by Emily Elgar
But then Mum called my name, told me to hurry up, said we didn’t have long and she had to get me ready for physical therapy. For the rest of the day I made up stories in my head about what could have happened if I had gone out to Cara. In the best one Cara and I were like sisters again, Dad was out of our lives, and Mum was always happy because I wasn’t sick anymore.
Every week after physical therapy, no matter what the weather, Mum drives us to Danny’s grave. The sky was gray today, but at least it wasn’t raining. Mum tucked blankets around my legs and I wheeled myself down the path while she talked to Danny. She says there are some things that are just between a mother and her son. She says I’ll understand one day, perhaps, if I can have children. She seems to talk to him so easily. I’ve tried, but nothing comes out. Today while she was talking to Danny I wheeled down the wobbly paths to read the graves I already know well.
Old favorites are “BELOVED BY ALL” PENELOPE GRAY, OCTOBER 2ND 1882—DECEMBER 28TH 1899. She was only seventeen when she died. I imagine her ghost as grumpy, pissed off she went just before the turn of the century. Then there’s WILLIAM KETTERIDGE, “LOVING FATHER, HUSBAND, AND SON,” 10TH MAY 1921—22ND NOVEMBER 1963. I always stop to stroke the etching of his cold name. I picture a good man, a man who thought that being a loving dad was the most important role in life, and to prove it he wanted “FATHER” before anything else on his headstone.
Today I played a game where I tried to find dead people who died when they were my age. When I couldn’t find any, I turned back to see if Mum had finished. She wasn’t talking to Danny anymore. Instead she was kneeling, holding on to his headstone as though she’d fall forward onto his grave without it keeping her steady. She reached for my hand as we left the cemetery and I noticed fresh soil under her light pink fingernails, from where she’d been pulling weeds from Danny’s grave.
I can’t tell Mum this but I hate it when she cries over Danny. I hate it because it reminds me there’s a part of her that will always belong to him, a part I can never know and will never heal. Another secret.
Lots of love, Grace xxx
14
Jon
My eyes burn as I close them and lean back on the sofa. My head is a nest of speculation, it won’t let me rest. I’ve been reading up on OxyContin. Nicknamed hillbilly heroin, it’s one of the strongest pain medications a GP can prescribe. I couldn’t see from the prescription slip how much OxyContin Dr. Rossi prescribed Meg, or for how long, but the withdrawal sounds horrendous. I leave the flat just after 6:30 a.m. The morning is a watery light blue, a whole orchestra of birds still celebrating its arrival. Aware I haven’t slept enough, I drive slowly on the empty morning roads. I turn the radio on and then off again—there’s enough chatter in my head about Meg, Dr. Rossi, and these pills without adding anything more to it. It’s only half past seven by the time I arrive. The office doesn’t open for another hour, so I push the driver’s seat back as far as it will go. My eyelids grate like sandpaper against my eyes as I let them close.
I wake with a start forty-five minutes later. There’s a gray-haired woman tapping on the window of my car, her face pinched and cross like a rag doll with the thread pulled too tight. I smile at her as I point towards the office so she knows I’m waiting for it to open. Her eyes move left and right, left and right before she finally looks up towards the sky and walks towards the entrance, unlocking the door with a shaky hand. I walk across the road, buy a takeaway coffee, and wait—with forced patience—in the parking lot for Dr. Rossi.
She arrives twenty minutes later, driving an old red Saab, and heads straight for a parking space in the far left corner, clearly her spot. She’s in another orderly two-piece suit, black shoes with rubber soles. She almost walks straight past me—she looks preoccupied, like she’s running through to-do lists in her head. She stops with a jolt as I step into her path.
“Hello, Dr. Rossi,” I say, my voice light.
She blinks at me a few times before recognition sinks in. She says my name like it’s the answer to a question she’s been puzzling over.
“Jon!” Her eyes are drawn over my shoulder. “What are you doing here?” She tries to match my light tone but it’s obvious from the way her lips thin and her eyes narrow that she’s far from pleased to see me.
