sunday, august 4, 2013

morning

it’s different, the nightmare i wake from thismorning. in it, i’ve done something wrong, but idon’t know what it is, all i know is that it cannot beput right. all i know is that tom hates me now, hewon’t talk to me any longer, and he has toldeveryone i know about the terrible thing i’ve done,and everyone has turned against me: old colleagues,my friends, even my mother. they look at me withdisgust, contempt, and no one will listen to me, noone will let me tell them how sorry i am. i feelawful, desperately guilty, i just can’t think what it isthat i’ve done. i wake and i know the dream mustcome from an old memory, some ancienttransgression—it doesn’t matter which one now.

after i got off the train yesterday, i hung aroundoutside ashbury station for a full fifteen or twentyminutes. i watched to see if he’d got off the trainwith me—the red-haired man—but there was no signof him. i kept thinking that i might have missed him,that he was there somewhere, just waiting for me towalk home so that he could follow me. i thoughthow desperately i would love to be able to run homeand for tom to be waiting for me. to have someonewaiting for me.

i walked home via the off-licence.

the flat was empty when i got back, it had thefeeling of a place just vacated, as though i’d justmissed cathy, but the note on the counter said shewas going out for lunch with damien in henley andthat she wouldn’t be back until sunday night. i feltrestless, afraid. i walked from room to room, pickingthings up, putting them down. something felt off, buti realized eventually that it was just me.

still, the silence ringing in my ears sounded likevoices, so i poured myself a glass of wine, and thenanother, and then i phoned scott. the phone wentstraight to voice mail: his message from anotherlifetime, the voice of a busy, confident man with abeautiful wife at home. after a few minutes, i phonedagain. the phone was answered, but no one spoke.

“hello?”

“who is this?”

“it’s rachel,” i said. “rachel watson.”

“oh.” there was noise in the background, voices, awoman. his mother, perhaps.

“you?.?.?. i missed your call,” i said.

“no?.?.?. no. did i call you? oh. by mistake.” hesounded flustered. “no, just put it there,” he said,and it took me a moment to realize he wasn’t talkingto me.

“i’m so sorry,” i said.

“yes.” his tone was flat and even.

“so sorry.”

“thank you.”

“did you?.?.?. did you need to talk to me?”

“no, i must have rung you by mistake,” he said,with more conviction this time.

“oh.” i could tell he was keen to get off the phone.

i knew i should leave him to his family, his grief. iknew that i should, but i didn’t. “do you knowanna?” i asked him. “anna watson?”

“who? you mean your ex’s missus?”

“yes.”

“no. i mean not really. megan?.?.?. megan did a bitof babysitting for her, last year. why do you ask?”

i don’t know why i ask. i don’t know. “can wemeet?” i asked him. “i wanted to talk to you aboutsomething.”

“about what?” he sounded annoyed. “it’s really nota great time.”

stung by his sarcasm, i was ready to hang upwhen he said, “i’ve got a house full of people here.

tomorrow? come by the house tomorrow afternoon.”

evening

he’s cut himself shaving: there’s blood on his cheekand on his collar. his hair is damp and he smells ofsoap and aftershave. he nods at me and standsaside, gesturing for me to the enter the house, buthe doesn’t say anything. the house is dark, stuffy,the blinds in the living room closed, the curtainsdrawn across the french doors leading to thegarden. there are tupperware containers on thekitchen counters.

“everyone brings food,” scott says. he gestures atme to sit down at the table, but he remains standing,his arms hanging limply at his sides. “you wanted totell me something?” he is a man on autopilot, hedoesn’t look me in the eye. he looks defeated.

“i wanted to ask you about anna watson, aboutwhether?.?.?. i don’t know. what was her relationshipwith megan like? did they like each other?”

he frowns, places his hands on the back of thechair in front of him. “no. i mean?.?.?. they didn’tdislike each other. they didn’t really know each othervery well. they didn’t have a relationship.” hisshoulders seem to sag lower still; he’s weary. “whyare you asking me about this?”

i have to come clean. “i saw her. i think i saw her,outside the underpass by the station. i saw her thatnight?.?.?. the night megan went missing.”

he shakes his head a little, trying to comprehendwhat i’m telling him. “sorry? you saw her. youwere?.?.?. where were you?”

