Final Cut

by S. J. Watson

  22

  Bryan kneels at the top of the slipway, next to a motorboat that rests on a rusted metal platform. It’s his own, I suppose, though it appears to be smaller than the one in the film, just a few yards long and with a tiny cabin at the front. When he hears me approach he looks up.

  “Alex!” he says. He sounds pleased to see me. He glances back at his boat, his eyes glowing proudly. It’s sweet, a boy with his toys, but I hope he’s not getting it ready for me. Seeing it now, I’m even less keen to take him up on his offer; it seems minute, far too insubstantial to cope with the brutal water.

  “Always good to keep on top of repairs in the winter . . .” He wipes his hands on an oily rag but in doing so seems to transfer more filth onto his skin than off it. “How’s it going?”

  I pause. “I wanted to talk to you about something.”

  “The car? Everything all right?”

  “Fine,” I say. “It’s David.”

  “David?” He tosses the rag into the boat. “What about him?”

  “You said he was your friend. You trust him? With the girls?”

  “Aye,” he says. “Why?”

  “You know where they might be? Kat and Ellie?”

  He glances at his watch. “Now? The arcade, maybe?”

  “Thanks.”

  “Want me to come with you?” He looks hopeful. “We could get a drink?”

  I hesitate. The girls may be more forthcoming if I arrive with a friendly face.

  “Okay,” I say. “Come on.”

  The place is garish and bright; a huge glitter ball hangs from the middle of the room, the pinball machines strobe and flash and, undercutting it all, there’s the sinister bass thrum of a rap song. It all seems to belong in another town, a different era altogether, and at the back of the room a guy sits in a change booth, looking down. He’s reading, I suppose, or staring at a screen, apparently unaware that anyone’s come in. There’s no sign of the girls.

  “We can wait,” says Bryan. “I just need to have a word with Pete.”

  I watch as he moves off and have the same frisson of recognition I had the other day, the same I had with David, and for a moment wish there was some way I could ask whether he remembers me, whether we knew each other before.

  But I can’t, of course. I turn away, and a moment later there’s a voice at my side.

  “Alex!”

  It’s Monica. She’s holding a bagful of twenty-pence coins. I greet her, forcing as much cheer into my voice as I can muster, and she asks how I am.

  “Listen,” she says, glancing toward Bryan. “I’m glad I caught you. I hear you’ve been talking to Kat and Ellie.”

  “From who?”

  “They told me.”

  “You know them?”

  “Oh, aye,” she says. “I just wanted to let you know there’s nothing to worry about. They’re fine. Kat was annoyed they’d been caught smoking and you’d made it public, but—”

  “Smoking a joint?”

  “Kat said it weren’t a joint.”

  “You believe her?”

  She lowers her voice. “Not really. But it’s not like it’s that bad, is it? And anyway, the point is, they say there’s nothing to worry about.” She looks up as Bryan returns. “I’ll leave you to it.”

  Leave us to what? I think, but before I can ask she moves off toward one of the fruit machines, greeting Bryan as she goes. A minute later a group of five or six girls arrives and joins her. I scan them anxiously and, sure enough, one is Kat, though at first glance she seems totally different. She’s dressed in ankle boots, tight jeans, a black leather jacket. She’s wearing lipstick, plus blush. Her eyes are dark. She looks much older and, next to her, wearing less makeup but still some, stands Ellie. Neither has noticed me, and I watch as Monica gives each of the girls a handful of coins, then puts her hand on Kat’s shoulder. The gesture is maternal, protective; it’s clear she has their trust, and I feel the urge to take out my phone to film them. To counteract the bad things I’ve seen, I tell myself.

  “How about that drink?” says Bryan, and I turn away. In the corner four plastic chairs are arranged around a Formica table and we sit opposite each other. Between us there’s a saucer, a few wrapped chocolates. He takes out a hip flask.

  “Want some?”

  I nod and he pours what I presume is whiskey into plastic cups. I watch Kat and Ellie. They’re both on their phones now, flicking through who knows what. Easy in each other’s company, they’re so relaxed it almost borders on indifference. Ellie holds her phone up to Kat, who examines it conspiratorially, but then each goes back to her own browsing as Monica leans against the machines like a mother hen.

