Forward Slash

by Louise Voss

  Of course, masturbation is only one way of letting off steam online. If I’m in a foul mood, or looking for some light fun, if I want a laugh, I like going onto the pages of cancer kids and leaving comments. You see those pages all the time: ‘My 10-year-old daughter is dying of cancer and her wish is to trend on Twitter. Please RT.’ They all have links to Facebook and Just Giving pages, or sometimes they have blogs on which they record their fight against sickness. I enjoy going on those pages and leaving comments about how ugly they are, or saying things like, ‘Jesus hates you,’ or, ‘You must have sinned in a past life and now you’re paying for it.’ I use one of my many fake profiles to do this. I like going onto forums and starting fights too. Poking liberals and goading them into fury.

  Looking through the Facebook photos of young girls in bikinis got me thinking about The One again. Those teens were too young for me. I’m not a Jimmy Savile. I like more mature women. The perfect woman is aged somewhere between 28 and 32. That’s when a woman reaches her sexual peak, when she knows what she’s doing and has the strongest desire. It’s all to do with her oestrogen levels. There’s a myth that men reach their peak at 18, but let me tell you, I am at my best now.

  Peaking and primed for The One.

  Anyway, news of Katherine’s demise put me into a great mood. I went into the room I needed to prepare for my beloved and got to work. I had moved an iPod dock into the room and I slipped my iPhone into it and put my favourite song on. I sat on the bed and closed my eyes, letting the words and melody envelop me. Do you know that song? Sad Café. Every day I’m without you hurts a little bit more. Yes, beautiful, isn’t it? It was Her favourite record; she used to play it all the time. Now, whenever I hear it, it’s like a million tiny baby spiders crawling up my spine.

  The room had no windows, so there was no sunlight to spoil the mood, no drapes to close. I set the lights low to create a crepuscular mood, then set about making the bed. I had ordered new linen: lilac silk sheets and an oyster-pink ruffled quilt cover, plump pillows and expensive cushions. Most men have no idea how to put a duvet cover on and it can be like watching someone attempt to stuff a flaccid cock into a condom. But I was well trained and am excellent at it.

  I had bought some art for the walls, some tasteful nudes by Helmut Newton and I stopped to admire them. My favourite, The Legend of Virginity, was a fabulous shot of a woman being swallowed by a crocodile, her naked legs protruding from the beast’s mouth. Often, that’s what I like to imagine myself doing: swallowing a woman whole, taking her all the way inside me, absorbing her. Two becoming one. It’s a beautiful image.

  Dire Straits’ ‘Romeo and Juliet’ came on and I sang along softly as I continued to prepare the room. To make sure the room would look right when the time came, I set up a trestle table in the corner (it took me ages to find the perfect position), then covered it with a red-and-white-checked tablecloth. I set out a pair of wineglasses, then went off to fetch a vase and fill it with water. Into the vase went a single red rose. I pressed my fingertips against a thorn, just enough to draw blood, which I licked from my fingers.

  Yes, it was perfect.

  Next, I laid some lingerie on the bed – Myla, this time. A white bodysuit, complete with stockings and suspenders. I had a feeling my love would want to dress up for me, would want to be naughty. I had toyed with the idea of buying her a vibrator, but decided I would be enough. I had bought a crystal butt plug, however, and had spent hours online searching for the perfect plug, one that would thrill my love and fit her perfectly. This one had cost £250, but it was worth every penny.

  I took some handcuffs out of my bag and attached them to the bedstead, one pair on each corner. These were designer items too. Only the best for The One, you know.

  Finally, I laid plastic sheeting on the floor.

  I stepped back and looked at my handiwork. Perfect. I couldn’t wait to bring her back to my place. We could, I was certain, be so happy together, have such a good time. As long as she showed herself to be the woman I thought she was …

  I was tingling all over, sweating with excitement. I was sure that she was going to pass with flying colours. I could feel it beneath my skin, deep in my bones. More than any other before. After all these years of searching, of rejecting and eliminating, I was finally so close to the woman of my dreams.

