Strangers

by David Moody

  ‘More exciting than school,’ Tammy moaned. Michelle ignored her.

  ‘It’s all coming together nicely,’ she said. ‘If things are going this well after a couple of days, just think what it’ll be like in a few weeks.’

  #

  Later, lying in bed together, lights out, Michelle felt Scott’s hand on her under the covers. She’d almost been asleep, but she was awake again in seconds. ‘Hello you,’ she whispered.

  ‘Hello you.’

  ‘You all right?’

  ‘I’m fine.’

  He slipped his hand under her nightie uninvited, cupped her breast.

  ‘Starting to feel good, isn’t it?’ she said.

  ‘It is to me.’

  ‘I’m not talking about my boobs, I’m talking about us... about being here. The girls seem more relaxed tonight, and you’ve managed to find some work. I’ve got a good feeling. This is going to work out, you know. If you’d said a couple of months ago that we could have all this, I’d never have believed you.’

  ‘I don’t let you down, Chelle. You should know that.’

  ‘I do. It’s just that sometimes you have to take a few steps back to start moving forward again, don’t you?’

  ‘Nice cliché.’

  ‘It’s true. Seriously, love, if you’re happy, I’m happy and the kids are happy, it doesn’t matter where we’re living. I’m really proud of you, you know... just walking into a job like that.’

  ‘It’s no great shakes. I’m just driving a knackered old truck around, delivering bricks and shit.’

  ‘It’s a start. You never know, your boss might let you have stuff cheap, make it easier to do all the things you were talking about doing to the house.’

  ‘Doubt it. You haven’t met Barry Walpole.’

  ‘I’m sure he’s lovely.’

  ‘He definitely isn’t. You are, though.’

  His compliment took her by surprise. Before she could react she felt him kiss the side of her face. He climbed on top and pushed against her. ‘I’m tired, love,’ she said.

  ‘I’m not.’

  THE YOUTH HOSTEL AT GLENFIRTH

  It never ceased to amaze Mairead how little respect folks had for the property of others. This building was here for the good of the community as a whole, and yet people seemed perfectly content to use and abuse the facilities without a care.

  The old farm had stopped being a farm more than two decades ago now. After falling into disrepair, the one remaining habitable building, this two bedroom cottage, had been renovated and re-opened as a very basic youth hostel, catering to the needs of visitors attracted to the area by the hills and the hiking. On the whole people usually abided by the basic rules of the facility: pre-bookings only, clean the place when you leave, collect and return the key to Mairead down the road. But the girl who’d used the place last night hadn’t returned the key and Mairead needed it back as three lads from Newcastle were due later this afternoon. She had better things to be doing with her time than chasing around after bloody kids who thought the world owed them. She’d put all her cleaning stuff in the back of the car before she set out. If the lass couldn’t be bothered to hand back the key, she thought, then she sure as hell won’t have cleaned up.

  The cottage door was open. The building was cold, but then again, it usually was. Mairead leant in and called out. ‘Hello... Hello, is anyone here?’

  No answer.

  Agitated, Mairead put her Hoover down by the door. This had happened all too often this season. The remains of a meal had been left on the table. Slovenly. It made Mairead cross. And she could smell tobacco too. Bloody hell, how large did she have to make the No Smoking signs? There was one stuck on every interior door. Was that not enough?

  The kitchen could have been worse, she supposed. There was a little washing up left on the draining board, and a pile of clothes which had been washed and rinsed but never hung out to dry.

  ‘Hello...’ Mairead shouted again. ‘Are you here, Miss? I’ve come for the key. I’ll have to make a charge for the state of the place. It’s really not good enough.’

  She picked up a waste-bin and carried it over to the bedroom door. She knocked and waited for a reply. When she moved again, the floor was tacky beneath her shoes.

  Mairead looked down and saw blood. More blood than she’d ever seen before.

  5

  ‘It’s not my fault. I didn’t take your order. No good shouting at me, mate.’

