The Killer Inside

by cass green

  Instantly deeply ashamed, I reached over and rested my hand on Anya’s leg. She pressed her foot into my thigh with a satisfied little smile like a cat.

  On Christmas Day, we exchanged our own gifts in the morning: a shirt, the Bob Woodward book about Trump I’d asked for and fancy noise-cancelling headphones for me, and for her, a silver bracelet she’d admired in a craft shop in Lathebridge, a cashmere scarf and some perfume. We were due over at Patrick and Julia’s at one pm.

  As we ate thick slices of panettone and drank tea, we talked about how strange it would be for a brand-new human to share Christmas with us next year.

  But as Anya went off to take a shower, I started thinking about Irene Copeland. Maybe she would be eating a sad ready meal in front of the telly while we ate goose-fat roasted potatoes and drank wine that cost at least twenty quid a bottle. I hoped she wouldn’t be alone today.

  Perhaps it was approaching parenthood, too, which made me think of my childhood Christmases and the inevitable path these thoughts followed.

  The nature of guilt, that was what was on my mind. The burdens we have to carry around with us and how each of us does it differently.

  After her shower Anya went back to bed for a morning nap, a painful sciatic twinge in her back having affected her sleep the night before.

  I decided to go for a walk to clear my head, despite the rain beginning to batter the windows outside. The house suddenly felt small and dark and I craved space, even if it meant getting soaked.

  The obvious thing would have been to walk along the seafront, but I found myself getting in the car and, before I almost knew what I was doing, I was driving along the coast road. Rain and wind buffeted the sides of the car as I drove to the turning into Petrel Point. There were several small car parks, rather than one big one, which was always confusing to out-of-towners. I pulled into the nearest.

  What was I doing here? I couldn’t rationally explain it. A link, I suppose, with everything that was dragging me away from enjoying my Christmas Day. Maybe I felt it would be cathartic to see where Copeland died so I could put it behind me, as Anya clearly had.

  No other car was here, unsurprisingly.

  I parked up and sat for a moment, watching silvery rivulets of rain chase each other down the windscreen. It was oddly hypnotic and peaceful, but I made myself leave the relative comfort of the car.

  I struggled to open the door against the force of the gale but then I was out, pulling up the hood on my waterproof and shoving my gloved hands into the pockets. Head down, I started to climb the path that wound up to the top.

  The bitter wind snatched the breath from my lungs. I looked down at the sandy path, which was fringed by semi-frozen dune grass that crunched under my boots. It was a far steeper climb than I had anticipated, and because the air was so unforgivingly icy, I soon felt a little out of breath.

  I played the scene over in my mind: Anya running from the man who had been haunting her for all those years, sobs tearing from her, in terror for her life. This thought made me squeeze my hands into fists and, just then, I was glad Michael Copeland was dead. He deserved it. I would have liked to have been there. The violent thought was like a pleasurable shiver in the dark places of my mind. Maybe I really was my father’s son.

  When I got to the top, I made myself stop and look out at the wild sea, a writhing, angry mass of silver-grey and white. I could feel the raw, salty air scouring my lungs. It was savage and beautiful, but I couldn’t enjoy the sheer majesty of it because it was too treacherous there. I stepped further from the edge of the cliff and turned around, back to the wind now.

  There was a World War Two lookout at the top, a red-brick building with two open windows that seemed to stare back at me in judgement. I had forgotten that it was there, even though it had significance for us. Anya and I had once had a passionate kiss inside it. It might have turned into something a bit more serious had it not been for a party of children arriving just as clothes were being unzipped and pushed to one side. The memory forced a smile to my frozen cheeks, but just as quickly, I felt it fade.

  Thoughts were beginning to clot and take shape in my mind and I couldn’t seem to stop them from connecting in a way I didn’t want to recognize.

  Something wasn’t right, as I pictured again the scene that Anya had described.