I take a step towards her and she flicks her head. Her short gray hair fans out around her.
“We need to have a talk.”
She frowns. “I don’t have to talk to you about anything.”
“I know you were writing prescriptions for Megan when she wasn’t your patient. I know that at one time Megan was taking OxyContin, thanks to you.”
Dr. Rossi’s face flares red from her neck, her eyes pinballing from me to the office and back.
“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“I have proof. Proof that would be easy to share with the police, and that is exactly what I’ll do if you don’t follow my instructions. OK?”
She blinks hard, as though trying to wake herself up. I open my palms towards her.
“It’s up to you—either me, or the police.”
“Yes, yes, I understand.”
“Good. I’ll give you a few minutes to tell reception they need to cancel your first appointment this morning. I’ll be waiting in that car”—I point and she glances towards it—“in the road just to the left of the café. If you’re not there in five minutes I’ll be calling the police and giving them the evidence that links you to Megan. You got that?”
She fixes her jaw, and nods. “I’ll be there in five minutes.”
Then she turns sharply away from me and walks towards the office entrance, as though I was just a smear on the asphalt she had to step over.
Four minutes and forty seconds later the passenger door opens. Dr. Rossi winces as she nudges away the rubbish in the footwell to make room for her feet. I wait until she’s shut the door and put her seat belt on, and then we drive silently away. I stop a few minutes later, on a tree-lined residential street. She looks surprised.
“Here? You want to talk here?”
I shrug. “As good as anywhere, unless you want to be somewhere more public?”
She shakes her head. In her lap she makes her hands into fists, but otherwise she seems calm.
“OK. Are you ready to tell me why you gave Megan those pills?”
She sighs, looks up to the sky through the windshield for a moment, before turning towards me. Her face is impassive as she talks.
“It all happened so long ago it feels like another lifetime. Grace and her mum were registered with my colleague, Dr. Marsh, but because Grace’s health was so complex everyone who worked at the office knew them. We all knew, of course, about the son’s death, and they were always so sweet, so smiley. They’d bring muffins in for the staff, that sort of thing. So, as you can imagine, there was a lot of goodwill towards them. Megan became close to our then administrator, who put her forward for the two-day-a-week admin role. Everyone who worked at the office thought it was a good idea, a good way to support them both.” She glances out of the window, sighs, before she continues. “One night, Dr. Marsh was on leave and I was working late with Dr. Brannagh—Jeremy. We thought we were alone, but we weren’t. Grace had the last appointment with Jeremy. We thought they’d long gone, but Megan forgot something and came back to Jeremy’s room. We hadn’t shut the door properly.” In her lap, Dr. Rossi’s knuckles are white. “She saw, well, she saw us. Together.”
The thought of Dr. Rossi having an affair was so far from my mind, so far from my comprehension, I have to stop myself from crying out in surprise. She keeps her gaze fixed forward, determined not to look at me. “I was married, of course; it was a reckless, stupid thing that shouldn’t have happened. We were both senior practitioners at the clinc. Megan was smart enough to know the repercussions would be serious, both personally and professionally.”
Dr. Rossi comes to an abrupt stop.
“So she blackmailed you into giving her drugs?”
&n
bsp; Dr. Rossi rolls her lips together.
“You have to understand—she could have destroyed everything: my marriage, my relationship with my children, my career, my reputation. My whole life ruined by this one mistake, this one moment of insanity.”
I understand now why she seems so robotic, why she holds herself clenched like a fist; it’s to avoid ever giving in to impulse again.
“She blackmailed me. Made me prescribe the OxyContin.”
“Did she say what she wanted it for?”
Dr. Rossi shakes her head. “She always claimed she had chronic back pain from when she fell down the stairs. It must have got worse over the years, lifting Grace in and out of her chair. I think she developed a dependence.”
“She was an addict?”
