Innocent Monsters

by Doherty, Barbara

  “So, as I mentioned there’s something I wanted to discuss with you, Miss Lynch. First of all, do you know if your sister was seeing anyone?”

  “A boyfriend? I don’t think she was seeing anyone at the moment, no.”

  “A close friend maybe?”

  “I suppose it’s possible.”

  She thought about it, Kaitlyn’s smile suddenly appearing in the forefront of her mind, clear as day. That smile, those perfectly plush lips, had won many men over. Kaitlyn enjoyed sleeping around, she never made a secret of it but never talked about her many conquests. The only time they had touched on the subject, years ago, Kaitlyn had admitted using sex to feel a closeness she should have reached in other ways, with time. Sharing this fact with a stranger, at this very moment, was as intolerable as telling him her sister was a complete slut.

  “She was very private about things like that. She wouldn’t necessarily have told me about it.”

  “Oh, I see. You weren’t close then?”

  “Yes, we were close.” She heard herself bark.

  “Talking about every single person you have sex with does not constitute a close relationship, as far as I know.”

  Brown sank in his chair, considering his next words carefully. He had already said the wrong thing.

  “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to upset you. Let’s see if I can explain myself a little better.” He looked at his printed sheets again. “The coroner in charge of your sister’s case has decided to open an inquest. This usually happens when the causes of death are not as straightforward as they initially seemed.”

  Jessica stopped breathing for a few seconds. What exactly was this unkempt old man trying to tell her?

  “You see, Miss Lynch, although the cuts on your sister’s wrists were deep, she didn’t lose as much blood as she should have.”

  “She lost enough to die.”

  “That’s just it. It appears that the amount of blood she lost was not enough to kill her. The coroner’s report opens the possibility of Kaitlyn’s death being caused by something else.”

  Something else? She definitely couldn’t breathe now. Her head was spinning and she tried to stop it holding it tight with both hands.

  “Miss Lynch? Are you ok? Would you like a glass of water?”

  Jessica didn’t speak, she merely nodded. What she really wanted was to get out of this stuffy room, breathe, but before she could stand up and walk out of the door Brown was back with water in his hand.

  He repositioned himself on his chair, slid the glass across the table. “Have a drink. Take a deep breath.”

  He waited, watched her drink, pull hair away from her face. She was a good looking woman, under strain, but still good looking.

  “I know this is hard to take in. I imagine you were just coming to terms with your sister’s suicide...”

  “How do you know? How does the coroner know it wasn’t the blood loss that killed her? How can you be sure?”

  “I really don’t want to upset you any...”

  “Just fucking tell me, will you!” She slammed a hand on the sticky table to drive her frustration across. Brown looked unmoved, mildly annoyed by her swearing. “You got me up here to review some details, didn’t you? You must tell me.”

  The detective contemplated disclosing that her sister’s bloodshot eyes were a definite sign of suffocation, that it was surely how Kaitlyn Lynch had died; he also contemplated telling her that Kailyn had been raped, probably just before being killed, which was the only reason he had asked about a possible boyfriend. But the woman sitting across him and didn’t look like she could take in any more information at the moment. She didn’t need to know.

  “Fine, let’s see... When someone has an injury and starts bleeding out, the heart pumps out the blood while it’s still working. The blood loss ultimately stops the heart. If this someone is dead before the injury, the heart stops, so the pumping stops and the blood doesn’t run out with the same speed. Do you see what I am saying?”

  Brown waited to catch in her eyes the same inappropriate excitement he had felt a few days earlier, reading the coroner’s report. He waited while Jessica searched his face, tried to understand, and then he saw it, that same elation, her eyes lighting up with realisation.

  “You’re telling me someone else was there? Someone else cut her wrists?”

  “Correct.”

  Jessica gulped down the rest of the water, pulled at her hair again. “Christ. Fuck. Jesus Christ... Who? Who did this?”

  “This is what we are trying to find out. It is very important you think about anyone who seemed remotely suspicious in your sister’s life. There was no forced entry, so the intruder was someone she knew, she must have opened the door.”

