‘And the picture … the laughter?’ I could barely get my words out.
‘I wanted you to know it was me, to be so sure of it but have no one believe you. I wanted you to know how I felt all those years ago. To know the truth but have no one believe you. I wanted it to send you crazy.’ You looked pleased with yourself for a moment.
‘I told Jonny we were all meeting up as a special surprise for you. He was reluctant at first, but he would have done anything for you. We arranged to meet at my flat.’
‘That’s when you gave him the sleeping pills?’ I asked. ‘Of course it had to be sleeping pills.’
You nodded in agreement.
‘After that we drove along to Cantina Latina and we waited for you to leave.’
I remember how he looked on the CCTV, leaning into you, eyes closed. I thought it had been a trick of the camera.
‘Sarah called us as you were leaving to warn us. She said you were pissed, which was always part of the plan, to get you as drunk as possible, so we waited until we saw you walking along the promenade and dragged Jonny out of the car. He wasn’t totally out of it by then, he could walk. We just needed to be seen in the same area as you.’
‘And you’d checked where the CCTV cameras were, I take it. So it all worked out beautifully,’ I said. ‘Except Jonny died and you didn’t make your getaway after all.’
‘James left him near Preston Park; he was clothed. It was cold I know, but Jesus Christ, we didn’t expect him to die – he was wearing a jacket when he left him. He must have stripped it off, you know people do that when they’ve got hypothermia. It wasn’t our fault.’ The words came out shakily, without conviction, because you knew that it was your fault, didn’t you? The unavoidable truth that you had killed him.
‘Well whose was it? It wasn’t his fault he ended up dead in the mortuary, his mother wailing because she’s lost her only son, ripped apart by grief. It wasn’t his fault he was so full or life and he had it stolen from him so fucking needlessly.’
‘Don’t, Rachel, don’t. I swear we didn’t mean it. I would never ever do that. I would never ever have tried to kill him.’ You wiped your nose with the back of your sleeve. ‘James heard they’d found his body when he was driving to see me, it was in the headlines on the radio. He had to pull over, on to the hard shoulder, so he could throw up. And then he told me.’ You were wailing now. ‘I didn’t believe it at first, I couldn’t believe how it had all gone so wrong. And then I just wanted it all to end. James had to hold me back from running into the sea because that’s all I wanted to do. Disappear into the waves, sink down somewhere cold and still and never resurface again.
‘He should still be alive, I should be thousands of miles away from here. It all went wrong,’ you said needlessly.
‘Why didn’t you leave, make your getaway?’
‘Amber,’ you told me. ‘Amber went to the police to report me missing so fucking quickly. We couldn’t believe it. I didn’t think they’d start a missing person’s inquiry so soon but there I was, all over the news, my face in every fucking newspaper. We couldn’t try to leave when all that was happening. We thought we’d let it die down – these things do, don’t they, we thought everyone would get bored with me after a few days and then …’ You still couldn’t say his name.
‘And then they found Jonny’s body,’ I said, finishing your sentence. Poor dead Jonny, the final nail in your coffin.
You opened your mouth, staring at me, unable to speak, like something was shattering within you. Every piece of you breaking up.
You were trapped, Clara, nowhere left to go.
James, Sarah, Debbie: they couldn’t help you now.
There was only me left to protect you.
Suddenly, a new plan was forming in my head.
‘Where do you go from here, Clara?’ I asked, gently this time.
You opened your mouth but no words came out. A look of horror crept across your face.
There was nothing to say.
‘All those people who’ve been searching for you, giving up their time, putting up posters, you’ve tricked them all. I can see the headlines now. You’ll be the most hated woman in Britain. You’re still breathing, Clara, but you’re already dead.’
You let out a cry, and then started sobbing the pathetic sobs of someone who had nothing left. I wondered if I was pushing you too close to the edge, unsure of which way you would jump. I imagined I was walking a tightrope, above a bottomless gully. One wrong move and it could be the end of me.
