I Know My Name: A stunning psychological thriller

by C. J. Cooke

  She was right: we did have a connection. And I had hurt her terribly. This was the consequence. I took a step backwards, torn between fury and remorse.

  ‘Why were you watching us, Harriet?’

  She gave a long sigh, then shook her head. ‘It was easy.’

  ‘Easy?’

  A half-shrug. ‘I know that’s no excuse. But once I was able to log on, I was hooked.’

  I stared at her. ‘And that’s your reason?’

  She looked away, ashamed. ‘I guess … I was … curious? I wanted to know what you had with her. What it looked like. And maybe I wanted to find out what she had that I didn’t.’

  She leaned in and kissed me full on the lips. It caught me by surprise – I was deep in thought, trying to examine her words for anything that sounded like the truth – and recoiled sharply. She stumbled forward, falling on to her hands and knees. A few onlookers shouted over to check that everything was OK and I held up a hand.

  ‘I’ve got this,’ I said, kneeling to help Harriet. I saw someone take out their mobile phone, and it occurred to me that now might not be the best time to be photographed and plastered all over Facebook.

  Harriet turned and began to walk unevenly. I followed. ‘You really expect me to believe you were spying on us for over a year because you were curious?’

  She didn’t answer.

  ‘You owe me an answer,’ I called after her, forcefully this time. ‘What did you do with her?’

  At this, she spun around, her finger raised to my face.

  ‘I’m going to court for my mistake, all right? I will likely do time because of what I’ve done and Dean will give me the sack. I’ll have no way of paying rent, no way of getting another job in this industry with a criminal record. All because I pressed a button.’

  ‘Oh yeah? Well, I’ve lost my wife …’

  She tilted her head back and gave a forceful laugh. ‘Your wife? Do you even know what a hypocrite you are?’

  ‘Yes, my wife,’ I said, but my resolve had started to waver, and we both knew it. ‘I know you’re involved …’

  ‘I have nothing to do with it!’

  ‘Stop lying to me!’

  I grabbed her and she started to sob, her knees buckling beneath her. I had to hold her to stop her from falling and she wrapped her fingers around my coat, clinging on.

  ‘I promise, I had nothing to do with this, Lochlan,’ she whispered in my ear. ‘I wasn’t even here the day she went missing. I was in Cambridge. Ask anyone.’

  People were starting to approach us, worried about the scene. I helped Harriet regain her balance, studying her for any sign that she might be lying. My certainty was fading and I felt confused.

  ‘When you were watching us,’ I said in a low voice. ‘When you were watching her on the babycams, did you see anything?’

  Her eyes focused on me. ‘Of course I did.’

  ‘What did you see?’

  She licked her lips, fixed her hair. ‘I saw a miserable, lonely woman. That’s what I saw.’ A beat. ‘But you know what I didn’t see?’

  I waited, and she poked me in the chest.

  ‘You. You were never there. And yet there was I, thinking you’d chosen her over me.’

  She shook her head slowly, and I looked down. I felt foolish and angry and I wanted to claw my skin off. She turned and walked away, her gait a little less woozy. I didn’t stop her.

  Wes appeared at my side a moment later.

  ‘You OK?’ he asked, but I stared ahead, too gut-kicked to answer. I knew Harriet had nothing to do with El going missing, but more sickening was the realisation that I was so desperate to avoid the truth that I was prepared to waste time chasing down false leads. I was prepared to wound and hurt people, if only to distract myself from the cold fact of my own role in my wife’s disappearance.

  For reasons I still don’t fully understand, my own selfishness was a factor in this situation more than anything else. It was an instinct that shouted loud and clear there in the street as I watched Harriet walk away.

  The problem is, nothing my instinct says makes sense any more.

  29 March 2015

  Komméno Island, Greece

  Sariah and I are waiting at the dock, the last rays of sunlight turning into gold tassels across the waves. Sariah is behind me on a hill, pacing with her arms folded and her face tight with worry. I know it’s every bit as important to her as it is to me that Nikodemos comes – after all, she’s got to eat. It is now ten past six.

  She calls, ‘You see anything?’

  I perch my hands above my eyes and squint against a bright bank of cloud ahead. I can see a white object bouncing over the waves. My heart leaps. It’s a speedboat, as sure as I’m alive.

