Tamsyn Murray-Afterlife 01 My So-Called Afterlife

by Tamsyn Murray

  He didn’t. Instead of using the diversion to get away from the lunatic, I watched in horrified disbelief as Jeremy picked up the newly broken toilet seat from the floor of cubicle one and raised it high over his head. He’d obviously lost it. Did he seriously think a piece of cracked plastic was going to help? My killer saw the action reflected in the mirror and turned, drawing his hand from his pocket at the same time.

  ‘Look out!’ I screamed.

  The momentum of his swing carried Jeremy forward. Almost in slow motion, the man drew his arm back. His sleeve dropped to his elbow. The outline of the ace of spades tattoo was dark against his pale skin. A glint of silver flashed in the flickering light and Jeremy’s eyes widened in sudden shock. Barely visible against his jacket, a knife was sunk deep into his chest.

  He took a few staggering steps backwards before dropping heavily to his knees. Twitching helplessly, his fingertips brushed at the knife handle, trying to tug it from the wound. With an effort, his fingers gripped it. I ran to him. White-faced, Ryan followed. The knife clattered from Jeremy’s numb hand and skidded into the shadows beneath the basins. He toppled backwards, unconscious.

  Ice-cool and emotionless, his attacker stared down for several long seconds. Then, without another glance, he stepped over Jeremy’s shuddering body and walked up the stairs.

  Chapter 20

  Time stood still. Caught in my own nightmarish memories, it felt like an age before I found my voice and started barking instructions at Ryan.

  ‘Go for help,’ I commanded, summoning all my strength to drag Jeremy’s limp hand on to the wound to try and stop the bleeding. ‘Hurry!’

  ‘I don’t want to leave you.’

  I looked up fiercely. ‘We can’t help him on our own. The best we can do is raise the alarm. Do you know where any of the Dearly D psychics live?’

  He nodded. ‘Will you be OK?’

  My expression was grim. ‘I will be. I’m not so sure about him.’

  Moments later, Ryan was gone. I did my best to assess the wound. It was hard to see much in the half-light but I couldn’t help wishing Jeremy had left the knife in his chest. It might have stemmed the shocking amount of sticky redness pooling on the floor beside me. The shallowness of his breathing scared me too. I stared down at his pale face. For the first time since my death, I prayed someone would come to use the toilet. It didn’t matter who, as long as it wasn’t Jeremy’s attacker, returning to finish the job.

  Minutes ticked by. It seemed like Ryan had been gone ages. I hadn’t thought to ask how far he had to go and had no idea how long help would be. I couldn’t even remember if Gonzo and Ripper were sleeping upstairs. Maybe I should try and get a message to the dog, but I didn’t want to leave Jeremy. In the meantime, I watched the dark red stain on Jeremy’s jacket grow and seep on to the tiled floor. My arm ached from the pressure of holding Jeremy’s hand over the cut. I couldn’t keep it up much longer. If help didn’t arrive soon I would have to think of something else to stem the bleeding.

  Jeremy’s eyelids fluttered. How could I keep him with me? Without a clue what to say, I started talking, producing meaningless sentences simply to make noise. I hadn’t come out with so much waffle since my Year Nine French oral exam.

  ‘I’m sorry I got you into this,’ I murmured, gazing down at his grey face. ‘You’ve done so much for me. Please don’t die.’

  His hand fell away as I let it go, unable to hold on any longer. Instantly, blood welled up. I bit my lip. How much longer would Ryan be? Could Jeremy last that long?

  I scrambled to my feet, reaching a decision. It was time to try and persuade Ripper to wake Gonzo up.

  ‘Hold on, Jeremy. I’ll be back.’

  The dog was already alert. His head rose as I stumbled up the last step and he let out a tiny, questioning whine.

  ‘Ripper! Wake Gonzo up!’

  He tilted his head to one side, letting out a single bark.

  ‘Come on, boy, we don’t have long. Make some noise!’

  Seeming to understand, he let out a volley of barks. Gonzo opened his eyes and sat up. ‘What’s up, Ripper?’

  ‘Good dog!’ I cried. All I had to do now was persuade him to drag Gonzo downstairs and we were in business.

