by J. A. Baker
A sickly sensation creeps under his skin, squirming and nestling in his chest, curling and coiling itself like a viper waiting to unfurl, to strike at the very heart of him. He opens his mouth to reply, his voice low and gruff, the words hard to say out loud. ‘What daughter?’ he says, a tremble evident in his timbre. But even as he is speaking, a terrible unthinkable idea begins to take shape in his head, a shadow, looming, filling the darkest corners of his mind. It can’t be. Surely not. Why would they even consider coming here?
They don’t reply, staring at him instead with doe eyes, an unspeakable sadness tattooed onto their greying skin. He can’t hold them at arm’s-length for any longer. They look completely stricken, as if they have been sucked dry by the woes and worries of life, chewed up and spat out as desiccated empty pods. He isn’t the only one who’s suffering here. These people look despairing, worse than him, if that’s at all possible.
Letting out a sigh of resignation, he steps to one side, waves his hand, indicating for them to come into the hallway and closes the door behind them with a muffled click.
40
The hallway is disconcertingly silent as they stand opposite one another, clearing their throats, rummaging in pockets, trying to work out how to break this awkward moment with the right words. Words that hopefully won’t bring the conversation to a close before it has even begun. Myriad images and ideas flit through Jacob’s brain as the couple slouch their way past him and stand cumbersomely, their eyes flitting about, their gazes landing on everything except his face while they wait for him to speak.
‘So, how can I help you?’ He is beyond attempting to sound cheerful, his usual social niceties stripped away by recent events leaving a painful rawness, a gaping, bleeding lesion that he feels sure is visible to anyone who meets him. He is certain it will never ever heal. Perhaps, given time, it will, but right now, anybody saying the wrong thing to him, cursory careless words and phrases shoved his way, feel like salt tossed onto an open wound.
The older gentleman speaks first, a hint in his voice that this conversation isn’t going to be an easy one. Too many pauses, too much emphasis on the sentence structure, making sure each word catches Jacob’s attention. He chooses them with care, stumbling over every syllable, casting his eyes downwards, wringing his hands together inelegantly.
‘There’s something we would like to share with you. Is it okay if we all sit down?’
Jacob nods, feeling suddenly numb. He follows them through to his own living room thinking how strange it is that their roles have been reversed in such a short space of time. It’s as if it is they who are the homeowners and he their visitor. He thought that recent events had left him desensitised to anything else life could throw at him but now their solemn expressions and grave manner are making him feel anxious, as if they are about to reveal something dreadful that he doesn’t want to hear. He puffs out his cheeks and shakes his head surreptitiously. Like anything could be worse than his current predicament. It’s not as if his life go could any lower, is it? He stops, checks himself, thinks about how close he came to losing Chloe on that first day. She’s here, clinging on to life and for that he should be grateful. He should not think such morbid thoughts.
He notices how antiquated they look, the man in his pale blue slacks and dark sweater, and the woman in her thick tweed skirt and matching jacket. Her hair is scraped back into some sort of clip and the puffiness around her eyes suggests she hasn’t been sleeping too well. They’re probably only in their late fifties or early sixties but look so much older, as if life has given them a good kicking.
I’m not the only one, he thinks as he lets out a deep breath. I’m not the only one.
Still, Jacob doesn’t want to speak, doesn’t want them to speak either. He has had a gutful of bad news and can’t bring himself to listen to any more of it. Whatever it is that they have to tell him, he feels sure he would be better off not hearing it. No matter how tired and distraught they look he still wishes they would take their misery and bad news elsewhere. He’s having a difficult enough time dealing with his own problems at the minute.
‘I’m Ralph, by the way, and this is my wife, Chrissie. We felt we had to come and see you, to speak with you and thank you for making her happy, our daughter. She wasn’t the easiest of people to get along with and admittedly we hadn’t seen her quite a few years.’ Ralph’s eyes dart towards his wife.
