Jail Bird

by Jessie Keane

  But that looks too needy, she thought.

  Although she felt needy, she knew she couldn’t show it. And she still wasn’t sure whether he could be truly trusted or not – after all, he’d kept Julia’s disfigurement from her, hadn’t he?

  God, she was tired. She climbed out of the pool, planning to grab a quick shower and then get an early night.

  She awoke in darkness with the usual sense of displacement. In prison? No. No noises of the druggies banging around in their cages, no soft tread of the screws passing by. It took her a moment or two to place herself, to remember where she was. She was home. But not in the master bedroom, not in their bedroom.

  Something had woken her up.

  Someone talking? Maybe Saz or Oli passing by on the landing…but the landing light was off, she could see nothing but darkness when she looked towards the door. There was no telltale crack of light at the base of it.

  Lily sat up, switched on the bedside light. Something had disturbed her, jolted her out of sleep. She looked at the clock. It was a quarter to four in the morning. Someone moving about? Voices. Someone talking. A woman’s voice? Then someone tapped at the door and her heart kicked into a gallop.

  ‘Who is it?’ she called out.

  ‘It’s me,’ came back the quiet reply. ‘Richard.’

  Ah. The semi-invisible bridegroom. And what the hell was he doing tiptoeing around the place in the dead of night?

  She could hear the voice again, droning out the same thing over and over.

  A female voice, high with distress…or was it a child’s voice? She felt a shiver of fear. What the hell?

  She threw on a robe and hurried over to the door and opened it.

  Richard was standing there in sleeping shorts and nothing else. He was bleary-eyed, his hair sticking up all over the place. He had one hand to his head. He looked worried.

  ‘I saw your light go on,’ he said.

  ‘What’s up?’ asked Lily.

  ‘It’s…’

  And now Lily could hear the voice more clearly, and she could hear snatches of what it was saying. Daddy?

  ‘…It’s Saz. She’s done this before, a couple of times. Before we got married, I’d stay over sometimes, and she did this then: it freaked me out.’

  ‘Where is she?’ Now Lily felt anxiety grip her. What was wrong, was Saz ill? Delirious?

  ‘In the master suite,’ said Richard, and started to walk that way.

  ‘What the hell’s she doing in there?’ asked Lily as she followed. ‘That room’s locked.’

  ‘She went down and got the key from the study. I followed her.’

  Oli’s door came open across the hall. She peered out, her tousled hair like a wild dark halo around her sleepy face. ‘What’s going on?’ she yawned.

  ‘Saz is in the master suite,’ said Lily, and Richard pushed open the door.

  ‘Oh Daddy, I’m so sorry. I’m sorry, Daddy, I’m so sorry,’ Saz was saying loudly in that weird singsong voice.

  ‘Jesus,’ said Oli, coming out into the hall.

  She followed Richard into the master suite, with Lily behind her.

  Saz was kneeling by the bed, her hands clasped as if in prayer. The wall behind the bed was pink with fresh plaster.

  Richard said gently: ‘Saz? Honey?’

  Lily stepped around the bed so that she could see Saz’s face. It was turned up to the ceiling, and her eyes were open…but seeing nothing.

  ‘She’s sleepwalking,’ said Oli softly. ‘She’s asleep.’

  Lily looked at Saz. It was spooky. She was there…but not there at all. She wasn’t aware that they were standing around her. Her brain was playing out some private movie scene that they weren’t a part of.

  ‘Oh Daddy, please forgive me, I’m so sorry,’ Saz was intoning, like a prayer.

  Forgive her for what? wondered Lily.

  ‘You said you’ve heard voices in here before,’ said Lily to Oli.

  ‘Yeah, I…’ Oli put a hand to her mouth. ‘Jesus! It was Saz, it was this. She scared me shitless, the silly mare. I thought I was losing it.’

  So did I, thought Lily.

  ‘Look,’ said Oli, suddenly brisk. ‘You mustn’t wake her up. I read that about sleepwalkers. You have to just guide them back to bed.’

  Richard bent over his wife and gently gripped her shoulders. Saz fell silent.

  The silence was even spookier than her endless droning, Sorry, sorry Daddy, sorry.

