The Gift

by Louise Jensen

  ‘Sort it out how?’ Tom asks.

  ‘By using the car parts business to smuggle in drugs. I’d told him it was losing money while you were so sick and he said he’d be able to clear my debt and make enough to pay our mortgage until you were better. He was helping.’

  ‘But we didn’t import that often,’ Tom says, ‘And when we did there was mountains of paperwork. Import forms. How did Owen manage that without my signature?’

  There’s a beat before Sophie says: ‘You weren’t the only one who could sign things. The business wasn’t solely in your name, was it?’

  ‘Amanda?’ Tom says, and he stares at his wife as though he has never seen her before as she drops her face into her hands.

  77

  ‘I didn’t know what else to do,’ Amanda says, lowering her hands from her face.

  Tom clutches his left shoulder. Even in the shadow of the moonlight I can see how deathly pale he’s become.

  ‘You were in hospital,’ Amanda says. ‘The doctor had said you might die. The bills were mounting up. The mortgage wasn’t being paid. What was I supposed to do? Our daughters were being threatened, Tom.’

  ‘You could have told the police.’

  ‘Like they would have offered 24-hour protection to Callie and Sophie? I had to do something to protect them. I’m their mother. Owen made it sound so easy. Sign a few forms and Callie and Sophie would be safe and we’d have enough to live on. How else could I have got the sort of money this Neil was demanding? It was thousands of pounds.’

  ‘You involved Sophie in something illegal.’

  Amanda flinches from Tom’s words. I’ve never heard him sound so hard.

  ‘It was because of Sophie I had to do something illegal. I did it because I love her.’

  ‘But you knew our daughter was taking drugs and you didn’t tell me?’

  ‘I tried everything to get her to stop and as soon as you came out of hospital she wanted to. Do you remember how she took off for months and you thought she just needed a break after the stress of your illness? I’d paid for her to stay in a clinic.’

  ‘I can’t take this in.’ Tom dips and I’m worried he’ll collapse. He really doesn’t look good. ‘Did you know about this, Joe?’

  ‘Not at the time, I swear. When you were home and you told me that Amanda had persuaded you to retire for your health and you asked if I’d run the business, I found out what had gone on when I looked at the accounts. Your profits had shot up. I thought Amanda had made a mistake with the books but she told me about her arrangement with Owen. I was livid. I didn’t tell you because the doctor said you must avoid stress but I didn’t want anything to do with it. I didn’t have anything to do with it.’

  ‘But it stopped? This arrangement. When Sophie’s debt was paid: it stopped?’

  ‘No,’ said Joe. ‘It didn’t. I’m so sorry, Tom. I tried to get them to stop I really did but the best I could do was make sure you were kept out of it. You and Callie.’

  ‘All these months you’ve been apologising, Joe, and I thought it was because the business folded after Callie died as no one had the heart for it any more. I never thought… this.’ Tom screws his face up as though he is in pain.

  ‘I felt so bloody awful,’ Joe says. ‘I hoped you’d never find out. When Sophie disappeared after Callie died I thought she must be using again as a way of coping with her grief. When you called me tonight and said she might be here I thought she must be with Owen. I didn’t want you to have a run in with him if she was off her face. When I found her alone in the caravan my first thought was to get her away from here as quickly as possible. I thought Owen must be around somewhere. I never dreamed he was… that she…’

  It is disconcerting to witness Joe’s anguish as he begins to cry again.

  ‘You know when you appeared earlier. There was a split second when I thought about shooting Amanda for what she’s done. Can you believe that?’ Joe wipes his nose with the back of his hand. ‘I tried to talk her out of carrying on so many times. I probably should have told you. I’m sorry. But I love you. You’re my brother and I didn’t want to risk your health.’

  ‘Neither did I, Tom.’ Amanda cuts in. ‘I looked after you when you were sick. I made sure you didn’t have to worry about the bills. You didn’t once ask me if we were managing. Not once.’ Amanda is shouting now: ‘And I carried on because without Owen all I could see was a future of struggling to meet the mortgage payments every month. Never anything left over for treats. Growing up it was holidays in the Maldives, eating at Michelin star restaurants. You. You brought us here.’ Her voice is bitter. ‘I gave up everything for you, but you couldn’t provide for us properly.’