“i was here. i was on my way to see?.?.?. to seetom, my ex-husband, but i—”

he squeezes his eyes shut, rubs his forehead.

“hang on a minute—you were here—and you sawanna watson? and? i know anna was here. shelives a few doors away. she told the police that shewent to the station around seven but that she didn’trecall seeing megan.” his hands grip the chair, i cantell he is losing patience. “what exactly are yousaying?”

“i’d been drinking,” i say, my face reddening with afamiliar shame. “i don’t remember exactly, but i’vejust got this feeling—”

scott holds his hand up. “enough. i don’t want tohear this. you’ve got some problem with your ex,your ex’s new wife, that’s obvious. it’s got nothing todo with me, nothing to do with megan, has it? jesus,aren’t you ashamed? do you have any idea of whati’m going through here? do you know that thepolice had me in for questioning this morning?” he’spushing down so hard on the chair, i fear it’s goingto break, i’m steeling myself for the crack. “and youcome here with this bullshit. i’m sorry your life is atotal fucking disaster, but believe me, it’s a picniccompared to mine. so if you don’t mind?.?.?.” hejerks his head in the direction of the front door.

i get to my feet. i feel foolish, ridiculous. and i amashamed. “i wanted to help. i wanted—”

“you can’t, all right? you can’t help me. no onecan help me. my wife is dead, and the police think ikilled her.” his voice is rising, spots of colour appearon his cheeks. “they think i killed her.”

“but?.?.?. kamal abdic?.?.?.”

the chair crashes against the kitchen wall with suchforce that one of the legs splinters away. i jumpback in fright, but scott has barely moved. his handsare back at his sides, balled into fists. i can see theveins under his skin.

“kamal abdic,” he says, teeth gritted, “is no longer asuspect.” his tone is even, but he is struggling torestrain himself. i can feel the anger vibrating offhim. i want to get to the front door, but he is in myway, blocking my path, blocking out what little lightthere was in the room.

“do you know what he’s been saying?” he asks,turning away from me to pick up the chair. ofcourse i don’t, i think, but i realize once again thathe’s not really talking to me. “kamal’s got all sorts ofstories. kamal says that megan was unhappy, that iwas a jealous, controlling husband, a—what was theword?—an emotional abuser.” he spits the wordsout in disgust. “kamal says megan was afraid of me.”

“but he’s—”

“he isn’t the only one. that friend of hers,tara—she says that megan asked her to cover forher sometimes, that megan wanted her to lie to meabout where she was, what she was doing.”

he places the chair back at the table and it fallsover. i take a step towards the hallway, and he looksat me then. “i am a guilty man,” he says, his face atwist of anguish. “i am as good as convicted.”

he kicks the broken chair aside and sits down onone of the three remaining good ones. i hover,unsure. stick or twist? he starts to talk again, hisvoice so soft i can barely hear him. “her phone wasin her pocket,” he says. i take a step closer to him.

“there was a message on it from me. the last thingi ever said to her, the last words she ever read,were go to hell you lying bitch.”

his chin on his chest, his shoulders start to shake. iam close enough to touch him. i raise my hand and,trembling, put my fingers lightly on the back of hisneck. he doesn’t shrug me away.

“i’m sorry,” i say, and i mean it, because althoughi’m shocked to hear the words, to imagine that hecould speak to her like that, i know what it is tolove someone and to say the most terrible things tothem, in anger or anguish. “a text message,” i say.

“it’s not enough. if that’s all they have?.?.?.”

“it’s not, though, is it?” he straightens up then,shrugging my hand away from him. i walk backaround the table and sit down opposite him. hedoesn’t look up at me. “i have a motive. i didn’tbehave?.?.?. i didn’t react the right way when shewalked out. i didn’t panic soon enough. i didn’t callher soon enough.” he gives a bitter laugh. “andthere is a pattern of abusive behaviour, according tokamal abdic.” it’s then that he looks up at me, thathe sees me, that a light comes on. hope. “you?.?.?.

you can talk to the police. you can tell them that it’sa lie, that he’s lying. you can at least give anotherside of the story, tell them that i loved her, that wewere happy.”

i can feel panic rising in my chest. he thinks i canhelp him. he is pinning his hopes on me and all ihave for him is a lie, a bloody lie.

