Last Night

by Kerry Wilkinson

  ‘Olivia’s box,’ I reply. ‘That’s all.’

  He nods. There’s a small plastic crate under our bed that is a chronicle of Olivia’s life. It has a couple of her baby teeth, for which the tooth fairy gave her a pound a piece. Inflation these days. There is some of her hair, photos, school reports, paintings, handprints from when she was a baby. I kept her first pair of shoes, which are small enough to wear as finger-warmers. She wrote a couple of letters to Santa when she was young that I still have; another to Jesus. Olivia was sporty when she was little – and she was part of the first-ever girl’s football team at her school. I’ve got the team photo and a report from the local paper. She was third in a handwriting competition and I have her entry for that. There are swimming certificates, running certificates, computer proficiency test results – and so many more odds and ends.

  When things have been bad between Olivia and I, when we’ve not spoken for days, I’ll go through the box and remind myself of better times.

  ‘I’d never want to take that from you,’ Dan replies. ‘Are you sure there’s nothing else?’

  ‘Not really. What about you? Is there anything else you particularly want?’

  ‘The iPad.’

  ‘Take it.’

  ‘Oh.’

  He reels back a little, perhaps surprised there’s no argument.

  ‘I don’t need any furniture,’ he says. ‘Not yet anyway. The flat is fully furnished. Perhaps in six months or so, depending on how things go. IKEA’s cheap enough, so I can go there if need be. It’s not like we’ve ever done extravagant.’

  I more or less knew that already, so say nothing.

  Dan is in his running gear but it doesn’t work with the way a deputy headteacher sits. He has his knees crossed and swaps them so they’re crossed the other way. It all looks a bit odd, like a drunken giraffe trying to perch on the floor. It’s like he has too many limbs. He shuffles uncomfortably before zeroing his attention in on me.

  ‘I suppose the biggest issue is the house…’

  ‘Right.’

  ‘I know you’d rather stay here – and obviously that’s good for Liv. But I guess she won’t be living here forever. After that, it’s a big place for one person…’

  ‘I don’t want to sell it.’

  He nods officiously, expecting this. ‘I was thinking we could have it valued and then split the total. Obviously, some of our joint savings will cover whatever’s owed.’

  ‘You want to take all of our savings?’

  I want him to turn away, to feel awkward, but he doesn’t. He continues to stare. ‘Only to offset part of the house’s value.’

  ‘But there’s no way my half of our savings is going to cover half the value of the house. I’ll end up owing you tens of thousands.’

  He still won’t relent and turn away. ‘We could remortgage. Or you could remortgage. We’ll put the house into your name, get the lump sum to pay me off and then the house is all yours.’

  It sounds so matter-of-fact. Not a discussion but a decision made. I realise it is precisely that. He’s thought all this through without me and now he’s presenting it.

  He’s right, of course. There’s no easy way out of this. If I want to continue living here, I’m going to have to buy his share. I don’t have the money for that, so I’ll have to remortgage. I’ll be back at the place I was years ago – working month to month to pay off a house. By the time that’s done, I’ll be ready to retire. Some life, huh?

  ‘What about Olivia?’ I ask.

  ‘She can continue to live here, obviously.’

  ‘I mean as an inheritance. If we’re her parents, wouldn’t we want to leave her the house eventually? If it’s all mine, then what are you contributing?’

  He bites his lip, uncrosses his knees and pushes back onto the sofa. It’s so satisfying to have stumped him – although I do wonder how our daughter’s future has completely escaped him.

  ‘Perhaps we can figure something out once we have a valuation,’ he says.

  ‘Figure what out?’

  ‘I don’t know… perhaps split the house three ways. I’ll gift you Olivia’s share, and then you buy out my share.’

  ‘You don’t need to gift me anything. She’s our daughter. You’re doing this for her.’