  ‘Yes!’ I shout. ‘It’s him! It’s Nikodemos!’

  I can hardly believe it. There is no fear in me this time, no trepidation about getting into his boat and contacting the British Embassy. I will force myself to remember any detail that can connect me to where I am and who I have left behind.

  ‘He’s coming! He’s coming!’

  I bounce on my toes and wave my arms in the air, shouting ‘Nikodemos! Nikodemos!’ Sariah runs up the pier towards me and joins me in the waving and jumping, the wood beneath our feet creaking so fiercely I think it might snap. Then suddenly she stops, squinting against the sunset.

  ‘I can’t see him,’ she says, breathless. ‘Where is he?’

  The waves have swollen because of the boat, rolling towards the shore like green hills.

  ‘He was right there. We’ll see him in a moment.’

  But he doesn’t appear. I keep waiting for him to rise up behind a wave, a hand in the air, the roar of the engine filling the air.

  ‘I’m not seeing him,’ Sariah frowns.

  ‘He was there! He was. I saw him!’

  ‘Maybe he’s changed direction.’ She stands on her tiptoes and peers into the distance. ‘He mentioned that the current out there gets pretty intense.’

  We decide to split up. Sariah says she’ll walk east and I’ll walk west, both of us keeping close to the shoreline.

  I walk until I reach the north end of the island, where the path rises upward and the cliffs are so sheer that they look as though they’ve been sliced clean with a knife: smooth, glistening white. The sea here is calm, swaying like a peacock’s tail.

  I know I saw him. I saw a speedboat with that sharp, shark-like snout, bouncing over the waves, a white trail of disturbed water following behind. And yet there is no longer any sign of him. I worry that he has turned back, unable to make it through the currents, or perhaps the rocks.

  When I meet up with Sariah again it is growing dark, the sky turning a deep purple and the sun an orange belt across the horizon. Sariah seems exhausted, her face damp with sweat.

  ‘I ain’t seen him,’ she pants, leaning her hands on her knees. My heart sinks. The thought crosses my mind that George has found out about the call, that he’s contacted Nikodemos and rearranged my plans, but I bat it away.

  ‘I went as far as I could,’ Sariah gasps. ‘I even climbed up on the roof of the hotel by the pier to get a better view. Are you sure you saw him?’

  ‘Yes,’ I say, but as soon as the wind whips away the sound of my voice I am blanketed in a wrenching uncertainty. I have no doubt that it was him in the boat. But he couldn’t have simply disappeared, could he? Maybe it was a mirage, like people see in the desert when they’re about to die from thirst and starvation. My thirst is not for water, but for something – someone – I can’t remember by name, sound, or even image, but by my emotions.

  ‘Maybe he turned back,’ I say.

  She nods and wipes her mouth on the back of her hand. ‘We’ll have to call him again. He’ll come back.’

  Sariah’s right – as the night and its blanket of searing cold sets in we have no choice but to head back to the farmhouse. I am terrified of confronting George, but she assures me over and over that he’ll be fine – after all, I did everyo
ne a favour by arranging for Nikodemos to bring food. They’re running dangerously low on supplies. Still, as we climb the steps to the kitchen door I can’t stop dry-retching with nerves.

  Joe is sitting at the dining table, scribbling in his notebook. Hazel is performing a solo waltz to Frank Sinatra on the radio. When she sees Sariah and me in the doorway, she stops dancing, leans over and turns the volume down on the radio. Joe rises from his chair, his face full of confusion.

  ‘What happened?’ Hazel says, her voice sharp.

  ‘Did you bring the food?’ Joe says.

  Sariah wilts into a chair and wipes her forehead with the back of her hand. ‘He must have turned around. Call him.’

  A loud crash makes me jump. I turn to see Joe standing in the centre of the kitchen with both fists clenched, his long frame trembling, a shattered jug on the ground by his feet.

  Hazel stomps towards the window and looks out.

  ‘That’ll be why he turned back – there’s a storm settling in.’

  The rain is too heavy for me to consider returning to the cave. Thick bands of it, moving at an angle, the wind knocking at the window and lightning crackling across the sky. I venture silently to the attic and drag a wooden chest across the door in case George comes upstairs, but despite this I don’t sleep very well.

