House of Straw

by Marc Scott

  ‘Is it OK?’ Bree asked Caroline. ‘Is it OK if I tag along?’

  ‘Yeeeessss,’ the small child yelled. ‘Bree is coming with us, Mummy. Jamie’s sister is coming with us.’

  As the three of them made their way back to the car park area, Caroline gave Bree directions to the Cheeky Charlies play centre. Maisie was excited, talking at a hundred miles an hour as she described the different types of apparatus at the venue. As they walked and talked, Bree began to find some small crumbs of comfort in the fact that Jamie had saved the lives of these two people. But she still felt slightly uncomfortable in Caroline’s presence. If it had not been for her then Jamie would still be alive. She needed to find out more about that evening, why they had broken down on the railway tracks, what the hell a young child was doing out at that time of night and why Caroline never opened the car doors. She needed to try to make some sense of it all, that terrible twist of fate that had led to her brother’s death

  * * *

  The play area at Cheeky Charlies was bustling with the screams and shouts of hyperactive children. Caroline could hardly hear herself speak. ‘We go over there,’ she said loudly, pointing to a cafeteria. ‘We can still see what is happening and the kids can’t get out once they go past the barrier.’ Maisie was impatient, kicking off her shoes and throwing them at her mother’s feet, before sprinting to the secure area. Somewhere amongst the din of the overexcited youngsters was her mother’s plea for her to ‘Be careful’.

  Bree joined Caroline in the queue for refreshments as Maisie disappeared into the ball park. She could not help but comment on the clamorous atmosphere. ‘Wow! It is crazy in here,’ she said. ‘Has Maisie gone in already?’

  Caroline pointed at her daughter’s tiny feet as they disappeared at the top of a rope ladder. ‘She loves it here,’ she said. ‘She can get a bit emotional about what happened sometimes, so I find that this place helps her to remember that she is just a kid. I forget myself at times that she is only six years old.’

  Bree nodded in agreement. ‘She seems much older than her years, she seems very astute.’

  Caroline smiled. ‘She is very forward for her age. I bring her here after we visit the cemetery to try to take her mind away from what really happened. She may seem very resolute, but I know it must have been a shocking experience for her. She just seems to take everything in her stride.’ Bree pondered on those words for a few seconds, maybe wishing that she had half of the resolve that Caroline’s daughter had.

  ‘Tea or coffee?’ Caroline asked as the women reached the front of the queue. ‘Or do you want to join Maisie and have a chocolate smoothie?’

  ‘Coffee will be fine,’ Bree answered with a small smile.

  The two women took their drinks to a table close to the entrance of the ball park area. Caroline removed her coat and made herself comfortable. ‘It is a lot easier getting her in here than getting her out,’ she said. ‘She never wants to leave this place.’

  Both the women seemed to sense that there needed to be an uncomfortable conversation. Bree got things started. ‘I didn’t see your car, you know, at the cemetery.’

  ‘I sold it, just after I came to your house, I suppose it just, well, you know, it brought it all back.’

  ‘How did you find out where I lived?’ Bree asked.

  ‘It was a local newspaper, they printed the name of your road. I just sort of knocked on a few doors and someone gave me your house number.’

  ‘Was that The Herald? I can’t stand that paper. I hated what they printed. Everything they published seemed like it was made up.’

  ‘Oh, I didn’t read it that way, but then in truth I didn’t really take much in for a while after it all happened.’

  Caroline paused for a second, she wasn’t sure what to say next, but her comment did not go down very well. ‘I thought everyone was OK. I never realised that someone was still in your car.’

  Bree was angered by her comment and raised the tone of her voice a notch or two. ‘What the hell were you doing on the tracks in the first place? How on earth did you get stuck?’

  Caroline looked down at her coffee cup, trying to avoid Bree’s eye contact. ‘The car ran out of petrol,’ she said, her voice filled with remorse. ‘We just ran out of petrol.’

  ‘How?’ Bree asked. ‘How the hell does a grown woman with a child in her car put herself in danger like that? You ran out of petrol? Who the hell ever runs out of petrol these days?’

