One More Unfortunate

by Kaitlin Queen

Trev put a hand on her back and said something about coffee.

  Jerry giggled again—Nick hadn't realised how intoxicated she had become. "He was enjoying it," she said, then moistened her lips with her tongue. "I can tell."

  Mandy turned and strode off towards the steps of the borrowed cabin. Trev paused awkwardly. "Coffee all round?" he said, then gave his brief smile and hurried after his girlfriend.

  "Things always go this well?" asked Nick, as Ronnie went off to his own chalet and Jerry stood a short distance away along the shore, tossing stones across the mud.

  "Somebody always ends up fighting," said Betsy. "Usually over Jerry, if she's here."

  "They all become schoolboys again," said Caroline. "Just right for the little tart." Then she seemed to realise what she had said, and added, "I'm sorry. I shouldn't talk like that."

  Nick lay back, feeling the stones pressing up into his back. "I met her in the week," he said, to nobody in particular. He laughed, sadly, "I thought she planned it all so we could start something. I came here to tell her not to be so stupid, but I haven't, 'cos I don't want to hurt the silly bitch." He was babbling, now, feeling foolish. "I just ... didn't want her harmed, you know?"

  ~

  A short time later, Mandy and Trev were on the deck of their cabin. They seemed to be arguing, their voices strained and kept low, then one would say something and the other would laugh. Maybe they weren't arguing at all, maybe it was some elaborate kind of seduction ritual. Nick couldn't tell which it was and he began to wonder if they knew, either.

  Ronnie was at the fire, building it up with wood he had hauled along the beach. "Going to make it burn all night," he said. "You reckon I can?"

  "Course you can," said Nick, not wanting to provoke him. There had been too much conflict for one night. "As long as you don't set fire to the cabins, 'kay?" Ronnie laughed, accepting a joke at his expense, so long as it suggested he might do too good a job.

  Betsy and his wife were sitting a short distance away, leaning into each other and looking out across the bay to the scattering of lights on the horizon that was Suffolk.

  That just left Jerry, sitting a little below Nick on the beach, her hair rippling gold in the light of Ronnie's fire. They stayed quiet like that for a long time, listening to Ronnie's exertions and the arguing, seducing sounds coming from the balcony.

  Then Jerry looked up at Nick, pinning him with one of her looks. "I want to walk," she said. She glanced around, a hint of melodrama. "Will you accompany me, Nick? Be my chaperone?"

  She held a hand limply in the air, waiting for him to help her to her feet. Her hand was tiny in Nick's. She stood, squeezed his fingers, let go.

  "Along the beach?" he said, but she shook her head.

  "The woods," she said. "Lets go into the woods, chaperone."

  She started to walk, and after a brief pause, Nick shook his head and followed.

  The path led diagonally away from the shore, across a narrow wedge of scrub and then into the solid darkness of Copperas Wood.

  "Hold my hand," said Jerry. "I can't see."

  Her hand slipped into Nick's and they walked slowly as their eyes adjusted. Now that they were alone, away from the smell of the fire and the mud, Nick could smell the distinctive aroma of cannabis, mingling with Jerry's perfume.

  "I love the forest," she said suddenly, releasing him and rushing up to the nearest tree. She spread her arms around it, pressed her face to its bark. "Have you ever done this, Nicky? You become a part of it, you feel your roots sinking into the ground, the hardness of the wood, so solid it'll never let you down."

  Everything was grey and black, shadows and absences. "Freud says something about trees," he said. He wanted to tell her that he was going to leave for good, that this trip had been a stupid mistake. But she was still talking about the trees and he didn't know where to begin.

  "Why do they lose their leaves every year, after they've spent so long growing them?" she asked, catching up with him. "They're beautiful, aren't they? But they're dying all the time."

  He paused, turned, and suddenly she put her hands up to his cheeks, her touch so light. She kissed him, moist lips pressing lightly, staying for a second or two, withdrawing. He felt intoxicated.

  "This is a mistake," he gasped. "I'm going to leave. Just forget me, Jerry, okay?"

  Her hands were resting delicately on his chest, now, her face tilted up to him. "Take me with you, Nicky," she said.