She is staring ahead, glassy eyed, her skin almost translucent, as thin and fragile as bone china, stretched over the sharp contours of her face. If anybody is in need of some decent sunshine, plenty of nourishment and a decent night’s sleep, it is this lady.
Ralph continues, ‘But we felt we had to thank you. At least the latter years of her life were happy ones. And that’s all because of you, Jacob. You don’t mind me calling you Jacob, do you? It’s just that we’ve been through some of Leah’s things and read some of her diaries and in them she writes about you with such fondness that we felt compelled to come and see you. Your relationship with her was a positive thing in her life.’
The room shrinks around him, the floor wobbling and teetering under his feet. His head swims. He has no idea why these people are here. What are they saying? Do they know how erroneous their words are? How far off the mark they are with what they’re saying to him? It’s apparent they know nothing about what has happened, about what their daughter did. Either that, or they are as deluded and deranged as she is. Overcome by a sudden need to move away from them, Jacob stands up and marches towards the door. If they refuse to leave, he will threaten them with the police. For all he knows they may want to harm him. Something tells him that isn’t the case but he isn’t about to take any chances. Not after what he and Chloe have been through.
Standing by the living room door, Jacob stares at Ralph, hoping he will do something. Both he and Chrissie remain seated. They sneak a glance at one another before continuing. ‘We know that you and Leah had a bit of a tiff before her accident. We hadn’t seen or spoken to her for a good few years ourselves, but death puts a different perspective on life, doesn’t it? We decided it was time to put the past behind us and to focus on the good memories of our daughter.’ Ralph looks at Chrissie, reaches across to her and grasps her hand tightly before looking back at Jacob. ‘And you were one of her good memories.’
‘We just wanted to meet with you to tell you how grateful we are that you were around for her, that you made her happy. We may have had our differences with Leah, but at the end of the day she was still our daughter,’ Chrissie says before dipping her head and weeping quietly.
Jacob feels his stomach tighten. Leah is dead and although he feels sympathy for their loss, he wakes every morning flooded with relief at that fact. Never did he ever imagine he would celebrate the death of another human being but in this case, he will make an exception.
‘She said in her diaries that her relationship with you was the best thing that ever happened to her and that she knew it was her fault you had broken up. She admitted being too controlling,’ Ralph says softly as he stares at his hands. ‘We just thought you should know that.’
Jacob moves back away from the door and sits, time stretching out in front of him. How in God’s name is he supposed to tell these people the truth? How will he ever find the words to verbalise to them what a sick and twisted individual their daughter actually was? That she stalked him relentlessly, waiting outside his flat, staring up at his window, banging on his door in the early hours of the morning demanding to be let in and then attempting to assault him when he refused? His fingers brush over the bridge of his nose at the thought of that night, the memory of her hand connecting with his face, her furious expression. The dead look in her eyes. That’s something he has tried to forget.
He should have called the police back then but it’s too late now for regrets and mulling over what he should have done. Time to move on and stop punishing himself for what he didn’t do.
He stares at Ralph and Chrissie, at their bro
ken expressions, their quivering shoulders as they sit and weep silently. How is he going to do this? How will he ever tell them that he barely knew Leah and that she was just a neighbour? Somebody he passed in the street from time to time. These poor misled people have no idea that he barely knew their daughter. She was a neighbour, not even an acquaintance. They were on nodding terms, people who smile at one another as they pass in the street. He wants to tell them that he met their daughter by chance as she was moving in and that he made the mistake of helping her with a few boxes and since that time she has been an unwanted presence in his life. In their life.