  Caroline tried her best to explain. ‘I had taken Maisie to the hospital that night. The nearest A&E was in Epsom. She was ill, she had a temperature of 105. I didn’t call an ambulance, I just panicked and put her in the car. Halfway there I realised that the petrol light had been on most of the day. I didn’t want to stop I just wanted to get her there.’

  ‘What was wrong with her?’ Bree asked.

  ‘It was just flu, a small chest infection. We were there for hours before they told me to go home. They told me just to give her some Calpol and keep an eye on her.’

  Bree was still seeking answers. ‘Why not then?’ she asked. ‘Why not stop on your way home? There must have been petrol stations open.’

  ‘Before I knew it,’ Caroline said, ‘we were coming back through Oxley. The rain was bucketing down. I thought the petrol would get us home. The main road was flooded, so we had to go through the level crossing.’ A tear or two appeared in the large lady’s eyes as she continued. ‘The car just stalled, as soon as we passed the barrier, it just stopped. I am so sorry, Bree, I can never ever tell you how sorry I am.’

  Sipping her coffee, Bree mused over Caroline’s answer. She still had more questions. ‘I banged on the side of your window, I told you what was happening, why didn’t you just get out of the car?’

  Caroline was becoming visibly upset. ‘I panicked,’ she explained. ‘I looked at all that rain. I thought, because Maisie was ill, I shouldn’t get out of the car. I didn’t know what to do. I just panicked.’

  ‘I tried to open your door, you had locked it.’

  ‘It just jammed. I didn’t know what was happening. I didn’t realise the danger we were in.’

  ‘You must have seen the train coming?’

  ‘When I looked back at your car, after it pushed us off the track, I thought I saw someone get out, I thought everyone was safe.’

  Bree shook her head. ‘No, I got out before that, Jamie was hell bent on getting you off the railway lines.’

  Caroline was shaking now, clearly remembering that awful night. ‘The train, it just came out of nowhere. It just all seemed so surreal, it just seemed to happen so quickly.’

  Bree nodded. ‘I don’t think the driver had a chance, he couldn’t have seen anything in that weather.’

  ‘He quit his job,’ Caroline declared. ‘The train driver, he was in shock for weeks. I read somewhere in one of the newspapers that he held himself responsible for what happened.’

  Bree turned up her nose at Caroline’s mention of the press. She hated the stories that the newspapers had written about the incident. ‘Probably that Herald rag again,’ she said. ‘Just scum, those reporters, evil scum!’

  Caroline agreed. ‘I know, I still have to live with what happened every day. To know that someone has given their life to save yours, that is not a burden that you can carry easily.’

  Bree tried to show some empathy. She could see that the woman was clearly still suffering from the events of that night. ‘You have to think of Maisie. You need to remember that she would not be here either. Maybe, I don’t know, maybe in some twisted way, you two are meant to be here and Jamie is not. I really don’t know. But what is the point of you punishing yourself and Maisie for the rest of your life?’

  ‘It just won’t leave me though, Bree. I have been offered counselling and stuff like that, but, I don’t know.’

  ‘You should speak to my mother. She would ha
ve you booked in at the psychiatrist’s like a shot. I am sure that is her answer to bloody everything.’

  ‘Your mother?’ Caroline asked. ‘You should support each other through this, it must be so hard for her too, losing her son.’

  ‘We don’t really see eye to eye, Caroline. I have even stopped telling her about my nightmares now. She will have the men in white coats pick me up and keep me locked away if I am not careful.’

  The two women shared a small laugh, a real laugh. It had been a very long time since Bree had heard that laugh. That was a good moment for Maisie to arrive back for a break. The two women were getting on well and all the animosity on Bree’s side seemed to have evaporated. Clutching several small plastic balls from the play area, an out-of-breath Maisie spoke. ‘I just want a quick drink then I have to go back in,’ she said. ‘That boy in the red jumper keeps chasing me, so I need these balls to throw at him.’ She took an ample mouthful of her smoothie, leaving a large brown beard of chocolate around her mouth.

