by Dean Mayes
The name of Rex’s dead sister stung Belle in much the same way that she guessed it had struck her mother in law. In that terrible moment, Belle realised she hadn’t heard Rex speak her name since Ruby was born.
Putting a hand up to his bandages, Rex held his head in a vain effort to splint his head against the pain but also, to hold himself up against the onslaught of his grief.
“I c-can’t stop it!” he wept openly. “I can’t stop the memories, Belle—of finding Aggy in that alley—after all those weeks of searching. She was—bleeding from everywhere. All those holes in her—all over her and…”
Rex gasped. His eyes went wide and he felt bile collect in the back of his throat as long dormant memories assaulted him all at once—memories he had blocked for so long from all those long years of drinking, of trying to forget.
Waves of nausea washed over him so powerful, he vomited into his lap.
“…and the b-baby!” he cried, kicking the soiled bed covers as far away from him as he could manage.
Belle stared stonily at her husband but inside, she felt her heart drop and shatter as though it were made of glass.
Dormant memories that, like Rex, she had buried deep down were now bubbling towards the surface and she had no way of shielding herself from them.
She had loved Rex’s dear sister from the moment they had met but from that very first meeting, Belle knew that she was deeply troubled.
Aggy Delfey had struggled in her relationship with her mother. Virginia's mental illness in the years after leaving the orphanage took its toll on their family and, while her husband and son were able to cope with the years of mental pain and suffering Virginia endured, Aggy railed against it. She railed against her mother; as a result, their relationship had fractured.
With their focus upon Virginia’s internal emotional battle, both Rex and his father failed to notice Aggy drifting further and further away from them.
Rebelling against her family, Aggy had fallen into a netherworld of drugs and prostitution, going missing for days at a time before being brought home either by friends or the police.
And then, one day she didn’t come home. Night after night, Rex had walked the streets of the city, searching for his sister. He’d watched Aggy Delfey’s downward spiral for months as she became entrapped in this world, forsaking herself from everything she knew to a posse of low-lives and scum, until it was too late.
Aggy Delfey’s final destruction came at the hands of the man who had raped her; the man with whom she had unwittingly conceived a child—a child that no one, not even she, knew of.
The man was a ‘regular’ of Aggy's, a dealer who had ensnared her in the world to which she had surrendered.
Her addiction ensured that he could use her for sex whenever he wanted while he could drip feed her a tantalizing but fractured supply of drugs. He raped her repeatedly and without conscience and Aggy endured it for fear that he would cut off her access to the drugs.
As time wore on, Aggy began to protest the violence she endured at his hand.
It culminated in a drug-fuelled argument in a city nightclub that had spilled out into the street and into the nearby alleyway. As the blade of the flick knife stabbed into her body over and over again, it triggered the premature labour of the child she unknowingly carried.
Had he been just a few moments earlier, Rex might have prevented the disaster that had befallen his sister.
“She didn’t even know,” Rex sobbed, holding up his arms in a parody of cradling a baby. “I scooped that kid up off that filthy pavement and held it up to her so she could see…and s-she didn’t even know!”
His eye drifted to a spot on the wall in front of his bed and glazed over, his memories becoming lost in a maelstrom.
Belle was stunned, her jaw slack. Horror flooded through her as she struggled to process the words her husband had spoken—things he had never spoken of until this very moment.
She was unable to speak. She didn’t know what to say. There was nothing she could say.
Her own memories of that night flashed before her.
She had arrived at the hospital to find her husband sitting alone in the waiting area of the Emergency Department, holding his head in his blood-stained hands, rocking back and forth.
As she sat down beside him and put her arm around his shoulders, he shook uncontrollably, unable to look up at her. Through his grief-stricken sobs, the only words he was able to utter were, “She’s gone… It’s over there…”
Belle looked to an area of the Emergency Room where several people were gathered around a small, wheeled cart, frantically attending to a tiny infant. So tiny, it wasn’t even crying…
Belle snapped herself back to the present and immediately felt the walls of the hospital room begin to close in on her. Her heartbeat began to quicken, her breathing became shallow. A sense of claustrophobia overwhelmed her. She glanced at her sobbing, pathetic husband in his hospital bed.
