Too Close

by Hilary Norman

  Shrill and ugly.

  He reached out too fast and knocked the receiver off its cradle. Nina gave a soft groan while he fumbled in the dark.

  ‘Sorry, baby.’

  He got hold of the dangling cord and pulled the receiver to his ear.

  And listened to the police officer telling him the unthinkable.

  Nina heard only his side of the conversation, but it was more than enough. She flicked the switch on her bedside light exactly as he ended the call.

  ‘What’s happened to Holly?’ she asked, quietly.

  ‘They let her out,’ he answered, getting out of bed.

  It was cold in the room. Nick, almost too angry to speak, opened the bathroom door and took down his robe from the hook.

  ‘What do you mean, they let her out?’ Nina was staring at him from the bed. In the space of those few moments, all the peace that had softened her face during the past days was gone. Her mouth and jaw were taut again, her eyes wary.

  Nick came back to sit on her side of the bed and took her hand.

  ‘You’re shaking,’ Nina said.

  ‘They let her escape.’ He shook his head violently. ‘And don’t ask me how that could happen, because I don’t know, because they wouldn’t tell me.’

  ‘But they said she was in a locked ward,’ Nina said, bewildered. ‘They said she was paralysed.’

  ‘She must have been faking – she must have been goddamned faking!’ He shook his head again. ‘How could they fall for that? I can’t believe they could fall for that!’

  ‘Not necessarily,’ Nina said. ‘Someone might have helped her.’

  ‘Jesus.’ It was almost a yell. ‘Jesus!’

  Nina gripped his hand. ‘Take it easy, darling.’

  ‘How can I take it easy?’ He took away his hand and stood up.

  ‘We don’t want Zoë to wake up.’

  He looked down, saw how pale she was. ‘You’re right. I’m sorry.’ He fought to cool down and take stock. ‘The officer on the phone said he didn’t know what happened – for all they know, she may still be inside the hospital, or maybe Richard and Eleanor are trying to fly her out of the country.’

  ‘Or maybe she’s on her way back here.’ Nina was still quiet.

  ‘He said they’ve put out an APB.’ Nick was starting to get his shock under control. ‘And they’re sending a car to check next door and keep a watch on the street.’

  He started towards the door.

  ‘Where are you going?’

  ‘To check on Zoë.’

  Nina pushed back the bedclothes. ‘I can do that.’

  ‘Uh-uh.’ He grabbed the quilt and laid it back over her. ‘You need your rest.’

  ‘You think I could sleep now?’ She pushed the covers back again. ‘I think I might make some tea.’

  ‘I can do that.’ Nick headed to the door. ‘You just stay put, and I’ll bring us both up a cup.’

  ‘I don’t want to stay put,’ Nina said.

  Nick opened the door.

  They both smelled the smoke at the same instant, as the detectors in the hallways began to shriek.

  ‘Zoë!’ Nina was up and flying across the room.

  ‘I’ll get her.’ Nick’s mind raced. ‘You wet some towels in case we need them getting out.’

  The smoke was drifting up from below. He ran next door into the nursery and grabbed the sleeping baby unceremoniously from her crib. She woke, clenched roughly to her father’s chest, and began to cry.

  ‘Sorry, angel, we have to get you out of here.’

  Nina came out into the hallway wearing a terry robe and clutching towels. ‘I wet a face cloth for Zoë – is she okay?’

  ‘Fine. Come on.’

  ‘We don’t have shoes.’ Nina stared at his bare feet. ‘Shouldn’t we have shoes?’

  ‘No time. Come on.’ He held Zoë even more tightly to his chest and started down the staircase. ‘Stay close behind me.’

  ‘Where is the fire?’ Nina sounded as scared as she felt.

  ‘I don’t know.’ They were halfway down. ‘We’re going to get out first and then worry about where it is, okay?’

  ‘Fine by me.’

  Smoke was sliding out into the hall from under the kitchen door. Nick took a towel for himself and carefully placed the small cloth over Zoë’s nose and mouth, then handed the baby to Nina. ‘The front door’s clear,’ he told her. ‘You take her out.’