  ‘Come here,’ her mother said. ‘Let’s clean you up.’ Reaching for a wet wipe Caroline wiped away all traces of the drink, shaking her head at the amount of mess one mouthful of her drink had produced. ‘Why is he chasing you?’ she asked.

  Maisie gave her mother a knowing look. ‘He obviously likes me, Mummy, that’s why boys chase you, if they like you.’ The two women both smiled at her observation. ‘But he won’t catch me,’ Maisie added. ‘I am too fast for him.’ With that she turned and sprinted back towards a large yellow slide in the play area, dropping half of the plastic balls en route.

  ‘I don’t know what I would do without her,’ Caroline said. ‘She is just so full of energy, she drains me sometimes, but I wouldn’t change her for the world.’

  ‘What about her father?’ Bree said, not knowing why she had asked such a personal question.

  ‘He works in Iraq, we don’t see much of him, just once a month, if we are lucky. He flew home the day after…’ Caroline suddenly paused in fear of upsetting Bree. ‘He flew back the day after it all happened. He said he would quit his job if I wanted him to. But we really need the money, so he is back out there.’

  ‘Is he in the forces?’ Bree asked.

  ‘No, he left the military years ago. He works in close protection, it is sort of doing bodyguard work. He has gone from a simple life as a security guard in a supermarket to risking his life to protect some rich oil tycoon. He said that the money was too good for him to turn down.’

  ‘So Maisie doesn’t get to see much of him?’

  Caroline shook her head. ‘I think he actually enjoys it, playing at being James Bond. I sometimes think that me and Maisie and all his responsibilities come second to his ego.’

  Bree changed the subject, realising that their personal life really was none of her business. ‘Did that reporter, the one from the Herald, come to see you? Did he do an interview?’

  Caroline nodded. ‘He made Maisie feel like she was a pop star. He took hundreds of photographs. They only ever used one. He called her ‘The miracle girl’ in the paper, but most of what he printed was just made up or he twisted things to make it all sound much more glamorous than it was.’

  ‘You were not happy about it?’

  The large woman sighed and shook her head. ‘They don’t print things that are real. The anxiety it causes, the pain, the guilt, all the sleepless nights, they don’t print all that stuff. I never even kept a copy of the newspaper when it came out. I try to forget that night, as if it never happened.’

  ‘He did the same thing to me.’

  ‘What, that Scottish fella? Kerr, that was him, David Kerr.’

  ‘Yeah, he came knocking on my door just two days after it happened. I didn’t want to let him in the house, but he was persistent. He asked me if Jamie had been depressed at the time, he asked me if I thought it might have been suicide.’

  ‘No!’ Caroline barked. ‘What a bastard!’

  ‘He told me he had spoken to one of his friends and they had told him Jamie had mental health issues. What a crock of shit that was, nobody loved life more than my Jamie!’

  ‘Did you find out which friend it was that told him that?’

  ‘No, I think the reporter just made it up or twisted the person’s words. He even asked me to call him first if I found a suicide note.’

  ‘Did you throw him out?’

  ‘I didn’t have the energy, I just sat there and let him ask me all that crap. I couldn’t really take in what he was saying.’

  ‘They are so out of order. He should be locked up, that Kerr fella, inventing stuff like that. Those scumbags will do anything to get a sensational headline.’

  ‘I am stronger now,’ Bree said. ‘I would tell him what I really thought of him if he turned up again.’

  A small silence followed, both women reflecting on the conversation. Bree started to realise how the events of that night at the Maple crossing had affected other people’s lives more than she could ever have imagined. She looked over at Maisie, rolling around in the playpen, teasing the young boy in the red jumper. If her and Jamie had not driven home that way that night or if they had gone to the Shallows club that night, that poor child would not be here now. Caroline and her daughter would be lying in the cold cemetery and not her brother.

  Bree decided it was time to leave the two of them to some quality mother and daughter time, giving a red-faced Maisie a friendly smile and a wave on her way out of the place. She felt so much better than she had done when she set out that morning. She reassured Caroline that if they did meet up at the cemetery again, that she would be much more welcoming than she had been earlier. It was not exactly an apology from Bree, but Caroline understood that her intentions had been well meant and the women parted on good terms.

