by Nina Milton
Not that I was quite able to think of Ricky as a man. His boyishness clung to him, a kind of inculpability.
The sun was fierce on my left side as I drove in a straight, northbound line. It had not ducked behind cloud for the entire solstice day and a golden evening looked certain. Gloria and Philip might be eating on the flagged patio at the back of their house tonight; it faced west and would catch and hold the balmy weather right up to sundown. I should find a local shop and arrive with some chilled white wine.
I came off the motorway and Ricky directed me through the housing estates of north Bristol. “Take this little road coming up on the left and we’re there … this house, with the high blue gable. That’s my room, under the gable.”
I pulled up to the kerb. “Sounds lovely.”
“Yeah …” He drummed his fingers on the dashboard again. “Sabbie,” he began.
“Tell me.”
“I’ve wanted to ask you something since … since I met you yesterday … but now I’ve held you up long enough.”
I cut the engine. “Never leave with regrets.”
He gave a brief laugh, though he was close to tears. “I promised myself I’d ask you. I lost my nerve.”
“You’ve found it again now.”
“Yeah.” He put his hand over his chest as if afraid his heart might jump right out. “Five years have gone past. Would that make a difference?”
“That depends. Is this something you’ve lost?”
“My sister.” He’d been staring straight out through the car windscreen, but now he turned to me, unashamed of his wet face. “My Babe.”
“Your sister is lost?”
Ricky dashed the back of a hand over his face, smearing his eyeliner. “She was sixteen. A bit spirited, you know?”
“You … lost her when she was sixteen?
“She disappeared. Wretched, wretched time.”
“I’m so sorry.”
“They started this countywide search. Didn’t find a button.”
“Had she run away, Ricky?”
“We’ll never know. Never. It wrecked my parents. We thought they were going to split over it. Mum did blame Dad, for a while. Babe was the only girl and he gave her less freedom than we’d had. I mean, like, going into town, clubbing, that sort of thing.” He reached over the seat back and swung his bag onto his lap, ready to leave. “Telling you feels bloody stupid. It’s so long ago.”
“Ricky, do you have anything of Babe’s? A small keepsake?”
“Mum might. I dunno.” He rubbed at his wet eyes. “Oh! I’ve got her sketchbook. Is that the sort of thing?”
“Ricky, that’s perfect.”
I followed Ricky into his house, a typical student residence darkened by forgotten curtains and smelling of ancient socks.
“Eijaz,” Ricky called. “Eijaz?”
A lanky boy with sharp-nosed Asian features and a two-day dark beard appeared at the top of the stairs. “Wass-a-time,” he asked, peering hard at his own watch.
“Time you were up. Try being awake for the solstice dawn.”
“I was up half the night, working on my thesis. Dawn musta come, but I didn’t take no notice.” Eijaz was in crumpled lounge pants and an inside-out t-shirt. His face had a crushed look too but nothing would have mussed his hair; it was clipped short on top and shaved short at the sides. To add to his trendy look, he fished a pair of sunglasses from the pocket of his lounge pants and pulled them on, as if ordinary daylight defeated him.
Ricky ushered me up the stairs and into his room. I’d expected the usual student riot, but Ricky’s bedroom was tidier than mine. On the small wooden table which functioned as his desk was a laptop, a writing pad, a ruler, a row of pens, and a folded pair of spectacles, all positioned so neatly it made me wonder if he’d used the ruler to lay the rows out. Stacked against the wall were tall piles of philosophy books in order of size. The walls were covered with posters of old men—philosophers, I had to assume—but between these were photos of Glastonbury, Avebury, Stonehenge, and other sacred sites, Blu-Tacked with geometric precision. There was still the fusty smell of closed-down living; stale beer and ancient dust, and I could see a greying pile of old jeans and smeared tops had been pushed under the bunklike bed, but the room would still take a medal if there had been one, for student sleep/work environments.
“The photos are lovely.”
“Yeah, I took some of them myself. But I must get on with my dissertation. I have a tendency to fall behind and I can’t let that happen this time. I’ve got my ideas all lined up; I’ve just got to start writing.”
“What’s it on?”
“‘The Concept of Light and Darkness in Plato’s Analogy of the Cave.’”
“The what?”
“That’s the title. It’s about perception of goodness. Plato uses a cave as an analogy of lack of virtue. He associates goodness with the sun—knowledge of The Good. The sun can’t be seen directly from the cave. That’s the point, you see. My tutor suggests I compare him to Locke, who says the sun differs from other objects because light comes directly from it and reveals all other objects to us, but I’ve decided to bring in someone more recent. Iris Murdoch. She was an atheist, and wanted us to rethink what goodness is without the inclusion of God—”
He broke off, realizing his student brain had gone into overdrive. “Sorry, I should be looking for Babe’s sketchbook.”
“No hurry. No one’s expecting me at any particular time. What do you think goodness is, Ricky?”
“Me?” He ran a hand through his upright hair. “Doesn’t matter what I think. I’m just a degree student. My job is to work out what the philosophers thought.”
“Surely you have an opinion.”
“I like the idea that goodness has something to do with love. Murdoch says—” He clamped his teeth together to stop himself.
