My Sister's Bones

by Nuala Ellwood

  “Well, I’d like to see it one day,” he says. “You can show me the sights of Soho.”

  He laughs awkwardly and we sit for a few moments in uncomfortable silence.

  I take a mouthful of the soup. It has cooled slightly and tepid soup makes me queasy at the best of times. I put my spoon down and play with a morsel of bread.

  “Anyway, where were we?” says Paul, pulling the laptop toward him. “The Myriad. If you’re happy with it, I’m happy to trust your better judgment. I’ll order it this afternoon and we can settle up later.”

  “Great,” I say. “I’ll write you a check before you go.”

  “Are you finished?” he says, gesturing to my half-empty bowl.

  “Yes, thank you,” I reply, handing it to him. “It was lovely.”

  “Fancy a coffee?” he asks as he balances the bowls and plates in the crook of his arm and takes them over to the sink.

  “Yes, please,” I reply, pulling the laptop over to have another look at the Myriad bathroom suite. I try to imagine what it would look like in my mother’s bathroom. I think back to this morning when I stood in the mildewed pink bath holding the sorry excuse for a showerhead over my body with one hand while using the other hand to scrub at my skin with a sliver of carbolic soap. Yes, I think, as Paul returns to the table with the coffeepot, the Myriad is a very good idea.

  As we sit, Paul pulls the computer toward him and opens up Facebook. “Just got to check my messages,” he says.

  “Oh, I didn’t know you were on it,” I say as he clicks on the message icon.

  “It’s the lads at work got me into it,” he says. “It’s okay for a bit of banter I suppose. They send me all these silly videos. You’d probably find them a bit immature but it gives us a laugh.”

  Why do people bother, I ask myself, as Paul gets up again and opens the back door to take the bin out. What purpose does it serve to paste your life on a website for all to see? I think of Rachel Hadley and her burgeoning Twitter page and my stomach knots.

  In the corner of the screen there is a box that reads, “People you may know,” and I scroll through the faces, happy that I don’t know any of them. Without thinking, I find myself typing a familiar name into the search bar, safe in the knowledge that the man I love would never parade himself on a site like this. But then there it is. His name. And I feel my fingers calcify as I click on it and see the life he has chosen over me.

  His profile picture, taken at some sort of family gathering, shows him, suited and smart, with his arm draped around a pretty, fresh-faced woman with short blonde hair. I take a closer look. She looks rather upper crusty in her lilac pashmina, all white teeth and rosy cheeks, like a young Lady Di. I click on the image and a page full of photographs comes up. One by one they tell the story he had always been too scared to share with me.

  On I go, while outside the window Paul clatters the lid of the wheelie bin. My finger becomes stiff as I click through image after interminable image. I walk beside him as he celebrates his wedding anniversary in the same restaurant in Mayfair he had taken me to when he returned from a long stint in Uganda. My skin prickles as I enlarge a photo of his wife, eyes glazed with alcohol, draped across the green banquette seats. My hand trembles as I click on another image. This one shows his wife lying on a secluded beach, holding a glass of champagne toward the camera.

  “I’m not one for holidays,” he had told me as we lay naked, entwined in each other’s arms, in a bombed-out Iraqi hotel. “How can anybody want to travel for pleasure anymore? How can we ever forget the things we’ve seen?”

  His voice pierces my eardrum with its deceit. I want to rip it out and stamp on it until it expires right here on my mother’s kitchen floor. He lied to me, all those years he told me he didn’t love his wife; that they lived separate lives; that nobody in the world would ever understand him as well as I did. And all the time I was pining for him he was living it up in shabby-chic heaven with Helen.

  Almost without thinking, I click on his wife’s name—it is displayed in blue type beneath her photograph. Helen pouts moodily in a single black-and-white profile picture. Farther down the page there’s a link to a website called Carrington & Miller. I click on the link and discover that she co-owns a homeware shop with her best friend, Della. Images of baby-pink bunting and Union Jack sofa cushions float across the page along with toe-curling posters extolling all to “Keep Calm and Carry On.” The whole thing drips with saccharine and I feel sick.