  It wasn’t as easy as it sounds. Realising the dog was in a frenzy about something, Gonzo couldn’t make out what it was and cast around for clues. Ripper didn’t want me to get too close and backed away with an anxious, whining snarl. Almost crying with frustration, I gave up. There had to be another way. In a city where millions lived and worked, there must be someone who could help. All I needed was for one of them to hear me.

  My panic-stricken footsteps took me to Oxford Street. Even in the early hours of the morning, it was busy. I ran from person to person, begging them to help. Each time, they looked straight through me. Tears streamed down my face. Jeremy was going to die if I didn’t do something. In desperation, I raised my head skywards and let out a scream of pure anguish.

  ‘What’s the matter? Why are you screaming?’

  I closed my mouth abruptly and spun round to find the speaker. It was a woman, around Jeremy’s age, and she was staring right at me, her face twisted in concern.

  ‘I’m a ghost. Can you see me?’

  It seemed like a ridiculous question, but after the Elvira incident I wasn’t taking any chances.

  ‘I’m a psychic and I can see you’re a very unhappy ghost. What’s wrong?’

  I almost fainted in relief. ‘Dial 999. There’s a man in the toilets on Carnaby Street. He’s been stabbed.’

  Her colour drained away. Fumbling in her bag, she hauled out a phone and did as I asked.

  ‘Show me,’ she demanded as soon as the call was finished.

  Thanking my lucky stars, I turned and led the way, praying it wasn’t too late.

  Apart from my own, I’m not massively familiar with stabbings. I did know that one cut in the wrong place was enough to kill. Was Jeremy’s wound fatal? He’d lost a lot of blood. His face was ashen by the time we got back to the toilet. He hadn’t moved.

  My angel of mercy went straight into action. Calmly, she swept her hair back out of the way and knelt at Jeremy’s side. Without a second thought, she shrugged off her expensive-looking cardigan and crumpled it into a ball. She eased it over the wound and pressed down firmly. Her other hand travelled to his neck.

  ‘His pulse is weak but steady,’ she said after a minute. ‘It’s a good job you found him when you did.’

  I couldn’t find the words to explain. Thankfully, I didn’t have to. A pair of heavily booted feet thudded down the stairs, closely followed by another. The paramedics didn’t waste any time.

  ‘Stand back please, miss.’

  One of them checked Jeremy over with professional coolness, cutting away the layers of clothing to reveal an ugly puncture on the right side of his chest. The other shook out the stretcher he carried and laid it out on the floor. I watched, gripped by an overwhelming tension.

  ‘It looks like he’s going to be OK.’ The paramedic kneeling next to Jeremy looked up at the young woman. ‘Any idea what happened?’

  I hadn’t thought that far ahead. It made sense for the woman to say no. The police would be arriving at any minute. If she said yes, she’d be sucked into an investigation and any chance at slipping quietly away would be lost. Her gaze slid towards me.

  I summoned a grateful smile. ‘You’ve done enough. I’ll understand if you want to go.’

  It might have been my imagination, but she seemed to shake her head the tiniest bit. Her eyes stayed fixed on mine. She wasn’t going anywhere.

  ‘OK. His name is Jeremy Parker. Tell them he came down to use the loo and didn’t come out. You came down to check on him and found him like this.’

  As she repeated the words to the paramedic, I let out a sigh of relief. Now that I knew Jeremy was out of immediate danger there were a whole load of other things crowding into my mind for attention. Having another psychic around was go
ing to be so helpful.

  ‘I assume you’ll want to come to the hospital,’ said the paramedic. ‘The police will need to talk to you, but they can catch up with you there.’

  She nodded. ‘I’m Celestine,’ she added helpfully, for my benefit.

  The paramedic threw her a polite look. ‘Good for you, love. Move back a bit and we’ll get him on to the stretcher.’

  During our ride in the ambulance, I gave Celestine the bones of what had happened. Not everything, but enough information to satisfy her obvious curiosity and enough so that she could pass on a description of my killer to the police. I couldn’t be totally sure she wasn’t going to sell me down the river like Elvira had, but she’d earned the right to know how Jeremy got hurt, especially if she was going to have to lie to the police about it. Although she absorbed the news in silence, I could tell she had questions. Later, I might have to answer them.