  Saz was now standing up and Richard was guiding her back to the door. Her eyes were open, but she still wasn’t seeing them.

  Sorry for what? thought Lily again, and into her mind came a vision of long-ago happy days, of Leo teaching Saz to shoot clays out in the grounds. Saz had become a really good shot.

  Sorry for what?

  Saz could easily lift a shotgun, even as a child.

  Lily watched Richard guide Saz tenderly back to their room. She kissed Oli a brief goodnight, and then stood there in the hall and thought, Oh fuck me, no, it can’t be.

  But…sorry for what?

  52

  She dreamed again that night. Mercy going back to Kingston, back to her home and kids. It was a happy scene, but Lily knew that the flowers, the party, the giggles, the fond reunions, were all a lie because she had heard on the prison grapevine that Mercy had been shot dead within a week of arriving home, killed by the same dealer she’d once been a reluctant drug mule for.

  For Mercy, there had been no happy ending.

  For Lily, there was just the daily grind, the endless grind…but it would end, wouldn’t it, one day? In her heart she couldn’t believe it, but in her head she knew it had to be true.

  Rumours abounded in Holloway, and besides the sad news about Mercy she heard other things, scary things: that the remaining King brothers were going to get her while she was in stir, make her pay in blood for Leo’s death.

  So it was a relief rather than a sadness when they moved her to Durham. All right, Becks couldn’t visit any more; but she hoped – maybe vainly – that Si and Freddy’s influence was weaker up north than down south. She did more years there in Durham, watching a new procession of cellmates go by – girls with boyfriends, women with husbands – who had all for one reason or another become embezzlers, crackheads, killers. Girls on suicide watch, others catatonic with fear at being banged up inside. Bullies. Bitches. Bull dykes. Brasses. All human life was there; Lily saw it all.

  Time wore on, and sometimes Lily thought that this was reality, here, inside; that outside was the dream, something her mind had cooked up to torment her. Outside was the myth, the cruel illusion. Her home, her life, her girls – all fantasy. This was the only reality. Prison.

  Finally she was moved to New Hall in Yorkshire, and then there was the staggering luxury of day-release for her last year at Askham Grange. The photo – that precious photo of her and the girls – was dog-eared and faded, but still safely tucked away in her bum bag. Every morning and every night she lay in her bunk and stared at it; it gave her comfort. And time wore on, and on, sunrise, sunset, just like the song…until one day, at last, she was released. She was free. Free to find out who had done this to her, and the girls.

  53

  Going back to bed after Saz’s escapade, Lily tossed and turned, but eventually fell into a troubled sleep peppered with the same old dreams of stir. She awoke with an aching head and a heavy heart. Cold rain was beating against the windowpane. The weather was an apt reflection of her mood.

  She got up, showered, went down to the kitchen and made coffee, then took it into the study with her. The house was quiet and she was glad of that. She didn’t want to talk, only to try and make sense of all the things spinning around in her brain. She closed the study door behind her, and went over to the TV. She plugged it in, switched on, loaded the tape in the old VCR. Pressed ‘play’.

  Leo was there.

  ‘Well babe, if you’re playing this then I’m dead,’ said his voice. On screen, he looked healthy, tanned,
prosperous. The old Leo she had known so well.

  No, Lily – you just thought you did.

  ‘You’ve found the stash and the gun. Keep ’em both safe, girl. Just a bit of life insurance for you. Look after the girls. If you need a hand, there’s always Si and Freddy.’ He hesitated, glanced down. ‘If you’re really in the shit, call on Nick. Okay? The boys’ll help you.’

  Oh really? She wondered about that. Leo had crossed Nick twice – once with Lily, and then with Julia – as if everything Nick had, Leo wanted to snatch away. Had he wanted other things, too, apart from women? A bigger slice of business, maybe?

  She wasn’t sure and it was all starting to drive her crazy. Her thoughts about Nick were muddled, her suspicions about him tangled up with that old powerful sexual attraction. She longed to call him, to be on good terms with him again. Their last conversation had rattled her. She’d forced herself to take a step back from him, cool it down, and he’d clearly got the message…but she hated not being in contact with him.

  ‘What the hell’s this?’ said Oli’s voice from behind her.

  Lily sprang to her feet, clapped a hand to her chest.