“they won’t believe me,” i say weakly. “they don’tbelieve me. i’m an unreliable witness.”

the silence between us swells and fills the room; afly buzzes angrily against the french doors. scottpicks at the dried blood on his cheek, i can hear hisnails scraping against his skin. i push my chair back,the legs scraping on the tiles, and he looks up.

“you were here,” he says, as though the piece ofinformation i gave him fifteen minutes ago is onlynow sinking in. “you were in witney the night megan went missing?”

i can barely hear him above the blood thudding inmy ears. i nod.

“why didn’t you tell the police that?” he asks. i cansee the muscle tic in his jaw.

“i did. i did tell them that. but i didn’t have?.?.?. ididn’t see anything. i don’t remember anything.”

he gets to his feet, walks over to the french doorsand pulls back the curtain. the sunshine ismomentarily blinding. scott stands with his back tome, his arms folded.

“you were drunk,” he says matter-of-factly. “but youmust remember something. you must—that’s whyyou keep coming back here, isn’t it?” he turnsaround to face me. “that’s it, isn’t it? why you keepcontacting me. you know something.” he’s saying thisas though it’s fact: not a question, not an accusation,not a theory. “did you see his car?” he asks. “think.

blue vauxhall corsa. did you see it?” i shake myhead and he throws his arms up in frustration.

“don’t just dismiss it. really think. what did you see?

you saw anna watson, but that doesn’t meananything. you saw—come on! who did you see?”

blinking into the sunlight, i try desperately to piecetogether what i saw, but nothing comes. nothing real,nothing helpful. nothing i could say out loud. i wasin an argument. or perhaps i witnessed anargument. i stumbled on the station steps, a manwith red hair helped me up—i think that he waskind to me, although now he makes me feel afraid. iknow that i had a cut on my head, another on mylip, bruises on my arms. i think i remember being inthe underpass. it was dark. i was frightened,confused. i heard voices. i heard someone callmegan’s name. no, that was a dream. that wasn’treal. i remember blood. blood on my head, blood onmy hands. i remember anna. i don’t remembertom. i don’t remember kamal or scott or megan.

he is watching me, waiting for me to say something,to offer him some crumb of comfort, but i havenone.

“that night,” he says, “that’s the key time.” he sitsback down at the table, closer to me now, his backto the window. there is a sheen of sweat on hisforehead and his upper lip, and he shivers as thoughwith fever. “that’s when it happened. they thinkthat’s when it happened. they can’t be sure?.?.?.” hetails off. “they can’t be sure. because of thecondition?.?.?. of the body.” he takes a deep breath.

“but they think it was that night. or soon after.”

he’s back on autopilot, speaking to the room, not tome. i listen in silence as he tells the room that thecause of death was head trauma, her skull wasfractured in several places. no sexual assault, or atleast none that they could confirm, because of hercondition. her condition, which was ruined.

when he comes back to himself, back to me, thereis fear in his eyes, desperation.

“if you remember anything,” he says, “you have tohelp me. please, try to remember, rachel.” thesound of my name on his lips makes my stomachflip, and i feel wretched.

on the train, on the way home, i think about whathe said, and i wonder if it’s true. is the reason thati can’t let go of this trapped inside my head? isthere some knowledge i’m desperate to impart? iknow that i feel something for him, something i can’tname and shouldn’t feel. but is it more than that? ifthere’s something in my head, then maybe someonecan help me get it out. someone like a psychiatrist.

a therapist. someone like kamal abdic.

tuesday, august 6, 2013

morning

i’ve barely slept. all night, i lay awake thinking aboutit, turning it over and over in my mind. is thisstupid, reckless, pointless? is it dangerous? i don’tknow what i’m doing. i made an appointmentyesterday morning to see dr. kamal abdic. i rang hissurgery and spoke to a receptionist, asked for himby name. i might have been imagining it, but ithought she sounded surprised. she said he couldsee me today at four thirty. so soon? my heartbattering my ribs, my mouth dry, i said that wouldbe fine. the session costs ￡75. that ￡300 from mymother is not going to last very long.