  In the morning, it is still raining. The sky is white with low cloud and the sea’s grey and violent. My stomach growls but I daren’t ask if there is enough food for me.

  ‘Good morning,’ George says in a sing-song voice when I enter the kitchen.

  ‘Good morning,’ I murmur cautiously. I had hoped to tiptoe out the back door without being seen, but as soon as he speaks the others appear. Joe is surly and panda-eyed, his black hair dishevelled. He looks as though he slept in his clothes. Hazel declares her mood in a series of stomps across the floor, pursed lips and slammed cupboard doors. She sniffs at me and glances down at my shoes – her tennis shoes, the ones she so freely gave to me when I arrived – before opening the door to the pantry and staring inside.

  ‘Anyone fancy jarred pickles for breakfast?’ Hazel says with a sigh.

  Sariah sashays into the room in a long red dress with buttons all the way down and gold bangles at her wrists, humming. She catches sight of me and throws me a wide grin and a wink, and I immediately feel struck with guilt. I am putting her through so much.

  Hazel sets about unscrewing a large jar, huffing and puffing with each turn of the lid. She pulls out a pickle and pops it in her mouth, pulling a face.

  ‘Of all the things I’ve seen you put in that gob of yours,’ George says drily, ‘that’s got to be the worst by a long stretch.’

  Suddenly Hazel lets out a shriek. She runs to the sink and spits out the contents of her mouth.

  ‘Those aren’t pickles!’

  Joe picks up the jar and inspects the contents. He pulls out a long tentacle dotted with suckers. ‘It’s pickled octopus.’ Sariah and George laugh, and Hazel squeals the house down.

  ‘Hey, don’t knock it,’ Joe says, deeply serious. ‘Might be delicious when it’s cooked.’

  ‘If we can’t get in touch with Nikodemos, we’ll need to consider calling the police,’ Sariah says, surveying the skies through the window.

  ‘The police?’ Hazel says, gargling water. She spits into the sink and wipes her mouth on a towel. ‘What are they going to do, arrest Nikodemos?’

  A look passes between Sariah and Joe that I’ve not seen before – a protectiveness on Sariah’s part. ‘Well, folks,’ she says. ‘As much as I hate to say it, I think we may have to cut our retreat short this time. We can phone our families at home.’

  George finds this amusing. ‘Are you planning on calling them on an imaginary phone, Sariah?’

  Sariah turns her face back to the window. ‘I was hoping you’d remember where you put it, George.’

  Hazel nods. ‘I know I didn’t sign up to eat pickled squid or whatever that stuff is. I can phone my Tommy. He’ll be out here for me in a jiffy.’

  ‘I doubt we’ll get our money back from Nikodemos,’ says Joe.

  George shakes his head. He pulls a cigarette from his pocket and lights it, taking a long drag with a thoughtful expression. ‘I think you’re a pack of drama queens.’

  Hazel sneers at him. ‘Oh yeah? You eat the flipping squid then.’

  He flicks his cigarette ash into the sink. ‘All I’m saying is, we don’t need to be worrying the folks at home unnecessarily. We’ve enough to last another fortnight, surely?’

  Joe marches over to the pantry and flings open the doors. ‘What are all these jars?’ He lifts one down and tries to interpret the label. ‘This one looks like rice wrapped in vine leaves,’ he surmises at last. ‘This one’s some kind of tinned fish. Beans. Anchovies.’ He counts them up. ‘By my calculations, we’ve got about five days’ worth of food in here.’

  ‘You’re asking me to live on anchovies and pickled octopus, Joe?’ Hazel says.

  ‘It’s better than nothing.’

  George inspects the cupboard. ‘Five days’ worth, is there? For how many people?’

  Joe lowers his eyes. ‘Well, four of us rented this place, so …’

  George turns, very slowly, and looks at me. For a moment, I’m not sure whether he’s going to suggest eating me or feeding me.

  ‘And what about our visitor?’

  A bewildered silence swells in the room. I feel at once relieved and pricked by guilt. ‘Look, I’ve gatecrashed your retreat,’ I say quietly. ‘I shouldn’t be here. It’s not fair on any of you.’

