Bremer looked pleased. ‘Good.’ Picking up his half-drunk coffee, he stood. ‘And then, when Nell gets in we’ll see where we are with O’Brian. We’re going to have to bring Gloria in, but I want to think of the best way to do it. Strikes me she’s going to be easily spooked.’
And Carla thought that was a pretty fair assumption to make.
Gerry was in the canteen. He rose when he saw Carla, enveloping her in a bear hug, before sitting down across from her.
‘Sorry I didn’t say goodbye last night,’ he said when they’d taken their seats.
‘No worries. I did look for you, but you’d gone.’
‘Yeah, it was only a quick catch-up …’
‘With your old mate,’ Carla finished for him.
He smiled and they let the lie sit there for a moment before he said, ‘Can I get you a coffee?’
‘No thanks.’
He looked questioningly at her. ‘What’s on your mind? Is it the letter?’
Carla picked a grain of sugar from the table with her finger. ‘Eve said you told her to bring it to us?’
He sighed, leaned back in his chair and folded his arms over his stomach. ‘I did. She didn’t want to, being Eve, but the reference to the case she was working on worried me. I mean, how would the letter writer know?’ His brow creased in thought. ‘It just struck me as more sinister than the rest, like someone was watching her closely, stalking her almost.’
‘But Eve doesn’t feel threatened?’
‘Eve just thinks it’s part of the job. She’s convinced it’s just some nutjob letting off a bit of steam.’
‘But you don’t think that?’
Gerry rubbed the back of his neck. ‘I did, until this last letter. Now I’m not so sure.’
It suddenly occurred to Carla that Gerry was referring to letters, plural. ‘So Eve has had others?’
Gerry’s hand stopped moving. He studied her for a moment before leaning forward, hands together on the table, pointing towards Carla. ‘There have been five before this.’
‘Five. Jesus, Gerry, why didn’t you tell me?’
He held up his hands. ‘It wasn’t my business to. They were sent to Eve; it was for her to decide if they warranted police action. I have them all in my office for when she feels able to show them to you all, but until then they are staying there.’ His voice told Carla this wasn’t up for discussion, but she pushed him anyway.
‘Why keep them in your office then, if you don’t want them seen?’
‘Because Eve wanted them out of the house, but I didn’t want to throw them away, so it seemed the obvious place.’
‘So there was something in them that made you worried? For you to keep them, I mean?’
Gerry smiled. ‘You’ll make a detective yet, Brown.’ He sighed before continuing. ‘They contain personal information, stuff we both don’t really want gossiped about. They weren’t threatening, but I considered it would be best to keep them in case they became so.’
‘Which they have.’
‘Yes.’
‘I need to see the letters, Gerry.’
He shook his head. ‘No way. Not until Eve’s ready.’
Carla sat back, exasperated. ‘Gerry, this is serious. Whoever is writing them may be involved in Connor O’Brian’s murder. I need to see the others – all of them.’
‘Carla, I can’t without Eve’s say-so.’
‘She agreed to one – she must have known the others would come out.’
Gerry looked sceptical.
‘You got her to show us the latest one, so you may as well give us the rest.’
She kept her eyes on him, but he still hesitated.
‘You’re not going to make me get a court order, are you?’ She laughed, Gerry didn’t, because they both knew she could.
‘I’ll get them for you,’ he said, pushing back his chair to stand. ‘But let me tell Eve first, OK?’
‘Of course,’ she smiled, ‘and thanks, Gerry.’
Seventeen
Then
Alf’s Café is a mix of old and new. The tables and chairs are totally 1970s, but the photos on the wall are present-day and I wonder if he’s taken them himself: black and white, the odd moody colour shot, all depicting shadows from people lying in the sun.
As I examine each picture I wonder why he doesn’t want actual people in them, but adults are strange and get odd fixations, so this is probably one of his. Shame, though. Surely people are more important than their shadows?
‘Ice-cream waffle?’ Alf’s voice fills the café. I stop looking at the photographs and check to see what Aoife says. She’s sitting on the counter, legs swinging.
