by Shaun Allan
"Oh don't nag, Sarah," he said.
So her name was Sarah.
She flicked his nose and then kissed it. I pulled the spear from my heart.
Martin stood up, taking his arm from around Sarah's waist, then smacked her bum. Like I needed an excuse to look in that direction. He walked over to the telephone.
"May as well listen to the message now, seeing as we're talking about it."
He pressed a small button on the top and a young man's voice said: "Hey boss. Not going to make it in today. Feel like shit. Off to doctor's later 'n' I'll let you know what he says then. Soz. Hope to be in tomorrow." There was a cough and then a long beep, silenced by Martin pressing another button.
"Great," he said. "That's Dean off sick. Just what I need."
Great, I thought. That's one less person to lose in a lie.
"He might be back tomorrow," said Sarah hopefully.
"Oh, he might be," said Martin looking doubtful. "He's not sick often, but when he is he makes sure he milks it more than he does the cows!" He looked at me with a wry smile. "You any good with animals, Sin?"
I'd once trained my dog to sit when commanded. If a cat sat on my lap, I'd be happy enough to scratch it between its ears. I didn't think he meant that.
"Not really," I answered.
Even if I could turn a foal in utero or spin a tractor around on a penny, including trailer, my answer would still have been in the negative. I wasn't entirely sure why, but I saw myself as a fugitive on the run, Harrison Ford fleeing Hannibal Lecter. Well, Dr. Connors was certainly no Tommy Lee Jones. Saying that, Lecter might have liked to dine on your doodads, but even he was something of a refined gentleman, with morals and standards - however warped they might be. Connors was three steps down from base. But continuing the line of thought, was I so very different? It's fine and dandy likening myself to a wronged man running because he could do nothing else. I was escaping a prison I'd incarcerated myself in, and from deaths - or murders - I'd committed myself.
I couldn't help seeing myself as a good guy, though. I wasn't bad, I was just drawn that way. Death, destruction and misery weren't my friends - they were my shadows, my stalkers. Was the fact that they picked me up Pinocchio-like and strummed my strings like a harp my fault?
But I killed people. Like it or not, I killed people. Innocents. Sure, the kid in the car had knocked down a girl. He didn't mean to do it - it was his own ignorance and arrogance that caused it. If I can excuse my own horrors why couldn't I excuse his? Why was he in the wrong, but I was still goody two-shoes? Ask me another. I could say that it was because the boy was reckless and stupid. He was an accident waiting to happen. I would rather have killed myself than another person. I wanted to control this demon writhing in my gut and exorcise it. That kid was the demon and was out of control. I really wasn't bad, I was just drawn that way. He was his own artist.
But who was I to judge? Who was I to sign-seal-destroy?
How could such a monster as myself be a 'good guy'?
But I felt that I was. If you looked past the body count, and you'd have to stand on your tippy-toes to do so, I was pretty much Mr. Ordinary Joe. Unassuming, apart from the power to rip seagulls apart. Almost shy, if you ignored the ability to throw a bus through the window of a Post Office.
Of course, I might simply have had a 'dark half'. Hiding under the double divan of my conscious mind, a sinister shade could have been waiting for me to be looking the other way so it could slip out and wreak a little wreckage. No uncontrollable power, no terrible curse - just the darkness stalking the edges of where I could see or think or imagine. Subdued by the dark side was I. Flip and catch. Heads - Obi Wan, tails - Darth Vader. Except with better dress sense. And without the asthma.
It was me. Of course it was. But I refused to believe it was some monstrous part of my psyche that acted on urges I pretended I didn't have. It was my power, or my ability, or my curse, but it wasn't me that wielded it. It was me, but not ME.
"So how about it?" Martin said.
"Huh?"
"If you don't fancy it, fair enough. After the night you've had, you'll want to just get home and get your head down, but you'd be doing me a real favour."
"Huh?"
"Maybe the bacon was too much for him," said Sarah, her voice sparkling with humour.
"Or maybe you are," answered Martin.
Oh. He'd noticed my interest. Ah.
