SO THE DOVES

by Heidi James

  ‘Mum, it’s not like that. He’s my friend, I’m just helping him.’

  ‘Yeah, helping him half-naked, drunk on my sofa, while your little brother is upstairs. You just don’t learn do you? What’s up with you?’

  Steve shook his head and sneered, ‘Nothing’s changed around here then, Melanie? I told you, Chrissie, didn’t I?’

  ‘Mum, what’s he doing here? You promised me he’d gone for good.’ Melanie stood up and moved closer to her mother, her hands turned up to plead with her, or show her she was clean, innocent. Marcus’s heart was racing, the brandy and the punches to his head were clouding his brain, he couldn’t think.

  ‘I decide who’s allowed in my house, not you. You’re a dirty little slut, Melanie and you know what’s worse, you’re a liar too.’

  Melanie stood rooted to the spot.

  ‘I can’t be doing with all this. I warned you Chrissie, I’m not coming back here if she is going to be causing trouble between us.’ Steve moved towards the door, his dark hair gleaming in the light.

  ‘Don’t go, Steve, we’ll sort this. Please, babe,’ Chrissie said, pleading, then turned to Mel and hissed: ‘See what you’ve done? You ruin everything. Everything. God knows I wish you’d never been born.’

  Steve stopped, still turned to the door ready to go, waiting.

  ‘Marcus, please tell her what happened, please,’ Melanie looked at him, her eyes wide, beseeching. But he couldn’t speak, couldn’t say the words. Shame and cowardice silenced him like a fist in his mouth. Melanie was begging him and he said nothing. Did nothing.

  ‘See, your boyfriend won’t even lie for you. Get out. Get out now.’

  ‘Mum, I’m begging you, please listen to me. Nothing has happened, Marcus was beaten up and I was just helping him.’

  ‘Right. Who beat him then? Why?’

  ‘Marcus?’ Melanie waited for him to speak up. She wouldn’t betray him, she wouldn’t tell them. It was up to him. But he couldn’t.

  She turned back to her mother. ‘It doesn’t matter why. I wasn’t doing anything wrong, I promise. Marcus is my friend, you know he is.’

  ‘Can’t think of a lie quick enough can you? I told you’d be out if anything like this happened again. Didn’t I? Didn’t I? Now get out boy, before I fucking throw you out. NOW.’

  ‘Marcus, please. Just tell her what happened. For fucks sake! Please!’

  He stood and walked out the door, shaking, about to be sick, her mother’s shouting hammering at his skull. He pushed past Steve, his cheap aftershave and sweat, into the street, where he collapsed down on the curb, to wait for Mel, wait for her mother to calm down. He left her in there, alone with them.

  Behind him, the screaming continued, and the neighbours came out, shaking their heads and folding their arms. One of them called over to him, ‘You’d best get out of it son, the pigs will be here in a minute.’ So he left. He left her there and kept walking until he got home.

  The Envelope

  There was a knock on my door. I was packing to leave. Charlie’s envelope was in my back pocket, unopened. I needed to get away from there, at a safe distance to open it.

  ‘Come in.’

  Mum walked in the room, her eyes small behind her glasses. ‘You could stay a little longer you know.’ She leaned against the desk, her arms crossed over her chest.

  ‘I know.’

  ‘I can’t see why you’re rushing back. You’ve been through a lot these last weeks. Why don’t you stay?’

  ‘I can’t, Mum. I have to sort myself out, I can’t live with my mother forever, can I?’

  I needed to get away from there, from that parallel universe of twisted happenings, from the ever-present past, but I couldn’t tell her that. I let her think there was a job, a future.

  ‘What will you do?’

  ‘I don’t know. Something will come up. Maybe I’ll sell the flat, start again somewhere. Write a book. I just need to let it all go.’

  ‘And will you move on? Will you let it all go?’

  ‘What do you think?’

  ‘I think you’ll pursue this story and try and clear your name.’

  ‘Maybe. Maybe there’s nothing to prove.’

  ‘Just be careful, please.’

  ‘Don’t worry, I’ll be back soon.’

