One Click

by Andrea Mara

  “Sure thing.”

  She imagines him running his hand through his hair. He says goodbye and Ruth looks at her expectantly.

  “I just asked him to check Shannon’s draft emails, which will take like two seconds, but he doesn’t seem enthusiastic.”

  “I don’t imagine it’s down to the effort or the time, Cleo. I imagine it’s about what he might find there,” Ruth says, throwing her ice-cream cup in a trashcan. “You’re suggesting his sister had been through something so horrible that she might tell a journalist about it, and that ultimately her ex-boyfriend murdered her. I’d say his reluctance is understandable?”

  Nodding, Cleo throws her melted ice cream after Ruth’s, and as they make their way back to the apartment, the rain starts, sharp and heavy, pelting them, warning them that something is coming.

  Chapter 41

  An hour later, Cleo is in yoga pants and an oversized sweater, warm and dry on Ruth’s sofa. Ruth inherited the apartment from her grandmother and hasn’t changed a thing since she moved in. It’s like something from the middle of the twentieth century, but somehow it works. The small mahogany kitchen table has hosted numerous pizza nights over the years, and the green-velvet pintuck sofa was often Cleo’s bed for the night afterwards. The gold jacquard wallpaper would be deemed far too fussy by today’s standards, but it makes the room cosy and comforting, tonight more than ever.

  As she attempts to reply to Lauren, Cleo’s phone jumps in her hands. Chris.

  “You were right,” he says as soon as she picks up. “It was in her drafts.” His breathing is rapid, his voice cracked. “She had written it all down to send to that person, Hayley. And she’d written one to my mom too. And –” His voice breaks then and he stops.

  “It’s going to be okay, Chris. Truth is better than not knowing. What does it say?”

  Silence.

  “Do you want to copy and paste the email and send it to me? Don’t press send on the draft – the police need to see that. Just copy and paste the text, and send it to CleoRHolloway@gmail.com.” She spells it for him. “Did you get that?”

  There’s a muffled sound that she takes as confirmation.

  “Chris, whatever it is, it can’t be worse than thinking she took her own life if she didn’t. We’ll figure it out, we’ll talk to the police, we’ll get through this. Okay?”

  “Okay.”

  She hears him take a breath.

  “I’ll send you that now. Call me back.” He disconnects.

  A minute goes by and she refreshes her inbox twice, but there’s nothing. Ruth comes out of the shower and suggests putting on a movie. As Cleo is filling her in on her call with Chris, the email comes through, and the movie is forgotten.

  Ruth sits down cross-legged on the rug and waits while Cleo silently reads the email.

  Hi Cleo – this is the draft email she had written but never sent to my mom. Most of it is the same as what she’d put in the email to the journalist, but there’s more at the end.

  Dear Mom,

  Something is eating me up inside and I can’t go on any more – if I’m ever going to get better, I need to get it out. It’s about a party I went to with Marcus, back when I was sixteen. It was all college kids, I was the youngest person there, and when they started passing around beers, I took one. So did Marcus – more than one. He had maybe three or four, and when I asked him if he’d be okay to drive us home, he said they were only small beers. There were jello-shots too, and I didn’t think there was much alcohol in them, so we had some. We were just doing what everyone else was doing, and I know we weren’t the only ones driving home after.

  When it was time to leave, Marcus was fine – he showed me he could walk in a straight line and count backwards from ten – so we got in the car to drive home. The party was about fifteen miles out of town. It was out by Brighton Falls, so nothing around but farmland and empty roads. We had the music on loud but I was feeling sleepy, from the beer I guess, and after a while I closed my eyes.

  Then it happened – we hit something. I remember screaming, and the car skidding to a stop. I remember Marcus saying it was probably a deer, and getting out of the car with a torch. I remember hearing him swear, and I got out to see too. It wasn’t a deer. It was a man.

  He was lying on the side of the road, cheek down, eyes open. A middle-aged man in a heavy coat, with mud on his brown loafers. There was a hat lying nearby, one of those old hats they used to wear back in the fifties. I don’t know why that sticks in my mind – maybe I stared at the hat to avoid looking at the man.

  I remember Marcus swearing again, asking what the hell anyone was doing on the road at that time of night. I took out my cell phone to call emergency services, but he grabbed it out of my hand. It was too late, he said, the man was dead.

  I screamed then, and Marcus shook me, and told me to shut up. I told him we had to call the police, but he said we couldn’t, because we’d both been drinking. We had to go, he said. I begged him to stay but he told me we’d both end up in jail for underage drinking and DUI. I know it sounds so bad, but I believed him, and on that night in the dark, his eyes half-wild, I was a little afraid of him too. The poor man was already dead, so – may God forgive me – I did what Marcus said. I got in the car again and let him drive us home.

  I thought about calling the police that night, after Marcus dropped me off, but I was too scared. And the next day it was in the news, and they called it a hit-and-run, and said that police were looking for a couple seen driving erratically north of Gatesville that night, out near Brighton Falls. I talked to Marcus, told him we needed to turn ourselves in, but he said under Texas law a hit-and-run is a felony and we could both go to jail for a long time. So I stayed quiet.

