Final Cut : A Novel (2020)

by Watson, S J

  Zoe Pearson’s story is different. She went in late spring, over three and a half years ago. She was there one day, gone the next. Her bed empty, her parents thought she’d snuck out to meet a boyfriend, but she never returned. A runaway, that’s all; no one has talked about suicide, no one thinks she was abducted. So why, according to Gavin at least, do ‘some people’ think the girls’ cases are linked?

  I finish my coffee and find my coat and camera. I won’t find out sitting here.

  I squeeze through the narrow gap and out on to Slate Road. The village is more or less deserted. A lone man sits down by the slipway, and a little further on a group of girls has taken over one of the benches near the pub. Smoking, I suppose, though I’m too far away to tell. There’s no one else. I record the scene for a moment, then head down. On the slipway I film the gulls wheeling and diving over the lobster pots, the weed-tangled ropes slapping in the wind. I film The Ship Aground – or The Ship, as I know it’s called locally – the gift shops, a bookshop I find up one of the alleys. I film the lighthouse and make a mental note to return at night. Beyond the pub the coastline curves sharply towards the promontory that juts out into the water – The Rocks, Gavin called it – and on it, the black house sits. Bluff House. I film that, too, then decide to climb the steep path up towards the car park.

  I avoid the black ice, using the steps where I can and stopping every now and again to get my breath back and film the view. I scan the horizon, recording the distant trees as they bend in the wind. The air seems thinner up here, easier to breathe. I turn left, past the car park and the village hall. There’s a grocery store on the right, plus a post office with a voluntary community shop attached. Both sell postcards, an almost identical selection, and I check to see whether either stock the one sent to Dan. I’m certain now that it came from Blackwood Bay, and though I have visions of sleuthing my way to an answer, this time I’m not in luck. The photos are views of the village and the surrounding area, pictures of the pub from centuries ago, but none matches. I’ll have to keep looking.

  The park is across the road and I push through the sprung gate and go in. It’s tiny, just a playground really, a few swings and a seesaw, a tiny bandstand in the centre, but from here there’s a great view over the village and down into the bay itself. In the distance sits Bluff House, silent and still. I feel drawn to it somehow, connected, even from here. The pull is hypnotic, a black hole at the edge of the water, sucking everything towards it, even light. I feel suddenly certain it’s the place where Daisy jumped.

  I tear myself away and look beyond it. Way in the distance, just visible across the water, is the next town along. Malby. A metropolis by comparison. There’re estates there, new homes with neat lawns and expensive cars parked in the driveways. The schools are there, the supermarkets, the fast-food restaurants, plus a tiny cinema and solitary nightclub. But it might as well be a million miles away.

  I decide to get a hot drink before returning to Hope Cottage. There’s a café halfway down Slate Road and I head there. The door clatters as I enter. An unreconstructed greasy spoon: plastic tablecloths, bowls of wrapped sugar cubes, egg and chips, tea served in a chipped mug. There are plenty of free tables. A tiny Christmas tree pulses on the counter at the back, the end of each branch lit with tacky fibre optics, and I order coffee from the woman who stands behind the counter in a spotless apron and smudged glasses. She’s in her early forties, I’d guess, and has cut her prematurely grey hair short, in a stylish pixie-cut.

  I’ve just sat down with my drink when the door jangles open and a man enters, wearing a waterproof jacket. He’s short – only a little taller than me – and solid. Unshaven; his hair is long and looks artfully disarranged. He orders a bacon roll and we almost make eye contact as he turns to choose a table, but then he skims past me to say hello to a guy sitting in the corner instead. He takes a seat and opens a magazine before settling in to wait for his food. He looks familiar, though only distantly, and I can’t place him. In one of the films, perhaps? In any case, there’s something about him that’s magnetic; though not particularly attractive, he has an aura, a glow that draws the eye. I go back to my drink, but too late. He’s spotted me staring.

  ‘Nice day,’ he says, and I look back up. He’s grinning, but his eyes are strange; one is darker than the other and has a curious, beady pulse. He lowers his magazine. ‘You visiting?’

