by Katie Lowe
Now, I curl my toes around the edge of the stool. I warm my palms on a steaming mug, and stare at it: the laptop. Our laptop.
I’ve been thinking about my mother a lot lately. Which I guess makes sense.
It’s hard not to miss her, going through this alone – not that she’d have been much help. Half the reason I’m the way I am now is thanks to the ambition she had for me: a relentless perfectionism that meant, whatever I did, it wasn’t enough.
I slide the laptop across the counter. I open it up and log in. I open a browser window, and look at nothing in particular.
‘Don’t end up a single mum,’ she used to say. ‘Trust me. You’re a good girl, and this is still the hardest thing I’ve ever done.’ She’d say it with a smile, but I knew, even as a child, that she meant it.
‘Don’t end up like I did, or I’ll come back and haunt you,’ she said, another time, just before she died. Her voice was barely above a whisper, but the look in her eyes possessed the same force it always had. ‘I’ll kill you if you don’t end up happy. Not after all I’ve sacrificed. No way.’
If she’d been around, now, she’d have been a nightmare: my whole pregnancy, rife with issues, would’ve been a source of constant panic. It would’ve been my fault, somehow. As if I’d chosen to do it on purpose. To act up.
Still, there’s something about carrying my own little girl that makes me miss her – more than I have in years. I want to see her face. To hear her voice. More than anything, I just want to ask her what to do. I type her name into the search bar. Evelyn McLelland, Google says. About 139,000 results.
I scroll past the obituaries of women I don’t know, who aren’t her. The first page, the second and third, all bring up nothing.
Not that I really expected them to. She certainly wasn’t ever online herself – she died long before that would’ve been a possibility – and she never really mentioned any family who might’ve posted an obituary online. It was only Graham and I, and a few of her work colleagues, at her funeral – not least because I hadn’t known whom she’d want me to invite.
The only time she’d mentioned anyone at all, in fact, was right at the very end, delirious and glass-eyed on pain medication, her teeth spackled with blood. She looked at me, that day, and told me I was ‘just like her’.
‘Who?’ I’d asked, trying to ground her, to bring her back to the moment.
‘My mother,’ she’d replied, before choking again.
It had been the first time she’d ever spoken about her to me. It would also be the last.
I continue to scroll. I find nothing. Until page fifteen.
I don’t suppose I’d have clicked it, if it weren’t for a half-memory, a thing I might have imagined. She’d said, once, that she’d grown up in the Peak District. Or maybe it was the Lake District. I can’t quite be sure. Archive Clipping: Peaks Gazette, the title reads. 15 July 1953. I click.
Black Widow pleads diminished responsibility at trial for murder of husband, daughter; attempted murder of youngest child.
My baby kicks in my stomach, like a warning. I steady myself on the barstool and read on.
Margot McLelland appeared at Derbyshire Crown Court on Tuesday, dressed entirely in black, charged with two counts of first-degree murder and one of attempted murder. Mrs McLelland was silent throughout the hearing, her solicitor claiming that the accused had no recollection of the events which led her to attempt to murder her family, who – according to neighbours – appeared to be as happy as any other.
A ripple of nausea spreads through me. I sip my still-too-hot tea, attempting to push it back down.
Police claim that Mrs McLelland waited for her husband and daughters to fall asleep, before rising from her bed and slipping into the family kitchen. There, she opened the oven and turned on the gas, before placing towels and clothes under all windows and doors.
McLelland then left through the family’s front door, using her coat to block the air from escaping under the door behind her. She sat on a park bench close to the family’s home for what is believed to be several hours, seemingly watching for signs of movement inside the house.
Her husband, Mr Alan McLelland – a bank manager, well respected by his colleagues and peers – and her eldest daughter, Samantha, were found in their beds, seemingly having passed away peacefully as they slept. The couple’s youngest daughter, Evelyn McLelland, survived only after neighbours broke into the house, finding the child, aged five, unconscious, but pressed up against a window. Police believe the girl had been attempting to get her mother’s attention, having seen her in the street outside, though it seems Mrs McLelland chose to ignore her daughter’s increasingly desperate cries for help.
