by David Haynes
He looked up. “Pat?”
Pat just stared down at her. He didn’t move.
Jack stood up and grabbed him by his jacket collar. “Pat, what the fuck happened here? What did you do to her?” He looked down. “You told me she’d gone off on the path.” The dread he’d been feeling had turned into gut-wrenching horror.
“We were going for it,” Pat started, but gone was the assured, cocky man from last night. In his place was the little boy being teased in the playground.
“And she was going for it, full on and laughing, like she was really loving it. And then she started with this shaking and her whole body starts convulsing and she’s choking and...” Pat was sobbing but he couldn’t take his eyes off her.
“We need to take her to the hospital,” Jack dropped down. “Help me put her pants on, for God’s sake!” He touched her skin again and recoiled. She was cold and her skin felt hard somehow.
“We can’t.”
“What?” Jack was trying to pull her underwear back on. “Pat, help me!”
“We can’t take her. The police will come and I’ll go to prison. They’ll say I forced her or something.”
Jack stood up. “Pat, we need to get her to the hospital. You didn’t do anything wrong. She took too much dope or something, I don’t know. Just help me.” He knelt down. The dew was coming through his jeans. It told him that this wasn’t a dream, it wasn’t a very bad dream, it was real.
“No, Jack. You’re wrong. I know what’ll happen. They’ll have me Jack, they’ll take me away and I’ll never see you or Joe again.” He turned away and looked at the sea. His voice was deadpan, as if he’d shut down.
“I might as well jump.”
He started walking quickly toward the clifftop.
Jack jumped up and sprinted toward him. He rugby-tackled him about a metre away from the edge and rolled him away. A flash of white water thirty metres below jagged across his vision as they both came close to going over.
Jack was up in a second. He pinned Pat to the grass by kneeling on his arms. “You listen to me, you shithead, you’re not going over the edge, not tonight.” Pat looked up at him. The man was lost, completely lost.
They both were.
“We leave her here. Someone will find her and make sure she’s looked after. We go home and forget it. We forget her.” He knew it was wrong. He knew at that very moment his life had changed forever, and that in the words he’d just uttered was a death. Not Carol’s and not Pat’s but his own.
He dropped to one side and for a few minutes, the three of them lay in the grass with faces turned to the stars. They were starting to fade.
“We need to get home.” Jack stood up and offered his hand to Pat who took it.
“What’s that?” He could feel something in Pat’s hand as he gripped it.
Pat opened his fist. In it was Carol’s locket. It looked tiny and out of place in his grubby palm.
Jack took it and hurled it away. He hurled it back toward the lighthouse and it made a metallic ‘clink’ as it hit something. Anywhere would do, just not in the hand of his best friend, of his brother.
“Go!” He pushed Pat away, took a last look at Carol and started running. Tears flowed down his face for the first time since he’d asked his dad to tell him how his mum had died.
Chapter 18
“When he walked back through that door, I was mad. I was spitting feathers. He knew I was relying on him and he’d let me down. I was going to give him both barrels but when he looked at me, I knew something wasn’t right. He wasn’t hungover and he hadn’t been fighting but something was wrong. He looked like he was lost. He had the same look in his eyes that you had the other morning when I showed you his note. Lost, simple as that. You look more than halfway there now too. But you ain’t there yet. You will be though. You will be, lad.”
*
“Where the hell have you been? You know...”
Joe took one look at his son and knew something was wrong, very wrong. He finished pulling his boots on and stood up.
“You in bother with the law?” he asked.
Jack stood in the doorway. Over his shoulder, Joe could see Pat in the car. He looked like he was a statue.
“What is it, son?”
If it was within his power, he could and would help him with anything. When the gearbox fell out of the Minx, he fixed it. When school told him Jack had been fighting, he fixed that. And when Pat’s dad smashed the front room window and came looking for trouble, he fixed him. When Lizzy died, he took it on the chin and fixed himself.