  ‘I loved you.’

  ‘I love you, I do, but I just wanted the girls to experience what I had growing up. It was all for them. For us. For our family. It seemed easy. It was easy. Owen arranged everything and I just turned a blind eye. I didn’t actually do anything other than sign a few forms. It wasn’t masses of money, not enough to draw attention to us but enough to provide a good income. Owen was careful. You didn’t have anything to worry about.’

  ‘You could have ended up in jail. We could all have ended up in jail,’ Tom’s voice is steely cold. ‘Where would the girls have been then?’

  ‘Owen said there was no risk. He knew what he was doing, Dad,’ Sophie’s voice is faint. ‘I’d told him we might lose the house. He was looking after us all.’

  ‘And Callie? Did she know?’ Tom is still clutching his shoulder.

  ‘No. She knew Owen got me hooked on drugs but she didn’t know about Mum, about the business. Owen was about to tell her everything that night, that’s why I hit him. I panicked. If I hadn’t, Callie might still be alive.’

  ‘No!’ Amanda wrings her hands. ‘Don’t say that. It’s been almost impossible to live with myself as it is. No matter how much medication I take I feel terrible every second of every day, losing Callie and thinking we had lost you too, Sophie. I thought you couldn’t bear to be around memories of Callie and that’s why you had gone to Spain with Owen. I can’t believe you… you killed him. I’m so sorry for what you went through, but we can sort this out, can’t we? Between ourselves. We’re a family.’

  ‘We are not all family,’ Sophie says and she grabs the gun from Joe’s hand and points it at me. ‘I still don’t know who the fuck you are but now you know an awful lot about me.’

  ‘Sophie!’ Amanda tries to wrestle the gun from her.

  There’s a struggle. A bang.

  Tom drops to the sand, clutching his heart.

  Amanda screams but as I look at Tom in the moonlight I can’t see an entry wound. I can’t see any blood. And then I realise. Tom must have had a heart attack. He isn’t the one who has been shot.

  78

  Sophie is crumpled on the sand. Joe drops to his knees, fingers pressed to her neck searching for a pulse. My heart is screaming no-no-no and I try to silently back away, but my feet crunch into the shingle and Amanda’s head jerks up. I am staring into the anguished eyes of a woman with nothing left to lose, except her freedom.

  ‘We need an ambulance,’ Joe shouts.

  The gun dangles from Amanda’s hand. She is frozen to the spot. I don’t know what she’s planning to do but I can’t take any chances. I’ve seen and heard everything.

  Run.

  Willing my sick body to move, adrenaline floods my system and I stagger towards the silent owl, a shadow in the distance. Amanda may be older than me but I’m weak. Slow. My best hope is finding somewhere to hide, reaching higher ground to try and get a signal and call for help.

  It’s dark. So dark. Clouds scud across the charcoal sky, blanketing the moon and stars. Dampness fills my lungs and as I draw a sharp breath nausea crashes over me in sickening waves.

  Don’t let me down Callie, I think, as I try to sprint towards safety but my feet are sinking and I feel like I’m moving in slow motion. My mouth opens as I gasp for air. The taste of salt and desperation on
my tongue. I clamber up the sand dune, my heart almost bursting with the exertion, feet scrambling for traction in the soft sand. My fingers cling on to tufts of grass as I heft myself upwards. My chest feels like it is on fire but I hear Amanda panting behind me and the survival instinct kicks in. The past few months I have spent wondering if I want to live, but this question is now obliterated from my mind. I’m terrified of dying.

  I reach the top and steal a glance behind me. I can’t see the top of Amanda’s head appearing but she can’t be far behind. There’s a bump. And I think she’s slipped back down.

  My energy is fading fast.

  ‘Jenna, wait please. I need your phone.’ she shouts but her voice sounds too close, she’s quickly catching up with me and I look around wildly trying to regain my sense of direction. Work out where the car is? Where the road is?