“I like that idea too.”
Ricky pulled a sports-bag out from under the bed which was filled with things from home; things maybe he’d never unpacked but didn’t want to throw away. “This was Babette’s.” He passed me a standard-sized sketchpad half-full with pencil drawings and some watercolour paintings.
I turned the first couple of pages, taking in chalk sketches of woodland, studies of trees and butterflies. “Where is this?”
“New Forest. The four of us were given a lot of freedom in the woods, with our bikes and that.” Ricky sat down on the bed as if his legs couldn’t support him any longer. “I was in Bristol, of course, when Babette disappeared, first year of my business degree. It was easy for me to get back, but Claude was stuck into his finals and Jacob was working in Dubai. Still is.”
“So you had to contend with your parents’ distress.”
“I had to contend with my own! Babe and me, we’d been inseparable when we were kids. You know how a family of four can split off into two? Well, it was always me and Babes.”
“Were the woods … I mean, they’re quite extensive, aren’t they?”
“Yeah, they were searched.” He held himself rigid and stared at wall opposite.
“Was it … was it after all that you fell ill?”
“After she went, business studies seemed pretty lame. Not worth the effort. I guess I had a bit of a breakdown.”
“That’s not at all surprising,” I said. “You’ve recovered really well.”
“Yeah.” He got up from the bed, as if to demonstrate his renewed energy. He found a crumpled carrier bag and we slid the sketchpad into it.
“She’s a talented artist,” I said.
“I hope she still uses that talent,” said Ricky. “If she still can. If she still is.”
Ricky did not ask me what I was going to do with Babette’s sketchpad, which was as well, for I had not yet worked that out. I knew I should study it more carefully; possibly journey with it as my lodes
tone, but for now I took a quick look through, turning the pages with care until I came to a pen and ink sketch of a girl. It could have been one of her friends, of course, but I decided it was a self-portrait, partly because the girl had the same buttony mushroom-shaped nose as Ricky.
Babe clearly loved to paint and sketch, and the passion behind her talent showed through. Most of the work was conventional, orthodox. The things you’d expect a teenager to study were all there: the family dog, the New Forest landscape, the view from her window. Later on in the book were pictures of her brothers. It was easy to spot Ricky, and fun to see him without his gothic makeup and gelled hairstyle.
Nothing was revealed through the pictures in the book. Nothing that whispered I am here … or I am gone …
I lay it on the passenger seat and drove to the grandly named Oak Villa—actually a narrow terraced house with no front garden—where my foster parents lived. I knew the Davidsons would welcome me in; they were as generous to me as they had been the day I went to live with them, eighteen years back. Right that moment, I was driving along in the continued proof of their generosity—a couple of months ago my foster dad Philip upgraded his car and donated his ten-year-old Vauxhall Astra to me.
I’d once had a wonderful car, a classic Morris Mini Minor with the original racing strips and metal wing mirrors still intact. I wept when I sold her, but I’d got into debt and thanks to an eBay auction, she netted me enough to reduce my outgoings.
I parked outside Oak Villa and was brandishing a Pinot Grigio, straight from the local shop, when Gloria opened the door.
“You look done in, girl.”
“Yep.” I entered the house and flopped onto the sofa in the living room. The telly was on low, the curtains half-pulled against the sun. It felt like heaven. “Been a ghastly day.”
“Want to stay the night?”
It was an offer I couldn’t refuse. My next-door neighbours had been commandeered to feed my hens while I was away; they weren’t expecting me back yet anyhow. I smiled my acceptance.
“Supper’s in an hour.”
“That sounds wonderful. Can we eat in the garden?”
“Why not?”
“Is Dennon in?”
“He’s in his room, packing.”
“He’s going on holiday?”
“Moving out.”
“What’s he done now to get the old heave-ho?”
“I mean, he’s moving in … to a flat of his own.”
I sat up. “Ye gods. This I have to see. It might even cheer me up a bit.”
Up in Dennon’s bedroom, things were at hurricane level. I closed the door tight and leaned against it to prevent any flying objects sailing past.
My foster brother stood straight as I came in, knuckles in the small of his back, and grinned. I laughed—Dennon’s smile has made me do that ever since I first encountered it. I was twelve then; he was thirteen, and I knew soon as I looked at the guy that he intended to cause even more trouble than I did. Now he was thirty, and, until this moment, still living with his parents. He looked groovy, though. Better dressed, now his job had become regular, and he’d clipped his hair short enough to see his scalp, although this evening he’d pulled a baseball cap over his head. He was wearing a loose, grey marl t-shirt over Diesels and his forearms showed bare sinewy muscles beneath skin the colour of an Americano coffee.
“You do understand the principles of packing, right, Den?”
“Get it in the boxes somehow?”
“Fold flat. Neatly wrap against breakage. Stack to allow maximum room. Wedge to prevent sliding and knocking. Not stuffed so full you can’t lift the package.”
“Hell … all that? I haven’t left the family threshold yet and already I’m useless in the wider world.”
“Where you going, anyway?” I took a drawerful of socks and started sorting and balling them into pairs.
“Northville. Me and a mate.”