  With a sudden gasp, I remembered Ryan. Whipping my phone out, my fingers flew over the buttons. He’d be out of his mind with worry and I wanted him to meet me at the hospital. After the events of the evening, I was in serious need of a hug.

  Once the message was safely winging its way towards him, I looked up. Celestine was frowning quizzically at me.

  ‘I’m texting my boyfriend. He went for help, I want to tell him to come to the hospital.’

  Her eyebrows shot up.

  I grinned. ‘Oh yeah, we’ve got ghostly mobiles. Some of us even manage to have love lives. There’s probably a lot you don’t know about the afterlife.’

  She winked. The odds against finding another psychic when I needed one had to be enormous. Maybe it was fate, although I doubted there was a god of lighting engineers. However I’d managed it, I had a good feeling about her. I glanced over at Jeremy, pale and unconscious underneath his red blanket. My relief evaporated. He’d been stabbed and it was because of me. Now I was involving someone else. She’d saved Jeremy’s life, but I shouldn’t be confiding in Celestine. I couldn’t afford to involve any more innocent people.

  Chapter 21

  I’ve never liked hospitals. The ones I’d been in were either too hot or too cold and smelled awful. Throw in the risk of contracting some disgusting flesh-eating bug and you’ve got the last place you’d want to go if you were ill. Obviously the chances of my picking up any deadly germs were infinitesimally small, but it didn’t make the place any less grim.

  University College Hospital wasn’t the worst one I’d been to. The atmosphere in the intensive care unit was hushed, punctuated by low voices and mysterious beeps from the equipment. Not long after we’d arrived, a doctor had appeared, briefly, to advise Celestine that Jeremy’s condition was stable. We didn’t know more than that. Celestine and I sat in the deserted waiting area, neither saying much. Occasionally another ghost passed through, but none of them paid us much attention. Celestine flicked through an out-of-date magazine someone had left on the worn fabric seat, one that I’d read already. Jeremy had brought it to me the previous month.

  I studied Celestine as she turned the dog-eared pages. She was very pretty. I’d guessed at first she was the same age as Jeremy, but now I had time to look at her properly, I thought she was a few years younger. With her blond hair tucked behind her ears, she didn’t seem that much older than me.

  ‘I’m twenty-five.’

  My mouth dropped. ‘Exactly how psychic are you?’

  ‘I’ve been able to see ghosts since I was little. I don’t read minds, but in this case I don’t have to. You’re trying to work me out.’

  It wasn’t the first time I’d wondered why Jeremy could only see me, but I had a more important question. ‘Actually, I was wondering if you’ve got a boyfriend.’

  Celestine laughed. ‘Not at the moment.’

  A half-smile crossed my face as my idea took shape. If everything worked out the way I planned, she wouldn’t be single for long.

  By the time Ryan arrived at three a.m., Jeremy was out of intensive care and in a side room off the main ward. There wasn’t time for more than a hurried introduction between him and Celestine. The police were hovering, eager to find out the details of what had happened, but Jeremy was sleeping and the nurses refused to let them near him. They turned their attention to Celestine. With our help, she sailed through the questions, keeping the details as vague as possible, apart from her description of my killer. It made sense to pretend she’d been on a first date with Jeremy and didn’t know him very well.

  ‘I think that’s all we need for now,’ the dark-suited detective said, closing his notebook. ‘You’ll be here for a while, if there’s anything else?’

  Celestine hesitated for a fraction of a second, and I wondered if she regretted getting involved. Then she nodded. ‘I’ll be here.’

  ‘Lucy?’ Jeremy’s voice sounded painfully weak as his eyelids fluttered open.

  ‘Hey,’ I said, abandoning my game of Paper, Scissors, Stone with Ryan and moving nearer to the bed. ‘Good of you to join us.’

  He gave a faint smile. ‘Sorry. I told you, I’m too old for these late nights.’

  I shook my head sorrowfully. ‘I hate to tell you this, but the extra beauty sleep hasn’t helped. You’re still ugly.’

  ‘Cut him some slack, Lucy. He’s had a rough night,’ Celestine joined in, her tone playful. ‘Aren’t you going to introduce us?’

  Jeremy’s eyes widened as he worked out the implications of the sentence. ‘You – she – you found someone else who can see you!’

  At least his brain still worked. ‘Celestine, meet Jeremy.