  I couldn’t help wondering why Anya hadn’t suggested meeting Copeland in a café, somewhere safe and surrounded by other people, rather than here. And that wasn’t all.

  I kept picturing the obese man who looked so out of condition in that photo.

  I was thinking about Irene saying, that day, that he didn’t like heights, and that he was in poor health.

  And I was picturing my fit, strong wife who went to the gym every day near work. Who could have run up this hill with ease, pre-pregnancy.

  Something didn’t fit.

  Something wasn’t true.

  I let out a moan and pressed a hand against my forehead, hearing the whip and thwack of my hood as it was almost torn from my head by the wind.

  Then it felt like I couldn’t stand to be here a moment longer and I began to run, back down the hill, slowly because the wind was against me, then pounding my feet into the compact frozen surface and sprinting until my lungs were on fire.

  It was as though I thought I could outrun it, the sudden absolute conviction that I hadn’t been given the true version of this either.

  That my wife had lured Michael Copeland to the top of the cliff and then pushed him off.

  I sat in the car, breathing heavily and shivering from cold, or shock, or something. Horror, maybe. Disgust.

  Fear. Fear that I didn’t know what was really inside my wife, what she was capable of doing.

  This is the point in the story where I could have made yet another correct moral choice.

  Where I went home, confronted my wife and told her that I knew what she’d done. That we could find a way to work it out together; go to the police and confess everything that had happened.

  Except, I didn’t do any of that.

  What I did was think about the child she was carrying – our child – however abstract that still felt. She’d go to prison. Because how could she have explained what happened to Michael Copeland, without also telling them about Liam and what happened in 2003?

  I started the engine and drove home.

  We were due at Patrick and Julia’s in less than an hour.

  AUTUMN 2003

  LIAM

  ‘Love? Liam? It’s actually five o’ clock.’

  His mother’s voice bleeds through his consciousness until he can’t ignore it any longer. He’s dimly aware this isn’t the first time today he has heard it.

  There is an apologetic tapping at the door now, which then grows in confidence and he winces, wishing he could disappear into the depths of the bed and never come out.

  ‘I’ve got you a cuppa here,’ she says now. ‘Would you like me to bring it in?’

  Liam hasn’t locked the door and, before he can say anything, she is there, at the entrance, somehow looking sympathetic and annoyed all at once. Then she sees the state of the room and her brow wrinkles.

  ‘I’ll just bring it in, shall I?’ Then, more decisively, ‘I’ll bring it in.’

  She picks her way through the discarded clothes and junk on the floor with exaggerated patience, as though having to hack her way through thickets of thorny undergrowth, then places the cup of tea next to the bed.

  Liam grunts a thank you. Hopefully she may leave now. But she is still standing there, gazing down at him.

  ‘Are you still under the weather?’ she says but doesn’t wait for his reply. ‘Only, your dad is worried about your work.’ She always does this; hides her concerns behind what he thinks. Like she has no mind of her own. It’s pathetic.

  He mumbles something about having ‘squared it with Janice,’ his line manager. But he hasn’t really. Who cares if he goes in?

  Who cares about anything?


  Finally, Mum takes the hint and leaves the bedroom, sighing theatrically as she goes.

  When the door closes, he rolls onto his back and stares up at the ceiling, not seeing the cracked whorls of textured paint.

  Every time he hears the clanging of the bell from the station closing the crossing, or any announcement about trains, he thinks he might start screaming and never stop.

  His breathing begins to quicken now and he makes himself sit up and glug down a sip of the hot tea, painfully scalding his tongue. His hands are trembling. He shakes all the time now. Maybe it’s that thing soldiers get? PTSD?

  Their small village had been filled with investigating Transport Police that night, according to his mother, who kept talking about ‘that poor, poor woman’ and being woken by blue lights and sirens.

  But by the time Liam had got home in the morning, shaking, pale and sick from drinking half a bottle of brandy in Anastasia’s room, you wouldn’t have known what had happened on those tracks.

