Four British Mysteries

by Thomas Brown

  Mum! Mum! Help me please!

  The only figure is Daniel and he is beside me, then inside me, then I hear his voice in my brain, right on time right on time to the pulse of the monster, to the pulse of his heart, to the pulse of my own organ scratching against my rib cage. The raspy breath of the train louder now a scream, a flood of light…

  38 The Hospital Visit

  Thom wakes up in a strange room. It takes him several minutes to realise where he is. He rolls over and finds his phone stuck within the covers. It is 9:42am.

  His neck is aching and his left arm is numb from the way he has been sleeping. He can’t remember closing his eyes last night. He hasn’t even switched the main light off and he is surprised that he’d been able to sleep with it on.

  Thom familiarises himself with the room. He decides that it looks even more tragic in the daylight and opts to leave the place as soon as he can. He takes a fast shower in the bathroom down the hall, dries himself off with a stained towel, and throws on the same rags he came in with. He hopes the spots of Michael’s blood on his sleeve aren’t noticeable to anyone else. The grey swelling on his fists only underlines his shame further.

  When he has his hand on the front door, Thom realises he has no idea where he is going. He slumps back onto the bed and considers his options. First, he could go back to the house and face Aunty Val and Richard. Second, he could go and look for Sarah and talk over the revelations of yesterday night. Or third, he could try to discover more about Daniel and why he died.

  Out of fear and perhaps tiredness, Thom chooses the most familiar. He will keep investigating Daniel. He can’t talk to his family yet, and finding out more about Sarah’s lies can wait. Just because everything in his life has changed so much, it doesn’t mean he can forget his task. He has to find out about Daniel.

  But where should he go now? The lock up? Mrs Tray’s? Yet Thom feels like these are places he has already been, places which make up the past and are not to be revisited. Where or what is he missing?

  Thom thinks back to when he met Mrs Tray and the way she played solitaire. What did she say to him? ‘Sometimes all it takes is a fresh eye’. And Thom remembers how the phrase slithered into his ear and solidified there. He has been caught in a whirlpool for weeks or months now and he needs to break out. As he always hears them say on the news, he needs ‘fresh leads’.

  So what places or people has he left out? Well there’s the station where it all began of course, but Thom isn’t sure he’s ready for that. He hasn’t even been in a tube station at all since Daniel died, let alone the one where he was smashed to pieces.

  The only other ‘lead’ he can think of is the hospital. Thom has never known enough about Daniel’s time there, and Mrs Tray made the link to it when they had talked. Therefore, this seems a sensible plan to Thom and he finally feels able to turn the door handle and leave the frowning room behind.

  Outside the air is cold and instantly stings Thom’s cheeks. He zips up his coat and makes his way towards somewhere where he hopes he can catch a bus in the vague direction of the hospital. He knows little about this hospital but he at least knows which one it is.

  Two long bus rides later, he is standing somewhere in South London, in front of an unassuming building which is actually a hospital. People walk by without even looking at the building, which Thom finds troubling as it is a grand and stony character. There is a large wall guarding it and only a small entrance at one of the sides, guarded by one man sitting in a booth, as though no one ever tries to gain entry to it. Or perhaps no one ever comes out?

  Thom hesitates as he stands on the pavement scrutinising the entrance. Standing here, the normality of the crowd threading past reassures him. At least here, his ‘madness’ of late is concentrated by all the other bodies and their sanity. But inside that hospital, his ‘madness’ will be spiked by all the insanity of the patients. In there, will he finally fall apart and reveal his strange thoughts? Will he finally tell someone he isn’t sure whether he can ever rejoin the life he left behind?

  Thom forces himself to approach the guard. He explains he is considering placing a relative into the hospital and wants to discuss his options with the managing director. The man reluctantly replaces his cigarette with the phone receiver and makes a hushed call to someone. When he replaces the phone, he nods towards the hospital and mutters, “see reception”. Thom does as he has been instructed; walking gradually towards the hospital he fears can undress him.