Martin stepped towards me and I resisted the urge to flinch.
"I asked if you minded taking a look at Dean for me. I could really do with him here today, or at the very least tomorrow. If you could check him out, cos I know he'll not get round to visiting the quack today, I'd appreciate it. You could call it payment for the ride and the butty."
Damn. He wanted the Doc to play doctor. I knew that you fed a fever and starved a cold - or was that the other way around? I knew that dock leaves were good for nettle stings, though I didn't know what a dock leaf looked like. I knew that paracetomol got rid of a headache and ibuprofen eased back ache, and I knew that it's good to let a cut breathe. I really couldn't do this.
"Sure," someone who sounded like me said.
"Excellent! Ready to go now?"
Blimey, I thought. On the case, ready to race! Come on man - give me a chance to wangle my way out of this.
"Sure, why not," that person who sounded so much like me said.
I stood and made to walk to the door then stopped.
"I feel a bit..." like I've slept in a forest with only my decomposing sister to keep me company... "dirty. Any chance I could... " run away and don't stop until my feet are stumps or I fall off the edge of the world... "get cleaned up?"
Martin looked at his watch. He wanted to get the doctor making his house call so he could get the hired help doing their work.
"Well...," he said, implying that me getting cleaned up was a great idea but time's a-wasting matey, so let's get this show on the road and worry about sprucing ourselves up later.
Sarah smiled. "Of course you can." She put a hand on Martin's arm to silence his obvious protest. I didn't think he was against me using his shower, but he seemed to be a time-is-money kind of guy and while I wasn't working, this Dean person was shirking.
Martin shrugged and smiled. Argue with a woman? Not me mister.
"Of course you can," he said. "Bathroom's top of the stairs, first door on the left. I'll grab some clothes for you. They might be a bit big but they'll do you for now."
"Are you sure?" I asked, thankful for the chance to avoid playing doctors. I was no George Clooney, and I doubted my ability to successfully pull off a Dr. Ross act. With my history it'd be more Crippen or Frankenstein than Dr. Jack Shepherd, though I was definitely lost. More Hyde than Jekyll. More Donald than Duck.
Well, maybe not that last one.
Martin nodded and I thanked him, heading towards the stairs. As I walked I looked for any hint of an address or a location of some sort. Mail or photo or anything that would give me a clue. Perhaps I should have just asked "Where are we?" but I felt like I was crazy now I was out of the mental institute. I didn't want to help confirm the diagnosis.
There was nothing. No stray letter lying on the hall table. No big map with a neon blue arrow proclaiming 'YOU ARE HERE!'. I was up crap creek without a shovel, and I couldn't find my way back.
Hey-ho, daddy-o.
With my mind wandering, my feet did the same and, instead of turning left at the top of the stairs, I turned right, finding myself in a spacious, minimally decorated bedroom. The master suite, it seemed. All chromes and chocolates, the bed looked almost as inviting as Sarah's smile, but I turned quickly and left the room, closing the door quietly behind me. As I moved across the short landing towards the first door on the left and straight on till morning, I heard Sarah's twinkling tones from below.
"He's not a doctor."
* * * *
Chapter Nine
"What do you mean?" Martin said quietly. The rumble of his voice ca
rried through the bones of the house. The words made my own rattle. They must have heard me close their bedroom door and mistaken it for the bathroom.
"Those clothes. They're not hospital scrubs. He's not a doctor. He's a patient."
"A patient? How do you know? He said... He didn't deny it."
"I know because I wore the same clothes when I was... you know."
"Oh."
Oh.
"Are you sure?"
"I'm sure." Sarah's voice had lost its shine. Cracks had appeared in the velvet, rents that ripped their way into me. "He made everyone wear them. Part of the process, he said."
He.
Dr. Connors. It had to be.
Oh.
"You never said."
"You know I don't like to talk about it. I'm better now, no thanks to him. It's the past. You're the future."
I heard Martin's footsteps. I could feel him moving towards her. Putting his arms around her.
"Still. We should call them. If he's wearing those clothes, he might have escaped. He might be dangerous."