  Jeremy, this is Celestine. She kind of saved your life.’

  Jeremy was silent for a moment as he stared at Celestine. ‘Thank you,’ he said finally.

  Without dropping his gaze, Celestine replied, ‘My pleasure. It’s Lucy you should thank, though. She was the one who told me where you were.’

  ‘And you came to the hospital?’

  Celestine shrugged. ‘Lucy needed someone to explain. There were no other psychics around so I got the job.’

  Soon, they were chatting like they’d known each other forever. I glanced over at Ryan and nudged my head towards the door. Would they notice if we left them to it? Probably not. If I was honest, now that I knew Jeremy was going to be OK, I couldn’t wait to get away. The hospital was giving me the heebie-jeebies. Besides, I wanted to get back to the toilet to see how the investigation was going.

  Outside, Ryan touched my shoulder. ‘Can we take a detour? There’s someone I need to see.’

  Mystified, I nodded and followed him along the corridor. Was there anywhere he didn’t have friends?

  A few minutes later, the awful truth dawned. The area of the hospital he led me to was a world away from the bustle of intensive care. The stillness was uncomfortable and the nurses padded around with sad efficiency. It wasn’t a ghost Ryan wanted to visit. It was his dad.

  ‘You can wait here if you like.’ Ryan was pale but determined as he paused outside the door to a side room. ‘His wounds have healed, but it’s still not a pretty sight.’

  The sadness in his eyes cut me. I wound my fingers around his and squeezed. ‘I want to come in.’

  You could have heard a pin drop inside the room. Every few seconds the air was split by the twin beeps of the life support machine and heart monitor. In the centre of the wires and regulation hospital bedding was the still figure of a grey-haired man. I stared in mute horror at the rise and fall of the respirator and the tiny blips of light on the screen. They were the only signs of life. My eyes grew damp. The machines might have kept him breathing, but he wasn’t truly alive. Now I understood Ryan’s need to help others. Whether he knew it or not, he was trying to make up for being unable to help his father. Maybe that was why he hadn’t passed across.

  ‘Has he ever woken up?’ My whisper sounded harsh in the hushed atmosphere.

  Ryan shook his head, his gaze glued to his dad’s face. ‘The worst thing is not knowing. He hasn’t passed across, he isn
’t here, so where is he?’ His hands jerked helplessly. ‘In limbo? Trapped inside his own head? Wherever he is, I can’t reach him.’

  I laid soft fingers on his arm. ‘Don’t do this to yourself. It’s not your fault.’

  His eyes glittered. ‘Yeah, I know. But I have to believe that one day I’ll find him and bring him back. My mum needs that.’

  I didn’t trust myself to speak. What could I say, anyway? The depth of his pain was almost unbearable, and I wasn’t surprised he kept it locked away. My heart ached for him, but I was also honoured that he’d shared his anguish. I gave him a fierce hug. ‘Is there anything I can do to help?’

  The faintest of smiles flickered around his lips as he turned to leave. ‘You’re already doing it. Come on, we’d better get back.’

  Carnaby Street was closed to everyone except the police. Even Gonzo was gone, although his blanket was still there. I had a momentary pang at the thought of him sleeping somewhere without it and sent Ryan off on a walk around to see if he’d settled somewhere else for what was left of the night.

  The toilet itself was almost deserted. Most of the crime team had been and gone. They’d found the knife and taken it away for testing. One last technician was dusting the taps for fingerprints, on the instruction of the shabby-coated detective who seemed to be in charge.

  ‘Make sure you do all of them. Check for DNA evidence. Our boy might have washed the victim’s blood off before he left.’

  I thought back. He hadn’t, but it wasn’t the worst suggestion I’d heard. During the investigation into my murder I’d got to know most of the local police. I recognised the detective’s face, although I didn’t remember his name. The young police constable he was with looked no older than me and wore his uniform proudly. He had ‘new recruit’ written all over him.

  ‘Wasn’t there another stabbing here last year?’ he asked.

  The detective nodded. ‘Yeah, a young girl. She died of multiple wounds. Nasty.’

  ‘Do you think there might be a link?’ The young officer looked thoughtful. ‘Two knife incidents in the same place in such a short space of time? It could be someone who uses these toilets a lot.’