‘It’s nice,’ she whispered to Jo as they headed to the rear of the hall.
Jo answered with an I-told-you-so look.
There was a smaller area at the back reserved for a couple of settees and a television. A low table with books and magazines sat on top of a rug that looked as if it had come from an antique shop.
‘Hello, Sonia, it’s me,’ Jo called out towards another room beyond. Her voice echoed around them, getting lost in the vaulted ceiling.
The place seemed deserted, even though the front door had been unlocked. For a moment Lorraine wondered if all the homeless people of Wellesbury and the surrounding area had been miraculously re-homed. The reality was, as she later learnt, they got sent out for the day and weren’t allowed back in until six p.m.
Jo’s voice rang out again amid the avenues of sunlight that sloped through the Methodist chapel’s tall windows.
‘Odd. She said she’d be here.’
Then they heard a noise coming from the other room, and soon after that a figure emerged through the doorway. ‘Sorry, sorry,’ the woman said in a flustered voice. ‘I was lost in what I was doing.’ She offered a small smile.
‘Sonia, this is Lorraine, my sister,’ Jo said, and Lorraine was struck by the note of pride in her voice.
Lorraine approached the woman and shook hands. She was extremely thin, her skin tinged grey and almost see-through, as if she’d not eaten in months. The pale blue jeans she was wearing would have once fitted snugly, likewise the white T-shirt that hung loosely from her slight frame. The jade-green silk scarf looped around her neck lent a small splash of colour to an otherwise washed-out appearance. Lorraine could tell she’d once been a beauty, perhaps not so long ago, but that recently taking care of herself had not been a priority. There was a tangible air of sadness about her, an aura of grief that was gradually consuming her.
‘You’ve done a great job with this place,’ Lorraine commented, and noticed the way Sonia’s eyes dipped briefly to the floor. Her hair was thin, once-blonde, but now the grey was pushing through at the roots, suggesting she’d not been to a salon in a while.
‘I try my best,’ she said coyly. ‘I don’t know what they’d do otherwise.’
There was a slight pause.
‘She means her boys,’ Jo said fondly. ‘The homeless lads. And there are a few girls, too.’
‘They must be very grateful to you,’ Lorraine said.
Sonia picked at her nails nervously. Lorraine noticed several were broken.
‘You have no idea how excited Jo has been about you coming to stay,’ she said. ‘She’s been telling me about your visit for ages.’
‘She might not be saying that by the end of the week,’ Lorraine responded with a laugh.
‘Freddie took his younger cousin up to your place to see the horses yesterday,’ Jo said.
‘Yes, Lana told me she’d bumped into them.’ At the mention of her daughter, Sonia smiled and her shoulders dropped an inch.
‘Stella’s no rider, that’s for sure, but she enjoyed seeing them. She told me she thought your home was beautiful.’ Lorraine wanted to mention Stella’s ‘nasty man’ incident, but wasn’t sure it was appropriate to bring it up without asking Jo first.
‘They’re welcome any time,’ Sonia said. ‘Lana would be happy to see them.’ It seemed as if she’d been going to say more, but she didn’t.
‘Well, we won’t keep you any longer,’ Jo said, breaking a slightly awkward silence. ‘I’m sure you’re busy.’ She cleared her throat. ‘I just came to pick up the leaflets.’
‘It’s nice to have a break, actually.’ Sonia walked over to a shelving rack next to the television and took down a stack of flyers. ‘I was going over the shelter’s accounts. Here.’ She handed the pile over. ‘It would be fantastic if you could spread them about. The event’s not until the end of August.’
‘Of course,’ Jo said, quickly scanning one. She nodded her approval, then slipped a hand on to Lorraine’s shoulder. ‘Right, let’s make a move.’
Lorraine nodded and opened her mouth to say goodbye but was interrupted by a deafening crash. It came from the kitchen. Sonia screamed and Jo jumped while Lorraine, immediately switching into work mode, dashed past them both to see what had happened. It sounded like breaking glass – a window perhaps? Might it be an intruder?
‘Wait there,’ she called back to them, slamming the door open as far as it would go with a swipe of her arm and scanning the room.
