Just Before I Died

by S. K. Tremayne

  Lyla loves making these chains of paperclips, linked and looped together, which she hangs from the branches of her den. They are her very own windchimes, making her favourite noise.

  Tinkle-tankle. Tinkle-tankle.

  Abruptly, she looks my way. ‘I’ve been reading lots of things today, lots and lots. Shall I tell you?’

  ‘OK.’

  She brushes black hair from her blue eyes. Now I realize that she’s been crying. There is a pinkness to her face. I want to hold her and hug her, but I am scared that my guilt and my evil will seep into her, the pox of Plague Market.

  Felix is awake, looking at me.

  ‘What have you been reading, sweetpea?’

  Her voice is level, and oddly calm. ‘About suicide. All facts about why people kill themselves.’

  Her wet sad eyes meet mine.

  ‘Gladiators. I read about gladiators: they used to kill themselves by putting their heads into the spokes of moving cartwheels. That’s what I read on Google. Because they thought that was a better death than obeying the Romans and fighting to the death in the arena. Sometimes they stuck javelins in their throats.’

  ‘Lyla.’ I don’t know how to stop this. We try to keep a check on her access to the Net, but really, these days, what can you do? And Adam is clearly right: someone has been talking to her. About me, and what I did. But I need to avert this, distract her. ‘Please, darling, it’s getting dark. You can tell me everything later.’

  She shakes her head and starts to lecture me again, her voice fast and quick. And as she speaks, she flutters her right hand. ‘There was one man who stabbed himself to death with spectacles. And there was another – another man who did it by drinking boiling water, and someone pushed a broom handle down her throat, and someone stuck darning needles into her stomach, to kill herself, and I read about one person, one person in America he tried to kill himself by drinking acid, but it didn’t work, so he tried again and he killed himself by swallowing lighted fireworks.’

  Her hands flutter, up and down, up and down, and she grimaces at me, and hisses. ‘Mummy. Ssss. Sss. Mummy, think about it, that must have been amazing, I think, I mean, what did that look like, he would have had sparks coming out of his mouth, fireworks in his mouth, exploding inside him.’ She clearly sees the concern on my face, but she goes on as if in a trance. ‘Ssss. And I read there’s been suicides in England since the sixth century. The first were reported on the South Downs – that’s in Sussex – and some animals commit suicide too, pigs can do it, and macaques, ssss I read that macaques will kill themselves, they’re monkeys, and most suicides happen very suddenly, people only think about it for five minutes. Sss. Ssss. Sssss. And then then then, I read about China and in old days the Chinese people had this this thing when the man died the widows would choke themselves to death on gold leaf, because they didn’t want to live any more. They had no one to love so they swallowed gold leaf, crinkling in their mouths. Swallowing gold, swallowing gold to make themselves die, and and and—’

  Her hands are fluttering so fast, she is trembling and shaking, and then she clenches her hands and her eyes are tight shut, and her fisted hands lash out. Suddenly she is attacking me, hitting me hard, as hard as she can, smacking me on the head. Eyes wide open and furious.

  I try to fend off her blows. The dogs scatter, out of the den. And still she hits me.

  ‘Why did you do it? Why did you do it why why why why why, Mummy? Why did you leave me, why did you try and leave me? Don’t you love me? You don’t love me, you can’t love me. I love you but you hate me, you don’t love me. You’re my mummy but you can’t love me, can you, because you left me here! You hate me, you left me and you tried to go away forever because you don’t even like me, you think I’m strange, you wanted to leave me alone in the corner you’re like everyone else you tried to go go to go go to go! Why why why why WHY?’

  And then she pushes me away and looks up at the tinkly-tankly chains hanging from the roof of her den and there are tears rolling down her face, and she is howling, and sobbing.

  And I cannot do anything. Because she is right. I tried to destroy myself, I tried to destroy her, I tried to destroy everything. And now I am destroying this family all over again.

  Salcombe

  Friday evening

  Tessa Kinnersley sat in her lovely expensive, steel-and-granite kitchen and waited for the Two Bridges receptionist to reply. The seconds ticked by.

  ‘No,’ the woman said, ‘there’s definitely no Kinnersley registered that night. December thirtieth, right?’