Belle backed away toward the door and exited hurriedly, almost crashing into a nurse who had come to see what all the commotion was about.
Before she could allow herself to collapse, Belle turned and ran away down the hall.
Ruby sat huddled on her bed, staring at the violin case that lay just beyond her feet.
It had been days since she’d opened it. She couldn’t bring herself to. To do so would be to invite all those terrible memories of her uncle’s appalling behaviour to visit her and she couldn’t bear the thought of reliving them again.
Her grandmother had set the violin at the end of her bed in the hope Ruby might pick it up and begin playing but not even that could cajole her from her trauma. The last thing Ruby could think of was music. All she could see and feel was pain, the broken pieces of their lives.
She hadn’t seen Khalili in over a week. In the immediate aftermath of Asher’s explosion, Ruby had taken the train into the city on her own and she’d approached Elder Hall from across the lawn. But something snapped inside of her. It was as if all the music she had learned and performed had suddenly left her. Her music was gone and she had panicked. She turned and ran away, even ignoring Sir Walter Hughes’ statue.
She hadn’t gone back.
Ruby was aware that Khalili had phoned the house and spoken to Virginia in the days following. Virginia had covered for Ruby by saying she was too sick to rehearse. He’d apparently accepted this explanation on the first occasion and the next—and the next. But as time wore on Ruby knew that both Khalili and her grandmother were growing increasingly concerned. The Malley-Joyce recital was fast approaching and Ruby was unprepared.
She knew she could only use the illness as a cover for so long.
But she wasn’t sure if she even cared any more.
Ruby had watched Asher withdraw further and further. She stayed in her bed, refusing to eat or drink, shower or even toilet herself. As much as Virginia and Belle tried to coax her back to some semblance of activity, Asher stayed mute and her apparent catatonia was beginning to take its toll on all of them.
Jeremy had begun to disappear after school for hours at a time, coming home long after dark while everyone else was asleep. He too had withdrawn, had broken his promises to Ruby yet again. Ruby knew those boys who were taking him over.
Again, she wasn’t sure if she cared.
About her music, about her future. She began to accept that, after all, she was destined to remain trapped in this fractured family forever.
Khalili sat at his desk, gazing out through the window, lost in thought. Frustration gnawed at him and he felt powerless to do anything. His repeated telephone calls to Ruby’s house had yielded little information to explain her sudden absence.
The recital was only two weeks away and there was still so much to do.
Hearing a knock, Khalili turned in his chair to see Lynch standing in the door way to his office.
Khalili gestured him in with a limp wave of his hand.
“Still no word?” Lynch ventured with an ex
pression of sympathy.
Khalili threw his hands up in the air in exasperation and he shook his head.
“I haven’t a clue,” he responded. “Just like that, with no explanation, she stopped coming. Her grandmother says she is sick but…I fear something terrible has happened.”
Lynch tilted his head slightly.
“Do you think that her grandmother might simply be telling the truth?”
Khalili shook his head.
“No. I could sense it in Mrs. Delfey’s voice. She is covering for her. Ruby is in trouble somehow. This is more than just an illness.”
Khalili steepled his hands in front of his mouth and unconsciously began nibbling at his fingers.
“You could go out there,” Lynch ventured helpfully.
“I don’t know,” Khalili sighed. “I am rarely a welcome sight at their home—as far as Ruby’s aunt and uncle are concerned. They see me as a something of an intrusion—a troublemaker. I’m not welcome in their world.”
Lynch reclined in his chair and crossed one leg over the other. Khalili noted with some annoyance his colleague’s conspiratorial grin.