  Thom takes on the stairs like a warrior certain he is climbing to his death. The door of the hospital grows with each step, a mouth that will swallow him. Yet when Thom finally grasps the handle, he feels reassured by its cold stillness, and manages to navigate his trembling legs through it.

  Inside, he is buzzed through another door and is greeted by a young woman. She tells him the director would be happy to see him and discuss admissions, perhaps even give him a tour should he want one. She asks him to take a seat but Thom barely grazes the chair when he jumps up again.

  “I don’t have a sick relative”, Thom confesses. The receptionist freezes and for a strange moment Thom believes he has stabbed her in the spine and she is paralysed. Yet after a few moments of silence, she turns to face him again.

  “So what is it you want exactly?” the woman asks, her hand creeping towards the edge of the desk. Thom suspects there is an alarm there and he doesn’t blame her for reassuring herself with it. If the position were reversed, and he was the one looking at a clammy-faced man with his clothes stretched to all sides and hanging off his shoulders, he would press the alarm instantly.

  “I want to ask about my cousin”. Thom attempts to straighten his clothes, as if this will help the situation greatly.

  “Who is your cousin?” She doesn’t take her eyes off Thom.

  “Daniel Mansen”. Thom is watching the woman equally as closely as he says the two words. These two words seem to spit glass in all directions whenever they are mentioned. These two words make Thom want to duck down after he’s said them and wait for the screams.

  “Daniel”, the woman repeats, letting her arm move back towards her body. She lets go of the physical alarm in response to the alarm in her mind.

  “You knew him”, Thom states.

  The woman slowly nods and takes a step towards Thom. “Why are you here?”

  “Daniel is dead”, Thom tells her. The woman bites her lip and looks down.

  “I’m sorry”, she mumbles, drawing even closer to Thom. “But why have you come here now?”

  “I know he left his job here, but I don’t know why”.

  Thom is standing next to the woman now; they are huddled beside the reception desk, speaking in quiet tones. Thom guesses the woman can feel his pinched sticky desperation and he can see her guilty curiosity that made her let go of the alarm.

  “He didn’t tell you?” she sighs.

  “I feel like I’m really missing something here”, Thom admits. He has just summarised his feelings throughout the whole investigation. Yet Thom guesses this is the nature of an investigation: always being in a state of lack.

  “I am sorry Daniel’s dead but I don’t think I should tell you anything”.

  “I’m sorry to ask this but I need…” Thom rubs his hands over his face, “I need to know what happened. I know it’s something bad, so you don’t have to worry”.

  “But the hospital…”

  “This is about people, not about this hospital”, Thom wrestles in. “Look, I promise you I won’t say anything to anyone. I just want to know, for me”. Thom pronounces each word precisely.

  “I understand how you feel and I’m sorry…” she persists, shaking her head.

  “No, don’t say that again. You have to help me, no one else can. I need to find this out, to help me understand him. I can’t ask him, can I?” Thom knows this is unfair but he is grasping at anything, showing only traces of his once noble self.

  “What is your name anyway?”

  “Tho
m”, he answers and holds his hand out.

  “Kelly”, she nods, taking his hand. Thom is glad he took the bandages off this morning. After all, they had been covered in Michael’s blood. “You know, Daniel and I were friends. I was shocked when I heard he’d been fired…” Kelly pauses, expelling air loudly, “and the reason, it made me sick…”

  “Daniel was fired”, he repeats. It is meant to be a question but it comes out as a fact, a brick wall suddenly complete. Thom can’t believe he hasn’t thought of this already. He should’ve figured this out by the fact that no one in the family ever discussed it, yet at the same time it hadn’t seemed crucial when it happened. But now, everything is vital, everything is a grain that gathers together to form a giant textile. Thom wishes he didn’t have to collect all of the parts so slowly.

  “He was caught with a patient”, Kelly adds, after a few minutes of cold silence.