  ‘Jenna! Please. You’ve got it wrong. It was all for the girls. All of it.’

  I take a deep breath and furl and unfurl my fists before propelling myself forwards once more, arms pumping by my sides. I look over my shoulder.

  ‘Jenna! Stop. Please don’t go. Don’t call the police. Let me explain.’ But she doesn’t sound remorseful. Fury pushes out her words and each one feels like a thump between my shoulder blades.

  Run. I must not stop.

  My trainers slap against the concrete and I don’t think I can hear footsteps behind me any more, but it’s hard to tell over the howling wind. I’ve got no chance of outrunning her. My best hope is that she has gone the wrong way.

  I steal a glance over my shoulder but my feet stray onto soft earth and I lose my footing and stumble, splaying out my hands to break my fall.

  The side of my face hits something hard and solid that rips at my skin. My jaw snaps shut and my teeth slice into my tongue flooding my mouth with blood, and as I swallow it down, bile and fear rises in my throat.

  Don’t make a sound.

  I’m scared. So scared. I don’t know what she’s capable of. How far she would go to stop me talking to the police.

  I lie on my stomach. Still. Silent. Waiting. My palms are stinging. Cheek throbbing. Rotting leaves pervade my nostrils. My stomach roils as I slowly inch forward, digging my elbows into the wet soil for traction. Left. Right. Left. Right.

  I’m in the undergrowth now. Thorns pierce my skin and catch on my clothes but I stay low, surrounded by trees, thinking I can’t be seen, but the clouds part and in the moonlight I catch sight of the sleeve of my hoodie which, unbelievably, is white despite the mud splatters. I curse myself. Stupid. Stupid. Stupid. I yank it off and stuff it under a bush. My teeth clatter together with cold, with fear, with fever. Where is she? To my left twigs snap underfoot and instinctively I push myself up and rock forward onto the balls of my feet, like a runner about to sprint. Over my heartbeat pounding in my ears I hear it. A cough. Amanda’s cough. Behind me. Close. Too close.

  Run.

  I stumble forward.

  I can do this, I tell myself, but it’s a lie. I know I can’t keep going for much longer.

  ‘There’s no point running,’ Amanda shouts. ‘I know this park like the back of my hand.’

  My legs are so weak. My head feels too heavy for my neck. It’s just a cold.

  Move.

  The clouds roll across the sky again and the blackness is crushing. I momentarily slow, conscious I can’t see where I’m putting my feet. The ground is full of potholes and I can’t risk spraining my ankle, or worse. What would I do then? How could I get away? The wind gusts and the clouds are swept away and in my peripheral vision a shadow moves. I spin around and scream. Amanda is right behind me.

  Run.

  79

  I slow. I’m exhausted. The world is spinning and black flecks zigzag across my vision. She’ll find me wherever I am. I’m sick. I’m dying. I can’t outrun her and there’s nowhere I can hide. Hot tears spill from my eyes, cooling on my cheeks. It’s over. The life I’ve fought so hard to keep. Hopelessness washes over me and, as I slowly turn around, Amanda stops. Hunches forward and puts her hands on her knees, panting for breath.

  I check my mobile. There’s still no signal.

  ‘Give me your phone,’ Amanda says and I shake my head.

  ‘Please. Tom and Sophie need help.’

  I waiver. If she wanted to kill me surely she’d have done it by now.

  ‘We can sort this out, can’t we?’ She straightens and walks towards me and the gun hanging from her right hand glints. I swallow hard. How does she think we can ever sort this out? I dread to think.

  Move, Jenna, a voice whispers inside my head, and my toes twitch and all of a sudden I’m running again, weaving among the abandoned ice-cream kiosks and giant plastic animals, their paint chipped and faded.

  ‘I’m not going to hurt you. You’ve got it all wrong. You can’t hide!’ Amanda cries but in an instant I know that I can.

  Count to ten. I know just where I’m going.

  The fairground is pitch-black but I see flashes of how it used to be, orange, yellow, green flashing lights. Music blaring. The smell of candyfloss. Small children tugging on the hands of parents. ‘Can I catch a duck?’ ‘Can I go on the merry-go-round?’