  Jessica started shaking her head, started wishing she had never agreed to come. “This is all my fault... If I never went for that stupid meeting she wouldn’t have been alone in the house. It’s all my fault.”

  “Please, Miss Lynch... Jessica, if I may. This is not the right attitude. Believe me, whoever did this would have found the time to do it another day, when you were out. You could not have prevented it any more than Kaitlyn herself could. But you can help us make sure he doesn’t go unpunished. Go back home, look through your sister’s things, any name, phone numbers, photographs of people you don’t recognise, the smallest detail could be vital.”

  Jessica nodded, a grim expression on her face. “I understand.”

  “I should be the first person you call. Call me directly. Anything at all.”

  “Of course.”

  She looked as if she could do with a hug, but it would have been inappropriate, so Brown remained seated, looked in the folder for the leaflet he usually gave out when physical contact was not an option.

  “Take this, there’s some phone numbers on there you might find useful. It’s our Victim Support centers. You might need someone to talk to.”

  Jessica took the leaflet knowing perfectly well that talking to someone was not what she wanted to do. All she wanted was to wake up from this evolving nightmare, she wanted to rewind time, wipe away the last two weeks completely, wipe away this feeling of guilt swelling up in her stomach.

  “Would you like a few minutes on your own?”

  “No, thank you.” Not in here.

  “In that case...” Brown stood up, offered her his hand to shake. “I will speak to you very soon, I hope. Take care of yourself.”

  Jessica shook his hand and smiled weakly as she stood up from her chair. She was nodding but secretly, she wished she would never hear from him again.

  5 November 2000

  IT WAS ten to eight, Sunday morning. The bedroom was still dark. Lisa slowly opened her eyes and looked at the red digits beaming at her from the alarm clock. She had barely slept five hours and someone was knocking at the front door.

  She turned to check on her husband lying undisturbed next to her and tried to move off the bed as quietly as possible, dragging herself along the armchair next to the chest of drawers. Waking up Bobby now would turn this into a very difficult day.

  She picked up her flannel dressing gown and walked out of the room, closing the door quietly.

  Outside, the knocks were getting more impatient.

  “Yeah, yeah, I’m comin’!”

  Lisa pulled the door open to find herself face to face with Jessica, tired, unkempt and completely dressed in black, looking as if she hadn’t changed or washed since the day of the funeral. Her hand was still raised, ready for another couple of knocks.

  “Jessica? It’s kinda early.”

  “Is it? I’m sorry. Can I come in?”

  She was shivering, shifting from one foot to the other. Behind her, the November sky was grey, the road deserted.

  “Sure.” Jessica stepped in, closed the
door and kept shivering staring at the floor, looking cold and fragile. “What is it?”

  “I need to talk to you. It’s Kaitlyn.”

  Always Kaitlyn, forever Kaitlyn.

  Jessica was wiping both hands frantically over her face, as if trying to erase her features, delete any expression on it, her breathing heavy. Lisa had never seen her like this. She looked deranged and it made her nervous.

  “Ok. It’s ok, come on. Let’s talk.” Lisa took hold of her arm and guided her to one of the chairs around the kitchen table. She sat across her, studying her, waiting for her to speak.

  The table was crowded with dinner remains, glasses, slices of bread, an open bottle of Coke. Bits of spaghetti were staring at her from one of the dirty plates.

  Lisa knew the mess bothered her friend, she had made it clear in so many ways during the few days she had spent here, before the funeral. They were very different that way, and in many other ways. Kaitlyn had always been the bridge between the two of them but, without her, they seemed nothing but isolated islands floating in their own private world, in their own habits. Disconnected.

  “Sorry about the mess. Bobby came back around three this morning, starving. I don’t know how he does it, eatin’ that late, just before he’s off to bed.”

  Bobby, again, Lisa’s eternal excuse for slobbishness. Apparently, when your husband keeps odd working hours, it’s almost impossible to clean the house, to iron, to wash your face before going to bed so that you don’t wake up in the morning with mascara melted under your eyes, impossible to lead a normal life.