  I tell him I am. ‘Seems pretty quiet?’

  He laughs.

  ‘It’s always bloody quiet nowadays.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Yep. You staying here?’

  I glance out of the window to where a group of girls is walking past, cackling as they go. I’m not sure why I’m pretending nonchalance; it just seems the right thing to do.

  ‘I am, yeah. Down in the village.’

  He pauses. ‘Anything to do with that film?’

  Before I can answer a shadow passes and I look once more out at the street. A lone guy is walking past and for a second I think he’s following the giggling girls I saw a moment ago, but then I tell myself I’m being paranoid, just projecting my own experience from when I was first down in London.

  ‘Only, I saw the camera, like.’

  I’d put it on the table in front of me, next to the bowl of sugar. I smile.

  ‘You caught me out.’

  ‘I’m a real Sherlock Holmes, me,’ he says, grinning. ‘I think I’m sorting out your car?’

  ‘Is that right? You’re a friend of Gavin’s?’

  ‘Yep.’ He reaches across and holds out his hand for me to shake. ‘Bryan. It’ll be done in a few days. Damaged suspension.’ He gestures towards the chair opposite mine. ‘Mind if I join you?’

  ‘Not at all. I’m Alex.’

  He comes over and settles himself. This close, I catch his aftershave, sweetly spicy, though with something else, too. A hint of leather, perhaps. Something dark and dirty. He puts his magazine on the table – Sea Angler – and I remember where I’ve seen him. One of the news stories I’d skimmed had covered the campaign – ultimately doomed – to save the lifeboat service, and he’d been in one of the photos, wearing a yellow jacket, handing out leaflets.

  ‘How’s it going?’

  ‘Sorry?’

  He laughs. ‘The film?’

  ‘Oh, okay,’ I say. ‘Early days.’

  ‘So what’re folk filming?’

  ‘All kinds of things.’ I think back to the clips from yesterday. The girl faking a suicide. Teenagers eating a takeaway on one of the benches by the pub. ‘They’re all online. Take a look.’

  ‘Maybe I will. It’s good, you know? It’ll be nice to see the place on the map at last.’ He glances towards the woman at the counter, though she seems determinedly engrossed in wiping the surface while she waits for her customer’s food to cook. He lowers his voice. ‘It’s tough, you know? Bein’ this quiet. Your programme might be a nice little boost for folk.’ He sits back. ‘That’s what we’re all hoping for, anyway.’

  ‘Well, I’ll see what I can do,’ I say. I hesitate. Dan’s words echo. See what you can dig up, okay? ‘I suppose you want to see the place in the news for the right reasons?’

  His eyes narrow, just slightly. ‘What’s that?’

  I pick up a sugar cube from the bowl. ‘I’m just saying. That girl who died. Daisy, was it?’

  ‘That’s right.’

  ‘It must’ve been a bad time. Small village like this … You were around back then?’

  ‘Aye. But I don’t live in the village. My place is over near Malby.’

  ‘You didn’t know her, then?’

  ‘Not well. But a little.’

  ‘It’s a small place.’

  He sips his drink. I wonder how far I can go.

  ‘They said it was suicide …’

  ‘Well, if that’s what they said, I guess it was.’

  ‘But why?’

  ‘Who knows? She were a teenager. Boyfriend trouble?’

  ‘That hardly exp
lains why someone would kill themselves.’

  He smiles ruefully and I find myself wondering if he has children. There’s something about him that makes me think not, though I can’t pinpoint what. There’s a sadness about him, an emptiness, despite the charm. He looks like, if he’s freighted with anything, it’s the weight of lost opportunities and wrong choices.

  ‘That’s what a few people were saying back then,’ he says carefully. ‘But, truth is, I don’t think her family life helped. Her mother was on her own. Drink. Drugs. You know they lived in a caravan?’

  I nod. The woman behind the counter is fiddling with the radio, pretending not to be listening. I lean forward and lower my voice.

  ‘There was another girl, too? Zoe? Zoe Pearson?’

  He hesitates. I wonder if I’ve pushed too far. After all, why should he trust me?