  Her tone was solemn. Too solemn, and he realised that she was only flirting again, a moth spiralling around the light but never quite there.

  "Take me, Nicky." Her fingers arched, claws digging into his chest, and he knew exactly what she meant.

  He raised his hands sharply, pushing her hands away, breaking contact.

  His mind was spinning, confused thoughts bouncing around the inside of his skull. He knew he would suffer tomorrow, with his head thrown this far out of equilibrium.

  "You're drunk," he said, echoing what Mandy had said earlier. "High. You don't mean what you're saying." He'd had enough of her games.

  "High? Low?" she turned away, spun drunkenly, then steadied herself against a tree. "What difference does it make?" She stepped towards him again, reached out. "I want to come with you. I'd be really grateful."

  He backed out of her reach. He felt betrayed, let down. Already his teenage dream was spoiled forever, another memory tainted by his return to Bathside. "I loved you," he said. "Do you understand me? I never stopped thinking about you."

  She brushed at her face, but by now he suspected tears were just another element of her armoury.

  "I loved you," he repeated.

  "Then love me again," she said.

  There was suddenly a desperation to her tone. All her layers of camouflage had momentarily lifted and that frightened Nick, and he turned away, started to run, as he ran when the adrenalin was pumping and his head was threatening to erupt on another manic trip on the mental rollercoaster.

  He crashed along the path, his hands raised to fend off the branches as they clawed at him, trying to drag him back. Then behind him, he heard her laughter, a bitter, drunken sound, and then he heard nothing and all he could do was run, on into the woods, trying desperately to outpace the demons in his head.

  Chapter 5

  He walked back along the shoreline, the sudden rush of mental energy burnt out by the run. He never should have come. Jerry—his own private Jerry—belonged inside his skull, as a memory. It was more simple that way. Far better than the complicated, mysterious woman she had become.

  He realised now why he was so confused: in almost everything she did he saw the girl he had once known, but in reality she had turned into the kind of person he found it very difficult to like. He could be sympathetic towards her, he could try to understand what it was that made her behave in this way, but he found himself unable to actually like her any more.

  As he walked, across sand and hard mud, he decided that he would be up before anyone else and he would go quietly to his car and drive away. He had left a few things at his digs, but nothing he valued. Leave them for old Jim McClennan.

  He had his leather jacket, his good running shoes. The open road awaited, no destination in mind. For a few moments he was there in his car, the road falling away behind, and he knew how good it was going to feel. A freedom that most people, with their mortgages and their jobs and their families weighing them down, could never truly experience.

  Lanterns burned in both chalets. Nick was going to sleep on a rug in the living area, with Ronnie in his own bedroom and Betsy and Caroline in the other. Jerry was sharing the neighbouring cabin with Trev and Mandy. Nick would be lying within feet of the door onto the deck. It would be easy to slip away at dawn, when he always woke.

  "We located some blankets for you," said Betsy, as Nick entered the cabin. "I expect it'll get cold on the floor. Some cushions, too. Jesus H, I wish I wasn't so pissed, Nick. It's been too long."

  Caroline came in, from one of t
he bedrooms, wearing a night-shirt that ended halfway down her pipe-cleaner thighs. She gave Nick one look and said, "Pardon my French, but you look like shit." She was even more drunk than Betsy, Nick realised, with a degree of satisfaction.

  Now, her husband narrowed his eyes, leaned towards Nick and said, "She's correct, you know. You okay, Nick? Look like something the cat threw up."

  Ronnie appeared in the doorway of his bedroom and glowered at the three of them. "D'you give the bitch one then?" he said. "I saw you going off, holding hands like fucking school kids." There was a hard edge to his words, and Nick wondered if he blamed his presence for spoiling the evening. He was the outsider. He always was.

  "That's nobody's business," he said, arranging his bedding neatly on the floor. He didn't want to fight with Ronnie, partly because he knew he would beat him easily and that would be another of his childhood memories shattered: the invincibility of Ronnie Deller. "We went for a walk. She wanted to talk."

  "That's why you look so bad, eh?" Betsy had missed the tension, the fight narrowly averted. He was in the mood to tease. "Look," he continued, "you've even got blood on your head."

