The Picture On The Fridge: The debut psychological thriller with the twist of the year

by Ian W. Sainsbury

  "You're scaring me."

  "Good. Get out. Now." Mags ended the call.

  One step at a time.

  She turned to Patrice. "Airport," she said.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  In the car, Mags breathed as if in labour, every breath hissing out. The dashboard clock ticked through the longest five minutes of her life. She called Kit back.

  Her phone was dead.

  "No… no." She waved it at Patrice. "Charger?"

  "Different brand. It won't fit your phone. Wanna borrow mine?"

  He handed it over. The only numbers Mags knew by heart were her home number, and the three numbers they'd had growing up. She couldn't call anyone.

  "Shit, shit, shit." She breathed faster.

  "Mags." That same calm tone. She turned, wide-eyed. "Don't know the number?" he said. She nodded miserably.

  "Okay, that's something you can do nothing about. But I heard what you said on the phone. They are getting out of the house, right?"

  "Yes. Yes."

  "Okay. You did what you needed to do. Now take a few minutes, listen to me talk nonsense again, and let your breathing go back to normal. Got it?"

  Ten minutes later, and after he'd thoroughly explained his issues with the Star Wars prequels, Mags' breathing no longer sounded like an asthmatic puppy. Patrice called the airport.

  "What's the first flight to London leaving after,"—he checked the satnav—"six o'clock this evening? Thank you. Could you put me through to the ticket desk, please?" Long seconds passed, then "Hello? Can you tell me if there are any seats left on the eighteen fifty to London? Great. Hold on."

  He looked across at Mags. Her breathing had steadied, but she was sweating and her skin looked pale and waxy. "I'll take it. Ticket in the name of Barkworth. If I pay now, can she pick it up at the desk? Thank you, you're very kind."

  He gave his credit card number and ended the call. "I'll drop you at the terminal. Go straight to the Virgin Atlantic desk. There's a ticket waiting. You get in at six fifty-five."

  Mags swallowed. "I'll pay you back. Give me your bank details. I'll pay you back, Patrice."

  "We'll talk about it when you call me. You have my number and my email. Mags." She looked at him. "Do I need to take this to the cops? What's happened? Are you able to tell me?"

  One step. One step at a time.

  Mags tried to imagine she was describing a movie, not real life. It helped. She told Patrice about Tam's latest picture as if it were someone else's daughter, someone else's brother, and someone else's brother-in-law who were being stalked by a serial killer.

  When she had finished, he was quiet for a long time, his fingers constantly on the bridge of his nose.

  "This is fucked up. You know that, right?" He didn't wait for her to answer. "You believe Tam has some kind of telepathic connection with this psycho, right?"

  At the mention of her daughter's name, Mags felt the tears spill over her eyelashes. Patrice glanced at her, then back at the road.

  "Keep breathing, Mags. I can't go to the cops with this. They'll laugh in my face."

  "You don't believe me."

  "That's not what I said. Everything I know, everything I've learned, every story I've researched and written, tells me that there's no way that a serial killer in America can communicate telepathically with an eleven-year-old girl in London."

  "You don't believe me," she repeated.

  "I'll level with you, Mags. I don't want to believe you. Partly because I'm a reporter, and everything is circumstantial. But mostly, I don't want to believe you because of what's happening in London. If it's true, your family is in terrible danger. And I don't want that to be true. Look, you said yourself that you struggled with your mental health. That you've had panic attacks before."

  "So I'm crazy? Fine."

  "Again, that's not what I said, Mags."

  "You didn't have to."

  They arrived at the airport in silence. Mags was out of the door and dragging her suitcase from the back seat before Patrice had taken his seatbelt off.

  "Mags."

  She turned and looked at him. Rumpled, hat in hand, his eyes trying to communicate something he couldn't put into words. Or maybe he was just relieved to see her go.

  "Thank you, Patrice," she said. "Thank you for getting me here."

  She was in the terminal building, heading for the check in, when she heard running footsteps behind her.