  I close the window and return to the Facebook page. I enlarge Helen’s cover photograph and my stomach lurches as I see him, champagne glass in hand, at some street party. I look closer and read the caption underneath: “Harrogate Celebrates the Royal Wedding.” What the fuck? This is the man who sat up with me through the night lambasting the establishment and raising a toast to the republic of the future, and here he is grinning like a fool in a lurid pink party hat. I scroll farther and see the interior of their smart town house, his daughters, preppy, all teeth and backcombed hair, sitting astride horses. I see his life through the eyes of his wife and I realize I have spent the last ten years making love to a stranger.

  “Sorry about that, the bin was overflowing,” says Paul as he comes back in. “Coffee should be nicely brewed now.”

  The smell of the coffee clashes with the bitter taste inside my mouth: the remains of the blood dream. It burns through my skin and rises up my gullet with such violence I think I might pass out. Scraping the chair back, I run from the table, up the stairs, and reach the bathroom just in time.

  “Kate?”

  I hear Paul’s voice as I kneel on the floor and vomit it all up: the smell, the coffee, the soup, the champagne flute in Helen’s hand, the daughters on their horses, and the unconditional love on Chris’s face as he stood beside her. I heave and heave it all up until there is nothing left but the taste of my own despair.

  “Kate, are you okay?”

  I feel the warmth of his hand on the base of my back and I spring to my feet before the tears can come. I need air and noise and nothingness to block out the searing pain that is coiling around my chest.

  “I’m fine,” I whisper as I stagger to my feet and dab my mouth with the wedge of toilet paper that Paul has handed me. “I just need to rest.”

  “Why don’t you go and have a lie-down?” he says. He is standing in the doorway, his face ashen with concern. “I’ll bring you a glass of water.”

  I silently implore him to stop being nice. I can deal with anything right now except kindness. Kindness will end me.

  “No, honestly, Paul,” I say, squeezing past him and making my way downstairs. “I just need to be alone for a bit.”

  I grab my bag and take out my checkbook.

  “Don’t be silly,” he says, following me into the kitchen. “We can settle that later.”

  “No, it’s fine,” I say as I scribble out a check and hand it to him. “I’ll only forget if I don’t do it now.”

  “Are you sure you’re going to be okay?” he asks, taking the check and putting it in his back pocket. “I can stay a bit longer if you want to talk.”

  “Please stop worrying,” I tell him as we walk to the front door. “I’m fine.”

  “Well, you know where I am if you need me,” he says. “Call me anytime.”

  “Thanks,” I mumble as I open the door.

  “Oh, and if you’re still up for it,” he says, lingering on the threshold, “I’ll meet you at Neptune’s Arm tomorrow. Shall we say eleven?”

  I have no idea what he is talking about. I just want him to go.

  “The trip to Reculver,” he says.

  “Oh, that,” I say, guiding him out the door. “I forgot all about it.”

  He looks at me and frowns. “Are you sure you’re okay? You look so pale. I just hope I haven’t poisoned you with my soup. It was a Nigella recipe as well.”

  “No, no, Paul, the soup was perfect,” I say, trying with all my might to suppress the sobs that are wavering at the
back of my throat. “It’s just . . . me.”

  “I’ll leave you to rest,” he says, patting me on my arm. “Take care, yeah?”

  He walks down the driveway and gets into his car and I watch as he drives away past the neat boxed gardens and modest semi-detached houses. This is life, I tell myself as I close the door. Not war and disease and burnt-out hotels, but men and women in their boxes with their babies and their coffeemakers and their holidays, this is what real life should look like. It’s what Chris’s life looks like. And I am on the edge of it all, a ghost with no foundations, no roots. As I step back into my mother’s dark house and close the door, I feel like the last person left on earth.

