Next of Kin

by Welfare, Sue

  ‘Wake up, mate,’ Woody laughed. ‘It was under the stool. Come on, get with the programme. The weed’s not that strong.’ His hands were still working over his body.

  ‘What do you need, man?’ Ryan asked, as Woody’s searching became more animated. ‘Lost something?’

  Woody sighed. ‘I reckon I must have left my phone in the pub.’

  ‘Bummer.’

  ‘Or maybe I’ve dropped it. I’m going to have to go back and have a look for it.’

  ‘What, you’re going to go now?’ asked Ryan, glancing over his shoulder, thinking about the long walk back.

  ‘Yeah too right, top of the range, 4G,’ said Woody, still searching his pockets.

  ‘Maybe someone will hand it in,’ suggested Ryan.

  Woody snorted. ‘Yeah and maybe the tooth fairy will pop round later and drop it off at the house. Can I just borrow your phone? I’ll call mine. Maybe, if I dropped it we’ll be able to hear it ringing.’

  Ryan nodded and handed Woody his phone. Woody keyed in a number and waited. Ryan was about to speak when Woody held up a hand to silence him. They both listened, but there was nothing but night sounds and the distant rumble of the traffic. Before the call went to voice mail Woody hung up.

  ‘Bollocks. Worth a shot,’ he said, as Ryan tucked his phone back into his jacket.

  They were a lot further along the towpath than Ryan had been in a long time; in fact he wasn’t all together sure where they were. Last time he’d come anywhere near this far was with a girl he’d been seeing, an exchange student – French, big brown eyes, naughty mouth. He grinned and took another pull on the joint; dirty little thing she was and the two of them way too horny with nowhere to go. That had been before his mum got really ill, before he had the flat, long before any of this with Sarah and Woody and the money. He tried to remember the French girl’s name. Although her name eluded him he remembered that they had walked down the towpath hand in hand, hands all over each other, looking for a quiet place, any place, maybe under the trees, maybe under the willows.

  It was getting muddier now, slippery under foot, the verges on the side of the path less manicured and a couple of the lights were out.

  ‘Are you sure that this place is down here?’ Ryan asked, glancing round. ‘Maybe we should just go back and just see if we can find your phone? Come back in the daylight? I’m mean it’s pitch fucking black down here.’

  The combination of booze and blow was making his head spin.

  ‘Stop whining, man,’ said Woody. ‘We’re more or less there now. I just need to get my bearings and work out which one it is.’ He was glancing up at one of the buildings that ran along side where they were walking. It was a little ahead of them in the darkness, behind a fence and patch of grass. Woody was peering up into the gloom.

  ‘I think it’s that one just there, look,’ he said, pointing. ‘You can see the back of it from here. Third floor, left hand corner – the one with the lights on and the blinds. Although it could be the next one up. It gives you an idea of what the view is like.’

  ‘Are you sure?’ said Ryan, craning his neck to see what Woody was looking at. ‘It’s a joke. I can’t see bugger all.’

  ‘Yes, I’m sure that this is it,’ said Woody and with that he looked up and stepped back, and Ryan – on the outside of the path – followed his lead, and as he did so he felt his foot slipping backwards, not a lot, but just enough to throw him off balance. Ryan laughed nervously and swore under his breath. He hadn’t realised quite how close he was to the edge.

  At the sound of his voice Woody looked back over his shoulder in Ryan’s direction, and as Ryan tried to regain his balance Woody swung round and reached out towards him.

  But he realised Woody wasn’t planning on grabbing hold of him. Instead Woody pushed him in the chest, hard, flat handed, palms level with Ryan’s heart, toppling him over backwards, sending him into the river.

  Hitting the surface was an icy cold wakeup call.

  ‘What the fuck,’ Ryan thought in the split second before he plunged beneath the surface. The water eagerly poured into his open mouth, the words – and new words – and a welter of thoughts lost in the deluge, all tasting of mud and something oily and dark. The water was bone-chillingly cold, and shocked the breath out of his lungs. Sober, Ryan could have probably clambered out. But drunk, stoned and totally disorientated the water grabbed at him with eager hands, and held on tight, soaking his jeans, his boots, the heavy plaid jacket he was wearing, filling him up, holding him down, pulling him under.