The kitchen work counter and floor were showered with shards and chunks of sparkling broken glass, and a still plugged-in power cable was trailing out of the smashed window. She peered out through the hole but all she saw was a small courtyard housing a couple of dustbins. The wooden gate was flapping open. Even after only a few seconds an intruder could be gone. Nevertheless, Lorraine ran towards the back-door exit of the kitchen, cursing her sandals which were no good for fast movement.
The door was locked. No chance now.
Sonia was crunching her way through the glass. ‘They’ve taken all the chicken we were going to give them for dinner!’
‘Please, stay back,’ Lorraine said, not meaning to sound rude. It was a natural instinct to keep a crime scene as clean as possible. ‘Are you sure it’s just the chicken?’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Was there a laptop in here?’ Lorraine pointed at the cable and watched Sonia’s expression change.
‘Oh shit,’ she said. It sounded wrong coming from her. ‘It was Tony’s computer, not mine. This can’t be happening. What am I going to do?’ Looking white and even more shaken, she advanced towards the window.
Lorraine raised her arm and asked her again to keep out of the mess. Local uniform would want a look.
Jo was hovering in the doorway. ‘Why was Tony’s computer here?’ she asked quietly.
‘I borrowed it for the morning because mine’s being mended. I couldn’t find him to ask his permission before I left.’ Sonia looked imploringly at Jo, then covered her face with her hands. ‘He’s going to be so angry.’
Jo stepped away, turned, then walked back again, as if she didn’t quite know what to do.
‘I should call the . . . the police,’ Sonia said, and then looked at Lorraine. Jo must have mentioned her job.
‘I won’t be helping with this one, I’m afraid,’ Lorraine said. ‘It’s not my patch. But I’ll make the call if you like.’
Fifteen minutes later, two uniformed officers from Warwickshire Police were on the scene. Another twenty minutes after that a dog handler turned up. After they’d given their statements, Lorraine tried to persuade Jo that they should go: she was concerned about leaving Stella alone and bored in a house she didn’t know very well – she couldn’t be sure of Freddie’s attentiveness – and they could always come back later.
‘I can’t exactly desert Sonia, can I?’ Jo whispered. ‘She’s still shaking, look.’
Lorraine could see that Sonia’s shoulders were indeed juddering with every breath she took. She and one of the PCs were sitting on the ends of two adjacent bunks. The young female constable was taking down notes while Sonia alternated between cradling her head in her hands and staring upwards into the cavernous ceiling.
‘Is she always like this?’ Lorraine asked quietly.
Jo looked sympathetically at Sonia. ‘As long as I’ve known her, which is a year or so now. We’ve only really become good friends in the last few months.’ She cleared her throat and moved in a distracted semi-circle around the bunks. Then she sat down on one of them and looked up at her sister. ‘Look, Lorraine,’ she continued quietly, ‘the motorbike suicide I told you about, Dean Watts? He was a regular here at the shelter. Sonia knew him well. His death gutted her, brought back horrific memories of Simon.’
‘Oh, that’s terrible,’ Lorraine said, understanding completely.
‘It’s been awful. She felt responsible somehow, as if she’d failed Dean as well as her son.’
Lorraine took a
moment to think about this. Then the other PC, a young chap with fiery red hair, came over to speak to them again.
‘The dog has picked something up,’ he informed them. ‘Straight from the kitchen window, down the street and into the back entrance of the supermarket car park. We’re trying to get hold of the manager so we can view their CCTV footage. We lost the trail after that. Meantime, we’ll get a forensics officer on scene to see if we can get anything.’
Lorraine was about to reply when she spotted a man coming into the shelter. He was tall and sturdy with a crumpled, weathered face set beneath wiry grey hair. It looked greasy.
‘What’s going on?’ he said.
The way he stood, his shoulders broad, hands on hips, bearded chin jutting forward, was commanding, and also slightly intimidating. He was probably in his early sixties but looked fit and strong.
‘Oh, Frank, thank God you’re here,’ Sonia said, getting up from the bed and making her way over. ‘There’s been a break-in. The dinner was stolen.’
‘And Tony’s computer,’ Jo added quietly.