“When has that ever stopped you?”
Belle was asleep in her armchair in the living room when a loud knock at the door woke her abruptly. Minty, who sitting on the floor at her feet watching Sesame Street on TV, jumped at the sound and turned to his mother. She struggled to her feet, knocking over a beer glass in the process, before she made it to the front door. Cursing under her breath Belle unlatched the door and swung it open to find Khalili standing on the step. His face was filled with concern.
“Mrs. Delfey,” he greeted nervously. “I am sorry to trouble you. Is Ruby or her grandmother at home? It’s just…I am very concerned about her. It’s been over a week and we haven’t had any rehearsal.”
Belle hung her head wearily and shook it slowly.
“Look…Mr. Khalili,” she began, choosing her words. “Virginia and Ruby have appreciated everything you’ve tried to do but…Ruby isn’t getting better very fast. I doubt she’ll be able to be in this concert thing of yours.”
Khalili huffed and puffed in barely concealed exasperation. He couldn’t believe it had come to this.
“Mrs. Delfey, is there anything I can do? I just can’t accept that Ruby is so unwe—”
“She’s not well and that’s that!” Belle cut him off angrily. “None of the children are. But it’s our problem to deal with and nobody else’s.”
Belle opened the screen door and stepped out on the porch.
“Go back to your school, professor,” she whispered in a tone that was mildly threatening. “Go back to your students and worry about things you can fix.”
She waited a moment as Khalili desperately searched for the words to respond, then decided not to respond at all.
“You can’t fix us, don’t you understand? You never could.”
She closed the door in his face without another word.
Chapter 27
Gavin and Mickey approached Jeremy on foot, having prudently decided to leave their car parked on the street, out of view of the school grounds.
They stood, watching Jeremy mingle with a group of his school friends on the quadrangle in front of the main building, until they caught his attention and he broke away from the group and jogged across the grass toward them. It had been several days since they’d witnessed Jeremy’s act of vandalism on his teacher’s expensive sports car.
When he came to within a few feet of them, Gavin and Mickey abruptly turned their backs to him and began walking.
“Come for a walk,” Gavin instructed out of the corner of his mouth as they did so.
Jeremy blinked and shook his head subtly before falling into a brisk walk behind them.
Making sure they kept out of view of the school buildings, Gavin and Mickey made their way to the car park where most of the teaching staff’s vehicles were parked. Once there, they began strolling leisurely in between each of the cars, as though they were customers checking out a car yard, peering in the windows of some of the vehicles, casually kicking the tyres of others.
Jeremy languished a few feet behind them, watching with a nervous expression.
Gavin came to Baxter’s sleek BMW coupe. He stopped, then slowly rounded the car, running a gentle finger along the polished Duco, admiring it with a malevolent smile. He paused at the still damaged headlight, shaking his head but saying nothing.
Mickey, meanwhile, walked across to a nearby fence and leaned against it, hands in the pockets of his hoodie.
Jeremy shifted his glance between Mickey and Gavin, hesitantly joining Mickey on the fence until Gavin had completed his inspection of the BMW, then he sauntered across to the others, nodding subtly to Mickey.
Rubbing his bottom lip between thumb and fore finger, Gavin tilted his head slightly towards Jeremy.
“Baner has called in a favour,” he began curtly, his eyes narrowing. “And we feel we’re in a position to…facilitate. We also feel, that the time has come to test you. It’s time for you to step up.”
Mickey paused for a moment, allowing his words to sink in. Then he continued.
“Baner is looking for…stock…a particular kind of stock that will attract a high price on the secondary market and we reckon we’ve found just the right piece that will interest him.”
Mickey nodded toward the BMW, then looked at Jeremy with an intense gaze.
Jeremy felt his mouth begin to dry. He felt his heartbeat quicken as the implications of what Mickey was saying struck home.
“He hates you…” Gavin stated unexpectedly. “Doesn’t he?”
