Four British Mysteries

by Thomas Brown

  “What have you done to her?” Thom asks, feeling the adrenaline begin to pulse through his blood again.

  “I’m trying to help her”, the man insists. He grabs onto Thom’s arm but Thom immediately shakes him off.

  “I think you should leave; whoever you are”. Thom begins to walk towards the house. Yet, the man chases after him, grabbing at his shirt. Thom spins around and bats at the man with his hand. “Just fuck off. I don’t know what you want and I can’t help you, okay?”

  “You think she’s fine but she’s ill. I know her. I promise I just want to help”. Thom can’t decide if the man is genuine or whether he just believes his own lies.

  “What’s her name then? You haven’t even said anything personal. How do I know you know her?”

  Thom and the man are standing in the middle of the road. The sun is starting to set and the impending darkness doesn’t seem attractive to Thom in his current situation. He has to get away from this strange desperate man.

  “Her name is Alice”, he says softly and Thom instantly starts to turn. The man stamps after Thom. “But I bet she told you her name is something else, didn’t she?” His words chase Thom across the street and will never fully be lost inside his mind. “Let me ask you, does she seem strange to you? Does she talk about her family? Do you know that much about her?”

  The man won’t shut up so as Thom reaches the gate, he flings round and aims a punch at the man’s face. Luckily, the man ducks and Thom misses. Thom doesn’t really want to hurt him; he just wants to scare him away. Like a moth head butting a light bulb continuously, this man is becoming irritating.

  “What are you doing?” the man shrieks.

  “I told you to leave. You haven’t convinced me of anything and you’re wasting my time”, Thom says the words but still inside, the moth keeps crashing into the back of his eyes and he knows he won’t sleep much tonight.

  “I don’t want her to hurt herself or anyone else”. The man seems weary now.

  “You don’t even know her name”. Thom puts the front gate between them.

  “That’s not important. What about the other questions I asked you? What about them?” The man looks like someone dying pleading for a cure. Thom could easily give him a glimmer of hope and give into the doubts he has dismissed in order to have an easier life. He has wondered about her: why she acts so coldly, where she appeared from. Yet Thom is too tired to trust this man, too battered to let something else in his life fall apart.

  “She has a lovely family. She’s shown me pictures”. Thom watches his words pull down the edges of the man’s mouth like weights. Thom stares at him for a few more moments and turns away.

  “I won’t give up”, the man vows to Thom’s back.

  “Do what you like”. Thom shrugs. Thom opens the front door and slams it behind him, almost in Mrs Tray style. As he laughs at the comparison in his head, he looks up the stairs and sees Sarah watching him. Thom doesn’t say anything, just returns the stare. He wonders if he should have protected her or if she will shed her skin and prove to be the monster the stranger warned him about.

  25 Red Scars Beneath

  He is bound to have them: questions, doubts. He hardly knows a thing about me; only the obvious physical attributes and a few snippets of information that can barely fill half a page. And when he sits down beside me on the steps, so close that our knees and thighs are squashed together, and says: “There was a man asking about you outside”, I know he finally has to ask. At the same time, I know it’s finally time for me to lie.

  “What did he ask you?” I question, managing a convincing mask of concern.

  Thom is instantly the gentleman, saying: “I didn’t tell him anything”.

  I should’ve known he would be on my side. He is a sweet man and I can’t help but reach up and touch his soft stubble. Like al-ways when I touch him, he opens his mouth slightly and freezes, waiting for the moment to pass.

  “So what did he want to know?” I ask again and Thom turns his head, making my hand fall away.

  “He said he knew you. He said you were ill and you need help”. Thom says the words cautiously and still doesn’t want to make the air throb with awkwardness or cause the stairs to creak underfoot. He glances at me from the corner of his eye, trying to gauge my reaction.

  “That’s strange”, I say casually. Inside, the drum of my heart thuds quicker.

  “I couldn’t tell if he was lying or not”, Thom pauses but quickly continues, “are you in some kind of trouble, Sarah?” He is more concerned than playing the detective.

