When the Dead Come Calling

by Helen Sedgwick

  Elise is still talking outside, and as Frazer goes out to join them Trish catches the tail end of her boast: ‘… I’ve been thinking about it since I heard, see, and there’s lots I’ve got to tell yous about that Dr Alexis Cosse…’ before the door to the interview room is closed.

  WHAT WEDNESDAYS WERE LIKE BEFORE

  Simon’s staring out the window of his bedroom, his back to the village, his view out over the disused field and the community shed that sits alone and derelict in the middle of it. They made it entirely from fallen trees, thirty years back now, the whole village had helped out – or so they say. Families used to meet there for play days, Adventure Wednesdays they were called. Simon went himself as a kid, though it’s hard to imagine local children running round in the field today. Overgrown with willow herb and gorse and nettles, weeds lodging in the timber walls of the shed, the roof rotten with damp. How or when it fell into such decay he can’t say, only that it slipped by while he was looking elsewhere. The families stopped going first of all, maybe there was an issue with safety; he thinks there was a story once about a man sleeping in there, folk arriving to find excrement in the grass by the back wall and a pile of mouldy blankets in the corner. Then it was relaunched as a ‘man shed’ for the old folks of the village, to help address the loneliness of the ageing male population, but the woman who’d been managing it moved away to the city and the old men stopped dropping in and then one day a padlock appeared on the door and no one was quite sure who had the key. It had just become a part of his view, like a tumbledown stable or the disused boat shed by the coast, until he woke up once in the middle of the night to find Alexis staring out at it.

  We have to fix it up, he’d said. Maybe we could get a grant from the council. Imagine what it could be.

  They’d stayed up talking about it, how it could be a centre for the whole community, with vegetable patches outside, an allotment for the village, and maybe fruit trees further out in the field. They had made a lot of plans that night. Never got round to applying for the grant, though. Simon doubted the council would have given them anything, but he didn’t want to say that to Alexis – didn’t want to ruin the hope he still had for building a home out here.

  They’d meet after work sometimes, after Simon had finished at the station. Alexis didn’t usually work Wednesdays, said it was good to give yourself a break midweek. He was a big believer in giving people a break, was Alexis. Often he’d have put a fresh loaf on, maybe made some hummus or got in some cheeses from the farm down the coast. Especially in the summer, when the light could linger all the way to midnight and the evening felt like the start of something.

  If the wind were calm, they’d walk along the coast path, take the binoculars and see if they could spot any oystercatchers. There are some good seabirds hereabouts, if you know when and where to look, and there’s more overhead than those cursed grey gulls that are dominating the skies this year. When it’s warmer, when it’s migration season, they get swifts and house martins, the terns that can be so territorial they dive-bomb your head, and sometimes ospreys too – they once saw one sitting majestic on a fence post. Didn’t even startle as they walked past. Alexis got a photo of it, on his phone.

  He liked taking photos, Alexis. Simon didn’t usually bother – and besides, the pictures Alexis got were better than any he’d take himself. He did the crime scene photos sometimes, for local stuff, but that was about it. Alexis though, he liked to get the big sky, all the shades of grey. Maybe it was from growing up in Greece, having always seen the same blue sky, that somehow the billowing grey over here struck him as beautiful. He was one of the only ones – most folk in the village complained non-stop about the weather. But Alexis could take photos of the sky for hours, he really could. Trees, too. Alexis was quite into trees. So that’s what they’d do, walk along the coast in the shimmering light of the late evening, take photos of sky and trees, find a rock to sit on for their picnic. It could be damn cold too, even in the middle of summer. Stunning though, really. No denying that.

  And they’d hold hands. It was good to be able to do that, and not something Simon took for granted. In Crackenbridge, even in Warphill, they’d have been a bit more cautious. Not that either of them ever said they were doing it, but generally, walking down the street in Crackenbridge, they’d not hold hands. Alexis said it was better here than in Greece. Simon was never sure if it was really the whole culture made him feel that, or just his family within it. Still, his family were probably formed by the culture they were in – it’s a thin line for the external to become internalised. Can’t really judge an individual without putting them in their context.