  He can’t forget though. If only he could ‘un-see’ it, just for a little while.

  It’s like the whole evening is on a constant loop in his brain.

  One of his old school friends had been having a party. He lived in a big fuck-off house in Landbeach, a village that was walkable from Liam’s house. He’d made the mistake of telling Anastasia that it was near his home and she had gone on and on about seeing where he lived, and cracking jokes about wanting to see his bedroom and all his childhood teddies and posters.

  He refused, of course. The thought of Mum’s over-polite awkwardness made him squirm. It would be like having a visit from Gwyneth bloody Paltrow or a member of the royal family. He imagined Anastasia being presented with a doilied-up plate of biscuits, or secretly taking a photo of their downstairs loo and its knitted crinoline lady toilet roll holder. No way was he having that.

  The plan was that she would meet him at the station and they would drink in the local pub before walking to the party.

  But the evening had gone badly. She had been in a strange mood in the pub and they had ended up going to the party too early.

  It wasn’t his sort of do either, but it was hers, as it turned out. Clearly his friend Matt had changed since he had last seen him. It was all City twats who talked in baying voices and thought they were so edgy because there was coke. Liam stuck to alcohol – there was plenty of that – but Anastasia was in the mood to party now she was here, evidently. She seemed to come back to him then and they went out onto the terrace at the back of the house for some fresh air. It was still early; they had only been there for an hour.

  She had pressed him up against the wall and begun to kiss him urgently. He responded as he always did, almost giving way at his knees with the effect she had on him. He ran his hands down her sides and felt her smooth legs where the short dress stopped as she ground her hips against his.

  But then, with a sexy little giggle, she had leaned up and whispered into his ear, her breath hot against his skin.

  For a moment, he couldn’t process what he had heard. She was smiling at him, then going in for another kiss, but no, her words had been clear.

  ‘I wish I could keep you as my sex slave, even when I meet someone proper.’

  The effect of her words was like someone had driven a blade up between his ribs. It was an actual impact.

  He had pushed her away, registering the slightly amused shock on her face. He had almost stumbled through the thickening bodies in the living room and hall and he could hear her calling him from behind, but he didn’t turn.

  She had run to catch up with him outside, rubbing her arms because she had left her jacket behind, and he marched ahead, ignoring her entreaties that she was ‘only kidding’ and couldn’t he ‘take a fucking joke?’

  ‘I’ll wait for you to get on the train then I’m going home,’ he’d said.

  When they reached the station, she had finally lapsed into silence and he could almost feel the sulky weight of her mood pressing against him.

  The truth was he couldn’t think of a single thing to say. All his energy was taken up with literally moving one foot in front of the other. He hadn’t experienced this sort of pain before. There was all that bullshit about the heart and love, but it was more like someone had reached inside him and yanked out all his tender inner organs. His chest actually hurt and he felt brittle, like he might shatter.

  The worst thing was that he had always suspected she felt that way but he had – like the fucking idiot he was – allowed himself to imagine they really might have some sort of a future.

  They were alone at the station, with fifteen minutes before the next train. The waiting room was closed and Liam sat against the railing that ran along the outside. Anastasia sat near him and he could actually hear her shivering, but he didn’t want to touch her. But he couldn’t bring himself to go, either.

  He was pretending to himself that it was some sort of chivalrous thing, waiting with her at this quiet station, but now there was someone else, a middle-aged black woman, her round body packed into a sturdy coat, on the platform too.

  She glanced at them and stood a little further down.

  ‘Liam,’ said Anastasia after a moment, in a small voice. ‘I didn’t mean it, you know. I really didn’t expect you to react like this.’

  Rage bubbled up, hot and quick, inside, and it helped a little.

  ‘Oh yeah?’ he said, aware that his voice was loud in the still night air. ‘How the fuck did you expect me to react then?’

  He sensed the other woman moving a little further away.