  “They’re okay, you think?”

  He glances over. “They look fine to me.”

  I sip my drink. “I’ve been thinking about what you told me. About Gavin, on the night I arrived. Any idea why he’d lie?”

  He shakes his head. “None.”

  “David told me Gavin’s the one who’s been selling drugs to the girls.”

  He cocks his head.

  “He said that?”

  “Yes.”

  “Gavin? You’re sure?”

  “Well, no. Not by name, He said “my friend,” but who else could he have meant?”

  He hesitates, then downs his drink before pouring another measure. He swallows hard.

  “He didn’t mean Gavin. I think he was talking about me.”

  The words sound wrong.

  “What?”

  “I used to do that,” he says.

  “What? Sell drugs?”

  “A little bit, yeah. It was just a bit of weed, and I stopped years ago, though David might not know it. But mostly I used to take stuff. Heavy stuff, you know? But it was when I was a kid. Not anymore. Not much else to do, back then. You know what it’s like, surely?”

  He’s said it pointedly. As if he knows.

  “I fell in with a bad crowd,” he continues. “Took me a while to see it. And that lady there”—he gestures toward Monica—“is the person who saved me.”

  “Saved you? You were together?”

  “I wouldn’t say that, but she persuaded me I was on a route to prison. Or worse.”

  “It was that bad?”

  He laughs. “Oh, yes. I was a wreck. Stealing things, you know. The works.”

  What? Selling your body, too? Breathing in the fat burps of drunk strangers so you could get your next hit? I don’t think so, though I suppose it’s possible.

  “That’s why I help out when I can. You know?”

  “What d’you mean?”

  “I rebuilt the village hall. Give the kids something to do. And Monica helps out, too, makes sure there’s a few things for the youngsters to do up there, keep ’em on the right track. It’s all about building a community,” he continues. He nods toward where Kat and Ellie stand with Monica, laughing with their friends. “They look fine to me.”

  I smile. He’s right. The sight of them takes me back for a moment to the reason I wanted to make this documentary.

  “Maybe I worry too much.”

  “Maybe.”

  But then I remember Zoe’s pregnancy, the rumors that Daisy didn’t kill herself, Bryan saying that she and Sadie had fallen out.

  “Do you think Daisy’s death was related to Sadie running away? You said they argued.”

  “I don’t know.” He sighs, then leans forward. “Maybe. There were rumors that things got nasty between them. One of them threatened the other.”

  “Who?”

  “Daisy. Daisy threatened Sadie, I think. She said she’d kill her. That’s what I heard, anyway. Don’t know how much truth there is in it. It was a long time ago.”

  “Almost ten years,” I say without thinking. “To the day.”

  “A long time, anyway.” He looks right at me. He wants to change the subject, I can tell. I glance at Kat and Ellie, and again I see the two of us. Me and Daisy.

  You’re not wearing that, are you? It ma
kes you look like a slag.

  Well, isn’t that the idea?

  “You okay?”

  I blink the image clear. Bryan puts his hand on my arm.

  “I’m fine,” I say. “It’s just . . . a couple of people have told me they don’t think Daisy killed herself.”

  “Who?”

  “Zoe’s parents, for one.”

  “Well, what happened to Zoe hit them hard. I wouldn’t take that much notice.” He smiles sadly. “Of course she killed herself. People just . . . they feel guilty, I suppose. She was so young . . .”

  For a second it seems almost as if he’s about to cry. I sense someone watching and look up to see Monica’s gaze fixed on us, her expression unreadable. She looks away when we both notice. He retracts his hand, but something’s happened over there. Ellie’s shoulders have fallen and she appears suddenly, desperately unhappy. As I watch, she glances up at me, almost as if she’d felt my gaze burning into the side of her face. Her eyes are wide and beseeching, her mouth set in a hard line, and I feel the urge to go over to her, to ask her what’s wrong, what’s happened. But I can’t; Kat would step in, as she had in the café, she’d begin answering my questions for her friend and I’d get nowhere. I’m going to have to be cleverer than that.