  There had been a moment, late on Monday night but not so late that his world had already shattered, when Simon had thought to himself that he just needed to get through the next two days. Because then it would be a Wednesday again. They could go on a walk despite the wind – and it was spring already, supposedly, so maybe they’d get a warm spell – just the two of them out on the cliffs with a flask of tea. Then whatever it was Alexis was doing, whatever he was keeping secret and whoever he was seeing behind Simon’s back, wouldn’t exist any more. It would all go away, and the world could be Alexis and Simon and the sky and the trees. One shared moment of that, Simon was sure, and they’d have found a way to fix everything.

  15:54

  Elise Robertson is standing just inside the statement room of Burrowhead police station, chatting away to Suze. Well, gossiping would be the word. It’s making Georgie bristle, and she’s not normally like that. They’re both about the same age, Suze and Elise, not that young but not that old either. Georgie’s trying to work out if the apparent friendship between them is genuine, or if there’s something else going on. Last week she’d have given them the benefit of the doubt, but now?

  ‘Afternoon, ma’am,’ Suze says with a casual smile.

  Georgie nods, but doesn’t speak. Beside her, Frazer is staring at the pair of them, standing tall, though truth is he’s a few inches smaller than Georgie. Still, he’s bringing a bit of formality to the proceedings – when Suze notices him the smile slips away and she adjusts her uniform before moving back to let them inside.

  ‘I’ll take it from here,’ Georgie says, and within seconds Suze is gone and it’s Georgie and Frazer sitting on one side of the table, and Elise at the other. It’s important to change the atmosphere, Georgie knows, if you want truth out of people that they might not want to give. Not that she has any reason to suspect Elise has come here to lie. There was something about their laughter, though, something about the easy way they were chatting to each other that put her guard up, and she can’t explain it by anything other than instinct.

  ‘I’ve to head in a minute,’ Elise begins, before Georgie has even spoken. ‘I left my neighbour to keep an eye on Da, see, before heading out for a bit – I need a break, now and then, like anyone – but then I saw the police tape by the flats and I’d already been thinking maybe I should call, though you don’t want to waste police time without reason, do you, and Ricky was coming up the lane there and even he said maybe I should report it like and so when I saw Suze I figured I’d have a quiet word, and she thought it would be a good idea to come in. But I’ll have to get back to my da soon enough, he’s not well, he’s no doing well. Though it’s been good to get a break from it if I’m honest with yous.’

  Georgie waits for the silence to settle, but is not given the time.

  ‘So like I was telling Suze, on the drive down here, and I’m going to need a lift back by the way but she said she’d drop me right home, so that’ll be good, it’s just that he’d been getting a bit weird, see, and to be honest I’d been thinking of stopping altogether anyway, then in our last appointment—’

  ‘When?’ says Frazer.

  Elise looks as startled as Georgie feels. Perhaps it’s the change in pitch that makes it sound so sudden, so unexpected in the room. Frazer’s voice is deep and hard, whereas Elise’s is high-pitched and tinkling.
/>   ‘When what?’ she says.

  Frazer softens his voice for the next bit, or maybe he’d been surprised by the force of the word too. Georgie reckons maybe he’s nervous.

  ‘When was the appointment?’

  ‘Oh, I see.’ Elise looks at Georgie, then to the door by which her friend left the room, then back at Frazer. ‘Well, it was at two. Two o’clock I mean, in the afternoon.’

  ‘Which afternoon?’

  ‘The day he…’ Her voice trails off and Georgie knows she’s looking at Frazer. Not often you see an unfamiliar face round here. ‘Erm, Monday,’ she says.

  ‘Thanks, Elise,’ says Georgie. ‘But could you start by telling us how long you’d been seeing Dr Cosse?’

  There had been no mention of Elise on the computer, as far as Cal’s team had found, and Simon seemed so sure Alexis had been meeting someone in secret. He’d thought it was a man though, the secret client. Or fake client. Whoever it was Alexis had been meeting behind his back.