  ‘I don’t know,’ shouted Anastasia suddenly. ‘I didn’t expect this big fucking tantrum.’

  Liam made a disgusted noise and walked down the platform, away from her. It was childish, but he didn’t care about that.

  He hated her right now. He loved her. He wasn’t going to speak to her.

  For the next five minutes, Anastasia tried to engage him in conversation. She hated to be ignored, he knew this. So even when she stuck her face up close to his and said, ‘I’m not going to go away until you speak to me. I love you, don’t you know that?’ and started to cry, he simply turned his head.

  Anastasia got up then and began to walk up and down the platform, muttering to herself.

  He thought again about leaving, but was acutely aware that, if he did, it would be the end. Wracked with indecision, he was turned the other way when he became aware of raised voices. Anastasia and the woman were now arguing.

  He heard Anastasia say, ‘What fucking business is it of yours what I do?’ and the low murmur of the reply.

  Anastasia was walking quite close to the edge of the platform and the woman seemed to be remonstrating about this. She reached for Anastasia’s arm and was violently shrugged off with a yell of ‘Get your hands off me!’

  Liam hurried down the platform.

  The other woman was breathing heavily, her eyes bright with outrage behind thick glasses.

  ‘This young lady needs to get home and into bed, I think,’ she said in a strong West Indian accent. ‘She is putting herself and other people in danger by behaving in this way.’

  ‘I know,’ said Liam, in a placatory voice, ‘I’m sorry, I’ll get her home.’

  Anastasia gave a scream of frustrated fury that cut through an automated announcement:

  ‘Will passengers on platform one please stay clear of the edge. The next train does not stop here.’

  ‘How dare you fucking speak for me, Liam!’

  She slapped him on the cheek. It wasn’t that hard, but the shock was great and for a moment he just stared at her.

  ‘I don’t think you should—’ said the woman and Anastasia turned to her.

  ‘And fuck you too! You all think you can control me!’

  She went to hit the woman, who, with surprising speed, quickly caught her hand. Anastasia began to wrestle it out of her grip in a disproportionately aggressive way.

  Liam finally came to his senses and phys
ically dragged Anastasia away from the edge of the platform.

  The woman backed away too, muttering to herself in anger and fumbling with a mobile phone she had pulled from her pocket.

  ‘Please, calm down a bit!’ he said.

  Then everything happened so quickly.

  They were standing apart from each other. The train was just visible in the distance.

  Anastasia gave a sort of high-pitched scream and hurled herself towards the other woman.

  And then there were only two of them on the platform. Anastasia had her hands to her cheeks and was peering over into the tracks.

  ‘Shit!’ she yelled. ‘She’s not moving! I didn’t mean, I didn’t think …’

  ‘What the fuck!’ He ran over and saw the woman lying at an awkward angle below, her head on one of the rails. She was unconscious.

  ‘We have to get her up!’ he yelled and Anastasia was pulling at his arm and screaming that it was too late.

  The worst part, the part he wouldn’t ever be able to get past, was that he wanted to be as far away as possible from the horror that was about to unfold. So he let Anastasia drag him along the platform and out of sight on the other side of the waiting room as the train came thundering into the station.

  Then, the dreadful screaming of the train’s brakes that seemed to go on and on.

  Liam swipes at his eyes, remembering this now.

  Anastasia had been crying hysterically as they ran down the road from the station. He was cocooned in shock, a welcome fleeciness that lasted only as long as the first flood of adrenaline.

  ‘I didn’t mean that to happen!’ she kept crying over and over again. ‘I just felt so angry with you and with her.’

  And then, as they reached the main road, finally he had turned to her. For the first time in his life, Liam had wanted to hit a girl.

  ‘You’re blaming her?’ He actually had to clench his fists. He saw his own spit fly from his mouth and Anastasia flinched as it hit her face. But he didn’t care.

  ‘I’m not blaming her! I’m just trying to explain!’