Fall From Grace

by Menon, David

  ‘I’m scared of nobody.’

  Both Joe and Steve almost laughed. Her big bravado act was looking so bloody ridiculous. Steve looked round but didn’t want to take a seat in case he caught something. The place was filthy. Why didn’t these people ever take care of the houses that were provided for them by his taxes?

  ‘When did you last see you daughter Michaela?’ asked Joe.

  ‘It’s none of your business!’

  ‘But that’s not your choice to make, Lorraine,’ said Joe, still with a sideways glance at Steve. ‘Your daughter is underage and alarm buttons have been pressed because she’s not been at school. Lorraine, do you know what happened to Shona Higgins?’

  Lorraine sat down at the kitchen table and began to weep.

  ‘What is it, Lorraine?’ asked Steve, finally breaking his silence much to Joe’s relief. ‘Come on now. What do you know about what’s happened to these girls?’

  Neither of them made any move to comfort Lorraine. Joe placed a hand on her shoulder but that was the only concession to whatever predicament she was in. Steve especially didn’t have much sympathy with her.

  ‘I don’t know,’ Lorraine wailed, between sobs.

  ‘But what do you know?’ Joe asked.

  ‘That she left for school that morning and she didn’t come home.’

  Joe sat down beside her. ‘But you know more than that, don’t you, Lorraine? You know why she didn’t come back?’

  Lorraine began to weep again and then said ‘No, I don’t know.’

  ‘So who else was involved, Lorraine?’ Steve asked with noticeably more impatience than Joe.

  ‘I don’t know,’ she cried.

  ‘Aww, come on, Lorraine! You’re obviously hiding something which means that the lives of these girls are at stake. Are you happy if any of them die because you didn’t have the guts to tell the truth?’

  ‘Don’t,’ she pleaded, ‘please, don’t.’

  ‘Why not, Lorraine?’ Steve went on, ignoring Joe’s signals to back off and take it easy. ‘What do you know that we need to know about?’

  ‘I don’t know anything.’

  ‘Rubbish! You know something.’

  ‘I don’t!’ she cried. ‘My daughter disappeared, just like all the others.’

  Steve scoffed. ‘Then you’re okay about whatever happens to your daughter?’

  ‘Just leave me alone!’ she begged. ‘I can’t tell you anything because I don’t know, now how many more fucking times!’

  *

  Paul was just getting into his car before driving to work when he saw Jake pulling up on the other side of the street. He wound his window down as Jake walked over to him.

  ‘Jake, I’m already late for work,’ said Paul. ‘It’s not that I don’t want to talk to you but I’ve got a lot on and…’

  ‘… Please, Paul. I haven’t told you everything and I know I shouldn’t put on you like this but… Christ, man, who else would understand?’

  ‘You’d better come in,’ said Paul.

  Paul got out of his car and led Jake into his house. He took him through to the kitchen and put the kettle on. They stood in silence whilst Paul made the tea and handed Jake a mug. Then they sat down at Paul’s kitchen table.

  ‘Jake, what the hell is happening to you?’

  ‘Everything that would scare the fucking life out of you.’

  Paul sat back and let out a long sigh. ‘You don’t give me easy answers.’

  ‘What do you think it’s like inside my head?’

  ‘Well that’s what you can tell me about now.’

  Jake rubbed his chin. ‘After my mates were killed in front of me and I was nearly taken by a mob who’d have ripped my limbs apart, I kind of lost it a bit. In fact, I lost it altogether.’

  ‘I can understand that, Jake.’

  ‘I couldn’t make sense of anything,’ said Jake, rubbing the palms of his hands together. ‘My mates were dead and I wasn’t. I couldn’t get my head round anything and I was in the darkest place I’ve ever known.’

  ‘Again, that’s hardly surprising.’

  ‘The audits that the unit did on all the guns and ammunition wasn’t always as tight as it should’ve been,’ he admitted finally, ‘I helped myself to some of it.’

  ‘You stole guns and ammunition from your unit?’

  ‘Twice.’

  ‘You fucking idiot! What would they have done if they’d have caught you?’

  ‘I didn’t care,’ said Jake.

  ‘What?’ said Paul.

  ‘I sold the weaponry.’

  ‘Who to?’

  ‘To some bad people! What the fuck does it matter?’ I was desperate for cash, Paul. I’ve got a bad credit history, so has Tiffany. We’re a right pair.’

  ‘Why didn’t you ask me for help, Jake? I’d have given you my last penny piece, you know that.’

  ‘I didn’t think I had the right,’ said Jake as he wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. ‘And this security job I’ve got. I don’t exactly sit watching a load of CCTV cameras.’

  ‘Christ, Jake, you’re scaring the shit out of me! You need help.’

  Jake slammed the palms of his hands down on the table causing Paul to jump back.

  ‘No, I don’t! Help is the last fucking thing I need.’

  Jake then stood up and made for the front door.

  ‘Wait!’ said Paul, his anxiety growing at Jake’s oscillating behaviour. ‘Jake, I’m worried… where the hell are you going?