ever since i made the appointment, i haven’t beenable to think of anything else. i’m afraid, but i’mexcited, too. i can’t deny that there’s a part of methat finds the idea of meeting kamal thrilling. becauseall this started with him: a glimpse of him and mylife changed course, veered off the tracks. themoment i saw him kiss megan, everything changed.

and i need to see him. i need to do something,because the police are only interested in scott. theyhad him in for questioning again yesterday. theywon’t confirm it, of course, but there’s footage on theinternet: scott, walking into the police station, hismother at his side. his tie was too tight, he lookedstrangled.

everyone speculates. the newspapers say that thepolice are being more circumspect, that they cannotafford to make another hasty arrest. there is talk ofa botched investigation, suggestions that a change inpersonnel may be required. on the internet, the talkabout scott is horrible, the theories wild, disgusting.

there are screen grabs of him giving his first tearfulappeal for megan’s return, and next to them arepictures of killers who had also appeared ontelevision, sobbing, seemingly distraught at the fate oftheir loved ones. it’s horrific, inhuman. i can onlypray that he never looks at this stuff. it would breakhis heart.

so, stupid and reckless i may be, but i am going tosee kamal abdic, because unlike all the speculators, ihave seen scott. i’ve been close enough to touchhim, i know what he is, and he isn’t a murderer.

evening

my legs are still trembling as i climb the steps tocorly station. i’ve been shaking like this for hours, itmust be the adrenaline, my heart just won’t slowdown. the train is packed—no chance of a seat here,it’s not like getting on at euston, so i have to stand,midway through a carriage. it’s like a sweatbox. i’mtrying to breathe slowly, my eyes cast down to myfeet. i’m just trying to get a handle on what i’mfeeling.

exultation, fear, confusion and guilt. mostly guilt.

it wasn’t what i expected.

by the time i got to the practice, i’d worked myselfup into a state of complete and utter terror: i wasconvinced that he was going to look at me andsomehow know that i knew, that he was going toview me as a threat. i was afraid that i would saythe wrong thing, that somehow i wouldn’t be able tostop myself from saying megan’s name. then iwalked into a doctor’s waiting room, boring andbland, and spoke to a middle-aged receptionist, whotook my details without really looking at me. i satdown and picked up a copy of vogue and flickedthrough it with trembling fingers, trying to focus mymind on the task ahead while at the same timeattempting to look unremarkably bored, just like anyother patient.

there were two others in there: a twentysomethingman reading something on his phone and an olderwoman who stared glumly at her feet, not oncelooking up, even when her name was called by thereceptionist. she just got up and shuffled off, sheknew where she was going. i waited there for fiveminutes, ten. i could feel my breathing gettingshallow. the waiting room was warm and airless, andi felt as though i couldn’t get enough oxygen intomy lungs. i worried that i might faint.

then a door flew open and a man came out, andbefore i’d even had time to see him properly, i knewthat it was him. i knew the way i knew that hewasn’t scott the first time i saw him, when he wasnothing but a shadow moving towards her—just animpression of tallness, of loose, languid movement. heheld out his hand to me.

“ms. watson?”

i raised my eyes to meet his and felt a jolt ofelectricity all the way down my spine. i put my handinto his. it was warm and dry and huge, envelopingthe whole of mine.

“please,” he said, indicating for me to follow himinto his office, and i did, feeling sick, dizzy all theway. i was walking in her footsteps. she did all this.

she sat opposite him in the chair he told me to sitin, he probably folded his hands just below his chinthe way he did this afternoon, he probably noddedat her in the same way, saying, “ok, what wouldyou like to talk to me about today?”

everything about him was warm: his hand, when ishook it; his eyes; the tone of his voice. i searchedhis face for clues, for signs of the vicious brute whosmashed megan’s head open, for a glimpse of thetraumatized refugee who had lost his family. icouldn’t see any. and for a while, i forgot myself. iforgot to be afraid of him. i was sitting there and iwasn’t panicking any longer. i swallowed hard andtried to remember what i had to say, and i said it. itold him that for four years i’d had problems withalcohol, that my drinking had cost me my marriageand my job, it was costing me my health, obviously,and i feared it might cost me my sanity, too.