"I know," she said. "I thought I was done with that place."
"One call, and then you will be."
A cold tingling started in my calves and worked its way up my legs. Goosebumps prickled my arms, Braille for 'What the hell do I do now?'
Then I knew. It was one of those, I just knew moments we all love so much. I could almost feel it creeping up on me that time though, much like a putty tat. Instead of the knowledge simply being there, I could sense it appearing. Like night becoming day, gradual enough for you to not quite notice until the change was done. A bit faster, of course, because that would have taken hours, but still steadily blossoming in my head. I knew.
I knew why she was in the hospital. Why she didn't want to go back.
I knew more than she did.
I knew about the rape one night after the club. The baby that was a result. The stillbirth of the child she'd come to want and to love. Her breakdown. Her committal. Her abuse at the hands of the orderly. How Jeremy, good ol' Jezzer himself, had discovered and stopped it. Her recovery. I knew that and she knew that.
But more. I knew more.
Martin. Farmer Giles. Loving husband. Carer. Friend and lover. Rapist. Father of her stillborn child.
I didn't realise I was standing on the top step until I almost fell down. I was dizzy and sick. A deep, slow breath steadied me and I took a step back. I heard pages turning from the kitchen. They were looking up the number.
"Hello?"
Pause.
"Yes, hello. Can I speak to Dr. Connors please."
The line went dead. I knew that too. I could almost hear the silence as the receptionist on the other end - probably Claire, all chubbiness, smiles and red hair - was cut off. I knew because it was me. I wanted it to happen. I made it happen. Yes, I crashed the bus and the car and did all those other horrible, awful things. But this time, somehow, I made it happen.
And the Braille on my arms had gone. In its place was the uncertainty of what the hell I was going to do now.
Martin was trying to get through to the hospital still. He would be unsuccessful. I returned to their bedroom and opened one of the built in wardrobes. It was his. I took a pair of jeans and a t-shirt from hangers. The top was a light brown with cream horizontal stripes. Not my colour really, but I was going to pass on the Catwalk of Chaos for now. I changed quickly, the clothes too big but more than suitable under the circumstances, and went back to the landing leaving the wardrobe door open. It wasn't going to matter in a few minutes. I walked down the stairs, my panic gone. I was calm. I was... I was smooth. A windless lake. A breath held.
There were no sounds from the kitchen. There wouldn't be. Sarah was sitting in her chair, holding her coffee. She wasn't noticing the heat was burning her hand. Martin was holding the useless phone in his hand. He was staring out of the kitchen window, possibly at the spot where the famous hill had once been.
I picked up his keys from the hall table where he'd left them and walked out of the front door. I didn't hear the flames start to lick the wall behind the cooker, but I knew they were. I didn't smell the smoke curling along the hallway but yes, I knew it was.
Perhaps it was following me. Perhaps it was saying goodbye. Perhaps the smoke was reaching out to coax me back, so I could enjoy the same fate that I'd handed to poor Sarah and her wonderful rapist husband.
He'd engineered their relationship. Bumping into her so she'd spill her drink on him only days after her discharge. The old ways were the best. He knew her history. He could be sympathetic. Was he a monster for doing so? Needing to be so much in control raping her wasn't enough - he had to dominate her entire life?
No. That wasn't it. Yes, for the rape he was a beast. But the rest? It was his reparation. His repentance. To care and to provide for the woman who he'd torn apart. To help mend the wounds, even though she didn't know he was the one who wounded her. It was his purgatory to be reminded each moment of each day of the vile act he'd inflicted upon her.
Did that forgive him? Did that make amends for his actions? Did that make him a good guy? A saviour? Beast become Beauty? Was I defending him in an attempt to defend myself? Was there a defence, or did one's actions taint one's soul for the rest of one's sorry life?
Ask me another. Anyway it wasn't Martin's past conduct that had damned him, it was his current. I wasn't going to let him hand me over. I wasn't going to let the good doctor get his greasy hands on me again. The drugs don't work, the Verve once said. Dr. Connors didn't give a flying flip about that. How Sarah had managed to escape his clutches I don't know. Perhaps that was down to Martin too. History, and my inner voices, didn't relate. All hail the laydee.