  ‘Home to my wife,’ said Jake. ‘Isn’t that where I should go?’

  ‘Jake, for God’s sake let me help you.’

  ‘This is what you wanted, isn’t it?’

  ‘What do you mean?’ Paul asked.

  ‘You wanted us to be sat here, drinking tea, perhaps having breakfast, being part of the brave new world of civil partnerships. This is how you wanted us to be.’

  ‘Jake, what’s that got to do with…’

  ‘…who am I, Paul?’

  Paul reached out and touched Jake’s arm. ‘I say again, Jake, let me help you.’

  Jake stood looking into Paul’s pleading eyes. Then without saying another word, he opened the door and left.

  *

  Anita Cowley had never taken very kindly to being told what to do. Her mother had always instilled in her the value of shouting first before getting shouted at and that way people wouldn’t dare to try anything on with you. It had worked. All the way through school she’d approached each day as if it were a battle zone. Her mother had never seen any point in school but had greeted her first ovulation as a sign that money was soon to be made.

  Every teacher had been the enemy and depending on how insistent the teacher had been about wanting her to pay attention, Anita had developed a way of dealing with them. She’d twice accused male teachers of making sexual advances towards her and she’d accused three women teachers of having slapped her. She always gave such a good performance of being the wronged against that it was hard for the authorities not to believe her initially. But during the investigations that followed, she could never keep up the victim act and her accusations were always thrown out. But the teaching staff had lost their patience after the fifth occasion. With the backing of their trade union they united in refusing to teach someone who’d made five false allegations against members of the teaching staff. She’d just turned fifteen and it was about this same time that she ‘fell’ pregnant with her daughter Candice. After that nobody made her think about school again. Her social workers had only been concerned about her getting the right kind of ‘support’ for her and her baby and finishing her education had not come into it at all. And she’d been happy with that. It had got her off the hook.

  But something was now shifting inside her.

  Up until now nothing had ever happened at home unless her mother approved of it. But now the two of them were locked in a battle and she was beginning to feel a desperate need to get away from her mother and the example of life her mot
her had shown her. If her mother had really loved her then she would’ve insisted that she got down to her schoolwork instead of going off in search of some feckless lad who could father her a child for her. Even when the deed had been done she should’ve advised her to have an abortion or to give the baby up for adoption, Anita realised all that now. She wouldn’t be without Candice but it might’ve been better for her daughter if she’d been given to a family looking to adopt. It was a mother’s job to put her child first. But she hadn’t learned that from her own mother.

  Anita had known nothing about bringing up a child when the whole process began. She’d known enough to stick a dummy in its mouth to shut it up. She’d known enough to believe that a bag of crisps in one hand and a can of pop in the other could stand as a proper meal. But now she worked with other women who were mothers and she was learning just where she’d got it all so wrong.

  She was starting to feel shame at her old ways. Everybody who worked at the centre was really nice and they’d talked to her, got to know her, asked her opinion on things. Not even Paul had tried to play the big ‘I am’ and some of the folks who came into the centre had made her feel that perhaps she wasn’t quite at the bottom of the pile. Some of the cases were so sad that they even broke her heart and nobody had been able to do that before. And her mother was wrong. The people she worked with weren’t laughing at her behind her back. They were doing for her what her mother should’ve always done.

  It was the end of her first week of working at the centre and she was happy. But she knew that this happiness would be ripped out of her when she got home. She wasn’t in favour with her mother. It was going to be a very long weekend.

  ‘Remembered you’ve got a kid then?’ Lorraine snarled, her face turned sideways towards her daughter who was tucking into beans on toast. Candice had the same and Lorraine had cut it all up for her in bite size pieces suitable for a small person.

  ‘What’s the matter, Mum?’ asked Anita, impatiently. ‘Can’t stand it because I’m happy on terms that aren’t yours?’

  Lorraine swung her arm round and walloped Anita across the face. It was so hard and so dramatic that little Candice burst into tears. Anita picked her up and cuddled her. She then turned her eyes to her mother.

  ‘You bitch!’ she screamed.

  ‘You’re the bitch in this house, lady!’ her mother roared back. ‘Going out to work when you know I’ve got enough on my plate worrying myself sick about our Michaela! You should be here with me.’

  ‘Doing what exactly?’

  ‘Helping me!’

  ‘With what, Mum?’

  ‘With living.’

  ‘Why do you need me to stay at home all day to do that?’

  ‘My God,’ Lorraine scoffed. ‘Two weeks at work and she’s coming out with all the clever rubbish they all talk.’

  ‘Oh Mum, please,’ said Anita, who could’ve just burst into tears but was determined not to. ‘Why can’t you just be proud of me?’

  ‘Because a mother who dumps her child at a so-called children’s centre whilst she swans it about in some stupid job is a rotten, selfish little bitch! She’s nobody to be proud of.’

  ‘Oh yeah? And if a mother knows more about her daughter’s disappearance than she’ll let on to the police then what does that make her?’

  ‘Do you want another slap?’

  ‘Go on, if it makes you happy! If that’s all you can do! Well I’ll tell you something. If my sister ends up the same way as Shona Higgins then I’ll never speak to you again.’