  "Mags! Wait up."

  She slowed, but didn't stop walking. Patrice came up alongside her.

  "One question. You owe me that, Mags."

  "What is it?"

  "You said your husband is a geneticist in Boston. What's the name of his company?"

  It was the last thing Mags had expected. She was so surprised, she answered without thinking.

  "Edgegen Technology. Goodbye, Mr Martino."

  After clearing security, Mags bought a portable phone charger and plugged it in. The flight was boarding. She checked her phone every ten seconds, but it only flickered back to life as she reached her seat. Economy this time. Squeezed between two strangers. As soon as the phone had booted up, she called Kit.

  No answer.

  The plane taxied to the runway, and a stewardess asked her to turn off the phone. The third time of asking, when Mags was praying Kit would pick up, she gave her the choice of turning the phone off or having the aircraft turn around and go back to the gate where she would leave the aircraft before being arrested. She turned it off, while her fellow passengers tutted.

  The plane's engines rose to a scream and it lurched forward.

  Eight hours and five minutes until she reached London.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  In her early twenties, Mags had once smoked a joint at a party, not knowing it was far stronger than the weed she tried years before at the sixth form disco. This was hydroponically grown skunk, and it made her a passenger in her own body for twenty minutes. She remembered waves of panic, while a tiny part of her brain insisted that it would pass, that she just had to ride it out and she would be all right.

  The plane journey from Atlanta to Heathrow was worse than an eight hour, skunk-induced psychotic nightmare.

  As the 767-400 climbed to its thirty-five thousand feet cruising altitude, Mags knew there was no way she would get through the journey without a plan. If she wasn't careful, her thoughts might trigger another severe panic attack. If that happened, the crew might sedate her—best-case scenario—or divert the flight to get her to hospital. She couldn't let that happen.

  There were earplugs and an eye mask in the bag they handed out. Mags ripped the bag open, put the earplugs in, and pulled the mask over her eyes. After a second, she pulled the mask up again and pressed the button above her head. When the stewardess appeared, her smile was a little forced after the phone incident. Mags spoke deliberately, avoiding giving vent to the scream threatening to break through.

  "I will sleep for the whole flight. Please don't wake me for food."

  "Of course, Madam." She looked relieved.

  Mags was in the middle seat of a row of three in the centre of the plane. No one would have to climb over her to go to the toilet. She was certain she wouldn't sleep. For the first hour, images of Tam, Kit, and David kept coming into her mind. She wished now she hadn't read the news stories about the Bedroom Killer. He had murdered every adult with something the police described as a home-made garrotte. This was, they thought, constructed from very strong fishing line tied to wooden handles. He either approached his victims from behind, looping wire over their heads then pulling it tight, or—if they were lying down—he slipped the wire behind their heads as he knelt astride them, pinning their arms down. A sob wrenched itself out of Mags' tormented body. She followed it with a series of coughs so as not to make her neighbours suspicious.

  She couldn't rest, but a lack of light, combined with the constant white noise hum of the engines leaking through the earplugs brought on a strange, semi-conscious state. It w
asn't sleep, more a series of short blackouts, punctuated by nightmare images and waves of dread.

  When, at last, the plane began its descent, Mags lifted her mask, blinking. She wouldn't have been surprised to have found her fellow passengers replaced by demons, the plane gone, her surroundings obscured by the roaring, spitting flames of Hell. Her sense of time was distorted. To the left, through an open blind, the sinuous Thames sparkled in the morning sun as it wound through the centre of London. She licked her lips. They were dry and flaky.

  The woman on her right—young, dip-dyed pink hair, each ear pierced multiple times, handed her a small bottle of orange juice. "Saved it for you," she said. "Thought you might need it."

  Mags took the proffered bottle and burst into tears at this simple display of kindness.

  "Thank you." She drank it as the young woman watched, her expression a mix of sympathy and wariness Mags might have found amusing under different circumstances.

