Bright Spark

by Gavin Smith

  A former angler, dad would relish the setting. Besides, he’d been fighting his own body for decades and had long accepted that he couldn’t evade death forever. A week earlier, while mother had been uncharacteristically confined with a migraine, he had confided in Sharon his need for solitude near the end, to find peace for himself and his family. He didn’t want the family home to be tainted by his terminal ordeal, nor did he want his choices to be trampled down by mother’s solicitude.

  Sharon had expected to be called upon to cajole and browbeat her mother, but instead the decision had been made quickly and presented to her as a fait accompli. Her mother wouldn’t have acquiesced quickly; it was, after all, her life’s mission to care for her father. Yet perhaps even she hadn’t had the stomach to thwart a dying man’s wishes on any grounds.

  Still, Sharon had felt compelled to be there when her father left the bricks and mortar he’d devoted most of his life to and passed into the limbo of palliative care; the river on whose banks the hospice stood might as well have been the Styx, its manager the boatman with his hand held open for his fee. She would offer moral support, if dad needed it or mum would accept it, and ensure that he actually left as he’d intended. Rory had instructed her to take as much time out of the office as she needed; she actually needed to be back by noon for a conference with counsel and for her emotional health. Mother, she was pleased to see, had paid for JJ to spend the day with his carer as he would not respond quietly to this permanent upheaval.

  “No sign yet, dear,” said Marjorie, easing the connecting door closed behind her. Sharon took half a second to recognise her. She’d replaced her cut-price spectacles with contact lenses that rarely came out of their cases, styled her hair, applied a judicious amount of foundation and blusher, and dug out an ageing but distinguished trouser suit which, remarkably, fitted and flattered. Most strikingly of all, she stood tall, her habitual stoop un-kinked.

  “Mum. You look fantastic. What happened?”

  “I do know how to dress, dear.”

  “I’m sorry. I just mean you look really good. You should dress up a bit more often, not just on special..…. I’ll just shut up. How’s dad doing?”

  “He’s resting.” Dad ‘resting’ meant that mum didn’t want him disturbed, regardless of what he was actually doing. Decades earlier, ‘he’s resting’ could have meant anything from ‘he’s sleeping off his Saturday hangover’ to ‘we’ve argued and he’s sulking with his fishing flies in the garden shed.’

  “I think I’ll have a chat with him, before I rush off back to the office.”

  “Have you seen yesterday’s newspaper, dear?”

  “No. Why?”

  “Oh, but you must. It’s very exciting.”

  Marjorie glided into the room, took the local newspaper from the windowsill, sat at the kitchen table and waited. Taking the hint, Sharon did likewise, remarking that she hadn’t seen her mother smiling this freely for longer than she could remember.

  “Listen to this,” Marjorie said, turning to page three. “‘Kevin Braxton, 18 years, appeared before magistrates today charged with the murder of Lincoln man Keith Braxton. Kevin Braxton was arrested following the discovery by police of his father’s body at an allotment in the north of the city on Wednesday morning. The youth has also been charged with burglary, sexual assault and a number of minor offences. He spoke only to confirm his name and was remanded in custody to Lincoln Crown Court later this week’.

  “Now this is the really exciting bit, darling,” continued Marjorie in the manner of Moses reciting graven wisdom. “‘A police spokesman refused to confirm or deny reports that Kevin Braxton had been linked to the horrifying murder of the family of prison officer Dale Murphy, or that Murphy and Keith Braxton had been implicated in the supply of controlled substances to inmates at HMP Lincoln.

  “‘Suzanne Murphy and the couple’s two children were killed in the early hours of 3rd August when an unknown arsonist used petrol to set a blaze at their semi-detached home on Marne Close in the Ermine area of the city. Dale Murphy was subsequently found dead below the Burton Road bridge over the A46 city bypass. While his death appears accidental, the police have yet to rule out foul play.’ Don’t you see, dear?”

  “See what, mum?”

  Marjorie appeared jubilant, while Sharon chewed her lip, processing. Harkness had given her hints, confided his weaknesses and errors, but he’d said nothing to prepare her for this. To the police, Firth had become an embarrassment. To Harkness, he’d become another sin to atone for. To Sharon, he’d remained an acid test of her judgement, a test that she was determined to believe she had passed.