  “What?” Thom snaps his neck up, too fast, and massages the ache that mushrooms across the back of it. It takes about thirty seconds for it to fade.

  “He was caught kissing a patient”.

  “Oh fuck”. Thom punches the desk. Although he is ninety percent sure Aunty Val might’ve known about Daniel being forced to leave his job, he bets she doesn’t know the reason.

  “How could he do that?” Thom covers his face.

  Kelly hovers next to Thom, her fingers twitching beside his arm but not making a connection. Thom doesn’t notice this and when he uncovers his face a minute later, she has moved her fingers away.

  “I can’t tell you anything else Thom, I’m sorry”. Kelly shrugs. “And I wish I hadn’t had to tell you that”. She smiles gently.

  “I don’t know why I’m surprised. I’ve been finding out so many things about him and most of them not good”. Thom is tired, he wants to hang himself over the desk and close his eyes. How much more can he take? Was Daniel a bad person, or a good person who’d made some bad mistakes? Had Daniel felt so bad about himself that he threw himself in front of that train?

  “Daniel seemed like a good person, but he really abused that patient’s trust, the hospital’s trust”. Kelly seems almost as broken as Thom. Yet he doubts the cracks extend as deep as his.

  “What happened to the patient?”

  “She got better”. Kelly smiles.

  “That’s good”.

  “I can’t believe Daniel’s dead…” Kelly shakes her head.

  “Me neither”.

  “I’m sorry, Thom, but I have to get back… to work”.

  “Okay”. Thom takes her hand and relishes in the warmth for a few seconds. Kelly smiles again and takes her hand with her, when she returns to her seat behind the desk. Everything is as it should be again, she behind the desk and he in front of it like a visitor. Their moments of sharing have finished.

  Thom reaches the door, still rolling the new information around in his mind and his heart. As he stands in the doorway looking out, his feet seem to curl up into balls, making his balance uneven. He holds onto the door frame to stop himself from falling. Taking a few breaths, Thom suddenly thinks of Sarah. He thinks about the revelations she shared with him yesterday night and before he has even considered this properly, he swings round and says, “Kelly, what was the name of that patient?”

  “I don’t think that’s relevant”, she dismisses.

  “I’d just like to know, out of curiosity…”

  “Okay”. Kelly leans across the desk on her elbows, like a little girl unloading a secret to her best friend. “The patient’s name was Alice”.

  39 Red Bruises

  I wake up in Michael’s guest room. The sheets are moist and my curls are pasted to my forehead. As soon as I attempt to push myself up, Michael appears at my side.

  “Don’t move”, he says quietly, stroking my sweaty curls. He lowers me back onto the pillow. I don’t want to do as he says but I feel weak and my body doesn’t have the same determination to defy him. I wonder how long I have been unconscious.

  “Alice, I’m so sorry”, he whispers, bowing his head. “We’ve really hurt you by keeping this secret. I mean… just look how your body reacted”. Michael’s eyes are glistening in the semi-darkness of the room. “You just flopped on the floor and…” he breathes in shakily, “and I was so scared. I feel so responsible”. He grabs hold of my hands and squeezes them between his. “I threw Doctor Rosey out by the way”, he adds and I can’t help smiling slightly. Michael lifts his lips to one side, knowing I would appreciate this.

  “I understand why you lied”, I confess; pushing myself upwards so I can sit against the headboard. Michael waits for me to continue. “It’s just that I think he influenced me and it’s affecting me… now”. Michael brings his eyebrows together in a slanted V at my words.

  “How has he influenced you now?” Michael asks. This is my cue, the moment I could reveal my nasty deed to him; the moment I tell him I am a murderer. Yet, I can’t bear to have him let go of my hands in shock, or have him look at me with the same confusion as he did a few days ago.

  “I saw an article in the paper, saying he had died”, I venture, not sure where I am leading myself.

  “I saw that too”. Michael nods. “I hoped you wouldn’t or if you did, you wouldn’t remember”.

