Guilty

by Heidi J Thomas

  “Kate?”

  “Yeah..?”

  “Next time…bring Ma with you. Reckon she needs to hear this too.”

  She looked at him, surprised and nodded. “Of course, we’ll be here.”

  He smiled, but there was sadness behind his eyes. “Okay…bye then.”

  * * * *

  Kate had to allow herself a little time in the car before she was able to drive, time to compose herself.

  (he didn’t kill her)

  She knew that for sure now, supposed she always had.

  She felt a sympathy for him, so deep it swamped her and she burst into tears suddenly, unable to imagine what he’d been through, what he was still going through, every day in that dump, all alone.

  Leaving him each fortnight had gotten harder and harder to do, and today it had been positively painful.

  There could no longer be any denying it.

  She was in love with him.

  Chapter Nine

  5TH FEBRUARY 2008

  Kate stood in the now very familiar room with Robyn by her side, holding onto her hand for dear life, and squeezed it gently. The poor woman was positively shaking from head to foot.

  “You alright, Robyn?”

  She smiled nervously and nodded. “Yeah. Yeah, I just wanna see him now.”

  “I’m sure he’ll be along in a minute.”

  Robyn nodded again. “Mmm. God this place is horrible, it breaks my heart. How has he survived here?”

  Kate opened her mouth to answer but then the door opened and she let go of Robyn’s hand, letting them have their moment.

  Danny stood in the doorway, clearly a nervous wreck too, looking at his mother as though trying to work out her reaction. Robyn let out an odd sound, a weird mix of grief and sheer delight, and ran to him. He opened his arms and she fell into them.

  “Oh, son!”

  “Hello, Ma.” He said quietly, holding her close, burying his face in her neck and looking up at Kate with a weak, almost-embarrassed smile and mouthing the word ‘hi’ which she did back.

  She pulled him away to look at him and stroked his cheek tenderly. “Hello, Danny.” She burst into tears and he held her again. Kate could see he was barely holding on to his own emotions. “It’s good to see you, sweetheart.”

  “It’s good to see you too, Ma. More than you know.”

  “Thanks for letting me come. When Kate said you wanted me here, I was so happy. God I can’t believe how different you look!”

  “I’m forty-three now, ma. Old man, me.” He ran a hand through his hair nervously. He was suddenly acutely aware of his slightly greying hair and how awful he must look to her, he had been a young man last time she had seen him, now he was middle aged, rough round the edges and so tired it must be obvious on his face. He had gotten old.

  “Got a few grey hairs now, too. Not surprising I suppose.” He said.

  “You look ill, sweetheart.”

  “I’m not ill, just tired. Anyway…you don’t look a hundred per cent yourself. Still my beautiful Ma though.”

  “And you’re still a charmer I see.”

  He laughed. “Yeah. Just ask Kate. She’s been a victim of my flirting. I’m pretty sure victim is the right word there. Listen, mum…I wish we could talk more, you know? Only…time is short. And there’s stuff I need to say. I’m gonna tell Kate today what happened the night Natalie died and I thought you should hear it too. Cause once I’ve said it, I can’t…I can’t go through it again, you know?”

  Robyn nodded as they all sat down. “Okay, well…I’m here and I’m listening. We’re ready when you are, aint we Kate?”

  Kate nodded. “Yeah, absolutely. When you’re ready, Danny.”

  Robyn reached for his hand, holding it tight in hers, just looking at him with awe and love.

  He let out a deep breath and nodded.

  “Right, okay here goes. So I went there, for nine like she said. Only she weren’t alone.”

  * * * *

  He stood on the doorstep holding a dozen red roses, a huge smile on his face. He had been looking forward to this all day, things were going to be alright now, he would make sure of it.

  Natalie answered the door with an expression on her face that could only be described as raw fear and his smile faded.

  ‘Nat? What’s wrong?’

  She opened the door wider and he saw Johnny Lewis standing behind her. The roses fell from his grip to the floor and for a moment he couldn’t say anything.

  Johnny smiled and put his hands on Natalie’s shoulders, making her visibly flinch. “Alright, Danny? You come to see my daughter? I take it from your expression you know now that’s she’s mine, that me and your wife here slept together?”