  ‘Oh yes, well, see, it all started last year with my da, who’s not well as I mentioned before and I’ve been caring for him, I mean of course I have, who wouldn’t, you know? You would, of course, you do, even though it’s difficult with my job and everything…’

  Her words come fast and flutter through the air; they need to be caught before they’re gone.

  ‘… but he’d started talking about all these things I can’t even remember, and it made me wonder if there was something had happened years ago that he was wanting to talk about. So there was that. Then at the same time, see, I was finding it hard, I mean it is hard, watching someone you love… He’s fading away, see. More every day, though when the doctors come round he always puts on a good show for them. Frustrating, when I can see he’s putting it on for the doctors, like it’s some kind of exam he needs to bluff his way through. But he’s dying, that’s the truth of it. I just wanted someone to talk to about it all, yous’ll know what I mean, and Alexis…’

  When she uses his first name Georgie feels the air gives a shudder at the familiarity of it, how personal it sounds, but Elise doesn’t stop.

  ‘… had been helping me come to terms with it over the past five, six months, see. With losing him but also realising there’s this big chunk of his life I never knew about. Maybe that always happens with our parents. I don’t know though, I always felt I knew my mum really well, like I knew myself really, and when she passed a few years ago I was younger and the feelings were simpler somehow, just loss, just emptiness but without the sort of confusion I’m feeling with Da, because I’m angry about something and I don’t know exactly what it is. Alexis was helping me come to terms with it, see, all of it really, with the stuff it was bringing up, you know? Stuff from the past. That’s what Alexis did.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘He helped people to remember.’

  She looks at Georgie then as if she’s wondering whether or not to say more.

  ‘That’s what he kept saying, see? That he wanted to help me remember. That’s why he started trying the hypnotherapy with me, a few weeks ago. I wasn’t sure about it myself, all sounded a bit dodgy, tell you the truth, but he was … well, he was a bit insistent actually. And I thought, where’s the harm? I didn’t believe it would work anyway, ’cause of how I’m very strong-willed really, everyone says, and I’m not prone to suggestion or anything like that. But Alexis, he thought he could help me remember more about my relationship with my da when I was really young, see. He thought that might be why we’d never really got along, why I was so angry at him for dying…’

  Georgie is leaning forward.

  ‘But Dr Cosse wasn’t a hypnotherapist,’ she says. ‘Not as far as I know.’

  ‘Well, he didn’t have the qualifications, that’s the thing. So he asked me to keep it quiet, what we were trying. He kept calling it a new procedure, like it were something special. And I trusted him. Maybe I shouldn’t have but I did, at first anyway… He had such a gentle way about him, I felt like I could tell him anything really. But I never remembered anything much, with the hypnotherapy. It was soothing, though, at first. That’s why he came round to the house, because it helps to be somewhere you feel at home. I could lie on my own bed, see—’

  ‘On your bed?’

  ‘Oh yes, it’s much better to be somewhere comfortable, somewhere personal. He told me that whole therapist’s couch thing is nonsense, much better to lay down on your own bed. I mean, that’s what he said.’

  Georgie pushes her seat back, Frazer clears his throat. Elise seems to get it at last.

  ‘Oh no, no… It was nothing like that,’ she says, with a slight laugh. ‘I mean, nothing like what you’re thinking. He was’ – she looks around the room, for confirmation – ‘I mean, he was so camp, it’s obvious, isn’t it? Everyone knew he was…’

  ‘Homosexual?’ Frazer’s voice has a hint of accusation in it.

  ‘I’m not saying anything bad—’

  ‘No need to get defensive.’

  ‘I’m not! Look, he was different to most blokes round here, that’s all I’m saying, and I’d never care about something like that.’

  ‘Do other people?’

  Georgie’s watching their back-and-forth; he’s doing well, Frazer. Elise doesn’t know how to take him.

  ‘My da would make comments like, well, you know, that was his generation, wasn’t it? But the point is, there was nothing going on between us. Not like that.’