  “I didn’t remember that I knew him”, I say, my chest seemingly filling up with air that is blocking movement and function. Yet, here it is: another lie. “But I felt curious for some reason. So I ended up going to his house”.

  “What?” Michael jolts in his chair.

  “I know, it’s crazy but I just felt some unconscious need to go there”, I pause, “and now I know why I found myself drawn there”. Drawn to him, I add to myself. Finding out about me and Daniel being together at the hospital probably did explain my fascination with him, the decision to follow him, perhaps even the decision to kill him. He’d been leading me for months before the push and he wanted me to know with those horrible words: right on time.

  “I just needed to look at the house, for reasons I couldn’t place. But as I stood there looking at it, one of his family came out and started talking to me…”

  “You left, didn’t you?” Michael interjects hopefully.

  “No Michael, I stayed. We talked and he invited me in”.

  “It was that Thom guy, wasn’t it?” Michael asks, running his fingers over his still swollen nose. I nod faintly, anticipating his anger or disappointment. Yet, Michael lowers his head and shows me his bald patch, mumbling, “If I’d been there for you, maybe you wouldn’t have gone to him”.

  “I don’t know. I clearly felt some link to Daniel”.

  “Does he know you knew Daniel? And how are they related?”

  “They’re cousins. And no”, I emphasise with my eyes, “he doesn’t know I knew Daniel”. I grimace appropriately.

  “You’re not going to tell him?” Michael places his hand on my arm.

  “I don’t want to and I’m not sure it matters”.

  “Is he a decent person, Ali?” Michael continues, calling me by a name he hasn’t used since before you died. I relish its familiarity for a few seconds and give my brother a warm smile.

  “He’s not a bad person, Michael. I know he hurt you but he just thought he was protecting me”. I lift my hand up and brush his cheek, trying to dull the red-grey stain that has blossomed there.

  “And you two… are an item?” He winces.

  “No”, I say, convinced this is what he wants to hear, “we’re just friends”. As I use one of the clichés people always use, just friends, I wonder what Thom and I actually are. Yes, we kissed the other day, but does it mean anything? I’ve supported him for a few weeks, he’d invited me to stay when he thought I had nowhere to sleep, but isn’t that merely friendship? Only that one violent kiss hints at anything more and now after all the lies, what does he think of me now?

  “I think you should be careful with him, Alice”. Michael grapples with my eye contact in order to stress his point. “I’ve only
met him twice but he seems unsteady… I think he’s capable of something…” Michael scrunches his mouth up and looks aside, imagining what Thom is ‘capable’ of while staring at the wallpaper. I sit up and take his hand.

  “What might he be capable of?” I ask, all the time thinking of what Michael is unaware of. He doesn’t know his own sister is capable of murder. He doesn’t know his sister is also a liar, a manipulator, still fascinated with the colour red. The whole time the two of us have been talking, I have been imagining his nose gushing with blood again and thinking of the scarf soaking it all into its body, a parasite sucking on my brother’s lifeblood.

  “I wish I could tell you. I mean; we’ve already seen he can hurt people. I just don’t know…” Michael stares at the wallpaper again and finishes, “just how far he could go”. Michael is unconsciously running his fingers over his bruises again. I think whenever he sees Thom, even weeks from now; he will stroke the areas on his face where Thom struck him.

  “He’s a good person”, I say, shaking my head.

  “Good people can still do bad things”. He frowns and suddenly pulls me towards him. He hugs me tight and continues to hold me for several minutes, his uneven breath humidifying my neck.

  As I am in my brother’s arms, I think about good people and bad people, good actions and bad actions. I consider how they are all interchangeable and question which way the scales tip for me: am I a bad person who commits bad actions? Or am I a good per-son who commits bad actions?

  40 Alice

  Thom doesn’t remember what happens for a certain amount of time after he hears that name again. It seems to crack against his head and make him lose consciousness, although he somehow manages to still walk and breathe. He next finds himself back at the bedsit, standing in the doorway. The clock above the kitchen sink says 1:27pm.