How to Disappear

by Gillian McAllister

  61

  Zara

  York, Yorkshire

  Seven weeks gone

  Dom hasn’t gone off her at all. Quite the opposite, in fact. It’s the end of another walk with Dom, and Zara doesn’t want to leave him, not yet. It’s early evening, but their walk’s finished. They’re back home, standing at the seam of their two terraces. Dom’s fingers are on the dark brown putty between the bricks. He is unconsciously moving his fingertips over it. He has neat fingernails. Short. Perfect circles.

  He told her, in that northern accent of his, that he is ‘actually utterly rubbish’ at the guitar. He talks fast, but with big pauses while he thinks. Short staccato bursts. He doesn’t seem to have any pretensions about him. He has named no obscure bands. He doesn’t have a particular niche interest. He told her he enjoys biology – ‘I like animals and plants’ – and she wanted to tell him so badly about her lettuces, but she didn’t. She has been good. Zara has been erased, Suzanne in her place. Sienna barely existing, like a firework that never went off, the gunpowder never there in the first place. She almost misses her, that life, even though she was miserable there for the entire time. That’s nostalgia for you, she guesses. Everything is enjoyable if it’s a memory.

  His feet are only a few inches from hers, down there on the frosted pavement, and that must mean they’re standing close to each other. Zara looks at him, his face a pale amber in the street light.

  ‘We could sit out, for a bit,’ Dom offers. He gestures to the steps outside their houses, separated by a metal rail.

  ‘It’s so cold,’ Zara says, but she sits down to show him that she wants to stay. The frost seeps immediately through her jeans.

  He sits next to her, on the other side of the handrail. It runs above them, between their heads. A kind of separation.

  Zara wants to lean into him, like a needy animal, and tell him how scared she is. She wants to tell him how it feels to be pursued by a justice group, to be wanted, to be in danger. She wants to tell him how closeted she feels, how closed away, her emotions dulled and flattened by the protection service. How every single sentence requires forethought, and so how everything is fake.

  ‘It’s pretty early days, Suzanne-by-the-river, but I think you’re kind of cool,’ he says.

  Zara roots around for something she can say.

  ‘Same. Look,’ she says, ‘there’s a lecture on next week, about this novel I read. I know it’s nerdy …’

  ‘If you’re there, I’m there,’ Dom says, and the sun comes out on Zara’s life, just like that.

  ‘Settled in yet?’ he says after a few minutes.

  ‘I feel like I’m in a holiday home.’

  Dom laughs. ‘Some holiday home,’ he says, but then his expression becomes set again. ‘As a serial mover, let me tell you that this is absolutely normal. It takes three months to feel at home,’ he says. ‘I go through all the stages each time. First, I’m really good, like it’s the New Year or something and I’ve decided to change all my habits. But then, after a while, I relax, let my room go to ruin. And it’s only then that I start to feel at home.’

  ‘That’s it,’ she says, thinking. She needs to bond with the house, the town, and with herself, Suzanne, too. ‘I keep thinking about my old life. Old me. Missing it all.’ And there it is. It’s easy, with him, to find some truths amongst the lies. You just have to search for them.

  Dom nods and sits forward again. He’s left two starfishes in the frost. Zara stares at him, and thinks: I could love those hands of his. The thought surprises her. It arrives fully formed in her mind. Same as she wrote on the Post-it. Don’t fall in love. Except, this time, the thought is: I could love him. She’s never thought anything like it before, but she thinks it again as she looks at him. I could love him.

  The future unfurls in front of them, the past irrelevant, like disappearing contrails in the sky.

  ‘So what’s the first song you’ll teach me – on the guitar?’ she says, shifting imperceptibly closer to him. She never would have asked such a question a few months ago. She would never tease, be too afraid to. But now she isn’t. Because he likes her for who she is.

  ‘Ha, hmm. “Three Blind Mice”?’ he says.

