by C. L. Taylor
“What girl?”
“A girl I know.”
“You haven’t left the house in days. How could you have met a girl?”
“Well, I . . .” He rubs his palms against his thighs. “I haven’t exactly met her in person yet but . . . but I know her.”
“How?”
“Through”—he clears his throat—“Tinder.”
“Tinder? The dating app?”
“Yeah.”
“But what about Kira? I thought you loved her.”
“I do. I do love her, more than anything in the world, but she won’t let me near her. We haven’t had sex in months.” The base of his throat flushes red as he stares at the carpet. “I was just having a bit of fun, a bit of banter.”
I hold out a hand. “Show me the phone.”
“No.”
“Show me the phone, Jake.”
“Mum, it’s . . . the messages, they’re . . . they’re quite explicit.”
“Show me the phone.”
“Okay. But you’re not going to like it.” It seems to take an age for him to cross the living room and join me on the sofa. He tilts the phone away from me and unlocks it, then shows me the screen. “See, Tinder.”
He points at a white icon containing a red flame. It’s the same app Liz showed me earlier.
“Show me the messages.”
He cringes away. “Mum, please.”
“Now, Jake.”
“Okay.” He sighs as he taps the message icon and a list of his most recent messages fills the screen. The one at the top says:
I can keep a secret if you can.
It’s the message I saw earlier. Below it is a message Jake sent:
I shouldn’t be doing this. I’m really nervous someone will find out.
The one before that reads:
I can’t wait to see you. Last night I fell asleep dreaming of your cock in my mouth and your fingers in my hair.
Beneath it, another message from Jake:
I really want you. I know I shouldn’t but you’re all I can think about. You make me feel things I haven’t felt before. I want to fuck you really hard and—
“Okay.” I push the phone away. “I’ve read enough.”
“I told you.” Jake can’t bring himself to look me in the eye. “I told you it was bad.”
“Bad?” Rage builds in my chest as I think of Kira, standing at the back door crying because of how much she loves him. “Go!” I point at the living room door. “Get out of my sight before I do something I regret.”
Chapter 37
The second Jake’s bedroom door slams shut I head for the kitchen and yank open the cutlery drawer. I riffle through the different compartments and count out the steak knives.
I find three and put them on the kitchen table, then pull open the door to the dishwasher. It’s mid-cycle—Jake must have put it on shortly before I returned home—and a cloud of steam hits me full in the face. When the steam has dissipated I pull out the cutlery basket and pick through the spoons, forks and knives.
I pull out two steak knives by their handles and line them up with the others on the table. Five knives.
I go through the cutlery drawer again, lifting up the metal tray to see if a knife has found its way underneath but there’s nothing there apart from a rusty bottle opener. I look in the dishwasher, both trays this time, then pull the bottom one out and feel around in the drum of the machine. Nothing.
The utensils pots near the oven are next. The missing knife isn’t in with the wooden spoons or the spatulas, nor is it in the knife block. I rummage through the junk drawer beneath the microwave but there’s no knife there either. The only other place to check is Jake’s room.
I have to knock three times before my son responds.
When I open the door he is lying on his bed in his boxer shorts, his thick arms crossed over his chest, his hands tucked beneath his armpits. I can see the wariness in his eyes. He thinks I’ve come to have another go at him about cheating on Kira.
“What is it, Mum?”
“Just looking for dirty dishes.” Normally I’d find plates on the carpet, mugs on the chest of drawers and breakfast bowls stacked on top of each other on his bedside table, but his room appears to be completely free of either crockery or cutlery.
“I put the dishwasher on earlier.”
“Yes, I saw.”
“You don’t need an excuse if you want to come and talk to me, you know.”
“I didn’t . . . I wasn’t . . .”
“I deserved it,” he says flatly. “You screaming at me earlier. It’s been a long time coming. I’m surprised you didn’t hit me.”
“I’d never do that.”
“I know, and I’ve always found that weird. When me and Billy were at primary school the other kids would come in sometimes and they’d tell everyone how they’d been walloped the night before because they’d stolen something or talked back to their parents or whatever. It wasn’t just one kid—loads of kids in my class were hit by their parents and I didn’t get it. Me and Billy answered you and Dad back all the time. We played up. We didn’t do what we were told. Billy even nicked money out of your purse one time and—”
“I didn’t know that!”
“He was sneaky like that.” He smiles. “We both were. We were little shits, just like the kids in school who got smacked by their parents, but you two never touched us.”
“That’s because our parents hit us and we swore we’d never do the same to our kids.”
“Me and Billy—neither of us were angels.”
“I know that,” I say softly, “but I still love you. There’s nothing either of you could do that I couldn’t forgive.”
“Seriously? So if I told you that Billy had killed someone or I’d raped someone you’d still forgive that?”
I stare at him in horror. “What are you trying to tell me?”
“Nothing that bad . . . but . . . I . . .” His chin drops to his chest. “I said and did some horrible things the night Billy ran away.”
I put a hand on the door frame. “Like what?”