  Danny could feel something snap inside him and sneered at him.

  “Slept together? That suggests Natalie had a choice, don’t it? Only she didn’t, did she?”

  Johnny looked at her incredulously. “You told him? After what I said? You do remember what I told ya I’d do, don’t ya?”

  Natalie looked at Danny, then at Johnny and nodded. “You said you’d kill me.”

  “That’s right, I did. And lover boy here don’t change that.”

  Danny lunged at him, grabbing him by the throat with a firm grip, marching into the flat with him and slamming him against the far wall of the living room. A picture of Emma fell to the floor, smashing at their feet.

  “You put your grubby hands…on my wife, and you think you can come here threatening her? Only one person’s gonna die tonight, and I guarantee it aint gonna be Nat,” he turned to her, “Babe, go see to Emma. Get her dressed and go to my mums. Wait for me there, I’ve got some business with Mr Lewis here.”

  Natalie shook her head firmly. “No way, I aint leaving you here with him!”

  “I can handle myself, Nat. Just go!”

  “No, Danny! Just chuck him out, please!”

  “And the next time he goes for ya? The next time I’m not here? What then, Nat? He’s threatened my wife and he’s threatened my baby. He aint gonna get away with that!”

  “She’s my baby.” Johnny croaked, Danny’s grip on him still firm.

  Danny stared at him

  (can’t believe the blatant cheek of this man, he must be mental)

  and tightened his grip again. “She’s my daughter! I’m the one who’s been looking after her. You? You’re just sperm, sperm don’t make a dad! Putting a baby to bed, changing her nappies, getting her food and clothes and somewhere warm to sleep, that’s what makes a dad. She’s Emma Edwards, not Emma Lewis; it’s my name on her birth certificate! You’re nothing, and you will never go near Natalie or Emma again, you got that?” he stepped away from him and gestured towards him, goading him. “Come on, then. Let’s see what you’ve got besides a big mouth. You might be able to intimidate women but you don’t scare me. So take your best shot. Come on. I’ll give you one free hit, go for it.” Johnny swung a punch and Danny ducked, grinning. “You’ll need to do better than that, Mr Lewis.”

  “Ah, that’s right. Mr Boxer, aint ya? Tell me, Danny…they use knives in boxing?”

  Danny flinched a little as he pulled a knife from somewhere – he hadn’t expected that. “And just what do you think you’re gonna do with that, huh?”

  Johnny held it up to the light. “I’d say things just moved in my favour, wouldn’t you?”

  Danny smiled again, but it was a maniacal smile, he was filled with rage like never before, adrenalin coursing through him. “You gonna knife me, Johnny?”

  Johnny nodded. “That’s right. Here’s what’s going down. This here knife is going in you. Not to kill you, no. Just to put you out of action, while your missus and me go for an encore performance. I’m thinking…the stomach. Painful, but not immediately fatal. Or the neck, might get lucky and paralyse you. Then she’s getting it too, only she won’t live to tell the tale. You…will have to watch. Then me and Emma are gonna go on a little trip.”

  Natalie burst into tears. “D
on’t hurt my baby! Do what you like to me, but don’t hurt them, please!”

  Johnny rolled his eyes but didn’t look at her. “Touching, really sweet. But not five minutes ago you didn’t even want her, and he was out on his ear…now you’re willing to die for them?”

  “Hell yes, I am.” She said with new found courage.

  Danny shook his head. “He aint gonna be hurting no one.” He turned to Johnny. “You seriously expect me to let you do all that, do you?”

  “No, I expect you to fight me all the way, wouldn’t expect no different. Only, like I said…things have moved in my favour now, haven’t they?”

  He ran at Danny, the knife pointing out, and for Danny time seemed to slow dramatically. He grabbed for the knife, and the two men grappled with it, twisting it this way and that way, fighting for control of it. Danny was vaguely aware of Natalie jumping in front of him, getting in between them, but it didn’t immediately register what had happened.

  There was a silence that seemed to go on forever and then she turned to him, stumbling slightly, a look of complete shock on her face. He saw two things simultaneously – Johnny holding the knife, now soaked with blood, and blood seeping through Natalie’s top, just below her left breast. He looked at her incredulously as she fell to her knees on the carpet and then onto her side, almost taking him down with her.

