by NJ Moss
“Jamie,” I say, and he flinches.
A cascade of emotion shivers across his face and then he settles down.
I’ve just done something extremely clever. Earlier today, I watched his wedding video on Instagram. He and Hazel were cutting the cake and, when he playfully dabbed her nose with some icing, she tossed her fiery hair and said, Jamie. I rehearsed it for an hour. I’m not even sure why. But it was worth it.
I’ve always loved playing with dolls.
“All right.” He shrugs. “No lines. Just one drink, okay?”
“Fine. If you absolutely must—”
“Oh, I must.” He’s back to his cheeky-chappie routine.
“Then I’ll take a vodka and Coke.”
I don’t intend to drink a single drop of alcohol tonight, or on any night. It never does good things to me. It’s difficult enough to maintain this façade without chemicals interfering with it.
Jamie calls the barmaid over and she exchanges a look with him and then with me, as though she thinks we’re involved in some kind of love triangle. She’s trying to tell me something with her eyes, and for a mad moment I wonder if she knows about Jamie’s night-time invasions. But I’m certain she doesn’t. She’s getting way too intimate way too soon because she can’t control her drinking. Her eyes are glassy.
She’s weak and unprofessional. She drinks on many of her shifts.
This isn’t the first time I’ve been to this bar and observed these two together. This is just the first time I’ve done it up close.
It was much easier when I was skulking at the door to the dance floor, when I was behind Jamie in line for coffee, when I was sitting in his workplace lobby pantomiming a phone call and watching him pass by. It was much easier when I was invisible to him.
I’ve broken the seal now. There’s no going back.
“Millie.”
Jamie’s hand is on my shoulder. His touch is too soft.
“Why are you touching me?”
Fuck. I’ve broken character.
Something in my voice must spook him, because he snaps his hand away at once. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to… Shit, I’m sorry, all right?”
“No, it’s fine.” I make myself bright again, even as my fingers twitch with the desire to grip his throat, hard, dig my nails in until I puncture skin and get to the meaty grisly bits people are made of.
“Your drink is here and you’re staring off into space like a…”
“Like a what?” I say, giggling again, a veritable party girl.
“I don’t know. Like somebody who stares off into space, I guess?”
“Oh. Silly me.”
Absolutely not silly me. I’m the cleverest person Jamie’s ever met by far.
“So, what do you do for a living?” he asks.
Of course he’d want to know this. People like him, in well-paying jobs – jobs that devour all their time and require justification – love to validate their existence with questions like these. He wants me to tell him my job is worse than his and his job is incredible and, most offensive of all, he wants me to do it without simply coming out and saying it.
“I’m a freelance writer. It’s very boring.” Look – an honest statement. “What about you? Oh, I’m sorry.”
This seems like the perfect time to fake a phone call, before he blabbers on about Sunny Skies Recruitment. I take my phone from my bra, intentionally, knowing he won’t be able to resist looking. It makes me sick to do this, but I’d be a fool not to use my sexuality against him. I know how much little Jamie loves older women.
I glance at my locked phone screen, making sure I angle it so he can’t see.
“I have to take this. And I’ve got work to do. I only stopped in for a quick drink. But apparently the world won’t even let me have that.”
“Somebody important?” He’s doing an utterly terrible job of hiding his disappointment.
“A friend,” I say. I invent. “She’s going through a divorce at the moment. It’s a whole thing. Anyway, it was nice to meet you. Do you want money for the drink, since I haven’t touched it? Or will you drink it… or?”
I sound unforgivably ditzy. Put a bullet in my head, please.
“What? No. Don’t worry about it. It was really nice meeting you, Millie. Have a good night.”
Hopping off the barstool, I adjust the hem of my skirt. Again, bile swirls around my belly. But I know his eye will be drawn to the movement, to my bare thighs, and I didn’t put in all the work at the house for nothing. Giving him the sort of wave an awkward, shy, interested woman would, I head toward the exit.
Perhaps I should end this here. I could wait in an alleyway that has a line of sight on the club’s exit, bulrush him, fall upon him like a wild animal, with teeth and nails and spit and blood. But how can I be sure I’d feel it, feel anything, if I devoured my meal before it was warm?
I need Jamie to cook, to burn if he has to.
8
Jamie
I’m going to follow her to her car or taxi or bus.
I need to see her and there’s nothing wrong with that. She’s a pretty lady, but there’s something more about her. I could’ve been anybody to her. She didn’t even look flattered when I offered to buy her a drink. I normally get something from women, especially the older ones I target for my game. They don’t expect a – let’s face it – handsome bastard like me to glance twice at them. Normally they melt, sometimes dragging me home the first chance they get.
I want to encourage her to come out of her shell a little.
I hand the doorman his fifty on the way out, annoyed I have to do it in the open.
But nothing’s going to stop me from getting another look at Millicent – Millie.
Everybody calls me Millie, she said.
I want to know who everybody is: her friends, her family, her acquaintances, her hobbies and her hopes and her fears.
Who are you, Millicent-call-me-Millie? Let me put you together piece by piece.