  It was crazy; all he had to do was find his footing. Ryan knew it wasn’t that deep and he could swim, for fuck’s sake. His head was full of thoughts, razor sharp and all begging for attention and at the same time they felt as if they were a long way away, so very, very far away that he couldn’t quite catch them. If this was Woody’s idea of a joke it was lost on him, but he knew that soon Woody would grab hold of him, help him out, pull him to the shore. He would do it in a moment or two, he would, Ryan was certain of that. They were friends, mates. And then they’d laugh about this, laugh for months, years – fucking Woody, what a joker, trying to frigging drown him, the dipstick.

  He tried not to panic, tried not to freeze up, and tried instead to bottom out. If he could just find the bottom he could push himself up to the surface and Woody would grab his jacket and pull him out on the bank. He’d probably hock his lungs up, ditch the booze all over the grass, and they’d laugh about it some more as Woody tried to avoid getting sick all over his fancy running shoes.

  Ryan tried to stand up. He seemed to be going down a long way. Shit, he had seen people punt on the Cam day in, day out. It couldn’t be that deep. He tried to strike out for the bank – it wasn’t that far, but the water grabbed hold of his clothes, the water sucking him down and holding him tight. It felt as if it wanted him for itself.

  Ryan tried to call out before he realised that he was still under the surface, and as the cold water filled him, he stopped fighting, and all thoughts seemed to slip away, bright like sparklers, and float downstream. He could see them glittering in the lights – all those thoughts, all his ideas, all of his future. He felt tired, sleepy almost, and then it occurred to him that maybe this wasn’t happening at all, maybe he was dreaming or maybe Woody hadn’t just put mary-jane in the joint, maybe it was something stronger, weirder – shit it was some sort of a hit if it was – and as the last thought bubbled up through his mind he started to laugh and as he did his lungs filled with water and this time he couldn’t taste it.

  Under the water it was dark as night but Ryan could see the lights above him and reached up one last time, instinct now rather than reason forcing himself to fight the pull, surfacing briefly, too shocked now to call out, too full with the river and the cold and the certainty that he was going to die, to do anything other than let the water take him. In that moment he could see Woody standing there on the bank watching him, making no effort to rescue him, his face no more than a white oval in the gloom. Then he was gone and there was darkness and the sound of Ryan’s heart as it struggled to keep him alive, and then even that was too far off, too distant to disturb the peace he had found.

  Woody stood still and quiet there by the water’s edge, waiting until he was absolutely certain that Ryan wasn’t going to resurface. When he was sure, he calmly continued down the towpath till he got to a pathway where he could cut through the buildings and get back to the road. As he did, it started to rain; Woody smiled to himself. He had chosen this route carefully, and carried on walking so that his footprints wouldn’t appear to double back at the point where Ryan had gone in, but hopefully now the rain would wash away any last remaining traces of his having been there at all.

  He walked briskly, purposely, but not so fast as to attract attention. A street or two from the river he slipped off the backpack he had been carrying, and paused for a moment to ease off his trainers. Taking out the shoes he had brought with him, he put them on. Gloves still on, Woody gla
nced left and right before dropping the trainers into a carrier bag, along with two firelighters and a pile of crumpled newspapers. Pulling out a few of the scrunched pages he held them in his hand.

  Mid-week, the street he had chosen to walk back along was lined with wheelie bins. Glancing round to make sure no one was watching him he picked a bin at random and lifted the lid. It was half full with plastic bags and fast food cartons and smelt of pizza and the sweet fetid scent of decay. Smiling, Woody dropped the carrier bag in alongside all the others. He added a hefty squirt of lighter fluid, a flick of his lighter to ignite the newspaper, and a stick he had left in the hedge earlier to prop the bin open – before carefully peeling off his gloves and adding them to the pyre in the bin. It took less than a minute for the fire to take hold, though Woody waited until he was certain the bin was well and truly alight before turning and heading for town. Now even if the police found the shoeprints down on the towpath there would be no trainers to match them with.