I had to stop them. I had to. But by killing them? Could I not have talked to them? Reasoned maybe? Look guys. I'm not that bad. I'm not crazy. True, I can teleport and kill people with my mind, but I'm not insane. Honest!
What would I have said? Hardly the truth. They would have been on the phone quicker than a rabbit out of a fox hole, with Connors as the fox and me as the gory remains of the cute little bunny.
I have a tattoo of a fox on my upper right arm. It's a symbol, to me, of freedom. But the doctor is the dark side of the fox. Vulpine instincts drive him. Why kill the chicken for lunch when you can slaughter the whole coup?
I'd taken three steps towards the dirt-washed van when I heard it. I might have missed the sound at any other time. Would have in fact. But around me all had become suddenly hushed. Mr. Bluebird on my shoulder, or at least the crows in the fields and the light buzz of insects had been muted as if by a great remote control. In space only Sigourney Weaver can hear you scream. Her Majesty the alien queen could have been standing behind me and I wouldn't have heard her. The sound had been sucked from the world like lemonade through a straw till not a drop remained. Were the fauna in the flora biting their collective tongues in protest at what I'd done? Did it resent me causing the fire that would soon consume this house and all who sailed in her? Perhaps. The silence echoed around me, non-existent whispers crawling up my spine. Not a whistle or a rustle or a caw. Not even the crackle of a flame.
Except...
A baby.
Crying.
From inside the house.
The spell was broken - the hex halted. The sound rushed back into the air like the seal on a vacuum suddenly fractured. Crows yelled from the trees at me. A bee had given up on bumbling and was spinning around my head in a crazed dervish. A buzzing had erupted from around me as if the ground itself was vibrating.
Everything was screaming at me. THE BABY.
I could tell myself - fool myself if that's what you want to call it - that Martin and the boy deserved their fates. In fact I may well have been Fate's own personal gopher, doing the job's he, or she, hated. Why would Fate get his hands dirty when I had a perfectly good pair to sully?
Actually, I always thought of Fate as a woman. Definite female tendencies there, don't you think?
The baby.
I turned and I ran. The front door had been drifting shut, a feeble attempt to bar my way. I crashed it open and took the stairs three at a time. I didn't need to think about which door to open; my hand took the handle, turned and pushed.
The nursery was decorated in yellow and Pooh was dancing across the walls with Piglet and Eeyore. And in a wooden cot (all the better to go up in flames, my dear) just inside the door was the baby. She had her mother's eyes and had stopped crying as soon as I entered. I took her up in my arms and was back out the front door before I'd taken another breath.
I stood trembling for the longest time, still not breathing. I didn't deserve a breath. The girl, doe eyed and pink romper-suited, looked up at me and...
Cooed. Then smiled.
Her name was Morgan. Morgan Alexandra to be precise. And she had just forgiven me.
A silver Mercedes was parked to one side. A car seat was in position behind the driver's. The car unlocked automatically as I approached and I gently fastened Morgan into her chair.
I walked as calmly as I could back to Martin's van and climbed in. As I drove away the couple in the kitchen slowly stood and left the house, collecting the keys to the Mercedes on the way. The flames in the kitchen died as they smiled at Morgan Alexandra and started the engine. I turned left out of the gate, knowing they'd turn right, and knowing that they were just going into town to buy a few essentials. Disposable nappies. Toilet roll. Baby wipes. You know the sort of thing.
It would be three days before they noticed the van missing. Probably a week or two before they decided to redecorate the kitchen. It was looking tired. Needed a face lift.
"A bit like me," Sarah would joke.
They wouldn't see the scorch marks or the smoke damage. And they wouldn't remember me.
Two miles? Three? No more than that. No more than three miles before I had to stop, open the door and vomit my bacon breakfast onto the side of the road.
Shame, that. I'd enjoyed it.
My shaking stopped after a few more minutes and I could get my breath and think again. I'd still not passed any signs or indication of where I might be. I needed to stop and get my bearings.