by Martyn Ford
‘Keys again?’ Isabelle’s voice from the intercom.
‘Uh, no . . . it’s Sam.’
There was a pause, then a lock groaned.
‘It’s open.’
Sam went in through a dim, windowless hall, towards number thirty-three – halfway there, an automatic light flashed twice in the darkness, before finally coming on. Arms folded, Isabelle met him at her door.
‘Can I come in?’
Isabelle hesitated. ‘Sure.’ She stepped aside.
In her living room, which smelled of burned matches and warm food, Sam took a seat at the round dining table by a kitchenette. Isabelle had been streaming YouTube on her TV – a video entitled ‘North Serpent – London protest, 2014’ was paused on the screen. The image was of a bald man, mid chant, his fist held high. A banner behind him read ‘Take Britain Back’. It had 2,300 views and the bar along the bottom was blue with upturned thumbs clicked in support.
A shadow appeared.
‘I know you’re not working today . . .’ Sam looked up. ‘Oh.’
The person wasn’t Isabelle. It was a younger girl. Perhaps a teenager. She was dressed in baggy jeans and a top speckled with paint. Blue, red, yellow splodges, some of which were neat handprints. Gentle brown eyes. Sister, maybe. The most notable difference was that, unlike Isabelle, her demeanour seemed unsettled – she held her arm across her chest and moved as though she was lost.
‘To you . . . to you.’
Isabelle arrived behind. ‘Abigail, this man is called Sam.’
The washing machine at his side was on, thrumming round and round quietly.
‘To you. To you.’
‘He’s from work.’
‘Happy— what name is he?’
‘Sam.’
Abigail came close to the dining table. She peered down at the washing machine, then glanced around the kitchen top. But she never, not once, made eye contact. He felt sure, however, that she was analysing him, using every other sense to assess this unknown guest.
‘To you,’ she whispered, frowning as though listening to a near-silent sound.
‘He’s cool,’ Isabelle said. ‘He’s a good one.’
Thinking, Abigail made a fist and pressed her knuckles into her temple, rocking slightly, like she was fighting off a sudden headache. Then she leaned over and placed her hand on his shoulder, staring only at the wall. Isabelle seemed alarmed – she shoved a chair aside and strode forwards, hovering above the situation, tense and ready to intervene.
Sam sat still, unsure exactly what was going on. It was the first time he’d ever seen fear in her eyes, so assumed he ought to share some. But she simmered down when Abigail stood up straight and turned away. The washing machine changed modes – an internal mechanism clunked and the drum slowed to a stop, water draining as it prepared for a spin cycle.
A long silence. Nothing moved.
‘No,’ Abigail said, definitively. ‘He is not a good one.’ And then she left the room, humming, ‘To you, to you, to you,’ to herself, as the machine began to whir again.
‘She usually doesn’t touch people.’ Isabelle sat opposite him at the dining table.
‘It’s fine. Is she . . . ?’
‘A good judge of character?’
‘Your sister?’
‘Yes.’
Sam glanced over to the coffee table in the centre of the living room. On top, between the TV remote and a pair of glasses, there was a sliced cake. A single candle surrounded by thick ribbons of icing, dotted with tiny stars and crystal sugar. The curled wick was black now, but he could still smell its smoke. ‘Is it her birthday?’
‘No,’ Isabelle said. ‘It’s mine.’
‘Many happy returns.’
‘You just missed the singing – Abigail gave it one hundred and ten per cent.’ Isabelle stood and pointed at the window. ‘Her carer, Mandy, who just left, she forgot as well – so I’ll let you off.’
There was sadness here, in this small home. Sam felt he was behind the scenes, behind a curtain she’d rather keep closed. It occurred to him that Isabelle, alone besides her sister, had probably bought that cake herself.
‘It’s more for her than me,’ she said, as if reading this thought. ‘You’d be surprised how many times she can blow out a candle . . . Do you want a . . .’ Isabelle pulled open her fridge and sighed, ‘very old Belgian beer?’
‘Sure.’
