by K. L. Slater
‘Can’t complain,’ he replies. ‘Glad to be home.’
His mouth stretches wide into a gapped grin. His thin lips are a dark pink and spotted purple in places. His chin looks sore and patchy with grey stubble. I feel my stomach turn.
‘Excuse me,’ I mutter and rush into the kitchen. I splash a little water on my face and hang over the sink for a moment or two.
‘Are you OK?’ The female paramedic stands watching me in the doorway.
‘Yes, I’m fine.’ I stand up straighter and wipe my mouth with the back of my hand. ‘Sorry, I just felt a bit queasy.’
She looks at me curiously. ‘Are you a relative of Ronnie, or—’
‘His neighbour. We’ve lived next to each other for years.’
‘Are you going to be OK looking in on him now and then, supervising his medication? He seems quite confused and he’s still shaky on his feet.’
I don’t like the way she still seems to be considering me, with her head tipped to one side. It’s as if she can see through the thin façade I’m trying so hard to maintain.
Looking at Ronnie back there, I felt a rush of revulsion but now I almost feel guilty for that. Ronnie might not have done anything wrong. In fact, I have real trouble even mulling over the possibility that he could have even remotely been involved with Billy’s death.
Surely, I’d know. Back then, someone would’ve known it.
Sheila’s face appears in my mind’s eye. I blink slowly and firmly. It’s essential I get a grip here.
I realise I need to get rid of the paramedics and get Ronnie settled so I can speak to him privately.
‘We’ll be fine,’ I say as confidently as I can manage. ‘I’ll ring the hospital right away if there’s a problem.’
‘Perfect.’ She turns to walk back in the living room. ‘If you want to come through we can talk you through his medication. There’s rather a lot of it, I’m afraid.’
I follow her down the short hallway again and sit in the armchair. I angle my body away from Ronnie so I don’t have to look at him for now.
‘It looks tidier in here,’ Ronnie says from my left. ‘You’ve been cleaning up, Rose.’ I turn to look at him then and he smiles at the male paramedic. ‘She’s ever so good to me, you know.’
My heartbeat grows louder in my ears as I grip the sides of the armchair.
‘That’s good because you’re going to need all the help you can get, Ronnie,’ I hear the paramedic says. His voice sounds soft round the edges like he’s moving away from me. ‘You’ve had a very nasty virus and you’ll feel weak for a while yet. You’ve got to take it easy and give your body time to recover.’
‘I cleaned the kitchen and the bathroom. I cleaned everywhere, Ronnie,’ I hear myself say, my voice high and strained. ‘Upstairs and down.’
Our eyes meet and I’m certain I see him falter, as if someone has prodded him sharply on the back of his head.
‘Are you OK, Ronnie?’ The female paramedic rushes to his side.
‘Not really,’ he croaks, looking away. ‘I feel hot… I think I might be sick.’
But he isn’t sick and after a few more minutes of fussing over him, finally, they leave.
I see the paramedics out and then I sit opposite Ronnie and look at him.
The room is gloomy; I can hear the ticking of the clock and each click feels like an arrow in my heart. I can’t do this; I can’t stay quiet any longer.
‘Ronnie,’ I say softly. ‘Can I ask you something?’
‘I don’t know.’ His breathing sounds laboured. ‘I feel weak and I still feel I could be sick.’ He grips the kidney-shaped cardboard dish as if his life depends on it.
I wonder if it’s my imagination that Ronnie seemed to stop feeling sick when the subject of cleaning the house was changed.
‘It’s just the one question I have,’ I say. ‘A very important question.’
Ronnie shifts in his wheelchair. He closes his eyes and breathes in and out through his nose.
‘Remember when they took you downstairs from the bathroom, just after I found you collapsed up there?’
He opens his eyes.
‘You said something to me on the way out of the house, can you remember what that was?’ He doesn’t reply. ‘You said, “don’t go upstairs”. That’s the last thing you said, Ronnie, before they took you into hospital. What did you mean? Why didn’t you want me to go up there?’
The silence falls again and the clock ticks.
I can almost feel the spare room weighing down upon us from upstairs, like it is ready to unburden its secrets at last.
‘Ronnie?’
‘I can’t remember saying that.’ His words sound strangled.
‘You don’t have to remember it, Ronnie, I promise you they’re the exact words you said to me. I need to know, what did you mean by it?’
‘I didn’t know what I was saying, Rose. I felt so ill.’ He pauses and pulls in a breath. ‘They said if you hadn’t found me so quickly I… I could have died up there.’
‘I know you were feeling really ill, Ronnie, and I know you still don’t feel one hundred per cent but have a little think. This is important.’
He’s mumbling to himself.
‘Ronnie?’
‘I can’t think straight,’ he says, his fingers digging into the plastic covered arms of his wheelchair. ‘Sorry. I just can’t.’
I stand up and walk across to him, lay my hands on his wasted arms. Arms that I can clearly recall used to be strong and muscular.
The man he was, so many years ago… that person is still in there somewhere.
Truth never disappears or deserts us; it’s there forever, shining strong. It can be covered and disguised but it’s still there. You just have to know where to find it.