Jeremy turned toward Gavin, his expression registering mild surprise. It was one of the few times that Gavin had ever spoken to Jeremy. His heightened anxiety halted momentarily, distracted by Gavin’s enigmatic presence.
“He ridicules you in front of the others, singles you out. I’ll bet he takes the piss out of you in class all the time. Doesn’t he, Jeremy?”
Gavin stepped forward in front of Jeremy, blocking his view of the BMW.
“He treats you like shit because he thinks you’re nothing but a dumb fuck coon, doesn’t he?”
The pejorative stung Jeremy, but he knew that Gavin was right. He was surprised that Gavin could know about all the humiliation Jeremy had endured at the hands of Mr. Baxter, even though he knew he shouldn’t be. Gavin was right about a lot of things. The memory of being humiliated in class and on the sports field the other day returned to Jeremy’s thoughts and he met them with anger that was fuelled by Gavin’s prescient words.
“This is your chance for some payback. Your chance to take from him, what he’s taken from you, over and over again.”
Mickey turned to face Jeremy now.
“We want to hit that prick and take his car from him. If we do, we’re going to be first in line for quite a handy payday—all of us.”
Mickey allowed Jeremy to take in what he was saying, before he continued.
“You know him, know his habits and his movements. We want you to help plan this and carry it out. It’ll be quick, painless, nobody will get hurt—except for Mr. Prickface’s pride and his wallet—and you, Jeremy, will have earned your status as an equal.”
Mickey gently punched Jeremy on the arm, the adrenaline surge returning once more, though this time, it was a surge accompanied by feelings of excitement, of anticipation, the promise of power.
A smile slowly broke across Jeremy’s lips as he thought about the prospects. That was until Gavin stepped right up close to Jeremy and fixed him with a menacing glower that immediately wilted those positive feelings.
He remained there, unmoving, silent for several long moments, his presence alone causing Jeremy to crumble underneath it.
Jeremy tried to meet Gavin’s eyes but he couldn’t. Instead, they involuntarily darted in every direction but Gavin’s.
“This is your chance, right? Your one and only chance,” Gavin rumbled malevolently. “If you fu
ck this up…there will be consequences. Understand?”
Jeremy stood as still as he could, trying not to cower. He nodded quickly, anxiously, praying that Gavin would back away from him.
Eventually, and in a manner that was sudden, Gavin did stand back. He relaxed and the anger seemed to dissipate from him all at once. He even managed a smile.
“Now…what do we know about your friend Mr. Stephen Baxter?” he asked.
Over by the main building, that looked out onto the lawned area flanking it and across to the car park, Miss Glasson sauntered leisurely on yard monitoring duties, chatting with a group of students whilst eating an apple. As she laughed along with them and surveyed the grounds, her gaze drifted across the lawns towards the car park where she noticed three individuals standing.
Though they were a considerable distance away, Miss Glasson identified Jeremy. The other two looked unfamiliar. Her first thought was that it probably wasn’t unusual since this school had a considerably large student population. However, something in the way they were standing, occasionally looking across and pointing to one of the cars—Baxter’s car—made her stop, lift her hand to shield her eyes and study them more intently.
An uncomfortable feeling settled in the pit of her stomach.
“He works out,” Jeremy was saying, looking down at the ground. “All the time—at a gym on Main North Road. In fact, he’s like, a part owner of it or something. He’s always bragging about it. He’s there at least four nights a week until late.”
Mickey nodded, impressed.
“Good. We’ll follow him then, for a couple of nights, see what he does, check him out a bit and then we’ll make our move.”
“I’ll word Baner and his crew up,” Gavin added. “Get them into position close by after we hit him so they can take delivery quickly.”
“We should be in and out of there before the dick-head even knows what’s happened to him.”
Gavin and Mickey exchanged satisfied looks with one another, the cogs turning in both their minds. Jeremy examined them both, a worried furrow creasing his brow.