  ‘Will you? You always say that and then I don’t see you for months.’

  I kissed her forehead and squeezed her shoulders. ‘I promise.’

  ‘Did you see the news about Edward Campbell?’

  ‘I did, he’s done all right hasn’t he?’

  ‘I should say so! Director General of the BBC and after what he did to you… It’s criminal.’

  ‘Yeah.’ I made a move towards the door, needing to get out.

  ‘It was her mother, wasn’t it? Who did it?’

  ‘So the police said.’

  ‘Yes. Well, they would know.’

  ‘I’d best be going.’

  ‘Yes, of course. Drive safely.’ She followed me out onto the drive. I leaned down and kissed her again and she gripped my hand. ‘You’ve got nothing to be ashamed of you know.’ I straightened and nodded. ‘I mean it, you can only do what seems right at the time.’

  ‘Yeah, thanks.’

  I got in the car and drove slowly out, watching her in the rear-view mirror as she waved from the door. The black Audi wasn’t on the street or parked on any of the drives. But it didn’t matter any more.

  Just before the motorway I turned off into the old industrial estate, and drove up past the cement works and the paper factory. The concrete road ran out, finished by a scrubby patch of grass and low wall. It was deserted, the factories closed. I climbed out of the car and up the over the wall. The river opened wide, merging and heaving against the sea. Currents coiled and bucked at the surface, and across the water I could just make out the mud banks of Essex. A seagull tilting on the wind above. I pulled Charlie’s envelope out of my pocket and tore it open.

  March, 1990

  She phoned first, her voice flat and thin as if stretched to the point of snapping. It was late and his mum was in bed. He was watching TV, still nursing his bruised face and back. He hadn’t left the house, too scared of seeing Darren and his brother. He was half-expecting them to turn up on the doorstep at any moment, ready to kill him. They hadn’t, but he half wished they would.

  ‘Of course you can come, I’ve been so worried,’ he said.

  Ten minutes later she tapped on the door. ‘You sure this is OK?’

  He nodded.

  ‘Where’s your mum?’

  ‘Upstairs, asleep.’

  She paused and seemed to reach an agreement with herself and looked up at him; her face was swollen – from lack of sleep or crying it was hard to tell. ‘Charlie is in the car outside, he wants you to go and speak to him.’

  ‘OK.’ He looked down the drive and saw the car parked by the hedge, its engine and lights off. ‘You wait inside, in the sitting room.’

  He trod lightly and then jumped to the lawn edging around the gravel drive and skirted towards the car that way, as quietly as he could. Charlie leaned over and opened the car door from the inside. He got in and as he reached to pull it shut Charlie gripped his arm, ‘Quiet.’ The heavy door slipped into the mechanism, only partway closed. ‘You alright?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘Nervous?’

  Marcus nodded, though he didn’t know why he should be nervous.

  ‘Don’t be, you’re a good friend, a good boy. We’ll look after her, alright? Keep her here tonight, and don’t tell anyone. You hear me? No one. Not your mum, not the police, not a soul. Promise?’

  ‘I promise. What’s going on?’

  ‘Nothing, Marcus. Nothing is going on. Mel’s just had some grief with her family, that’s all. You understand that don’t you?�
�

  ‘Yes, I understand.’

  ‘I’ll be back for her tomorrow night, same time. Can you keep her hidden that long?’ His big hands rested on the steering wheel. A tree-shaped tag hung from the rear view mirror, scenting the air with pine.

  Marcus thought about his mother and Joyce and their unvarying routine. The next day was kitchen day, cleaning and restocking the cupboards, scrubbing the slate floor. ‘Yeah, that won’t be a problem.’

  ‘Good, you’re a good lad.’ Marcus pushed the door and started out. ‘Marcus.’ He stopped and turned back, one leg still on the pavement. ‘You’re a part of this now, you understand? You have to keep your mouth shut or we’re all up shit creek, especially Mel. It’s important you understand what I’m saying to you. I’m trusting you now.’

  ‘I understand, and I won’t let you down. I promise.’