  He chews on the inside of his mouth and it feels like we’re about to argue. He’ll say I know what he meant, I’ll say I know exactly what he meant. He’ll ask what I mean by that. I’ll reply that he always puts himself ahead of anyone else, including our daughter. And then it’ll explode. He’ll storm out, I’ll sit and stew. We won’t talk tonight or tomorrow – and then, at some point next week, we’ll start again with trying to figure it all out. We’ve been in similar positions so many times before.

  Dan pushes himself up from the sofa and smooths down his vest. ‘I’ve got to go,’ he says. ‘I’ll be at the gym for a couple of hours, then I’m doing lunch. I’ll be back this afternoon. We can talk about this again later or tomorrow. I’ll have a think and you can do the same. Perhaps we’ll come up with a better idea? I’m not adverse to anything.’

  He doesn’t elaborate on what ‘doing lunch’ means. On whether he’s by himself, or with someone else. And, if he’s with someone, then who. I hate the way he says it anyway. You don’t ‘do’ lunch, you eat lunch.

  It’s not lunch that’s the real problem, of course. I’m going to be in someone’s debt for decades – if not Dan’s then the bank’s. I’m stuck. Not only that, he’s right: Olivia will be leaving soon and I’ll be alone. Perhaps I should let the house be sold. I can hold on until Olivia’s found somewhere of her own, then we can sell and split the money. I’ll use my half to have a midlife crisis. I can travel and explore and… stop imagining such fantasy nonsense.

  I won’t do any of that.

  Dan’s already in the hall when I call him back from the living room. He pokes his head around the door frame, surprised at the interruption to his routine.

  ‘You all right?’ he asks.

  ‘Work are organising this group bonding thing at the end of the month,’ I say.

  ‘Okay…?’

  ‘They’re talking about going shooting. I think it’s clay pigeons, something like that. I don’t know. Someone else mentioned going to a range so we can be indoors. I was wondering if you know much about it.’

  He steps back into the room. His head is tilted, his eyebrows dipped in bemusement. We never talk about things like this. ‘Much about what?’

  ‘Guns. Shooting. Things like that.’

  He frowns and then holds his hands up. ‘You know I don’t. I didn’t know it was your sort of thing.’

  ‘It’s probably not. I guess I was wondering if you’ve ever shot anything…?’

  It’s as subtle as a sledgehammer – but I can’t think of a better way of asking him about the stun gun in his locker. I could ask him outright – but then I’d be admitting my own snooping.

  His body language doesn’t shift. He continues to stand with a straight back, features unmoving.

  ‘When would I have shot a gun?’ he asks.

  ‘I don’t know. I was only asking.’

  ‘I’m the wrong person to ask.’ He glances to his watch. ‘Was that all?’

  I tell him it is and then he spins on his heels. The front door clicks closed and I listen as his car engine starts to grumble.

  All these years and I never realised how good a poker player my husband is. My question was hardly waterboarding, but he didn’t crack at all. If it wasn’t for the fact I’d seen the gun in his locker, I’d swear it didn’t exist. I know it was a taser in his locker, but it’s still a weapon. I’m sure he would have still reacted to the word, ‘gun’. He’s also left me in a position where I either have to ask him directly about it, forget about it, or do something unpredictable, like tell the police.

  I’m still thinking that over when there’s the sound of a key scratching against the lock. By the time I get into the hallway, Dan is back inside.<
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  ‘Forget something?’ I ask – but he shakes his head and holds the front door wider.

  Behind him are constables O’Neill and Marks. PC Marks’ friendly smile seems a long way away as she shares her colleague’s grim look.

  It seems obvious why.

  ‘You’ve found Tyler…?’ I say.

  I expect forbidding acceptance. Something awful has happened to him and I’m going to have to break the news to poor Liv.

  PC O’Neill shakes his head. ‘I’m afraid not. Can we come in?’

  He looks between Dan and I, but neither of us protest. Dan holds the door open and the officers wipe their feet before stepping into the hall. We all move through to the living room and I close the door, pointing upwards and telling them that Olivia is sleeping.

  The officers exchange a quick glance. ‘We might have to speak to her,’ PC O’Neill says.

  ‘Why?’

  ‘I believe there was a possible break-in here a few days ago…?’