“After Dad went to the pub and you went to Gran’s, Billy started dicking about with his lighter, holding it under a cushion and saying he was going to burn the house down to pay Dad back. I lost it. I told him that everything Dad had said was right. That he was a loser and an embarrassment to the family.”
“That’s no worse than the things your dad said.”
“It gets worse. Billy told me I was going out with the town slut and that everyone was laughing at me behind my back. I lost it and I hit him. I punched him in the face. I split his lip.”
I try to cover my shock with my hand but I’m too slow and he hears me gasp.
“Kira heard the whole thing.” He turns to look at me. “She was standing at the top of the stairs. I ran up to her, thinking she’d thank me for sticking up for her, but she just . . . she just sort of froze, so I asked her if it was true. She didn’t say anything. She just stood there.
“I was so angry I went into my room and cracked open a bottle of whisky and drank it. Next thing I knew it was morning and Kira was in bed beside me and I was so hungover I could hardly open my eyes.”
I can’t believe what I’m hearing. “Why haven’t you told me this before? Does Dad know? Did you tell the police?”
“I thought Billy would come back. I thought he’d done it to get attention and I wasn’t going to play along.” He takes a deep breath. “When we realized that he wasn’t dicking about and the police interviewed us I told them the truth. They asked if anyone could corroborate my statement and I said that Kira could. They never talked to me about it again. I should have told you and Dad too but you were both so cut up and I didn’t . . . I didn’t want you to hate me.”
“Oh, Jake.”
“No, Mum. Don’t hug me. I don’t deserve it. If I hadn’t hit him Billy wouldn’t have left and Jason Davies wouldn’t have got hold of him. My brother’s been murdered and it’s all
my fault. It’s my fucking fault!”
He moves in a blur. One second he’s sitting on the bed, the next he’s up on his knees. He swings back his right arm and smashes his fist into the bedroom wall, then follows it with a punch from his left hand.
“Stop! Jake, stop! Don’t do this!”
I use all my body weight to try and pull him away but it’s like wrestling a bull as he punches the wall again and again and again, driving his fists into it, smearing it with blood.
“Please! Stop! Please!”
Jake pauses, fist pulled back, and as quickly as his rage boiled to the surface it dies away and he slumps onto the bed and curls up in the fetal position, his knuckles raw and bleeding.
“Jake.” I press myself into the curve of his back and wrap my arms around him. “Jake, it’s not your fault. Listen to me, please. I could never blame you for what’s happened. Never. Never.”
He howls with anguish and then bursts into tears. I hold him as he cries, his body shuddering in my arms just the way it did when he was a toddler.
Chapter 38
Sonia gestures for me to take a seat and smiles warmly. The box of tissues that normally sits on the windowsill behind her has been relocated to the coffee table next to me. I don’t know if that’s because her last client was a crier or because she’s expecting me to be.
“Thanks for seeing me,” I say. “If you hadn’t had a cancellation I don’t know what I would have done.”
“No problem at all.” She tucks a strand of hair behind her ear and settles herself in the seat, neatly tucking one ankle over the other. “Tell me what’s going on with you, Claire.”
She listens silently as I tell her what happened after I read the message on Jake’s phone. Almost everything. I don’t mention the blood or the knife.
“Then,” I say, “when Kira came home I managed to have a quick word with her before she went up to Jake’s room. I told her he was in a bad way. That he felt guilty about Billy’s disappearance but that didn’t give him the right to talk to her the way he had. I said that if he spoke to her like again she needed to tell me.”
“How did she respond?”
“She looked shocked.”
“Did you ask her about the night Billy disappeared?”
“Yes. She said it happened exactly as Jake had described. She said she’d been angry too, that Jake would believe that she’d cheat on him. That’s why she wouldn’t talk to him.”
“How do you feel, Claire? Knowing more about that night?”
“Confused.” I run a hand over my face. The window on the other side of the room is open a few inches but the air feels too thick to breathe. “If Billy did run away there were a lot of reasons why, not just because he was in trouble with the police and us.”
“And how do you feel now, about spending that night at your mum’s?”
“I don’t know.” My head is pounding so I close my eyes.
“What is it, Claire? What’s wrong?”
“I just . . . there are so many things going around in my head and none of it makes sense. I thought the fugues would stop after I started seeing you but the last one was terrifying.”
“Because of where you were?”
Do I tell her? I didn’t tell Mark about my blackout when he came home. I don’t know why. Maybe because there’s a tiny part of me that’s worried he’s lying about the photo album? What if there is more evidence that links him with Billy’s disappearance? But what? None of it makes sense. Mark loved Billy. He’d shout at him and come down on him hard but he’s not a cruel or violent man. So why is part of me so suspicious? What is it that I don’t know?
“Claire?” Sonia says. “What is it?”
I look at her through my fingers. If I tell her about the knife will she inform the police? My GP? Could she have me sectioned if she thinks I’m dangerous?
“If I . . .” I falter. “If I tell you there’s a chance I’ve committed a crime will you tell the police?”
“A chance?”
I sit forward in my chair. “Will you tell the police?”
For the first time since I sat down Sonia looks ruffled. “I am not legally obliged to report any crimes that my clients may confess to but it does present me with an ethical dilemma.”