  For twelve years, I stayed quiet.

  But now I think it’s time we talked about it and let the poor man’s family finally have some peace.

  Mom, I’m so sorry. It was a terrible thing we did that night, and we should have stayed with the man. We should have called emergency service. Maybe he wasn’t dead at all – maybe if we’d stayed, they could have saved him.

  I should never have listened to Marcus. And I understand now that I would never have gone to jail – he lied to me. I was a minor. But he was eighteen – he did it to protect himself, scaring me into silence. And I let him, and I stayed with him all those years, and I thought I could make it work, but I can’t keep it inside any more. And now that he’s left me, I see him for what he really is.

  So I’m going to see him tonight to tell him first, to give him a chance to arrange a lawyer and go to the police himself. I think once he’s heard everything I have to tell him, he’ll do the right thing. I have something to show him too, to help him see sense.

  After I’ve told him he needs to confess, I’ll send you this email, so if it gets into the news, you know about it already. And I’ll send a copy to Dad too. If Marcus doesn’t cooperate, I’ll send the story to a newspaper contact I have, and to the police.

  I hope you can find it in your heart to forgive me, and may the Lord have mercy on Marcus when he faces up to what he’s done.

  With love,

  Shannon x

  Without speaking, she passes the phone to Ruth who reads it quickly, then looks up, shaking her head in disbelief.

  “And she doesn’t mention his name – the man they killed . . .”

  “No – I wonder if it’s in the draft to the journalist. I can ask Chris. Jesus, I can’t believe she stayed with him all those years after that. He’s a monster.”

  Ruth is chewing at the corner of her lip.

  “Well, she’s hardly whiter than white herself – she was involved too. I guess they were wrapped in it together.”

  “But she was only sixteen, she’d never have been held responsible. Even under Texas law, right?”

  Ruth shrugs. “Yeah, I guess, but there’s something in the way she writes about it – it sounds kind of skewed towards a ‘poor little frightened girl’ picture of things,�
�� she says, pulling herself up off the floor and walking over to the kitchen. “It’s extraordinarily easy to play the victim and make everyone else seem like the bad guy. You know?”

  Behind her, Cleo can hear the sound of glasses and a wine cork popping as she rereads the email, trying to see what Ruth sees.

  Ruth hands her a glass of wine, and sits back down on the rug with hers. In the lamplight, her face is pale, and there are shadows under her eyes that Cleo hadn’t noticed until now.

  “She wasn’t entirely innocent, true, but I don’t know that any of us can defend Marcus – you saw me that night, Ruth, after what he did to me – he’s not the good guy here.”

  “Of course not. I’m just curious about the tone of the email and why she wrote it, and why she was going to discuss it with him first. Plus she hadn’t told anyone about the pregnancy but that has to have been a factor in whatever she was planning. There’s something more to all this.”

  Cleo reads the email a third time, stopping at the line about talking to Marcus.

  So I’m going to see him tonight to tell him first, to give him a chance to arrange a lawyer and go to the police himself. I think once he’s heard everything I have to tell him, he’ll do the right thing. I have something to show him too, to help him see sense.

  Does the “everything” refer to the pregnancy? The thing she wants to show him might be a pregnancy test? But if she was potentially sending him to jail, and wanted nothing more to do with him, why tell him about the baby at all? Or had she already found out she wasn’t actually pregnant?

  Her head is spinning.

  Ruth puts her wine on the floor and stretches her arms above her head. “Perhaps she told him about the baby and that’s what happened? They fought about it and he pushed her?”

  “I don’t know. I’m not sure Marcus would care that much if she was pregnant. It’s not like he was married to me. Our relationship was very much on the rocks at that stage, and he was already spying on me with the camera.”

  Ruth says nothing but she’s looking at Cleo strangely.

  “What?” Cleo asks.

  “Nothing, I’m just tired after all that shit with my boss today, and my brain is addled trying to piece together this jigsaw.”

  “Come on, it’s me you’re talking to. What is it?”

  Ruth gets up off the floor again and walks over to the kitchen, and Cleo watches as she opens one cupboard door, then another. She’s not looking for anything but the right words.

  “What if we caused it?” Ruth says finally in a small voice. “What if seeing our conversation on camera made Marcus so angry it caused a fight with Shannon, and ended with her death?”

  “No, he didn’t see our conversation until he came back from Shannon’s that night – she was already dead by then. I’d even seen it on the TV news – I just didn’t know it was her.” Cleo gets up and walks over to Ruth. “But even if it had been prompted by something he saw on camera, that wouldn’t make it our fault. He was spying on me. We’re entitled to have a conversation without the presumption that we’re being watched, and we can’t control what someone like Marcus chooses to do. Okay?”

  Ruth nods, then her face changes.

  “Hey, you don’t think he might have had a camera in Shannon’s apartment too? If he was spying on you during your relationship, maybe he did the same with her?”

  Cleo pauses to think about that. It was entirely possible. Would the police have searched for something like that – possibly not in a suicide case? Would Marcus have removed the camera if he was there that night? Presumably yes, but it’s worth checking. She needs to call Chris.