‘Look at you,’ I said softly. ‘Niamh caused all this, it’s her fault. She tricked you into believing she loved you and ever since you’ve been paying the price. She didn’t love you, not real love where you’d do anything for someone. She loved herself. She loved drink. You were just a novelty, a plaything that made her feel she could make amends. Given the time, she would have cast you aside when she got bored with you. She didn’t love you in the way I did.’
I watched as your hand clenched around the knife, it’s blade directed at me. I felt my breaths coming irregularly, I tried to concentrate on breathing through the fear that was expanding in my lungs, suffocating me.
‘Shut up, shut up, Rachel.’ You were shaking your head to dislodge my words.
Gently I stretched my hand out to you, turning my palm up to the ceiling, a sign of peace. ‘When I realised what you had done, how you had set me up, I thought I hated you, I tried to hate you. But this thing we have, it’s too strong, it keeps pulling us back to each other. We’re friends, Clara. Remember, friends, forever. Even after everything you’ve done I still love you.’
Your sobs echoed round the room, one following the other, leaving you gulping for air. But you didn’t let the knife fall from your hand.
‘I’m the only one who can help you now, Clara.’
You wailed, raw pain seeping out from you, your face blotchy and puffed. You were like an animal writhing in agony, a creature that needed to be put out of its misery.
‘It’s so black,’ you said finally. ‘Everything is so black.’
The knife in your hand still pointed my way.
‘Killing me won’t make it go away. I’ll be the last person you see before you sleep at night and the first person you look at in the morning.’ You were sinking, Clara. Those waves you wished would wash over you and drag you out to sea, they were coming for you now, squeezing the breath out of you. You were drowning in life. You looked at me with desperate, dying eyes.
‘I … don’t … know … I just don’t know anything any more. I don’t know how I got here.’ You cast your eyes down to the knife and I watched as your hand loosened its grip on it. ‘I’ve tried, I’ve spent years trying to make sense of it all, but it’s all so murky. And every time I think I have it straight in my mind something happens to make it twist out of shape again.
‘Do you have any idea what it’s like not to trust yourself? To question every word you hear, every thought that goes through your head, to not know what’s real? I used to be so confident, Rachel, so certain of everything before Niamh died.’
You stopped for a moment, your sobs dying down into little puffs of air. I was looking at you, looking at the knife, thinking, thinking.
And then I saw you raise it in the air again, towards me, a final show of strength.
‘You did this to me, Rachel, you broke me with your lie. It’s you, it was always you,’ you screamed but by the end of the sentence the conviction had gone from your voice.
‘No, Clara, I didn’t.’ I spoke the words as softly as I could, so they’d soothe you like a balm.
The sobbing started again, your body shook as if it was shutting down.
‘Clara,’ I whispered. ‘Let me help you.’
Slowly you looked up and our eyes locked just as they did that very first day we met. A spark between us momentarily reignited. And we didn’t need to speak, we understood each other without words, just like we used to. It made me want to cry.
‘You
can escape, Clara.’
Your eyes were wide, staring, filled with tears.
‘Help me,’ you mouthed. It wasn’t a question, was it? It was a plea to the only person who loved you enough to save you.
I will help you, Clara.
You let the blade of the knife slip downwards, your sign of surrender.
And I knew then there was no fight left in you.
I breathed deep.
Slowly, with both hands, I reached out for the knife. Your grip still loose on it, your fingers cold around the handle. I placed my hands on top of yours and let them rest there for a moment. Your whole body quivered.
The room was silent, hushed, the light dim. A candle flickered on the mantelpiece.
Your eyes were closed as if in prayer, waiting, for some kind of intervention to lift you out of your pain.
Gently, by degrees, I moved my hands upwards with the knife. Your breath irregular, hot on my skin.
‘Don’t be scared, Clara,’ I whispered.
Your eyes clicked open. Questioning.
‘It’s your way out,’ I breathed. ‘Don’t be scared.’