  When she arrived back in the seat of her car, she felt as if she could finally start to move on now, not from the numbness that ran through her body and her mind, no, that would last her a lifetime. But she would try to stop blaming other people for what had happened. Maybe if she could accept that it was just a tragic accident that took the life of her brother, then the nightmares she was having might finally end and she could close her eyes without fear of dreaming.

  Before she set off for the short journey back to Oxley, she switched on her mobile to retrieve any calls or messages she might have missed. She thought that her mother would have probably called her in a panic again, because she had switched off her phone, but she was certainly not in any mood to deal with her today. As she looked at the entrance to Cheeky Charlies adventure playground, she smiled again, remembering the comment that young Maisie had made about Jamie being a ‘superhero’. It warmed her inside to think that someone would remember him that way.

  As her phone came back to life, she pressed the message button, fully expecting to hear the overexaggerating tones of her worried mother. But the only voice she heard was that of Kayleigh. ‘Call me as soon as you get this message, babe. I think I have found him, I think I have found the man in the photograph.’

  Chapter Thirteen

  Most people would be excited about a trip to the seaside, but halfway through their two-hour journey to Bournemouth, it was obvious that Matt was looking forward to the day out a whole lot more than Poppy was. The restaurant was closed. Danny had returned to his native Ireland for a family funeral at short notice, leaving the staff with a day off. Matt had talked Poppy into taking this excursion, telling her it would be a real tonic for her to get away from all the stress in her life, even if it was just for one day. After all, Danny was still paying them for their day off, so in Matt’s words it was a ‘win-win situation for everyone’. Poppy’s solemn expression, however, told its own story. She began sniping about everything from the length of the journey to the unsettled weather. Matt had begun to have second thoughts about his invitation.

  Since that encounter at Chez Blanc, they had repeat
ed their secret sex trysts three times. The first move would always be initiated by Matt, but the sex most definitely enjoyed more by Poppy. They had christened the food preparation table in the kitchen once. On the other two occasions they had returned to the scene of their first encounter in the staff toilets. Poppy had refused to go back to Matt’s flat, saying that to do that would make it seem that it was more than it really was. ‘A fuck, Matt!’ she would say. ‘It is just a fuck!’ What she didn’t tell him was it was a ‘good fuck’, and that she thrived on their steamy episodes in unusual places. They had almost been caught in the act the previous week, when Chantelle had returned to the restaurant unexpectedly, looking for her purse. They both knew that what they were doing was bad, but also, that it felt so good.

  The warm-hearted Geordie persevered with her sullen mood and self-indulgent attitude and spent most of the journey attempting to find out more about his passenger’s past. ‘I can’t believe you have never been to the seaside,’ Matt said. ‘Fresh fish and chips, the amusement arcades and sticks of rock. You can’t beat it.’

  Sitting with her arms folded and her mouth twisted, Poppy responded. ‘I went once,’ she said. ‘It was cold. I didn’t like it.’

  The cheery northerner wasn’t giving up. ‘I love the seaside, I used to go to Whitley Bay every month when I was a kid. You will see, Poppy, it will be fun!’

  Her enthusiasm was still somewhat lukewarm. ‘Whatever you say, Matt. Now how much further is this bloody place?’

  Poppy was impressed with the cruising speed of Matt’s perfectly polished BMW five series, but not his choice of music. She had ejected several of his CDs from the player, throwing them onto the back seat, with a scathing attack on the choice of artists. ‘That one is shit, never heard of them, this one is alright if you are twelve years old, I suppose.’ Eventually they both agreed on a national radio station to keep them company for the rest of the journey. Even then Poppy complained that the DJs talked too much.

  That morning, Poppy had left her precious Omega parked outside Matt’s flat. Her only concern was that one of Cameron’s friends might be sober enough to identify the vehicle. Her body was still recovering from his last violent outburst and the last thing she needed was another beating from him.