‘Ronnie,’ I say gently. ‘You’ve been here through everything. You were here before and after Billy. We’re like family, you and I. So, I have to ask you, why did you specifically tell me not to go upstairs?’
Ronnie’s wrinkled hand reaches for mine and he squeezes my fingers.
‘I’m so sorry,’ he whispers, ‘but I honestly can’t remember a thing, Rose.’
32
ROSE
PRESENT DAY
I haven’t slept. I have literally been awake the entire night.
People come into the library all the time and say casually, ‘I barely slept a wink last night’ or ‘I was wide awake from two a.m.’… they’re just phrases people use to indicate broken or disturbed sleep but I really mean it. I didn’t sleep at all last night.
I can’t go on like this. Not unless I want to undo all the years of therapy, of working so hard to keep myself functional.
I’m the first to admit that, compared to some, I’ve not got much of a life. But it’s a life of sorts, bolstered by a routine I’ve made for myself in order to get by. And I’d like to keep it that way.
So, during the long hours of last night, as I stared up at the ceiling, walked around the house, sat in the kitchen with my third cup of coffee… I was thinking about the exact same thing.
Not what happened sixteen years ago, not finding Billy’s blanket but this: What am I going to do about it?
I don’t know what I expected Ronnie to say when I spoke to him.
I think I was hoping he’d immediately confess but come up with a totally plausible excuse as why the blanket was in his house. Something that made absolute sense to me.
I’d imagined myself smiling sadly and realising I’d let my imagination run away with me. I thought I’d feel relief that everything had been explained and I’d now be able to get my life back to normal.
Ronnie had looked so frail, just out of hospital, I couldn’t bring myself to blurt out what I’d actually found in the spare room. He might have fainted, collapsed, anything… I’d felt I had no choice but to bide my time, to wait for the right moment so he was strong enough to explain himself.
I waver constantly between the certainty of Ronnie’s innocence and his
obvious guilt. A jury sits in my head and I present, very convincingly, both sides of an argument I can’t possibly win.
I know Billy had his blanket when he was at the abbey that day. I saw it poking out of his rucksack.
When they found his body and the rucksack, the blanket was nowhere to be seen. And the police never found it despite a fingertip search of the area.
Now, after all this time, I have found that very blanket in Ronnie’s spare room.
How can he possibly explain that away?
My head pounds and I feel sick. I’ve not eaten since teatime yesterday and I certainly can’t face anything this early in the day.
I’ve managed to get myself ready for work on autopilot, and I’ve discovered that not sleeping is a bit like not eating. You get to a stage where you sort of get past it and just carry on as normal.
I know this is merely a little pocket of recovery, and sleep deprivation will return with a vengeance later, but for now I can just about see straight.
I look down at the pen and paper on the kitchen table. I think it was about three o’clock this morning when I wrote down my options as I saw them:
Do nothing
Go to the police
Speak to Ronnie again
Now, in the cold light of day, I can completely discount option one.
There is no way I can unfind the blanket now even though, during the past eight hours, there have been times when the voice in my head said, You know it was Gareth Farnham. You know it. He’s serving a life sentence, being punished for what he did. The police at the time said it was a good result. So just leave it.
But if I ever want a decent night’s sleep again, then I know I have to face up to the significance of what I found next door. I just have to.
Option two: speak to the police.
DCI Mike North was the one person who’d lived and breathed Billy’s death almost like we as a family had done. To him, losing Billy wasn’t just part of his job.
I didn’t have that much to do with him during the actual investigation, of course. Quite rightly, he’d disappear into the front room with Mum and Dad and I’d get any developments second hand from them.
But I can remember Mum saying in conversation, only a few months after Billy died, that Mike North had retired due to ill health.
I doubted anyone senior on the original investigation would still be working for Nottinghamshire Police. As I recall, Mike North and his senior officers were all in their late forties/fifties.
Going to the police would mean explaining everything again to someone who hasn’t a clue what happened here. And anyway, I’d say what, exactly? That I wanted Ronnie taken in for questioning because he says he can’t remember what Billy’s blanket is doing in his spare room?
The more I think about involving the police, the more ridiculous it sounds. The other villagers will bay for my blood, upsetting Ronnie when he has just been discharged from hospital.
But then… maybe there is a compromise to be had.
I might not be able to go to the police and make an accusation against Ronnie directly but it’s possible, if I could only speak with Mike North, that I could discuss the case again with him. Find out if it was truly as watertight as it appeared at the time.
I don’t know anyone I could speak to informally at Nottinghamshire Police about contacting ex-DCI Mike North but I know Sarah and Tom well enough, our local PCSOs. I don’t want to put them in an awkward position, asking for protected data information, but it’s a good place to start.
Option three: I can also speak to Ronnie again. Hopefully in a day or so, he’ll be feeling physically stronger and not as confused. I know that, underneath, I’m still hoping Ronnie can clear it up, say something that negates all my doubt.
It’s a long shot but it’s all I have. I’ll speak to him again later, hopefully when he is feeling a little better. The hospital has arranged a nurse and a carer to pop in and see him during the day and I’ve agreed to keep an eye on him at night and look in on him each morning.
