The fingers squeezed and the bullet was fired.
I looked to the end of the barrel and at its head I saw a slight whisp of smoke. There was a pain in my shoulder from where the gun had jolted back when the trigger was pulled. I still had the gun at my eyeline and I was focused upon the wisps of gun smoke. My ears were ringing from the fire but I could still hear the silence, and from this I knew that my husband would be dead and his soul was leaving his body like the smoke dancing out of the barrel. I reached towards the barrel opening to try and stop the smoke in an attempt to put it back into the gun. Instead the gun slipped to the floor beside my bare feet.
I looked at my painted red toes and then to the floor; from there my eyes darted to the chair that stood beside me then to the table top and then to the first splatter of blood upon the glass. My eyes transfixed upon this small droplet and I waited in vain for the sound of Mark’s angry voice asking me what I had done, but it did not come. I inched my head further up the table to see the red belly of a once breathing man. It had slipped beneath the table and through the glass table top I could see the naked body of my husband, slouched in a sleeping pose. I forced myself to look up and as soon as I took full view, my body buckled in shock. His lower jaw and his left eye remained of his face, but everything else was sprayed across my breakfast room. His head resembled the smashed watermelon Mark had bludgeoned with Grant only weeks prior. The blood clung to the room and dripped down my delicate butterfly walls, but this time there were no seeds from the melon, just globules of flesh which stuck to the windows and walls.
I looked up to the ceiling where I could see the sky through the window and uttered, ‘No’ when I saw a clump of flesh sitting beside two seeds that the cleaner had missed when mopping up the melon.
My body weakened and I slumped to the floor in silent screams which came from deep inside my stomach but were too frightened to make a sound. I sat on the floor clinging to my legs, waiting for the police to arrive. I do not remember the sound of the gun shot but I was certain that it must have been heard from all around. It was a Wednesday morning around 10am. My gardener did not prune the roses midweek nor did my cleaner tend to my dust on this day. But I was sure there must be many others who would have heard the shot and seen the spray of glass as the bullet left the building behind Mark’s head. So, I sat and waited for my fate to arrive in flashing blue sirens and pull me away in hand cuffs.
By 4pm I had woken in the foetal position on my marble floor. I do not know how long I slept but it was a deep sleep which was whipped away from me when I saw the dried blood on my toes where I had stretched out and slid my foot through Mark’s blood. Instantly I grabbed my legs in towards me and I started to shake; just a gentle pulse throughout my body which matched my slight rhythmic rocking back and forth on the floor.
Where were the police? Why had they not already arrived? Don’t they have a sixth sense about a gun killing? Or maybe they hadn’t been called yet? I could have called them if no one else had, I could tell them that I did not mean to kill him. I just wanted everything to stop. I wanted him to be alive but just away from me; that was all, just away from me and my home. They might have understood? There may have been a caring officer who would put her arm around me and tell me it was all over.
Or, I could have cleared the room myself? I could have dumped Mark on the compost and mopped the room until my French Renaissance wallpaper shone. But Mark was a big man and he would be too heavy for me to budge even with half his head missing. Also, I had no idea where my cleaner kept all the cleaning materials, I didn’t even know where the mop was kept.
Or, I could run, which is what I should have done if my devil hadn’t grabbed me for that one last conversation. So, I scrambled onto my bare feet and ran to the front door. Outside, the air held the weight of a forthcoming night storm: fresh and cold. The strong storm breeze whooshed up my nose and stole one breath from me. I closed my eyes momentarily, and when I opened them again I ran towards the burgeoning storm. I ran from my house, over fields, crossing country lanes and through gaps in hedges. In the middle of one farmer’s field I felt the first splat of rain. I stopped to look up; I could feel the wind swirl around my body. I shut my eyes as huge drops fell heavily on my skin.
By the time dusk came I was shivering from my wet skin and hair. The rain had stopped but dark towering clouds still policed the sky. The light remained low as night slipped into the cracks between the black clouds. I retreated to the woods which bordered the field and I snuck into a natural cave inside an old tree.
This oak tree must have been decades upon decades old. It was far older than me and it will still be there long after you or I have gone. It had stood silently swaying in the breeze for many a lifetime, without any care. It would have existed at times of great social unrest: during both world wars, world depression, loss of towers and it would have grown during many different parliament elections and not cared about the outcome. Its leaves would have sprung out in the spring and fallen in the autumn, year after year after year. Its bark was weathered from the different seasons and cracked down the centre to deform the trunk and create a hollow for me to eventually hide inside.
It didn’t care for me, who I was, what I wore or where I had run from, as it didn’t care for anything. I sat within its belly and hugged my knees close to my chest and I shivered from the cold. My teeth chattered involuntarily and at times I shook violently, waking myself from my thoughts. These thoughts plagued my mind and they flitted from panic about what I had done, to calm acceptance of murdering a man. When the panic raged in my head then I crawled further into the tree and when it was calm I poked my head out to look at the pearl white moon that shone upon this part of England; this moon was like a search-light when I was scared, or a white sun brightening the land all around me when I felt calm.