  The moment that the plane's wheels squealed and bumped on the tarmac of the runway, Mags turned on her phone. The old man on her left looked over. He was about to voice his disapproval when he looked into her eyes. Whatever he saw there, it made him shut his mouth so fast it made a sound like a clap. She watched the phone come on, and the mobile signal appear in the top left corner of the screen. It buzzed in her hand as a message came in. She held her breath, but it was a generic text advising her of the cost of UK calls. There were no other messages. She called Kit. The phone rang and rang. She tried David's number. It went straight to voicemail. There were three missed calls from the same unknown number.

  It wasn't until she was through customs and heading for the taxi rank, that she gave up trying to call, another idea occurring to her. She stopped walking, looked at her phone, suddenly unwilling to do it. But she had to know. Mags opened Google on the phone, typed in Camden Lock and pressed News.

  She waited.

  CAMDEN KILLING: POLICE APPEAL FOR WITNESSES. She scrolled down. The police tape used by the British Constabulary was blue-and-white, not the gaudy yellow of their American counterparts. The photograph showed it pulled across the gate in front of 273 Aubrey Terrace.

  "Tam." Her knees buckled. She hit the pavement hard. A turbaned man rushed over and helped her to her feet. "Are you okay? Do you need help?"

  "Slipped. No. Fine." She had to get there, had to know what happened. "Need a taxi." The man insisted on walking her to the car and seeing her safely inside.

  She didn't remember telling the taxi driver the address, but she must have said something, because he pulled out, merged into the traffic, and headed towards North London.

  Something is wrong. I should feel different. This is not what I was expecting. I'm not sure what to do next.

  It was so clear up to now. The dreams made it clear. I am like Joseph in the old Testament. He had dreams that told the future. Not just Joseph. Other prophets had dreams that came true. I am no prophet, but I know the Universe is listening to me. The dreams are another sign that I am chosen. I must try to live up to that honor. But I failed this time.

  The dreams started back in Ocala. The night after I first knew I wasn't alone, that someone, or something, watched over me. I didn't know the dreams were important then, didn't recognise them for what they were. I often dream during my micro-sleeps of two or three minutes. Vivid dreams. Strange. Scary, sometimes. Not these new dreams. These are wonderful, and they are as real as anything I see when I'm awake.

  In the dreams, I'm a kid again. But not back home in Florida. I see no one I know, go nowhere I recognise. In school I sit with kids who are maybe ten, eleven years old. They all wear the same dark blue sweater. When I look at my arms, I'm wearing it too. The teacher is a woman. There are no sounds in the dreams, so I don't know what she's saying. When I look outside, everything is strange. The trees, the buildings, even the color of the sky. All different, all wrong.

  The dreams don't repeat themselves, but they have an atmosphere, a flavor. When I'm not in school, I'm in a house I don't know. I'm in a bedroom with a poster on the wall, bookshelves, a laptop on the desk. It's tidy. I've never seen so many books in one place outside of the library. Who wants to read so much?

  It's the dream after the trailer park that gets me moving. Maybe the signs were clear before but I didn't know how to read them. Maybe this feeling of failure is a punishment for being so slow to understand. I don't know. But two things I see in my dream send me to the airport. First, I look out the window. The street is narrow, cars parked on both sides. It's only after I wake up that I know what was wrong. The cars. They were driving on the left-hand side of the street. My dreams are in a different country. Then I remember a poster in the bedroom. Five colored rings; 2012 in big numbers. A photograph of some skinny black guy kissing a gold medal. The Olympics. The cars. London.

  I take the bus to the airport and hang out until I see someone my build with the same color hair at the check in desk. I don't have to kill him, just follow him into the bathroom and lift his passport right out of his bag while he dries his hands. Some things are meant to be.

  It's the first long-haul flight I've ever been on, and it's tough. Everyone falls asleep. I start wondering if maybe I could help some of them. Crazy. I would get caught for sure. But the urge is so strong I pinch the skin on my forearms to stop myself. Soon I have a line of bruises, real peaches.