  ‘Jesus! I thought you were still asleep,’ she gasped.

  ‘After Saz’s little floor show last night?’ Oli said, crossing the room and standing there, staring at her father on the screen.

  Lily turned down the volume. Leo was mouthing something. Oli was still staring at the screen, awestruck. ‘That’s Dad,’ she murmured.

  ‘Yeah,’ said Lily. ‘It is. He left the tape for me to find. In case of emergency.’

  Oli turned and Lily could see the bright gleam of tears in her dark eyes. ‘I loved him so much,’ she said softly.

  ‘I know, Ols.’ Lily thought about Oli’s news of her possible pregnancy. If it was true, if she really was, then this would be Leo’s grandchild, a grandchild he would never play with, never see, never throw laughing into the air. She felt sadness grip her, and anger. All right, he hadn’t been the best of husbands, but someone had snatched his life away, and that someone had yet to pay for it.

  But Saz, she thought suddenly. What about Saz, muttering apologies to her dead father in her sleep? What about Saz, who even as a child had been used to handling guns…

  And now another thought occurred. Saz had hated the smell of guns when they were fired, hated to get the oil and cordite on her hands, so Leo had bought her a small pair of gloves and she had worn them whenever she was shooting with him.

  There were only my fingerprints on the gun.

  No, it was rubbish. Lily told herself firmly. Saz and Oli had been out that night, Maeve had been babysitting them. But Saz had been used to handling guns. And last night Saz’s tormented brain had sent her into this study to get the key and then up to the master suite to apologize. For what?

  Lily had a sudden flashback to that awful night. She felt again the shock, the horror. Leo lying dead with his head blown away. The blood. The gun. The horrid, cold slippery weight of it. For a moment she felt a wild leap of hope as she considered that. The weight of it. But she had seen Saz lift that gun when she was a child; she knew it wasn’t beyond her. Oh Jesus, so much blood…

  ‘You all right, Mum?’ asked Oli, looking at Lily’s face.

  Lily shook herself. ‘Yeah. Fine.’ She sat down quickly.

  ‘Oh my God,’ said Saz’s voice from the doorway.

  This is all I need, thought Lily with an inward wince.

  Saz was crossing the room quickly. Now she stood beside Oli and stared at the screen.

  ‘For God’s sake, what is this?’ she demanded.

  Not the tearful reaction of Oli. Saz was looking at the screen with something very like horror.

  ‘Leo left this for me to find,’ said Lily quietly.

  ‘Did Richard tell you that you were sleepwalking last night?’ Oli asked Saz.

  Saz seemed to recoil slightly at that. ‘Yeah. He did.’

  ‘You were in the master suite.’

  ‘I know. He told me.’

  ‘You were like a bloody zombie. You seen those flicks? They walk like this.’ Oli did a stiff-legged zombie stagger.

  ‘Oh shut the fuck up, Oli,’ snapped Saz, still staring, as if mesmerized, at the screen.

  ‘Yeah, come on, Oli. Saz can’t help it. Cut her some slack,’ said Lily, watching Saz’s face.

  Saz whirled, arms folded, and looked at her.

  ‘And I don’t need you to defend me,’ she said. She turned back to the screen. Stared. Said nothing. Showed not a flicker of emotion.

  Lily watched her.

  Then, abruptly, Saz turned away from the screen and came over to where Lily was sitting.

  ‘We’ve been talking, Richard and me, and we’ve come to a decision,’ she said.

  ‘Oh?’ Now what?

  ‘Yeah. We’re leaving. Today.’

  Lily sat there, gobsmacked.

  Then she rallied. ‘Don’t go, Saz. Stay. Let’s work this out.’

  Saz shook her head. Lily thought she saw something, some faint shadow like fear in her daughter’s eyes, but maybe she had imagined it. After all, she didn’t know her daughter at all. Not any more.

  ‘No, I’m not staying here. I don’t want to be here any more. Not with you here.’

  Lily felt the hurt of that, stabbing into her guts like a knife.

  Her lovely Saz hated her. She looked directly at her daughter, her heart feeling as if it was bleeding. Saz had erected an impenetrable wall between them, and she wanted so much to break it down, to find the girl who was hiding behind it. ‘Saz…what are you sorry about?’ she asked gently.