Frank took a moment before speaking. Pale blue eyes peered out from behind rimless glasses, scanning the scene. ‘What do you mean, a break-in?’ His voice was deep and gravelly, and seemed somehow to pull Sonia closer, as if he was coaxing her to explain what had happened.
‘Someone smashed a window in the kitchen,’ Lorraine said, approaching the man. She noticed the jeans he was wearing had oily streaks down the front, and she caught a whiff of sweat as she drew near. Heavy tattoos spread out over his forearms beneath the rolled-up sleeves of his check shirt, making it look as if he had greeny-black bruises. ‘But no one was hurt.’
‘I see,’ he said, looking Lorraine up and down. Then he switched his gaze to Jo and sized her up too.
Sonia’s shaking was intermittent now, although she was still very pale. Her eyes were red and inflamed, and two small trails of black mascara crawled down her cheeks. Lorraine dug in her bag for a packet of tissues and handed them over.
‘We’re taking this very seriously,’ the young red-haired officer stated. ‘There’s been a spate of similar burglaries in the area recently.’
Sonia stiffened noticeably. ‘Spate?’ she whispered.
‘It’s been a tough few weeks for her,’ Frank said slowly to the officer, his tone slightly less gruff, as if he was making an effort not to sound menacing. ‘Don’t worry, I’ll look after her. She’ll be fine now I’m here.’
Lorraine watched as Sonia relaxed, allowing Frank to take control. Jo, on the other hand, now seemed more shaken than Sonia.
Lorraine frowned, staring at her sister. ‘Shall we go then?’ she suggested.
It was a moment before Jo spoke. ‘Yes, sorry,’ she replied.
When she still didn’t make a move, Lorraine took her by the hands, pulled her upright and guided her towards the door, wondering what on earth had upset her sister.
5
THE WALLS OF his bedroom seemed to be closing in on him, pressing down on his life, making everything seem unbearable. The room was a mess, he knew that, but he couldn’t be bothered to sort it out. There were other things on his mind.
Freddie went over to his bed and swept the pile of clothes and wet towels on to the floor with his arm. He lifted the corner of the mattress and pulled out his laptop from underneath. He’d started hiding it a few months ago, when things got really bad. His mum was always moaning about the state of his room, using it as an excuse to nose about, he reckoned, prying into his phone, his diary – except he’d given up writing that long ago. He’d hate it if she somehow managed to get on his computer, if he’d accidentally left it logged on.
He shoved a stack of dirty plates and mugs aside on his desk, clearing a space for the laptop. His heart began to thump as he waited for it to start up. It was like a drug – he had to know, had to get his fix, even though it was slowly, surely destroying him. His palms became sweaty, his fists balled up and tense. Why him? he wondered. Why wasn’t he allowed to enjoy life like everyone else?
A lump filled his throat, but he swallowed it down. He was beyond crying about it now.
First he checked his emails, laughing when he saw one from a gap year company trying to sell him some working holiday in South America. Losers like him didn’t do things like that. What had he been thinking, signing up for information when they’d had that stupid talk at school? Some kids in his year had already gone off on their adventures – teaching English in China, kayaking stretches of the world’s longest rivers, helping to build schools in poor African countries. What was he doing with his life?
Freddie stared around his room again. He hadn’t even bothered to open the curtains in weeks.
His fist came down on the desk, sending a plate to the floor. It cracked in half.
He deleted all the spam emails and hovered the cursor over the only important one in his inbox. It was from Malcolm Wade, his stepdad, the only man who’d ever been a father to him. Except he wasn’t in his life any more. What was the point of even reading it?
He still couldn’t believe he’d left. When it happened, his mum told him that they’d just grown apart, that it was best for all concerned if Malc lived in London near his work.
All concerned. He’d thought about that.
Did his mum think he was stupid? He’d known something was up for a long time, seen the signs, the little changes in them both – his mum always in a cheerful mood (except when Malc was home at the weekends) and Malc increasingly anxious, turning up unannounced, drinking too much. But with everything else going on in his life – exams; this shit – he’d not been able to do anything about it. He wished now that he could take time back, help them sort it out. Malc might still be here then, perhaps notice something was wrong, maybe give him some advice.
