The Silence

by Luca Veste

  “The Candle Man—”

  “Yes, but it’s more than just that. There’s got to be a reason why the police refuse to acknowledge his existence. Maybe they’ve been waiting for something to happen, so they can finally say it’s a definite truth. If we give them the location of where he’s buried, maybe that’s enough for them to finally close the investigation. The reason we haven’t told anyone what we’ve done is because we buried him.”

  “And you think a year is enough time for that to be forgiven?”

  “Of course not,” I said, earning a look from the woman behind the bar in the distance. I lowered my voice again. “I’m just saying look at it both ways—guilt and keeping this secret has started messing with our minds. What we’re suggesting is that it’s making Michelle see candles appear that she put there herself. Lit herself. It’s made Stuart take his own life. It broke me and Alexandra apart.”

  I paused before I continued on, making a quick decision not to lie anymore. “It drove me inside my house, scared to do anything but meet you here once a week. I mean, it’s a struggle to leave, mate. I stand at the door for ages, working up the courage. I don’t feel safe anymore. I can’t sleep, Chris. I can’t get that night out of my head. I know it’s affected you and Nicola as well. I don’t want to live like this anymore. If there’re consequences, they’ll be better than this life.”

  “Are you sure about that?”

  I thought for a second, but didn’t need much longer than that. I simply remembered the lad who disappeared, and it confirmed my first instinct. “Yes. And then there’s the other side of it.”

  “If someone was really there and saw what we did.”

  “Exactly. Which, of course, is the only explanation for Mark Welsh’s body not being there when we went back into those woods. We never talked about that—just like we never talked about that boy back when we were teenagers. Mikey. He died while we were in that scrapyard, and we never talked about it. Not even when that drug dealer got life for his murder. We just pretended like it never happened. That lad’s body was moved. Someone took him. I don’t know why and I don’t know how, but someone had to have done that. He didn’t just turn into dust like an Avengers character.”

  “And you think someone has waited a year for what?”

  “He wants revenge or something like that. It has to be someone connected to whoever the Candle Man was. Stuart didn’t kill himself; this person did. And Michelle is next.”

  “So, in either case, we go to the police and that all stops. That’s what you’re suggesting?”

  “I’m saying it’s worth discussing,” I said, picking up the sandwich on my plate, looking it over, then laying it back down again. My stomach didn’t seem to be interested. “We all have to agree to it. That’s how we work.”

  “Then, let me stop you now,” Chris replied, swallowing a mouthful of his salad and putting his fork down. He picked up his napkin and wiped his hands. “I’m not doing that.”

  “Chris—”

  “No, I’m not interested,” Chris said, an edge to his tone that I hadn’t experienced in a long time. “You might have decided that because you and Alexandra couldn’t make it through this that you have nothing to lose anymore. Not like on that night, when if I remember correctly, you were right behind the whole idea. If that’s different now, it’s not my fault. It’s not anyone’s fault. I still have a lot to lose if the truth comes out. So does Nicola. Do you think we’d just get a slap on the wrist? That they’d let us off because we stopped a serial killer? How do we even prove that was the case? We got rid of everything. The candle in the woods, the boy he killed. It won’t work. We kept this secret for a year, while that boy’s mum has been everywhere trying to find out what happened to her son. We’d be the new enemy. We’d be his stand-in. They can’t be angry with the guy that killed that boy because he’s already dead. Instead, they’d be angry with us for not saying anything. We’d be pariahs, Matt. No one would want anything to do with us ever again. Everyone would know who we are and what we’d done. That would be our lives forever.”

  “I understand, but we need to do something.”

  “We don’t need to do anything. The plan worked. No one knows what we did. Yes, it’s hard to live with, but that’s true for everyone.”

  I scoffed at that. Shook my head and placed the edge of my hand against my head and rubbed a temple with my thumb. “This is a little different. I hope you can see that at least.”

  “Of course it is, but I refuse to allow it to define me. Nicola too. That wasn’t us and all we are. That was a situation we dealt with and came out the other side with our lives. I don’t know what happened to that boy’s body and I don’t care anymore. I’m done with being scared and looking over my shoulder. If someone did move him—which I know is what happened—then that person obviously doesn’t want him to be found either. And if he comes after us, then I’m ready for that as well. I’ll protect my wife and myself just like I did a year ago. I can’t go to the police now because it’s just not going to help anyone if I did. It would only hurt everyone involved and why would I want to do that?”

  “Someone is coming,” I said, standing up and staring at Chris. We had barely disagreed about anything in our twenty-odd years of friendship, but this was beginning to feel like one of those things that could break us. “You know that’s the truth. You know Michelle isn’t just making things up, that neither am I. I know what I saw. You know what those candles mean.”

  “They mean nothing.”

  “You know what they mean,” I said, leaning on the table with both hands and leaning closer. “I love you like a brother. That’s why I came to you first. And I promise I won’t go to anyone just yet; I just need you to think about it properly. Will you give me that at least? Speak to Nicola about all of this. You need to be totally sure, I get it, but I don’t see any other way out of this.”

  “There’s plenty of ways out.”