  He looked up at Johnny, who incredibly, smiled. “Oops.”

  What self-control Danny was still hanging on to left him at that point, and he lunged at him, screaming in anger and grief, sending them both toppling into the open plan kitchen. He pinned him to the floor, wrestling the knife from him, and stabbed him over and over again, until everything around them was a sea of red, and Johnny Lewis was smiling and moving no more.

  * * * *

  2008

  He looked up at Kate and his mother, who were both staring at him, both crying. He swallowed hard, clearing this throat.

  “The um…the police said I stabbed him um…thirty-one times. Personally, I weren’t keeping count. I was…blind with rage. The only thing stopped me was Natalie, screaming my name. I ran to her, and held her in my arms, told her she’d be okay. She said she was going to die and um…asked me to take Emma and go. I couldn’t let go of her, even though Emma was screaming in the bedroom. She looked up at me and told me that she loved me. That was it, I started screaming, shouting for help and telling her I was sorry, sorry for everything, sorry it had come to this, sorry I hadn’t protected her. She was just…saying my name, over and over, smiling at me and telling me to go, leave. I didn’t even grant her last wish, I didn’t take Emma and run. I just sat there like an idiot. I couldn’t move, I couldn’t just…leave her, she was bleeding to death…”

  He lit a cigarette and wiped his eyes again, which were streaming with silent tears.

  “The police came first, then the ambulance. And I still couldn’t let go, they had to prise me off her, still hysterical. They took the knife out my hand; I didn’t know I was still holding it. They put Nat in the ambulance. I was telling them to call you, mum, to look after Emma. And I was saying I wanted to go with Nat. They said they’d take care of Emma and I would have to go with them, answer some questions. I told them no way, my wife needed me. They said I didn’t have a choice and they took me to the police station. I never got the chance to say goodbye.” He had half smoked the cigarette and stubbed it out, immediately lighting another.

  “They took my clothes, gave me this…stupid jumpsuit thing to wear and sat me in this room for…hours. I swear it was nearly dawn before they came back. Then someone came in, handed me a coffee and said ‘Mr Edwards, your wife is dead’…just like that, no compassion. I’d noticed people looking at me funny, but I never realised I was a suspect in Nat’s murder, and I stupidly thought Jonny’s would be classed as self-defence.

  They had me go over what happened, from start to finish. I can’t tell you how many times I went through it all. On the second day they told me they didn’t believe my story. Jonny had been wearing gloves, so the only finger prints were mine. People had seen us arguing the night before, and well, you both know the rest no doubt. Next…I’m being charged with two murders, remanded into custody and my life is over. It was a complete nightmare, locked up with nothing to think about but Natalie dying alone and no idea where Emma was, they wouldn’t tell me anything. I fell apart.” He glanced at Kate, aware this part was more for her, his mum had been there and would remember. “Nat’s funeral was horrendous. Everyone hated me there, and they wouldn’t let me grieve properly, chained to that copper like a damn dog. I had to sit at the back, like some uninvited, unwanted person at my own wife’s funeral, and take all the looks and all the comments. And then I had to wait away from everyone else while they put her body in the ground and chucked soil on it. I didn’t get to do anything, or say anything. And then I just stood for like…two minutes staring at the hole in the ground where my wife was, not a moment alone with her, and then I was chucked back in the police car and that was that. I just didn’t want to live.”

  He sighed and shook his head. “So there you have it. The truth, as it was. That’s what happened, from start to finish.”

  Robyn moved her chair around to his side of the table and held his hands in her own.

  “Daniel Joseph Edwards…say the words. Tell me what I already know to be true.”

  He looked directly at her, his eyes filling up with fresh tears that spilled down his cheeks, having given up trying to wipe them away.