  Their laughs ring out in the night. High and low, commingling like their warm breath in the cold December air. Zara, wet bottom, cold hands, doesn’t ever want to leave. Here, in York, over a year after she witnessed the crime, she has found happiness, just a speck of it. At last. As Dom reaches forward to kiss her, his lips as soft as candyfloss, she lets him: she lets him in. And that’s the first step. The first step to here being home, and London being somewhere she never wants to return to.

  But, sadly, she must.

  The phone rings exactly when Zara expects it to. She is sitting on her bed. Her mother is out. This is it.

  ‘Zara, Harry from the Crown Prosecution Service here,’ a voice says. ‘Can you talk?’ Harry. Zara hasn’t seen him since the trial. But she has spoken to him. Many times.

  ‘Yes, yes,’ Zara says, staring at the nondescript walls, the cheap wardrobe, the dusty mirror. It’s not a home yet. She thinks about what Dom said about settling in.

  ‘We’re working hard over here. We’re ready, now, for your list of names. And the date has been set for the trial: end of February.’

  ‘Okay,’ Zara says, taking a deep breath.

  This is why she has to return. And this is why things are going to get worse.

  But she is ready for it. Whatever it entails.

  62

  Aidan

  Holloway FC, London

  Two days to go

  Aidan goes up on to the roof terrace to think. He tries to map it out logically. In the end, he goes and gets a paper and pen. He finds a floral stationery set Lauren left right in the back of a cupboard, the first page bearing an old shopping list of hers – curry paste, something LOVELY to put in the bath, something for A for when he comes – beer, or nice tea?? – and his heart just about rolls over in his chest. He gently pulls the list out, being careful not to rip it, and puts it in his pocket.

  He turns to a new page of the notebook and writes one word: Mal.

  Luke was dropped but Mal, who never served time, is still a player, yet not at the meeting nor in the group. Why?

  What if he could find Mal, and speak to him, and – if he isn’t interested in the group – get him to talk?

  It’s time, he has realized. It is time to take the information that he has about the cover-up, and do something with it.

  Aidan stands, finally, at Holloway FC, where it all began, watching the training. Back and forth, back and forth, dribbling around cones. Mal is tall and wiry, a deft touch. Aidan watches, waiting for his moment. Mists swirl around the pitch, only noticeable from a distance. Aidan stares at his own trainers. They’re probably steeped in it, too, winter’s freezing steam, only it’s invisible.

  His moment arrives when they leave the training ground.

  ‘Mal.’ Aidan catches up with him.

  Mal dismisses his fellow footballers with a nod. ‘Can I help you?’

  ‘I’m the one from Facebook Messenger,’ Aidan says. ‘Mr A.’

  They stand alone in the cold. Aidan feels strangely vulnerable, out here on the training field, the bleachers behind them, and nobody around. It’s dark – isn’t it always dark in December? – and the fog gathers around the floodlights.

  ‘I want to talk about that night,’ Aidan says.

  He knows it’s dangerous to be here. Mal could easily place him as Zara’s father from the public gallery. He’s taken his glasses off, has got his beard, and all he can do is hope that Mal doesn’t connect him to Aidan. He meets his eyes, and doesn’t see any recognition. Aidan is fairly nondescript, and the public gallery was pretty far from the dock.

  Mal immediately leads him inside, into an empty changing room that’s open. Blue and yellow, garish gloss paint, pristine benches lining the walls. It’s cold down here, like a church or a tomb, and Aidan
shivers as he realizes they’re totally alone.

  ‘What’s going on?’ Mal says.

  ‘I know what you were doing,’ Aidan says. ‘I know about the deaths, and the cover up.’

  Mal’s skin changes colour. Aidan has never really seen anybody pale before, but he recognizes it immediately. His lips turn winter-sky white. ‘You’ve been told,’ he says, to Aidan’s surprise.

  There is something dangerous about Mal’s expression. Something that says they’re headed somewhere from which they can never return. Aidan hopes he’s imagining it, and begins to negotiate.

  It’s hard to believe that darkness exists when it’s so light like this. A bright Nando’s restaurant. His beautiful daughter in front of him, sipping an Indian nectar tea and waiting for her lemon and herb chicken.