  ‘Yeah,’ he says slowly, ‘but that were different. She ran away. That’s all I know.’ He puts his cup down. ‘Is this what your film’s really about?’

  He sounds disappointed, wary, and I shake my head. ‘No. It’s just … I’m interested, I suppose. Two girls from the same village—’

  ‘Not the same, though,’ he insists. ‘One ran away. The other jumped off the cliffs.’

  I can see him deciding whether or not to talk to me, but I’m doing something right, because he goes on: ‘And there was her friend, of course. Went missing around the same time, about ten years ago now.’ The room goes cold. ‘Some folk reckon there was something going on there. Some falling-out or something. But who knows?’

  A silence falls. The sugar cube I’ve been fiddling with bursts, and I sweep the table with my hand then look out at the darkening sky.

  ‘Is Daisy’s mother still around?’

  He shakes his head. ‘It were the last straw for her, from what I heard. She were half dead with the drink anyway, and the shock of it all pretty much finished her off.’

  ‘So is there anyone who knew them?’ I say. ‘Daisy and this friend of hers? Anyone who might know what happened between them?’

  He thinks for a moment. ‘Monica, maybe?’

  ‘Monica? My landlady?’

  ‘You’re in Hope Cottage, then?’

  I nod. His lunch arrives, wrapped in greaseproof paper, along with a coffee. He thanks the waitress.

  ‘Try her, if you want to go delving into all that, but like I say, I reckon it were just one of those things. You can’t live your life like she did and not pay the price.’

  ‘Like she did?’

  He smiles ruefully. ‘She could be wild. Anyway, I’d better go.’ He gathers his things with a cheerful wink. ‘See you around, I hope.’

  7

  I sit at my computer. I’ve persuaded Monica to meet me later this morning, but there’s still time to work. A film of an older guy petting his dog has come in; another of a woman baking while, next to her, a baby gurgles happily in a highchair. I crank up the ancient machine and there’s a short-lived grinding noise from deep within. I used this computer to make my first film and, though I know it’s sentimental and ridiculous, abandoning it now would feel like Samson cutting off his own hair.

  I wait for it to recover, then press Play. The next film opens with a black screen and noise, shouting that sounds wordless, and then the camera steadies, showing first a yellowed wall and then a woman appearing in front of it. She’s overweight, dressed in a cardigan, her hair tied back in a tight ponytail. She yells at whoever is holding the camera.

  ‘No!’ she’s saying. ‘You can forget it!’

  The reply comes from close by. Just behind the camera.

  ‘That’s not fair!’

  ‘Fair?! I’ll give you fair, you little … And what the fuck’re you doing with that?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Your phone, Ellie!’

  ‘Nothing.’

  ‘Put it away!’

  There’s no answer. The woman looks to her right, where a man in a shirt and jeans leans against a doorframe, watching the argument but apparently reluctant to join in.

  ‘Are you gonna tell her?’ she says. ‘Or just stand there?’

  He shrugs pathetically.

  ‘Chris! For fuck’s sake!’

  Now he turns to whoever has the camera. ‘Ellie,’ he says. ‘Listen to your mother.’

  ‘But it’s not fair!’

  ‘You were told,’ he says. ‘No more dance class unless you start improving at school.’

  ‘But—!’

  He holds up his hands. ‘Enough. Go to your room. And turn that bloody thing off.’

  The frame lurches as the girl holding it – Ellie – swings to the left. There’s a mirror on the wall next to her father and, in it, and only for a frame or two, I glimpse her reflection. I press Rewind and freeze it. She looks young. Thirteen or fourteen, with pale skin and beautiful ginger hair framing an innocent, freckled face.

  I hesitate. Should I make this public? It’s been filmed in anger, and no doubt uploaded in a fit of rage, a kicking out against the impotence of being a teenager. But she might regret it later. She might realise she never wanted it to be seen by anyone else, let alone the rest of the village. She might wake up tomorrow and worry about being in even more trouble with her parents when they find out what she’s done.

  I move the clip to the section marked Private then go upstairs. I need to get ready, and think about how I can get Monica onside.