“So you would, then?”
“No.” She regains her composure. “That’s not what I said. I’d use my professional judgment to work out what to do, and what to advise you.”
“You’d tell me to go to the police?”
“Well, yes. I’d be more likely to advise you to go to the police than do it myself but if I did report the crime to the police it wouldn’t be without your knowledge. And I would discuss it with my supervisor first.”
I weigh up my options. I could keep quiet and get rid of the knife. I could talk to Liz about it. Yes, that’s what I should do. I should tell Liz. But if I have committed a crime that would make her an accomplice. And what could she do, anyway, other than tell me to go to the police, tell Mark or keep quiet about it—all possibilities I’ve already considered myself.
If I tell Sonia, I get a psychologist’s insight into what happened. And if she can’t help me maybe I should go to the police? The only way I’ll find out whose blood is on the knife is for them to check it for DNA and ask the car park company to look at the CCTV. But what if it reveals that I stabbed someone? I kicked a cyclist after I came around from my second fugue. What if I’m capable of worse? If I killed someone I’d be jailed for murder.
“Claire.” Sonia moves the box of tissues away from me. “Claire, it’s okay.”
There is a pile of torn tissues on the floor in front of me. I don’t remember reaching for the box. How can I have shredded that many and not noticed?
“Whatever happened”—Sonia crouches on the floor beside me, her eyes soft and non-judgmental—“it has obviously really upset you. Have you spoken to anyone about it? A member of your family, or a friend?”
I shake my head.
“You said you might have committed a crime, not that you did,” she says softly. “There’s a difference. Tell me what happened.”
“I can’t.” I shake my head. “I can’t remember.”
“Then what makes you think that’s a possibility?”
“There was a knife”—the word catches in my throat—“on the floor next to me in the car park toilet. It was covered in blood.”
She nods, gently urging me to continue.
“It was one of my steak knives. I checked the drawer when I got home. There are supposed to be six, but one is missing.”
“I see.” Her expression remains impassive. “And when was the last time you counted the knives? When did you last check that there were six?”
“I don’t think I ever have. I bought them years ago and put them in the drawer. I’ve never bothered counting them because we only ever needed five.”
“Are you the only person in your family with access to those knives?”
“No, of course not.”
“Claire,” she says softly, laying her hand on the table, “what if you weren’t the one to commit the crime? What if someone else took that knife?”
“But it can’t have been anyone else,” I say. “Jake was at home, Kira was at a friend’s house and Mark was away.”
“That’s not what I mean.” Sonia’s knees click as she eases herself up from her crouched position and returns to her chair. “The knife could have been taken from the drawer months ago and you wouldn’t have noticed.”
“You think . . .” My heart double-beats in my chest. “You think Billy could have taken it?”
“I think anyone could have. But what I’m most interested in is why you’ve jumped to the conclusion that you were the one who used the knife to commit a crime.”
“Because it was right next to me and I was alone. Wait!” I jolt forward in my seat. “The couple who found me saw a man running across the car park. He told them I’d collapsed. I thought it was Billy.”
“
Why?”
“I don’t know.”
“But it could have been someone else?”
“Yes, yes, it could.”
“Which means there’s a possibility that you witnessed a crime. Claire, I’m going to be completely honest here. I think you should go to the police and tell them what happened. Do you still have the knife?”
Yesterday, before Mark came home, I wrapped the knife in a plastic bag and hid it in an old tote bag in the bottom of my wardrobe.
“But what if you’re wrong? What if . . . I don’t know . . . what if the man who was running away was a witness and I had stabbed someone?”
“Why would a witness run away? And why would he ask total strangers to help you?”
“I don’t know.”
Neither of us says anything for several minutes.
If I contact the police I could be turning in someone I love without knowing what they did or why. Just yesterday Jake was asking me if I’d still love him and Billy if either of them did something awful. What if it was him? What if I caught him stabbing someone? But he wouldn’t run away and leave me in such a confused state. Or would he? No, I won’t let myself go there. I can’t.
“Claire,” Sonia says. “I have a suggestion. In our last session we tried to make sense of the causes of your fugues so we could work on preventing them from happening again. Unfortunately it seems that it didn’t have enough of an effect so I have another suggestion.”
I eye her warily. “What kind of suggestion?”
“Would you agree to be hypnotized by me?”
I make my decision in a split second. “Yes, yes, I would.”
Chapter 39
My mind has retreated deep inside itself. Normally my thoughts are at the front of my brain, whizzing and whirling around each other, but those thoughts are a long way away now. It is dark, this place I have reached inside my head. It feels as though I’m in the depths of a tunnel. The sides are gray and cloud-like but they make me feel protected, not scared.
Sonia’s voice surrounds me, telling me to relax, telling me to let myself go deeper with each breath. I do as I am told and my body becomes limp and heavy and my heart stops thudding in my chest. As Sonia continues to speak random thoughts pop into my head—thoughts telling me that I should be worried, that I need to stay in control. I acknowledge them and then, as Sonia tells me to, I let them drift away.