by Corri Lee
“You can’t possibly know that.”
“Yes, I can.”
“How?”
The terse atmosphere drained out of the entire house, leaving us standing in a dead aired vessel of ugly resentment. Blaze’s head lowered, reality dawning on him with a harsh, infernal light. The many layers of his positivity stripped away under the intense heat. Everything I thought I knew and understood about the absolute love of my life was eviscerated. I was completely unprepared for what happened next.
“You didn’t kill Natasha, Emmeline.” Blaze blew out a slow breath, taking several steps backwards that seemed to created an enormous, impassable gulf of distance between us. “Because I did.”
On a sharp inhale, Blaze took a further step back from me and changed. The restlessness faded to hopelessness. I knew it because I’d been the same at times—so furious one minute but so resigned the next. I stared at him open-mouthed as he dropped to the floor and curled up into a little ball of shame and guilt. I’d never seen him look so small.
“It’s the first time I’ve had to say that out loud.”
“Is this where you break into one of your great monologues and recount a scene of my life from your side? I don’t think I have the mental fortitude to handle that right now.”
“No, cupcake. Jeez. We don’t have time for that. But if you’ll let me, I’ll explain myself.”
By silent agreement, he continued. An explanation did sound ideal—he kept talking of time but it seemed to be standing still that day, pausing at crucial moments to prolong the suffering.
“Forgive me if sometimes I sound a little extreme but—”
“We’ve both just admitted to the same murder, I think we’re past extreme.”
“Fair point.” Ever the insufferable fidget, Blaze moved across the floor to grab the latest bottle of wine I’d been nursing and poured us both a glass. “You know, I’m absolutely slaughtered.”
Knew it. Saying so at least made me smile. “I know.”
“Yeah... I guess it’d be best to start from the beginning but you already know about all that. So maybe, we go from the point when you and I had been together a little while—from the masquerade ball. The morning after, actually. When I found out you were a Tudor.”
“Sounds great, but you said this wasn’t a monologue.”
“I lied.”
Blaze shook off his blazer and laid it on the floor next to him, inviting me to sit on it like a picnic blanket. In a moment so strangely sedate, it would have felt rude not to. Once at his side, Blaze took my hand and wove our fingers together. It was the same hand and grip I’d always known and loved. If he felt the same, nothing had changed between us.
“Until I decided to give you your ring, I’d done my best to keep Natasha at the back of my mind, but I knew it would always pose a problem. The plan had always been to sit it out and stick with her to prove I was the better man they swore I wasn’t, but it was no longer an option.”
“You knew? You knew all along about their bet.”
“Guilty as charged. They didn’t realise I was in the house and I overheard them.”
“And her MS?”
Blaze squinted at me, slowly shaking his head. “You know, I’m almost insulted that you really thought I was that stupid. I made the mistake of becoming empathetic far too early. Young, stupid and mostly drunk, I did believe Natasha when she said she could only take next of kin to appointments, so we were married before I got to sit in. She’d been sketchy on the details of her illness—’something neurological’, she said. The moment I heard the words ‘multiple sclerosis, I knew I’d been screwed over.
“So I stuck around in defiance, keeping home-life and work separate. Then Tasha’s father died and she had a massive relapse. I guess now I know that Mona contesting the will probably had a lot to do with that. I had to become her carer, so she became a job. It was easy that way until I met you.
“I had to get out of that marriage, but it was such a big deal to me to get what I’d earned. If I went in there and told them I knew everything, I’d be kicked out with nothing. It felt like chasing a hopeless cause until I met that old woman in the hospital. Do you remember?”
“ ‘Fuck it’.”
“Right. I told Natasha about you and she was that in love with me, she supported anything that made me happy. Mona took her abroad to see an MS specialist, and I got to spend all that time with you. It was awesome and I fell for you more every day. I knew I wanted to marry you, I just needed to figure out how.”
“This story isn’t starting from The Roses.”
“Shut up. When I saw Henry that morning after the ball—” Blaze paused, letting me revel in what felt like a minuscule victory. “When I found out he was your dad, I was relieved. Henry had always helped me out before and was always willing to help again. I took him for that walk around the hotels garden, told him everything about Natasha. He wasn’t exactly happy that I’d gotten married and not told him, but he agreed to help me as long as I told you I had a wife. I was fully prepared to do that, but Tallulah got there first.
“He didn’t think that damage was irreparable. He called me the next day with his plan.”
“Murder Natasha.”
“Murder is such an ugly word. The way he said it was, ‘aid the passing you’ve been led to expect.’ I’d been playing clueless so long even you believed it, and I’d acted so long that I’d be able to grieve convincingly. We could have done it as soon as she came back from Normandy, if I could only get you to hold on long enough to do it before I told you about her. If you didn’t know, you had no motive. You were safe from blame when her family became suspicious.