‘Sure,’ making it sound like it’s not the biggest treat we’ve had since we got here. ‘With sprinkles?’
Alf grins. His teeth fall all over each other and I’m not sure where one starts and another stops, but his eyes are bright like a cat’s, so I can’t help but smile.
‘Sprinkles it is,’ he says.
We eat warm waffles dripping with ice cream as Alf quizzes us about our families.
‘So, you have a dad?’
Aoife shrugs.
‘And what about your mum?’
Aoife points to my plastered arm, her mouth full, and while I’m annoyed about the inaccuracy – it was after all my dad who broke it – I can sort of see her point. Where is my mum?
Alf is watching our exchange. He’s standing behind the gallery kitchen divide, hands behind, like he’s about to pull himself up onto the work surface. But of course he won’t: too much effort, too much weight, even I can see that.
When we’re finished eating Aoife says we should go, but rain is pounding the windows so hard it’s almost impossible to believe they won’t crack.
‘You want a lift?’
‘It’s OK, we’ll be fine.’
I know why she doesn’t want him driving us. It’s because he’ll see where we live and then we’ll just be another pair of care-home girls – rejects, unlovable, unwanted – and she wants to hold on to us just being us for a little bit longer. And I want to as well. I feel like I’ve been floating around on the edges, like it wouldn’t matter if I just upped and died, because who would notice? Who would care? But here in this café, I feel seen. I’m stapled to the floor, I belong, and I don’t know if it’s being here with Aoife, or the way Alf listens to us chat – as if what we say really matters – or just sugar from all the waffles, but it’s how I feel and I like it.
Alf reaches for his car keys and I see a flash of panic from Aoife, but suddenly I know Alf won’t mind where we’re from, I just know it. I tug at her sleeve. ‘Come on, it’s fine.’
She looks doubtful, but then Alf says, ‘Big house on the end of Roseway Drive, yeah?’
Aoife looks up and I grin. See, I knew it! He already knows where we live and while a little bit of me feels like we must have a stamp on our heads or something, the rest of me just feels relieved. He knows where we’re from and he doesn’t care.
‘What do you think of him?’ Aoife asks.
‘Fat,’ I say, and we fall backwards onto her bed, laughing. When we stop Aoife turns to face me, hand on her cheek.
‘What did your dad do to you to make you come here?’ she asks. ‘Can’t just be a broken arm – they don’t put you here for that.’
I feel the waffle in my stomach churn. When I don’t reply Aoife sighs and lies back down.
‘My dad did it too. I think most dads do. Men are just made that way, I suppose.’
I try not to think of mine, of his smell, the stubble on his face.
‘Did your mum know?’
I turn to stare at her. ‘No.’
Aoife looks unconvinced, so I repeat myself.
‘No.’
She gives a small shrug. ‘Most do, they just don’t want to admit it. I mean, unless your dad was really clever, but I doubt it.’ She yawns. ‘Mine didn’t bother hiding it and Mum couldn’t have cared less. Got him off her back.’
&nb
sp; I want to cry so I push my fingernails into the palms of my hands. It’s strange to think of other people walking around with the same feeling of cement in their stomach, the same dread as the footsteps get closer, pretending to be asleep but still feeling the hand on your shoulder to wake you. I feel a little bit lighter knowing Aoife understands. ‘Do you miss your mum?’
‘God, no. She’s worse than him. At least with my dad I got to know what was coming. Mum was all nicey-nicey one minute, then the next, bam.’ She punched her hand into the pillow.
‘She hit you?’ At least my mum hadn’t done that. The worst she’d done was let him do it.
‘Yeah. But I didn’t mind that so much as the silence. The pretending I wasn’t even there. However much I said “Mum”, she’d ignore me until I was so desperate to be seen I’d throw a tantrum and then she’d hit me.’ She was staring at the ceiling. ‘My own fault then, really.’