  I went to the computer and sat down. I had bookmarked her website, the one she runs. It’s impressive. A decent little site. How clever she is. Not a tenth as clever as me, but not many people are. And I wasn’t after her for her mind, after all.

  What kind of site was it? Oh, a little shopping site for people who are into crafts and all that shit.

  It was called Upcycle.com.

  24

  Amy

  Thursday, 25 July

  Amy took off her helmet as she came through the front door, feeling a crackle of static electricity from her hair. She went straight into the living room, trying and failing to keep the tremor of shock out of her voice as she told Gary:

  ‘Katherine’s dead. Clive found her lying on the bathroom floor inside their cottage. Massive drugs overdose, they think.’

  She knew she had to stay calm, or she would be lost entirely. ‘I’m going to go and try and talk to him, see if I can persuade him to let me look at Katherine’s computer. I just need to sit down and gather my thoughts for a bit first. I’ll make us some coffee.’

  Gary looked shocked too: queasy, and white as a sheet. He was sitting on Amy’s sofa in his boxer shorts and nothing else, his hands dangling uselessly between his legs. On her ride back from the police station, Amy had almost forgotten he was still here. Boris sat on the floor at his feet, a doleful expression on his sweet face.

  ‘This is terrible,’ Gary said in a bemused voice. ‘Terrible. Do you think Becky was doing drugs too?’

  Amy took a deep breath. ‘No, not for a moment. She hated drugs. But I think what you’re really saying is, do I think Becky’s dead somewhere too?’ She took another breath, gathering her courage. ‘Well, yes, maybe I do. I told the police about Fraser and they’re going to talk to him. In fact, they knew about him already. They wouldn’t tell me explicitly but it seems clear they think it was him who gave or sold Katherine the drugs that killed her.’

  Strangely, after her panic attack in the cab the previous night and even in her current state of shock, there was a part of Amy that felt stronger than before. The news of Katherine’s death had horrified her, but perhaps it might yet help find Becky.

  Amy paced the room. ‘I can’t believe that Fraser, obnoxious though he is, had anything to do with Becky’s disappearance. His reaction when he saw Becky’s photo and talked about her – either it was an incredibly sophisticated double-bluff, the kind he didn’t seem capable of, or his only contact with her was, well, the contact he told us about.’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Gary said. ‘He seemed like a nasty piece of work to me.’

  Amy shook her head emphatically. ‘No. I just can’t see it. I’m sure whoever faked Becky’s disappearance is still out there.’

  An image came to her: Becky, aged five, playing hide-and-seek so thoroughly that nobody found her for almost two hours. Their mum had eventually discovered her, sobbing quietly at the back of the cobwebby greenhouse, thinking that she wasn’t allowed to come back unless she was found. Amy’s heart clenched.

  ‘I feel like it’s got to be someone else Becky met through that hook-up site – probably someone Kath met too. That’s why I need to talk to Clive.’

  ‘I’ll come with you to see him,’ Gary said, gnawing his thumbnail down to the quick. ‘I’ve taken the day off already. I had some time in lieu owed, and—’

  ‘No, it’s fine, thanks, Gary,’ Amy said, more forcefully than she’d intended. ‘It’s really kind of you, but—’

  ‘It’s really kind of you, but—’ he mimicked bitterly.

  Amy blinked at him. ‘What?’ There was so much other stuff whirling around inside her head that she barely r
egistered his tone.

  ‘You keep saying that, like I’m some sort of elderly uncle you’re humouring, instead of—’

  ‘Instead of what?’ Amy’s heart sank, although she knew that this conversation was already overdue. She was vaguely curious to know how he did see his role in her life – just not at that minute.

  ‘Well, I don’t know, Amy. What are we? Friends, or lovers; both or neither? I’m not stupid enough to think we’re girlfriend and boyfriend.’

  She sat down next to him and picked up the baby bootee she was knitting, desperate for something to do with her hands. Knitting was safer than smoking. Or self-harming. She was on her fourth bootee and had yet to make two that were near enough the same size to be considered a matching pair. For a moment, she pretended to be counting stitches. Gary’s words had hurt her feelings, and simultaneously irritated her – surely, Gary couldn’t have expected her to give serious thought to their ‘relationship’, whatever it was, under these circumstances?

