Birthdays for the Dead

by Stuart MacBride

  I jammed the red plastic folder back in her satchel, hooked it over her head, then hoisted her up by the armpits.

  She stopped singing. Frowned. ‘He wasss hurt by a blonde … thirteen-year-old girl. She broke … she broke his heart… An’ maybe his arm. Or a leg or something.’

  ‘You’ve got cheesecake all over your cheek.’ I let go and Dr McDonald wobbled a bit, took a step back – looked as if she was going to keep on going into the other table. I grabbed her again. ‘Top of your class, eh?’

  ‘Have you … you been … has a thirteen-year-old-girl ever broke … broken your heart?’

  Oh, she had no idea.

  ‘Can you walk?’

  ‘I bet she did. Bet she snapped it in two and … and stomped on it, like a … like a bug.’

  The sound of vomiting echoed out of the cabin bathroom. I lay back on my bunk, pillows folded behind my head, bare feet on the duvet, flicking through the photos in Dr McDonald’s folder. Tramadol and Naproxen wrapped their warm arms around me, more soothing than the ferry’s gentle rocking.

  Another round of splattering heaves. Then a voice. ‘Ash … Ash … hold my hair back…’

  ‘No.’

  McDonald’s printouts didn’t seem to be in any sort of order. The Hannah Kelly birthday cards were at the top, but right after those were Helen McMillan’s: the twelve-year-old from Dundee with thirty-two grand’s worth of signed first editions on her bedroom shelf.

  She didn’t look much like the photo we’d found on her chest of drawers. The fairy princess outfit and the gap-toothed smile were gone; now her Irn-Bru hair hung in lank curls around a heart-shaped face and long, bruised neck. Freckles covered her nose and cheeks, a thin line of blood running from her nose. Too much eye makeup, the mascara smudged and tear-streaked.

  The collar of Helen’s bright-green coat was torn on one side, the stuffing sticking out. Both arms behind her back, both ankles strapped to the chair legs, jeans dark around the crotch and thighs. A number ‘1’ was scratched into the top-left corner.

  The photograph wasn’t a Polaroid like the ones on Rebecca’s cards, or any of the earlier victims. The Birthday Boy had finally moved with the times and got himself a digital camera. Well, it wasn’t as if he could take conventional film into the supermarkets and get them to process it for him.

  I stared into Helen’s eyes. They were grey-green, surrounded by pink, shining where the flash bounced off her tears. The card only arrived yesterday, but she’d already been dead for a year.

  ‘Ash… Ash, I’m dying…’ More retching. ‘Oh no… There’s … there’s black pudding in my hair…’

  Thank God the bathroom had an extractor fan that came on with the light: wheeching away the stench of a three-course meal, two whiskies, a brandy, and two bottles of wine. She’d better be getting it all in the toilet, because if not she could clean it up herself.

  I put Helen McMillan’s card to one side and pulled out the next set: the girl from Cardiff. Then the one from Bristol. Aberdeen. Newcastle. Inverness. London. London again. Oldcastle, Glasgow… Ten victims – not counting Rebecca – going back nine years. Forty-two cards in total.

  Amber O’Neil’s cards sat at the back of the pile. Abducted from the Princes Square shopping centre in Glasgow ten years ago, she was the first girl to catch the Birthday Boy’s dark little eye.

  A mousy blonde, tear streaming down her pale face, nose a bit too big, lips drawn back showing off bloodied teeth. No gag. Not in the first couple of photographs anyway. He wanted to hear her scream, then changed his mind. Maybe it wasn’t quite as much fun with her roaring her throat raw as he carved shapes into her naked skin.

  Blonde to start with: so no need to dye her hair. Abducted in Glasgow. Never seen again.

  Lauren died between card four and five; Hannah between seven and eight. Amber lasted till number six, eyes wide and pleading, Stanley-knife graffiti scrawled across her naked body. And a year later, card number seven arrived. The left side of her head was caved in, the mousy blonde hair matted with blood. The next card was worse, but at least by then Amber couldn’t feel it any more. Now it was her parents’ turn to suffer.

  I unzipped my wheelie suitcase and pulled out the cigar box, opened the lid and took Rebecca out. Five cards and she was still alive, still struggling and screaming and bleeding…

  The sound of a toilet flushing, then a couple of groans, then the shower running. Washing off the chunks.