I knew I had to be quick then. Little time left. The blade touched the skin on your neck. A sharp blade against soft skin. The shock made your body twist, your hand tried to push the knife away, to stop me, but mine were too strong. Your face full of surprise, of fear.
‘Be brave,’ I whispered. And then I couldn’t look at you any longer so I closed my eyes.
I closed my eyes as I pushed the knife deep into your flesh.
Everything stopped, frozen in a moment.
We were next to each other, very close, closer than we had been for so long. All around us still and quiet and calm.
When I opened my eyes again I saw blood running everywhere, pools and patterns and swirls of red, beautiful, crimson red, spilling over the white sofa and floorboards.
Drip, drip, drip.
I let the knife fall. From my hands and yours.
I told you I would do anything for you, Clara. I was the only one who could. I saved you by ending it all.
Then finally my gaze came up to meet yours.
And in your eyes I saw something was wrong.
A movement.
Two words on your lips. ‘Help me.’
I tried to think, think clearly, empty my head. It had to end. I had to finish it. But before I could do anything, it was too late. A bang followed by shouts, loud voices screaming, and then the door was kicked open and armed police were running through the hall, a swarm of black, heading towards me.
Coming to end it all, before I could end it myself.
In my statement I told the police you’d threatened to kill me. I told them of a struggle to wrest the knife from you, how we fought and it went into your neck.
‘Thank God you arrived when you did,’ I said with all the conviction I could muster.
I gave them that version, Clara, because no one would ever understand the lengths I would go to in order to help a friend. No one would believe I was simply trying to help you find the peace you craved.
When my statement was finished and signed, I asked them the question that had been on my lips since the moment they burst into my home hours earlier.
How did they know you were there? How did they know to come to my aid?
‘The security cameras,’ they said, smiling. ‘The ones your friend fitted for you yesterday. He had them rigged up to his computer, a feed from your house. He called us when he saw she was there.’
I didn’t breathe, I just listened to the sound of thunder in my head, the sound of my life crashing down around me.
I staggered out of the police interview room to find Jake waiting for me, his face a picture of concern.
‘Thank God,’ he said, ‘thank God you are all right.’
‘The cameras?’ I asked, my voice stretched and tight.
He smiled and kissed me.
‘It was supposed to be my surprise.’
After
September 2007
IT’S BEEN WEEKS now, months since I started writing to you, Clara, and I’ve almost reached the end of our story.
In the beginning, in those first days, the summer sun would slant through the window casting its shadows, filling the room with a brilliant white light. That’s when I could lift myself out of here and pretend I was far away. I could see it all, the vast sky, the expanse of sea drawing me in. I could almost taste the salt air on my lips.
But it’s autumn now. The light is changing, deserting me. No matter how hard I try, all I can see are the four walls of my cell, the painted brick, the bars, a bed and a desk. The room where I have been locked up for months facing trial for your attempted murder.
I am here because I love you.
I am imprisoned because my love for you is so powerful I was prepared to hurt you in order to save you.
Sometimes you have to be cruel to be kind.
If only we had learnt to hate each other, stayed away, cut all ties, it would have been much easier. But that magnetic force that pulled us together was always too strong to resist. We are each other’s weaknesses and our bond is tight.
So tight it might destroy me.
Because you are the star witness for the prosecution. Their case will stand or fall on what you say, on how convincing you are, and how far you are prepared to go to damn me. They will have offered you a deal, I know that much: save your own skin, sacrifice your friend. Without you, they only have the footage of a struggle. I say it was self-defence, you claim I was trying to kill you. My truth and yours. The police believe you, but ask yourself this: who will a jury believe?
You tried to frame me for your murder, you stalked me, broke into my house and then you came for me with a knife. It’s enough to rile the saintliest person.
Of course the police won’t tell you their case is hanging by a thread. They need to keep you on side, Clara. Nor will they prepare you for the force of what is coming your way. The press will feast on every moment of the trial, TV cameras from here and abroad (our appeal is global I’m told) will follow your every move, study your expressions, dissect your words. The most high-profile reporters from the BBC, NNN, Sky News and ITN will pack the courtroom to listen to your evidence. The rest will fill the overflow room where they’ll be drip-fed your testimony to parcel and package into something sensational.