“Will you come with me, Dad?” Jack looked over his shoulder at Pat who was sitting motionless in the front seat. “Will you come with us?”
“You need me?” he asked.
Jack nodded.
“Then I’ll come.”
Nobody spoke in the car on the way. Neither Jack nor Pat said anything to each other for half an hour but Joe’s inner voice was deafening. It screamed at him to turn around and sit them both down to find out what was going on. But Jack had looked frightened, truly terrified, and that was all he could think about. His son needed him and whatever it was that was scaring him like that couldn’t be fixed by sitting down at the table. There was a voice too. A voice that kept repeating itself, over and over again, ‘Don’t lose someone else you love.’
What stars were left were fading away quickly. In another hour, the sky would be the most beautiful azure and the sun would bounce like silver daggers off the surface of the sea. It would be a perfect day for setting lobster pots.
Jack pulled in and buried the car in the hedge. They were still a fair way from the lighthouse but the beacon was flashing clearly. He watched Jack shove Pat out of the passenger side and the three of them set off running toward the lighthouse. He had no idea what was coming but it wouldn’t be good, that much was crystal clear.
They skidded down the bank and rounded the lighthouse perimeter wall. Part of Joe, a huge part of him, hoped that whatever it was he’d been brought here to see had vanished; had been blown away on the wind.
Jack pointed to a flock of seagulls which took off as they got closer. He heard Jack swear and behind him he could hear Pat sobbing.
“Oh God.” Jack retched and Pat fell to the ground. There was a girl lying half-hidden in the meadow. The gulls had been at her. The gulls had been at her for some time and had stolen her eyes. There was nothing but two empty holes left.
“Tell me this isn’t your doing, boys.” Joe’s mouth was dry and sour-tasting.
He looked at them in turn but neither of them would look back at him. Jack was bent double and Pat had buried his face in the grass.
He grabbed Jack and straightened him up. “Tell me you didn’t do this.” He looked into his son’s eyes and saw the little boy he’d raised on his own. He cupped his face. “Tell me, Jack. Tell me this isn’t your doing.”
Tears rolled down his cheeks. “We think she took drugs, Pat came down here with...”
He closed his eyes and pushed Jack away. Pat was still on the ground face-down so Joe grabbed his hair and lifted his head.
“What have you done?” he yelled. Pat’s eyes were closed. “Patrick Bailey, you tell me now or I’m going up to the lighthouse and I’m bringing the police down here.”
Pat lifted himself until he was sitting but he kept his eyes closed.
“She... I came down here with her and she had a fit or a seizure or something and she started being sick while I was... They’ll lock me up, they’ll lock Jack up too, Joe.” Pat was almost wailing.
“We can say we found her, we can say we were just down here and found her...”
He heard Jack’s voice but someone else was talking too. Someone in the hospital, a doctor, a small grey-haired doctor with bad breath was telling him something about Lizzy and about the baby. But he wasn’t smiling like he should be. He wasn’t congratulating him on being a father. No, he was saying something else. Something Joe didn’t really understand. He didn
’t want to understand it. And then he was in another room and Lizzy was there and a nurse was holding Jack in her arms. Shouldn’t my Lizzy be doing that? She should be holding Jack, not the nurse. We chose the name after her granddad. It’s a good, strong name for a good strong baby.
But why were they covering Lizzy with a sheet? Why were they looking at him like that? Where’s Jack gone now? Where are they taking him? No, no, no, he’s my son. He’s our little boy. You can’t just take him away from me. Nobody will ever take him away from me. Never.
“The pair of you come here,” Joe growled.
They both did as he ordered.
Pat touched his throat and opened his hand as if he expected to see something.
“The pendant,” he whispered. “She had a silver pendant. It came off in my hand when we were...”
“Where is it?” Joe bellowed.
Jack pointed toward the lighthouse. “I threw it over there.”