  I was staring at Rebecca’s last birthday card when the toilet door clunked open and Dr McDonald lurched out, wrapped in a towel, clutching her clothes to her chest. Wet hair hung in straggly curls around her face – one eye scrunched shut, the other all bloodshot. She opened and closed her mouth, making sticky clicking noises.

  ‘Urgh…’

  I pulled one of Amber O’Neil’s cards on top of Rebecca’s. ‘Well, what did you expect?’

  Her voice was still slurred. ‘I’m dead. I’ve died, and this is hell…’ She slumped down on the other bunk, rocking back and forwards with her knees clamped together. ‘Do we have any water? The stuff in the tap tastes like dog pee.’

  Not so rambly now, was she?

  ‘Bottle beside your bed, got it from the little shop while you were spewing your ring.’

  ‘I’m never – drinking – again.’ She dumped her clothes on the floor and helped herself to the two-litre bottle, drinking deep. Then surfaced with a burp. ‘Urgh… Tastes of sick.’

  ‘Stop whinging and drink it. You’ll feel better tomorrow.’

  ‘Why did you let me drink all that wine?’

  ‘You’re supposed to be a grown-up, remember?’

  ‘Urgh…’ She collapsed back, lying half on, half off the bed, one arm thrown across her face. ‘You’re doing it wrong.’

  I frowned at her. ‘I’m looking for—’

  ‘That’s Amber, right? You have to … you have to look at them all at once, or it’s… All her birthday cards, all at once…’

  ‘What difference does that—’

  ‘See, for us they arrive a year apart, it’s like … it’s like paintings on a cave wall, something that happened long time ago. Slow motion, but for … for him it’s quick, it’s visceral, it’s … it’s happening all in a whooooooosh…’ Another belch. ‘Urgh…’ More sticky clicking noises. ‘It’s all now and bright and bloody and sharp. You’ve got … you’ve got to appreciate it like he does, you’ve got … got to be in the moment like him. Got to beeeee. A busy, busy little bee…’ Getting quieter all the time. Then silence.

  ‘Dr McDonald?’ Nothing. ‘Alice? Hello, Alice?’ Silence.

  She’d conked out.

  I slipped Rebecca’s birthday cards back into the cigar box, stuck everything else on the little table bolted to the bulkhead, and clambered off the bunk. Rolled Dr McDonald onto her side, pulled out the duvet, then rolled her back again so she was covered up. Might be an idea to put her in the recovery position so she didn’t choke on her own vomit. Assuming she had any chunks left to choke on.

  After that, I got the cabin’s bin out from under the tea-and-coffee bit and placed it next to her head. Then stood and looked down at her, lying there with her mouth open a crack, dribble slowly glistening its way down her cheek.

  Just like Katie after her first proper party. First week in secondary school and there she was: white sweatshirt stained the colour of clay, flecked with little chunks of sausage roll, reeking of sick and sticky cider-and-blackcurrant. Eleven years old, and she didn’t want to be daddy’s little girl any more.

  Ah, the good old days.

  I tucked the duvet under Dr McDonald’s chin. ‘Sleep tight, you complete and utter rambling lunatic…’

  Something rumbled under the covers, followed by a waft of mouldering cauliflower.

  ‘Oh, Jesus! Ack…’ It was followed by three aftershocks, sounding like someone was kicking a duck down a length of metal pipe. And the smell! I opened the toilet door and f
licked on the light, setting the extractor fan going.

  There were lopsided letters scrawled across the mirror above the sink in plum-coloured lipstick: ‘WHOSE HE REELY TORCHERING?’

  She’d come top of her class? What the hell were the rest of them like?

  Wednesday 16th November

  Chapter 16

  ‘There you are, I’ve been looking all over for you, you want breakfast, I want breakfast, I mean I’m ravenous this morning, no idea why: had a huge dinner, actually are you OK, because you look a bit rough…’

  I twisted my head to the side. Pops and cracks rippled down my spine; someone jabbed a rusty compass right between my shoulder blades.

  The forward bar was full of bleary-eyed people and the smell of stale breath and stale beer. The metal grille was still down, locking away the row of taps and glinting optics, but the place was alive with stretching and yawning. A collection of booths and horseshoe-shaped sofa-style benches surrounded little round tables heaped with personal possessions. Like a refugee camp the morning after a booze-up.