  Woody was back in the pub before closing time, in time to retrieve his phone from where he had hidden it in a planter, close to where he and Ryan had been standing earlier. If the police tracked his phone they would be able to see where he was when Ryan slipped into the Cam, and it wouldn’t be there with him.

  After a few minutes watching the comings and goings, Woody got up, slipped off his wedding ring and tucked it into his inside pocket, all the while apparently concentrating on checking his phone, but just in time to collide with a big blonde girl who was navigating her way between the tables carrying a tray of drinks. She looked a little tipsy, her hair a little awry. He didn’t hit her hard, the collision wasn’t overly dramatic nor did it cause much damage but it was just enough to be memorable.

  The girl squealed; the tray slipped sideways out of her hands, the contents clattering to the floor in an explosion of glass, orange juice and booze.

  ‘Oh excuse me, I’m so sorry,’ said Woody, catching hold of her arm so that she didn’t slip.

  ‘You wanna watch where you’re going,’ the girl snapped right back at him in perfect estuary English, as she made a show of tidying herself, and he stooped down to pick up the tray.

  Woody smiled up at her. ‘Will you forgive me?’ He raised his eyebrows, part question, but heavy on the flirtation. She reddened and giggled.

  ‘Depends on what you’re planning to do next,’ she said.

  People around them grumbled and stepped around the mess, a man picked up the one bottle of mixer that hadn’t been smashed, and on a raft of Chinese whispers word spread across to the bar staff to get over to them with a brush and dust pan and a mop and bucket.

  Woody meanwhile had taken his wallet out, and was guiding the woman back towards the bar. ‘Let me replace your drinks for a start. What can I get you and your friends?’ he purred, while his hand settled into the small of her back. ‘Haven’t I seen you somewhere before? Do you work at the university?’

  She smiled and shook her head. ‘No, I work in Boots.’

  ‘Really? Maybe that’s where it was then. So what do you want?’ he said, as they eased their way to the front of the press of customers.

  ‘I’ve got a list,’ she said, slyly.

  Woody grinned. ‘Really?’ he said. ‘I like a woman who knows what she wants. Best we work our way through it then, aye?’

  The girl giggled. ‘Cheeky.’

  ‘So, what’s your name then?’ he asked.

  ‘Carol. Carol Mullings.’

  Woody held out his hand. ‘Pleased to meet you, Carol. I’m Woody,’ he said.

  ‘Really?’ she looked at him quizzically and pulled a face. ‘I thought – well you know – that it would be something much more exotic.’

  He laughed. ‘It is, but Woody is what my friends call me.’

  ‘So what is it really?’

  ‘You don’t want to know,’ he said. ‘Maybe I’ll tell you later.’

  She nodded. ‘Later? That sounds like a nice idea. So, Woody, did you bump into me on purpose?’

  He pulled an innocent face. ‘What, and spill good booze? No, I don’t think so. Would I do a thing like that just to meet a gorgeous woman?’ he continued in a voice that implied that that was exactly what he had done. ‘Me and my friend are just out for a quiet drink.’

  The girl glanced round. ‘So where’s your friend now then?’

  Woody grinned. ‘Gone. He said he had to go home. Lightweight. Didn’t want to be out too late on a school night.’

  The girl peered at him for a minute or two, considering what he had just said and then finally she said. ‘What is he like a teacher or something?’ At which point the barman glanced in their direction.

  ‘What can I do you for?’ asked the man.

  Woody nodded towards the blonde. ‘Tell the man what it is you want, Honey.’

  Carol giggled. ‘Where to begin,’ she said, winking at Woody.

  The barman laughed. ‘Now, now, Miss, keep it clean,’ he joked.

  Carol moved in so close that their bodies touched, as they waited for the barman to sort out their order.

  ‘Shouldn’t you be getting back to your friends?’ he asked. ‘I can bring the drinks over if you like; make sure they all get there in once piece.’

  ‘They can wait a bit longer,’ she said. ‘You live round here, do you?’

  He smiled. ‘No, how about you?’

  She took the drink that he offered her. ‘Not far.’

  ‘Really? In that case maybe I ought to walk you home, make sure you don’t get into any more trouble.’