  ‘The art foundation is almost this year,’ she says. ‘On January the first, I’ll be able to say it’s this year.’

  Aidan smiles sincerely at his daughter. Aged three, she taught him to appreciate everything. The specific blue of the sky in the springtime. The march of a line of ants down the pavement. Aged seven, she taught him optimism, that Monday mornings were equally as exciting as Saturday nights, the weekdays as full of adventure as the weekend. And now, as a teenager, she is teaching him something else. The art of looking forward to a new year, not bemoaning another year lost, zipped by in double time.

  ‘And then art school,’ he says.

  ‘Art school,’ Poppy echoes, her smile so wide her eyes crinkle shut. ‘And then …’

  ‘And then I’ll be front and centre of your fashion show.’

  ‘Sorry – front row is reserved for A-listers,’ she says, smiling at him as she sips her tea. ‘The frow.’

  It’s the first time they’ve spoken like this for a while. In a normal way. A happy way. It’s the first time since Lauren left. Or maybe since Zara saw the murder. Aidan is aware in a dim, hidden part of his mind that this is the right path to follow. Leaving his family in protection, ceasing meddling, moving on.

  ‘Anyway,’ she says. ‘I can’t talk about it. Honestly, I can’t. It makes my stomach hurt with excitement.’

  ‘You’ll never work a day in your life, if you love your job,’ Aidan says. He misses his father, suddenly. He misses a man saying this stuff to him.

  ‘I know,’ Poppy says, so secure in the notion of doing what you love that it isn’t even a revelation to her. ‘I honestly can’t wait.’

  ‘What will Emily do?’

  Poppy blinks, surprised. ‘She wants to do HR! Always has. Likes people. She’ll be good at it. She gives me good advice.’ Poppy looks at him, her expression suddenly serious.

  ‘Will you stay in touch?’

  ‘Of course we will,’ Poppy says, as if it’s that simple. And maybe it is. She plays with the string of the tea bag.

  ‘Nicer than detox tea?’ Aidan says wryly.

  ‘You look like you’re on the detox – not me,’ Poppy says, appraising him levelly, finally saying what she’d noticed before.

  ‘Don’t you worry about me, Pops,’ Aidan says.

  ‘You got new teeth.’

  He says nothing.

  Their chicken arrives. Poppy ignores the waiter, looking at him earnestly.

  ‘Everything is going to be fine,’ he says.

  ‘Yeah?’ she says.

  No false hope, no false hope. But – fuck it.

  ‘Yeah,’ Aidan says sincerely to her. He brings his beer to meet her tea cup. ‘We’re going to be fine,’ he says. ‘Trust me.’

  Poppy gives him a strange look, a look he can’t read. A knowing look.

  But it can’t be.

  63

  Zara

  York, Yorkshire

  Seven weeks gone

  Zara doesn’t know how she has managed to keep six calls with Harry a secret from her mother, but she has. On each one, she has described a different homeless person to Harry, and he has gone off to interview them. Sometimes they talk to him, and sometimes they don’t. It has been Anna’s turn, this week. He is building a new case. This time, the defendants aren’t Luke and Mal. It’s all of Holloway FC.

  ‘Did she speak to you?’ Zara says quietly, sitting on her bed.

  ‘No. Afraid not.’

  ‘She was let down by the police, before,’ Zara explains. ‘She left an abusive relationship and the CPS … you … they …’ Zara rolls her eyes at her over-thinking, ‘they let her down.’

  ‘I thought as much,’ Harry says. ‘Still, we have your evidence about what she told you. It’s hearsay, but it’ll still work.’

  ‘Me, the known liar,’ Zara says.

  She says something like this during each phone call with him. Harry has spoken to five other homeless people about the hazing in their community by Holloway FC, but Zara is at the centre of it. She is the one who pulls all the strands together. And she’s a discredited witness.

  Zara went to visit Jamie’s friend, Anna, the weekend after the trial, all those weeks ago. She went to apologize. To give her condolences. To talk about their mutual lost friend.