  ‘What about you?’ Nina took the baby and started coughing.

  ‘Get her out – I’ll be right behind you.’

  Nina got to the front door and opened it. A breeze blew in and fanned the smoke around the hall. She stepped out into the cold night air, took a deep breath and removed the flannel from Zoë’s nose. The baby sneezed, then went right on crying.

  ‘Is she okay?’ Nick had to shout over the piercing noise of the smoke alarms as he felt first the living room and then the dining room doors, checking for heat inside those rooms.

  ‘What are you doing?’ Nina called from outside. ‘Get out here!’

  ‘Nina, go get help – get Zoë to a neighbour’s and call 911.’

  ‘I’m not going anywhere without you,’ Nina protested. ‘Get out here with us!’

  ‘I’m pretty sure it’s in the kitchen,’ Nick shouted back. ‘If it’s a small one, I’m going to try to put it out – now go call the fire department!’

  ‘Nick, please, just leave it!’ In her arms the baby began screaming.

  ‘Will you get our daughter somewhere safe and warm,’ he yelled, starting to cough as the smoke hit his throat. ‘And for God’s sake get some help!’

  Across the street a front door opened and Joe Tanakawa – a man Nina and Nick had met just a handful of times – came running over. ‘My wife’s called 911.’ He came up the front steps, panting. ‘What’s happening? Are you guys okay?’

  ‘Nick thinks it’s in the kitchen.’ Clasping Zoë close, Nina stared back into the house, but Nick had disappeared from sight. ‘He’s trying to put it out.’

  Tanakawa was wearing a heavy sweater, jeans and sneakers. He looked at Nina’s robe and bare feet. ‘You must bring the little one over to our place.’

  ‘I can’t see him.’ Nina held the baby out. ‘Will you take her, please? Get her safely inside.’

  ‘You have to come over with her,’ Tanakawa said.

  ‘I have to go find Nick.’

  She tried to push Zoë into his arms, but the man resisted and took a step back. ‘No way,’ he insisted. ‘Your baby needs her mother, not a stranger. I’m sure your husband will be right out.’

  ‘Oh, my God.’ Nina turned back to the doorway as realization hit her. ‘It’s Holly!’ she yelled into the house. ‘Nick, it has to be Holly – you have to get out of there!’

  ‘Nina, come away.’ Tanakawa grabbed both her arms, careful of the baby. ‘Come on, you can’t go in there.’ He pulled her back out onto the steps.

  ‘But I can’t see him!’ Nina started crying. ‘I can’t see him!’

  The kitchen was hot and filled with acrid smoke, but Nick couldn’t seem to locate the source of the fire. He moved further in, fastening the wet towel over his face with his left hand, trying to stay low. If the blaze wasn’t rooted in the kitchen, then the next most likely place had to be the utility room.

  He went through the door carefully, but nothing appeared to be burning in there either.

  And then he saw the glow coming from under the door leading down to the garage.

  He knew, even before he had it open, that Holly was in there.

  Waiting for him.

  He kicked the door open with his bare right foot, and moved carefully down the steps.

  She was there, standing in a clear space in the centre of the floor, a small figure framed by fire and smoke.

  ‘I’ve been waiting for you,’ she said, raising her voice to be heard over the sound of the flames. She was wearing weird clothes: a skirt too big for her, a black sweater too small, and white hosp
ital shoes.

  The middle section of the garage was clear of the fire, which was snaking around the walls and through the hoard of left-over stuff, tongues of orange, yellow and pure white flames gobbling up wood and paper and plastic and cardboard, licking right up to the ceiling, snapping out cables, sending white flares across the closed up-and-over door.

  Nick knew that the door was double locked.

  He stared at Holly through the smoke.

  ‘Let’s get out of here,’ he said, and put the damp towel to his face.

  ‘I don’t think so,’ she said.

  He moved the towel so he could speak. ‘The fire department are on their way, and the cops.’

  ‘I’m sure they are.’

  She was holding something. A big can with a handle and spout. He recognized it. Barbecue lighter fuel. His mind flashed back to two summers before – Nina telling him to throw it out because it was dangerous. But for some reason(too lazy, too busy doing other things) the can had stayed here in their garage along with all the other useless junk.