All three of them looked that way in silence for a moment until Joe shouted again,
“You take that poor girl and you carry her to the edge. You say a prayer for her and then you bury her in the ocean.”
They both looked at him but they didn’t argue. They didn’t make a sound, they just lifted her gently and carried her to the edge. They looked at each other for a moment and then closed their eyes.
“I’m sorry,” he heard Pat wail.
They dropped her into the waiting white foam of the ocean below. It was always hungry for new souls, forever had it been that way.
Nobody was taking his boy away from him again. Nobody.
“I’m sorry,” Joe whispered and turned his back on them.
*
Chris stared at his granddad for what felt like an eternity. Their eyes were locked together like adversaries preparing for battle, like boxers squaring up before a fight. But Chris didn’t want to fight with Joe. He didn’t know what he wanted to do. He wasn’t exactly sure how he felt about him at that moment in time.
“That’s why they’re here,” Joe whispered.
Chris was momentarily confused. “Who?”
“Lizzy and Jack. They’re here because she wants you, she wants you and she wants Ollie.” He leaned across the table. “They’re upstairs. They’re in his room.”
Chris pushed his chair away from the table. “I need some air.” He opened the door and walked around to the garden. He didn’t know how to handle this, no idea at all. Whether or not Pat had contributed to Carol’s death, there was no way of knowing. Whether or not they could have done anything to help her, again there was no way of knowing. Maybe she’d taken something other than pot, something that she had no business taking, there was no way of knowing that either. A lot of what happened was up for debate. But what was certain was that they had disposed of her body before anyone, any of her family, had been given the opportunity to say goodbye properly.
He clutched his head with both hands. God this was so... so fucking messy and confusing. What would he have done in Joe’s shoes? It was easy to say he’d have gone to the police, but would he? Would he risk putting Ollie through an investigation when there was another way out? Would he risk losing his son and another boy he considered a son when he’d already lost his wife? He shook his head. What was the saying? Never judge a man until you’ve walked two moons in his moccasins.
He walked back to the house. One thing for absolute definite in all of this was that nobody and nothing was going to harm Ollie in any way. And he wasn’t going to put all his trust in two ghosts either.
He walked back inside and found Joe making a cup of tea.
“I did see her down on the slipway, didn’t I? She was there then, wasn’t she?”
Joe put two mugs down. “Yes, she was. I think Jack was still trying to help her, even then.”
“But she didn’t look like she does now. She wasn’t as...”
“Angry?”
“Yes, there wasn’t this blackness around her, this awful stench of corruption coming out of her.”
“Look, I don’t have the answers, maybe over time these things grow darker and angrier. Maybe. I don’t know, Christopher. I don’t know!”
“Hello, boys!” Lou walked in, quickly followed by Ollie.
“Look what I’ve got!” He ran straight up to Chris and swiped him across the back of the head with the foam sword. “How d’you like that then?”
There were still a thousand things going round in Chris’s head but he snapped out of it the instant Ollie came into the room. His life-force was infectious.
“I’ll show you how I like it, shall I?” He turned around and made a grab for him, but Ollie was already off.
He looked up at Lou. “Good day?”
She bent down and kissed him. “Tiring.”
She kissed Joe too. “Is the kettle still warm?”
Joe stood up. “I’ll make you one. You look like you could do with a sit down.”
Lou sat at the table and silently mouthed something to Chris. He didn’t get all of it but he got the gist. He looked toward the front room to make sure Ollie wasn’t in earshot. “It’s okay, we’ve had a good talk. We’re not going mad, Lou. Granddad understands.”
He watched Joe pour the boiling water into Lou’s mug. He couldn’t tell Lou about Carol, or about his dad and Pat’s part in her death. Nor could he tell her about Joe’s role in it. Maybe one day, long after Joe was gone, he’d do some research and try to find out who she was and find her family, but for now he had his own family to protect. That came first.