  Dr McDonald fiddled with her glasses. ‘Thanks for not … you know, thanks for letting me have the cabin, I know it probably seems silly, but I really get uncomfortable if—’

  ‘I didn’t.’ I swung my feet onto the blue-and-green carpet and sat there, blinking, rubbing the grit out of my eyes. A cough ripped through me, making my ribs ache. ‘You snore.’

  She pulled her head back, giving herself a double chin. ‘I do not snore, it’s—’

  ‘Thought the farting was bad, but Jesus – you’re like someone hacking up a metal dustbin with a chainsaw.’ One. Two. Three… I pulled myself upright, then slowly straightened. Twinges, aches, and pains.

  ‘You were there? In the room while I was sleeping?’ Her eyes widened, then pink rushed up her cheeks. She wrapped both arms around herself. ‘I was naked, I woke up and I was naked, and I’d been drinking, and I was naked in bed when I woke up! What did … did you … it wasn’t … oh no, no, no, tell me we didn’t actually—’

  ‘Like rabbits. All night. Couldn’t keep your hands off me.’ Why wouldn’t my shoes fit properly? Like trying to squeeze a Labrador into a letterbox.

  ‘Oh God…’ The pink got a shade darker. ‘I didn’t … it was a mistake and I really don’t think…’

  And then she slapped me. Not hard enough to do any real damage, but it still stung like a bastard.

  ‘How could you? How could you take advantage of me like that, I was drunk, what kind of a man are you, you’re old enough to be my father, you slimy, lowlife, exploitative—’

  ‘Don’t be stupid; nothing happened. You spent half the night throwing up, and the rest of it snoring from both ends.’

  ‘Ah.’ She bit her top lip, looked away. ‘I see, you were being humorous, joking that I was promiscuous and predatory, when in fact I was revolting and disgusting…’

  ‘Believe it or not: you’re not irresistible, and not all men are potential rapists.’ I rubbed a hand across my throbbing cheek. ‘And if you hit me again, I’m hitting you back.’

  A pale blue glow edged the horizon, the sky a deep indigo twinkling with stars. Most of Lerwick lay in darkness, just the sulphur ribbons of streetlights and the occasional car’s headlights breaking the gloom, but the Holmsgarth ferry terminal was lit up like a football stadium.

  My badly behaved wheelie case jinked and skittered as I limped down the covered walkway after Dr McDonald. Her breath streamed out behind her in the fluorescent lighting.

  Cold leached through the soles of my shoes, making my feet ache.

  Shetland in November – I had to be mad.

  The ferry terminal looked like a massive corrugated-iron pig sty, its grey curved roof trimmed in red.

  She stomped down the stairs into the reception area. A ZetTrans bus idled outside, its blue-and-white livery spattered with pale brown. ‘How are we getting there?’

  It speaks! ‘Thought you weren’t talking to me.’

  She stuck her nose in the air. ‘That wasn’t nice.’

  ‘Yeah, well, it wasn’t nice getting hammered, sticking me with the bill, then puking all over the bathroom, was it?’

  Headlights swept across the ferry terminal as a little white Ford Fiesta pulled in beside the bus. It had the distinctive blue-and-yellow checked stripe down the side and blues-and-twos fixed to the roof. The world’s smallest patrol car. A uniformed constable unfolded himself from the driver’s seat, then stood there, checking his watch.

  I dragged my wheelie case out into the cold dark morning.

  The PC looked up. He had a thin pale face, a long nose, and a short-back-and-sides haircut with a gelled fringe at the front. ‘You Henderson?’ A north-east accent, so he wasn’t a local lad.

  ‘Thanks for the lift, Constable…?’

  ‘Clark. Royce Clark. Like James Bond only without the gadgets.’

  ‘OK…’ I went around to the boot, but there was sod all space for luggage in there – it was jammed full of safety gear and black holdalls.

  ‘Sorry.’ He shrugged. ‘Everything bigger is out at that double murder on Unst.’

  Dr McDonald peered into the back seat. ‘Oh dear…’ More safety gear.

  ‘Well, you’re not going that far.’ Royce pulled open the back door, grabbed the smaller of her cases and jammed it in behind the driver’s seat. ‘Maybe fit the big one on your lap?’