Dr. Rossi nods. “She was on it for years. When you called after she was murdered, I was sure Cara somehow knew about it. Megan told me she’d kept the prescription slip as proof of my involvement, to maintain her hold over me. That’s why I agreed to meet you and Cara. I thought somehow you knew.”
We both stare out of the windshield. The silence seems to swell with questions.
“You said Meg was doing an admin role at the practice, so presumably she would have had access to patients’ records?”
Dr. Rossi keeps her face turned away as she replies, “She would have been trained in how to use and update records, yes.”
“So she could have edited a patient’s record?”
“Of course—why do you ask? Do you think she was—” but I cut her off with a shake of my head. She clearly didn’t know about Grace’s real name and age, and there’s no point in telling her now. So Meg would have changed Grace’s details herself. Even though Meg and Grace were well known, the office must hold thousands of patient records, and in the unlikely event someone queried Grace’s it would have been easy for Meg—this wonderful mother—to convince them they were getting confused. I need to keep pressing Dr. Rossi while I still can.
“You said Meg fell down the stairs, but she always claimed Simon pushed her.”
Dr. Rossi turns to me. “I didn’t believe a single thing that came out of that woman’s mouth.”
I don’t want the tension to slacken, for her to find an excuse to stop talking, so I keep asking questions.
“Did Simon know Meg was blackmailing you?”
Dr. Rossi shrugs. “I have no idea. After they left Plymouth he registered under a false name at the office. He made an appointment with me. He wanted to see Grace’s medical records.”
“Why?”
Dr. Rossi shakes her head again. “Frankly, I think they were both mad, him and Megan. And no, before you ask, of course I didn’t let him see the records.”
“Did he say anything else?”
“He didn’t have time to say anything else, to be honest. As soon as I figured out who he was, I told him to leave but he wouldn’t, he kept asking to see Grace’s medical records. He became quite aggressive, kept on saying again and again that he had to tell me something, something important about Grace. He grabbed hold of my wrist, which is when I called for help.”
“Did he mention anything else? Maybe something about Grace’s age, her birth certificate?”
Dr. Rossi shakes her head. “No, he just kept rambling on about her medical records even as my colleague called the police to have him removed. I really don’t see why any of this is important—”
“Do you think Simon killed her?”
Dr. Rossi’s eyes dart away from my face.
“Who knows? It’s the most likely conclusion. Megan was an addict, she probably abused him for years, drove him mad until he snapped. Or perhaps they were both taking the drugs. I wouldn’t put it past them.”
“What about Grace? How was she with Grace?”
Dr. Rossi shakes her head emphatically. “That’s the only thing I couldn’t fault her on. Even though she was screwed up, taking God knows what, she always seemed to be an impeccable mother. She’d research Grace’s illnesses, find out about new treatments, that sort of thing. She’d never miss an appointment. Dr. Marsh said Megan was always alert and completely present in their appointments. She’d even take notes sometimes. He said he felt she’d lay down her life for that little girl. I thought the drugs were probably her way of coping.”
“So what happened? Why did she leave when she had two senior doctors on the hook?”
Dr. Rossi stretches out her fingers and then makes fists again.
“A few of the nurses reported some of their meds and supplies were going missing. We had a meeting about it. Jeremy and I knew it was Megan, of course, pocketing what she could find when rooms were left empty; thought she was selling it on. Then things escalated when the daughter of an elderly patient with dementia claimed her mother’s watch had gone missing during an examination with Dr. Marsh. I’d seen Megan talking to this patient, so I immediately had my suspicions. There was no way we could prove anything, of course. The daughter couldn’t even prove her mother had lost the watch at the office and not somewhere else so it never came to anything. Still, with the meds disappearing and the accusation from the patient, Jeremy and I thought we’d found a way to get rid of her, but then she just disappeared without a word, without warning. Dr. Marsh was worried—he felt it was out of character—but Jeremy and I convinced him not to pursue it. We were just so relieved to have our lives back.”
“Where’s Jeremy now?”
Dr. Rossi swallows. “Heart attack, three years ago.”
I nod, feel Dr. Rossi twitch beside me.