  ‘It’s not the first time, and it won’t be the last,’ Anna had slurred. Zara had averted her eyes from the can of alcohol in her hand and concentrated on what she was saying.

  In a cold and dark underpass, Anna told her everything the homeless community knew. Her information was meandering and confusing – government conspiracies about aliens wound up with the truth – but certain points came up again and again. That youth players from Holloway FC were in the habit of baiting homeless people as part of their initiations. And that, sometimes, it went wrong.

  Once Anna had told her everything – that it was common for footballers during initiations to pick on them, to taunt them, to piss on them – she went straight to the police before going home, even though she felt it was hopeless. She’d got the evidence of what she knew in her gut to be true – that Luke and Mal were monsters – two days too late.

  The police didn’t believe her, so she called Harry and they met up. She told him to look up the dates of youth team footballers’ birthdays and correlate them with crimes against homeless people. He said he would, but that he’d have to do it on the side, that it would take weeks.

  And then.

  And then. The wheels turned too quickly, and she was grabbed in the street. And it was decided they would be taken into protection.

  She overheard her mother and Aidan talking. About how their lives were ruined by Zara testifying.

  And so on the eve of leaving, she called Harry. Told him to keep in touch, that she’d testify, but only if her mother wasn’t told. He wasn’t supposed to do that – apparently, he needed parental consent – but he broke the rules for her.

  And here she is, the star witness in yet another pending trial. A bigger one. A greater one. A conspiracy. A discredited witness, yes, but people believe her. Because there is evidence.

  ‘They can’t talk about the previous trial,’ Harry tells her patiently, again. ‘And, even if they do, your lie makes sense, now. You sensed contempt, for Jamie, and you were right to. Because of what Anna told you after the trial.’

  ‘Maybe,’ Zara says doubtfully. If she hadn’t lied … imagine. But then, would Anna have told her the real story? That none of the homeless people wanted the police to find out, because they feared repercussions from the club? Maybe not. And then Harry would never have found all the evidence. The birthdays and the attacks.

  ‘Anyway, I’ve got three more homeless people who reported abuse on footballers’ birthdays. So that’s six.’

  ‘Good. Good,’ Zara says. ‘I’m glad.’

  Each week, he uncovers more and more. Each time, they speak on the burner phone he gave her that day.

  And then what, after it’s done? Who knows. Who knows what the future holds for Zara, for Sienna, for Suzanne. Perhaps she could leave for ever. She’s seen enough homeless people to know she could get by.

  64

  Aidan

  Croydo
n, Greater London

  Tomorrow

  Brian has called an emergency Find Girl A meeting.

  Everything feels like it’s falling apart. The entrapment meeting is tomorrow, the twenty-first. When Brian called the new meeting, Aidan panicked, and tried to rally Lottie, but she insisted on keeping their entrapment plan in place. That is when she has the staff to arrest, she said. Only half the group could make today, and Aidan doesn’t know whether they have their burner phones with them. It’s better to wait. It’s better to be fully prepared.

  Aidan left work in the middle of the afternoon to be here, in the warehouse in Croydon.

  ‘Thanks for coming, those who could,’ Brian says. ‘I’m afraid we need to up our game.’

  ‘What’s happened?’ one of the players says.

  ‘Somebody was contacting Mal on Facebook. They started to harass him about the initiation. There’s a leak. Mal spoke to his uncle, who’s a cop, who did some digging. For a fee, obviously. There’s an undercover investigation going on into all the initiations around homeless people.’

  Aidan’s jaw slackens in shock.

  ‘God,’ Luke says, almost to himself.

  ‘And Zara is going to testify.’

  A hot flash moves up and down Aidan’s body, which he tries to conceal. She’s testifying?

  His mouth is dry as he works it through. How could that be? Does Lauren know? Why is she doing it? And what then – afterwards?

  And finally. And finally. The last piece of the puzzle falls into place.

  This.

  This is why Zara is in witness protection.

  Because she is the most important witness in unmasking a cover-up. And she needs protecting. She is valuable.