  And now Holly was holding it in her hands like a lethal weapon.

  Nick could smell the fuel burning, and knew she had probably poured it around the garage and then dropped a match.

  ‘Why don’t you put that down, Holly,’ he said, ‘and come outside with me?’

  ‘I don’t think so,’ she said again.

  ‘They told us you were paralysed,’ Nick said.

  ‘I got over it.’ Her voice was husky and thinner from smoke inhalation, but otherwise she showed no obvious signs of physical distress. ‘Go ahead,’ she said, ‘tell me how happy you are about that. How happy you are for me that I can still walk. That I didn’t die. Go on.’

  ‘Let’s get out of here, Holly, then I’ll tell you I’m glad.’

  ‘Sure you’re glad, Nick. That must be why you pushed me out of a third-floor window. Because you wanted me to get up and walk away.’

  ‘I was mad at you.’ Nick started coughing and tried to breathe through the towel, but it was already dried through and almost useless.

  ‘Yes, you were,’ Holly agreed.

  Nick went on coughing. He felt pressure in his chest, felt the soles of his feet getting warm, and took a wild look around. The concrete floor was clear of junk for a yard or so around them, and no fuel appeared to have splashed on it, so he hoped – prayed – they were safe enough for at least a few more moments; but the cracked rectangular window pane above the main door that was probably allowing in enough oxygen for them to stay conscious, was also fanning the flames.

  He twisted around, could feel the heat growing more intense behind him, knew the fire had to be spreading into the house, knew he wasn’t going to be able to back out the way he’d come in.

  The side door.

  He stared at it through the smoke. Its frame was already burning, the handle probably too hot to touch, but it looked exactly like the one next door that he’d broken through a week or so – a lifetime – ago, and maybe he could kick it down, or maybe if he just ran hard enough at it—

  He heard sirens and thanked God.

  ‘They’re here,’ he said. ‘They’ve come to help us, Holly. Let’s get out of here and save them the trouble of coming in and getting us.’

  ‘You never did love me,’ she said, suddenly, bizarrely.

  ‘Come on, Holly,’ he urged, like a football coach, trying to ignore the crazy switch. ‘Let’s do this outside.’

  ‘You remember I told you about Eric, my brother?’ she said, switching again.

  Nick heard more sirens and horns, and imagined the street filling with fire engines and police vehicles, imagined Nina going out of her mind, the way he had when she’d been next door with Holly.

  ‘Come on, Holly,’ he said, ‘it’s time to go.’

  She didn’t move.

  ‘It was my fault he drowned, you know,’ she said, her voice growing hoarser, and for the first time since Nick had found her, she began to cough. ‘Remember how I told you he jumped in the pond and I tried to save him?’ Her eyes were red and watering. ‘That was what I told everyone, but it wasn’t true.’

  The smoke was thickening, the temperature rising. Nick took another frantic look at the door behind Holly. It came to him that he could probably rush her or push her out of his way and escape without her, but as swiftly as the thought had come, he knew he wouldn’t do that – not to her, not to himself. However much he had wanted her dead when he’d shoved her out of that window, however passionately he had wished her gone since then, that rage – the sheer, blinding madness that had driven him that day – was gone now.

  She’s the mad one, the killer – not you – you’re not like her.

  ‘I still dream about it,’ she was saying, calmly, absently, like someone talking to their analyst in the safety of an office, not like a woman standing in the middle of an inferno she’d created. ‘In the dream, Eric always tells me to lie, says I should say it was his fault – that was what we always did, you see.’

  ‘Holly, let’s go.’

  Nick’s voice was cracking, his throat felt like sandpaper. He thought one more time about rushing her, maybe trying to drag her out, but the can looked heavy enough to have too much fuel left in it, and if the fire caught that, it would probably go off like a bomb.

  ‘Holly, we have to get out of here now!’

  ‘I was always getting in trouble’ – still remote, still detached – ‘and Eric always defended me, always took the blame for everything. Until he went away.’ Suddenly she was focusing again, coming back. ‘I thought you’d come to take over from him, Nick – that you were always going to be there for me, the way he was.’ Harsh again now, accusing. ‘You made me believe that, Nick. You conned me—’

  More sirens and horns and voices yelling.