  ‘But he used to visit you at home?’ asks Georgie, softly now. ‘For this hypnotherapy?’ It seems out of character for Alexis to have been doing something like that, unqualified too. He was always so professional.

  ‘Aye, he used to drive over and meet me at home, in Crackenbridge. My da’s been living with me for quite a few months now, which is better really, ’cause he wasn’t right for looking after himself, and I couldn’t stand the thought of… Well, I’m my father’s carer, and I can’t leave him alone too long, so Alexis would come round. He was good like that. Actually I had to call on my neighbour, to keep an eye, while I came in here. I’m a bit worried now though, I do need to be getting back soon, but the thing is, once I’d heard about what had happened to him, I really felt I had to tell you about how weird he’d got, the last couple of appointments.’

  Elise pauses, looks between them, Georgie leaning forwards over the desk and Frazer leaning back, and all three of them sit in the silence.

  ‘When we started the hypnosis sessions,’ she says eventually, quieter now, more controlled in the way she’s speaking, ‘I didn’t think anything was happening at all, to be honest. We’d talk about my life, you know, what I remember from when I was a kid, memories of my da and my family and that. Afterwards I just felt like we’d had a good chat, that’s all. Like I say, I’m not very suggestible. Maybe I was resisting it. I’ve read somewhere you have to be open to hypnosis for it to work. Anyway, last week, at the appointment before the last one, something changed. It was a full hour we had, but honest to God I can’t remember where the time went. Alexis said it was like being in a trance state, and he was really pleased about it. Said we were making great progress. But I didn’t like it.’

  She looks up from her hands.

  ‘I didn’t like the way he told me not to tell anyone, either. Just seemed … I don’t know. Not how a therapist is supposed to behave. Maybe that was why it didn’t work the next week. Last Monday. He did it all the same, but I didn’t go into that trance state again – I knew exactly what he was asking me. And it was … weird. He was asking me about my da’s friends, if they used to visit the house when I was little. Then he said, “Tell me about your friend who went missing,” but I never had a friend who went missing. He asked some of the normal stuff too, like how I was feeling and what I’d say to my dad if I wasn’t worried about hurting his feelings or anything, but then right towards the end he says to me, “Describe the time when you were most scared as a child.” And I couldn’t do it – I don’t remember when it
was, even. But for a second there, I don’t know, something in the way he said it, all keen like that, it felt like he wanted me to have been scared. Like he was hoping for it.’

  THE INACCURATE TIMEKEEPING OF THE CUCKOO CLOCK

  Mrs Helmsteading is standing by the worktop in her kitchen trying to open a can of dog food. But she can’t get a grip on it. Can’t get the tin opener to latch on right. Can’t shake the feeling she’s about to get dragged right through the floor, either. Used to be bright, this kitchen, not this dim space of under-counter shadows and threads of dust. The overhead light is one of those energy-saving ones they got free from the power company but it never seems to get bright, just lets out a sickly yellow that leaves everything not in its path darker than it was before. And there’s no other lights in here left working.

  She had a mouse issue a while ago, seems to her like maybe they’re still nibbling away through the wires, or maybe they always have been, though Bobby put down all that poison when he first moved in, a few months back. She’s been finding dead mice ever since. In the corners, in the crevices. And now she doesn’t want to climb up the stairs to the room he was staying in – doesn’t want to go up there at all. Not that he was spending much time there, really, but the stairs with their dark-brown carpet lead up to the darker landing that turns a corner and she can’t bring herself to climb up there, doesn’t even want to look. Drops of liquid fall onto the worktop as she stands there, though she doesn’t make the connection between them and her tears.

  The can of dog food drops right out of her fingers – her hands have been shaking all day – and it topples and rolls along and then right off the counter to fall onto the floor. Rattle is down there waiting, poor dog. Not his fault, is it. She won’t bend down to the floor to get it, though; doesn’t know what she’ll see under the cupboards. So she gets some biscuits from the shelf instead, tips them into his bowl till it’s full, then drags her feet through to the living room where the photo of Dawn is lying on the coffee table. She lets herself drop down to the rug. Sits with her legs out in front of her, disappearing under the table.