by Linda Coles
Walk Like You
Linda Coles
All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review. This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, brands, media, and incidents are either the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2019 Blue Banana
Prologue
There was no going back now. He’d be on his own from this point on, he knew, and he deserved to be so. Too coward to tell her what he’d done, that he’d betrayed her trust in him, again; he couldn’t bear it, couldn’t deal with it. And after all the tears she’d shed, they’d both shed, promises that he’d try harder, get some help. Promises that she’d wait for him, but not for an eternity, she’d made that part clear. He’d eventually managed to abstain from the devil. But temptation had long, gnarly fingers that pulled at him like a fly dragged to a spider’s web. And like a fly, he’d fought hard to set himself free.
Not hard enough.
He was weak, he knew that. And he despised himself for being so, for what he’d done, and for the upset to come, for her. The pity he’d see reflecting back at him from her eyes. Or would it be hatred now, this final time? Maybe that would be easier to deal with. The thought sparked resignation and he lifted his chin slightly as a tear rolled over his three-day-old stubble. He watched it land on his thigh, a tiny wet stain spreading as another fell and added to it, widening the dampness on the trousers of his uniform. There’d been so many tears from them both. There could be no more.
The idea was born.
It would dissolve the anguish in each of them, set them free. Wiping his face with the flat palm of his hand, the driver sniffed loudly to clear his sinuses and force an energy into his lungs. The idea had caught him by surprise, but he was instantly comfortable with it all the same. There was no other choice. He sniffed again, loudly, his nose flaring like a racehorse’s, then wrinkling in determination. He lifted his eyes and dragged them into focus, shaking his head slightly in an attempt to clear them. A shot of determination coursed through every muscle, every sinew, every tendon. He sat up straighter in his seat, feeling cocky almost as he edged the accelerator on another ten. He heard the engine change slightly as it processed the request for further power and he listened to the increase in tempo like he might an orchestra. Another ten, and another subtle change in sound. It was likely not audible to anyone sat in the carriages further back, but he was tuned in, he knew what to listen for. He was the conductor though of a rather different kind of orchestra. There were no music instruments on his dashboard. No triangle to chime when the time came, no drum to beat, no bugle to blow.
It wouldn’t be hard to hear the next acceleration, and his passengers would certainly feel it. The driver knew the tracks well, knew every signal, every bend, every station platform. Even faces, though not their names. The train hurtled through the Kent countryside – the vivid yellow of rapeseed topping fields on both sides of the tracks like runny egg yolk resting on soldiers of toast – as the long string of carriages headed south then on to France. They wouldn’t be getting that far, not today. He was sorry, though he couldn’t tell them all. Or explain why.
And still the orchestra played on in his head, cymbals crashing, double bass bellowing.
His timing, once his decision had been made, was crucial. He was in control, his actions clear in his mind. The bend he needed was rapidly looming in the distance and he forced another shot of determination into his veins, wrinkling and flaring his nose once more as he added the final instalment of electric power to the engine. The train could go no faster. Idly, he wondered if anyone further back had noticed the shift in acceleration. Were they concerned at all? Frightened, possibly? It was too late to think of them now. He knew his plan would work; the corner would make sure of that. Then the steel arc was upon them, and he sounded his horn, though not in warning, there was no point in that. The scream that descended was his own anguished cry of pain, the engine vocalising for him what he felt in his core so deep down inside.
He’d done it.
Peace at last. The torment deserted him, the betrayal extinguished, the noose around his neck slackened. The darkness was a blessing. His own orchestra quiet.
Chapter One
‘An adventure for one’ is what her own internal doctor had ordered. A little celebratory excitement consumed on her own time with no one to be concerned about but herself. Since her husband Marcus was away working in Hong Kong again, Susan Smith had made the decision to go alone. And enjoy herself. He’d been distracted when they’d spoken by phone the night before, and so she wasn’t actually sure he even knew she was planning her little awayday or two. But then they weren’t as close as they had once been. Susan had already come to terms with that, though she doubted Marcus had even thought about it.