I don’t know if it was or not. There are so many rules adults give you, rules that seem to switch daily, it’s impossible to keep up with them all, however hard you try. And just when you think you’ve got the hang of one, it goes and changes, and you’re back to square one.
‘What do you want to be when you’re an adult?’ I ask. She thinks for a while and I get sleepy waiting.
‘Dunno. A scientist.’
I almost laugh. ‘You need to go to school for that.’
‘I’ll pull it off. I can do anything.’ She speaks with such certainty it doesn’t occur to me to think she won’t.
‘Like one in a white coat and lab glasses?’ I ask.
‘Maybe. Or a renowned physician who travels the world lecturing people on how clever they are.’
‘Why a scientist?’ I’ve never met anyone who wanted to be that before; it seems as impossible as being an astronaut or the prime minister.
‘I went to hospital once, after boyfriend number two broke my leg, and when I asked why they were taking my blood and what they were going to do with it, they pushed me to the lab so I could see. It was amazing. This big room with bottles and machines and a woman was there in a white coat and a clear face mask. She took my tube of blood and showed me how they can find out every little thing about you just from one drop, like our whole lives are there in that little speck, telling her if I like baked beans or if I’m going to die when I eat a peanut.’
She’s speaking so fast I can barely keep up, her expression caught up in the memory of it.
‘You can find out all this stuff about people from one tiny bit of them, then solve all their problems, like you’re a god or something.’ She grins at me. ‘Or a superhero. I want to be a scientist superhero!’ She raises her fist and I laugh.
‘What do you want to be?’ she asks.
I want to be a mum; I want to love my kid more than anything else on earth. And I want to love other people’s kids, kids who don’t have enough love themselves so haven’t any to spare. But I don’t tell Aoife this, it seems silly when she has such grand things lined up for her life.
‘Not sure yet. Probably a teacher or something.’
Aoife nods, then yawns. ‘I’m tired.’ She moves her head slightly, so she can see me. ‘Shall we go and see Alf again tomorrow? Get more waffles?’
I grin. ‘For sure.’
‘He’s nice, isn’t he?’
‘Yes.’
We sit for a while, swapping stories about our mums until I feel almost better about mine.
‘Do you believe in God?’ Aoife suddenly asks. She points to the Bible by my bed and I notice her nails are encrusted with dirt. I shake my head.
‘We all get them. When we arrive. You’ll have one in your drawer.’ I nod to the side of the room where she sleeps and the little brown wooden box by her bed. She doesn’t follow my eyes and instead throws my Bible to the floor.
‘God doesn’t exist. He’s just made up by adults who want to control us.’
I’m surprised by how angry she sounds. ‘Control us?’
She squints at me as if I’m half mad. ‘Of course, dumbo. They pretend God made all these rules that we must follow and use them to punish us when we don’t. So they get to be in the right when they’re beating on you, because they are doing it to make God love you.’ She leans in closer and I smell sweetness on her breath. ‘But it’s a lie.’ Her Irish accent is thicker now, and I struggle to make out her words.
‘You know why my mum had me?’
It’s not really a question, so I wait for the answer.
‘She had me because God said it was bad if she got rid of me. But God lets her boyfriends put me in hospital? Let her lock me out of the house all night because they don’t want me around? What sort of God is that?’ She stops speaking and lies still, her breathing hard and fast. I take her hand and we stay like that until her breathing slows. After a while she picks up her torch and a book. Pushing pillows behind her, she half sits and opens at the first page.
I lie with my head on her stomach and listen to her tell me stories before sleep pulls me down. As I drift away I make her promise to read every night. She strokes my hair.
‘Sure thing, dumbo.’
‘I don’t mind you calling me “dumbo”,’ I whisper.
And when I wake in the morning, Aoife strewn across me like a rag doll, I realise it’s the very first night in my life I haven’t wet the bed.
Eighteen
Gerry walked back into the canteen carrying a brown envelope. Taking his seat, he pushed it across the table to Carla.
‘We’ve had six letters in total. Started six months ago and there doesn’t seem to be a pattern as to when they’re delivered.’