I think of my mother, the oxygen mask covering her face. I hear her, telling the doctors she’d been treated for carbon monoxide poisoning, years before – the result of a faulty boiler in her childhood home.
It was, they said, why she suffered such dramatic mood swings; why words were always on the tip of her tongue. And it was, they said, the root of the lung disease that killed her, at thirty-nine.
My daughter kicks again. Grief washes over me in a way it hasn’t in years. It wasn’t an accident, I realize. My mum was murdered. A slow, agonizing death – caused by her own mother.
I rub my belly, trying to calm my own kicking child.
In the wake of her plea, the article goes on, Mrs McLelland was sent to the Hawkwood House psychiatric facility for further assessment and monitoring. The trial is expected to continue later this year.
The kick in my stomach becomes an ache. I close my eyes and try to catch my breath. I think of my mother’s feverish words, spilling out of her, at the end: ‘My mother. You’re just like her.’
The next few hours pass in a kind of mania. I bounce from one search to another, without any logic or plan – only a raw and gnawing need to know what happened, and why. But I find nothing. No more newspaper clippings; no more notes from the trial. Nothing at all.
Eventually, I begin searching for the institution itself: Hawkwood House. I’ve never heard of it, though that’s hardly surprising – most of the old asylums disappeared in the eighties, when ‘care in the community’ was introduced. Still, I remember poring through the archives of one, years earlier, after they’d been handed over to my university in the name of research. I wonder whether Hawkwood’s have survived in the same way.
I find a few photos of the house on Google; another click leads me to a land registry listing, which describes it as an early private psychiatric hospital, opened in 1792, with a few details about the history of the building – but not much else.
Finally, I land on a local history forum. I scroll up and down for a while, uselessly. And then, I sign up. I type and retype my post, a knot of foreboding in my throat. Something tells me I shouldn’t. That I should leave it be. But I can’t.
I’m trying to find out more about an asylum known as Hawkwood House, I write. My grandmother was a patient there, and I’m curious about the kind of treatments provided. Can anyone shed any light on what happened to their archives after they closed?
I think of my ideal reader: the caretaker and guardian of Hawkwood’s past. I add in a line – manipulatively, I know – designed to make them trust me. To make them want to let me in. I’m told the centre was fantastic. It had really good intentions behind it – very modern, above and beyond anywhere else operating at the time.
I stare at the words. I reread them, three times, and wonder if I ought to tell the truth. My grandmother was sent there after she murdered her family. I need to know why she did it, so I can make sure I never do the same. My imaginary reader grimaces, and clicks away; I think better of it. I click post. An error message flashes back. Your post will not appear on this board until you have activated your account. Please click the link in the verification email sent to the account with which you registered.
‘Shit,’ I mutter, aloud.
I open another window. Type in the address of my
email provider. The screen loads, and I stare at it, blankly. I don’t recognize any of these messages.
Subject: Re: Re: Re: Tomorrow … x
Subject: Thinking about you
Subject: Always
I click the first. It loads, agonizingly slowly. Or so it feels. Maybe it’s simply that time slows around me to cushion the blow.
I can’t wait to see you. I can’t stop thinking about what I’m going to do to you, when I get you to myself.
The sender’s email is one I don’t recognize. A throwaway account, I suppose, a random pattern of numbers.
I glance at the icon in the corner. My husband’s face smiles, brightly, back.
I am logged into his account.
Tell her you have a meeting, and then come see me. I hear the words he’d said, in bed, last night. ‘I have a meeting tomorrow. I’ll be back by lunchtime, but … I can’t get out of it.’
‘It’s your day off,’ I’d said, all too aware of the scratch of neediness in my voice. ‘I thought we could spend it in bed. Together.’ He’d wrapped his arms around me and squeezed me tight.
‘Don’t be like that, sweetheart. You know if I could get out of it, I would.’