  “I told you, I’m a little behind on my rent but that’s all”. I give him a sheepish look. He nods understandingly.

  “He said your name is Alice”, he adds and lets the name hang in the air for a moment. He seems to be watching it to see if it attaches itself to me or to see if I make a move to claim it.

  “Alice? That wouldn’t suit me at all”. I laugh. Thom chuckles a little but it doesn’t fit his mouth properly.

  “Sarah does suit you”, he agrees.

  That’s exactly what I always thought. I even wanted to change my name by d-poll but I had never done it. I’m glad I can be who I want now.

  Do you mind that I left my name behind, Mum?

  “Did you ever call Daniel ‘Dan’?” I ask.

  “No, it didn’t seem to fit”. Thom shrugs. “I guess nicknames are familiar and playful. Daniel didn’t really go for that type of thing”. Thom picks at the skin around his nails as he picks at his memories.

  “That’s sad”, I say quietly.

  We fall silent and listen to the house, humming and creaking.

  “Aren’t you going to ask what the man outside looked like?” Thom asks abruptly. I almost believed we had left the subject behind but Thom is scrutinising my every pore, line and muscle for weakness.

  “Oh… I meant to ask”. I fumble slightly. Thom seems a bit suspicious for a moment but he gives me a brief description nonetheless: short black frizzy hair, the beginnings of a beard, a brown overcoat, and a bend in the bridge of his nose. I shake my head in response and say, “I don’t know who that is, sorry”. Thom seems disappointed but nods again.

  “He had a picture of you”, Thom adds. He has been quiet for a few minutes and I have been listening to his puckered breathing. He seems distressed about something, unable to even let the air slip easily through his windpipe. What is wrong with my Thom?

  “He did?” I ask, unable to think of anything else just then.

  “Yeah. It looked like you were a bit younger in the photo”, Thom pauses. “How do you suppose he got that?”

  I have to think fast. At that moment, I hate Michael more than ever.

  “I didn’t want to tell you about this but I suppose I have no choice”, I hear a voice saying. Thom is looking at me with keen interest and I realise it’s my throat that is vibrating with sound. “About two years ago, I was raped”. The words hang in the air like poison gas and neither of us knows whether to breathe in or out. We stare straight ahead for a few minutes.

  “You were raped”, Thom repeats. I know he instantly believes I am weaker. Everyone does when they hear that. So many people didn’t know how to speak to me afterwards, that’s what made it more isolating.

  You kept me alive, Mum. I wouldn’t have survived without you. But you aren’t around to pull me out of the quicksand anymore; I just keep sinking until even the numbness doesn’t feel anything.

  “What does this have to do with that man?” Thom asks quietly but his fists are already wriggling with his assumptions.

  “He was my boyfriend but we broke up”. The lie feels like fur on my tongue. I want to stick my fingers down my throat and make it come gushing out. I want him to see the blackness inside but at the same time, I want him to love my black curls instead. “He didn’t take it too well”, I add. Thom is biting his lip so hard I can tell there is blood gathering beneath his teeth. It is slowly throbbing out of him like the blood that oozed from his ha
nds in Daniel’s room. I resent him for a moment, for being able to see some of his pain in the burnt scars beneath his bandages whereas my scars are inside, hidden beneath the bandages of my skin.

  “That man hurt you”, he says but his teeth and his clenched expression muffle his words. I nod and this is enough to answer. Being so close, every movement is like an earthquake between us.

  It all happens so fast. Before I can blink, Thom is on his feet and has managed to jump most of the staircase. He is advancing on the front door, his body arched like a hedgehog preparing to defend. I stumble after him and manage to reach him just as he grabs at the door handle. I push him against the wall.

  “That won’t help anyone”, I tell him but he squirms underneath me. His head is so furrowed I want to shake him. I want to make him look sad again. Anything would be better. “Please Thom”, I say and press my face into his shoulder. He smells of sweat and cold.