  I figured it would be easier once I got to England. The dreams would get clearer, show me where to go. But they don't. Not at first. I can't rely on them. Sometimes two or three days go by without a single dream. Sometimes, I dream four times in a day.

  If I learn how to do it, I think I could dream while I'm awake. If I am being led, I must learn how to follow.

  I checked my savings today. Not much left. But the signs are so much clearer now, and there are more of them. It's the end times. If I play my part, I will find peace.

  Yesterday, a new dream. This time I see the name of a street, and a number on a door. I buy a map and go there. It's a difficult place to check out - the street is too busy. I stand opposite the house, watching for as long as I dare. It's strange. The people passing by don't look at me, don't care about what I'm doing. But still I feel I'm being watched. The feeling is stronger than ever here.

  And, for a while, standing there, I know she's there, inside that house. It's the first time I'm clear about my purpose.

  Coming to London was the right move. I am being guided by an unseen hand, and someone has led me to this exact location.

  I'm tired. Soon, real soon, I will have rest. I, too, will sleep.

  I am here because one soul needs me more than any other of the billions in this world. I do not know her name, but I know we are bound together. Sometimes my dreams are her dreams. Sometimes, when the excitement builds before I begin my work, she is with me, like an angel by my side.

  I am here to free us both.

  A few hours later, I go back to the street, watch the house, but my certainty is gone. A ghost of it remains, like the smell of stale beer the morning after a party.

  Maybe it's better if I wait.

  Then I see a light go on in the house, my stomach tightens, and I make my mistake.

  I walk across the street when there's a gap in the traffic. I open the gate. My bag contains everything I bought since coming to London. Underpants, socks, towel, toothbrush, toothpaste, sledgehammer. I place it on the front step.

  I lift the sledgehammer, take aim, and swing like I'm in my own Olympics.

  My aim is true. The hammer drives the lock through the wood and the door swings open. I check the street, then step inside.

  Stairs. I head up. A man's face above me. He yells, "Hey!" and disappears.

  I run. He will not be thinking clearly yet. He will panic.

  At the top of the stairs I see him. He has a cellphone in his hand. He's quick. I reach into my pocket and pull out the device. I used wooden handles from a jump rope to make this one. It feels different in my hands.


  He runs but I'm faster. He has his back to me now, which makes it easier. I jump when I'm close, looping the wire around his neck and snapping it tight. He does what they all do. His hands go to the wire, try to loosen it. Folk don't think clearly when they are under attack. They should reach for me, not the wire. But they never do, and those few seconds are all that it takes to weaken him.

  He crashes into a wall, slides to his knees, pivots, and ends up face down on the floor. He fades quickly, feet tap-tap-tapping on the hard wood. I hold the wire in place until I'm sure.

  I sniff in disgust. He has soiled himself.

  Un-looping the wire, I tug it out of his fleshy throat. He is bleeding. I used too much force, but I wanted to be fast. The dreams have not led me to him. I have seen his face, but I am not here for him. It's someone else I'm looking for. There is a kitchen ahead of me, a corridor to my left with two doors. One, half-open, reveals a bathroom.

  The second door is closed. Bedroom, I guess. I have seen this house in my dreams. He doesn't live here alone. There must be others.

  I roll him over and take one last look. He is peaceful. "You can sleep now," I whisper.

  I walk towards the bedroom.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  When the cab turned left into Aubrey Terrace, Mags opened the door before it stopped. As the driver cursed her, she fumbled in her purse for cash, finding only dollars. She stared at her credit card, forgetting what to do next, before muscle memory took over and she jammed it into the machine. When she got out, the taxi didn't move away. The driver honked the horn, and she looked at the open door in confusion, then dragged her case out. When she shut the door, the taxi jerked away from the kerb with one last long blast of the horn.

  Across the road, a policeman guarded the shattered front door of 273. Twenty feet of road, another ten feet of garden path, a policeman and a broken door lay between Mags and finding out what had happened. Mags didn't move. She couldn't move.