He was certain that the key to his future wellbeing and mental health would be closure on Ben Walker’s case. To find Ben’s murderer had been, and still was, his obsession. Being off the case wouldn’t mean that he couldn’t be the one to solve the murder, it would just be a hell of a lot harder not having the support of his old team.
He knew Sergeant Matthews wasn’t actively working on the case which was now residing in the unsolved pile. Matthews was not the sort of policeman who expected the unexpected and had no interest in embracing the mysteries of nature and forces that weren’t fully understood. Witnessing that UFO in Ullapool forty three years ago is what shaped Markland Garraway into the man he had become.
He instinctively reached for his whisky but remembered that Joan had thrown it out on Saturday. She was sick of his dependence on the stuff. He knew she was right. He didn’t consider himself an alcoholic, but sometimes he really needed a drink and this just happened to be one of those times.
He went to bed early and was endeavouring to read a challenging Fyodor Dostoevsky novel. By nine forty five his heavy eyelids closed and he slumped onto his pillow with the book in his hand. He began dreaming immediately.
This dream was different. It captured the moment Daniel Boyd crashed the rock into Ben Walker’s head. He could see there were others standing around watching Boyd murdering Ben. His dream allowed him to pan around the scene. He could see the hill and the school behind. As he turned back the rock was resting in Ben’s forehead, just as he’d seen it the morning Ben’s body had been found. He panned further to his left where Liz Mason lay unconscious on the ground. There was a young girl who looked to be fourteen or fifteen. She turned and pointed directly at Garraway. He could see her face as clear as day. Then, as if in slow motion she shouted something whilst pointing at him. He could read her lips as she yelled "Run, it's the police." All of them took off and ran to the depths of the woods leaving Ben and Liz alone. The images were very clear, but there was no sound in his detailed dream.
Then he was awake. His sheets were soaked through with sweat. He checked the clock to see how long he’d been sleeping and was surprised that it was a matter of minutes. It felt as if he’d been sleeping for hours. It was just minutes before ten o’clock. He recalled the time captured on Ben’s watched the moment he died. Had Garraway witnessed a detailed vision of what happened a year ago to the minute? Had he just witnessed the murder of Ben as it happened? Were the youths in his dream the actual ones who were there? And what about that shouting girl, did she shout to make them all run to the woods? He knew there were no police on the scene so unless she thought she’d seen something, she must have being trying to stop the attack and had probably saved Liz’s life.
What was he thinking? It had only been a dream. But the more he thought about it he was convinced the hill was working its magic again. He remembered the line on Polly’s suicide note, the one which had been written by Sarah.
Please tell Markland Garraway not to give up on Ben Walker. Accept the evidence you find no matter how it is presented.
He was now certain he had witnessed the murder first hand. But what could he do? He couldn’t make out any of the attackers, other than the girl who had shouted. For some reason she was the only one who he clearly saw. Anyway, who in the force would accept what he had just seen as evidence? He knew the answer was nobody, especially Sergeant Matthews.
Garraway picked up the novel which had fallen to the floor, grabbed a pen and scribbled what he had dreamt on the back inside cover. He jotted a detailed description of the girl’s face before it faded. He wrote the date and his initials beneath the notes.
Then he fell into a proper sleep.
Chapter thirty eight
Maria’s home
Christopher’s first birthday
7.05pm
Monday 6th September 2010
“Little man you’ve had a busy day” sang Maria as she tucked her son in for the night.
It had been a busy day for Christopher. Maria made sure that his first birthday would be one that she would remember, even if Christopher didn’t. She had arranged a little party. Samreen and Claire were there along with a group of mums and their babies she had made friends with at Joe Jingles. Maria’s small flat had been trashed. There was cake and crisps trodden into the carpet, juice had been spilt over the furniture, and the kitchen bin stank of soiled nappies. All in all it had been a great day and she had loved every minute of it.
He had so many birthday presents there was not enough room for them all. Maria could see a visit to the charity shop looming up as there was no way he could play with all the things he had been given.
She kissed him on the head as he slept soundly.
Returning to the lounge she started to clear away wrapping paper, cardboard boxes and the remains of burst balloons.
It had been an excellent year and he was growing so well. He’d learnt to walk while holding her hand. She would let go of him and watch him attempt to balance, only to fall with a soft thud. His speech was improving. He still said “Meee”, but was also saying mummy and Nana. He was trying to grasp some other words which Maria couldn’t work out.
By half past nine she was done in and was craving a glass of wine. Five minutes later she was relaxing on her sofa, nursing a large glass of Sauvignon Blanc and watching Bridget Jones's Diary for the umpteenth time.
She was fifteen minutes into the film when she heard “Ughh ughh ughh ughh ughh ughh ughh ughh ughh.” Maria put down her wine, paused the DVD and turned the volume up on the baby monitor. “Ughh ughh ughh ughh ughh ughh ughh ughh ughh.” Oh no, he’s at it again, she thought. She waited for a moment and hoped he would stop. He didn’t and she could hear his head banging against the pillow.