  ‘Right.’

  ‘There was a blood sample taken from your garage…?’

  It’s clear he knows the answers to these questions and I again confirm he’s correct.

  He takes a breath and, in that moment, I know what he’s about to say. My knee wobbles but I hold onto the back of the sofa, maintaining some degree of control.

  ‘We’ve got the results back on the blood,’ PC O’Neill says. ‘It belongs to Tyler Lambert.’

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  I stare from one officer to the other, expecting some sort of follow-up. I’m not simply holding onto the back of the sofa for support any longer, it’s the only thing holding me up. My legs are jelly.

  I killed Tyler.

  Me.

  Not Dan with that stun gun; not Jason with his cryptic remarks about people getting what they deserve. Not Frank going after his own son for whatever reason.

  None of them.

  It was me.

  When I woke up in that field in the early hours of Tuesday, Tyler’s blood was on my car.

  ‘Are you okay?’

  It’s PC Marks who speaks. She’s calm, using that measured tone that public service workers like police officers, doctors and nurses can pull off so well. Dan does it, too. For a long time, I believed it was because someone genuinely cared. After the arguments with Dan, the passive aggression and the breakdown of our relationship, I’ve become confused about it all. I’ve wondered if that tone is an act. I’m muddled at whether strangers really do care.

  ‘Surprised, I suppose,’ I manage.

  PC O’Neill responds this time, asking to talk to Olivia.

  Dan seems a little bemused and I can’t read him. I’m not sure how but I make my way to the stairs without my knees giving way. There was a second after they confirmed it was Tyler’s blood in which I assumed they knew everything. They were here to arrest me and it was game over. As it is, it’s not even me they want to talk to. It should have been obvious. The clearest reason for his blood to be in our garage isn’t because I hit him with a car, it’s because he spends time at the house with Olivia. At some point, they were in the garage and he cut himself. Simple.

  I forget about the creaky stair and wince as the screech echoes through the house. I push open Olivia’s door and whisper ‘Liv’ through the darkness. She’s a groaning mass of bedcovers as she asks the time. I reply that the police want to speak to her and she sits up so quickly that it makes me jump backwards. Like a scene from The Exorcist.

  ‘Have they found him?’

  ‘No.’

  There’s a pause as she wriggles against the sheets, fumbling her legs over the side of the bed. ‘He’s not…?’

  ‘They don’t know,’ I reply. ‘They’re not here to say he’s dead. They only want to talk to you.’

  She says she’ll be right down and so I turn on the light and close the door for her, heading back downstairs to sit awkwardly with the officers. Dan’s on one of the sofas making small talk, out of place in his running shorts compared to their uniforms and my regular clothes. There’s nowhere for me to sit other than next to him and it feels so weird. We’re husband and wife, yet we haven’t sat by one another in years. It’s always on separate sofas, or across from each other if we end up going out for a meal with mutual friends. I’m paranoid that the police must notice our awkwardness. He’s in one corner, me in the other. It’s like either or both of us have a contagious disease that the other is trying to avoid. If the constables do see it, then they say nothing. Instead we talk about weather and roadworks. About plans for the weekend and what’s on telly tonight. The usual. I play the part well enough, or think I do; my stomach is doing cartwheels.

  It takes around five minutes for Olivia to come downstairs. She’s in jeans and a T-shirt. Her hair is unwashed, the pink dull and faded. She still has bedhead. I ask if she wants my spot on the sofa but she’s already plonked herself cross-legged on the carpet in front of the officers as they explain about finding a patch of Tyler’s blood in our garage.

  Olivia turns to look at her father and me and it’s clear she has no idea what’s being talked about.

  ‘How do you know it’s his blood?’ she asks.

  ‘The sample from your garage was tested and compared to the DNA database,’ PC O’Neill says. ‘Mr Lambert is in there because of his shoplifting convictions. It’s a one hundred per cent match.’

  He waits for another question and, when it doesn’t come, adds: ‘Do you have any idea how Tyler’s blood could be in your garage?’