  Ever since her wedding, Lisa had started spending her days waiting for Bobby, sitting somewhere waiting, doing nothing, wasting her life away waiting for him. Fucking Bobby. How could she have willingly built a life around this idiot? Waiting for him? Waiting for a man who prohibited her from finding a job, who didn’t like her to have a social life, to see anyone he didn’t feel superior to, a man who still believed women were supposed to spend their days cleaning, cooking, ironing, looking pretty and not much else. Laziness. It had to be laziness. Easier to live for someone else than make any decisions about her own life.

  “Jessica?”

  “Sorry, I was miles away.”

  “You don’t look great, sweetie. When was the last time you had some sleep?” Sleep. That was exactly the problem. She kept dreaming about her sister. Every time she closed her eyes she was there, always the same dream, in her childhood home, then in her bathroom... Was it possible Kaitlyn was trying to tell her something?

  Jessica shook her head. “I can’t sleep. I can’t eat. I’m losing track of time... The police are investigating her death.”

  “Who’s death? Kaitlyn’s? Why?”

  “They think she didn’t kill herself. Someone else slashed her wrists. They think she was murdered, Lisa. She didn’t want to die. Someone she knew, they think.”

  Lisa was stunned, lost for words, her big green eyes huge on her pale round face. “No, there must be a mistake... Who would do anything like this? Everybody liked her... Right?”

  “I know. I know. It’s crazy. And you know what else is crazy? It’s made me feel better. I feel better about my own sister being murdered because it means she didn’t kill herself. How insane does that sound?”

  She felt sick just uttering the words out loud, but Kaitlyn was happy, just as she though she was; Kaitlyn had not chosen to end her life. It had to be a glimmer of light at the end of this long dark tunnel.

  Lisa was shaking her head, looking down at the dirty plate by her arm with tears welling up in her eyes, trying to process the information she had just been given. It was like watching someone struggling to understand a foreign language, with the irritation and confusion that comes with it and it made Jessica feel momentarily selfish and cruel. But that same information had been too much to bear on her own and around seven o’ clock that morning telling someone else seemed like the only sane thing to do.

  “I’m sorry. Maybe I shouldn’t have told you,” she whispered. “But I keep thinking about her being lonely and scared. I need someone else to go through this with me. I’m sorry.”

  “No, don’t be. I think... I know I should feel relieved, just like you said. It’s just...”

  Lisa stood up sniffling without saying another word and walked to the small window above the sink. She poured some water in the coffee maker and stood there for a few minutes staring outside in silence, gripping the edge of the sink firmly with both hands. When the water started boiling she let go and sat back down, arms crossed resting on the table, a slice of bread under her elbow.

  “Y’know what? What difference does it really make? Nothing is gonna make any difference anymore. She’s gone. She ain’t comin’ back. However it happened, she’s gone, Jessy. I don’t know what you’re gonna do, but I just want to forget about this whole nightmare and move on.”

  Irritation squeezed Jessica like a fist. Lisa had managed to chew up a distressing piece of information and spit it out in one single word: DEAD. What difference did it make how if the end result was the same? Simple. And of course she was right, Kaitlyn was gone, but Jessica couldn’t let her go as easily as that and Lisa’s simplistic approach to the whole situation, to life in general, annoyed her, forced her again to wonder about their friendship and its foundations, made her wish again there could have been someone else to turn to, another door to knock on. But there wasn’t anyone.

  “How about some coffee?” Lisa proposed.

  Simple. Coffee, the solution to every problem. So easy. “If you like.”

  Lisa cleared the table piling everything in the sink; she poured two cups of coffee than sat back at the table with a packet of cigarettes ready next to the mug, and once the cup was emptied she had one. Always a cigarette after a cup of coffee.

  It was almost ten when Bobby emerged from the bedroom. Jessica saw him heading for the bathroom, coming out then heading for the kitchen, his skin pale, a smudge of toothpaste by the side of his thin lips, his clear blue watery eyes still puffy under the bushy eyebrows, his long mullet already tied in a ponytail, like every respectable low- class loser. She could have punched him.