  Kenneth Potter pointed accusingly at Scott. ‘Then who else am I going to shout at? And I am definitely not your mate. Good grief, what’s Barry doing employing folks who can’t even load up a van right?’

  ‘Listen...’

  ‘No, laddie, you listen. Barry and I go back a long way. I taught him and most of the men who work in his yard. I’ve never had any problems before, and I don’t understand why I’m having one now. Fence panels, concrete, sand and fence posts. Did you not stop to think? Christ’s sake... how am I to repair a fence if I’ve not got any bloody posts? Should I just balance the bloody fence panels on their side and hope the wind doesn’t blow them over? I mean, come on... it’s not rocket science.’

  Scott bit his lip. He’d been warned about this little fucker. He wondered if the blokes at the yard had done this on purpose, screwing up Ken Potter’s order as some kind of fucked-up initiation? Or had they done it to get back at Potter himself? He’d noticed them all muttering to themselves when the order had come through. Ah well, I’ve handled worse. Remember that job in Alvechurch when they set your boots in the concrete...

  ‘Well?’ Potter demanded. Scott knew he had little option but to take this one on the chin and head back to the yard to get the missing posts.

  ‘I’ll go and get the rest of the order,’ he said, making little effort to disguise his frustration. ‘I might as well unload what I have for you, then come back. It’ll take about an hour.’

  ‘I’ll not sign for any of it.’

  ‘Whatever.’

  ‘Anything you leave here remains your responsibility until I’ve received everything I’ve ordered, understand?’

  ‘Loud and clear.’

  Scott started to unload the truck, working around Potter who watched him, arms folded, eyes following his every move. No one was going to pinch any of this stuff. As Potter himself had said, what good was a fence without posts? And anyway, there was no one else here. No other houses for miles.

  #

  The morning had been going reasonably well until then. He’d had a number of small loads to deliver, all going to folks in locations which seemed to be both miles from the yard and miles from each other. He’d been starting to think that this job, although hopefully only temporary, might not be as bad as he’d originally expected. Out here alone in the truck he had time to think, to try and work everything out. At home there was always something – someone – who wanted something from him, but his time out here was almost his own. His mobile signal dropped regularly and Barry Walpole didn’t believe in satnavs, apparently, so it looked like most of the time it was just going to be him, his maps and the open road. It was surprisingly relaxing. It could have been a lot worse.

  The job was way beneath him, though. He’d managed complex projects before now where he’d had to coordinate large numbers of staff and trades to hit specific deadlines, so this was easy by comparison. Getting five bags of sand to one location, then a number of timber joists to the next... it was all straightforward. But one thing had taken him by surprise, and that was the sheer scale of everything. Before they’d come here, he’d imagined Thussock and the surrounding area to be twee and small. The reality was very different. The landscape was immense, unending. This was a vast, sprawling place, often with many miles between communities, sometimes between neighbours. In the half hour or so it had taken him to get to Kenneth Potter’s house from his last drop off, he’d seen only two other cars and a solitary hiker walking along the side of the road. He’d driven along an otherwise empty road which
ran along the foothills of a mountain he couldn’t even see the top of. Even the largest landmarks back home would be dwarfed by this enormous mound of rock. It was awe-inspiring, strangely humbling.

  The practical differences between this place and Redditch had been hammered home last night when he’d tried to get petrol. It was past ten, and the only filling station in the town had been shut. He’d managed to get online using his phone, and had located another station some thirty-five miles away. He’d probably had enough in the tank to get there, but he’d decided not to risk it. It was strange just how isolated it had made him feel. What if that one was closed too, or what if he got lost and took a wrong turn which led him down another endless road where he might have run out of fuel and ended up stranded? He’d given Michelle the money instead, leaving her with instructions to fill the car up in Thussock later.

  When he got back to the yard, Barry Walpole was waiting for him. ‘What the hell’s goin’ on? I’ve had Ken Potter on the phone, tearing a strip off me.’

  ‘It’s not my fault,’ Scott protested. ‘No good shouting at me. I never loaded the bloody van.’