“Who is she?” It was the most natural and obvious question but he wasn’t prepared for it. Neither of them was.
He had to say something before Joe did. Joe was in the mood for spilling his guts but it wasn’t the right time.
“God knows, but it definitely is the woman who was with my dad.”
“Well, what does she want?”
Joe put the mug of tea down in front of Lou. “She wants revenge.”
That was it, it was simple. She wanted revenge for what his dad and Pat had done. Now neither of them was left, she wanted the next in the bloodline. She wanted him and she wanted Ollie.
“For what?” Lou looked at them both.
Joe opened his mouth but Chris jumped in. “That’s what we’ve been trying to work out all day. Something Dad and Pat did when they were younger. This has been going on for years, Lou.” He slid the folder over to her. “This is Pat’s work.”
She took it and looked inside. “Jesus.” She flicked through it and pushed it back. “I don’t want to look anymore. Did your dad have anything like this?”
He looked back to Joe. “I’d have to speak to Mum about that. But it’s all making sense now. His moods, his depression, all of it was connected to what happened when...”
Lou waited for him to finish. “When? When what?”
“When they were lads. I don’t know but now Pat’s gone, she’s coming for me and she’s coming for Ollie.”
Lou got up from the table and poured the tea away. From the front room, Chris could hear cartoons on the television.
“And your plan? You’ve been sitting here all day, so you’ve got to have a plan.” She edged past Joe and took a few steps toward the front room.
Chris bit his lip. There was no plan. He didn’t know what to do. He looked up at Joe who stared blankly back. If Joe didn’t know what to do then they really were in trouble.
“You’re safe here,” he said.
“Safe?” Lou turned on him. “I don’t feel safe anywhere, Joe. Not after what I saw in...”
“Lizzy will keep him safe.” Joe spoke as if his dead wife were standing right beside him.
Lou shook her head and looked straight at Chris. “I’ll tell you one thing right now. Nobody touches my boy.” She turned back to Joe. “Not Lizzy and not that bitch, whoever she is.” She stamped out of the room and went to Ollie.
Joe looked grey. His cheeks had lost the rosy glow they always had, and his body loo
ked like nothing more than a clothes hanger. Most of all, he just looked tired.
“I need to have a lie down,” he said and walked slowly away.
Joe was beaten. His years of fixing things for everyone and for himself were coming to an end. There was no point in looking to him for the answer because he didn’t have one. Why had she never come for him, though? She’d haunted Pat for most of his life and probably his dad too but why not Joe? His part had been significant but he’d never touched the girl, he’d just told the boys to dispose of her. To bury her in the sea. Maybe that was it.
Chris rubbed his face. He was the only one who could do something now. He wouldn’t have Ollie put through any more of this. The question was, what could he do?
Chapter 19
Chris hadn’t gone off to sleep yet. He was surprised Lou had managed it. He usually slept naked, but something told him to keep his shorts on tonight and they kept riding up in uncomfortable places. There hadn’t been any conversation since the discussion at the kitchen table. Not that the house had been silent, but any noise, any talk or questions, were directed toward Ollie. Joe came downstairs briefly to have a sandwich with them then went back upstairs quickly after that. He hadn’t gone to The Queen’s Head for his game of dominoes.
The house had changed. The air inside the house had changed. The air they expelled during their conversation was tainted and sour and it made everything smell old. It wasn’t the same cottage he’d spent so much time growing up in. It wasn’t the same cottage he’d been in last night or the night before. It had been altered and not for the better.
Lou muttered something in her sleep and twitched her legs in a series of spasms. She was dreaming. About what, he could only guess but she moved as if she were fighting.
He went over and over the story in his head until his brain ached with it. It was awful, truly terrible what had happened and mistakes had been made by all of them. Joe, his dad and Pat had lost themselves that night. In doing so, they had forced him and Ollie down a deep, dark tunnel from which he couldn’t think of a way to escape.
