by Emily Elgar
I shifted in my seat, uncomfortable under their expectant gaze. I chose my words carefully, suddenly aware of how fragile they both were.
“In part, yes. I want to hear, if I may, about both those things. But the article is also about the new branch of Dads Without Borders in Plymouth. So, I do have some questions about Grace’s dad and what happened in your relationship with him.”
A frost seemed to pass across Meg’s face and her eyes became hard, unseeing. Grace turned anxiously from her mum to me, then back again.
“What do you want to know about Simon?” Meg’s mouth pinched with the question.
“Do the two of you ever speak?” I knew from having interviewed Simon that they didn’t, but I wanted to hear her side of the story.
“To the man who is responsible for my son’s death? To the man who used to be physically violent, who tried to kidnap my daughter? No. I don’t speak to him.” There was a sob in her throat and her face reddened, while the color seemed to drain from Grace’s already pale skin. Meg’s words built an invisible wall between us. Simon was clearly not a topic for discussion. Grace stared at me, and behind her glasses I saw her eyes had blurred with tears. Her hand searched across the table; she needed to be held by her mum. They found each other like magnets. I apologized, asked to see the photos of Grace in hospital again to calm Meg, to lighten the mood. Later, when Meg stood up to go to the toilet, she winced, rubbed her lower back. When she saw me looking she shook her head like it was nothing. “Old back injury,” she said, “from a long time ago. He pushed me down the stairs.” She put a hand on Grace’s shoulder in a way that meant she didn’t want to say anything more about it.
As soon as Meg was out of the door, Grace leaned forward in her chair and asked in a whisper, “Have you seen him? Have you seen my dad?”
The memory comes back to me, clear as a day, and as I pull onto the main road a sign reminds me how close to Woodgreen Avenue I am right now—just five minutes away. I could drive by the house, see what’s going on. I won’t even get out of my car. No one will notice I’m there and no one need ever know I went. And I’d still be at Dr. Bunce’s in plenty of time. So why not? Once I’ve been, my curiosity will be sated and I won’t need to go again.
Fuck it.
I turn off the main road.
The Summervale Estate is a maze of identical Spam-colored houses built in the nineties, an uninspiring lump a couple of miles outside Ashford. Only a handful of locals actually live in the town now, most of them having sold up to rich families looking for a holiday home with sea views years ago. I don’t blame them. Many of the people here found themselves newly poor and unskilled after the collapse of the tin-mining industry in the nineties, so when the estate agents told them what their tiny fishing cottages were worth they were already packed and ready to move to new-build suburbia.
I creep slowly on the approach to the Nichols’s bungalow and set myself some rules. I won’t get out of the car. I won’t talk to anyone. I’m here only as a concerned Ashfordian, not as a reporter. I don’t know if restraining orders still apply if the protected person is dead, but I can’t afford any trouble.
I don’t remember the last time I was here, six months ago. I don’t remember because I’d drunk the best part of a bottle of Jack Daniel’s—and I’m not a drinker. I don’t remember banging on the door, screaming at Meg and ripping up the front garden that volunteers from the Wishmakers had planted. I don’t remember breaking their sitting-room windows with one of my dad’s old golf clubs and I don’t remember the police tackling me to the ground.
It’s stopped raining by the time I park outside number 50, close enough to see what’s happening but far enough away to hopefully avoid being recognized. The police have cordoned off the area outside Meg and Grace’s house. Two uniformed police officers stand stock-still, hands clasped, outside the front door. The curtains are drawn in the big front window but the lights are on. One of the police officers is smiling slightly, delighted perhaps that something big, a drama like on telly, is at last happening here in Ashford. The pink bungalow looks just the same, though freshly painted, and I notice guiltily that they’ve replanted the garden. There’s a new-looking VW Caddy in the driveway, a Wishmakers sticker in the window; it looks specially adapted for Grace’s wheelchair.
There’s a loud smack at the window and a damp-looking palm lands flat against the glass. It’s Ben, cradling his camera like a baby. He bends down to look through the passenger-side window, his Italian features folding into a wide, easy smile, before he opens the door.