A click and a hiss, the cap clinking on the counter. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said, still facing away. ‘For what happened to Freddie . . .’ She placed a small green bottle on the table, opened another for herself, then returned to sit opposite him.
Sam put his hand over his mouth, holding in a wave of nausea.
‘You OK?’
He shook his head.
‘I thought it before.’ Isabelle squinted at him. ‘You’re ill . . .’
Blinking, Sam cleared his throat. ‘You’re very observant.’
‘What’s wrong with you?’
‘I . . .’ He didn’t really know how to phrase it. He’d told no one. But this was as direct as questions come. So he said, ‘I’m dying.’
‘We’re all dying, Sam. Where’s that trademark optimism gone?’
‘I have a . . . tumour in my brain. Military grade. Best of the best. No more birthday candles.’
‘Uh . . .’ Isabelle seemed confused, as though she couldn’t find the words. ‘Is this a dark joke?’
‘Yes. But it’s also true.’
‘Why didn’t you say?’
‘You didn’t ask.’
There was a long pause. ‘Are they . . . Can they operate?’
He shook his head again.
‘Does Marilyn know?’
‘No.’
‘How does that square up with your honesty?’
Sam’s expression didn’t change. ‘Withholding information is not the same as lying. If she asks, I’ll tell her. She’s a worrier anyway – it’d just rub off on Freddie.’
‘Does he know?’
‘I . . .’ Sam half nodded. ‘I want to tell him.’
‘Shit, you sure? Pretty big burden.’
‘I thought it might be better to keep it quiet. But who am I to decide? It’s the truth. Imagine him living the rest of his life, angry that I didn’t.’
‘The truth . . . it’s not a silver bullet.’
‘Oh, but it is. Have you ever in your life heard a piece of pertinent information and felt worse off for it? Or would you rather know?’
‘Yeah, but I’m an adult . . . It’s a choice between possible anger and certain sadness. You shouldn’t tell him. You’ve done the right thing.’
‘No, I haven’t.’
Isabelle stared for a few seconds at the bottle in her hands, her thumbnail picking at the label. ‘How will it happen?’
There was something warm in these cold questions, in her absolute disregard for anything besides reality. She hadn’t tilted her head, she hadn’t tutted, she hadn’t reached over the table and squeezed his hand and whispered, ‘Oh, Sam . . .’
‘Horribly,’ he said. ‘In a hospice bed, kept on a machine until someone has the decency to switch it off. Draining away, like most do.’
‘I doubt that’ll be the case.’
Sam lifted his beer. ‘You know me well. I’m going to buy a little boat – I’ve already picked one. It’s good, got a nice deck so I can see the sky. I’ll take what I need to take. Drift out into the open water, out on to the shifting sea.’
Calm, slow breaths as Isabelle smiled. ‘Hence the impatience.’
‘Yes, this will be the last card.’
She shook her head. ‘But nothing justifies what they did, OK? It’s not your fault.’
‘Always said I would die for my kid. Maybe better to say should. We need to find them.’
She turned her hands over, palms up.
‘You need to find them,’ he added.
The washing machine was spinning now, loud in this narrow space.
�
�And let’s suppose, for argument’s sake, you knew where they were, what would you do?’
Of course, she needed to ask. Even Abigail, with all her cognitive restrictions, had gone straight to the crux of the issue. She’d zeroed in on Isabelle’s admirable misconception. No, she’d said, he is not a good one.
Sam sighed. ‘Violence is appealing,’ he admitted. ‘But there’s no logic in vengeance. I just want them arrested. I just want Freddie to be safe.’
Her placid eyes searched his face. ‘Is that the truth?’
‘I don’t lie, Isabelle.’
‘You were in a hospice bed a second ago.’
‘That was a joke . . . jokes are fine.’
‘He’s safe,’ she said. ‘I promise. They’ll keep officers on the ward around the clock.’
They sat for a while, listening only to the rhythmic drumming from the washing machine. In the next room, Abigail’s song was no more than a whisper.
‘Why did you come here?’ Isabelle asked.