  To her mother, he’d remained inconsequential, even when it was publicly assumed he’d committed the foul deed. Now it seemed he’d been irrelevant in every way, a scapegoat tethered to a hillside just to draw out the tigers. Why wasn’t she angrier with Harkness and his reckless passion? Was it because she’d nursed her own doubts, underneath all the righteous bluster and indignation?

  “Well, those awful people from over the road. They must have started the fire after all. And now they’re gone. Isn’t it wonderful news, dear? We can all sleep safe and sound in our beds again.”

  “Well, it doesn’t exactly say that in the article, mum.”

  Sharon had never represented the Braxtons or met them socially. They’d moved into Marne Close after she’d moved out but she’d never heard any complaints about them as neighbours. Hadn’t Keith Braxton actually tried to stage a rescue on the night of the fire, getting himself singed in the process?

  “Well, these journalists can’t say everything, dear, can they? But they can’t make it up. They must have got it from somewhere. You should know that, in your profession. These men were obviously all mixed up in their drugs and so on together, so it’s just logical. It’s a great weight off mine and your father’s minds that they’re gone.”

  Why on earth would mum be so exultant, so garrulous about an equivocal report that the Braxtons had started the fire? Or, more precisely, by the fact that both men had now been rendered harmless, one forever and one for a decade or more. Had they done it? Had mum or dad or Jeremy seen something and been threatened?

  “Mum, I’m going to ask you a question.”

  “Am I in trouble, dear? You’re using your professional voice on me.”

  “And it’s very important that you tell me the truth.”

  “I’m not a child. And you can always talk to me directly. About anything. Spit it out.”

  “About the fire next door.” Sharon ignored the oblique criticism and stored it for later mulling. “Did you or anyone in this house see anything? You know, on the night of the fire. Did anyone say anything to you? I mean, did anyone threaten you?”

  “You sound like that policeman, dear. He wasn’t so direct but that’s what he was after.”

  “I’m just concerned, mum. You seem, well, different.”

  “Of course I’m different,” she snapped, eyes flaring. “It’s all different today, isn’t it? This is what you wanted, both of you. To be away from me! So I do my best. I look my best. Shouldn’t I try harder?”

  “I’m sorry, I’m just concerned…”

  “Of course you are, Sharon,” Marjorie continued, whispering now, all sibilant spite, ever mindful that Tony and Jeremy and the neighbours alike must never be disturbed by unnecessary or unseemly noise. “Slipping out of the office for a second to show your concern, while I’m stuck here every second of every day and it’s still not good enough, never good enough for him or you and Jeremy doesn’t know and he can’t understand but he’s still grateful….and now he’s escaping me like I’m just some old ward nurse with my keys to the drug cabinet and my nagging and my clean apron and….and…..”

  Sharon cast her eyes to the floor and allowed herself to focus on the old and battered linoleum where she’d first crawled and walked decades ago. She tried not to think about how much she’d enjoy ripping it out, gutting the old house, cleansing it and re
placing everything with new fixtures and fittings, gleaming and bland and entirely free of associations.

  Marjorie accepted this mute surrender and stood, dabbing at her eyes and fussing with her hair in the mirror. A diesel engine stopped nearby. A few seconds passed and a hydraulic whining began.

  “I’m sorry, dear. It’s a very difficult day for me. It’s just….well, I’m not one of your clients, not one of those people.”

  A fist rapped briskly at the front door and the breeze carried a whistled pop tune to the half-open kitchen door. Death, thought Sharon, is in chipper form today.

  Marjorie walked up the side path via the kitchen door to greet and boss and arrange; to manage her latest campaign. Feeling like a naughty schoolgirl, Sharon slipped into the front room to find her father in his wheelchair, ready to embark. Some light had died in him; his body become nothing more than jagged bones held together by taut and lifeless skin. And yet his eyes had found a few more scraps of fuel to burn as they focussed wide, hungry and sparkling on the family photographs arrayed on the sideboard, images he’d seen many thousands of times before, but which may never have seemed as real or as pregnant with meaning as they did today.