I spot her at the end of the street, waiting to cross the road. The light turns green and she walks on, moving awkwardly in her heels, making her seem drunker than she is. I don’t want some sicko seeing her like this and taking advantage. Say what you want about me, but I’ve never touched a woman, never hurt a woman, never violated a woman like some men do.
I stick to the shadows as I trail her, hugging close to buildings. I used to play rugby when I was a teenager. I’m pretty athletic and I know how to move efficiently, without drawing attention to myself.
Thunder Thighs moves like a ballerina, my coach would say, and we’d both laugh.
I have no clue where Millie’s going. I expect her to climb into a taxi or turn into a building any moment, but she keeps walking. Her phone call with her friend must’ve ended quickly. There was only about a minute between when she left and when I decided to go after her.
The traffic grows lighter and the streets become quiet. There are hardly any people about. We’re heading toward residential streets. She’s doing something completely mental. She’s walking home from a club. Nobody walks home, especially in heels.
Millie, what a puzzle you are.
She’s got a stunning lack of self-awareness. Most women glance behind them from time to time when they’re walking alone in the dark. They have to be sure they’re not being followed. And, when their too-quick search doesn’t find me, they assume they’re not. But Millie doesn’t look behind her once.
She brings me to a quiet street about an hour after she left the club. My legs ache a little, my feet throbbing in my stiff shoes.
She walks to the end of the street and heads into the perfect house. It’s detached. No security lights blink on. There’s no sign of an alarm system out front. I don’t spot any cameras, and people tend to put these in obvious places to deter burglars. The garden is long and the space between her house and her neighbour’s is even longer. A tall hedge blocks the view to most of the ground floor and some of the upstairs. She doesn’t s
witch on any lights.
The door closes, and the house remains still and dark and dead-looking.
I should leave it here. I have her address. I’ve done a decent recon of the place. But I’m hard and excited and everything about this is perfect. It’s like this house was designed for my desires.
What sort of idiot would I be if I walked away now?
She’s offering it on a platter. It’s like she’s doing it on purpose, the same way sweet Lacy stuck her arse out in her sleep a couple of weeks ago. Thinking about that makes me stiffer. The base of my cock is throbbing.
I glance up and down the street, waiting for a neighbour to come out, for a light to blink on. Something needs to stop me. I haven’t done even a tenth of what’s required to make this safe.
I should think of Hazel, of our life together. I should think of Ray and how he’d react. I should think of my parents. But Mum’s gone and Dad has too, even if his body is still hanging around.
I walk carefully past her hedge and toward her front door. I’ll make sure it’s locked and then I’ll leave. Of course she’s locked her front door. Everybody locks their front door. It’s not like Cardiff is some small village.
I turn the handle. There’s no resistance. I push the door. Still no resistance. It opens with a slight whine, showing me a hallway that ends in the kitchen. There’s a living room to the left, and then a staircase off to the right.
It’s time to walk away. I’ve come too far already.
Stepping into the house and slipping off my shoes feels so natural. I won’t let my footsteps give me away.
My throat gets tight with anticipation as I walk to the base of the stairs. The house smells clean, hospital-clean, and it has an empty feeling. I wonder if she’s recently moved in. There are no photos on the walls.
I stare up at the stairs, almost lost in the darkness. There’s a window at the top letting in a little moonlight, but the curtains are closed. Normally, I’d know by now which steps creak and which are safe. I lift my foot and then withdraw it straight away, moving to the side and pressing myself against the wall.
She’s still awake. She only just got in. I can’t hear her, but that doesn’t mean she’s not up there. She’s a freelance writer and she said she had work tonight. I don’t hear any keys tapping, but some people type quieter than others.
For hours and hours, I wait. It’s an annoying part of this process, but it’s necessary. Impatience helps me in my day job, but in these excursions, patience is the name of the game. The world is quiet this far from the city centre.
Finally, I glance at my phone and see it’s 3am. Surely she’s asleep by now. Not that it matters.
I have her address. I should leave.
I imagine Mum screaming at me, telling me I’m disgusting, broken. But it doesn’t work. I’ve spent too long waiting down here to abandon Millie now. And Mum has no right popping into my head like this. She lost it a long fucking time ago.
Luckily, the stairs don’t squeak. I walk on my tiptoes, my arms at my sides for balance, breathing as quietly as I can.
There are three rooms up here. Two bedrooms and a bathroom. The door to the bathroom is open, showing a recently-cleaned toilet and a plastic cup without a single toothbrush inside. One of the bedroom doors is open too, showing a well-made single bed. Empty.
I move to the third door. My excitement waned as I waited, but it’s stoked again. My mouth is somehow dry and filled with saliva at the same time. My balls feel heavy.
I put my ear against the door, expecting to hear breathing, or something, anything. But there’s silence. I can smell something. Rotting food.
There’s a light coming from underneath the door, a yellow glow.
I should turn back. This is my last chance.
I grab the door handle and twist it slowly, making the movement last half a minute, not making a single sound. I push the door open and step silently into the room.
The stink washes over me, and there’s blood, and guts, and there are pictures pinned on the walls lit by heavy lamps. For a second, I’m sure I must’ve fallen asleep down there. This must be a nightmare.