Maria opened his bedroom door and waited for her eyes to become accustomed to the orange glow of the nightlight which illuminated his room. She watched as he lay face down banging his head as regular as clockwork up and down on his pillow. He would stop for a few seconds and then start rocking from side to side still chanting his strange mantra “ughh ughh ughh ughh ughh ughh ughh ughh ughh.” She picked him up and held him with his head against her shoulder. He continued to rock backward and forward and chant into her ear. “Ughh ughh ughh ughh ughh ughh ughh ughh ughh.” She rocked him, but he wouldn’t stop, so she began to gently shake him but he carried on. He was in a deep sleep from which she couldn’t wake him. She didn’t know what to do. Carrying him in her arms she took him into the lounge and sat with him trying to hold his head still as it rocked from side to side and backwards and forwards. The chanting continued “ughh ughh ughh ughh ughh ughh ughh ughh ughh.”
Maria started to sob. She was alone and had no one to turn to for help. She sobbed and rocked Christopher hoping that he would soon tire himself and stop.
Chapter thirty nine
The Awareness
9.45pm
Monday 6th September
Christopher was chanting while rocking and banging his head because the Awareness had awoken again. It had been evolving for exactly twelve months and was about to flourish and grow faster than before. It was sorting images and memories into order and was working out who was who and what went where. It didn’t know the names of faces, but it was able to sort them into categories. Categories of who was good, who was bad, who it had loved and who it had disliked. It was identifying places as well as faces. Places which were important, places which were good and places which were bad.
Then it remembered the burial mound. It paused and held onto the image of the grassy hill. The Awareness was experiencing confusion. It couldn’t work out what to do with this image. It was both good and evil. Now that the Awareness had learnt to access and recall memories it was visualising good things about the hill. It could see a young boy playing there. The boy was laughing and smiling as he played. The Awareness felt love for the boy and knew that the boy loved him in return. This was why it was a good place. The Awareness was accessing more memories of the hi
ll and they were also happy ones. All of the memories were with the boy. The Awareness was experiencing happiness. It was remembering how it had felt to be happy and loved.
The Awareness was visualising the hill again. This time the image was different. The young boy had gone and it was now seeing an image of a young woman, who was laughing and smiling. It was recalling more good memories. She was running up the hill and the view was from beneath her looking up. She fell backwards and as she did the Awareness saw she had a small tattoo of a butterfly on her back. Next there was confusion and a lot of scrabbling around at the bottom of the hill. The image of the girls face was very near and she was smiling. The Awareness was feeling a strong emotion of love for her and it was the happiest memories it had experienced since its formation.
The image of the young woman’s face had become so close it could not make out her features. It was confused and did not understand what was happening. The emotion of love intensified and was merging into a new feeling. It felt warm and the Awareness found its level of happiness was increasing. Her face was so close it was blocking everything else. It could not see the hill behind her or the sky above and then for the first time it became conscious of two of the five senses. It was experiencing the sense of touch as it could feel her lips and it was experiencing the sense of taste from her lipstick. The emotion of love, the warmth of happiness and the senses of touch and taste had taken the Awareness to a higher level. It wanted to hold on to these new sensations as they felt so good.
Next there was confusion again. The feelings of good were replaced with feelings of bad. The young woman was still in the image but she was lying on the floor. There were new figures all around, figures it didn’t recognise but sensed they meant harm. Then one of the figures was attacking the young woman and kicking her over and over. The Awareness then became conscious of a variation of the sense of touch it had experienced with the young woman. The feeling was more acute. The Awareness was trying to register what was happening. It concentrated on this new experience whilst seeing that the harmful figures were very close. The acute sense of touch was repetitive as it started and stopped over and over again. It was feeling pain. It was remembering the pain that night as it was set upon by the bad figures. The Awareness could still see the young woman but now she looked different. Her eyes were closing and she was not smiling. The Awareness looked up to the sky and saw a figure standing above with something in its hands. It could not work out what was happening. Why had such a happy memory turned into something so bad?
The figure standing above him was holding a rock. The Awareness concentrated on the figure’s face. It was trying to match the face with other memories but couldn’t recall where it had seen the face before. Again, the awareness recalled a memory of acute pain. It looked up and saw the figure was standing above him but without the rock. The Awareness was regrouping its thoughts and was attempting to work out what had just happened, when another image of the figure returned holding the rock high above his head. Again, the Awareness focused on the figure’s face but it still couldn’t work out who it was. This time the Awareness saw the rock falling and was followed by another sensation of acute pain.
This time the feeling of pain stopped as soon as it had started. The Awareness was trying to work out what all of this meant.
Whilst the Awareness was recalling the memories, Christopher was in his cot rocking, chanting and banging his head over and over. Maria was crying as she could not stop him. He wouldn’t wake up and his chanting was getting louder and more disturbing.
The Awareness replayed the last sequence again and again, which was causing Christopher’s head banging and chanting to intensify.