And then there’s the cross-examination. My barrister will tear you apart, chew you up and spit you out. It’s brutal. I’ve seen it done so many times. It’s like a blood sport. And you’re not a reliable witness.
You killed your mother and now you want to put your sister away for life. What kind of person are you, Ms O’Connor?
Is it true you were sectioned in your late teens? Why should I believe someone like you?
Rehearse your answers, they’d better be good.
But worse, Clara, just when you think you can’t take any more, when you feel like your soul has been ripped out and you want to run away and hide from the men in wigs who twist your words and the police who lied to you and the press vultures who hound you, that’s when the jury will return a not-guilty verdict. I will be free to walk away. And Jake, who has never doubted me, will be there waiting for me. What then for you? The woman who faked her own disappearance and played the public so cruelly.
The intensity of public outrage will rain down on you like an erupting volcano. It’ll be ferocious, merciless, fanned by a press frenzy. No one will save you from it. Not the police; they’ll want to forget all about you and the case they should never have brought to court. They’ll behave like you never existed. You’ll be cast out to face the heat alone.
There will be nowhere to hide.
You could go anywhere, travel thousands of miles, and still you wouldn’t escape it.
I’m telling you this because I care for you in a way no one else does. I am the only one who understands you. I’m telling you this because even after everything you’ve done to me, I can’
t stop loving you. I want to protect you.
I’m sure you’re scared, Clara. I imagine the darkness is circling and enveloping you. You can’t see a way through, can you? There is no light ahead.
I could have saved you from all this; it’s all I ever wanted to do.
I was trying to help you because I knew it was what you wanted, before you even knew yourself.
It’s a gift I have.
You wanted out.
If I offered you the choice now, if I breathed it quietly into your ear, you’d take it, wouldn’t you? You’d snap my hand off, just to be free from all this. From your racing, tormented mind. From the pain that will never end.
But I can’t help you now. I can only send you this letter. I’ve been passing it to Jake every week when he visits, when the prison officers aren’t looking. He’s been waiting for this, the last instalment, before he gives it to you.
Read it, Clara, read it and then destroy it. Destroy it so no one ever finds out what you did to Niamh, your mother. And I promise I will tell no one. Our secret, safe forever.
You know what you have to do, Clara.
Be brave.
Friends, always,
Rach
X
Two weeks later
Press Association news snap
1 PA Missing
A young artist who faked her own disappearance has been found dead in her flat in an apparent suicide.
Sussex police were called to the home of Clara O’Connor, 29, in the early hours of yesterday morning. It is thought her boyfriend James Redfern called paramedics after finding Ms O’Connor’s body. In a police statement DCI Roger Gunn said they were not looking for anyone else in connection with her death.
Acknowledgements
The idea for Precious Thing came to me in 1998 but it took fifteen years of procrastination before I finally began to breathe life into the story.
The wise words, critique and support of many people have helped shape this novel. I am grateful to them all but in particular my thanks go to Richard Skinner at The Faber Academy. I may have written a novel without your input, but it wouldn’t have been this one. To my agent Nicola Barr, I am still amazed you got it so early on. Your gentle cajoling forced me to write better and bolder than I could have imagined. I am indebted. To Imogen Taylor, Sam Eades, Jo Liddiard, and all the wonderful team at Headline, I have been blown away by your enthusiasm and drive. I really couldn’t be in better hands. To the Faber writing class of 2011, thanks for the laughs, criticisms and ridiculous email streams. To Dr Niamh Power and Chris Johnson QC, thanks for your professional generosity and insight. To Liz and Danny McBeth, who always believed, thank you. I don’t need to tell you that your support, childcare and home cooking has made all the difference. Thanks also to Jacqueline McBeth, James Waters and John and Margaret Curran, and to Haylee, for keeping the kids entertained when I couldn’t.
Precious Thing Page 26