“As odd luck would have it, you already knew and you left me over it. You removed yourself from the picture completely. Henry was convinced you’d be back and was keen to stick with our plan—which would be even easier to pull off if I was lovesick. But I felt so demotivated and depressed that I didn’t go back to Natasha’s house at all. I couch-surfed until you were gone, not really caring if I was penniless, homeless and dirtier than a hobo.”
Blaze took a break from talking to empty his glass and refill it. Mine hadn’t yet touched my lips, my attention acutely focused on fitting all this new information around what I’d already known.
A murder plot led by my father. The implications were horrendous. I felt almost guilty that it hadn’t been conducted by a callous killer, but by a dad who just wanted to secure happiness for his broken little girl.
“I can’t even explain how it felt when you came back.” Blaze wiped the residue of wine from his mouth and stuck his bottom lip out thoughtfully. “I couldn’t really believe it for a while. After it sunk in that you were staying, I filed for divorce and asked nothing of Natasha but a signature. She refused to sign the petition, insisting that we could all live together in harmony and she’d die soon so there was no need for courts.
“Then you said you’d let me continue being her carer so long as I came home every night. It was all very cushy and put up a great front of unity should anyone have ever found out about her. We moved into your flat and were like any other couple. Until Japan.
“Finally telling me you loved me... My priorities changed. I wanted to marry you right away. Natasha had to disappear. There was no more time to wait, no reason not to get the plan back on track. Are you ready for this to get ugly?”
No. What kind of woman wanted to hear about how her fiancé killed off his wife just to put a ring on her finger? As far as hearing that story went, I was as unready as I’d ever be. “Okay, go ahead.”
“Okay...” He sighed and puffed out his cheeks, releasing the air with a muted ‘pop’. “In the days after Hunter’s wedding and the time we were in New York, Henry put in a lot of work to tie up all loose ends and set your own ingenious plan into motion. Again, without knowing anything, you made yourself look like an upstanding, honest person and removed yourself as a suspect—for the most part. For that little part of doubt, we protected y
ou by intentionally keeping you in the dark. If you were questioned, there was nothing to inveigle out of you. You were in the clear.
“Most of Henry’s effort went into removing further suspicion. Foremost, housing. We were the illegitimate couple existing alongside a sick, rich woman, living in a squat. We’d have benefited a lot from Natasha’s death, and that right there is motive. There was still work being done on your studio and only so much that could be rushed through. He had the suite in the hotel vacated, waiting for us as temporary accommodation.”
“Wait, so when I suggested getting our own place last December—”
“Yes. This was planned. I always knew I’d get us here. While we were at Natasha’s dinner party, Henry and some removal men were boxing up and moving everything out of the flat. Anyone who might have been spying would have seen us moving out before Natasha died. I’d planned to take you out to the house the morning after the dinner party. It was perfect.”
“But not ugly.” There was a distinct lack of obscene cruelty I’d built myself up for. In fact, it was all very clinical and understated; the most well-meaning murder of all time.
“It was ugly living it. It was ugly having to visit Henry at his office to talk about how to kill her. Making it look like suicide was the only way to get around it, so we sourced a pharmacy in India that sold Natasha’s sleeping tablets online. Just when we were wondering how to get them into her, Natasha suggested that you and I go to her house so you could meet her. It was still too close quarters, so I twisted it around somehow to make her think that it had been my idea, and from a spontaneous jolt of inspiration, I invited your friends. A house full of people increases the suspects, but it also makes questioning a longer process, biding us time Henry could use to cover my tracks. Then we got there and she’d rallied her friends and family in. An even longer list to get through.”
We were quiet again, so I took the chance to set things straight in my mind. Things I’d taken as knee-jerk reactions—like being moved out of my flat—were not results of my family believing I’d die. They were part of a bigger scheme between the two most prominent male figures to place my life somewhere better than it was.
“So we’re at the dinner party,” I whispered, staring down into my still unsipped wine. “The end of the story.”
Blaze looked down at my hand and let it go, the way I’d have done in a moment of self-depreciation. “I crushed the tablets before we left the flat while you were working. The cleaning team who went in after the removal guys would have wiped away all traces of powder left over. I slipped a little bit into every drink Natasha had that night, then mixed the rest into the cream on her cheesecake, using your cupcake as an excuse to be in the kitchen. I was in high spirits, truly believing the end was nigh.
“But then we told her about the consummation clause for divorce and she caught me out with the statutory rape thing. As soon as she pulled that out of the bag, everyone on our side of the table had motive again. I told her I didn’t care, even though it felt like the whole thing was fucked. I’d tried to just save you but instead, I put everyone in danger. You were reeling, your friends were confused and Natasha had a truckload of drugs swimming around in her blood stream. It couldn’t get any worse.