It was Chloe, in the end, who bore the brunt of her madness. How can he ever begin to tell them that their daughter would turn up on his doorstep begging to be let in, that she followed him to work, waiting outside the college gates for hours at a time. All of this is the truth, but so often the truth is so much harder to relay. Why is it that falsehoods flow easier and faster than cold hard facts? He finds himself thinking that this is why people lie. It’s no surprise to him that the world runs on mistruths and mendacious gossip. The truth is so often an ice-cold slap in the face and few can deliver it with the respect and reverence it deserves. Falsehoods can be moulded and shaped to suit the narrator whereas the truth simply is what it is. No frills, no dressing it up to soften the blow. The truth is a cold hard mistress and nobody is immune from her blows.
Jacob decides to take another route through this messy labyrinth so these people don’t have to suffer yet another hard setback. They don’t look able to withstand more bad news. Perhaps they already know the answer to the question he’s about to ask but feels duty-bound to ask it anyway. He can’t sit here, voiceless and helpless. Something has to be said. ‘Have the police been in touch with you?’ His ears buzz with anxiety, his pulse thick and solid in his neck like a drumbeat. ‘About anything other than the train crash, I mean?’
He can tell by their reaction that he has hit home. Any remaining colour drains from Chrissie’s face. Her eyes appear to droop and he watches as her fingers tremble in her lap like the wings of a small bird attempting to escape from a predator. Ralph clasps her hand tightly, makes an effort to catch her eye before speaking but she has already zoned out, distanced herself from what he is about to say.
‘Aye, lad. They have. It’s all such a mess, isn’t it?’ Ralph’s voice is low and croaky, laced with desperation. ‘That’s why we’re here really. Not just to thank you, but to apologise as well. The police haven’t given us too much detail but we’ve worked out what happened. We’re not the daft old codgers everybody thinks we are.’
A lump fills Jacob’s throat, a resisting force as he tries to breathe properly. He didn’t expect such a visceral reaction to Ralph’s words. His skin is burning and his head feels too heavy for his body, his neck unable to support it. He slumps back in his seat and waits for the moment to pass.
‘We had our kids late in life. When Ellis and Leah were teenagers, people used to sometimes think we were their grandparents.’ Ralph lets out a loud gravelly chuckle. ‘We didn’t mind it so much. We were just glad to have a family at all.’
There is a silence, the air heavy with his words, heavy with the regret and sorrow that all three of them are experiencing, laden with a thousand other emotions that are too difficult to say out loud.
‘We shouldn’t be here really,’ Chrissie finally says, her eyes shining with more tears. ‘The police said they’re still conducting the investigation and that we should wait until more details are available before we say anything but…’
‘We couldn’t just leave it, could we, love?’ Ralph says, finishing the sentence for her.
She nods and more tears spill down her face, closely followed by a muffled sob. Her hands rummage in her bag for a handkerchief. Jacob stands up and hands her a box of tissues. His own throat is constricted, his eyes bulging with tears he cannot shed. Not here in front of these people. Another time, another place perhaps. But not here.
Chrissie takes the box and thanks Jacob. She can’t meet his gaze. He’s thankful for that. His emotions are fragile at the minute and he has no idea how he is feeling about their knowledge of how he and Leah were acquainted. How can he ever begin to tell these distraught people that before things took a more sinister turn, they were no more than neighbours who sometimes stopped to say hello and chat about the weather and the fact the bins didn’t get emptied on time.
He knew Leah had her sights set on him and that she saw Chloe as an obstruction. He’s not an idiot. He presumed she was lonely and slightly unstable, but this? This idea that they were actually in a relationship is so far from the truth that it makes him sick to his stomach. Never in a million years did he imagine that this was what was going through her head when she stood outside his flat gazing up at him. He thought she had designs on him, that she imagined in some weird and warped way, she could split him and Chloe up and then perhaps muscle her way in, but to actually think she was already a part of his life, that they were actually lovers? It’s insane. He has no words. He feels pity for these people but has no answers to make any of this sorry mess any better.
Sensing Jacob’s growing distress, Ralph stands up, helping Chrissie to her feet with gentle guiding hands and a strong arm. ‘We’ll be off, then. We don’t want to keep you any longer, do we, love? We just wanted to say thank you and sorry. Please tell your partner that we’re so sorry as well.’