Business, business, business. ‘I received an anonymous message this afternoon, from an email made of numbers. One of those temporary addresses.’ Sam got his phone out of his pocket, unlocked it, then passed it across the table. ‘There’s a video attached. A video of Anna.’
Chapter 22
The snow in his mind had settled again. Big, flat flakes fell quickly without wind to make soft pillows on every imagined bench and lamp post, like carved marble – all the edges were impeccably rounded. Just like those cold months he remembered from Montreal. Francis had been able to get a repeat prescription of tramadol from his doctor for the toothache. Far stronger than the relatively tame pills Jeremy had shared. They were an afternoon flurry. This, at double doses, was the real deal. The roads were closed, weather warnings had been issued and all flights were grounded until further notice. Winter. Calm winter.
He’d had to bend the truth a little and say his back was playing up again – otherwise they would have given him anti-inflammatories and booked him in for treatment. The pain was still there, tingling when he bit down, like the metallic flavour of a battery. And he probably would need to see a dentist soon enough. But, in the short term, this cosy covering of opiates was sufficient.
They’d moved him, extending the amount of time they could keep him in custody once again. Jeremy said ninety-six hours in total. After that, they would release him or, and this was by far the most likely option, they would charge him.
‘Body or no body,’ Jeremy had said. ‘You’re not going home without Robin.’
His cell was a dismal concrete box. Its walls were plastered, painted grey and the bed was a creaking board which hung from chains – more a fold-down shelf. Previous inmates had decorated the back of the door with scratches and dents. Francis could imagine himself on the floor, desperately clawing at that steel when spring arrived to expose the grass and tarmac.
Lying on the thin mattress with his legs crossed, he folded his hands on his stomach, closed his eyes and breathed in the cool, silent air. In this state of chemical hibernation, he was able to assess his situation in a calmer, more rational way. The facts were these: the police had found Robin’s blood in his car, on the driveway and wiped crudely off a screwdriver in the garage. Despite the aggressive interrogation, during which he was told to ‘end the torment’ and just tell them where the body was, Francis’s recollection of the night had been entirely sincere. He’d done what Sam said he should – he’d told the truth. Sam. Honest Sam.
Francis had been woken by Anna shaking his shoulder – wide-eyed and panicked. Initially, he thought she was sleepwalking again. There was that manic distance on her face – as though no one was home. At her worst, Anna would have entire conversations with him. Her responses were curt and sometimes little more than grunts, but she appeared, at least to a casual observer, to be awake. But Francis could tell. He knew when there was life behind those eyes and when there wasn’t.
In the half-light of her reading lamp, even with that concern, she looked beautiful. Standing over him, saying, ‘Robin’s gone, Robin’s gone, Robin’s gone.’ Beautiful Anna. It was the best word to describe her. Francis felt ‘pretty’ was too feminine, ‘sexy’ was misleading and ‘attractive’ just fell short. Anna was beautiful. Even at 3 a.m., fresh from bed, telling him their daughter was missing.
Francis had met her back in Canada, when he was working in the IT department at MoleculeBlue, one of Montreal’s lesser-known failed tech start-ups. The job had begun as a placement for his computer-science course. When the internship expired, they offered him a full-time position. It wasn’t the best work, but it was still a real golden era in his youth. He was earning adult money, all the while enjoying a college lifestyle.
The first time he saw her was at the last of Jordan Weaver’s ‘legendary house parties’ before Christmas. Anna, standing in the kitchen, sipping beer from a red plastic cup, was as clear as any of his recent memories. Unlike other faces, her features had the clarity of a photograph in his mind. Even Robin, even Ethan needed context to exist as anything more than an abstract idea.
Anna, nineteen years old at the time, though he’d have guessed younger, had been leaning on the kitchen counter, wearing a blue minidress with a Peter Pan collar buttoned right up to her neck – very English. Her slender arms were covered by tight sleeves, but her thighs were visible above the high boots and white cotton socks, pulled up an inch over her knees. Her blonde curls were held back with a matching blue-ribbon hairband. Large white flowers across her dress and big plastic hoop earrings hung by her cheeks to complete the 1960s look – which was, Francis realised only upon arriving, the party’s theme.