  ‘Yes.’ Tessa frowned, looking at the kitchen window. The February darkness was now total outside. ‘Are you sure? Perhaps my husband used a company card, we really do need a copy of the invoice. And he’s sure he stayed that night.’

  The woman sighed, clearly irritated.

  ‘I’m sorry, but yes, I’m sure. The only guests on that night were a couple from Germany, Schwartz, a single woman, name of Dickinson, and …’ The woman tailed off, presumably trying to read something. ‘Another couple, from Japan. No Kinnersley, and no company booking. Sorry.’

  The sorry was emphatic. It said, Please go away and leave me alone.

  Tessa took the hint.

  ‘All right, thank you. I hope I haven’t troubled you too much. There must be some mix-up.’

  Tessa rang off. This information made it even more mysterious. Kath had remembered Dan being at Two Bridges in the afternoon, and that memory was probably reliable, triggered as it had been by the scent of lemon. She had read all the literature: people with brain traumas, and returning memories, commonly had troubling associations that only made sense when the mental networks healed. And scent was particularly associated with memory: the use and application of specific scents was a known, professional technique when attempting to retrieve deep memories.

  So Dan had probably been at the hotel on the day of Kath’s suicide bid, and he was there the day after. But the night was missing. Where had he been in the evening hours, the early morning? What did he do? During those very hours when Kath drove into Burrator? And what, in particular, made Kath run away from him?

  Tessa looked at the clock on her expensive cooker. The date, the time, in glowing red lights. A week ago they’d all been on a scary ride in Disneyland Paris, looking at animated pirates with the boys. Laughing at Captain Hook and the parrot that said Arrrrr.

  Yet in minutes her marriage, that family, everything, could be over. The house, the life, the happiness. Gone. She estimated her husband would be home in about three minutes: he’d called from the petrol station. His two-day business trip was complete, he was happy to be coming home.

  She looked at the clock again. The vivid red glow, slightly pulsing. She was precisely right. Three minutes had passed and she could hear the big car pull into the drive, the smooth grumble of the garage door. The engine turned off. The key would be going in the door. The happy, successful husband returning to his lovely family.

  Tessa gazed down at her glass of red wine. It was entirely untouched.

  If her marriage ended she wanted it ended soberly. For the right reasons.

  She needed to be sharp. Didn’t she?

  Tessa took a big gulp of the wine.

  Dan was coming down the hall. She could hear his footsteps in the living room, the sound of him probably looking for her.

  ‘I’m in the kitchen!’ Tessa called out. Loudly. Too loudly.

  Hiding her fears.

  Moments later he appeared, smiling, good-looking: the man she had desired, until recently. Another image from Disneyland rose in her mind from nowhere, Dan and the boys buying ice cream from Mickey Mouse, and giggling. Dan tousling Oscar’s hair. Could this same man really be involved in Kath’s suicide bid? What had he done that made his own sister run away?

  ‘Hello, darling.’ He raised his hands to tousle his hair, dark and wet from the rain. ‘Bitch of a day. Horrible trip. I sooooo need a sharpener.’

  As usual, he made strai
ght for the cupboards, took out a big tumbler. Then he went to the shelf, grabbed a bottle, poured a generous shot of Williams gin. Turning to the fridge, he grabbed a tray of ice, clunked his tumbler full of ice cubes, and drowned it all with Fever Tree tonic. The sugar-free kind.

  This was his evening ritual. He thought this was a normal evening.

  Tessa stared at him as he rummaged in the fridge. He had no idea.

  ‘Where are the lemons? Where do they go? Ah, wait, here you are, you citrusy little slut. Flaunting yourself by the milk.’

  He turned as he dropped the lemon slice in his drink; he smiled and glanced at her wine as he sat down at the wooden counter.

  ‘I can make you something stronger, as well, if you like. Keep out the winter blues?’

  She ignored his offer, without a smile. He shrugged. She looked him in the eye. ‘Dan,’ she said, very calmly, ‘Tell me what really happened that day, the day after Kath had her accident.’

  He gazed back at her with a puzzled frown. And a puzzled chuckle. The ice cubes rattled in his glass as he laughed, and sipped.

  It’s fake, she thought, it’s all bloody fake, the frown, the laughter, the sense of bewilderment. She said nothing but waited for him to realize.