  Saz’s face went blank: the shutters were down. Everyone – Lily especially – shut out.

  ‘What?’ she asked.

  ‘When you were sleepwalking last night in the master suite, you said the same thing over and over again,’ Lily went on. ‘You said, “I’m sorry, Daddy.” You kept on repeating it.’

  ‘For God’s sake!’ Saz burst out, her eyes angry. ‘I was sleepwalking. I do that sometimes. It’s none of your business; nothing I do is any of your business, you got that?’

  ‘Come on, Saz…’ started Oli nervously.

  ‘No!’ Saz turned on her like a snake. ‘Don’t tell me to come on. Christ, you’re so weak, Oli.’

  Lily saw the hurt on Oli’s face.

  ‘You’ve swallowed all her lies whole,’ Saz went on. ‘Well, I ain’t. I’m not staying here. You’re welcome to each other.’

  Jack phoned an hour later, while Lily was in the kitchen, alone, feeling miserable. She didn’t pick up at first, scared it could be him, the breather, but finally she thought oh sod it and snatched the phone up.

  ‘Yeah, what?’ she asked, relieved to hear Jack’s broad Cockney accent.

  ‘And a good morning to you, too,’ said Jack.

  ‘It ain’t a good morning, Jack. But go on, what’s the news?’

  ‘Oh, this and that. Found out from one of the nursing home staff that Alice’s brother was none the worse for wear after I decked him.’

  ‘Pity.’

  ‘I thought that too,’ said Jack, and she could hear the smile in his voice. ‘And I had to stump up a ton to get to know who paid her bills. Which will go on your bill, naturally’

  ‘Yeah, sure. And?’

  ‘Purbright Securities. Paid every month, on the first. You know Purbright Securities?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Me neither. I’ll check it out with Companies House.’

  ‘Thanks. Anything else?’

  ‘Oh yeah. That fruitcake phoned.’

  ‘Which fruitcake? I know so many’

  ‘Suki the tarot lady’

  ‘Oh, that one. What did she want?’

  ‘She’s shot away, ain’t she? But hard to dislike. Quite nice, really, in a batty sort of way.’

  ‘What did she say?’ Lily didn’t think Suki was a nice girl. Nice girls didn’t shag other women’s husbands, not where she came from.


  ‘She said to tell you that you gotta take extra care. She did your reading after you left, and it wasn’t good, that’s what she told me. Said she turned up the death card and there were other things too. Now the death card, she explained this to me, the death card ain’t always a bad thing. It can mean transformation, she said. But it can also mean—’

  ‘Death?’ suggested Lily, trying to make light of it. But she felt – ever so slightly – spooked.

  ‘Got it in one. She said you had a troubled aura, very dark, she said she could see—’

  ‘Yeah. Enough, already,’ said Lily sharply.

  ‘Just passing on the message,’ said Jack.

  ‘Consider it passed. I’ll take care.’

  She could hear wheels running over a floor, voices. She turned on the stool and looked through the open kitchen doorway into the hall. Saz and Richard were there, dragging their cases towards the front door. Saz paused, and threw her a poisonous glare. Richard didn’t look at her at all.

  Lily sighed and turned away. ‘Was there anything else?’ she asked Jack.

  ‘I’ll drop the bill in sometime, okay? For services rendered.’

  ‘Yeah. Do that.’ She put the phone down.

  Behind her, she heard the front door close. Saz was gone.

  Lily sat there, feeling like shit. Finally, she picked up the phone and gave in. She called Nick.

  54

  Winston was singing along to the radio, he was happy. Bob Marley was on there, singing about one love, one heart.

  But Winston had two loves.

  Amen to that. Happy was Winston’s default setting, and why not? He lived here rent-free with two beautiful blonde mamas, he drew the social, he did a little man-vanning on the side, smoked a little ganja, got plenty of ciggies from the local tab house, did a few deals here and there, everything was cool, everything really was just fine, yes sir.

  He’d been here three years with Bev and Suki, and he loved it. He loved London; he loved the sights and the smells of the big city all around him. His family were back home in the Caribbean, and he loved them, sent home what he could, but he didn’t miss that life too much, not right now.