‘Posted?’ Carla pulled out a pile of paper.
‘No, arrived by hand.’ He pointed to the first letter in the pile. ‘That was the last one Eve got, until the new one. Four weeks ago.’
‘Are they threatening?’
‘More …’ he searched for the right word, ‘… a warning. No explicit threat or I’d have made her go to the police,’ he added. ‘Go on. Read one. Let me know what you think.’
Carla picked out a typewritten page, noted the same typeface, the same font size as the letter in the office.
Dear Eve,
I want you to know I understand and that your husband has reminded me of the reasons why you’ve behaved as you have. These are clear, but, of course, I can’t excuse what you’ve done.
I wanted to tell you the death you struggle with will never go away. But you can’t continue to use it to attack others. Your grief must find its own course, find whatever way it needs to expunge the anger it creates, but I won’t be the recipient of your anger, no more than I should be anyway.
Carla stopped reading. ‘They say they met you?’
‘I know. I’ve gone over and over it and I can’t think who it could be. I’ve never spoken about Eve with anyone.’
Why were his eyes averted? Why was he tapping the plastic spoon on the table?
‘So I wondered if they’d got the wrong person, but the tone suggests they know Eve. At least on some level.’ He looked at her. ‘Could it be a stalker? That sort of thing?’
Carla knew he didn’t believe it – or expect her to. The references were too specific. Whoever was writing these knew Eve, knew her life, and knew it well, even without taking into account the O’Brian reference in the most recent letter.
‘They mention Eve’s “situation”,’ she said. ‘Any idea what that refers to?’
Gerry shook his head. ‘No. There is no situation, not that I know of anyway.’
‘And Eve is OK?’
Gerry leaned back, folded his arms. ‘In what way?’
‘Well, anything happened recently to make her on edge? Or something that could have triggered the letter writing?’
‘Nothing. Our lives are as they always are: work, dinner, bed.’
Carla nodded. ‘OK.’ But she had a growing sense of unease. Gerry seemed defensive, but she couldn’t see why. Unless she wasn’t asking the quest
ions he expected her to ask. But then what were the ones he wanted?
‘And the death the writer refers to, Eve’s grief, do you know what that might be?’
He flinched.
‘Gerry?’
He sighed and put his hands on his thighs. ‘It’s partly why Eve didn’t want the police involved. It’s a very private and upsetting thing.’
She waited for him to continue, but when he didn’t she said, ‘It may help me to know? It may help us find out who is writing these letters.’
‘I doubt it.’ He took hold of the half-empty coffee cup and moved it a little to the right, then tapped his finger on the rim. ‘We had a baby. It died.’
‘Oh Gerry, I’m so sorry.’
He shrugged, eyes on the table. ‘Eve miscarried. Four times.’
‘My God, Gerry.’ She felt winded. What words could she muster that would do justice to a pain like that?
‘We stopped trying after the last one. Couldn’t stand the hurt.’
‘I’m sorry.’ The words felt so insignificant it was almost as if she hadn’t said them at all.
‘It’s OK. It was a long time ago and we’ve both made peace with it. Well, I think I have; Eve sometimes still struggles. It doesn’t help, of course, that we haven’t told people. She has no one to confide in and I think she feels she’s exhausted the subject with me. Which she hasn’t. I’ll talk about it with her whenever she wants,’ he added. ‘But as time passed she just buried it away in her heart and sealed it up.’
Carla felt a wave of guilt: guilt for never imagining Eve as a mother; guilt she could probably have a baby but was actively trying not to; guilt she was lying to Baz about it; and guilt she was making Gerry talk about it now.
‘Hey.’ He reached across the table and touched her hand. ‘You look like you’re going to cry. It’s OK, really. I’m fine. We are both fine.’
She nodded. Then thought of something. ‘You said you hadn’t told anyone.’
‘Yeah, it felt too raw, and by the time it didn’t – if that’s possible – the opportunity had passed.’
‘But then how does the letter writer know?’
Gerry frowned. ‘What?’
When I Lost You Page 9