  His chuckle faded. ‘What? Why the fuck are we back to this?’

  ‘Tell me.’

  He took another swift hit of his gin. ‘Oh God. Enough. Ça suffit. I told you. Jesus Bleeding Christ.’

  ‘Told me what?’

  ‘I drove back fast, with the guy with the Aston.’

  She nodded. ‘So if I call him, call this rich guy in Padstow, he will back up your story?’

  The frown returned. ‘Yes. Of course. Because it’s the damn truth. Jesus, what is this detective crap? You know, you should buy a magnifying glass. Deerstalker hat. Try injecting cocaine.’ He looked at her. ‘Oh come on, Tessa. This is a joke. I’m joking, can we move on?’

  Tessa shook her head, bleakly. ‘When you first told me that story, you said that this rich guy, Alex Delaney, lived in Truro, not Padstow.’

  Dan was silent for several seconds. Then he laughed slightly drunkenly, the gin beginning to hit. ‘For fuck’s sake. I forgot! And who gives a scintilla of a shit, anyhow? Padstow. Fowey. St Mawes. Somewhere with yachty idiots in deck shoes. Somewhere rich, on the Cornish coast.’

  ‘But where?’

  ‘I don’t know! And I don’t bloody know, my beloved wife, because he dropped me off, he had another hour to go, down the A30—’ Dan sighed, loftily. ‘Christ, Tessa I’m not lying about this, I’m not bloody lying about the day my sister nearly died. That’s not my style.’

  Yes, you are lying, Tessa thought, I know it. I need to prove it. And then I might have to leave you.

  And yet, even as she thought this, Tessa’s resolution began to crumble. She thought of her boys, having their sleepover: did she want them to come back to a broken home, to a fatherless house, to a divorce, or something much, much worse? She thought of the parrot that said Arrr.

  She thought of Charlie, laughing, at the parrot, and Dan ruffling his hair.

  Tessa drank some more wine. She was scared but determined. ‘It’s not just your lies,’ she continued. ‘There are witnesses. Eyewitnesses. I have proof.’

  And now as she said this, she saw for the first time something different in Dan’s eyes: a brief and passing hint of fear.

  Tessa hastened, seizing the moment: ‘Your sister Kath says she saw you in your Lexus, driving into the Two Bridges. That day. A memory that’s come back to her. So you were there, at the Two Bridges, that day. December thirtieth. And when she saw you, she ran away. Why?’

  Dan shook his head. Rather contemptuously, he finished his gin, and went over to the counter to get the gin bottle.

  This is what he did before, Tessa thought, this is how he buys time to concoct lies, to fashion explanations, he’s like an actor using a prop.

  Here it came. His glass was refilled, and he turned back to the table.

  ‘For God’s sake, my sister has amnesia, Tessa. You’re a psychologist. She has brain trauma. She’s not herself.’ He sank some cold gin, half smiling. ‘You told me she has hallucinations: she actually thinks she saw our dead mother hanging around bus stops – maybe she sees fucking witches flying across Huckerby during the full moon, how can you possibly rely on her—’

  ‘Because she was telling the truth, I am sure of it. Because, as you say, I am a psychologist. It’s what I do.’

  ‘Sure, but you’re not a fucking mind-reader, Tessa. Holy Christ, enough of this DCI Kinnersley shite. Put down your evidence bag and get a grip.’ He was almost shouting now, and there was real fury in his voice, fury designed to scare her off, to make her drop it. ‘Stop this, Tessa. Stop it!’

  Was that an actual threat? Tessa steeled herself and sat back, in case. He was quiet, scowling. Waiting for her to yield. But she would not yield. It was time for her to finish this off. To present him with evidence he could not wave away.

  ‘Dan, you need to let me speak, and you need to listen, because there’s more.’

  And this time she saw it for sure. A flinching, a glimpse of deep anxiety. A faked smile of confidence he did not actually feel. And he was drinking gin too quickly. He always drank fast but this was different. He was unnerved. She went for it.

  ‘I spoke to the nurse at the AMU in Derriford Hospital. Nurse Davis. Do you remember that name?’

  Her husband blinked, once, twice, then firmly shook his head.