  THE PHONE LIES on the floor beside me and I watch as its screen darkens on the unsent message. He still won’t pick up, so all I’m left with is my own bitterness and hate. I’ve spent the evening trying to express it in a text message but my words are coming out wrong. The first text was a barrage of hurt and anger at his hypocrisy, his cowardice, his double standards, and his appalling taste in party hats. Then I changed my mind, deleted, and started another one. And now, after the third attempt, I have given up. A text is too small a medium to relay all that I want to say to Chris. And there is dignity in silence, I think, as I pick up the phone and wipe the final text.

  It’s late, but I can’t face my bed. The old woman waits for me there. So I take my warm sweater, wrap it around my shoulders, and head downstairs. After a handful of sleeping pills I decamp to the firm green armchair. Sitting here brings me closer to my mother; its threadbare arms feel like her embrace as I sit here sinking into its folds, darkness swallowing the house.

  I try not to think about Chris but he is everywhere. I can smell his skin—a mixture of sweat and cedarwood—as I curl up in the chair.

  We came from such different worlds. He’d had a happy, middle-class upbringing in Yorkshire. His parents were teachers and they had brought up their four boys in a rambling farmhouse deep in the Dales. It’s where Chris discovered his love of forensics. I remember him telling me the story so clearly. When he was eight years old he had found a bone sticking out of the ground. He’d pulled it out and couldn’t believe the size of it. The next day he came back to the spot with his father’s spade and began to dig. After a few hours he’d excavated a huge skeleton. It was later confirmed to be that of a Clydesdale horse that had been lost in a storm some fifty years previously. Over time its body had sunk back into the ground. It had fascinated Chris how a set of bones could reveal a mystery that had lain unsolved for years and the discovery changed his life. He knew then what he wanted to be when he grew up and he set about achieving it. His parents supported him through university, encouraged his dreams. And as far as I know they still do. Last I heard they were still living in the same old farmhouse. Of course, I’ve never met them. They don’t know I exist. But I imagine their home to be full of framed photographs of their children and grandchildren; there will be a big wooden table where they all gather at Christmas and a roaring open fire to keep everyone warm.

  That was Chris’s childhood. Warm and secure. The total opposite of mine.

  And he tried to re-create that childhood for his own kids. But then he met me and I turned everything upside down. I was his secret, his buried bones, the mystery he just had to solve.

  My eyes grow heavy but as I close them Nidal is there, clutching his scrapbook.

  “Tusbih ‘alá khayr, Kate.”

  “Tusbih ‘alá khayr, Nidal. What are you doing today?”

  “I’m making a book.”

  “That sounds wonderful. What’s it called?”

  “It is called the book of smiles.”

  And as I sink deeper into sleep, flimsy paper cutouts flutter around my head: I see a beaming boy standing on a fairy-tale bridge; I see the sugary pink towers of Disneyland glistening in Technicolor sunshine and Mickey Mouse gamboling across a lush green meadow.

  “I want that.”

  I hear Nidal’s voice but I can’t see him. All I can see are his pictures.

  “You want Disneyland?”

  “No. I want that. To be the boy on the bridge. You help me.”

  “I can’t see you, Nidal.”

  “Help me.”

  “Nidal, where are you?”

  His voice is closer. He’s right next to me. If I reach out I can touch him.

  “Help me.”

  I stretch out my arms toward the voice and I feel myself falling. There’s a loud bang and when I open my eyes I’m lying in a heap on the living room floor.

  “Just a dream,” I reassure myself as I haul myself up. “Just another sodding dream.”

  Sweat clings to my forehead and I wipe it with the back of my hand as I step out into the hallway. The air is salty and a breeze flutters across my bare feet. Then, as consciousness returns, I hear it: thud, thud.

  “Who’s there?”

  The words come instinctively. The human body knows when it is alone, truly alone, and when another being is nearby, every nerve, every muscle reacts accordingly. As I creep down the hallway I take a cursory glance around to see if there is something I can arm myself with and I grab my mother’s old wooden clock from the sideboard. It’s the closest thing to hand.