  ‘You should ’a checked it ’fore you went out.’

  ‘It’s my first day. I didn’t know the routine. You should have told me if I was supposed to check the bloody load first. I assumed it would have already been done. What’s the matter with you people?’

  ‘It’ll be your last day if you don’t bite your lip. You know who you’re talking to?’

  ‘Yeah, someone who’s accusing me of fucking up when I haven’t. I’ll load the fucking van myself next time.’

  ‘Next time? You think there’s gonna be a next time after this?’

  Scott marched away, ready to leave this power-crazed arsehole and his bumbling staff behind and not look back. Warren blocked his way through. ‘What?’ he yelled. Warren looked past him and at Barry.

  ‘My fault, Baz.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘I said it’s my fault. I got the manifest wrong, not him.’

  ‘Ya bloody idiot. Get ’em on the truck.’

  Scott watched Warren scuttle away then glared at Barry, waiting for an apology that didn’t come.

  ‘You’ve a quick temper and a foul mouth, Scott. You should fit in nicely here, long as you don’t piss me off. I’ll come with you and make the drop at Ken’s. I’ll phone him now and say we’re on our way. We’ll give him a hand with his fence, make up for the delay.’

  Barry returned to his caravan office, leaving Scott alone in the middle of the yard, stunned by the ineptitude of pretty much everyone he’d so far met in Thussock.

  #

  The drive back to Potter’s house seemed to take twice as long second time around. Maybe it was the fact Scott knew this trip was unnecessary, or maybe it was just because Barry was with him. Whatever the reason, Scott would have rather done this on his own.

  ‘Ken’s a good friend, but he’s always been a bit of a bugger,’ Barry said. ‘It’s ’cause he was a teacher. Taught most folks round here, actually. He likes things done jus’ right, know what I’m saying?’

  ‘I get it,’ Scott said. He could see why he was such good friends with Barry. They were both angry old bastards, both cut from the same cloth.

  The goods Scott had delivered earlier were where he’d left them on the verge, but there was no sign of Potter himself. He’d expected him to come charging out of his house again at the sound of the truck’s engine, ready to berate Barry for employing this useless southerner. In fact, he’d half expected him to be out in the road, clock-watching. Scott parked up then waited as Barry marched up to the front of the house and hammered on the porch door. ‘You in, Ken?’

  No response. Barry looked back at Scott, then knocked again. When the door remained unanswered, he took a few steps back then peered in through a downstairs window. Scott got out of the truck and stood beside him. ‘No sign?’

  ‘Daft sod’s probably asleep.’

  Scott felt as if he’d found a hole in time, a wormhole letting him stare back into the seventies. Everything about this house was so... antiquated. Yes, that was definitely the right word. He’d had the same feeling when he’d first walked into his own house – the grey house, as Barry had called it yesterday. Paint was peeling from the metal frames of Potter’s windows, no uPVC or double-glazing here. Was it that this place was struggling to keep up with the modern world or, as Scott was beginning to think, was it just not interested in catching up? No one in Thussock was concerned about keeping up with the Joneses. Christ, from here you couldn’t even see the Joneses.

  Barry knocked the door again. Still nothing. ‘This don’t make sense. He was spitting feathers on the phone.’

  ‘Shall I just start unloading? I’ll shift all his stuff round the back. Get us back in his good books.’

  ‘Good idea, Scotty. You get to it. I’ll keep trying.’

  The driveway continued up the side of the house and, at the far end of the drive, Scott saw that a section of fence was missing. There was a pile of old rotten panels there too, dumped out of view behind Potter’s heap of a car. He went through the gap in the fence, wondering why Potter hadn’t answered. He might have fallen asleep as Barry suggested, all the exertion of his vociferous complaining tiring him out. He might have been out walking his dog (if he had one), or visiting a neighbour (though he didn’t seem to have any of those either). After the noise and bluster of earlier, his non-appearance was irritating more than concerning.