  ‘All in the past, Holly,’ Nick told her, as forcefully as his parched throat and struggling lungs would allow. ‘This is here and now, and we’re both going to get out of here before it’s too late.’

  He began coughing again, tried holding the towel over his nose and mouth again, but it only made it worse, made him choke, so he threw it away, over to his right, where he heard, rather than saw, it being swallowed up by flames.

  ‘It’s already too late,’ Holly said, lifting the can of fuel in both hands.

  Nick took a step back.

  She smiled. ‘Scared?’ She jerked the can, smiled again as he flinched. And then she raised it higher in a long, slow, smooth movement. Even in the ill-fitting clothes and shoes, Holly looked very graceful, almost as if she were dancing.

  Nick thought he knew what she was going to do.

  ‘Holly,’ he said, uncertainly, ‘put it down.’

  ‘Too late,’ she said again, and, with the spout right over her head, she closed her eyes, tipped the can and poured.

  ‘Holly!’ Nick said again, hoarsely. ‘Jesus, Holly!’

  He took a step towards her, then stopped, remembering what would happen if he got fuel on himself, remembering that he had a wife and child outside, out in the real world, the sane world, and he wanted to see them again, he wanted to live—

  ‘End-game, Nick,’ Holly said, opening her mad, inflamed eyes again. She let the can fall to the ground, and a few last drops rolled out of the spout and lay near her feet, round, glistening, reflecting fire. ‘End-game for us both.’

  Nick smelled the fuel soaking her hair and clothes and skin, and now he knew exactly what she was going to do.

  ‘Holly, please,’ he said, ‘this is crazy. You don’t want to do this.’

  ‘That’s just it, though,’ she said, challenging him. She coughed again, then controlled herself. ‘Who’s going to know it was me who did it? This is the game where you get to try and prove it wasn’t you who set fire to me.’ She took one step back, closer to the flames behind her.

  ‘Holly, stop it!’

  ‘The police saw you push me out of the window, Nick,’ she went on, ‘and you didn’t need to come in here
after me tonight, so why wouldn’t they think you were glad of the chance to finish what you started?’

  ‘Jesus, Holly, don’t do this –’ His voice was almost gone.

  ‘I would have done anything for you, Nick. You know that, don’t you?’ She shook her dark head and coughed again, and her voice was beginning to rasp. ‘But not any more. No more. Now you can go straight to hell for all I care – fast or slow, it makes no difference to me.’

  A loud, booming sound made them both jump, and the big up-and-overdoor vibrated and shook violently as the firemen outside began breaking it down. The central lock on the door smashed and flew into the air and fell to the ground, its metallic clatter almost inaudible beneath the roar of the flames and the firemen’s battering ram.

  The door began to move. Up and over.

  A gust of early December wind fanned the flames.

  Holly just stood there, not moving.

  ‘Get out of the way!’ Nick yelled a warning.

  Still she didn’t move, but a strange look flew across her eyes, and Nick had the sense that suddenly she might be less sure about what she was doing – that maybe she was not, after all, entirely ready to die—

  ‘Holly,’ he yelled, one last time, ‘get out of the way!’

  The look went away.

  She held out her right hand to Nick.

  ‘Come with me,’ she said, quite calmly.

  It happened before the firemen’s hoses could reach her, fast as a lightning strike on a stifling August night. The wind blew the flames straight on to her fuel-soaked body, and the fire enveloped her like a blazing, roaring cloak, hooding her head with a swirling white-hot aura, whipping through her dark, blowing hair, melting her clothes, torching her eyebrows and lashes into tiny lines of miniaturized, sparking flames, devouring her cheeks and invading her open, silently screaming mouth.

  Nick did nothing.

  There was nothing to be done.

  It was too late. It was already over.

  Holly had just finished telling him to go to hell.

  But she was already there.

  Chapter One Hundred-nine

  They buried Holly last week.

  In three days’ time it’ll be Christmas. Her twenty-eighth birthday.