I want you to teach me a lesson. Because I’ve been a very, very bad girl.
A fissure crack in my heart splits open, and tears in two. My baby – his baby – shivers, once, and stops.
I feel a dampness spreading, a warmth beneath me; I hear a steady tapping on the tile. I look down at the blood. There’s so much of it, it seems impossible that it could’ve come from me.
But it has. The stain spreads through my robe and slips hot between my legs. Where she’d been kicking, now, an awful, eerie stillness.
I knock the mug from the counter as I try to stand, and as it shatters, hear the hiss of torn skin on the sole of my foot. I slip on the already blood-slicked floor, and my throat aches with the force of my scream.
Hours later, I wake in a hospital bed, split in two. I turn my head, slowly, the room chasing a little behind. My husband has his back to me, shoulder blades like clipped wings through his shirt. He hasn’t noticed I’m awake.
Still, I suppose he feels me looking. He turns, a bundle of blankets in his arms; a tiny pink fist reaching for his collar. ‘Sweetheart,’ he says, a crack in his voice. ‘You’re OK. You’re both OK.’
My mouth is too dry, my tongue too thick to speak.
‘She’s beautiful,’ he says. ‘She’s perfect.’ Give her to me, I want to say. Give her to me, right now.
He’s three feet away, and he doesn’t move. ‘We could’ve lost her,’ he says. ‘What were you doing? I told you to stay in bed.’
She’s mine, I want to say, but I can’t.
‘You were supposed to be resting. For her, as much as you.’
Give her to me, I plead with him, voicelessly. I know he sees it. He steps back, and sits in the armchair, shoulders slumped with exhaustion.
‘I thought I was going to lose you both. I …’ He leans into the bundle in his arms, and presses his lips to my baby’s head. I try to speak. What emerges is an awful croak.
He looks at me. At the water on the table beside me, just out of reach. Hate winds through me, lighting up my veins. But I keep this to myself.
‘It was an accident,’ I say, in a voice that’s not my own. ‘I’m sorry.’
15
Derbyshire, 2018
The cursor blinks, and I scan the words again.
Thanks for showing me round last week – great to hear your plans for HH. If you need anything else, I now have a working phone – number in signature below. Call me any time.
I’ve rewritten it what feels like hundreds of times in the days since, trying to find the right balance. Between friendly and professional. Between envy and curiosity. Outside the staff-room door, I hear the lilting patter of gossip. I wonder if it’s about me.
I take a breath, and press send. I lean back in my chair and try to ignore the fear gnawing at my bones like a dog.
Countdown to Episode Two, Conviction tweeted earlier. Get your popcorn ready. It’s on.
When my phone vibrates, I flinch. I glance down at the screen. It’s a number I don’t know. My stomach flips as I answer.
‘Too soon?’ Darcy’s voice echoes, bell-like. I can hear her heels clacking on Hawkwood’s hallway floors. Something about it soothes me.
‘That was very fast.’
‘Sorry. I just … I’ve been drafting an apology for days, but I haven’t quite managed to send it. I thought if I didn’t call you right away, I’d end up doing the same thing again. I felt like you thought maybe I was trying to get rid of you, last time …’ She trails off. ‘Anyway, I’m so sorry. It wasn’t even worth it. The contractors were a whole two hours late, if you can believe that.’
‘Oh dear,’ I say, stiffly. I’m not sure I do believe it. I think she and I are more alike than she realizes. Or perhaps she does – realize it, I mean – and this is a way of drawing me in. ‘Friends close, enemies closer,’ as the saying goes. ‘Well, don’t worry. I didn’t think anything of it. How’s it all going?’
‘Terribly. Obviously it’s all going to be much more difficult and expensive than I’d planned. I’m totally out of my depth. Which is why I plan to take complete advantage of your offer of help.’
I laugh. ‘Oh, really?’ I shiver, feeling myself watched, and look up. Sarah storms in, a bad mood clouding her face. I’m suddenly protective of Darcy, of my attachment to the house – a thing I know Sarah will discourage me from pursuing, the moment I explain. Or worse, she’ll wade in and offer to help herself.
