by Tammy Cohen
‘No. But if you start building up a convincing dossier showing every single thing that’s happened, it’ll get to the point where there’s too much evidence to ignore.’
I hadn’t seen Frances so animated before. Though she kept her voice steady, a dull pink flush was spreading up her neck from her chest. It struck me then how much it really mattered to her that justice was done, that the right outcome was achieved. Her passion left me feeling shallow by comparison.
‘How did you know,’ I asked her, as I drained the last of my drink, ‘that I’d been working at the magazine?’
‘Oh, Em told me.’ Frances was already on her feet and gathering her things to leave. ‘She’s very proud of you.’
On my way home I tried to call Rosie again. We’d taken such a huge step forward by meeting up that time in the café, and then she seemed to have backed away again. I knew I couldn’t pressurize her but I was terrified of losing momentum and her slipping away again.
This time she picked up but sounded distracted.
‘Sorry, Mum. I’m in a rush.’
‘Hot date?’
Even as I said it, my faux-pally tone grated. I wasn’t Rosie’s pal. I hardly qualified as her mother these days. But Rosie was clearly at that stage of a new relationship where any opportunity to talk about it was not to be missed.
‘Maybe. Yes.’
Encouraged, I dared press further.
‘So it’s going well?’
‘Ye–es.’
‘Hope you’re going to be nicer to this one than you are to most of your admirers.’
It had been a family joke since school days, when the boys who had crushes on my elder daughter were invariably given short shrift, that Rosie was impossibly hard to please when it came to potential suitors. Even the few that made it out on a date were usually ‘let go of’ within a few weeks, as if they’d run foul of their probationary period. She had high standards for everyone, that was the problem – boyfriends, me, but most of all herself.
‘This is completely different.’
‘How so?’
‘He’s nothing like all the others. He’s a proper grown-up.’
‘Oh. Well, that’s great.’
In truth, I was taken aback by the excitement she was unable to disguise in her voice. If things hadn’t been so delicate between us, I might have sounded a note of caution. She was still so young, so vulnerable to hurt.
I sent up a silent prayer to this unknown boy. Please be kind to her.
Back home, Dotty hurled herself at my legs. She was still subdued after her ordeal, but the cut on her belly was healing. The vet said it probably looked worse than it actually was but he hadn’t been able to tell us what might have made it. ‘Perhaps she tried to jump over a rusty fence, or lay down on broken glass,’ he’d suggested.
‘Or someone did it deliberately?’ I’d asked.
‘That’s also possible.’
Giving her a final scratch behind the ears, I went into the kitchen and opened my laptop, acutely conscious of the possibility that Stephens might be shadowing my every move, seeing through my eyes.
The thought took hold of my throat and squeezed.
I switched on to the webcam so that I could watch my parents. If Stephens really was tracking everything I was doing, he’d already have seen them, so I wasn’t exposing them to any new danger. And if he was logged on at this moment, I reasoned that watching two elderly people doing nothing would surely bore him into logging off again. Even so, I couldn’t help viewing them through a stranger’s eyes, which left me feeling both protective and embarrassed.
My mother was in her usual chair, watching East-Enders with such rapt attention that the plate of food she had on her knee had slipped, baked beans sliding off on to the floor, forming a lumpy orange puddle on the carpet by her feet.
She’d clearly dressed herself today and was wearing an old grey T-shirt of mine with a faded photograph of Bob Marley on the front that I left at their house to sleep in which she’d teamed with one of her fancier skirts, a knee-length blue velvet number she used to wear to parties.
There weren’t any parties these days.
Dad was nowhere to be seen, and I waited with growing anxiety until I heard his voice in the kitchen. ‘Have you finished, love?’ he asked her, coming to the doorway. I saw he had his insulin pen in his hand, as if in the middle of giving himself his injection.
His face fell as he saw the beans pooling on the carpet next to Mum’s feet and pity tugged at the hem of my heart as his features slumped into an expression of sheer exhaustion.
A beeping noise alerted me to a new text message. My laptop was synced with my phone, so I opened up a new window to read the text on screen, keeping one eye on my parents. It was from Rosie, but the brief flare of pleasure from seeing her name was extinguished when I read her message.
OK, in the interests of full transparency, I might as well tell you b4 Dad does that new man is kind of a rough diamond & was in trouble with law in past. But he’s completely different now. Runs own business. Reads Guardian!! So plse DON’T WORRY.
I sat frowning at the screen as something niggled like incipient toothache at the back of my mind. Something more than worry about what my daughter was getting into.
Almost instantly came a second text. I really like this one, Mum. FINALLY! So try 2 b happy for me!
I began typing a reply. Thanks for letting me know. I really appreciate it. But now something occurred to me and I broke off as a cold web of dread spun itself around me.
No, I was being ridiculous. Paranoid. I continued typing. I AM happy if you’re happy, darling.
I clicked send and shut down the window, selecting ‘sleep’ on the pull-down menu. Then it was just me, looking at my own reflection staring back from the depths of the blank computer screen.
29
I tried to push my suspicions from my mind. But it was no use. The more I thought about it, the more it seemed to make a sickening kind of sense. The timing, the little details.