  ‘Good lad. You’ll have no trouble from the Shines from now on, either. Just keep your mouth shut, alright? You ain’t seen Melanie and you don’t know where she is.’ Charlie smiled, his teeth yellow in the streetlights.

  Melanie was sitting on the corner of the settee, her knees pressed together. She sighed and shrugged off her jacket, letting it fall behind her into the gap between her body and the cushion. He noticed that her hair was damp, freshly washed; the scent of coconut shampoo lifted off her in warm waves. She looked like a little girl, her eyes huge like a seal pup, reflecting the flickering apparitions from the TV. He reached to turn it off. ‘Leave it on,’ she whispered. He sat in front of her on the floor. She was wearing white trainers with black laces, thin ones, like formal shoe laces; she had a thin bandage around her hand.

  ‘What happened to you?’

  Surprised, she looked at her hand as if she’d not realised it was there. ‘Nothing, I burnt it on the iron. I was ironing. A silly accident.’

  ‘Ouch. Does it hurt?’

  ‘It’s fine,’ she tucked her hands under her legs, her elbows winging out in triangles from her body. She looked thinner than usual.

  ‘You need a drink? Food?’

  ‘No thanks.’

  ‘What happened with your mum?’

  She blinked, her slow focus settling on his face. Nothing.

  ‘I tried to call you but there was no answer.’ He reached for her arm and she moved back, sitting up straight.

  ‘No, she unplugged it.’

  ‘What’s going on?’

  ‘This is a lovely house.’ She turned her head and stared at the photos on the mantelpiece. She stood up and walked over to the fireplace. ‘Do you light this?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘The fire. I’d love a real fireplace, I bet it’s lovely.’

  ‘Sometimes, Mum likes it. Listen, tell me what’s going on.’

  ‘I told you, nothing. I just need to leave.’ She picked up a photo of his father; in tennis whites, he looked like Fred Astaire, grinning at the camera. She put it down carefully and adjusted it so it was in the exact same position as before.

  ‘But Mel, that doesn’t make sense? Is it my fault? Because I’m sorry, I didn’t know what to say to your mum. I was scared; I know I should’ve said something, explained. I was just so scared.’

  ‘It’s not your fault.’

  ‘But you’re leaving home, this is terrible…’

  ‘Marcus, it’s not one of your dramas, it’s not telly, it’s nothing. Ordinary, boring life. No big deal.’

  ‘It is a big deal; I don’t understand why you’re going. It doesn’t make sense.’

  ‘Because it doesn’t, OK? We aren’t all like you, with history and logic and photos to prove who you are. Sometimes it doesn’t all add up. My life isn’t a science project or a fucking novel that ties itself neatly in a bow. Maybe it’s all too roughed up to show, but there it is. It’s what I’ve got. Besides, it’s pointless. D’you know what my fucking mother said to me? She said, “This is all down to you. All I do for you, after all I’ve gone through.”’

  As Mel spoke, she pulled her lips back over her teeth, imitating her mother, the hard bones of her face reassembling, becoming her mother. She began pacing back and forth reciting the words, ‘“We’re not hunks of meat – a beating doesn’t soften us up, no, no it doesn’t. These scars make you hard, you hear me. You have no idea what you’re talking about. You’ve got a lot to answer for my girl, and let me tell you something. You don’t know you’re born, you spoilt little bitch, whatever happened to you, you asked for it. Slut, slut, slut. I wish you’d never been born, I wish it was you who was dead.”’

  She stopped speaking as suddenly as she’d started and stood at the window looking at herself, at the room, Marcus behind her reflected in the night-blackened glass. Her body was rigid, accommodating only the heave and contract of her ribcage. ‘Now leave it. Be my friend and help me. Please.’

  ‘But Melanie, I don’t understand.’

  ‘I said leave it.’

  He took her upstairs. She slept on the floor, though he offered her his bed, and he woke early, listening for his mother. He made a space in the wardrobe for her to hide, just in case someone tried to come in. He sneaked her some juice and toast and told his mother when he passed her on the stairs that he hadn’t managed to sleep all night, so he would rest that day. She agreed, stroking his forehead and lightly brushing his black eye and cheek with her fingers. ‘Back to school next week though, alright? Or I will call the doctor.’