  I look back at Bryan. He’s noticed nothing.

  “Can I have some more?”

  He unscrews his flask and begins topping up my drink.

  “Say when.”

  I watch him tip the flask, watch as the amber liquid flows into the cup, but it’s as if I’m not there, or rather that I’m disconnected from it, as if I’m somehow watching it both from a great distance and in extreme close-up. And when I see that he’s added as much of the alcohol as I’d like, I can’t work out how to say stop, how to send the signal from my brain along the nerves and into the muscles of my jaw. Instead I watch mutely as he continues to pour, until after what seems like minutes I manage to force myself to shake my head.

  “Enough.”

  He looks up. He’s grinning. I hear myself thank him, then stand up.

  “I just . . . I won’t be a second.”

  I head toward the toilets at the back of the room. On the way I manage to catch Ellie’s eye and, though she looks away instantly, I hope she’s seen where I’m going and got the message.

  I go in. The light in here is even brighter; there’s a sink, a broken paper-towel dispenser, a cracked bar of pink soap. The noise of the arcade drops to a muted thud as the door closes behind me, but still it’s too loud. I drink some water—stale and lukewarm—then go into the cubicle and lock the door behind me. I listen out but hear only the distant music, the muffled voices and the stomping of my chest. I breathe in as deeply as I can. I try to calm down but can’t.

  The door opens and someone comes in. I step out.

  It’s Ellie. She’s standing in the doorway; she looks tiny.

  “Ellie,” I say. “Are you okay?”

  She doesn’t move. She stares straight at me, utterly still. I get the sense that if I were to move toward her, she’d run, like a startled animal.

  “Talk to me,” I say, as softly as I can, but she shakes her head.

  “I can’t.”

  “You can,” I say, nodding. “You can trust me. I promise.”

  “He was listening,” she says quietly.

  “Who? What?”

  “The other day. He was listening.”

  “The boy?” I say. “Kat’s boyfriend?”

  She shakes her head.

  “Who, then?”

  She doesn’t answer. I remember the phone I saw on the table, remember Kat’s burner phone.

  “What’s wrong, Ellie? What’s going on?”

  Still nothing.

  “Is it David?”

  She looks up at the mention of his name but says nothing. She’s terrified.

  “Tell me. What’s he done?”

  The door opens once more and Kat comes in. This close, I see her eyes are blackened with kohl and she’s wearing lipstick the color of a ripe plum. She looks from me to Ellie, and then back. Her face is like a bruise.

  “Oh, you’re here.”

  Her arms are bare and I see the circular tattoo on her upper arm, brand new. She stares at Ellie. “We have to go.”

  “Ellie, don’t—”

  Kat steps forward. She grabs the other girl’s arm. “I said, come on!”

  Ellie looks at me, but she’s already being dragged toward the door.

  “I’d better go,” she says, and I know then I need to find some way of speaking to her alone.

  23

  I return to Bryan, only to tell him I need to leave. He bites his lip.

  “Everything all right?”

  “Yes,” I say, vaguely. “It’s just . . . getting late.”

  He laughs briefly at the excuse, and I glance over to where Monica was standing with the girls. She’s drifted off a little now, and both Kat and Ellie stand with the others, looking happy enough.

  I smile as winningly as I can. “It’s just . . . work, you know. I have to try and get an edit done soon. I’m on a deadline.” I add: “For my producer.” He nods slowly, his disappointment evident. “I’ll see you soon.”

  I avoid Ellie and Kat as I leave but walk right past Monica. I smile at her, and she reciprocates, but half-heartedly. If she’s so keen to help out the girls, I wonder why she told me that Ellie is fine, when it’s clear she’s not. I wonder what she really believes.

  I turn left. The air is cold and damp, and a few steps up the street there’s a recessed doorway from where I can keep watch on the arcade. I will Ellie to come out by herself, but after fifteen minutes or so I’m disappointed; Kat appears with her friend in tow, Monica straight after them, with others trailing her. She and the girls huddle in a group, then she glances at her watch. “Come on, girls,” she says. “We don’t want to be late.”