On impulse, I picked up my phone and shot Rosie another text. Out of curiosity, what does new man do? I half expected her not to reply. The truce between us was still tissue-paper fragile. If I pushed too hard, it might tear to shreds. But again I’d underestimated the headiness of those early stages of romance, when it’s all you can think or talk about.
Why, you already worrying about his prospects? Haha. Not really sure what Steve does. Nothing creative (sorry 2 disappoint). Some kind of building trade. Anything else? Nearly at pub now 2 meet him. Want me 2 ask him how much he earns & inside leg measurement??
A lump of ice formed in the pit of my stomach. I could no longer ignore the horrible conviction that Rosie’s new man was Stephens.
Everything added up. If it really was him, chances were he wouldn’t use his real name. But Steve would be an obvious pseudonym to choose. And ‘building trade’ was vague enough not to identify him but also close enough to the truth that he’d be able to bluff convincingly. She’d said he worked for himself. And God knows he’d definitely been on the wrong side of the law.
Still, I couldn’t quite believe it. What Frances had suggested was bad enough, Stephens combing through my private messages. But targeting my daughter, just to get revenge on me? Surely he wouldn’t?
Then I thought about the football coach and how his mouth had set into that tight, thin line when he’d heard what Stephens had done, as if he wasn’t entirely surprised. I thought about the old lady dwarfed by her doorway and the young girl in the police-station waiting room with the biro’d heart. I remembered those lumps on Emma’s scalp. He’d already targeted one daughter. Would he really baulk at targeting another? Did I really think he wouldn’t retaliate for everything I’d done?
I called Rosie. The phone rang six times then went to voicemail. I hung up and immediately tried calling her again.
‘Pick up,’ I said out loud. ‘Pick up, pick up, pick up.’
‘First sign of madness.’
>
‘What?’
I’d completely forgotten Em was in the house and had half shot out of my chair.
‘Talking to yourself. First sign of madness. Who are you so desperate to get hold of, anyway?’
‘No one.’
I clicked off my phone quickly.
Em raised her eyebrows and I realized she probably thought there was a new man on the scene.
If only it were that simple.
For a moment, I was tempted to tell Em everything. Worry for Rosie was pressing down on my chest so I could hardly breathe. But how would it help Em to know that her older sister might be out somewhere with the very man who attacked her? I knew my younger daughter’s propensity for taking responsibility for things that were way beyond her control. When the World Cup was on, she had to leave the room if a match went to penalties, holding herself somehow accountable for the misery of whichever player failed to score. She would see this as her fault, for bringing Stephens into our lives.
As soon as Em had gone back upstairs I started calling Rosie’s number again, but each time the voicemail message snapped on.
Call me, Rosie. As soon as you get this.
Rosie, it’s urgent. Please call.
I sent Rosie text after text but didn’t get an answer.
In desperation, I called Phil.
‘I’ve got a horrible feeling Rosie’s new boyfriend is the same guy who attacked Em.’
‘I beg your pardon?’
In my agitation, I couldn’t remember how much I’d told Phil of what had been going on. Very little, it turned out. As I hurriedly filled him in, my words coming out in a hot, impatient rush, there was a resolute silence from the other end of the phone. Then:
‘Have you any idea how crazy you sound?’
‘I know it sounds like the plot of a really bad film, but there are just too many coincidences.’
The ice in my stomach was spreading along my veins, up through my body. Where was Rosie right now? What might he be doing to her?
Another silence. But the next time Phil spoke his voice carried a new note of uncertainty.
‘I just don’t get any of this, Tessa. How would this man have found Rosie in the first place?’
‘She was listed on my Facebook profile. He could have tracked her down through that.’
I didn’t add that, if he really did have access to my laptop, as Frances had suggested, Stephens would be able to find out any detail about all my friends and family. I was still trying to prove to Phil that, contrary to what the vindictive anonymous note had alleged, I was a steady, responsible mother. Steady, responsible mothers did not have spyware installed on their computers.
‘Bloody hell, Tessa. How can you be so careless about what you give away? Oh, hold on a minute …’
‘What? What’s happening?’
‘I think that’s her now.’
I heard Phil’s voice, muffled, shouting Rosie’s name. Then – oh, the relief! – the sound of Rosie saying, ‘What do you mean, where’ve I been?’
There were more raised voices, but I couldn’t make out the words. Then Phil came back on the phone.
‘She’s not happy.’
‘Put her on the phone. I’ll explain.’
A pause. More voices arguing in the background. Then:
‘Mum? Just what the fuck?’
I was too happy to hear her voice to mind how angry she sounded.
‘I’m really sorry, darling, only I have a horrible feeling this guy you’re seeing might not be who he says he is.’
‘Is this because I’m leaving uni? Because I can tell you now that has nothing to do with Steve – I made up my mind ages ago.’
‘No, it’s nothing to do with that.’
‘Oh, so it’s because he made a couple of mistakes when he was a teenager and he doesn’t work in a nice office wearing a nice suit.’
‘No, Rosie. I’m not like that.’
‘What, then?’