  “Hi, dad. It’s me.”

  “Hello, love,” he mumbled through his oxygen mask as his right hand, a withered and sluggish thing unsure of its purpose, slowly drew it from his face.

  “Thought I’d come and say hello.”

  “And goodbye,” he said, blankly, his face glazed and slack.

  “No, dad, I’ll be seeing you at Riverside. Tonight, if you like, when you’ve settled in.”

  “Don’t need to,” he said, holding his head from sinking to his shoulder with a twitching effort. “Just death. Nothing to it. My turn. Are you courting? Look like you’re courting. All….rosy.”

  “Yes, dad, and without a chaperone too.” She faked a convincing giggle, sensing the depths he’d had to plumb to focus beyond his own end. “He’s got his own car and he’s so cool. But I’m always home by ten.”

  “Don’t be cheeky,” he gasped. “I’ll put you ….across my knee.”

  “I’ll look after mum,” she said, regretting it.

  “Don’t be….morbid.” He took another gasp of oxygen from his mask. “Heard arguing. Not happy. With this. Your mum. She’ll….have…. to get used…”

  “I know, dad, I know.” She motioned to the sideboard. “Are you taking some pictures, dad? Make the place more homely?”

  “No. Not home, love.” He shook his head fiercely. “Not home. We know that.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “No. Me. My fault. Scared. Grumpy. Got pictures in here though.” He raised one crooked finger to his head. “And you….still my bonny girl.”

  She thought she’d held it all back until she felt the bulge in her throat and then the tears were shuddering out of her. She turned away from him, ashamed to let the side down, as the front door opened and her mother ushered in death in the form of a middle-aged man with an apologetic smile plastered to his face and a uniform that couldn’t quite contain his belly.

  Under the pretext of keeping out of the way, she retreated into the kitchen like a coward, suddenly regressing into the cowed little girl who’d been jolted into life by other people’s needs. Loose threads had been plucked and the old fabric of this place had begun to unravel. Jeremy, the one unchanging but uncomprehending thread, couldn’t be here for this. Her father was moving beyond her as she paced the linoleum, dwindling into oblivion, barely himself, no longer her doting, protecting dad. Her mother had also changed utterly and inexplicably, and her change was the least explicable.

  Sheepishly, she followed the procession up the garden path, her father leading, swaddled in his wheelchair and propelled by the fat driver, while she brought up the rear, locking the doors behind her. As she bolted the garden gate, the hydraulic lift raised her dad into the private ambulance and her mum stepped in after him to secure him in place. The driver resumed his whistling, winked at her and slammed shut the rear doors.

  Her mum waved to her, a polite dismissal, and continued tending to dad, wholly engaged and too busy for sentiment. As the ambulance departed, Sharon cocooned herself within the Mini’s close-fitting interior, letting its recently valeted aromas of leather and polish wash away the tang of stale urine, detergent, cooking fat and decay, the tastes of a home that wasn’t hers anymore. Her blackberry flashed a warning of the imminent conference with counsel, another hefty fee and tranche of paperwork about to be generated over a question far less pressing than the one Sharon had just discovered wearily and without surprise in her mother’s kitchen.

  For all her teary truthfulness, her mother still hadn’t answered Sharon’s questions. Had her mother been a client she’d shepherded through a police interview, she’d have commended her artful and powerful displacement routine. It would have taken a persistent and cold-hearted cop with an aggressive line of questioning to penetrate the lachrymose veil she wore; and even they’d have balked at doing that to their own mother. Marjorie Jennings, taller and steelier than the mother Sharon thought she knew, had undoubtedly lied consistently and well about the events of the third of August.

  Harkness awoke to the hollering of his mobile phone in the dusty half-light of a stranger’s bedroom. Over the last few nights, his sleep, while generally restless and shallow, had plunged him into deep ocean trenches of oblivion, dark and silent spaces where nightmares drifted by without ever quite touching him. He found himself missing the flaming medium and her commentaries; at least she’d given him a sense of purpose.