A woman further up in the same Business Premier carriage caught Susan’s eye as she stood, presumably headed for the toilet. Watching her move gracefully away down the aisle, Susan was intrigued by the woman’s hair colour and style – they were identical to her own. She wondered what the woman looked like, if her face was similar too. Absent-mindedly, she touched her own strawberry blonde hair that just brushed her jawline in a shaggy bob. She’d have to wait and see when the woman returned. Not feeling like reading the newspaper that was resting in her lap, Susan fixated on a building in the distance and let her empty thoughts drift a while, dissecting nothing in particular. A few moments passed then her mind caught on the sound of the doors opening up ahead. The woman was returning to her seat. Susan gasped quietly to herself as she noticed her facial resemblance. Though a little older than Susan, the woman could have passed for her older sister. Not that she had an older sister. Her doppelgänger? She could well have been Susan’s. She watched the woman check on something in her handbag, which was balanced on the table in front of her, then satisfied, move it away to the side again. The simple action reminded her to check the money belt she’d added before leaving the house earlier in the morning. Cash was required for this particular trip, though her credit card was along for the ride, just in case. Patting her stomach, she traced the thick line around her waist – it was still in place. The familiar webbing was there, its two pouches firmly closed. Happy all was safe, Susan resumed her fascination with the building approaching in the distance. A large, decrepit house maybe, it was hard to tell from where she was, but it was certainly in need of repair. Parts of the roof were missing, the tiles long gone, leaving glaring holes for the elements to wreak havoc with. A gable end looked like it would buckle at any minute and, as they drew closer, she could finally see the building had once been a home of some sort, or possibly a pub. So many had closed down over the years but that was progress. As the building vanished behind her, Susan felt the subtle shift of the carriage as it appeared to pick up speed. Or did she imagine it? Idly, she picked her newspaper up and scanned the front page, the carriage rocking her from side to side slightly, the sound of the rails clacking as the wheels passed over the joints – it was almost therapeutic. But another shift in speed caught her attention and she glanced over her paper at the handful of other passengers. Had they noticed it too? Was she imagining it? Nobody appeared to give the subtle shift any attention, they were concentrating in their own worlds, and so Susan went back to her paper and tried to settle. But she was a perceptive woman and so when she felt the third shift, and looked intently out of the window at the horizon flying by, she instinctively knew something was wrong. Standing, she pondered what to do or say – anything? Susan made her way towards the door
s and the luggage rack that was filled with cases much like her own; she wasn’t the only person heading away on a break, work or otherwise. The red emergency lever was right there in front of her, daring her to pull it as she held on to the overhead rail to keep herself steady. She felt the train increase in speed one more time. Frightened now, she called out to her fellow passengers for what to do.
“Something’s not right!” she yelled, sounding like a demented woman. “We keep increasing speed!” she explained as eight blank faces tried to focus on what she was saying and decide for themselves if there was anything to concern them. A couple went back to their laptops, passing her off as a deranged individual no doubt. Susan looked on in disbelief, anxiety building in her chest – something was about to happen. But not everyone dismissed her. A man in a navy suit eventually called out to her, “I thought it was me!” he said, panic evident in his voice as he too stood, holding on to the headrest in front to steady himself. That was all it took for the remaining passengers to once again look up from what they were doing and take notice. Two people had sensed it.
But they were all too late.
Then, all hell let loose.
Chapter Two
There was no stopping the catastrophe that was to unfold. As the train entered the bend at nearly double the speed limit, the rear of the first carriage left its tracks and twisted back on itself awkwardly before it collided with a concrete wall that formed part of a bridge. Only momentum dragged the remaining carriages on. They screamed and groaned like a metal dinosaur in distress before, eventually, each one slammed down on its side. Glass windows were ripped out and loose gravel sprayed into the air like machine-gun fire. The deep, anguished screeching and bellowing filled the late morning air as metal mangled and grated where it slid, the dregs of the train’s energy propelling it forward. Concrete from the bridge collapsed and fell, adding grey dust to the mayhem. The impact was catastrophic. Smoke and fumes seeped out of giant tears and crevices in the train’s carcass, rising into the air in pungent, billowing clouds. Carriages were tossed far and wide, most lay on their sides as they’d come to a grinding, piercing standstill. The front ones now a mangled mess and unrecognisable from what they had been only moments before. It took seconds for the whole event to unravel, catapulting its internal cargo of human life across nearby tracks and grass banking. The stench of ammonia from damaged capacitors drifted along like low cloud. And then it went quiet.
Susan was on her back, flung from her seat unceremoniously and, like other passengers in her carriage, lay quiet and still. Minutes passed until sirens filled the air as emergency services approached the scene. Maybe it was these sounds that brought Susan out of unconsciousness. Maybe the smell. As she opened her eyes and tried to fathom what had happened, what was going on, panic hit her chest with a heavy thump as realisation grabbed her. The speeding train had derailed and crashed. She listened as passengers in nearby carriages came around to the enormity of what had happened. Crying, wailing and sobbing added to the steam and smoke, filling the air with an acrid horror and grief. With calls and cries from passengers trapped within their metal confinements, the birds stayed silent.
As her sticky eyes did their best to focus, Susan registered the sheet of protective steel above and almost covering her. Miraculously, a large part of the carriage ceiling had fallen down and covered her protectively from other mangled debris that had been pushed skywards or flung across the chaotic space. She had to – no, needed to – get out. In one frantic, claustrophobic moment, she somehow found the energy to shimmy her way out of the dark grey mass, not stopping to think she may be in further danger, or to see if she’d been badly hurt. It was on impulse. Once out of the metal confines that had undoubtedly saved her life, she stopped briefly to catch her breath and steady her heartrate. Then the severity of what she was now in the midst of hit her. Her carriage was wedged upside down and she was sitting on the inside of the old roof. Luggage had been tossed across the space, shards of broken glass littered the new ‘floor’, seats dangled above her head. Thank goodness for their bolts.