“All right, mate!” We shake hands before he steps into my car, kicking away the empty cans and crisp packets that litter the floor. “Thought you’d come down. I was having bets with myself, wondering whether you’d stay away—”
“Good to see you, Ben.” The only way to get Ben to stop talking is to regularly interrupt him. “I’m just here out of concern, as a neighbor, not for work. Is it . . . is it Meg?”
Ben nods his head slowly, sorrowful for a moment. “It’s a fucking tragedy, mate. Something bad, and I mean bad, happened here. Remember my wife’s mate Remi, goes out with Sam over there?” Ben nods his head towards the smiling police officer and keeps talking.
“Sam told me that Meg’s skull was smashed in using an iron bedside lamp, in her own bed. Sounds totally fucking brutal. ‘Frenzied’ is the word everyone’s using. Anyway, the neighbor found the body, and on top of that no one knows what’s happened to Grace. Mate, I know it sounds mad, but it’s looking like someone’s taken her.”
No, no, that can’t be right. Ben sees my frown, the confusion.
“I know what you’re thinking. Of course, it was the dad—who the fuck else would kidnap a disabled seventeen-year-old kid, right? Sam said they’re already trying to track him down—last seen in Plymouth—but no luck yet—”
We both turn towards a movement in front of the house. A dark-haired young woman I recognize, wrapped in a gray blanket, is being ushered slowly out of number 52 by two female police officers. One of the officers is carrying a tote bag over her shoulder. The young woman is Cara Dorman from number 53, Meg and Grace’s next-door neighbor. Cara’s mum, Susan, clad in bright red chinos and clutching Grace’s ginger cat, walks shakily behind them. They keep their heads down, respectful; stare at their feet. Ben clutches his camera—“Gotta go, mate”—before scrambling out of the car and lifting his camera to his shoulder like a hunter with a rifle.
Everyone on the street turns to watch the somber procession as they shuffle slowly past the Nichols’s car and onto the pavement. Ben’s camera pops. They’re walking right towards me and for a mad moment I think they’ve come to arrest me for breaking the restraining order, but the police officers and Susan keep their heads low, like sad, wilting flowers. Only Cara lifts her gaze. She glances at me where I’m parked across the road, her brown eyes wide, wild like they’d scream if they could, but she doesn’t recognize me, and then she looks away again as she is gently ushered up the brick path and through the door to number 53.
Once the door is shut behind them a tension settles coldly in my chest; it pulls and tugs, makes my hands grip the steering wheel. The pain’s familiar. It’s the same pain I felt when my son was diagnosed with leukemia, that sat in my chest the whole time he was in hospital. Two years on and he’s in remission now, thank God. His hair has grown back blonder and he plays football four times a week. It’s Ruth and I who didn’t recover. Jakey’s illness put a strain on our relationship, but it was my badly judged article about Meg and Grace that marked the beginning of the end. A court case, a restraining order, and a difficult separation later, here I am. Back again.
I close my eyes, rub them under my glasses to try to stop an image of Jakey, sick and in hospital, from coming into my mind. Instead I see Grace, remember her showing me the assortment of pills she had to take every day. Blue for her muscles, white for her stomach; she held out a pink pill for me to see.
“This one, this is the most
important, this keeps me alive. I have this one twice a day,” she said in her singsong voice. “It keeps my heart from stopping.”
I watched as she swallowed the pill as easily as a drunk with vodka. God, where are those pink pills now? How long will it be before she starts to weaken without them? I imagine her heartbeats becoming soft, irregular, like a wind-up toy running out of energy. I rub my hand over my face because my eyes have filled and all I can see is the photo of Grace we used in the article. She had a new beanie hat covering her bald head, her smile so wide her eyes disappeared behind her huge glasses. And as I try to rub her image and the tears from my eyes, I hear her again—It keeps my heart from stopping—and I know that Grace must be found quickly before she fades and fades and there is nothing left.
The sound of my phone ringing pulls me back from losing it completely. Ruth’s name flashes on the screen. I turn the keys in the ignition and as I pull away my tires squeal, which makes a couple of police officers look up. I glance at my watch. Fuck, fuck, fuck. It’s 2:52 p.m. I have eight minutes to get to Dr. Bunce’s before Ruth loses her shit. I answer, and press the speaker button on my phone.