  At the back of the house was an ugly concrete patio which hadn’t been touched in years. It was covered with mottled, ground-in dirt, dotted with patches of moss and persistent weeds which had patiently forced their way up through the narrowest of cracks. Potter obviously wasn’t particularly interested in maintaining his property to any great extent. Judging by the state of the rest of the house, he was only fixing the fence because it had collapsed.

  Scott looked at every place he saw with builder’s eyes. Maybe if he could get on the right side of Potter he could give him his details and quote for some of the immediate repairs which needed doing? From the outside décor and style, he thought the house was probably built in the twenties or thirties. There was a large patch of rendering missing from around one of the windows, and an equally large damp patch under the eaves of the roof (which sagged in the middle somewhat).

  ‘Mr Potter?’ he shouted, looking in through a back window. ‘You here, Mr Potter?’

  The interior decoration looked as dated as everything else. The sitting room floor was cluttered with piles of newspapers and stacks of books, all centred around a grubby, well-worn armchair which was angled towards a TV so old Scott thought it looked steam-driven. He rapped his knuckles on the glass and shouted again.

  When Scott turned around, he noticed something strange in one of the flowerbeds. In contrast to the house itself, the rest of Potter’s garden was reasonably well-tended. The lawn had recently been mowed and the beds were a riot of colour, and that made it harder to understand why he could see what he was seeing. It was a bare foot, toes pointing upwards. He took a step forward then hesitated, uneasy. Had Potter had an accident out here?

  ‘Scott, I don’t know where the hell he’s—’ Barry started to say, stepping through the hole in the fence. He stopped speaking when he saw it. ‘What the hell’s that?’

  The two men walked further down the garden together in silence. The body in the flowerbed was definitely not Kenneth Potter. It was a young girl, and it was clear even from a distance that she was dead. Scott didn’t get too close because he didn’t need to. He could tell from her ice-white skin, her frozen expression and her unblinking eyes that she was gone. For several seconds all he could do was stare deep into those eyes, unable to look away.

  From where they were both standing, a large Rhododendron bush obscured much of the girl’s body, covering her chest down to her feet. Barry moved slightly, trying to get a better view, but not sure if he should. He leant down and moved part of the
bush away, immediately wishing he hadn’t. ‘Jesus...’ he said. ‘Bloody hell...’ He staggered back, tripping over the straps of a discarded rucksack and ending up on his backside on the grass, scrambling away. Scott helped him up.

  ‘You know her?’

  ‘Never seen her before.’

  Scott looked back at the house, half expecting Ken Potter to appear, gunning for the two of them. The mad bastard must have done this girl in, then made a run for it.

  ‘What the hell happened?’ Barry said, still backing-up.

  Scott moved around to see what Barry had seen. He kept his eyes on the girl’s face, and it felt for a moment as if he and the corpse were the only two things left in the world. He looked down at her feet – one wedged in the mud, still wearing a thick hiking sock, the naked toes of the other still pointing skywards – then at her legs. And then, much as he didn’t want to, much as he knew he shouldn’t, he lifted his eyes further.

  Fuck.

  It was hard to make out exactly what he was looking at. He didn’t mean to stare, but it was impossible to look away. Between the girl’s pale white thighs was a mass of blood, torn tissue and pubic hair. Still wet. Glistening. Maybe still warm. It looked like blood had gushed, not trickled, from her horrific eviscerations. There were pools of it in the flower bed, crimson puddles under her buttocks. And yet, despite having crushed the plants where she’d fallen, there were no immediately obvious signs of a struggle. The blood was strangely contained.

  Scott walked away from the corpse, his head spinning. ‘We need to call the police,’ he said, tapping his pockets and checking for his phone. He’d left it in the truck. He turned to go fetch it.

  ‘Where you going?’ Barry asked.

  ‘Phone. In the truck.’

  Barry followed him, not wanting to be left alone with the dead girl. ‘Wait... Ken wouldn’t have done this.’

  ‘Then who did?’ Scott demanded, grabbing his phone from the glovebox. He checked the screen. No signal. No surprise.