She held her hand to her mouth in horror as she took in the other passengers. They were strewn awkwardly as she had been but without the lifesaving protection of a metal sheet covering them. There were no sounds from anyone, no whimpering, no screaming – not in her carriage. On her hands and knees, she carefully made her way over to each person, checking for a pulse, any sign they were still alive, hoping. Many were heavily soaked in their own blood. One man had lost most of his arm, severed at the elbow. Another had been impaled through his thigh by a jagged piece of metal. Susan diligently checked them all for signs of life anyway. When she reached the only other woman, Susan could see by the awkward angle of her neck that it was broken. There was no pulse. Sitting back on her haunches, Susan gave in to the despair and shock and began to silently cry.
There were no other survivors in her carriage. Susan Smith was the only one.
Blood streamed down her nose, mixing with salty tears as she sat stunned by the carnage and loss of life around her. Debris was everywhere, luggage and laptops and briefcases landed on the floor with her, anything that had been loose now resting haphazardly among the mangled chaos. The harsh stench of ammonia assaulted her nostrils. Susan leaned forward and began to cry in earnest, arms wrapped around her body, consoling herself since no one else could. She reached out and grabbed a soft bag. It was something to cling on to, like a child might hold on to a teddy bear in a time of need, the soft leather object giving her a modicum of comfort. Holding it tightly to her chest, she sobbed harder, letting the emotion, stress and horror vent from her being until she finally calmed a little. Her own case was somewhere in the wreckage, though she’d no idea where. Susan again glanced over at the dead woman, then looked down at the bag she was holding. She’d seen the woman carrying it only minutes earlier. Unfastening the zip, she peered inside, pulled out the woman’s wallet and opened it. The name on the driver’s licence was Tabitha Child. Susan quickly slipped it back inside, feeling like she’d pried on something immensely private. The dead woman lay only a few feet away from herself.
“I’ll say a prayer for you, Tabitha Child,” she said gently, wiping at tears with the back of her hand.
A noise nearby, a voice calling, brought Susan back to reality and she listened. A rescuer, she surmised.
The voice called out again, “Hello! Anyone?”
Scrambling to her feet, being mindful not to add to her injuries, she stood on wobbly legs and inched herself forward, straining to look through smashed windows for what was happening on the outside of the wreckage. She spotted an older man, wearing a high-viz vest, who was the source of the calling. As he approached the carriage, Susan yelled back.
“In here!”
The man smiled, likely relieved to have found someone alive in the mangled wreckage.
“Stay there, I’ll help you,” he called back, but Susan wasn’t listening. Now more stable on her feet, she carried on towards an open gash in the carriage’s wall and forced herself through it, still holding on to the comfort of the soft bag. The man was by her side in an instant, helping her down from the twisted mess. In the distance, Susan could see people moving in all directions, some obviously passengers, some rescue workers, each with a safer destination in mind. The air smelled metallic. Debris littered the tracks as far as she could see.
“They’re all dead,” she said to her rescuer, pointing back towards her carriage. “I couldn’t find a pulse on anyone.” The man looked at her, sadness and anguish evident on his face at the news.
“Come with me,” he said gently. “We need to get you to the hospital. What’s your name, love?”
But Susan was elsewhere, her mind as jagged as the gashed wreckage behind her. When the words finally made their way to her lips, she replied.
“Tabitha. Tabitha Child.”
Chapter Three
Since her father had died, and following an unavoidable falling out with her moth
er, Chrissy Livingstone had become a little closer to her younger sister, Julie. Even though there was only a year between them, with the amount of Botox and the copious amounts of time Julie spent on spa days, she looked a good ten years younger. Money bought youth for Julie Stokes and she had plenty of it to play with. On the other side of the sister spectrum, Chrissy generally opted for the more natural look. Max Factor didn’t cling to her face in the same quantity, or with the same regularity, as it did her sibling, but as a naturally striking blonde herself, she didn’t lose out on admiring glances. Polar opposites, men gawped at one or the other depending on their own personal taste. Both women were at the start of their forties and in good shape, though Julie needed a good hot meal or two in Chrissy’s view, she was on the thin side and it concerned her. Recently, Julie had gone back to work, setting up a boutique shoe store in Richmond, The Quadrant main street no less, one of the most affluent areas in greater London. The unit on its own had cost a King’s ransom never mind the eclectic stock she’d purchased. Chrissy had kept her judgement to herself, hoping that her sister would take the investment and the workload seriously, and not rely on Richard to bail her out if she screwed things up. She had to admit, Julie was pulling things off beautifully. One skill Julie had in bucket loads was an eye and a sense for a person’s ability and work ethic. The three women she’d employed were excellent characters as well as creative marketers, leaving Julie to hover over them like a mother hummingbird as they reaped the rewards together. The life that Julie now led was doing her good, and Chrissy was pleased she’d finally found a use for her talent. Getting out into the real world and discussing more than gossip-magazine material was broadening her horizons. Chrissy had always detested the fact that Julie had lived off Richard’s money all their married life, and with their girls at boarding school there wasn’t even that excuse for being a home bird. But that was Chrissy’s opinion, her own ethic. Now, Julie was blossoming with the success of Jooles, Jooles and there was talk of another boutique opening closer to home in Egham. ‘Jooles, Jooles’? The name said it all.