As the night progressed the periods of calm were more frequent and I was able to lie on the ground resting my head upon a clump of fallen leaves. The sounds of the forest were a comfort to me; even the screams from the Muntjac deer calling for a mate gave me solace that I was not alone. I hugged my body and I watched the night floor itch with minibeasts within the soil. I remember squeezing some leaves against my face just to feel the wet dew upon my cheeks. I desperately wanted to crawl in amongst the worms, beetles and centipedes, I wanted to plant my limbs alongside the tree roots and watch England through the years the way the trees did season after season after season, not moving, not caring just existing upon God’s green land.
Finally, I fell into a deep slumber until beams of morning sunlight pierced the sky and fell upon the earth where the ground held my head. My eyes eased open and my body shivered from the morning chill but I was relaxed, dare I say Jason, the most relaxed I had been for many years, right up to the point that my mind twisted away from its gentle sweet dreams and back to taking in all the weight of the day that had passed just twenty hours before, and the onslaught of the days that I must face from now on, starting with this day. I screamed in response to this and then I cried out to all the oak trees standing all around me. They towered above my puny body, the wind played amongst their leaves and their sound was like a child laughing at my cries.
‘You’re on your own,’ the trees smirked. ‘We have no interest in you or your troubles; leave us be to enjoy the sunrise and the wind and then the sunset of today and for many beautiful days to come.’
Their smug superiority snubbed any hope of further refuge so, like an urchin in a shop doorway, I crawled out before the shop owner brushed me away.
I returned to the field where a crop was growing and I walked in the gullies between each long line of winter green vegetables. I was not sure what the farmer was growing to feed the supermarkets’ profits, but the green leaf heads reached my fingertips. I dragged my hand from crop to crop as I wondered who would eat this one then who would eat the next. These dull thoughts spared me from the hysteria that was rumbling in my body. My next di
straction was the beautiful pain from my bare soles. I had been running upon my naked feet from house to road to field to wood, and they were now torn in places. Blood had oozed from my feet from the first moment they encountered a sharp stone but I would not allow myself to tend to these wounds, instead I wanted to feel this pain to the point that I sought hard ground within the gully and each time I winced I thanked the ground for the distraction of this agony.
Ahead of me was another field separated by a road. This wild flower field dipped down into the valley where my town had grown. Within it was the exclusive avenue and within this exclusive, ‘sought after road’, was my house. I stood on the hard concrete that intersected these two fields and looked down into Stoning Town. I stretched my hand out to my eyeline to where the tops of the trees surrounding the town came. I stroked the air to stroke this bubble world which had its residents just waking to their alarm to start their day. Some would be rising for work, some would be rising to wake their children for school and some, as I would have been, would still be asleep waiting to wake before lunch. How easy all their lives are, I mused. How sweet that they have so little to fear from their society; no one will hurt them and they can enjoy their day and many other days to come. I continued to stroke the rooftops then eased my hand back to stroke the wild poppies swaying in the morning breeze. Each flower danced in unison, one way then the next.
Morning fog began to slide across the ground and swathed Stoning Town in a white steam as if it nestled in a hot bath supplied by a nurturing Mother Nature. I envied all those who were waking inside this happy cosy scene. I did not belong there or anywhere and Mother Earth was not interested in comforting away my loneliness.
Above the earth, the sun was crawling up into the sky, it was a raging red and, as it rose, this colour seeped into the morning blue. The haze from the ground smudged the horizon and diluted the red rays on the ground to a burnt orange colour. The bright sunshine stung my eyes. I closed them as I crossed the field to the busy A3 which separated this piece of green and flowery England to an English exclusive town on the outskirts of London. The road was beginning to fill with commuters and I wondered how many would see a ghost walking down the sloping field above them. How many would be calling the police to add their observations to the pile of other observations, of a woman in white with blood across the base of her dress billowing in the wind. She looks lost, one may report; she seems disorientated walking along this busy road; she’s likely to get herself killed in her clearly deranged state, another would complain. Could she be missing from a care home somewhere? She’s not wearing a coat, not even a shawl to keep her warm on this cold autumn morning and she’s not wearing any shoes! Someone needs to grab her and take her back to the asylum. Has she been reported as missing? Is she the one on the news? Is she the woman in white who the police wish to question in relation to the shooting yesterday?
I could hear the news in my head.
The police are hunting for the wife of a revered business man who was killed yesterday morning. They are treating the death as suspicious and wish to speak to Mrs Olivia Hopkins whom they fear is armed and dangerous. The public are warned not to approach her and advise anyone who sees her to call the police for armed back-up.
I walked across the motorway bridge which took me back into the town. I could hear the commuter cars whizz past me and, with the whine of the cars beneath me, I again wondered how many were calling the police to say they had found me. I looked out for the police hiding in the woodland and blackberry bushes on the other side of the bridge. With each rustle of the leaves I flinched believing it to be the armed response unit waiting to pounce. I strode on, focused on returning to the house. I suspected that they were not going to grab and tackle me to the floor because they were waiting for my return, when an arrest for murder could be discreet, thus not upsetting the good society over their cornflakes.