“Jon?” Ruth’s beautiful, husky voice fills the car.
“Oh hi, love,” I say, not looking properly as I pull out of the estate, wiping my eyes.
“You sound stressed. Why are you stressed?”
There’s never any lying to Ruth.
“No, no, I’m just, um, the traffic’s just a bit tight.”
“Well, where are you?” I imagine her outside Dr. Bunce’s in her own car, peering down the road perhaps, hopeful that I’m about to appear. She thinks the sessions will help us figure out how we co-parent Jakey, but I’m hopeful they’ll make her realize how good we are together and bring her back to me.
“Just coming from an interview, sweetheart. I’ll be there in about fifteen minutes.” The GPS says twenty-eight minutes.
“So you’re going to be late,” she sighs, as though me letting her down is inevitable, like I am the cross she has to bear. My stomach tightens.
“A few minutes late, and I’m sorry, but I am on my way. Why don’t you get started? I’ll be there before you know it.”
“Because this is supposed to be couples counseling, Jon, and when one half of a couple can’t be bothered to turn up . . .”
“I can be bothered, Ruth. I’m clearly bothered. I’m just a few minutes late because of work and I’m sorry. Look, the longer you talk to me the less time you have to tell Dr. Bunce what a massive pain in the arse—” but I know Ruth’s stopped listening because in the background she turns up the news on the radio. I catch a few words clearly: “body,” “Megan Nichols,” and “missing.”
“Ruth? Ruth?” I ask, but she’s not listening to me anymore.
“OK, see you soon, Jon,” she says, distracted by the news story. She hangs up as I move into the fast lane.
I’m twenty minutes late by the time I pull up outside Dr. Bunce’s Victorian terrace. My wrist smarts; I’ve been flicking the elastic band nonstop. I ring the doorbell and hear the shock of it reverberate throughout the house. Dr. Bunce likes to move slowly, not because she’s old—she’s only in her mid-fifties—but as if she wants to convey that life is something to savor, a fine wine. Hurry the fuck up. By the time she’s opened the door and I’ve kicked off my shoes on her cool mosaic floor I’m at least three minutes later. I apologize, which she accepts with a gentle nod of her fine, gray-haired head. The therapy room is sparsely furnished and always smells freshly vacuumed. Ruth is sitting in one of two armchairs opposite Dr. Bunce’s larger chair, a box of tissues in front of her. Her wavy blond bob curls behind her ears; the dimple in her chin is visible, which means she’s trying hard to stop her chin from wobbling. She pulls the sleeves of her red sweater over her hands as I bend to kiss her cheek, as I say, “Sorry, sorry I’m late.”
I sit in the chair next to Ruth, my heart still in fluttery panic in my chest, not yet tuned in to the stillness of the room after the speeding and swearing of the last twenty-eight minutes. Ruth glances at me, her eyelashes dewy, before she turns back to Dr. Bunce, who sits opposite us, her fingers raised in a steeple, her head angled slightly to the side like a thoughtful hen.
“Ruth, are you happy for me to share what we were talking about before Jon arrived?”
Ruth nods. There’s a tissue scrunched into a ball in her hand. Dr. Bunce turns to me.
“Jon, Ruth was explaining how she feels you’re not committed to these meetings and, by extension, no longer committed to making your marriage work.” Dr. Bunce speaks like she moves, slowly and clearly. My words sound loud and boisterous in comparison as I twist in my chair towards Ruth.
“No, come on, please. This is the first time I’ve been—”
Ruth’s forehead knots and her green eyes darken as she interrupts. “It’s the second time you’ve been late, and I know you lied about where you were earlier.”
“I didn’t lie.”
“You said you were working, at an interview.”
“I was . . . I . . .” I feel heat flush my cheeks.
“I heard about what happened to poor Megan Nichols on the radio. You went to their house, didn’t you?”
“Ruth . . .” I glance at Dr. Bunce but she’s no help. She’s looking at me, after the truth as well.
“I knew, I just knew you wouldn’t be able to stay away.”