  I cut across the waltzer, my feet thudding against the wooden boards, almost feeling it spinning round and round, faster and faster, until the faces of the bystanders blur into one.

  The large building with the faded food and drink sign is boarded up and I skirt around the edge, imagining I can smell hot, oily chips.

  The hut is in front of me. The crazy golf sign hanging from rusted hinges, blowing in the wind. I drop to my knees and scramble around for the large loose footboard. It wobbles but the weeds have woven between the planks and I can’t free it.

  Snap. A twig breaks and I know she is close. I dig my nails in the tiny gap between the boards and yank as hard as I can. The nail on my index finger is ripped off and I bite back a scream. The gap is small. Big enough for a child, but I don’t think I will fit and a lump of frustration lodges in my throat. I stick my hand through the gap and realise that, inside, the ground dips. If I can squeeze through there’s enough space for me to hide.

  My elbows dislodge dirt as I wriggle forwards like a snake, and as I swallow dust an urge to cough grips me, but I hold my breath until the feeling passes. My head enters the dark, damp space, my shoulders, my torso. Something touches me, stopping me, and I freeze – thinking she has caught me – but it’s just my bottom hitting the plank above and I have to twist and twist until I can fit it through.

  I’m inside. A tight ball now, and I manoeuvre myself around, my muscles already screaming. I reach my hands through the gap and replace the board just as a slither of light appears around the corner of the canteen.

  Amanda’s torch.

  My knees are digging into something hard and lumpy and my pins and needles feet are itching to move but I keep still, ignoring the pain.

  I’m incredulous that she can’t hear my galloping heart, my ragged breath, but she calls my name over and over and I hear the frustration in her voice. She doesn’t know where I am.

  I peek out of the slit between the boards and see her shoes. They are getting larger and larger as she approaches me, and I’m shaking with terror. Praying she won’t find this place where Sophie used to hide from Callie so long ago.

  There’s a creak.

  The door of the hut opens.

  The stamping of feet above my head. Dust pours into my face. My eyes. My mouth. I know if I can just keep still I’m safe. She’ll go to look somewhere else.

  And then my mobile rings.

  80

  Whimpering like one of the injured animals I treat, I struggle to pull my phone from my pocket in the confined space. It’s Sam.

  ‘Jenna, I’ve just read your text and—’

  ‘Help me,’ I garble into the handset. ‘She’s going to kill me.’

  ‘Jenna? What’s going on? Where are you?’

  Amanda drops to her hands an
d knees and peers in through a knothole. I poke my thumb in her eye as hard as I can and she screams with pain. Her hands slap against the boards trying to find a way in, but she’s the wrong side of the hut.

  ‘Jenna, please. I just want to talk. You owe me that much at least?’ Amanda says.

  ‘I’m at Owl Lodge Caravan Park in Newley-on-Sea. Please call the police and an ambulance. Sam? Sam?’ I check my screen but the signal has dropped off again and I don’t know if he heard me.

  ‘Jenna. Please come out. Let’s talk about this properly. I’m sorry. I really am. I know what I did was wrong but I did it for the right reasons. Please. Don’t tell anyone. For Tom? He doesn’t deserve to be alone. I was trying to protect him. Protect the girls.’

  I hesitate. If she wanted me dead she’d have shot me by now. There must be some good in her.

  ‘Please. Let’s talk about what you’re going to do. You don’t want to tell anyone, do you? It’s Tom who will suffer if I go to prison and you’re fond of him, aren’t you? He’s very fond of you. We both are. Think about Callie’s memory. You don’t want everyone knowing she helped cover up a murder. She saved your life. You wouldn’t be here without her. Without me. You owe us. Surely?’

  Callie. I press my hands against my chest and a tear runs down my cheek. I don’t know what to do and I’m so very, very tired.

  It’s just a cold.

  But my heart is slowing and I know it’s very nearly over.

  The hut above me rocks and creaks as Amanda kicks the panels and there’s the sound of splintering and I know I can’t possibly make it out before she gets in, but I summon every last ounce of strength I have left. I have to try.