  We’ve arranged to meet at the end of the lane, and she greets me with a cheery ‘Morning!’ when she sees me emerge from beneath the archway. She holds out her hand; plastic bangles crackle on her wrist. ‘Nice to finally meet you!’

  ‘You, too!’ I say. She looks younger than in her picture, early thirties, perhaps. Only a few years older than me. She’s heavier, though. Her hair is longer now and today it’s tied back with a pale yellow bandana. She’s wearing faded blue jeans and a purple waterproof jacket. At her neck I glimpse a knitted sweater in a garish yellow and she’s wearing a plastic necklace of blue beads the size of marbles. Her eyes spark and she has a strange, twitchy nervousness; she looks like some kind of earth-mother, like someone who’d make her own muesli and buy everything organic and Fair Trade. Or perhaps a schoolteacher, friendly but slightly lost.

  ‘Settled in? Everything okay?’

  I tell her I’m fine.

  ‘I left all the details. They’re in the folder.’

  She means the one on the coffee table in the living room. I skimmed through it the first night. It’s stuffed with information leaflets, things to do, places to go. Most are out of date.

  ‘And I’m just next door.’

  ‘Right,’ I say. ‘I didn’t know that.’ She glances at me, her eyes curious. Has she sensed the discomfort in my voice? ‘Must be handy.’

  ‘It is,’ she says. ‘But don’t worry. I won’t disturb you.’ She pats my arm. ‘Shall we go for a brew? I’ll take you to Liz’s.’

  I tell her that’d be good and we begin to climb the hill. Once we reach the café – the same one in which I met Bryan yesterday – we sit in the window and Monica picks up a laminated menu.

  ‘Tea, then?’

  The woman from yesterday comes over – Monica introduces her as Liz – and today she smiles thinly as she takes our order, without quite meeting my eye. While it’s not exactly hostile, it occurs to me she’s found out who I am and doesn’t like it. Well, I think, let her disapprove. Not everyone has to be onboard for the project to work; the odd sour-faced old cynic won’t matter.

  ‘Anything else?’

  I say no and she retreats. Monica leans forward.

  ‘So, was there something you wanted to talk to me about?’

  I hesitate, but think of the documentary. I have to get the channel to bite. I got the girls in Black Winter to open up, so I must have it in me.

  ‘Daisy,’ I say.

  She recoils, just slightly, but then seems to recover her composure. ‘Daisy Willis? Is that why you’re here?’

  ‘It�
�s just background for the film. I’m interested in the effect it had on the community. You knew her?’

  She’s about to answer when the door opens and a group of girls comes in. They’re teenagers, fifteen or sixteen I’d guess, still in uniform. They’re gossiping, giggling; they transform the place with their frenetic energy. One is taller than the others, clearly in charge; she’s leading the conversation, her eye-rolls exaggerated as they talk about someone who evidently isn’t there.

  ‘What makes you think that?’

  I glance over at the girls. I think of Daisy. I wonder if she’d have been like that.

  ‘Oh, just something Bryan said.’

  She seems to relax a little.

  ‘Oh, you’ve been talking to Bryan. Well, I guess I did a little. Everyone knows everyone here, see?’

  ‘Is it okay if I ask you a few questions?’

  There’s a curve to her lips, not entirely encouraging.

  ‘I thought the film was supposed to be light-hearted. Wasn’t that what your friend said? No one’s out to get anyone?’

  My friend. She means Jess, my assistant, of course. Monica must’ve been at the meeting.

  ‘Yes,’ I say, as warmly as I can. ‘And believe me. No one is.’

  Before she can answer, Liz arrives with the tea. She puts down a cracked teapot and gives each of us a mismatched cup and saucer, then, once she’s exchanged a few words with Monica, withdraws. I remember Gavin saying that not everyone thinks Daisy’s death was suicide.

  I go on: ‘I’m just trying to understand what happened.’

  She takes her time to answer. Discomfort flits across her face. After a second she glances over to where Liz sits watching us, then to the girls who followed us in. She lowers her voice. ‘Come outside for a smoke?’