Finally the Awareness comprehended what had happened. The last memories, which were the most recent ones, were of the moments it had stopped being what it once was. It placed what it had just experienced in chronological order and filed it with the other images and memories and contemplated what it meant.
The Awareness had no real concept of time, but now it was alert to how long it was taking to work out what all of this meant. It was conscious that it was taking time to piece together the jigsaw of memories. It was replaying the memories of the girl, the hill, the figures, the falling rock and the acute pain. All of these were the last things it had experienced before it had become what it was now.
Then it made sense. The Awareness had finally worked out what all of this meant. It knew it had once been alive and had been spending happy times with people it had loved. It had many images to support this. So if it had once been alive, now it must be dead.
The Awareness was experiencing something new. It was a new emotional sensation which was fear. It was scared as it knew that it was dead and may never again experience happiness.
So if it was dead, where was it now? Once it thought it was in a safe place and surrounded by love, but now it felt as if it was imprisoned in solitary confinement.
When it first evolved it instinctively knew it had to be heard and as it flourished it understood it had something it had to say. It had a message. Now things were making sense. It understood that once it had been alive and its life had ended abruptly and violently. It thought about the memory of the girl. Who was she? She had clearly meant something.
The Awareness wondered about what it had been when it was alive. It had seen no memories of itself. Had it been young or old? Had it been male or female? What had been its home and where did it live?
It recalled memories with new purpose. It needed to learn more about itself.
As memories were replayed the Awareness was honing its ability to stop, pause, rewind and replay them. It was learning to scrutinise and analyse them. It revisited memories and was able to make use of its new sense of touch and its enhanced emotions of love and hate.
It played specific memories over again, whilst skipping ones of little significance. One memory kept resurfacing. It was an image of a smartly dressed young man looking very proud and who was wearing a uniform. It was a black jacket, blue shirt and a peaked cap. The Awareness had skipped over this image several times at it seemed insignificant. This time it examined the image in more detail. In other memories people had been moving around and interacting with others. This memory was an image of a solitary figure and there was something about it that made it different from the rest. The Awareness played it over again and was trying to work out why it was different and why it now seemed significant?
The young man was standing still but would move to adjust his hat and his jacket. He would turn to his side and look over his shoulder whilst craning his neck as if he was trying to view something before returning to his original standing position.
What bothered the Awareness was the young man’s eyes. They were staring directly at the Awareness as though the young man could see it, and the Awareness felt it was staring back. The Awareness kept replaying the memory until it understood what was happening.
It was the memory of someone looking at them self in a mirror. The memory of the young man was the reflection of the Awareness when it had been alive.
The image in the mirror confirmed that the Awareness had been male and that he’d lived until he was at least in his early twenties.
He knew that he’d been killed, but he didn’t know who he had been or what his name was. Hopefully he could piece these things together as he continued to develop.
He thought about the message that he had to get across and knew what it was he needed to say. He had to let it be known that he still existed and he had to get a message out about his killer.
He had to find a way to be heard and he could only think of one way and that was to shout. He was starting to fade. He’d achieved more and had learnt more about who he had been than ever before. But it had drained him of his energy. He faded until he was no more. But he would return.
Whilst the Awareness had been recalling its memories and working out who it had once been, Christopher had been reacting violently by banging his head against
the wooden slats of his cot, chanting louder than ever before and rolling from side to side.
-------------------------------------------
Maria was helpless, she had picked him up, put him down and tried to wake him repetitively, but he wouldn’t stop or wake up. Then suddenly after about half an hour he stopped and slept. Gently snoring as if nothing had happened.
Maria was exhausted and her eyes were red with tiredness. In the commotion she had forgotten to video Christopher as Campbell had suggested. She decided to get Christopher back to the doctor tomorrow and insist on a visit from the Child Health Visitor. It was five past ten, the whole episode had lasted only thirty five minutes but had seemed a lot longer.
She was tired and needed to sleep, but didn’t want to leave him on his own. Eventually she went to her room with his baby monitor and turned the volume up to ten.
The rest of the night passed without incident.
Chapter forty
Darlington
9.15pm
Monday 6th September 2010
Carla had been dreading this day. Twelve months since the murder. Considering all the things that had happened during the last year she was doing pretty well. But today had not been a good one. Her stomach had been churning all day long. She should have started sixth form, but she didn’t feel up for it.
She had done well in her GCSE exams and was pleased to be going back to school for A levels. Hopefully she would be well enough for school tomorrow but today had been a bad day just as she knew that it would be.
She felt awful guilt. Her life was moving forward and she had a future. Ben Walker could have had a future. She had read his obituary and knew that he’d been a policeman. She had great respect for the police and knew he would have been a good person. Although she had respect for the police, she didn’t have the guts to stand up and turn herself in. She hated herself for it and considered herself a coward.
The Hill - Ben’s Story (Book One).: A Paranormal Murder Mystery Thriller. (Book One). Page 15