  They read and dozed all day, not risking talking, though neither had much to say anyway. She lay back against the bed at one point, and he saw the purple curve and red dots of a new bruise around her neck, but knew better than to say anything and looked away before she realised he’d noticed it. That was how they spent their last day together. Lying in his room, side by side, but she’d already gone. Charlie came for her at eleven thirty, in a different car, a white Ford Fiesta with a nodding dog perched on the parcel shelf.

  She hugged him, tight, the smell of coconut shampoo pressed deep against him. Then they were gone.

  Elena Santi

  I was sitting in a lecture hall, jetlag working like grit behind my eyes, swallowing my Starbucks coffee with her locket around my neck, the chain tarnished and grey, not silver any more. I’d put it on after I opened Charlie’s envelope and not taken it off since.

  I turned to watch as students filtered into the room, so definitively American with their sportswear and well-fed bodies and perfected teeth. They climbed the stairs to find a place among the raked seats, pulling out notebooks and pens, flicking through their phones, chattering and flirting and laughing. The room was filling up. The title of the lecture was projected onto the screen above the rostrum: Ethics and the Nature of Language. In a smaller font the name of the Professor: Elena Santi – the name scrawled by Charlie on a scrap of paper, a scrap of paper folded into the crude shape of a bird; the name that Charlie had tucked into an envelope and asked Darren to give me; the name on a bird-shaped piece of paper that I have pressed between the pages of my passport.

  She wasn’t hard to find. Her faculty page was impressive in an institutional, establishment way. The Director of the Center for Ethical Studies, she’s on the advisory board for Sedenco, the energy giant, and an advisor to the current administration. According to her bio she holds a BA, MA and PhD from Harvard, where she was the recipient of the W.G. Michaels Fellowship and the Kennedy School Prize.

  She’d written a lot, mostly academic papers, research and analysis, articles responding to government proposals, a monograph on Justice and Morality, the kind of thing that flies beneath the radar unless you are in the same field: important, but not mass media worthy. The only photo of her online is a formal headshot, where she is smiling against a beige backdrop and looks like a thousand other women in their forties. I could find nothing about her private life, she had no public social media page and her Twitter was strictly professional and pretty s
poradic.

  So why was I there? Why did I fly all the way to Boston and book into an expensive hotel without emailing her first? But what would I have said? Hi, I was given your name by an ailing old man. Do you happen to know anything about a girl called Melanie? Did you kill Steve Burrell? Who are you? So I booked a flight, because what else could I do?

  A woman entered the hall and stepped up behind the rostrum. She moved the microphone, and turned briefly to check the screen. She had no notes or prompts that I could see. She cleared her throat, swallowed and raised her head. She smiled, and looked around the room, taking everyone in. The students fell silent. Sitting there in the front, I caught her eye, and for a moment the woman looked back at me with Melanie’s slow, calm gaze and time fell in on itself, collapsing around me like the pixelated world in a computer game, leaving only us two balanced in the void. She made no move to show she’d recognised me.

  She began, her accent Bostonian with a hint of something else. It would be hard to place if you didn’t know, but I could hear the glottal stops and flat vowels of Estuary English. There she was, almost unrecognisable, well groomed, grown-up, professional and still entirely familiar. Talking as if the universe was an open book and she knew all the words off by heart. I watched her: the slow way of blinking, the slight turn of her head, the way she looked as if she was just outside of time, just beyond the world around her and was only there to observe; and it was like she’d never disappeared, she never left.

  ‘Language is so constructed as to require… It’s necessary always to make distinctions… not I, not us… this or that… you or me. Black or white. You see, our survival as a species has depended on these binaries in order to distinguish what was safe from what was potentially dangerous and yet now, it destroys us. This false taxonomy of being… this fascist impulse at the heart of our language… This is what Nietzsche asks of us... and Derrida, the deconstructive impulse is…’