  “I didn’t kill her…” he said, almost as a whisper, his voice shaking hopelessly. He then broke down completely, sobbing and she pulled him to her, stroking his hair as she had when he was child. “I didn’t kill her, Ma! She was killed in front of my eyes and I couldn’t save her, I couldn’t do anything at all! It was just so fast, it was all so fast. He killed her, he killed my girl! He raped her and he murdered her and I didn’t stop him, I couldn’t stop him! I had my hand on the knife when it went in, I felt it go in for fuck’s sake…but I didn’t mean to hurt her, he did. It weren’t me stabbed her…it was him…I just…my hand was on it too…”

  Kate looked on, sobbing herself, heartbroken to see him so distraught, so utterly broken.

  (you did that, you just had to know didn’t you?)

  Robyn nodded her understanding. “I know, sweetheart. I’ve always known that.” She pulled him away to look at him and put her hands on either side of his face. “You don’t belong here, Danny Edwards.”

  He frowned. “Why not? I’m guilty as sin.”

  “You didn’t kill her, Danny.”

  “Maybe not, but it was my fault. I had my hand on the knife, Ma. And she died protecting me, and because I didn’t protect her. Someone needed to pay for her death. I decided that someone should be me.”

  “But why, love?”

  “Because…I was a lousy husband, I really was. I hurt her and I treated her badly. I loved her, but I didn’t say it enough, didn’t show it enough. If I had been a better husband, she would have been able to tell me she was raped and I could have helped her deal with it properly, gone to the police and that. Only she was too afraid of me, of my reaction. Because I as good as told her she asked to be raped. I spent all that time on remand just thinking…if only…if only I hadn’t yelled at her that night, called her a tart, let her walk out that door, or if only I had followed her, anything to keep her safe. If I hadn’t been the hard man, trying to take him on, if I had just got her and Emma out the flat before it all kicked off…if, if, if…you remember mum, I was losing my mind. I just felt so guilty. So…I changed my plea, and it was like I was telling Kate…it was a massive weight off, like she could rest if I took responsibility. I did the right thing, and I need you to understand that.”

  Robyn sighed and shook her head. “I’m sorry, I don’t. Do you think you’ve achieved anything by getting yourself locked up for eighteen years? Do you feel better, do you feel closure? And most importantly, do you think Natalie would have w
anted this for you? To see you throw your life away, and suffer, a broken man?”

  He shook his head sadly, knowing she was right, knowing Natalie would’ve been devastated to know where he had wound up.

  “No, she wouldn’t. She’d be devastated; it’s exactly what she didn’t want to happen. But that’s totally irrelevant because she aint here, Ma. She’s dead and she’s gone forever. And I have a part to play in that.” He frowned as though realising something for the first time. “You don’t get it, do you? Either of you. This is how I’ve punished myself for my failings. This has been my way of paying for doing her wrong. Because I feel responsible.”

  Robyn nodded, she understood where he was coming from, and it broke her heart to see him in so much pain, finally beginning to grieve, inconsolable.

  “If that’s what you were trying to do, then you have. It’s over, so it has to stop, Danny. You have to learn to let go of the past. Forgive yourself and move on. How long is this going to go on for, when will it be enough, will it ever be enough? Have you looked in the mirror and seen what you’ve done to yourself with all this…misplaced guilt?”

  “It’s not misplaced, Ma…that’s the point.”

  “It is!” she said, throwing her hands up in the air in frustration. She took a moment to think, choosing her words carefully.

  “Okay…okay so…maybe you messed up sometimes. Maybe you and Natalie had a…a volatile relationship. Yeah, I get it, sometimes you probably were a shitty husband, sometimes maybe you lost your temper, went too far or were just plain out of order. Maybe that’s the case. But he raped her because he wanted to; he would have done it sooner or later, regardless of what you and Natalie were up to as a couple, and regardless of the length of her skirt. He didn’t rape her because you were a bad husband, or because she asked for it, he did it because he saw her and he wanted her, but he didn’t care one bit about her, or anyone else. And she made a choice not to tell you, it’s not that easy for a woman to come out and say something like that, there’s a lot of self-blame, especially if she felt she’d asked for it, or was somehow at fault. That was her choice, and not your fault. And…she made the choice to protect you, because she loved you that much, she wanted to save your life. Instinctively she stood in the path of the knife to protect you, as you would have done for her, because that’s what you do when you love someone. Again, not something you asked her to do. Her choice.”