‘I think he might be the same man who attacked Emma.’
Stunned silence. Then a snort of laughter.
‘I don’t believe this, Mum. I really don’t believe this.’
‘How did you meet him?’ I asked her.
‘If you must know, I went to see Hamish’s band playing at a place in King’s Cross and he was there. We got chatting at the bar. It was completely random. He didn’t groom me, if that’s what you’re thinking.’
‘How many Facebook friends do you have?’
‘What?’
‘Go on. Five hundred? A thousand?’
‘I don’t know, somewhere in between.’
‘So if someone sends you a friend request, you usually accept.’
‘If we’ve got mutuals, sure. But I don’t post private stuff on there. I’m not an idiot.’
‘What about events? Did this gig in King’s Cross get flagged up as an invitation in your events section? Did you click the box that says “going”?’
‘I don’t know. Maybe. It’s not a crime. Loads of us did.’
‘So any one of your friends would have got a notification saying Rosie Hopwood is going to an event in London on this particular date at this particular time?’
Now Rosie had had enough.
‘Oh, for God’s sake, Mum. Will you listen to yourself? You know, I really missed you over the last six months. But this kind of bullshit is why I had to have a break from you in the first place. Why can’t you just accept that none of this is about you – not the guy I’m seeing, nor the attack on Em. I’m really sorry you lost your job, and then Dad pissed off and left you, but you have got to stop trying to create dramas in my and Em’s lives just to fill up the empty spaces in your own.’
‘Rosie, I—’
But she was gone.
I sat at the table, momentarily skewered by doubt. Might she be right? Was this whole thing an attempt to position myself back at the centre of Rosie’s world after all these months of feeling excluded?
For one brief moment I allowed myself to taste the sweet relief of accepting that none of it was real, that everything that had happened since Emma’s attack was somehow my doing.
But I knew the truth.
My daughters were in danger.
I watch you.
It’s ironic, isn’t it, given everything I’ve done to get as far from you as possible, that I should spend so much of my life checking your movements?
Because I couldn’t stand you following me, I’ve ended up following you.
I watch you on Facebook and Instagram. I track you through LinkedIn. Did you know you accepted my request to join your network? Probably not, as I used neither my real name nor my real picture.
I see who you’re connecting with. I see where you go. And because I know you, because I know your little habits and your way of looking at the world, I can read between the lines of the story you tell in public.
I watch you to keep us safe, my boy and me.
Tonight I have my laptop open in front of me and I have half an eye on the television screen on which is playing an episode of a Netflix series about a man who is on trial for murdering his wife. It is a real case and I watch it despite myself, despite knowing that true crime is the last thing I need in my life. Bodies at the bottom of stairs. Questions of motive, of opportunity. Of guilt. How well do we ever really know anyone else? When they visit the pathologist on screen, it’s Matt’s body I see there under the sheet.
Yet I can’t switch it off. The need to see justice done burns a hole in my brain.
At the same time, I am scrolling down your Instagram feed. Looking at the photos you have chosen to show to the world, the face you are presenting.
There is a photograph of you in a pub. Or it could be someone’s house.
You are smiling, looking up at the camera.
I double-click on the picture and enlarge it until your face takes over the entire screen, and then I keep enlarging until you disappear altogether into a blur of pixels.
30
/> By the next morning, I was calmer. I’d seen from Facebook that Stephens was DJ’ing at a club in Coventry that night, so I figured Rosie was safe from him at least for today.
Frances arrived after breakfast, bringing with her a smell of Acqua di Parma and a bag of fresh croissants from the artisan bakery in Muswell Hill. In all the furore over Rosie and Stephens I’d forgotten the arrangement we’d made for her to come over to check out my laptop and was momentarily taken aback to see her on the doorstep.
I told her about Rosie’s new man, hoping she’d dismiss my suspicions like Rosie had done, but instead her expression turned serious.
‘If you’re right, this isn’t just abstract words on the internet any more, Tess. He’s invaded your actual life, involving your kids. You should go to the police, get Rosie to—’
‘I can’t involve Rosie.’
‘But she could—’
‘Can we please drop the subject?’
It came out harsher than I’d intended and Frances’s cheeks flushed pink.
‘Of course. Sorry.’
While Frances got to work on the computer, I went to sit outside in the garden. It wasn’t really warm enough, but the sun was out, and I felt I needed to be on my own for a minute or two. It had been another night when sleep taunted me from the end of the bed, always out of reach, and now I felt wrung out and bone weary. I heard my neighbours two gardens along chatting quietly to each other in Greek and a woman singing through the open upstairs window of the house backing on to ours, and I envied them their nice, normal lives.
Frances appeared in the doorway. ‘Sorry to tell you, I did find evidence of spyware installed on your laptop. I can’t be sure how much he had access to but I’m afraid you should probably assume he’s seen everything that’s on there.’
‘Everything?’
I felt light-headed with disbelief. I thought of the emails to Nick, of my parents shuffling around their living room in Oxford, of all the things that related to the girls. I had photocopies of both their passports stored on my desktop. Might he be able to do something with those? The thought brought on a rush of nausea.