  “Speak to her. And Michelle. She’ll tell you the same as she told me. See if that changes your mind.”

  I left him at the table and walked out of the pub. Paused in the parking lot and looked back. I wanted to go back and let him convince me more that there wasn’t anything to worry about—but there was a part of me that knew he couldn’t.

  No one could.

  I kept walking.

  Twenty-Three

  I was driving back home when she called. My phone was in its cradle, linked by Bluetooth to the speakers, so I couldn’t even ignore the ringing if I’d tried.

  Her name was on the screen as I glanced at it.

  “Hello,” I said, answering as I looked for somewhere to pull over. I indicated left and stopped the car. “You okay?”

  “Hi, Matt,” Alexandra replied, sounding like she always did, even if there was a little resignation in her tone. “I’m not bad. Not great either.”

  If I closed my eyes and forgot everything I knew, I could almost believe it was a year earlier and we were still together. That this was just a normal conversation. Instead, I had to live in a world where that wasn’t the case.

  “I’m just…I don’t know,” Alexandra continued, a deep sigh filling the car as I put the phone to my ear.

  My stomach lurched as I thought about what had happened to Michelle recently and heard a note in Alexandra’s voice that worried me. “What’s going on? Has something turned up in your house?”

  “No,” she replied, the note that concerned me being replaced by confusion. “I guess I’m just worried about you, that’s all. Can we talk?”

  I breathed a sigh of relief, then thought about what she’d said. The idea of meeting up with her before that week would have filled me with hope and excitement. Now, I couldn’t work out what I felt. Only that I didn’t want her around if Michelle and I were right.

  “Yes,” I said eventually, knowing there was no other answer. “Now?”<
br />
  “Give me a few hours. I’ll come to your house after work.”

  The call ended, and even though I knew it was true, the words still hurt.

  Your house.

  It was supposed to be ours. Our home, our future. Now, it was a reminder of all that had been lost. A daily ritual couldn’t erase it. Nothing ever would.

  She hadn’t been over since the day she left. In fact, I struggled to remember anyone being in there besides myself or Chris in months. I didn’t have visitors. My family—of which there were basically very few—lived far enough away that a simple visit was barely worth it. Everyone was getting older, so it was on me to make the trip to them.

  I plugged the phone back in and set off. Outside, rain fell in spots, dusting the windshield and smeared away with wipers. A fine rain that I would barely feel if I were outside, but now was a minor annoyance in a day, a week, filled with them.

  That’s what I was feeling. Annoyed. I had created a sheltered life, that I now realized I wanted to protect. A bubble, in which I could pretend the outside world didn’t exist, so I could live in peace.

  Only, there was never peace. Not for me. Not for any of us. I didn’t think there ever would be.

  Back home, I turned the volume up loud on the music blaring from Alexa and tidied up what needed doing. There wasn’t much. Along with creating a shelter, I’d also become more frugal. Mainly because I had to, given I was paying a mortgage I could barely afford and didn’t have much left over for any luxuries. No takeout containers littering the rooms, no empty bottles of soft drinks, no clinking bottles of alcohol to hide. I didn’t drink, I barely ate, and coffee remained my only extravagance. Even that cost me about a tenner per week.

  My phone buzzed in my pocket, just as I finished vacuuming a living room floor that hadn’t really been walked on for months. I pulled it out and saw the alarm I’d set a week earlier and forgotten about, then swore under my breath. Wondered if I should reschedule, then thought about the two hours still to go until Alexandra arrived and thought it would save me staring at a wall.

  Decided I could at least fill the time semiproductively.

  We’d been talking about nothing for forty-five minutes, before her name came up. The counselor doing what she’d tried on my previous visit—opening me up to talk about what she knew was hiding behind the veiled answers of everything I was saying.

  I had made a decision to never return, but there I was. Back again. It wasn’t just because I couldn’t sleep. I was there because I needed help. Because I could kid myself that I was trying by going and speaking to this stranger, as if by doing so I was at least trying. Yet, it was like a game, where I couldn’t tell her all of the rules or where the pieces were supposed to move.

  So, instead, we danced around subjects, and she prodded and pried, trying to back me into a corner that would have me reveal all. Asked open questions, trying to get me to disclose things she knew I didn’t want to.

  It didn’t work. It wouldn’t work.

  “The ex-girlfriend,” she said, flicking back a page or two in her notepad. “Alexandra?”

  “Yes.”

  “Any contact?”

  She knew there must have been. I’d told her about Stuart’s death—leaving out as much detail as was possible—but she had the knowledge that, of the friends I had, they were all connected. And that included Alexandra. “Briefly.”

  “How was it?”

  “It was…it was nice. Polite. I’m actually seeing her after this.”

  Her eyebrows raised at this. I felt like, for the first time in that room, I’d actually said something that had surprised her somewhat. “Really? How do you feel about that?”

  “Nervous, excited, I don’t know. I’m not thinking it’s going to lead to anything, but it’s the first time we’ll be on our own since we broke up.”

  “How is the sleep going?”

  I frowned at the sudden shift in conversation. “Same as it was before.”

  “And you think it’s insomnia?”