“I’m impressed. Does this mean you’re sticking to the promotion you got?”
“They’ve made it permanent. Not bad, eh?”
“Shocking.” I continued to ball the socks. “Den, do you remember those so-called legal highs you had once?”
“Er …” Dennon looked me over, trying to spot the trick in my question. “Sort of.”
“How much do you know about that drug?”
“Come on, Sabbie, you were the one that was all over the Internet about it. You’re the one with the facts.”
“I’m trying to remember. Para-meth-something? PMA, and lots of pretty names for it too. Pink Lady?”
“Dr. Death, we called it. Some guy round my mate’s place, he had some. We bought half a doz each. Thought they’d be the same as E.”
“Weren’t they the same?”
“Yeah and no. They were bloody amazing, but mad. One minute there’s nothing there at all, and the next, you’re trippin’ balls.”
“So you did take it?”
“We all popped one and sat round, waiting. Waiting and waiting. Bark, he couldn’t wait no longer, took another … two, maybe. I didn’t bother, I was on the beer. Then I started feeling really horny.”
“Eugh,” I said. “Too much information.”
“But not high, is my point. Not for a bit. We stuck the music up on max and suddenly I was smashed, right along with all the others. We was flyin’ round Kyle’s house to the sounds. Then Bark went onto his knees. He was sort of retching, y’know? I took his pulse.”
“You? How did you know where to find it?”
“I watch Casualty, don’t I? Anyway, it was fast, man, racing like a pro.”
“Was he hot?”
“Yeah, and he knew it. S’if he had rabies or something, he was scrabbling at his clothes, stripping them off, panting. We got him under the armpits and he sort of squealed, like a pig, but we dragged him into the garden.”
“Cool air. Good thinking.”
“Yeah, ’cept my heart was doing about a million to a minute by then. It made me panicky. I could see why Bark was squealing all the time, just layin’ there on the patio, making these piggy noises.”
“And you didn’t think to call an ambulance?”
“Are you kiddin’, man? This was Kyle’s house, his mum would’ve killed him!”
I shook my head. I’d forgotten about balling socks; they lay limp in my hands. “What happened in the end?”
“He was okay. We all came out kicking. It was the scariest experience of my life.”
“And that’s saying something.”
“It was the panic. You go totally down the rat hole. I’m not ’xactly a panicky person, would you say?”
“No, Den, I’d say you were generally mellow.”
“For ages after that, slightest thing would set me off. Sweatin’ and dizzy and not seeing proper, like club lighting strobing into my brain.”
I remembered Stefan, his eyes red hot. Had Wolfs been right about spiking the flying tea?
“It kinda did make me think some,” Den was saying. “After, I mean. Like, what is a high, really?”
“D’you mean, what is real ecstasy? For me, it’s the joy of being a shaman. That’s as close to the divine as I reckon I’ll ever be getting.”
“Yeah, sort of that. And you—God, Sabbie—you’re such a good role model for me.”
“I am?”
“Yeah, like, you got your head sorted, and you went and did your degree, and like … you’re happy.”
I paused. Happy? Not this day. “I’ve just watched someone die.”
“Shit, no!” Dennon rocked back. “Did they take something?”
“I’m sure we’ll find out. They’ll be doing the tests. They’ll be examining the body. Awful thought. Alys had a lovely face, you know? I hate to think of them examining her body, stretched out and totally naked. Cutting her w
ith a scalpel. Taking samples. I hate it.”
I thought about both of them. The Hollingberrys. Alys has wanted to dance, so Brice spent a night on the Tor even though he thought it was “purgatory.” How must he feel about that now?
“I can’t believe it only happened today.” I stoppered the light, folding my hands over my eyes. “It seems years have gone past. Decades. And seconds, at the same time.”
“Fucking unbelievable,” said Dennon. “Come here, sis.”
He put his arms all round me.
six
laura
I got home around eight the following morning. It had come onto rain in the night. The brilliance of the sun’s zenith had passed. It was the twenty-second of June already. I felt something wrench, deep inside. It was almost physical, as if I’d torn a hole in my body. Death and sadness.
I needed Rey. I reached for my phone. I put it down again. He’d be on his way to Bridgwater Police Station to start his day as detective inspector. As soon as he walked into his office, the pressure would begin. He would not be pleased to have a call from his girlfriend.
Girlfriend. That’s what I was. The girl he dated. The girl he came round and bonked when he had a spare evening.
For quite some time now, that hadn’t been enough for me. I wasn’t pushing him; I wasn’t even mentioning it, but I wanted more. Rey lived in a microscopic studio flat—what was the point in that? He could move in with me whenever he liked. I had two bedrooms—the spare one could be his den (if we cleared it up a bit), or office, or whatever coppers need in their life.
I hadn’t asked, and he never raised the subject. I don’t think he ever considered it. The extent of our relationship was the toothbrush he kept in my bathroom.
Usually, I left the phoning to him. I knew he would call me; that or turn up on my doorstep after work, holding a couple of bottles of Merlot. He initiated the moves and I let him, because cops worked antisocial hours and had their heads totally immersed in the job, and because I was afraid that a nagging girlfriend might quickly become an ex-girlfriend.