And then to her face – subtle blue dusting across her eyelids, black liner flicking up at either side and her lashes naturally long, no need for fakes. She wore no lipstick. Again, not necessary, her lips were pink enough against her pale skin – she had the complexion of a redhead and he’d wondered if her hair was dyed. However, of course, it was all her. Beautiful, natural Anna.
If she’d been anyone else, and she’d been modelling those retro clothes, the photographer would have taken all day and a thousand shots before he’d get this image. But this was just how she stood. Effortless Anna.
Francis had stared from across the apartment – the party swinging all around him: two girls kissing to rapturous cheers and raised cups, someone on the floor drinking from a beer bong, half the room singing, clapping along to ‘Runaround Sue’ – ‘hey, hey, whoa-ah-oh-oh-oooh’ – a classic they’d later adopt, with more than a hint of irony, as ‘their song’. A tall man shouldered into him and apologised as the drunken choir swayed and, arms up, warned him again to stay away from this girl. But none of it existed. Only her. Just beautiful, natural, effortless Anna. She had looked past him and closed her dusted eyes for a sultry blink. When they opened, they found his and kept them for the entire chorus.
Francis hadn’t been brave enough to talk to her that first night. He’d never had much luck with girls – he was, as she would later tease him, quite ‘camp’, and perhaps this restricted his appeal. The jocks at school tended to go for something less nuanced, like, ‘You fucking faggot’. As far as he was aware, high school was the only place on earth where you could have the absolute shit beaten out of you for liking drama class more than lacrosse. He sometimes wished he could travel back there and whisper in his timid, twelve-year-old ear that existence gets better. One day, being shy won’t mean getting hurt. He would tell himself that the world wasn’t out to get him. No, he wouldn’t say that – that would be a lie. Maybe this earlier version of Francis – the kid who’d cry alone in the bathroom and pray for some kind of escape – was right to feel that way. All these years had just fooled him otherwise. Now he was back as he should be – alone and in pain, for reasons he simply did not understand.
In short, approaching a beautiful girl at a party really wasn’t an option.
However, a few weeks after that evening, maybe a month, Francis had
been working late and was riding the night bus back to his apartment. His street was the final stop of the journey. Sitting at the rear, in his favourite seat, he’d been reading when another passenger climbed aboard. He paid little attention to her – she faced away, clinging on to the yellow pole near the front by the driver, swaying with the corners. She was wearing jeans, snug around narrow hips and a slim frame. On her head, she wore a knitted hat with a reindeer motif and a white bobble on top. Blonde curls at her neck were not quite familiar enough to place her as that girl.
They were turning out of a crossroads when, lifting his head from his book and looking to his right, Francis saw a quick flash of headlights hurtling towards them, skidding at unimaginable speed, then smashing, spinning wildly off the front end of the bus with broken glass and metal panels sparking on the tarmac below. It all happened within two seconds.
He lurched forwards, shouldering into the seat in front, bashing his head hard on the plastic handle. As for the girl, she was jolted from her feet and landed with her hands flat on the dirty floor.
The bus itself wasn’t too damaged. Although the internal lights tripped off, the engine still rumbled. It had ended up in the centre of the junction, parked diagonally. Remaining traffic weaved around them.
‘You guys all right?’ the driver asked, leaning out with a frosting of glass powder in his hair. He was dark in the ambient glow – snow tinting the scene blue.
‘Yes, fine,’ she said in an English accent, clambering back to her feet. And then, hands filthy, knees wet with melted ice from winter boots, the girl in the bobble hat turned round and looked at Francis. ‘Are you OK?’ she asked, stepping towards him, wiping her fingers on her jeans.
When he realised it was her, her, her from the party, he smiled. ‘I am.’ He knew his face was red.
The man who’d hit the bus was drunk and travelling at almost triple the speed limit, so police attended the crash and checked them both over. Then the driver told them where to wait and when the next bus would arrive. Instead, Francis decided to walk. When he told the girl which direction he was heading, she said, ‘Oh, great, me too.’