  “Well, yeah, I guess so,” I replied, trying to work out the possible path she was trying to take. I was paying for the privilege of this, I realized. Money I could ill afford. I wanted to laugh at the ridiculousness of it all but kept myself in check. “It certainly seems to fit the criteria.”

  “Did you do any of the exercises I told you about last time we met?”

  “Yes, they didn’t work,” I lied, knowing that the truth would be too difficult to explain without straying into territory where I couldn’t go. “Still can’t sleep.”

  She tilted her head and stared at me long enough for me to look away. The silence grew until I couldn’t take it any longer.

  “I don’t know what it is,” I said, feeling a sense of relief when I could hear the sound of my own voice. “I just can’t seem to switch off.”

  “You seem uncomfortable.” It was the first statement she had made. Not a question—she was identifying a fact and she seemed to be happy with the assessment.

  “I’m fine. I just don’t know how useful this is turning out to be.”

  “After one and a half sessions?”

  Back to the questions. I rolled my eyes in annoyance. Frustration. “I know. I understand that it probably takes a lot more than that, but I’m not a wealthy person. I’m not even a half-wealthy person. I can’t really afford to spend a fortune coming back here over and over, just to be told the same things. I tried the exercises; they didn’t work. Maybe I should just go the sleeping pills route.”

  “You told me you’d tried that and it hadn’t worked. Do you think anything has changed since then?”

  I shook my head. “Probably not. Doesn’t mean I shouldn’t try again. A prescription is cheaper than these hour-long meetings though.” I smiled so she knew I was speaking with some humor, but she was unbreakable.

  “When you wake up in the mornings, is it always at the same approximate time?”

  I nodded. “I set my alarm. I work from home, so it’s important to have some sort of routine. Otherwise, I could end up never doing anything productive.”

  “The alarm wakes you up?”

  “Yes,” I said, frowning again, as she steered the exchange in another seemingly odd direction. I wondered if she was intentionally trying to make me feel off-kilter, unsure of where the next turn would be, so she could trip me up and make me reveal more than I wanted to. I was locked into a game now, it seemed. I was sure she knew I wasn’t telling her the entire truth, but I wasn’t going to give up. “I lie in bed awake for hours, and eventually my body just gives in. Never early enough for me to feel right though.”

  “What are you thinking about?”

  “Now?”

  She shook her head, almost imperceptibly so. “When you’re lying in bed trying to sleep. You said your brain won’t switch off. What are some of the thoughts that run through your mind? Give me some examples.”

  I sighed and leaned back in the chair. “All sorts of things,” I said, running through the images that immediately sprung to me. The man in the woods. The sounds he made. The anger that coursed through him and us. The smell of sweat and blood. Michelle’s crying. Alexandra’s face. Chris’s fear. Stuart’s barely constrained panic. Nicola trying to ground herself back into reality. The boy. His body.

  The red candle. Burning. Mocking us after what we’d done.

  The empty patch of ground where the boy had once been.

  “Just normal things,” I lied, refusing to catch her gaze now. I looked around the room and settled my eyes on a large oak bookcase that held numerous red-leather-bound books. Thick and probably unreadable to most people. I squinted to try to read some of the titles but failed. “Money worries, social anxieties. Whether I locked the back door before I came to bed. Something I watched on TV before going upstairs. That kind of thing.”

  “When you di
d the exercises, did any of this dissipate whatsoever?”

  I thought about the list she had given me. All of them had involved the same issue I couldn’t deal with—silence. They all required me to turn off the music, the radio, the podcasts. Everything that I used so I wasn’t lying in the darkness in total quiet. I couldn’t tell her that though, because it would just lead to even more questions I couldn’t answer. Instead, I had to lie to this person and pay for it. Literally. Hand over cash I couldn’t spare to lie to a stranger.

  Now, I did laugh out loud. A short, sharp bark of laughter, which momentarily broke her blank expression. I recovered quickly and held up a hand in apology. “I’m sorry, but I just don’t think this is going to work.”

  “Matt, what is it about silence that bothers you?”

  The shock of the question almost made me shout in response. In truth. I closed my mouth and stuttered around a reply before composing myself. “I don’t know what you mean.”

  “That’s the problem here, isn’t it? Every time there’s a lull in the conversation, you feel the need to fill it. You don’t realize it, but when there’s quiet in the room, you begin to exhibit signs of some distress. Is this something that happens at night also? Does it become worse then?”

  “I have to go,” I said, getting to my feet and grabbing my jacket from the back of my chair. “Thanks for trying, but I don’t think I’ll be coming back.”

  “Wait, Matt, what is it that you don’t want to say?”

  I didn’t answer, shouting a goodbye as I left the office and closed the door behind me. I didn’t breathe again until I was outside the building and leaning against my car. I looked over at the window, where the counselor’s office was, half expecting her to be standing there and holding a phone.

  Calling who?

  I knew the answer and how stupid it was. My breathing slowly returned to normal, as I realized it was just fear. That she hadn’t seen through me and knew what I was hiding. The noise filtered back through now—the calming sounds of traffic passing by, the wind in the air, the conversation from someone talking on their phone as they walked past me. It all coalesced into a cacophony of aural pleasure.