  Hazel shuffles to the kitchen table and noises agreement, but George raises his hand. ‘There’s plenty of food out there. No one needs to starve. I’ll see to it that we don’t, all right?’

  ‘George …’ Joe says, but George shuts him up. ‘We’ll be fine. What are you all worrying about? This place is Empyrean. We can stay here forever.’

  Sariah and I share a look.

  ‘I gave you my word that I’ll feed us, all right? ALL RIGHT?’

  ‘All right,’ we chorus.

  George grins, clapping his hands together. ‘That’s better. Now quit whingeing and get back to writing.’

  *

  Doubt has been niggling me since Joe smashed the water jug last night. Some of the glass shards had landed on the orange life vest that I’d been wearing when they found me. It was sitting on the ground, close to the window. It made me think of the moment I’d found the boat they said I’d travelled in, and I had wondered about the fact that I had been discovered wearing a life vest. Had I been travelling with someone? Had he or she fallen overboard and drowned? It was a larger boat than I’d imagined, too, and despite the damage on the side, I wondered whether it could be fixed. The sails, the red sails wrapped around the masts – I had never checked whether they were torn or still usable.

  The sun thumps down brutal waves of heat. I make the mistake of journeying outdoors without eating or drinking, and after twenty minutes I consider turning back. But as I approach the cliff, a heavy wind kicks up and a light shower of rain sweeps over the hills and valleys, sending a cool wet breeze around my face and legs. After a few minutes I continue on towards Bone Beach.

  Seawater tongues rhythmically at the boat, causing the long masts to scrape against rock. The sails have come loose and bedraggled. I can see no tears in the fabric, though they are badly tangled and the ropes are ragged.

  I take off my shoes and climb inside to get a better look. It isn’t a rowboat at all – from somewhere deep in the corridors of my mind springs the word ‘dinghy’. It is a sailing dinghy, a small wooden boat about ten or twelve feet long. I open the stowage compartments to check for any belongings that might indicate whether someone travelled with me. I discover some food packets and rip open the foil without checking the contents or date, and it is only once I’ve filled my mouth with a white dusty substance that I realise they are dry porridge oats. I swallow and choke it down, but put the other three packet
s down my T-shirt for later.

  There is a bottle of water which I drink, but surprisingly little else. A box of matches, a pack of red tubes that turn out to be distress flares, a few scraps of paper. There is an address on one of the scraps, however, that makes me stop and take notice.

  It is a crumpled invoice, the tell-tale ledger lines and figures at the bottom revealing its purpose, even if the obscure language conceals what had been purchased. I can’t make out a date, but it suggests that the boat originated in Chania.

  Perhaps George’s theory was right. Perhaps I did get drunk and fall into the boat at the harbour, which then drifted out to sea. There is no indication that I travelled with anyone, and the absence of supplies in the stowage compartments indicates that I hadn’t planned to go sailing.

  On the other hand, when George found me I was wearing a life jacket. If I’d been that drunk, I probably wouldn’t have thought to put one on. Also, the invoice is crumpled but looks recent. Was it my invoice? Had I intended to sail? Where was I headed, and why?

  As if through a fog, I see myself holding the tiller and using it to steer the boat. I am sitting on the edge of the boat, my life jacket on, looking out across mother-of-pearl skies and jade waves arcing towards the island. Komméno. And I remember heading there quite deliberately, excitement clasped by each of my breaths. There is no one on the boat but me. No child.

  The memory renews my feeling of purpose – if I know how to sail, if I had managed to take on this kind of sailing adventure on my own, then maybe I could fix the boat.

  When insistent waves begin to surge towards me, I try to shift the boat in order to access the damaged stern, but it is astonishingly heavy. As I’m struggling with it, a large wave rolls in with enough force to knock me into the water. I emerge gasping and drenched, seaweed wrapping itself slickly around my calves.

  When at last I haul myself up, I see that the boat has moved enough for me to view the full extent of the damage. It’s a long shot, but the smashed stern could possibly be restored with some planks of wood and tarp. I unroll the sails all the way out and survey the ropes, heartened to see that, for the most part, they are usable. The centreboard and rudder are a problem, however. I’ll have to attempt to reconstruct these, and then there is the problem of launching. Even last night’s storm has failed to shift the boat out to sea.