She’s better placed to do so, after all, knowing far more about managing a unit than I do. She’s the better woman for the job. She always has been. Darcy seems to catch the pause. ‘I mean – only if you don’t mind, that is. I wouldn’t want to—’
‘It’s fine. I’d be happy to.’
Sarah flops down on the sofa opposite. Wrap it up, she mouths, twirling her fingers around in the air.
‘Oh, I’m so grateful. Do you think you could come back? One day this week, maybe, or—’
‘Great,’ I say, finally, cutting her off mid-sentence. ‘I’m at work, so … Text me when’s good, and I’ll let you know.’
‘You’re amazing. Thank—’
‘Looking forward to it. Mmm-hmm. OK then. Bye.’
I click the screen to black, and turn my attention to Sarah, who’s sliding ancient magazines around the coffee table. ‘What?’
‘Hmm?’
‘What’s so important that it’s brought you down here to slum it with the rest of us? I know it’s not the coffee, or the reading material.’
‘Oh, nothing – I just wanted to see how you were doing. But I’ve got five minutes, tops – so if you’re going mental, tell me quick.’
‘I don’t even know where to begin explaining why that’s inappropriate.’
‘Then don’t. Who was that?’
‘A friend of Dan’s.’ I’m surprised how easily the lie slips out. ‘An aspiring novelist, apparently. She wants to “pick my brains” on what we do.’
She examines a hangnail, and tugs at it with her teeth. ‘Do you really think that’s wise?’
‘What do you mean?’
‘I mean, given the circumstances, with all this attention on you, from … Do you think it’s a good idea to let a stranger – anyone, really – get too close right now?’
I laugh, though I know she has a point. ‘What are you saying – that she’s some kind of plant?’
‘Jesus, no. You’re not that interesting. I’m just saying … there are people looking to buy stories about you, just to trade on Conviction’s popularity. You don’t want—’
‘Wait – wait. Has someone approached you about that?’
‘Come on, Hannah. You can’t be surprised, surely. You’re married-not-married to a journalist, for God’s sake.’
‘What do you mean?’
She sighs a
nd goes on, as though explaining a complex concept to a child. ‘It’s the bloody circle of life. Something dramatic happens on the internet, where people can access it for free. The media have to make money somehow, so they wade in and exploit every other ludicrous angle to sell papers, based on people’s interest in the original, freely available thing. The people creating the free stuff benefit from the increased attention, so they make more. And so on, forever.’
She stops, seeming to consider, for a split second, whether to go on. ‘So, yes, I’ve been approached about giving “my perspective on the Graham Catton case”. I’ve been offered a lot of money to do it. But I’m your best friend, and even if I wasn’t, I’m your boss. I think HR would have a fucking fit if I started leaking employee files, don’t you?’
I think of our conversation, days earlier: the ‘delusions’ in my file, among other horrors: things that would, without a doubt, go against me in the court of public opinion. In criminal court, too, I suppose.
I wonder if she’s trying to tell me something, in telling me this: if it’s a reminder of the secrets she’s keeping. Of how good she is – has always been – to me. Something in me prickles, sensing the undercurrent: the threat.
But then I remember Graham. ‘You’re being paranoid,’ he’d told me, so many times. ‘There’s nothing to worry about. It’s all in your head.’
Sarah’s eyes flit to the clock. ‘Fuck. Fucking board meeting. Got to go.’ She stands, wiping invisible dust from her skirt with both hands. ‘Are you ready for tonight?’
‘Nope.’ I stand, too, though my next meeting isn’t for another twenty minutes. But I need to step outside. I’m too hot; the air around me seems to have turned thick, arid. ‘It’s happening, though, isn’t it? I don’t have much choice either way.’
‘And you’re listening to it with Dan?’
‘Yeah. It feels … sensible. Like if we listen to it together, I can … I don’t know. Reassure him, I suppose. Correct whatever it is they’re going to say about me. Or whoever.’