As I got nearer to the pristine, perfect street where I once lived, I again mused over the gossip buzzing from one person catching sight of the police cars surrounding the Hopkins’ house. Maybe it would be Cynthia Mason who caught sight of the police flashing lights on her morning jog or Pricilla Atkins on her walk with her yapping poodle? Either way, one word from one would be spread across the commuter town by breakfast and all across London by lunch.
As I neared my driveway, I felt the familiar twisting of my torso as I envisaged the police cars surrounding my house. There would be an ambulance waiting to carry Mark’s body out in a white body bag and policemen taking evidence inside and outside my home. I anticipated a fleet of police cars racing towards me down the drive then throwing me upon the shingles with my arms locked behind me in handcuffs as my rights were read.
But there were no sirens or police dogs or policemen in bulletproof vests stalking around my house. There were no ambulances to carry my husband away or people passing by to deliberately witness the humiliation of a couple torn apart by one bullet fired twenty-one hours ago.
Instead this seven-bedroom building with mock Georgian pillars and a double car port with swimming pool in a sought-after location sat peacefully in its two acres of land. To anyone looking in then the expected envy of the grounds and the house of a perfect, wealthy, socially elite area would remain intact as it has since the day I moved here. The house was magnificent and manicured to display a model house in a model village. Yet, for me, every step closer to the front door increased the amount of bile floating to my throat. I no longer felt smug about living here but nauseated that I had to open the front door to my white hallway with sweeping stairs and white marble floor. As the door closed behind me and I smelt the cold air infused with iron from the blood of Mark, this bile squeezed my stomach and opened my throat to make me retch. I grasped the French Renaissance display table to steady myself, which made the china white lilies topple over.
Like a ghost I floated from room to room looking for signs of help, but no one had noticed the gun shot killing my husband and so I knew I was alone to face Mark once more. As I approached the breakfast room the air felt like a frosty iron bar across my face. I saw the dark splatters of bloody footprints I had made last night from running in the opposite direction to where I was walking now. I was making new footprints, but this time it was wet dew mixed with new blood from the cuts made from walking barefoot across a wet autumn morning field.
I stopped just before the entrance. I could see the smashed window from the bullet escaping the room where it had killed Mark. I could see the congealed dried blood across my butterfly wallpaper. The sweetness of my birds were now dyed red and the peace of this room was now shut away as dark blood stained the room like a lid across the coffin.
I couldn’t enter any further and see any more of the body, that lay inside it, so instead, I turned around and ran back to the hallway. There in in front of me was the telephone where I could call for help; I grabbed the receiver and dialled James’ number. I screamed when James’ voice told me he could not answer the phone right now but please leave a name and number and he’d get back to me as soon as he could.
‘James, James! Help me,’ I cried. My lips were shaking and my voice was tinged with the remnants of the scream I had given when I first fell to my knees, ‘Help me James, help me, I’ve killed him. He’s dead. There was a gun and a bullet and it killed him. I didn’t mean to, I just wanted everything to stop, I’m sorry. Help me.’
I hung up the receiver and stared at the phone for an eternity, but my James did not ring me. I shuddered and thought of calling again but instead I grabbed my mobile phone and car keys and left my home for the last time. I drove my sports car that had been given to me on my birthday earlier in the year. I had used it only half a dozen times since the day the keys were sent to me and placed in my hand by a Porsche delivery man.
I raced away without any clue of where I was going. I figured the M25 would tell me when I got on it, so I turned left out of my drive and drove, still barefoot, towards
the motorway. It was the morning rush hour and every turn I took was met with traffic but eventually I got to the M25 and headed anticlockwise. I flitted from lane to lane to try and budge my way through the herd of cars I was caught in. I crawled along the slip road onto the M23 but I was met with more traffic tiptoeing along this stretch of road. I remained in first gear for nearly half an hour and in that time my mind was able to refocus away from the shuddering quivering panic I had when I got into the car, and towards a calm, gentle, stroking hand as it focused on the commuters surrounding me. Bizarrely, I felt comforted and protected by them and for a brief moment I was also just a driver on my way to work.
I was once more the young red-head on my way back to Liberty of London to sell rugs to different people. I was going to see my work friends and laugh about the night before and then discuss the next evening out. I was going to meet James for coffee later in the morning and chat about the future and, in particular, where we were going on our next diving holiday. I smiled when I remembered that just before I met Mark we had made a pact that no matter what happened we were going to work hard to save up to go diving in the Galapagos Islands. It never happened as Mark did not approve and James did not insist that I kept to my promise.
Dear wonderful James, a man who had loved me for who I was. Something my naïve youth rejected and my penance for trying to love the wrong man was a miserable life. My marriage was a slow execution and I was buried many years ago in my house, but nobody really noticed and very few came to my funeral or visited my grave. Except for James, he was different; he still reached out to me even when I had rudely ignored him since our beautiful days in Australia. My skeletal hands reached for my phone and once more I rang my James; again it went to answerphone:
The Society Game Page 28