Rough Sleepers

by Nem Rowan

  As we twisted, my body bucking to break free of him, he lost his balance on the edge of the steps. His hand tore a strand of hair from my head and I flew in the opposite direction, landing with a crack on my bare knees to the sound of something large and heavy tumbling down the steps. Panting, I only knelt there on my hands and knees, listening to Pete's groans of agony, the slapping sound of his bloated flesh on the stairs, and the final thump as he hit the bottom. For several minutes, I couldn't move. I couldn't believe what had just happened.

  My hands were trembling violently, and I could feel my dinner rising in my throat as I turned slowly, my fingers gripping the edge of the first step, my head tilting to peer down the stairs. Pete was laying on his back. Blood was streaming from his mouth; some of his teeth were broken and his nose was bleeding too.

  "Oh my god..." I breathed, discarding my heels and handbag and running down the steps as fast as I could. "Oh my god! Oh my god! Oh my god!"

  I couldn't stop myself from shaking as I crouched down, reaching for his puffy face and holding it between my palms. His eyes were open, and they looked at me.

  I will never forget the expression in them as we gazed at each other. Fear, disappointment, sadness. Tears began to swell in my eyes.

  "I'm so sorry! I'm so sorry! Pete, are you okay! Pete!" I whimpered between noisy sobs.

  His lips moved, and a blood bubble popped between them. No sound came out.

  "Don't move, okay. I'm gonna go use Mrs Patel's phone, alright? I'll be right back. Don't move. Don't move," I stammered as I struggled to my feet, grabbing hold of the railing and using it to haul myself up the steps.

  I had never felt so exhausted in my entire life. Mrs Patel went to make me a cup of tea as I cried hysterically into the phone, telling the woman on the other end that I didn't mean it, I didn't mean to push him down the stairs, it was just an accident. I couldn't drink the tea. I couldn't stop myself from shuddering. The paramedics were coming, it was going to be all right. They'd come in an ambulance and take Pete to the hospital and everything would be all right.

  I ran back along the corridor bare foot, rushing down the steps to where Pete was laying. I knew he was dead even before I reached him. His chest wasn't moving, and his eyes were staring into the space above him, as though mum had appeared there in a blaze of ethereal light to lead him off to heaven. There was a strange expression of peace in his eyes. I couldn't bear to look at him, sliding down against the wall and waiting there in silence until I heard the lift down the hall opening and the sound of many feet heading towards me.

  What happened after that is a mystery to me. I remember vague things about policemen taking me aside to talk to me. But after that, I draw a blank. I must have gone into shock or something. My memories of what happened in the court are blurry and distant; all I remember is the hatred I felt when the 'witnesses' claimed they had seen me fighting with Pete. They said I had pushed him on purpose, said how he was always trying to set me straight and try to stop me from ruining my life. They said they had heard me talking about how I wanted Pete to die and leave me alone, things I had never said, things I would never wish on anyone. I was in a lot of trouble.

  After some time in young offenders, I became an adult and was moved to prison. That was a time in my life I'd rather forget. I spent most of it trying to survive, enduring daily abuse from other inmates and holding on for the next letter from Slater or my solicitor. While I was there, I made a friend, an older man who took care of me, but ultimately nothing came of it; he was a mentor and a father figure to me up until the day I walked free. He and Slater kept me going, somehow. Slater told me about his ex, that she'd had a baby with him and she didn't want it, so he had taken it and was going to raise it himself. He sent a photo of a round-faced, dark-haired baby wrapped in a blanket, her large eyes staring back at the camera in fascination. It was the first time I got to see Amy, and even without ever meeting her, I just knew we were going to be the best of friends. Slater told Amy her Auntie Leon was in a special place, but soon he'd come and live with them and they'd start a business together. That's exactly what happened.