I snap the band on my wrist. Dr. Bunce sees, arches an eyebrow. Out of the corner of my eye I see Ruth glance at Dr. Bunce for support before turning back to me. I don’t look at Ruth as I try to explain to her as calmly as I can: “Megan Nichols has been murdered, her disabled daughter kidnapped.”
“Exactly. That’s why you of all people should show some humility, some decency. And if that’s too much like empathy, then at least show some respect for the restraining order. What if the police had seen you?”
“I only went out of concern, Ruth, nothing more. I won’t go again.” I’m surprised to hear that my voice has grown into a shout. Ruth’s eyes widen. I’ve overreacted. I force a calm I don’t feel into my tone. “Look, maybe I shouldn’t have gone, but I knew them both a little and I interviewed Simon. You know I always thought he was treated unfairly. I can see the same thing is going to happen—”
“Jon, listen to yourself!” The tendons in Ruth’s throat swell as she shouts. Jakey once told me “that means Mummy’s really cross.” “The woman’s son drowned when he was four, her daughter’s severely disabled, and the father of her kids pushed her down a flight of stairs when she was pregnant and then tried to kidnap their daughter, and you’re protecting him? Jesus!” Ruth sits back in her chair as though exhausted by my stupidity, looking at Dr. Bunce like they’re a team. The therapist strokes the air with her hands, as though it’s the air and not us that needs calming. But I don’t see her, not really. Instead I see Grace again, smiling, holding out that pink pill. Dr. Bunce asks something about what me visiting Woodgreen Avenue means in terms of our relationship.
“It means Jon cares more about trying to save his professional reputation than saving his family,” Ruth says, matter-of-fact and keeping her eyes on Dr. Bunce, a child telling a teacher about another’s naughty behavior. I’m shaking my head before she’s even stopped talking.
“That’s bullshit, complete bullshit.”
“OK, can you tell us what it means for you, Jon?” Dr. Bunce’s steady gaze settles on me like a blanket.
“It means I’ve got shit time-keeping skills.”
After the last couple of sessions, Ruth invited me back to New Barn Cottage, the home we converted just outside Ashford. We picked Jakey up, had a family meal together, then, after I put Jakey to bed, Ruth and I stayed up, drinking wine. Last week we kissed and it felt like the first time, only better; the love came back in a flood. But today the tendons in Ruth’s throat are still twitching as we leave Dr. Bunce’s in silence. Once in her car, she snaps her seat belt around her and I have to tap on her window b
efore she winds it down, and it’s only then I see she’s crying again.
“Oh God, Ruth, look, I’m sorry. It was a stupid thing to do. I should have come here straightaway, but don’t make it into something bigger than it is. We were doing so well.”
Her eyes dim as the tears pool, and she says, “I was starting to think these sessions were about more than just Jakey. I was starting to think they could help save our marriage. But if you’re late and don’t take them seriously then I don’t think we’ve got anything left to talk about.”
I watch as Ruth drives away. She’s right, of course, she usually is. I need to stay away from Summervale and the whole case. Now is a time to focus on rebuilding my family and my career. It’s not a time to be digging around for an angle about a murder and kidnapping; there’ll be plenty of reporters doing that already. Though those other reporters won’t have met all three of the people involved . . .
All three of them.
Did I just think that? Assumptions are so contagious and so slippery. It’s so easy to assume Simon is involved in all this. I sit in my car and snap the band on my wrist to try to stop thinking about Meg, Grace, and Simon when I should be thinking about Ruth and Jakey. My bones feel heavy as I turn the key in the ignition, but I don’t start to drive, not yet. I don’t want to go back to the flat I refuse to think of as home, but I have nowhere else to go. I still need to write the article about the summer fair; it’s due tomorrow. If I focus, I’ll get it done in a couple of hours. Then what? I wish I had a friend, someone I could meet for a pint and a chat, but I left all my real friends behind in London. I scroll through my phone, try to find a name, someone I can call who lives near Ashford who isn’t better friends with Ruth than me. Becks and Clare went to school with her, so they’re both a no, and Laurence, who lives round the corner from my flat, was her first boyfriend, so he’s a definite no. Besides, since the article and the tsunami of vitriol against me, I know none of them would relish being seen with me in public. Which just leaves Dave.