  In the next moment, I feel him push me away gently. He has stopped shaking. His anger has been replaced by concern for my gesture. What does it mean? What do I want from him? If only I knew myself. Never did I think I would confess my secret to this man. Even though I’d lied about the person who’d committed the act, I wasn’t lying about the incident.

  I wish you were here, Mum. You were looking after me and you didn’t finish. I need you still. Yet maybe I’d asked too much and that’s why I lost you.

  “I can’t promise I won’t do something if I see him again but I’ll leave it”, Thom says, “for now”. I nod and take a step back. He is pressing himself against the wall. He takes a side-step towards the stairs but before he can take another, the doorbell rings.

  We both look at one another but neither of us moves.

  26 The Visitor

  “Emma”, Thom croaks when he opens the door. She isn’t smiling but she doesn’t look angry either. The wind is making her loosely tied hair dance and she has goose bumps on her arms. He is slow to react and she gives him an impatient narrowing of her eyes. “Oh sorry, come in”. He ushers her in and glances outside to see if the stranger is still there, but he is nowhere to be seen. He closes the door.

  Sarah is still standing just inside the door. She and Emma are facing one another. They both look as though they are owed an explanation. Thom feels like two opposing forces have met and are pushing against one another but he doesn’t know why – no one has moved or spoken.

  “Who’s this then?” Emma finally asks.

  Thom is about to answer but Sarah lifts her hand up and informs her, “I’m Sarah”. Emma returns the favour but her mouth slants down to one side as she speaks. After all, she is no clearer on who this strange woman is.

  Thom clears his throat and both of them turn to him expectantly. “Sarah, could you leave us please?” he asks, feeling like a traitor. Sarah just nods quietly and makes her way upstairs (without making the stairs creak, when he still does after walking up them all his life).

  Emma turns to him. He remembers her appearance as though it’s been years since he last saw her. He recaptures the three-freckle cluster beside her earlobe, the way she twitches her mouth when she feels uncomfortable, her slender fingers that press against his arm now.

  “Let’s go in the living room”, Thom says and leads her by the hand into the darkened room. He turns on a lamp, closes them in and they both settle on the edge of the sofa. Sarah’s bed sheets are in a pile by the chair, like dog shit that neither of them wants to acknowledge or clean up. Emma is staring so hard at him that he feels she can see everything he has done in the last few weeks – his obsessive detective work, his tears and depression, his explosions of anger, his taking in of a mysterious woman he knows nothing about. Yet she can’t know. She has come here because she doesn’t know what he’s been doing, or what he’s been thinking.

  “What happened to your hands?” she asks as she lightly traces her fingers over the gauze.

  Thom hesitates for a moment, on the verge of confessing but instead says: “I dropped some plates and cut myself a few times”. This is the second major lie he has told her. It all started with the note and his first lie. Now, he is lying again to stop her entering the world he has been living in since his first deception.

  “You’ve grown a beard”, she comments. She is noting the changes one by one, hoping to get past the surface. Yet Thom hopes she gets lost in unwrapping the bandages and his clump of facial hair.

  “I just haven’t shaved. No reason”, Thom tells her, wiping off the small hint of a smile on her lips.

  “I’ve been trying to call you, as you’ve probably realised...” Emma drops her eyes to her lap, probably not wanting to hear what he has to say about this. What explanation would be a good one?

  “I’m sorry. I needed some time... and quiet”.

  The couple know there is an undertone to the conversation, words and thoughts that are being trapped beneath their tongues and inside their heads. The words and thoughts are cockroaches that struggle to surface in view of others and prefer to scuttle around in the safety of darkness.

  “I know you needed time. I’ve left you for three weeks, wondering how you are every day. I only called because I thought it’d be easier if I made the first move”. Emma is leaning closer but Thom shrinks into the arm of the sofa and ignores her.

  “You were probably right to think so”, Thom agrees blankly.

  “Then why didn’t you answer one of my calls?”

  “I’m sorry. I just had nothing to say”. He shrugs. Emma doesn’t respond to this, she falls silent. For several minutes, they both find sanctuary in the rhythm of the clock on the mantelpiece. It chugs onwards, regulating their jumpy heartbeats for a small period at least.