  ‘Friends, without a doubt, at the very least,’ she eventually said, putting down the knitting again and turning to him, placing her hand on his bare knee. ‘I know that I couldn’t have got through all this so far without you. But, forgive me, Gary, honestly, with Becky gone and now Katherine dead, I just can’t think about anything else … I’m really not ready for a relationship just yet – but please don’t give up on me? It’s not easy for me to say it … but I really need you. I’m sorry if I led you on last night. Please don’t think I make a habit of it. It was lovely though, wasn’t it?’ She smiled tentatively up at him but he didn’t smile back.

  ‘It was amazing,’ he said, scratching his stomach. ‘That’s why I’m gutted you don’t want to do it again.’

  ‘I do!’ she protested, forcing herself to look at his knee and not in the direction of his boxers. ‘I mean – you’re hot, Gary, you really are. But I mean, this just isn’t the right time … You do understand, don’t you?’

  Gary removed her hand, stood up and walked towards the bedroom. ‘Loud and clear. Probably for the best. I’m going to get dressed now. Are you sure you don’t want me to come to Clive’s?’

  She jumped up and gave him a hug, which he held on to for far too long. ‘No, I think I can get him to talk better if I go on my own. But thanks. Make sure you close the door properly when you leave, won’t you?’

  The police told Amy that Clive had discovered Katherine’s body at the cottage, even though the couple had split up some weeks earlier and Clive had officially moved out, so she decided the best way to track him down would be to start there. She had no idea where he’d moved to after the split, but perhaps the old man next door would have a forwarding address for him.

  But when she arrived and kicked down the bike stand by the kerb outside the cottage, she saw straightaway that she wouldn’t need to involve the neighbour. There was a uniformed policeman outside the partly open front door, and crime-scene tape strung from the hedge on either side of the front gate. A small group of onlookers had gathered a few doors down, gossiping and gaping at the house and at the black private ambulance parked next to two squad cars. With a shiver of horror, Amy realized that Katherine’s body was likely still inside.

  ‘Excuse me,’ she said to the PC, taking off her helmet and feeling the glaring sun on her face. ‘The police told me this morning about … what’s happened in here. I need to talk to Clive, Katherine’s ex. Do you know where he is?’

  The PC was a young Asian man with a fluffy moustache and traces of acne on his cheeks.

  ‘He’s not here, madam. This is a protected area – the coroner is still inside.’ He took out a notepad, flicked it open and hovered a pencil over the top. ‘Could I have your name please?’

  ‘Amy Coltman,’ she said, trying to look over his shoulder into the house. ‘Katherine Devine was a friend of my sister’s, and my sister has been missing for a week. I need to talk to Katherine’s ex. The police at Camberwell station told me that he discovered the body here last night.’

  He laboriously wrote down everything she said, all the while glancing up at her as if worried she was going to shoulder-barge past him.

  ‘So he must have been here earlier,’ she pleaded. ‘I don’t have his number – if you can’t tell me where he is, please could you ring him and ask him if he’ll talk to me?’

  ‘I’m sorry, Miss Coltman, but we’re not allowed to give out witness information.’

  ‘I’m not asking you to give out witness information, I’m asking you to contact him on my behalf.’ The glimpse of a white-suited forensics person moving down the hallway carrying a camera – Amy couldn’t tell if it was male or female – made her feel nauseous. Would these people be doing the same thing soon, in another house, with Becky’s body lying on a floor somewhere?

  ‘Are you all right, Miss?’

  Amy took a deep breath and concentrated on an ant carrying a fragment of tortilla chip four times its size across the flagstone by her feet. She nodded, unable to speak, wishing that Gary was with her after all. The PC took pity on her.

  ‘I can tell you, if it’s any help, that Mr Clive Dick was met here by a member of the band he plays in. They mentioned they were going straight to the pub to have a drink, for the shock. If you know which pub they mean, you might find him there.’