  The girls trill with confident excitement. One peels off, saying she can’t make it but will come next time, while the remaining five or six accompany Monica toward The Ship. I wait until they’ve almost reached the corner before following and keep them in sight all the way up Slate Road. They chat, they look animated, happy to be going wherever Monica is leading them. Even Ellie is joining in, though she seems much younger than the others, looks almost like she’s trying to copy them, taking her cue from Kat.

  At the top of Slate Road Monica waits for the stragglers, then they enter the car park, a clutch of chicks scampering after their hen. Monica approaches a battered Volvo estate and gets in the driver’s seat, Kat next to her, while Ellie is helped into the boot by one of the others. Once they’re loaded, Monica begins to reverse and I head toward my car, intrigued.

  I set off unnoticed, aware suddenly of the whiskey coursing through my blood. Monica drives out of the village and turns left, not toward Malby, as I’d expected, but toward Crag Head. We go past the turning for the lighthouse, then she takes a side road that heads inland, then another lane, even narrower. I watch Monica drive up it but don’t follow, parking instead a little farther on before continuing on foot.

  She’s left her car next to a metal gate. I climb the trail as it rises gently, my view blocked both left and right by tall bushes between which the path meanders. I hear voices in the stillness, Monica and the girls chatting happily, a distant crow’s plaintive caw, but little else. I jog a few steps, fearful of losing them, but as I round a bend I see they’re directly ahead, standing in a huddle just past another gate, at which Monica fiddles with a padlock. I film them for a moment then step back, still unseen, and wait until they’ve moved on before following them through that gate, too, and into the fields.

  I hold my camera in front of me, still recording. The group is ahead, striding purposefully toward what looks like a large shed that sits in the near corner of the field with a yard in front of it. I skirt the edge, staying as close to the undergrowth as I can, and get as near as I dare. I spot two horses over in the middle of the field—on
e gray, the color of the sky, the other chestnut brown; both wearing rugs—and it all makes sense.

  I creep closer. Monica is unlocking the smallest of the three doors on the stable, chatting as she does. “Kat?” she’s saying. “Give us a hand, would you, love?”

  The others wait while Kat and she disappear inside what I’m guessing is the tack room. They reemerge a few minutes later with blankets and halters, then Monica takes the girls into the field itself.

  She’s too far away for me to hear what she says, but she gets one of the girls to whistle; it’s surprisingly loud. Both horses look up from their grazing and, to the girls’ evident delight, begin to trot over. Monica makes a fuss of the gray one while the girls crowd around the other, then she shows them how to attach the head collar and a rope. When that’s done they lead the snorting horses gently back to the yard and tie them up, then Monica demonstrates removing the rug and lets the girls do it, before they scratch the withers. Monica rubs a hand over each horse, explaining something as she does, and the girls coo enthusiastically. They look like they’re enjoying a rare treat; even Ellie looks in her element, a long way from the anxious girl who’d left the arcade. Kat and a couple of the others erupt into laughter; I consider trying to get nearer, to hear what’s being said, but it’s too risky, I don’t want to be seen; I have no earthly reason to be here.

  Still, I decide to try. I wait until Monica and the girls are engrossed. She’s kneeling at the horse’s foot, picking at it with some kind of metal tool while the girls watch, fascinated. I step forward, as slowly as I can, still filming. “Then we use a brush,” she’s saying, and Kat passes her something. “Like this.”

  “It doesn’t hurt?” says Ellie, and Monica shakes her head.

  “No, love. You can’t hurt her. Look, have a go?”

  “Can I?”

  Monica hands the pick to a thrilled Ellie. The others watch as she attends to the hoof, though a couple seem to be getting restless, giggling among themselves.

  “Girls?” says Monica, looking up. “Can you get the feed? Kat?”

  Kat leads them into the stable, emerging with two brightly colored tubs, one yellow, one green. They finish picking both horses’ hooves and Monica puts a different rug on the gray horse before letting the girls do the same with the brown. They pet both horses, stroking their muzzles, then Monica asks the girls to lead them into the stable and watches fondly as they begin to untie them. Ellie in particular seems to enjoy the connection with the neighing creature.