup of tea at the kitchen table, the notebook open at an empty page. Somehow, it feels blasphemous to write on Tish’s belongings, as though I’m defiling her memory. But I think about what Helen has said today and I know she’s right, and I figure that Tish would find it funny that I’m writing on her flowery paper so I try to decide what to write about. I don’t know what to say, though. I try to recall my day, what has happened to me, every little event. What was significant? There’s my escapade with the cat, of course. She’ll be pleased, no doubt, that I made some sort of effort with social contact. I scribble a few lines about what happened when I went out and how I felt about it, the fact that I’ve decided to keep the cat and already I don’t feel quite so alone. I drop the pen for a moment as my new friend comes for a fuss. I rub behind her ears and she jumps onto my lap, purring. Then she leaps down again and stands sentry at her bowl. I fetch an open pouch of cat food from the fridge, tip it into the bowl, and she dives right in. She’s still so hungry I can’t seem to feed her enough but I can see, already, that she’s putting on weight. It gives me a good feeling to see her thrive, a warmth in my soul that hasn’t been there for a long time. Maybe counselling isn’t what I need after all, maybe all that’s missing is a little love in my life. I can’t help the broad smile that stretches my face as she licks the last bit of jelly from the dish and looks up at me with bright, inquisitive eyes. ‘You’re not getting any more, piggy,’ I laugh.
Then I pick up the pen and I start to write again, the first thing that comes into my head:
Dante, like the painter. What’s your problem?
The phone wakes me from the warm cocoon of sleep. Maybe it’s Meadowview. I pull my dressing gown around me and run for the stairs. As I take the last step I lunge for the receiver and snatch it up.
‘Hello?’
‘Cassie, it’s Rob Johnson.’
I feel my hackles rise. All that worry and it’s just him, hassling me again. I had thought I was rid of him after the interview but it seems I was wrong. ‘I don’t have anything else for you.’
‘It’s not for me this time.’ A pause. ‘There’s someone else who really needs your help.’
Back at the same coffee shop where I met Robert, DI Karl Massey hands me a photo.
‘Taken three days before she was killed,’ he says in gravelled tones.
I recognise the girl as I take the picture from him. It’s a different photo from the one that’s been shown on TV but there’s no mistaking it’s the same girl whose murder has been a regular feature of the evening news for the past few days. She’s pretty, in an unassuming way, ash-blonde hair modestly drawn back in a low ponytail that sweeps her left shoulder, sweet, kind eyes behind trendy glasses. I turn my face back to him.
‘She was the same age as you,’ he says.
I wonder why this fact is significant but he doesn’t offer an explanation and I’m not sure how to ask. I stare at the photo, and then back at him while I hand it over and he puts it away in a plastic bag. Robert interrupts the moment, arriving back at the table with three coffees and two muffins, balanced precariously on a tray. He places it on the table between us and takes a seat, handing a muffin to Karl before starting on his own. I take my coffee and wrap my hands around it.
‘Will you help?’ Robert says.
Karl gives me this intense stare, like he’s getting the measure of me. Years of service, of dealing with the dregs of humanity, I suspect, has given him a keen instinct and an appetite for sniffing out bull. I know he’s trying to tell whether that’s what I’m full of or whether I’m the real deal.
‘It’s not really about whether I will, it’s more to do with whether I can,’ I say.
‘But you can do that thing…’ Robert lowers his voice as he switches his glance between the two of us.’
I shrug and take a sip of my drink, wincing as it burns the roof of my mouth. ‘I don’t know if it’s that simple. I have no idea whether it works for anyone or whether the special connection to my family was the catalyst.’ I don’t offer him anything else. I could try, but I don’t want to. The thought of having to live through this girl’s death fills me with cold dread.
‘Could you use an object?’ Karl asks. He seems to understand my reluctance more than I do. ‘I’ve heard of psychic phenomena being channelled through objects.’
I’m a little taken aback to hear him speak of psychic phenomena and it hadn’t really occurred to me before that what I can do might fit into that category of weirdness. Looking at him now, he doesn’t strike me as the kind of guy who’d give any credence to psychics. Clearly, something has made him consider such things. ‘I don’t think so,’ I reply. ‘It’s only happened with a person before.’
‘Really?’ Disappointment registers on his previously composed expression ‘Can’t you at least try? You must know that we’re linking this murder to one from last October so I don’t think I need to spell out what I’m afraid we might be dealing with.’ He glances around and lowers his voice. ‘This is strictly confidential, but we’ve drawn a complete blank. Whoever this killer is, if the same man is responsible for both, he seems to be some sort of magician. Nobody saw anything, heard anything… forensics haven’t turned up anything significant.’
‘I’m surrounded by my family’s belongings and they don’t give me anything at all. I’m sorry but I’m pretty sure it has to be the person.’ I think about how hard it is living surrounded by the flotsam and jetsam of the dead at home, let alone getting flashback vibes off them.
‘I’m sorry too. We don’t have a great deal of information, but all the signs are –’
‘I know what you’re trying to say, Detective Inspector, I re
ally do,’ I cut in. ‘And I wish I could help you but I can’t.’ I offer him an apologetic look, and he returns it with a wry half-smile. His manner is more open now and I think he’s decided I’m ok.
‘I’m sorry I asked,’ he says, taking up his cup again. ‘People think that serial killers are all over the place, but I’ve never had one on my patch in all my years of police work. I don’t mind telling you that I’m terrified we might have one on our hands now. I just want to get answers, one way or another, and I hope I’m wrong.’
‘And the public will be grateful that you feel that way,’ Robert chips in.
Karl looks at him as though he’s suddenly remembered his presence. ‘I’d appreciate it if you didn’t print this conversation,’ he says. His tone is steady but there’s a veiled warning in there.
‘But you said – ’
‘I said that you could write a story about Cassie’s involvement once the killer had been caught and if she consented to it,’ Karl interrupts, glancing at me. ‘There’s nothing to write at this moment in time that wouldn’t compromise the investigation in some way. And I don’t think repeating what I have just told Cassie will help the public feel safe, do you?’
Robert looks as though he may argue for a moment, but then nods his submission.
Karl drains his cup and pulls his heavy coat from a nearby chair. ‘Thank you for agreeing to come, Cassie,’ he says. ‘But I’m afraid I have to leave you as I have a great deal of work back at the office threatening to collapse my desk.’
I try to smile and then my gaze is drawn to the window. I’m suddenly aware of the gloom creeping over the street outside and what that means. Karl must see the apprehension in my face.
‘Would you like me to take you home?’ he offers.
‘No, I can walk, it’s not far.’
‘I can take you home,’ Robert offers.
‘Really, there’s no need,’ I say. Robert is the last person I want to spend time with right now.