Freddie stared at the computer screen, idly drifting on to eBay to see if that hard drive he’d had his eye on was still there, then going to check what was on telly later. He didn’t take any of it in.
Finally, there was nothing for it. He had to know. Had to know what had been going on. That’s what they thrived on, he realised. The certainty that wherever he was, whatever he was doing, he’d never be able to ignore it, walk away from it, act like he didn’t care. Sure, he was eighteen; he could leave home, struggle to establish a new life somewhere. But one thing was for certain: wherever he went, cyberspace would go with him.
He logged into his profile, his shoulders slumping forward as he realised what was going to happen. The little red alert showed he’d got fourteen new messages and twenty-seven other notifications. He suddenly felt sick. Whatever he’d mindlessly shoved down his throat for breakfast churned and curdled in his belly. He dashed into the bathroom across the landing and threw up.
‘Hi, love,’ his mum said when he went into the kitchen to fetch a glass of water.
He felt dizzy, dry-mouthed, not real. For a second, he stared at her, wondering if he could tell her.
No way, he thought.
‘We saved you some lunch,’ his Aunt Lorraine said. Her voice was crisper than his mum’s, more to the point.
He stared at her for a moment too, wondering if he could confide in her. But she was a cop and would just make it worse. Everything would get out of hand if he told her. He was coping OK, wasn’t he?
‘Not hungry,’ he replied, not meaning to sound so ungrateful. He saw Lorraine shrug as he walked out again, retreating to his room.
He passed Stella on the landing. She said something to him in an excited voice but he just slammed his bedroom door. Whatever it was, he didn’t want to hear it.
Malc had given him the framed photograph years ago, the one he’d always kept on his bedside table. For the past few weeks it had been face down in a drawer, but now he took it out, held it under the light. He’d thought it was silly at first, to have it on display, but then he’d grown to love staring at it, remembering all the good times they’d had. The three of them on holiday in Spain, the waiter snapping
the picture of them at the table, the huge paella in the foreground.
Freddie stared at himself. He’d been about fourteen, he reckoned. He had a tan, too, just enough to highlight his hair, and he’d been excited about going back to school, to see if that girl Lana would notice him.
He traced his finger over his mum and Malc, joining them up with an invisible line. Surely he could get them back together again? How would he ever escape Radcote otherwise? How would he get away from all the crap? He could hardly leave his mum alone as things stood.
You have been tagged in two photos.
Shithead loser gonna die 2nite . . . was the caption beneath the latest picture. It was of a rack of pig carcasses hanging in an abattoir.
Why r u not dead yet? put yrself out of yr misery fuckhead. This one was linked to an actual picture of him getting on a bus. He was wearing his new trainers, he noticed, so it had been taken after term ended. His stomach churned again. Would they follow him to university, if he ever got there, and through the rest of his life?
Freddie read a couple of the messages. Occasionally he laughed at them, to see if that helped. It didn’t. After enough time, he’d begun to believe what was written. He was a loser, useless; he was ugly and he stank; he shouldn’t even exist. They were right. Everyone in his year hated him; they all wished him dead. He was a waste of space.
The underlying message was always the same: why don’t you just kill yourself?
They’d set up a page for him, dedicated to him as if he’d already done the deed – already hanged himself, taken an overdose, slit his wrists in the bath. Sometimes they made suggestions about how he should do it, sent him links to suicide websites or pictures of corpses. There were fake messages of condolence put up every day, vile pictures either of him or something gory sent to his inbox. He was tagged in everything, just to make sure he knew.
And then there were the text messages. Day and night, anonymous, malicious . . . and they were getting worse.
Of course, he’d considered telling someone – a teacher, his mum, Malc, or the authorities, like you were supposed to – but that would make them hate him even more. He’d thought about telling Lenny, reckoned he might understand. Lenny had been through a load of shit himself and was always getting out of one scrape or another. He was the only friend Freddie had these days, and even then they’d only got to know each other as mates because Lenny had been on the scrounge – food, money, beer, whatever. Sometimes he disappeared for days, turning up at New Hope when he needed a hot meal, a bed.
Before You Die Page 5