  For a long time after Pete's death, I would lay awake at night, analysing what had happened and trying to figure out where I had gone wrong. It never banished my worst memories of him, but I came to realise that Pete had done those things and said those words out of love, not because he wanted to hurt me but because he was scared of losing me. I had hated him. I still hated the memory of him that lived on in my mind, but it only took him falling down those stairs to make me realise that I blamed him for Mum's death, blamed him for failing to save Mum from drugs, that I relied on him a lot and that he was the only person left who remembered Mum for who she really was. He didn't understand why I dressed like a girl, but then, I had never tried to explain to him why because I didn't really understand either. I couldn't expect him to understand me when I couldn't educate him.

  We both clashed and neither of us approached the subjects that hurt our feelings with any tact because we didn't know how. All those times he wanted me to come and watch the football with him was his way of saying he wanted to spend time together, not because he was trying to convert me into a macho football fan. Mum's death had fuelled an unhealthy obsession with food; he ate and ate to try and block out his grief, yet why I had never noticed this? I felt so much hatred for myself for such a long time. If I had only noticed, if I had only taken a second to think about it instead of tarring him with the same brush as everyone else. There had been a time where Pete and I would go the park to kick the ball around, and he would take me to the greyhound tracks for candy floss and hotdogs. Maybe if I had given him a chance, things would have turned out differently.

  It took a lot to recoup my self-esteem in the years that followed. I threw myself into caring for Amy and raising her to be confident and kind, all of the things I hadn't been when I was young. I began to evolve from the ugly duckling into the beautiful swan, and as the club's popularity increased, so did my own pride. When the DJ put on Earth, Wind & Fire, I became the centre of the dance floor. It was as if the past had never happened.

  As I lay reminiscing, I glanced at the clock on the nightstand. It was gone midnight, and yet my mind was a churning barrel of vivid nostalgia. Maybe, if things turned out all right, I could open the club again with Ceri. I smiled to myself and nestled closer to him in the dark, pulling the duvet right up to my chin as I closed my eyes. If being the operative word.

  Time was passing rapidly. It had taken a few days for us to totally barricade the house, boarding up the ground floor windows and adding new locks and bolts to the external doors. Over a week had gone by since our last interaction with Wallace and Darnel, and yet it seemed the trail had run cold. It was starting to show, too. Every time Ceri came back emptyhanded, I could see the sorrow in Mecky's eyes and there was only so much I could do to gloss it over. If we didn't do something soon, Kelly would become a killer, too.

  Twenty-Four

  The moon was getting closer with every passing day; I could feel the pull of it, the gravity tugging, getting harder and harder to ignore. We waited for an attack at any moment from Wallace, but nothing came. We listened to the radio and read the papers, expecting to see more victims, but there were none. It was as if he had gone into hibernation in preparation for the next full moon, and if anything, the silence was even more threatening. Things in the house started to become tense. Mecky paced about like a caged animal, and Christine grew restless as she was getting bored of watching television, so the three of us went out shopping while Ceri was busy at the library.

  It felt liberating to walk through town together, visiting different shops and trying on clothes. It was even better since Mecky had paid us for our work in the shop, so I at least had some money I could spend on a new outfit. I picked up some new underwear, although while we were in the store, Mecky and Christine went out of their way to tease me by picking things out with the suggestion that Ceri would like to see me in it. We
got some very funny looks from the staff.

  I had swapped my shabby tracksuit for a tight-fitting dove grey dress and pale blue stockings with matching grey patent leather heels, and I began to feel quite smug as we wandered from shop to shop, aware of the stares coming from the people around us. I even had a few interested smiles, and one guy actually winked at me. Oh yeah, I was feeling pretty damned smug, indeed, for if there was one thing Leona Valentine liked more than anything, it was being the centre of attention.

  We stopped off at a café for a light lunch, and Christine and I went into the bathroom together so that I could do her makeup for her. Mecky, who I came to realise preferred to dress in rather masculine attire, declined the offer of makeup and instead waited at the table in her smart shirt and trousers, sipping a cup of tea as she watched people passing outside the window. I touched up my mascara in the mirror as Christine pulled on her new leggings in the cubicle behind me, and another woman came in through the door, blissfully ignorant of me standing there. It was only when I opened my mouth to respond to Christine that she was startled by how deep my voice was, but even then, she only smiled at me as she bustled past and went into another cubicle with her arm laden with shopping bags. When we returned, Mecky was talking on her mobile phone, and as we approached, she pressed her finger to her lips excitedly.