  Amy hadn’t known that Clive’s surname was Dick. Poor guy. As if things weren’t bad enough for him. So – one of his mates from the band had collected him. Which pub would they go to? The only one she could think of was the one she and Gary had been to, where his band had been playing. It was local, and they played there regularly, so it could be the one.

  ‘Thanks – I think I know where he might be. I’ll try there.’

  ‘I’ll just take your address and phone number, if I may, Miss Coltman,’ said the PC, pencil hovering again. Amy gave him the details, put on her helmet, and got back on her bike, wishing that she could accelerate to eighty miles an hour to get as far away as she could from the knowledge of Katherine’s dead body – not to mention the knowledge of having to confront a grief-stricken man who already hated her sister and, by default, her.

  ‘Clive?’ she said tentatively, approaching the dark corner of a back room of the Crown where, even at eleven thirty, several empties were accumulating on a small table in front of him. He was there alone, his head buried in his arms, shoulders shaking. Amy’s heart sank even further.

  She touched his arm and he jumped, staring up at her with wild, streaming eyes. ‘You again. I suppose you’ve heard.’

  She sat down next to him. ‘I’m so, so sorry, Clive. I really am. I just can’t believe it.’ Tears filled her own eyes.

  ‘What do you want? I doubt you’ve come over here to give me your condolences.’ He sounded flat and resigned.

  Amy sniffed hard. ‘Well, I have – but not only that.’

  ‘So your sister hasn’t showed up yet.’

  She shook her head. ‘Clive … I know you hate Becky – and for whatever reason you blame her for what happened between you and Katherine, and if she did split you two up, then I don’t blame you – but this isn’t about Becky.’

  Clive lifted up his pint with shaking hands, closing his eyes as he drank deeply, as though the act of swallowing would take away his pain. He was such a funny little man, thought Amy, trying to imagine him and the larger-than-life Katherine together, when they were happy. He looked like Katherine would have eaten him for dinner, although maybe he was one of those men who changed behind closed doors: meek in public, strong in private.

  ‘Isn’t it?’

  ‘Not just about Becky,’ Amy corrected herself. She bit her lip – this part was going to be hard. ‘It’s about me, going insane, because I’m convinced something bad has happened to her. It’s about my mum and dad and grandparents, who’ll all be devastated if it has. It’s about everyone who loves her – some of them will be mourning Katherine soon, when they find out. All their work colleagues, and all the boys at school … All the
ir friends, who’ll have to cope with one death, wondering if it’s two … Whatever your own personal feelings about her are, Clive, please don’t put us all through what you’re going through over Katherine. Please?’

  Amy had to stop talking because suddenly she was crying too much, and they sat in silence for a few minutes, punctuated only by her suppressed sobs. She delved in her bag for a tissue. She didn’t dare look at Clive – in fact, she was worried that he would simply walk out and never speak to her, ever.

  Clive’s friend reappeared, having been outside for a cigarette. He reeked of smoke and was slightly unsteady on his feet. Amy briefly wondered why they hadn’t just sat outside in the garden if he was smoking, but when she did pluck up strength to look at Clive, she knew: he couldn’t be out in the sunshine, not when everything in his world was so unrelentingly dark.

  ‘All right, mate?’ Clive’s friend clapped him on the back, slightly too hard, making Clive’s pint glass clink against his front teeth. ‘I’m Jerry,’ he said to Amy. ‘Were you a good friend of Katherine’s?’ He sounded embarrassed. ‘Awful business. Drinking’s the only answer. It’s my round – what can I get you?’

  It wasn’t even noon, but they were both well on the way to complete inebriation.

  ‘I’m on my bike, thanks, but a Coke would be lovely,’ said Amy, gesturing to the helmet by her feet. Jerry weaved off into the saloon bar. ‘Same again for you, sir,’ he called back over his shoulder – a comment, not a question.

  ‘He never liked Kath,’ Clive said to Amy, wiping his eyes. ‘Good mate, though. You didn’t like her either, did you?’

  At least he was talking to her. It was a start.

  ‘I hardly knew her. Honestly, I only met her once or twice with my sister. I thought she was an amazing artist. I was going to ask her to write something for my website. I’ve got this crafts website, you see, called Upcycle.com, it’s—’