  Nick rubbed at his forehead. "A branch scratched me," he said. "We had a disagreement, that's all. Look, I'm tired. I don't care if you all want to stay up talking, but I'm going to sleep right here on these rugs. Okay?"

  ~

  He didn't manage to sleep. After a few minutes there was a soft rap at the glass doors. Stripped down to his jeans, Nick opened up, letting Mandy Kemp in from the deck.

  "Is Jerry here?" she asked. She was wearing a track-suit, and without her make-up she looked like a different woman.

  Nick spread his hands. "Not unless she slipped in the back way," he said. "Why's that?"

  Mandy looked cross. "She hasn't come in yet," she said. "And we want to lock up before we go to bed. You've got to be safe these days, haven't you?"

  Caroline had come back out now. "Not back?" she said. She looked at Nick. "Didn't she come back with you?"

  He shook his head. "Like I said: we had a disagreement. Went our separate ways."

  "How long ago was that?" asked Caroline.

  Nick shrugged. "I didn't time it," he said. "Maybe half an hour or so. I don't know for sure."

  "Maybe we'd better look," said Mandy. "You never know who's out there, do you?"

  Nick was beginning to get concerned. "She was drunk," he said. "Maybe she's lost."

  "She's always drunk or smashed," said Caroline. "But you're right: she was worse than ever tonight. She could be lost. She might have fallen into a ditch somewhere."

  "Probably just asleep in a field," said Ronnie, emerging from his room. "Suppose we'd better find her though, hadn't we? Hey, Betsy! Come on out of there you lazy swine!" He hammered on the flimsy door, laughing and cursing.

  Nick looked around. Nobody seemed to be in any state to go out searching—they'd probably all get lost, all end up sleeping it off in some ditch or field.

  "Mandy," said Caroline. "Go and fetch Trevor. Nick. Tell us when you last saw her. What state was she in? How long ago was it?"

  "Along the path to the woods," he said, struggling to focus. "She was laughing ... laughing at me. I ran away, couldn't take it. She was laughing at me."

  ~

  They split up into four search parties, all hollering and waving the lanterns Ronnie had re-lit. Trev and Mandy went east along the shore, Ronnie west towards the mud cliffs where sand martins chattered all summer. Betsy and Caroline took the path into the woods, where Jerry had last been seen, while Nick wandered slowly up the Strand Lane.

  Nick didn't know what he was looking for. If she had fallen into a ditch, then he would never spot her. If she was somewhere along the Lane then she could not be lost—the Lane would lead her right back to the Strand, or to the level crossing, in which case she would just have to turn back. Either way he was wasting his time.

  "Jerry," he called, every few paces. If she was wandering somewhere nearby in the woods, maybe she would follow the sound of his voice. He suspected she was playing another of her drunken games. The spoilt brat in her hadn't got what she wanted so this was her revenge.

  "Jerry, are you there?" He would be out of it tomorrow. Free. He paused in an opening to relieve himself. It looked like this was another parking area, presumably for the summer when the Strand was busier.

  "Jerry," he called again, tired, fed up. In the distance he heard the others calling. If she was genuinely lost, then she must hear somebody. Why didn't she call back, at least? He began to think that something had happened to her: she must be asleep, or lying somewhere in a drunken stupor.

  And then he heard a scream. It was a harsh cry, suddenly choked off, followed by one or two sobbing sounds.

  It had come from the woods, but such a sound could never have come from Jerry. In the time it took him to work that out, he realised that it had been Caroline screaming, and that they must have found Jerry.

  He guessed the direction and plunged into the dark woods. There was a track here, or at least a consistent gap through the trees and undergrowth.

  He heard voices, now. Betsy's—low, insistent—and then Caroline's sharp reply. "I'm okay, now," she said. "Will you leave me alone?"

  "Betsy!" Nick shouted. "Where are you?"

  "Here! Over here!"

  Nick spotted a flashing light, a lantern being waved from side to side, its light interrupted by the trees. He scrambled through the woods, and a few seconds later he emerged on the path he knew from earlier.