  "Dobrze. Dobrze. Mm-hmm," she uttered into it as she watched us sit down to the table.

  "Who are you talking to?" Christine whispered to her and she mouthed 'Ceri' in response.

  Christine glanced at me and I shrugged, pouring myself a cup of tea and dropping in a sugar cube. I had already scoffed down three macarons and half a sandwich by the time Mecky had finished the call.

  "Ceri come to pick us up. He is talking very important, we are seeing a lady now, all of us," she told us, watching Christine and I munching on our sandwiches.

  "What lady?" Christine frowned after she had swallowed a mouthful.

  "She is on the quilts. Sewing lady, her name Edith," she replied, picking up her cup and downing the rest of her tea. "You hurry eating, we are seeing Ceri now."

  The sheer excitement that something new was about to happen was more than enough to get us on our toes, and Christine and I walked out of the café with our food in our hands, anxious to meet Ceri on the Horsefair so that we could jump into the car and find out what was going on. We rushed across the city centre, and by the time we reached the bus stop we had arranged to meet at, Ceri was already waiting for us. A bus honked its horn as it approached from behind, waiting impatiently while we all piled in and Ceri revved the engine, taking his foot off the brake and sending us lurching into the wave of traffic that was circulating the one-way system. I stuffed the bags of clothing we had bought into the footwell, huffing and tidying my hair; it had been a few months since I had worn heels properly, and even longer since I had had to run in them.

  "I found our Edith. She's moved out by Clevedon, and as far as I'm aware, she hasn't had a visit from our friend, Wallace Reed. I couldn't find her because she's been calling herself Edie Thompson instead. The quilting club told me, but they wouldn't give me her address; I guess they thought I sounded suspicious. Well anyway, I found out she's running sewing classes from her home," Ceri told us as he changed lanes, swerving across to join in behind another car as we approached the traffic lights.

  Our chorus of relief and nervous joy was enough to make him grin, and I caught him looking at me in the rear-view mirror, so I gave him a cheeky wink back.

  "I found the address her business is registered to; it was suburban, so I checked it out on the map and it's a house. I think it's her house," he continued, moving us on again as the lights changed.

  "You are not calling first?" Mecky inquired cautiously, no doubt wondering if we were going to knock on someone's door and find she wasn't there.

  "No. I thought we'd go and surprise her," he chuckled.

  "Oh god." Christine rolled her eyes at me and I mimicked her expression of apprehension. "Ya know, it's gonna look really weird when four strangers turn up at her house. She probably won't even answer the door to us."

  "Just give it a chance. There's no harm in trying," Ceri declared, undeterred by our anxiety.

  It was just as well we had been to the bathroom before we left the café because it was a forty-minute drive down the motorway and I began to wonder if we should have picked up some snacks before we had jumped in the car. Ceri put the radio on and we listened to some music, watching the cars passing by on the carriageway while the gloomy clouds in the sky began to part, and by the time we reached Clevedon, the sun had come out. Oh, it was such a relief to see some sunshine. It was still bitterly cold, but at least it wasn't snowing and there was no wind chill either, which really helped when you were wearing a short skirt. As we passed through the small town, we all peered through the windows at the buildings as we drove by. Ceri turned us off a main road and followed the winding street in search of our destination.

  "These houses. Very big, they are very big," Mecky remarked as we eyed the large, imposing houses that lined the street. Many of them had expensive cars parked on the driveways, others with broad front gardens that would ordinarily have been in bloom in the summertime. It was obvious that whoever lived in these homes likely had plenty of cash to spare.

  "Look at that one. It's like a fairy tale castle." Christine sighed as we passed one with a Medieval-style tower built on one side, its weathervane-tipped spire pointing skyward. "I'd love to live in a house like that..."

  "Maybe you will be living someday." Mecky smiled over her shoulder as she turned in the front seat. Christine smiled back, but I could see that she didn't think it was likely.

  "You already live in a tower." I chuckled, giving her a little nudge with my elbow. She laughed, but there was no humour in the sound.