They slouch away from him into the long hallway. Jacob swallows down his fears, knowing he should say something, tell them that they’ve got the wrong idea and that he barely knew their daughter, but every time he opens his mouth, nothing comes out. How can he possibly do it? Isn’t it bad enough they are grieving for their daughter? Is he really going to be the one who exposes them to yet more hurt and heartbreak? He knows as well as anybody, that life is tough enough.
Besides, the police will inform them of their findings soon enough. Let people who are paid to do this type of thing inform these poor people. Let them tell Chrissie and Ralph what sort of person their daughter really was. He hasn’t got it in him to do it. The police are better equipped to deal with these sorts of situations without causing even more trauma and rupturing what little life these two people have left.
Jacob shows them out and leans back on the door after closing it, thinking he should have seen this coming. He should have called the police many months ago, taken control of this situation and nipped it in the bud. But he didn’t. He let it escalate and now he’s having to deal with the fallout.
Clutching his head, trying to alleviate the pain slicing through his skull, he returns to the living room, drops down onto the sofa and closes his eyes.
41
Rachel
She bites at her nails nervously, tearing at a small strip of skin just beneath the nail bed and spitting it out onto the floor. A disgusting habit and one she had recently kicked, but now, here she is, at it again, tearing and spitting, tearing and spitting before shoving her hands under her armpits and holding them there tightly.
The café fills up around her, the echo of voices and the deafening clank of crockery pounding in her ears. She suddenly feels conspicuous, as if everybody knows what she’s up to. As if they all know what a fraud she is, spilling the beans and making a hefty amount of cash out of a tragedy. She lived when others died. She was fortunate when others weren’t. She shivers despite the dry heat of the room. Blood money – that’s what it is. Blood money. She swallows and sinks down in her seat, her feet crossed at the ankles. Why didn’t she request this meeting somewhere more private? Somewhere more conducive to the sensitivity of the story she is about to reveal? Stupid, so very stupid. Maybe she shouldn’t have come at all. Maybe she should have gone with her gut instinct and said no.
The chatter behind her grows in volume, people drinking and eating, laughing, feeding their children, making small talk, while she is sitting here, wondering if she has done the right thing, wondering if, rather than tell her story to
the masses, she has actually sold her soul to the devil. It doesn’t feel right, giving this interview, and yet here she is, waiting for him to turn up, waiting for the devil incarnate to scribble down her words and put them in print so the waiting world can gorge themselves on them, so that they can slake their thirst for stories that include blood and guts and the misfortune of others. Her stomach is in knots, her knees knocking together.
She needs the money, that’s the thing. She needs the money and it was too good an offer to refuse. She has debts from her days as a student. The amount she is being paid won’t wipe them all but it will get rid of a good chunk for sure. It hadn’t even been her idea to do this sodding interview. It was her mum’s neighbour who suggested it. She’s a receptionist at the local newspaper and said she would ask around, see who was interested in Rachel’s story. They came back to her within hours, ringing her, emailing her, asking when they could meet up. As it turned out, the local paper was trumped by a national newspaper who came up with money that the local paper simply couldn’t offer. And she couldn’t refuse. Not with her debts. So she said yes, and now here she is, sitting waiting, wondering if she is doing the right thing.
The urge to chew at her nails again is overwhelming. She keeps her hands tucked firmly under her armpits. It’s the only way she can stop herself. Hopefully this reporter will arrive soon, they will talk and then she can settle herself down but right now she’s as tight as a spring, ready to bounce all over this place.
She removes her arms and glances at her watch then spins around in her seat, her eyes roving all over the café, searching every dark corner for a slimy individual with devil horns and an evil twinkle in his eye. Where the hell is this man? She’s been here for over ten minutes now and if she doesn’t–
‘Rachel? Rachel Blakeley?’