  He could blame for his stupefaction the pain-killers he’d been prescribed to mask the lingering pain in his hands; codeine by day and amitryptiline with a whisky chaser by night left the world a blanched and nebulous place. He could blame the glut of overtime he’d been compelled to put in over the last week to round off the committal file for R v Braxton, and he was certainly entitled to the bone-deep weariness that had seized him.

  He could blame the bitter and abrupt end of his five-year relationship with Hayley; he could also blame the fact that this had coincided with the messy wrapping up of a murder enquiry in which he’d irrationally allowed himself to take a personal stake. He couldn’t blame it on the sunshine, the moonlight or the good times, but he could blame it on the boogie. He winced at the lameness of his wit, dragged himself to his feet and waited for the floor to stand still.

  Had the phone rung? Why else would he be out of bed at this hour? What hour was this anyway? It might be work, but he’d taken leave with Brennan’s enthusiastic blessing, on condition that he didn’t leave town and kept his phone with him. It might be Slowey, although relations between them had been strained. When the prosecutor’s decision had been relayed to them the day after they’d interviewed Braxton, neither had expressed any recriminations or regrets and they’d worked hard together to tidy up and submit the file.

  The original murder enquiry team remained in place, working hard under Brennan’s direction to exhaust the few remaining lines of enquiry and ultimately satisfy the Coroner that whoever committed the deed, whether Firth or Murphy, had subsequently taken their own life. His private doubts throbbed like a toothache, tender but impossible to leave alone. Still, of the four solid candidates for the original murders, only one still drew breath and he’d be serving serious time soon.

  He would need to patch things up with Slowey, if Slowey would ever let him, but for now it suited him to remain on the outside, where he could neither harm nor be harmed. Sharon had gone to work. He remembered her stooping to kiss his forehead, thinking him soundly asleep, showing unguarded affection as she left in her severe business suit. He’d slept even more deeply afterwards, allowing unsought affection to slip under his wire and make him feel utterly cosseted.

  He couldn’t stay here. If Hayley hadn’t ejected him, if he’d met Sharon under less tainted circumstances, if he’d had his own place or the time and inclination to rent a new one, he wouldn’t be s
taying here. Yet he’d stayed here every night since he’d rendered himself homeless. He’d been offered wardrobe space in the spare room and cabinet space in the bathroom; he’d demurred, preferring to live out of the suitcases and plastic bags he’d stuffed his essentials into. He wouldn’t lay his hat or slide his feet under the table here.

  They spent their nights as lovers and their days as flat-mates. Far removed from colleagues, past loves, friends and family, their affair was an escape, an amnesty, a tryst with home comforts. They said nothing of the past or the future and very little about the present. They gave and received passion and companionship without pretence or expectation and would do so for as long as it remained exciting, painless and convenient. Or so they’d said, right at the start, a few weeks and a thousand years ago.

  Yet he’d found himself not just needing her but caring about her. If he hadn’t cared about her, he might have felt less like he was exploiting her, as surely as he’d exploited Hayley towards the end. He deplored the hackneyed and mutable concept of love, a handy device for self-deception and emotional blackmail. He’d already drifted into deep shoals and should claw his way back to shore before a riptide snagged him. Even if it could work, the stigma of adultery, the inertia of the rebound and an accidental cohabitation would not make an auspicious start.

  He found his way to the bathroom, filled the basin with cold water and plunged his head into it. As the blood surged, he realised he’d begun to see the present more clearly and to contemplate the future without once thinking about work. He needed to make some strong coffee and flush away the tranquilisers while he still recognised himself. Hunger clutched at his stomach; when had he last eaten anything other than toast? He should eat something hearty.

  Hearty and healthy, he reflected, eyeing the love handles bulging pertly above the waistband of his boxer shorts like plumped-up pillows. Yes, it was decided, his innermost will had spoken; he would eat a nutritious lunch, then go for a run, or better still, use that gym membership he’d been paying for since his last visit in the first week of January last year. No, he would run; that would allow him to better acquaint himself with a neighbourhood he might be spending a lot of time in. Then he would eat a healthy evening meal at a sensible time and wash it down with nothing stronger than coffee. Words, he conceded, were easy; but remaining a flabby flake was harder by far.