“And yet it did. Some sadistic higher power threw down the worst tragedy in my life, and yet the best caveat of all.”
“I tried to kill myself.”
Blaze’s thumb rubbed across my inner wrist and he shuddered, as if feeling it triggered the memory again. “About the same time Natasha breathed her last, yes. She’d gone to bed straight after her closest friends, mother and sister had watched me tell her she’d never have me. She slipped away to her room depressed and never woke up. You wouldn’t be suspected, I wouldn’t, nor would any of our friends.
“It sickens me to say it, but what you did that night saved my ass. Things I might have had to do like report her death were shoved aside for you. As a result, nobody found her body until the next morning. You saved us both from what could have been a gruesome fate.
“But I could never see it that way. Sitting on that kitchen floor, holding you, covered in your blood and watching you die... It felt like payback and I’ve regretted what I did ever since. I’ve tried to redeem myself these past eight weeks—convince myself that I deserved to have you here, alive, with me, the murderer. And all I’ve done is wrong you, so blinded by my own guilt that I couldn’t see this happening to you. If I’d had a single clue that you would end up feeling responsible, Natasha would still be alive.” Blaze pulled a face and shook his head. “Maybe.”
“What do you mean, ‘maybe’?”
“The toxicology results were much different to what I was expecting. She’d ingested far more than I had slipped her. Maybe double. She did actually try and kill herself, but nobody knows who gave her the pill that finished her off.”
“Or if it was me.”
We would never know who’d really killed her. It would be mystery that spanned the ages and we’d go on living like no harm had ever been done. What I’d spent weeks believing would tear us apart instead provoked truth and brought us together into this... Very strange but calm new place. I never had to live another day scared that Blaze would find out what I’d done and hate me, and neither did he. Our relationship was truer and somehow purer than ever.
“I tried to bribe her into the divorce, you know. I figured it out about the MS straight away and said I’d tell you if she didn’t sign.”
“Good.” Blaze put his arm around my shoulders and urged my head to lean against him. It felt good to be close to him again with a clear conscience. It felt better to know we’d fought the same battle in our own ways and won.
“God, what monsters we are. We take lives in cold blood and excuse it with feeble reasons of love and virtue. We are damned to Hell... No. Hell is damned to us.”
“I’d like to be on the throne next to you when we overpower the Underworld, Emmeline. We deserve peace now the war is over.”
That sounded nice, but I was still lingering in a life-pause. Time had not yet begun to pass again, we were still frozen in this nightmare with no way out in sight. “Where do we go from here?”
“Up, Emmeline. It’s the only way.” To make his point, Blaze stood and pulled me up with him. “Now outside, down an aisle, to the bar, to a Caribbean island, then Chicago. Then who knows where. Will you walk with me, cupcake? We’ve been through Hell and back already. Next stop, a well-earned happy ending with no regrets. If you won’t, all of this was for nothing.”
Of course I would. In the worst and best ways, we were so well-matched. He was the lighter side of my blackened soul and in return, I was his. He was the reason I’d abandoned one identity to forge another, I was his reason to break free of oppression.
Our respective crimes would tie us together more strongly than any number of promises. We had both shown incredible strength and perseverance over the months. Yes, we had earned this.
I slipped my hand around the curve of his arm and let him lead me out of the house towards my future mother-in-law’s garden to take the vows we’d already proven that we could uphold.
For better, for worse,
For richer, for poorer,
In sickness and in health,
Until death do us part.
Nobody’s death but our own.
acknowledgements
NOTEABLE MENTIONS
Jaguar
BMW
Mercedes
Brokeback Mountain
Star Trek
‘Misery loves company.’
From Stephen King’s ‘Misery’
Mack the Knife
Frank ‘Ol Blue Eyes’ Sinatra
Thnks Fr Th Mmrs
Fallout Boy
‘Knowing is half the battle.’
From G.I. Joe
Lisbeth (Salander)
From Steig Larsons ‘The Girl Who Played With Fire’
Weak
Skunk Anansie
Cygnet
Gremlins
Optimus Prime
From ‘Transformers’
Bentley
‘Knowledge is power’
Buffy The Vampire Slayer
Panic! At The Disco
‘To fear love is to fear life.’
From Bertrand Russell
Ironman
DC Comics
Marvel Comics
Stan Lee
Jar Jar Binks
James Cameron
‘I was wishing that I could believe you were real. And I was wishing that I wasn’t afriad’
From ‘The Twilight Saga’s character, Bella Swan
Glory Box
Portishead
Don’t Know Why
Norah Jones
University of London
Roxy (Hart)
From ‘Chicago’
She-Ra
Converse
Spiderman
Blackberry