  "Yeah, it's not really the same though, is it," she mumbled, sinking down in her seat.

  Ceri pulled up outside a particularly impressive looking house, square in shape with large bay windows and a pond in the garden. The columns either side of the front gate had statues of eagles carved out of stone, their heads turning towards the gate as if so they could observe any visitors that might pass through. There was no driveway out front, but a Chrysler was parked on the kerb right next to us. Ceri took off his seat belt and turned to look through the window, all of us craning our necks to get a better view.

  "Well, this is it by yere. Shall we go in?" he suggested, looking round at each of us.

  "You first," I remarked, beginning to feel more nervous than curious. He sighed and opened the car door, climbing out onto the salt-strewn pavement and collecting the keys from the ignition.

  The three of us followed suit, Christine shivering in her fleece-lined coat, so I put my arm around her and gave her a reassuring squeeze, the two of us walking side by side behind Ceri and Mecky. The gate was already open, and as we stepped onto the neatly paved pathway towards the front porch, I wondered what the occupants would think when they saw us standing outside.

  We stopped before the front door, Ceri pausing to glance at us before reaching to press the doorbell. I heard the bing-bong ring through the house, attempting to pick up on any movement within with my sharp ears, and soon enough I heard shuffling footfalls approaching across what I assumed was hard flooring in the hallway. Without realising, we all held our breath simultaneously, listening as the lock was undone and then the door opened, gliding smoothly on well-oiled hinges. An old lady appeared in the gap, her spectacles dangling on a chain against her bosom and her wispy white hair tucked away under a gauzy, patterned headscarf. She was wearing a houndstooth jumper and blue slacks, her feet hidden in a pair of soft suede slippers.

  "Can I help you?" she inquired after lifting her glasses onto her face and peering at us. Her accent was somewhat upper class, but there was a burr to it, just like my lower-class accent, which made me think she hadn't lived in luxury her entire life.

  "Hello there. We're sorry to co
me knocking on your door unannounced, but we're searching for a lady named Edith Connors, do you know her?" Ceri replied politely, and I half-expected to feel the static sensation that had come off him before, but there was nothing.

  "Oh—yes, I—I'm Edith," the old lady stuttered, seeming confused, if not a little wary of us. "Do I know you? Are you here about the sewing classes?"

  "Hey there sweetie," I decided to intervene, cutting off Ceri before he had a chance to speak again. "My name's Leona, and these are my friends, Ceri, Mecky, and Chrissy. We're looking for someone and we think you might know him. We were hoping we could come in and just have a bit of a chat, yeah? Would that be all right, love?"

  Ceri glanced at me, obviously suppressing the desire to tell me off for interrupting.

  "Oh, nice to meet you." Edith perked up a little, smiling as she greeted us, if not seeming a bit flustered at suddenly meeting a group of strangers.

  "Can we come in? We might look like a bunch of ne'er-do-wells, but I promise we'll be tidy, and we'll even use our manners." I climbed onto the step so that I was level with her. She looked at me from head to toe, and I could see her jaw going up and down as she processed what to say next.

  "Okay, th-this way," Edith finally agreed as she turned and shuffled back into the hallway.

  "Oh, what a lovely house you've got," I remarked as I followed behind her, looking over my shoulder at the others with a mischievous wink. Ceri raised an eyebrow, but his mouth was starting to quirk into an amused smirk, and Mecky and Christine both grinned from ear to ear.

  Edith's house really was lovely, I wasn't just saying that to flatter her. It was tastefully decorated in a country house style, with white furniture and pale green walls, picture frames of family and friends lining the shelves and sandy-coloured marble floors beneath our feet. She took us into the living room where two enormous porcelain ornaments of white dogs sat either side of the wood-burning fireplace, the beige leather sofas arranged around it and the flat screen television mounted on the chimney breast above. We were polite enough to remove our shoes before we entered, which was just as well since seeing Ceri's scabby boots on the shag pile of her rug would have given me heart palpitations. We sat down, Christine perching opposite me beside Mecky and Ceri sinking down beside me on the other sofa as Edith came to stand over us.