  I look to Dan and then Olivia, hoping somebody other than me might answer.

  Dan’s the first one to speak with an odd-sounding, ‘I’m not at home much.’

  It’s true, but it’s a strange way to answer the question. I think he realises it because he then offers a prompting, ‘Liv…?’

  ‘No,’ she says. ‘We never went in the garage.’

  This is bad. This is really bad.

  PC Marks writes on a pad while PC O’Neill leans forward. ‘You never went in the garage?’ he asks. ‘Not once?’

  Olivia shrugs. ‘Why would we? None of my stuff’s in there. I never go in there, let alone Tyler.’

  ‘Is he interested in cars at all?’

  ‘He couldn’t care less.’

  ‘Have you ever left the house through the garage?’

  ‘That’s what the front door’s for.’

  She replies clinically and it’s good to know it isn’t only me she can make sound like a fool.

  PC O’Neill is unmoved. ‘Is there any chance he could have gone in there by himself. When you weren’t around, perhaps?’

  ‘Like when?’

  ‘I don’t know. That’s what I’m asking.’

  There’s frustration in her voice when she replies. That annoyance that other people don’t see Tyler as she does. I’ve heard it so many times myself. ‘No. He wouldn’t go in there without me.’

  The constable holds her in a firm gaze for a moment and then nods.

  There’s a silence in which I can’t help but think of all the quotes from television. Things like, ‘It’s always someone close to the victim’. It sounds like a cliché but it’s probably true. Do they suspect Dan? Me? Olivia? Is that what this is about?

  ‘That does leave us in rather a quandary,’ PC O’Neill says.

  ‘Why?’ Olivia replies.

  ‘Because if he never went into the garage, then how did his blood get in there?’

  ‘I…’ Olivia stops herself and then starts to rock. She can’t answer because she doesn’t know.

  Dan’s voice cuts across everything. ‘Perhaps we should get a lawyer…?’

  I turn to stare at him and then I realise that everyone’s doing the same. Olivia’s the first to question him.

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because there are questions that none of us seem able to answer.’

  I turn from him to a gaping Liv to a pair of officers with unreadable straight faces. Is Dan right? Are we really
suspects and this casual visit is anything but? Does he believe Olivia’s not being entirely truthful? Does he suspect me? Or is it guilt on his behalf? He used the stun gun on Tyler for whatever reason and now he’s scrambling to cover himself?

  ‘I haven’t done anything wrong, Dad.’

  Olivia’s stung and the air is suddenly thick, like a smoggy August day before a thunderstorm.

  ‘I’m not saying you have—’

  ‘So why do I need a lawyer?’

  ‘It’s complicated, love. I’m not saying—’

  She spins back to the officers: ‘Ask me whatever you want. I want you to find him.’

  Dan shuts up but there’s a big part of me that thinks he probably knows what he’s talking about. If the officers suspect Olivia for whatever reason, then she could talk herself into trouble even is she’s done nothing. Not only that, the blood might have come from my car. I should be the suspect.

  I don’t know what to do, so I end up doing nothing.

  And then Olivia proves how much smarter than me she is by saying something that hadn’t crossed my mind.

  ‘Do you think Tyler broke in?’ she asks. ‘You think he got in through the back door, cut himself somehow and then bled in the garage?’

  Sometimes I can be so thick-headed. PC Marks shifts in her seat and it’s obvious that’s what they think. Why didn’t I come up with that? The answer’s obvious. Not only am I paranoid about Dan and his intentions but I’m convinced I did something awful on the night I woke up in the field.

  It’s PC O’Neill who answers. ‘That’s a possibility we’re examining,’ he says.

  Classic police speak. It’s up there with ‘proceeding in a northerly direction’.

  ‘Have you noticed anything missing?’ he adds.

  Everyone’s looking at Olivia and she must feel it because she hugs herself a little tighter, shrinking under the attention. The thing with Olivia is that, deep down, we really do share a lot of the same traits. I was happy with my own small group of friends when I was her age, never caring for the approval of adults. She’s like that, too – except her look is her shield.