“And now Megan’s dead you never thought about going to the police with any of this?” I don’t bother keeping the anger out of my voice.
“I thought about it, of course I did, but we kept our secret for so long. We both had so much to protect, and now that Jeremy’s dead I couldn’t do it to his widow, his kids. I can’t destroy their memories of him.”
“I don’t think you’re trying to protect anyone other than yourself.” I sound bitter, angry. She turns to me then; her face is flushed but her eyes are hard.
“Oh come on, Jon, you of all people know the extremes we’re capable of when people we love are threatened.” She must have read up on me, knows about the photo of Jakey, the whisky and the golf club. She knows I have no right, taking the moral high ground.
“Look, what are you going to do now, with all of this—with everything I’ve told you?” she asks.
“I don’t know. Not yet. I’ve done a fair bit of asking around, but no one’s ever mentioned Megan’s toxicology being anything other than normal.”
Dr. Rossi raises her eyebrows.
“You’re surprised,” I say, as a fact.
She nods. “I never thought she’d get off the drugs, not the amount she’d taken over the years.”
We fall into a heavy silence.
I turn to Dr. Rossi. “What are the main side effects of OxyContin?”
“Well, short term, besides numbing pain it can cause vomiting, stomach pain, headaches, that kind of thing.”
“And what if someone takes an overdose?”
“Then things get more serious: respiratory problems, swelling of the face, throat, tongue, cardiac arrhythmia, seizures . . . all sorts of nasty stuff.”
Something starts buzzing in my chest. I don’t recognize it at first, it’s been so long since I felt it, but eventually I know. It’s the feeling of making a discovery, of flipping a slanted world and finding it makes more sense upside down than what you thought was the right way up. I can’t move, can barely breathe, I’m just staring straight ahead.
“Jon? Jon, what is it?”
I turn the key in the ignition.
“I need to go, I have to go. Right now.”
I leave her outside the office and drive away before she has the chance to question me again.
A few moments later, I pull into a quiet road, let my head drop to my hands. I need peace to order my thoughts, to try to make some sense out of them. Simon would have kno
wn Grace’s real name, her real birthdate—why wouldn’t he tell someone? Was Meg blackmailing him too? Or did he have another reason not to tell the world the truth? There were no drugs found in Meg’s system and no one has ever mentioned her being unwell with any withdrawal-like symptoms. Meg certainly didn’t seem like someone addicted to drugs when I met her and, besides, when would she have found the time to get off them while caring for Grace around the clock? Dr. Rossi mentioned that Simon could have been taking OxyContin too, but when I picture someone suffering from addiction I don’t see Meg and I don’t see Simon. I see someone else completely.
I’m propelled back to a small, clammy hospital room. It’s nighttime and Ruth’s asleep in the chair by Jakey’s bed. He’s so small under the blankets that I get up to check he’s still there. I stand by his bedside and am surprised to find he’s awake. He’s too weak to cry or say anything; he just looks at me with complete resignation, like he’s already agreed to die, and I know he wants it to be over. It was like he was begging me to make the pain stop and in that moment I would have done anything to help him, to end his suffering. Thank God Ruth stirred. She watched as I stroked Jakey’s cheek with one finger until his huge, empty eyes finally closed, like he couldn’t bear the sight of the world anymore. I blink the memory away, then I see Meg by Grace’s bedside, Grace looking at her mum with the same imploring eyes, her tiny body pumped full of chemicals, begging her mum to help her, to make it stop, and as her thin body rattles with pain I see Meg reach for a bottle of pills.
15
Cara
With just a few hours before I meet GoodSam I know I won’t sleep so I don’t even bother trying. I open my laptop and google “Missing Grace” to check for updates and click on a new video link. Suddenly, Cookie, with a mewl, leaps onto my bed and curls herself into a shell shape in the space between my crossed legs. I remember how she used to curl up and sleep on Grace’s legs. I scratch her ear, lean in close to hear her purr, and whisper, “You probably know more than anyone, don’t you, Cookie?”