  Carol held his gaze, eyes bright with mischief. ‘Not backwards in coming forwards, are you, Woody?’

  He raised his eyebrows. ‘Who me?’ he said.

  She laughed, closing carmine lips round the straw in her cocktail and sucking gently. ‘Yes you,’ she said, as she pulled away, her tongue working on the end of the straw.

  He grinned; the suggestion clear as day.

  Sarah

  ‘Two women out jogging found Ryan the next morning. In the reeds. On a bend in the river. They thought it was a black polythene bag at first. Till they saw his hands. Floating. It was dark when the police came to the house. I don’t know why it took them all day to find out where he lived. I didn’t ask.

  ‘I couldn’t work out what the noise was to begin with. I’d been reading and fallen asleep on the sofa in the sitting room. The noise woke me up. There were voices and the sounds of banging and hammering. I suppose it was maybe half past eight, maybe nine. I’m not altogether sure now. I’d been sound asleep, and then I realised it was someone knocking at the door. Hard. And then I was hard awake. First of all I thought that it might be the men who had come before. The ones who had beaten Ryan up. And then I heard Woody talking to them, and heard them say they were police. And then I thought that maybe they had found out about me and Woody and they had come to arrest us both. But whatever the reason was that they were there, I knew that it wasn’t to bring us anything good.’

  Chapter Fifteen

  ‘You’d better come in,’ said Woody, as he opened the front door. ‘I’m not sure exactly where my wife is. Come on through. Sorry it’s so dark in here. I was upstairs. I hadn’t realised how late it was. I’ll just get the lights.’

  From the sitting room Sarah could hear the low rumble of voices. She didn’t know whether to feel relieved or anxious that Woody had answered the door. Standing up she straightened her clothes and ran her fingers back through her hair, trying to tidy herself up. She had fallen asleep on the sofa when she got in from work, and between then and now it had got dark, and cold too. Still feeling slightly disorientated Sarah opened the door into the hallway, making a concerted effort to wake up, blinking in the glare of lights that Woody was busy switching on.

  ‘Sorry,’ he was saying, talking over his shoulder as he moved around switching the lamps on. ‘I was studying upstairs. Ah, there you are, Sarah. Are you okay?’

  Sarah turned. There were two police officers standing
in the hallway, both very still, both very young, both composed with sombre expressions.

  She said nothing, waiting for one of them to speak. Her body might be still but her mind was working overtime. What did they know? Would they put her in handcuffs? Would they let her get changed out of her work clothes before they took her to the police station? And more to the point, how had the police found out about the sham marriage? She hadn’t said a word to anyone, not a word, and couldn’t imagine Woody would have said anything – which left Ryan; maybe Ryan had said something.

  It didn’t take a great leap of the imagination to guess that it had to be him. Drunk maybe. Stoned. Bragging. Sarah closed her eyes, wondering what the hell he had said and to whom. Would they take her straight to prison? On remand. Sarah waited, her pulse banging like a drum.

  Woody caught her eye and said, somewhat unnecessarily, ‘It’s the police.’ As if she couldn’t see for herself, and then he said, quickly, as if she had asked. ‘It’s about Ryan.’

  ‘What about Ryan? What’s happened now?’

  ‘We need to talk.’ He spoke gently, holding out a hand towards her. ‘Why don’t you come through into the kitchen so we can all sit down?’ He spoke to her as if she was a child or possibly ill, in a voice so tender and so contrived that she almost laughed.

  ‘She’s not been sleeping well,’ he said, as an aside to the police officers. ‘She probably had a bit of a nap, took a sleeping tablet. Leaves her a bit groggy.’ He smiled at her. ‘She worries me sometimes. Always rushing about, looking after everyone else, anyone but herself.’

  Sarah stared at him, wondering why he was lying, and if that was what a husband might say, a real one, someone who genuinely truly loved her. ‘I didn’t take a sleeping tablet,’ she said.

  He nodded. ‘Oh well – that’s good,’ he said gently, as if it was a cause for congratulation.

  Woody was so clever; and then her attention shifted to the other thing that he had said.