  If there is an intruder, then one crack on the correct part of the head will be enough to disable him. Holding the clock tightly in my hands, I slowly make my way to the kitchen. The sound grows louder as I approach. Thud, thud, thud. It falls in step with my heart as I reach the kitchen door and prepare to launch myself at whoever is in there. I take a deep breath and slowly count to three. One, two, three—

  I burst into the kitchen ready to fight. With the clock raised above my head I let out a scream of fear and relief. The room is empty, and nothing, as far as I can see, has been touched. Except the door, which is wide open. And the cool evening breeze that had drifted into the living room and tickled my feet is now blowing it open and shut. Thud, thud, thud.

  Moving slowly toward it, I stand on the step and call out into the empty garden, “Who’s there?”

  The sky is moonless and the darkness makes me feel vulnerable as I step out. I push my hair out of my eyes with the back of my hand so I can see clearly. I should have brought my torch, I tell myself, as I hear Harry’s voice through the gloom. “If you ever need a spare torch,” he used to chuckle, “just ask Kate. She’s got enough to supply a whole army.” And he was right. In my job a torch is a necessity I can’t live without. I have hundreds of them. And here I am standing in the darkness with only an old wooden clock to light my way.

  I put the clock down and creep toward the fence, my hands shaking as I pull myself onto the plastic chair and look into next-door’s garden. Everything is still and silent. The house is in darkness and the shed just an ordinary garden shed. No noise, no movement, no face at the window.

  What is happening to me?

  I stand there for a few moments longer, but all is still. I have to sleep. Perhaps the stress of everything is getting to me.

  I go back inside and double-bolt the kitchen door.

  But as I reach the stairs I catch a glimpse of myself in the hallway mirror. There’s something on my face. I step forward to take a closer look. There are rusty red smears across my cheeks. What is it? I go to wipe my face and then I see that it’s on my hands too. I smell it. It’s blood. Dried blood. My heart starts to pound. I check for cuts or grazes—maybe I scratched it on the fence. But there’s nothing.

  My mind feels like it’s shutting down. How can this be? I am standing here covered in someone else’s blood.

  21

  Herne Bay Police Station

  35 hours detained

  I’m sorry, Kate, but I’d really like to talk about your last visit to Syria,” says Shaw softly. “I think it’s important.”

  I immediately tense. The woman won’t give up. The whole interview, I realize now—these past thirty-odd hours—has been a prelude to this. Shaw doesn’t care about sleeping pills. She doe
sn’t care about Polish waitresses. What she is interested in is what happened in Syria. It’s Syria that has sent me mad. Or at least that’s what she thinks.

  “I told you. I’m not going to talk about Syria.”

  Shaw leans forward in her chair and looks at me.

  “Kate, we have to talk about it if I’m to make a full assessment. Do you understand?”

  I look at her. Her face is expressionless. She has no idea how hard this is for me.

  “Kate, if I can’t make a full assessment, then the alternative is—”

  “That I’m stuck in here for good?” I say, interrupting her.

  “No,” she says. “But we would need to take you to the hospital for further assessment. Look, I know this is terribly distressing for you but it really is crucial for me to ask these questions.”

  She’s right. I know that. Still, it doesn’t make it any easier.

  “Okay,” I say quietly. “Let’s do it. But can we be quick about it?”

  “We can take a break at any point,” says Shaw, opening her notebook. “If you feel it’s getting too much, just say and we’ll pause.”

  I nod my head.

  “Right,” she says, her voice gentler than before. “Can I begin by asking why you decided to return to Syria? It seems odd that you would choose to go when you were obviously in such mental and physical distress.”

  “What do you mean?” I ask, trying to stay focused.

  “Well,” continues Shaw, “we’ve spoken about the incidents with Rachel Hadley and Rosa Dunajski and I know that you’re taking some pretty strong antipsychotic medication. Surely, in such a fragile state, it would seem ill advised to travel to a place as volatile as Syria?”

  “You make it sound like I was booking a package holiday, Dr. Shaw,” I reply. “Nobody advised me because I’m a senior reporter. I know what I’m doing because it’s my job, a job I’ve done without any trouble for almost twenty years.”

  Shaw writes something in her notebook. I know she thinks I’m unstable. I have to stay strong; I have to show her that I’m not what she thinks.