  ‘No.’

  ‘She’s a young Welsh nurse. She was the one who phoned you, Dan, who phoned you from the hospital to tell you Kath was in a coma. She first phoned you, apparently, at eleven thirty a.m. And you were at Kath’s bedside by noon. I suppose it is possible you drove from central London to Plymouth in thirty minutes, but that would mean your friend’s Aston Martin averaged, ooh, six hundred miles per hour, and in that case, yes, you’re right, I do think you would have got speedcammed once or twice, don’t you?’

  His smile was entirely gone. Dan looked queasy. A tiny tremble disturbed the corner of his mouth. Tessa calmed herself, and prepared herself. It was time for her exaggeration, but she needed it, so she could get his confession. The truth. At last.

  ‘I confirmed with Nurse Davis, Dan. She has all the official hospital case notes, written down at the time. She quoted the conversation with you, as it’s all on record. Because you told her where you were when she rang, you told her where you’d stayed.’ A big deliberate pause. ‘And you were at Two Bridges Hotel. On the night Kath drove into Burrator. It’s all written down. At the hospital. In a file.’

  The refrigerator hummed. It was the only noise in the room. Dan was wholly silent. He finished his gin and gazed into his glass.

  Tessa waited.

  Dan went back to the counter and poured a third large glass of Williams, but this time he did it with a distinct air of resignation, leaning over, his palms flat on the counter. He was defeated, she’d got him, she’d proved his lies. She’d won.

  But still the worst remained to be uncovered. Why was he lying? She still didn’t understand the depth of his involvement. Did he meet Kath that night, and if he did, what did he do, or say, or reveal? And why had she run away from him?

  ‘Sit down, Dan. This is very, very serious. You need to be entirely honest now or I will never speak to you again. I will ask for a divorce and I will fight you for the boys and I will get them. I’ll take the house. I’ll take it all.’

  Dan sat down. Obedient, and subdued, like an admonished child. A different man. ‘Go on,’ he said, quietly.

  ‘I need to know,’ Tessa said. ‘This isn’t any old marital lie, Dan Kinnersley. This is a lie that involves the near drowning of your sister.’

  He squinted at her as if trying to work something out. Then he gasped. ‘Oh my God! You really do think I was actually involved, don’t you? You think that somehow all this links with Kath’s suicide attempt. You think I caused it, you think—�
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  ‘Of course I bloody think that!’ Tessa was shouting now, she didn’t care if she got the neighbours calling the police – the police were probably coming anyway, they might be coming for her lying husband. ‘What do you expect me to fucking think? The night your sister drives into deep water on Dartmoor you lie about your whereabouts, you say you were in London but you were on Dartmoor!’ Tessa slapped the table hard: so hard it stung her hand. ‘And, what’s more, there’s no record of you actually staying in that hotel. I checked with their reception, so your movements that night are a total mystery, except we know that from late evening to mid-morning you were somewhere around Kath, the very same time she made her fucking inexplicable suicide bid. And we know that she was scared of you, because she ran away from you.’ Tessa leaned forward, spitting her words. ‘So what did you do, Dan? Did you meet her that night, did you say something, do something? What did you do to your own fucking sister that would make her try and take her own life? What did you do?’

  As she shouted these last words, Tessa swept her arm angrily, sending the wine glass spinning on to the slate kitchen floor, smashing it into a thousand satisfying shards, the way she wanted to smash this marriage.

  There. Done. Broken. Fuck it.

  Yet the noise and shock seemed to purge something in her. She felt herself calm. And as she calmed, she noticed that Dan was looking her right in the eye, with an expression she had not seen before. Ever.

  Sadness. Resignation.

  ‘OK, you’re right.’

  ‘How am I right?’

  ‘I lied about that night.’

  She stared at him. ‘How? Tell me everything!’

  ‘I lied. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I lied. I’ve been lying. And I’ve been lying for a year.’ He searched her gaze, imploringly, looking for sympathy. ‘But please, believe me. I had absolutely nothing to do with what happened to Kath. I didn’t see her that night, that afternoon. I didn’t see or talk to her at all.’

  ‘So what bloody happened? Why were you at Two Bridges, yet there’s no record of you staying? Why and how are you lying?’