  It was close to where Jerry had hugged her tree trunk, close to where they had argued.

  Caroline was standing stiff, upright, Betsy resting an awkward hand on her arm.

  "What...?"

  Betsy withdrew his hand and pointed towards a dark shape, slumped just off the track. Nick took a step forward, crouched. He held his lantern up so that he could see.

  The dark shape was Jerry. Her right cheek was pressed into the compacted leafmould of the woodland floor, eyes still open, lips parted. The back of her head was a mess, blood matting her hair, a great dark cavity where she had been struck with something heavy. He looked down her body. Her jeans had been undone, pulled down part of the way to reveal brief white knickers.

  Someone came crashing through the undergrowth. Trevor Carr. "We heard the scream," he said, struggling for breath. "Came to the lights."

  Then he saw Jerry and fell silent.

  A few seconds later Mandy had joined them. "Is she okay?" she asked, a mad, panicking edge to her voice. "Let me see. I know first aid."

  Trev tried to hold her back, but she shook him off. She squatted by Jerry, pushed her over onto her back, checked her neck for a pulse and then immediately lowered her face to try resuscitating her.

  "Come on, Mandy," said Trev, trying to pull her free. "It's no good. Can't you see? She's dead."

  "No," said Mandy, but she stopped trying to revive her. "She can't be."

  "Ahoy there!" came a shout from down the path. Ronnie. "What's all the noise then? You found the dumb bitch yet?"

  ~

  "What do we do?" asked somebody, back in Ronnie's chalet.

  "Call the police," said Nick. His head was throbbing again, from the alcohol and the madness all around him. "We have to call the police."

  "No blowers," said Ronnie. "Unless any of us has a car-phone. Anybody?"

  They hadn't.

  "We'll have to find one then," said Nick. "Any farms nearby?"

  They decided it would be quicker to head for a call box than to try to find their way to a farm in the dark. "Come on, we have to do something," said Nick. "There's a frigging psycho out there. Who's going to the 'phone?"

  Nobody seemed interested in going out again into the unknown night. They were all too drunk to keep a car on the road, he realised.

  "Look," he said, "I've drunk less than anyone here. I'll go. Where's the nearest 'phone?"

  "No," said Ronnie. "It's my place, here. It's my responsibility
. I'll do it." He reached into his pocket and produced some keys.

  "Don't be stupid," snapped Caroline. "Nick will go. He's right. We'll all stay here and lock the doors and Nick will go."

  He didn't understand the look she was giving him until much later, when she pointed him out to DS Cooper. She wanted to lock every door in the chalet, with Nick on one side and her on the other. She was remembering that he had argued with Jerry, that he had come back looking awful, with a graze on his forehead from that damned branch. What else had he said or done?

  Chapter 6

  "Did you strike her?" DI Langley, leaned forward in his seat, sensing that Nick was weakening, maybe about to crack.

  "I went for a walk." His head was spinning, confused. He wasn't in control of the situation and he couldn't bear it.

  "In the woods? At one in the morning?" Langley shook his head, then jerked his whole body suddenly back. "Come on," he said. "You can do better than that. Did you strike Mrs Wyse?"

  The tears came, and he hated himself for it. He wished his ineffectual solicitor would do something instead of just sitting there taking notes. He needed protection but didn't know how to ask.

  "Did you hit her?"

  "I don't know," he said, remembering her hands resting against him, fingers digging into his chest. He remembered raising his own hands sharply, pushing her away. "I don't know what happened," he said. "I just ... don't ... know."

  ~

  Alone at last.

  He had been up all night. This close to dawn he knew it would be futile to try sleeping. He lay down on the cell floor, hitched his hands behind his head, and began a long series of sit-ups.

  At first his body complained, but then the adrenalin started to flow and he sat, stretched, sat, faster and faster until the sweat was flowing freely off his face.

  Two memories kept leaping up in his head to plague him. Jerry's kiss, lingering on his mouth long enough to promise at so much, then pulling away so that, in reality, it had only been brief, a tease. And then, from later, the image of her right cheek pressed down into the compacted leafmould, the back of her skull caved in. It must have been a rock, or a hammer, he guessed. A single blow.