  *

  Sara ran into the station and was given a message that Superintendent Hargreaves wanted to see her. She straightened her hair with her fingers and made sure her dress was tidy by wiping it down with her hands. Then she knocked on the Super’s door and he called her in.

  ‘Sit down, Sara,’ said Hargreaves as he gestured to the chair in front of his desk.

  ‘Is something wrong, sir?’ Sara asked.

  ‘Why do you ask that?’

  ‘The look on your face, sir,’ said Sara. ‘It says you’re desperate to get something off your chest.’

  ‘You’re known for being very direct, DCI Hoyland.’

  ‘It’s the way I am, sir,’ said Sara, noting that he’d switched to DCI Hoyland instead of using just Sara, ‘and I’ll never be any different.’

  ‘And that’s to your credit,’ said Hargreaves, ‘but rumours have got back to me, Sara. They say that you and DI Norris are not getting on. Want to comment on that?’

  ‘Tim and I have some personal history, sir, yes,’ said Sara, ‘but we’re both professional officers. It doesn’t need to affect our working relationship and I for one won’t let it. You don’t need to worry, sir.’

  ‘Good,’ said Hargreaves, ‘but if it does, despite your best efforts, get out of control, you will let me know?’

  ‘Of course, sir, but like I said, it is under control.’

  ‘I know what you’re thinking, Sara.’

  ‘Sir?’

  ‘That I’m a fine one to talk about personal lives considering the rumours that go around about me?’

  Sara blushed and smiled nervously, ‘oh I wouldn’t know, sir.’

  ‘Yes, you would,’ said Hargreaves, ‘I know what’s being said about me and a certain WPC. And the reason I’m saying all this to you is that you’re a bloody good officer and I don’t want anything to spoil the career path ahead of you.’

  ‘I won’t let that happen, sir.’

  ‘Good, right answer.’

  ‘So if there’s nothing else, sir?’

  ‘No, I think we’re done for now,’ said Hargreaves. ‘Just remember what I’ve said.’

  Sara stood up and made for the door but before she opened it she turned round to face him again.

  ‘Sir? I think you deserve to know this. The rumours you talked about concerning you and a certain WPC? They mainly come from her. She can’t help boasting about her relationship with you and she seems to be under the impression that if she was simply to click her fingers you’d leave your wife for her.’

  Hargreaves felt rather uncomfortable about what Sara was telling him. He knew that Sharon Howells had not been altogether discreet about their relationship but he hadn’t known that she was the source of much of the gossip. The sex with Sharon was good but it wasn’t that good to risk the rest of his life on it. As for him leaving his wife? There was no way that was going to happen.

  ‘Thanks, Sara,’ said Hargreaves. ‘I appreciate that.’

  ‘If I hear anything else, sir, I’ll let you know.’

  NINE

  Paul helped his Dad eat some of the fish and mashed potatoes he’d cooked for him. Then he took the dishes out to the kitchen and loaded them into the dishwasher. He’d battled with his mother for years to get one and had considered it something of a victory when she’d finally relented. When he came back into his father’s bedroom he stopped for a moment. He’d have to admit that his father looked ghastly. His eyes seemed to have sunken even further back into his head and he was so painfully thin.

  His mind swept through memories of his father as a younger man, when Paul was a child, when his father was physically strong and free of the disease that was now slowly taking him away. He smiled. These were the memories he’d need to hold onto, especially in the days after his father had gone and his grief would be at its sharpest.

  ‘How are you doing, son?’

  ‘I’m doing alright, Dad.’

  ‘Paul?’

  ‘Yes, Dad?’

  ‘In the top of the chest of drawers, buried right at the bottom, you’ll find a small box. I want you to get it and bring it over.’

  Paul went over to the chest of drawers and followed his father’s instructions. He then brought the small box over to him.

  ‘Open it,’ Ed commanded.

  Paul opened the box and his eyes widened at what was inside. It was a man’s wrist watch encrusted with small diamonds.

  ‘Bloody hell!’ Paul e
xclaimed. ‘Is this yours?’

  ‘It’s solid gold,’ smiled Ed.

  ‘I never knew you had this.’

  ‘Nobody knows I’ve got it, not even your mother,’ said Ed. ‘It was given to me many years ago by someone I loved very much.’

  ‘It’s beautiful.’

  ‘I want you to have it.’

  ‘Me?’

  ‘She was the love of my life, Paul.’

  Paul sat down on the edge of his father’s bed. ‘Is this where you tell me you were a bit of a one with the ladies, Dad?’

  ‘I had my moments,’ said Ed, smiling as best he could. ‘You youngsters weren’t the inventors of fun, you know.’

  ‘You dark horse,’ said Paul, ‘I can see the memories are making you smile. Whoever this woman was I like her for that at least.’

  ‘I loved the absolute bones of her,’ said Ed. ‘There was nothing I wouldn’t have done for her.’

  ‘What happened to her?’

  ‘She died, son,’ said Ed. ‘It was tragic, really, really tragic. She was so young.’