  She swallowed, shuffled her feet on the frosty tarmac. ‘Right, yes, that’ll be fine, it’s not like we’re going to be stuck in there for ages, is it, it’s more of an adventure this way, and—’

  I took the big case off her. ‘It’s bloody freezing: stop faffing about and get in.’

  ‘You know I don’t like enclosed—’

  ‘You’re the one wants to go and see Henry.’

  Royce blew into his cupped hands. ‘No offence, guys, but I’ve got a load on today and we’re short staffed, so…?’

  ‘Yes, we’re fine, perfect, it’s all good, no problem here at all, I’ll get in the back…’ She rubbed her fingers together, then took two deep breaths and climbed in.

  I lumped the big case onto her lap; it took up all the remaining space, leaving her peering over the top like a wee kid at a sweet-shop counter. Clunked the door shut. Then squeezed in the front, wheelie case stuffed down at my feet.

  Royce stuck the blower on full and pulled out of the car park, heading north out of town. Some sort of live Queen concert blared out of the car stereo – Freddie Mercury singing about not wanting to live forever.

  Be careful what you wish for.

  I turned it down.

  ‘So,’ Royce looked in the rear-view mirror, ‘you’re a criminal psychologist then?’

  ‘Can you keep your eyes on the road, please, only I get nervous in cars, well, any enclosed space really, I mean it’s nothing personal, but—’

  ‘Yes, she’s a criminal psychologist.’

  ‘Great.’ He nodded, shifting down as we turned the corner and headed up a steep hill. The last remnants of Lerwick disappeared behind us. ‘You here about the murder? Bizarre, right? Married couple hacked to death with an axe. Word is they were swingers.’

  ‘Actually—’

  ‘Can you believe that? On a wee island like Unst? Not like everyone doesn’t know everyone else’s business up here, is it? Break wind in Valsgarth and everyone in Sumburgh knows what it smells like before you’re halfway home.’

  ‘We’re not really—’

  ‘Tell you: it was quite the culture shock, coming up here from Lossiemouth. You know most of them are related? Well, except for the incomers. Our victims – you know, the swingers – they were from Guildford originally. That kind of thing’s probably quite normal down there…’

  Scrubby heathland drifted by in the dark, pale yellow and green in the patrol car’s headlights.

  I pulled out my mobile. ‘We’re not here for your murders.’

  ‘No?
’

  ‘Birthday Boy.’

  Another nod. ‘Right.’ The road swept around to the left, and the bleak landscape opened up into a valley. Pre-dawn light turned a sea loch into a pewter slab, nestling between dark hills. ‘Want to know what I think?’

  Not really.

  My phone bleeped and pinged: fifteen missed calls. Eight from DC Rhona Massie – probably wanting another moan about Sergeant Smith from Aberdeen – the rest from Michelle. Three new text messages as well, all sent while the ferry was out of mobile range.

  Royce held up a finger. ‘I think your Birthday Boy’s a paedophile: he’s torturing them ’cos it’s the only way he can get off, so he’s probably impotent. The photos help him relive the experience when he’s masturbating. Probably got a big house in the country somewhere, so no one can hear them screaming. How am I doing, Doc?’

  A plastic creak came from the back seat. ‘Can we slow down, please?’

  ‘Bet he’s a single white male, twenty-four … twenty-five, menial job, but his parents were loaded: that’s how he can afford his place in the country.’

  ‘Hmm…’ I clicked on the first message – Shifty Dave Morrow:

  Holy FUCK! You owe me big time!

  The next was from Michelle:

  WTF were you thinking?

  Wre suppsed 2 b past all this!!!

  What the hell was that supposed to mean? The third one was from her as well, sent at eleven fifty-five:

  Yr suppsed 2 b a grown up!

  Fkn act like 1

  U cant just have kt stay ovr & not tell me!

  Shit. I jabbed the call button. ‘Pull over.’

  ‘We’re only going to be another five—’

  ‘Stop the fucking car!’

  ‘Answer the bloody—’

  ‘Ash?’ Michelle’s voice boomed in my ear. ‘What the hell are you playing at? We had a deal!’

  I took another couple of steps away from the patrol car. PC Clark had parked on a crescent of tarmac by the side of the road, at the top of a steep hill overlooking Scalloway. The little town curled at the join between two fingers of land reaching out for the Atlantic Ocean – street and harbour lights glittering back from the dawn-blued water.