  He picks up after one ring, sounding calmer. He thinks the police had a look around Shannon’s apartment but he never heard anything about a camera – maybe Detective Murphy will be able to check. He wonders if it’s worth searching for the video files rather than the camera, but Cleo doesn’t know where Marcus’s laptop is now. The cops took it the night Marcus attacked her, and she hasn’t seen it since. Another question they can ask tomorrow. She’s saying goodbye when Ruth starts waving at her to stop. She’s mouthing something. Cleo excuses herself to Chris and covers the phone with her hand.

  “I have Marcus’s laptop – remember I took his stuff from your apartment? It’s here in mine!”

  “No, the police have it – they told me they took it that night and they never gave it back. It was part of the evidence against him.”

  Ruth looks confused. “Then whose laptop do I have – is it yours?” She walks over to a closet by the door, and rummages around in the bottom of it.

  “Hang on, Chris,” Cleo says into the phone.

  Ruth turns around from the closet, holding a rose-gold Mac.

  “That’s not mine,” Cleo says, “but I’ve seen it before – Marcus had it under his arm when he came home the night he attacked me.”

  They stare at each other for a beat, then Cleo puts her cell phone back to her ear.

  “Chris, what kind of laptop did Shannon have?”

  His voice is rasping now. “A Mac. A kind of pink-gold colour. Why?”

  “It’s here. At least I think it is.” Cleo holds the phone to her ear with her shoulder and takes the laptop from Ruth. “I’m just opening it now. Would she have had a smiley sticker at the top of the screen near the camera, and more smiley stickers down the left-hand side?” There’s an intake of breath on the other end of the line. “There’s a post-it stuck to the right-hand side with lists of passwords and PINs, and the number 0316 comes up over and over. Does that mean anything?”

  “That’s her birthday. March 16th.”

  “Okay, I’m going to charge it up and log in to have a look around – is that okay?”

  A pause.

  “Could you wait for me?” Chris says. “Could I call by your friend’s apartment?”

  Cleo looks over at Ruth and mouths “He wants to come over”.

  She nods.

  “Sure, grab a pen and I’ll give you the address – we’ll wait.”

  Ruth finds a charger and starts to power up the laptop while Cleo passes her address to Chris. When the call ends, they sit together on the couch, staring at the black screen.

  “There’s probably nothing there we haven’t already found in her emails and her messages,” Cleo says, when the power gets to 5%. She sits forward and starts to type, trying the first password on the post-it note.

  Ruth puts a hand on hers.

  “Maybe leave it till he gets here. This is a huge deal for him – let’s do as he asks.”

  Cleo sits back.

  Fifteen minutes later, Chris arrives at Ruth’s apartment, looking like a shadow of the person Cleo met that morning. Without speaking, Ruth and Cleo get up from the couch to let him sit down at the laptop. His hands are shaking as he types in the first password and screen opens on her email account, the one they’ve already looked at on her phone. There are other websites open in her browser, but nothing unusual – Facebook and some news sites. The deflation in the room is palpable. Ruth moves back towards the kitchen and throws Cleo a give him some space look. Cleo follows her.

  “It’s a shame it’s not Marcus’s laptop like you thought,” she whispers to Ruth. “If he had a hidden camera in Shannon’s apartment too, I imagine he’d have taken it with him that night, but there would have been something in the video files.”

  She nods. Then she stops and her eyes widen. “Wait, what if there’s a video on Shannon’s laptop? Remember the ‘thing’ she was going to show him – the one she mentioned in the draft email to her mother? What if it wasn’t a pregnancy test, but a video – what if she was planning to record her conversation with Marcus that night, in case he backed out of turning himself in?”

  “I don’t know … it’s worth a shot, I guess.” Cleo turns to Chris and raises her voice a little. “Can you check for a folder with video files?” He looks confused. “We were wondering if perhaps Shannon recorded her conversation with Marcus. That night.”
/>   Understanding washes over his face and he turns back to the laptop.

  Ruth is shaking her head.

  “What?” Cleo asks.

  “If she did record him that night, she wouldn’t have been able to save the file anywhere afterwards, because she was dead.” She glances at Chris. Then out loud she says, “It would just be there in the video-recording app on her laptop. Look for PhotoBooth or QuickTime apps. If she used one, it should still be open.”

  “This is a long shot,” Cleo whispers to Ruth. “I don’t know if she’d have gone to this trouble. He’s the one with the spy-camera history, not her.”

  “They’ve been keeping a huge secret for twelve years, and they share responsibility for killing a man then leaving him alone on the roadside,” she whispers back. “I’d say there’s a reasonable chance some of his habits have rubbed off on her. It’s worth a look.”

  Cleo walks back towards the couch to look over Chris’s shoulder, just as he minimises the web browser, and that’s when they see it.

  They’re looking at themselves, on a video screen – Chris to the forefront, Cleo and Ruth behind. There’s a red “stop” button at the bottom of the screen.

  “It’s her Photo Booth app,” Ruth whispers. “It stops recording a minute or two after you close the laptop – it restarted when we opened it. It’s recording us now.”