In spite of all my logical reasoning, the awful thoughts still keep surfacing.
Did Ronnie have anything to do with Billy’s death?
Is he lying about losing his memory?
If the answer to either of these questions is yes, then how can I possibly help him? How can I ever speak to him again?
For now, I have to push such terrible musings away.
One way or another I have to get some answers so everything can be packed back safely into the correct boxes in my head, as it was before.
I have to carry through my decisions now, or I risk slowly falling back into the bottomless pit of madness I’ve visited once before and hope I will never have to revisit.
I just don’t think I’m strong enough to get through it all again.
33
SIXTEEN YEARS EARLIER
When the sirens first began their high-pitched screaming, they merged into Rose’s dream and became part of it.
Then, as they travelled closer still, she finally roused from her slumber. She heard voices in the street. Doors were banging downstairs.
The red digits of her alarm clock declared it was one-thirty a.m.
Rose quickly got out of bed and pulled on her fleecy dressing gown. She crept across the small landing bare-footed and stood listening at the top of the stairs.
Strange, urgent whispers floated up and then she heard her father’s voice.
‘And you’re sure… it’s definitely Cassie?’
Rose flew downstairs.
‘What’s wrong?’ She pushed past her father to find a small group of neighbours clustered at the door, their faces all struck with horror. It was then she realised that they were surrounding Jed, keeping him standing upright on useless, buckling legs.
‘Come on, lad, let’s get you inside,’ Ray said, stepping back.
‘Jed, what’s wrong? What’s happened?’ Rose thought him drunk and incoherent at first and then she realised he was sobbing.
‘Cassie. It’s our Cassie—’ And then, as if he could not bear the thoughts and feelings that presented themselves, he burst into a flurry of sobs and pushed his way clumsily from the crowd, stumbling up the street.
As people leapt after Jed, Stella took Rose gently by the arm and led her back inside. Ray picked up his boots, sat down and began loosening the laces, his face dark and menacing. The hairs on the back of Rose’s neck prickled.
She pulled away from her mother, her skin suddenly burning.
‘Mum, Dad? Tell me what’s happening!’
‘It’s Cassie, love,’ Stella said gently. ‘She’s been… attacked.’
Rose’s hand flew up to her mouth.
‘She’s been raped, Rose,’ Ray said grimly, pushing his feet into the boots. ‘Some bastard’s raped her.’
‘Ray, don’t—’
‘She’s not twelve any more, Stella,’ her father’s voice thundered. ‘Rose needs to know… needs to know the danger out there. She’ll find out anyway. Half the village is out there looking for him.’
‘But – how…’ Rose struggled to put the words in line. ‘Where did it happen?’
‘At home,’ Stella said. ‘Carolyn and Jed were both out. Cassie was home alone for the evening.’
‘Do they know who it is, who did this?’ Rose heard herself speaking, yet her voice drifted far away. She and Cassie had always spent Friday nights together, usually watching television with snacks round at Cassie’s house. At least that was until she met Gareth.
Stella shook her head. ‘They don’t know who did it. Apparently, he didn’t speak and wore a balaclava.’
‘Was it someone she knew? I mean—’ Rose’s mouth hung open, the words refusing to come.
‘Don’t you worry, love.’ Ray looked at her. ‘We’ll find out who did this and, when we do, we’ll string the bastard up. That’s all you need to know right now.’
When Rose got back to her bedroom she lay on her bed and stared at the ceiling.
His last angry words about Cassie danced in her ears but she pushed them away. Gareth would be shocked about what had happened. Everyone was so shocked.
Things like this just didn’t happen around here. The local police wandered around the village from time to time, talking mainly to Mr Sandhu, the owner of the convenience store. Also, they made a point of chatting to the teenage kids who hung outside the Miners’ Welfare at night and at weekends because they had nothing else to do.
Probably the most shocking thing to happen in Newstead during the past year was when someone put a rock through the window of the chippy. But that only turned out to be Daft Davey, a big soft lad in his thirties who lived up Mosley Road with his elderly parents.
Apparently, he’d take offence when they wouldn’t sell him all eight potato fritters on the hot shelf at the expense of the rest of the queue. Everyone knew that Daft Davey lived for his potato fritters.
But now this nightmare had happened. And it had happened to Cassie.
Newstead had always been a friendly place to live, Rose reflected. What had happened to Cassie though… it felt so shocking it had happened here, right in the heart of the village. It felt like a much-loved family dog that you trusted, turning on you without warning.
Stuff like this just didn’t happen in such a safe, dependable place where generations lived together in relative harmony and everyone knew everyone. Did it?
Rose reached under her pillow for the mobile phone that Gareth insisted she kept turned on, even through the night, in case he needed to reach her. He was forever fretting about her keeping in touch, keeping safe.
She called him on speed dial. There was only one number programmed into the device and that was Gareth’s own.
Rose listened, her heart beginning to pump harder as she waited for the shrill ringing to fill her ear. The call went to answerphone. She would have liked to have heard the reassurance of Gareth’s voice, strong and sensible, but there was just the standard recorded message.