“i don’t remember things,” i said. “i black out andi can’t remember where i’ve been or what i’ve done.

sometimes i wonder if i’ve done or said terriblethings, and i can’t remember. and if?.?.?. if someonetells me something i’ve done, it doesn’t even feel likeme. it doesn’t feel like it was me who was doing thatthing. and it’s so hard to feel responsible forsomething you don’t remember. so i never feel badenough. i feel bad, but the thing that i’ve done—it’sremoved from me. it’s like it doesn’t belong to me.”

all this came out, all this truth, i just spilled it infront of him in the first few minutes of being in hispresence. i was so ready to say it, i’d been waitingto say it to someone. but it shouldn’t have been him.

he listened, his clear amber eyes on mine, his handsfolded, motionless. he didn’t look around the roomor make notes. he listened. and eventually henodded slightly and said, “you want to takeresponsibility for what you have done, and you find itdifficult to do that, to feel fully accountable if youcannot remember it?”

“yes, that’s it, that’s exactly it.”

“so, how do we take responsibility? you canapologize—and even if you cannot remembercommitting your transgression, that doesn’t mean thatyour apology, and the sentiment behind your apology,is not sincere.”

“but i want to feel it. i want to feel?.?.?. worse.”

it’s an odd thing to say, but i think this all thetime. i don’t feel bad enough. i know what i’mresponsible for, i know all the terrible things i’vedone, even if i don’t remember the details—but i feeldistanced from those actions. i feel them at oneremove.

“you think that you should feel worse than you do?

that you don’t feel bad enough for your mistakes?”

“yes.”

kamal shook his head. “rachel, you have told methat you lost your marriage, you lost your job—doyou not think this is punishment enough?”

i shook my head.

he leaned back a little in his chair. “i think perhapsyou are being rather hard on yourself.”

“i’m not.”

“all right. ok. can we go back a bit? to when theproblem started. you said it was?.?.?. four years ago?

can you tell me about that time?”

i resisted. i wasn’t completely lulled by the warmthof his voice, by the softness of his eyes. i wasn’tcompletely hopeless. i wasn’t going to start telling himthe whole truth. i wasn’t going to tell him how ilonged for a baby. i told him that my marriagebroke down, that i was depressed, and that i’dalways been a drinker, but that things just got out ofhand.

“your marriage broke down, so?.?.?. you left yourhusband, or he left you, or?.?.?. you left each other?”

“he had an affair,” i said. “he met another womanand fell in love with her.” he nodded, waiting for meto go on. “it wasn’t his fault, though. it was myfault.”

“why do you say that?”

“well, the drinking started before?.?.?.”

“so your husband’s affair was not the trigger?”

“no, i’d already started, my drinking drove himaway, it was why he stopped?.?.?.”

kamal waited, he didn’t prompt me to go on, hejust let me sit there, waiting for me to say the wordsout loud.

“why he stopped loving me,” i said.

i hate myself for crying in front of him. i don’tunderstand why i couldn’t keep my guard up. ishouldn’t have talked about real things, i should havegone in there with some totally made-up problems,some imaginary persona. i should have been betterprepared.

i hate myself for looking at him and believing, for amoment, that he felt for me. because he looked atme as though he did, not as though he pitied me,but as though he understood me, as though i wassomeone he wanted to help.

“so then, rachel, the drinking started before thebreakdown of your marriage. do you think you canpoint to an underlying cause? i mean, not everyonecan. for some people, there is just a general slideinto a depressive or an addicted state. was theresomething specific for you? a bereavement, someother loss?”

i shook my head, shrugged. i wasn’t going to tellhim that. i will not tell him that.

he waited for a few moments and then glancedquickly at the clock on his desk.