  “Who is that woman?” Emma finally ventures.

  “We met about a week ago. She’s having trouble with her rent so Aunty Val invited her to stay”.

  “Where did you meet?”

  “In the front garden, if you must know”, Thom answers, realising it sounds completely insane as he hears it. Yet, he has accepted it readily as it happened, as though meeting people in the front garden is a regular occurrence.

  “In the front garden?” Emma repeats slowly, like someone who is speaking English as a second language.

  “I know it’s not ordinary but that’s how it happened”.

  “What was she doing in the front garden?” Emma persists but Thom cuts her down, “Look, I don’t have to explain my whole life to you”.

  “That’s not what I’m asking”, Emma tells him, folding her arms.

  “I’m sorry about this”, Thom says quietly after another few minutes of silence. The room feels hot so he goes over to the window and pulls it up. The cold wind hardly affects his bandaged hands. Across the road, he sees the stranger with the photo getting into a car and turning the ignition on. With one last look at the house, seeing Thom, the man pulls off quickly and his lights disappear within a few seconds. Thom almost wonders if he imagined it.

  “I think you want to talk to me but you’re holding back for some reason. What is it Thom?” Emma can’t help but let her affection for him resurface. After all, as far as she is concerned, until about ten minutes ago, nothing had been different between them. Thom’s head droops, disgusted that his love for Emma seems to have become buried between all the half-clues and mysteries surrounding Daniel’s death. Where have his old feelings gone? All he feels now is curiosity, anger, and infatuation.

  “I have things I need to do”, Thom reveals, not answering her question. Emma waits for something more and Thom only adds, “I can’t go back to my old life now”.

  “Everyone has to go back sometime. Everyone has to get over losing someone”, Emma says, not understanding the situation. Yet, it is not her fault. Thom has kept her separate.

  “It’s not about that. It’s not about losing Daniel. I just have to find answers”.

  “Have you spoken to the police, Thom? Did they tell you what happened?”

  “They haven’t even bot
hered with him. They don’t care enough”.

  “I have no idea why you’re isolating yourself, Thom”.

  Thom watches her approach him in the reflection on the window pane. He doesn’t move away, yet doesn’t turn to greet her either. He watches her bow her head.

  “I’m not. I just can’t explain all this to anyone, even if I tried. I need to work on things. I need to learn more myself”.

  “Have you spoken to Aunty Val about all this stuff?”

  “Only some. No one would understand it. I have to wait”. Thom is being deliberately short, almost relishing the air of mystery he is creating. He imagines he is a renegade detective who will win the case in the end and reveal his amazing discoveries to all those involved! Yet Thom knows real life isn’t like this, he is no Sherlock Holmes or the like. He is an ordinary man who is just as lost as anyone else would be given the same facts and clues.

  “You sound a little crazy”, Emma tosses his way.

  “Sarah doesn’t think so”, he bites back.

  “Right, who is this woman and what the hell is she doing here?”

  In response, Thom does something he himself doesn’t understand. He spins round and laughs. After weeks of depression, he finds himself laughing, when there is nothing amusing around him. Emma immediately withdraws a few paces. She is looking at him as if he has just cut his own hand off. He simmers to a chuckle and then only smiles. Still watching him in half-fear and confusion, Thom approaches her, grabs her and kisses her. Emma is rigid in his hold but lets him continue, opening her mouth slightly to allow him in. When he lets her go, she settles on the back of the sofa like someone who has merely tolerated something.

  “Who is she, Thom?”

  “Sarah. She’s a nice girl who’s been no trouble to us. She needed help and we were there for her. Is it okay to help someone else or not?”

  “You know I wouldn’t mind that”, Emma says, taking a breath and trying to rephrase it, “I’m just not sure you should be welcoming strange people into your life right now. You’re the one who needs some help and you need your close family, me – people you can trust”. Emma has a good point of course, but Thom won’t allow her to win.