  “Mornin’. Look who’s here! Any coffee ready?”

  Lisa shot out of her chair. “I’ll get you a cup.”

  Bobby sat himself in front of Jessica as soon as Lisa stood up, one elbow on the back of the chair, one arm stretched out on the table, the fingertips of his right hand drumming on a stain of Coke, his nails badly bitten.

  “When’d ya get here then?”

  “Around eight, I think.”

  “Eight? Glad I didn’t hear you knockin’. What did ya’ have? Four hours sleep, Liz?”

  Lisa nodded by the sink pouring hot coffee in his cup. Behind her the sky was now a pale blue, weak sun rays came through the window tracing her nose, her pouting lips as she concentrated in dissolving the sugar granules in the mug. She looked like a little girl, pure, malleable. It reminded Jessica of her own mother, of all the times she had seen her prepare the man she had married something to eat or drink. It reminded her of all the breakfasts she had eaten at the kitchen table looking at the bruises on Margaret Lynch’s face, all the times her mother had been standing listlessly by the window, where the purple of the blood under her skin disappeared because the light of the morning sun shining behind her made her whole face look darker.

  “Jessica needed to get some things off her chest,” Lisa said bringing the coffee to the table.

  “I’m sure Bobby doesn’t want to hear about it.” She didn’t want him to be involved; he had made his indifference very evident during the days before the funeral.

  “That’s right. And I’ve had enough lookin’ at my princess here crying. She’s been in a state, y’know that?”

  Bobby grabbed the mug without a thank you, lifted his ass from the
chair and shuffled into the next room to reposition himself on the sofa in front of the impossibly large television. As he switched it on, George W. Bush’s face was on the screen, a big grin on his lips.

  “Jessy, you wanna stay for lunch? ...Bobby?” Lisa shouted at him, “what do you think? Meatballs for lunch?”

  His voice came loud from the room next door. “This guy is gotta win the election. Al Gore my ass, that’s what I say. Ya think some environmentalist faggot is gonna win our wars? I say, send him back where he came from! We need someone with balls running the country!”

  The two women looked at each other, for a second able to share the same embarrassment then Lisa moved her eyes away, breaking off the fleeting conspiracy out of respect for her husband.

  “Meatballs, then?” She asked.

  Meatballs? Kaitlyn was dead and there was an idiot sitting on the sofa next door, a clown Lisa had decided to marry and the question coming out of her mouth was Meatballs? Would shout help her friend see how ridiculous this was? How long would they have to go on pretending anyone might be in the mood for lunch when they both knew Jessica couldn’t bear to spend anytime at all with the man sitting on the sofa next door?

  Jessica still clearly remembered Lisa’s wedding day, a small affair at the City Hall. She remembered Lisa’s parents, proud and well dressed, whispering at each other politely, her relatives and friends looking around the place, commenting and complimenting the architecture endlessly while waiting for the ceremony to start. She remembered Bobby’s father, an older version of his son, the two of them practically a carbon copy of each other twenty-odd years apart; both sporting a cheap suit, a mullet and a greasy ponytail. She could still hear the old man bellowing at everyone that San Francisco’s City Hall was featured at the end of Invasion of the Body Snatchers, had anyone seen the movie? It was after the fourth of fifth time Jessica had heard the words pod people and snatchers that Kaitlyn had grabbed her by the arm, pulled her behind one of the large marble pillars surrounding the main room and asked through gritted teeth, “Why are we letting her do this? Lisa is our friend, not some stranger throwing her life away”. Yes, it was ridiculously bad timing, but something had to be done, they had to try and make her understand that Bobby wasn’t exactly the best she could have done for herself. For Chirst’s sake, Invasion of the Body Snatchers? At a wedding? Was this the kind of DNA her future husband carried? As her closest friends, surely they had an obligation to inform her of what everyone else was thinking. It was only then that Lisa had confessed being pregnant. They loved each other and they were going to have a family whether everybody else approved of it or not.