“we will pick up next time, perhaps?” he said, andthen he smiled and i went cold.

everything about him is warm—his hands, his eyes,his voice—everything but the smile. you can see thekiller in him when he shows his teeth. my stomach ahard ball, my pulse skyrocketing again, i left his officewithout shaking his outstretched hand. i couldn’tstand to touch him.

i understand, i do. i can see what megan saw inhim, and it’s not just that he’s arrestingly handsome.

he’s also calm and reassuring, he exudes a patientkindness. someone innocent or trusting or simplytroubled might not see through all that, might not seethat under all that calm he’s a wolf. i understandthat. for almost an hour, i was drawn in. i letmyself open up to him. i forgot who he was. ibetrayed scott, and i betrayed megan, and i feelguilty about that.

but most of all, i feel guilty because i want to goback.

wednesday, august 7, 2013

morning

i had it again, the dream where i’ve done somethingwrong, where everyone is against me, sides withtom. where i can’t explain, or even apologize,because i don’t know what the thing is. in the spacebetween dreaming and wakefulness, i think of a realargument, long ago—four years ago—after our firstand only round of ivf failed, when i wanted to tryagain. tom told me we didn’t have the money, and ididn’t question that. i knew we didn’t—we’d taken ona big mortgage, he had some debts left over from abad business deal his father had coaxed him intopursuing—i just had to deal with it. i just had tohope that one day we would have the money, and inthe meantime i had to bite back the tears that came,hot and fast, every time i saw a stranger with abump, every time i heard someone else’s happynews.

it was a couple of months after we’d found out thatthe ivf had failed that he told me about the trip.

vegas, for four nights, to watch the big fight and letoff some steam. just him and a couple of his matesfrom the old days, people i had never met. it cost afortune, i know, because i saw the booking receiptfor the flight and the room in his email inbox. i’veno idea what the boxing tickets cost, but i can’timagine they were cheap. it wasn’t enough to pay fora round of ivf, but it would have been a start. wehad a horrible fight about it. i don’t remember thedetails because i’d been drinking all afternoon,working myself up to confront him about it, so wheni did it was in the worst possible way. i rememberhis coldness the next day, his refusal to speak aboutit. i remember him telling me, in flat disappointedtones, what i’d done and said, how i’d smashed ourframed wedding photograph, how i’d screamed athim for being so selfish, how i’d called him a uselesshusband, a failure. i remember how much i hatedmyself that day.

i was wrong, of course i was, to say those thingsto him, but what comes to me now is that i wasn’tunreasonable to be angry. i had every right to beangry, didn’t i? we were trying to have ababy—shouldn’t we have been prepared to makesacrifices? i would have cut off a limb if it meant icould have had a child. couldn’t he have forgone aweekend in vegas?

i lie in bed for a bit, thinking about that, and theni get up and decide to go for a walk, because if idon’t do something i’m going to want to go roundto the corner shop. i haven’t had a drink sincesunday and i can feel the fight going on within me,the longing for a little buzz, the urge to get out ofmy head, smashing up against the vague feeling thatsomething has been accomplished and that it wouldbe a shame to throw it away now.

ashbury isn’t really a good place to walk, it’s justshops and suburbs, there isn’t even a decent park. ihead off through the middle of town, which isn’t sobad when there’s no one else around. the trick is tofool yourself into thinking that you’re headedsomewhere: just pick a spot and set off towards it. ichose the church at the top of pleasance road,which is about two miles from cathy’s flat. i’ve beento an aa meeting there. i didn’t go to the local onebecause i didn’t want to bump into anyone i mightsee on the street, in the supermarket, on the train.

when i get to the church, i turn around and walkback, striding purposefully towards home, a womanwith things to do, somewhere to go. normal. i watchthe people i pass—the two men running, backpackson, training for the marathon, the young woman in ablack skirt and white trainers, heels in her bag, onher way to work—and i wonder what they’re hiding.

are they moving to stop drinking, running to standstill? are they thinking about the killer they metyesterday, the one they’re planning to see again?

i’m not normal.

i’m almost home when i see it. i’ve been lost inthought, thinking about what these sessions withkamal are actually supposed to achieve: am i reallyplanning to rifle through his desk drawers if hehappens to leave the room? to try to trap him intosaying something revealing, to lead him intodangerous territory? chances are he’s a lot clevererthan i am; chances are he’ll see me coming. afterall, he knows his name has been in the papers—hemust be alert to the possibility of people trying to getstories on him or information from him.

this is what i’m thinking about, head down, eyeson the pavement, as i pass the little londis shop onthe right and try not to look at it because it raisespossibilities, but out of the corner of my eye i seeher name. i look up and it’s there, in huge letters onthe front of a tabloid newspaper: was megan achild killer?