I focus and bring it into some sort of order.
Millie isn’t here. There’s no en suite and the room is small. Millie hasn’t been here all night. I have no idea where she is. She must’ve gone out the back door before I worked up the courage to come inside.
A bunch of gore is piled on the bed, long bloody entrails and guts and mulch and a bunch of other twisted stuff. I can’t tell what animal it came from. Or if it came from a person. I can’t see a body or anything that would identify the mess. It stinks, making me gag and cover my mouth.
Animal or human, it doesn’t matter. I shouldn’t be here.
The photos are of dead men, their heads smashed in, their faces eviscerated brutally. Every one of them has been slaughtered in the most animalistic way imaginable. Next to the photos she’s pinned newspaper articles, with headlines like, Police Still Looking for Park Murderer. All of the headlines she’s selected, whoever the fuck this woman is, are about how the killer hasn’t been caught.
There are more photos. Of me.
I’m walking out of the office.
I’m sitting at a café window on my phone.
Jesus, I’m chatting up a woman at a bar. I’m walking out of Lacy’s bungalow. There are photos of the woman before. We’re sitting together in the cinema, but thankfully I had the presence of mind not to hold her hand or touch her when we were in public. Still, it doesn’t look good. The photos go on.
She’s been following me for at least six months.
I step forward, hand raised to tear them down. But why? She has copies. Of course she has copies.
None of this makes any sense.
Did she kill these men? Why is she following me? What does she want?
I run down the stairs, my breath loud in my ears. I never should’ve come here. There’s something wrong with her. I’ve never taken photos. I’ve never arranged a sick murder scene, with the blood and the guts and everything. It’s plain wrong.
I yank the door open and run down the street.
It’s only when I round the corner I realise I’ve forgotten my shoes. But it’s not like I can go back for them.
I keep running.
9
Hazel
“Jamie? Are you even listening to me?”
He’s been staring down the garden, across our small-but-lovely swimming pool, to the sauna he had built when we returned from our honeymoon. I’ve given the garden a bit of a spruce up these past couple of weeks, clearing out the winter clutter. The grass is freshly-mown and the potted plants are in order. It looks great, ready for some springtime snapshots.
He keeps staring, his eyes glassy and weird. It’s like he’s looking at something that isn’t there. I normally like his dreamy expression. But only when it’s aimed at me. It makes me wonder if he’s thinking about the unspoken things between us, the ignored things, and that makes me want to scream. Our time together is our time.
How are we supposed to pretend we’re normal if he doesn’t make the effort?
“Jamieeeeee.”
“Sorry, what?” He smiles, but that doesn’t hide how tired his eyes look. “Sorry, H. I was miles away.”
I gesture to his breakfast, which I make him every Saturday and Sunday if I haven’t got other plans. In the week, he’s normally gone before I wake up. “Are you going to eat something or shall I throw it out?”
He glances at his scrambled eggs and bacon, and then does that classic Jamie thing of running his hand through his messy hair. “Sorry. Yeah. Course. What were you saying?”
I take a sip of my cucumber juice and try to pretend it’s not horrible. We’ve all got to make sacrifices. “I was thinking we could go and see your Dad today.”
“What? Why?” He picks up a piece of bread and tears a chunk away with his teeth.
“Because he’s your dad. And he has Alzheimer’s. It’s t
he right thing to do.”
“He was demented long before he got ill. Let him rot.”
“Jamie! That’s a terrible thing to say.”
He shrugs and tears off another piece, hardly seeming to chew before he swallows.
“You’ve been acting weird ever since you got back last night. Did something happen in Cardiff you need to tell me about?”
He shakes his head, aiming those butter-wouldn’t-melt-eyes at me. “Just work.”
I sigh. I can tell I’m not going to get anywhere this morning. “What do you think about going to see him then?”
He groans and rubs his jaw, like he’s trying to scratch away his light beard. “I’ve told you what I think. Why’re you so set on it?” He pauses, looks closer at me. “Oh, I get it.”
“What? What do you get?”
“No, it’s good. I thought my wife had been replaced by an alien for a second.”
“If you have something to say, why don’t you come out and say it?” I lift my cucumber juice for another sip. But I don’t want another sip. It’s revolting, like this insinuation is revolting. I slam it down on the table, making a loud glass-on-glass noise. “Fine. Then I’ll say something. I think you’re acting weird because you did something bad in Cardiff. I think it involved another woman.”
“What? Where is this coming from?”
He knows full well where it’s coming from, but sometimes it’s like we can believe the surface of our marriage is the real thing, that there are no sleazy depths.
He reaches across the table and takes my hand, smoothing his thumb over my knuckles. Tingles dance up my arm. Even after two years of marriage, he still does that to me. I can’t deny how much I love him. I can’t even try.
“You know I’d never cheat on you,” he says passionately. “It’s me and you, remember. Hazel and Jamie against the world. I’d die before I cheated on you.”
“Good.” I’m unable to fight the smile that lifts my lips. “Because if you did, you wouldn’t have much problem dying.”
He nods. “Right.”
