The Hill - Ben’s Story (Book One).: A Paranormal Murder Mystery Thriller. (Book One).

by Andrew M Stafford

  “Perhaps they’re sounding you out, you know, seeing how open your mind is?” suggested Polly.

  “It’s got to be to do with the murder case you’re dealing with, perhaps it’s planning to tell you who the murderer is and it’s preparing you?”

  Garraway laughed. “So you’re trying to tell me that the hill is just going to rock on up and tell me Colonel Mustard did it with a length of rope?”

  “I thought it was a rock to the skull,” said Polly in a serious tone of voice.

  “Look,” she added, “my Sarah seemed to know thing or two about you and your Strawbridge mate, explain that!”

  Garraway shook his head and looked at his watch. They had been there for well over an hour.

  “I can’t explain it,” he said. Wearily he added, “I’m tired and I need to go home.”

  His body ached as they walked back to his car.

  Chapter nineteen

  The Awareness

  At the same time Garraway experienced his latest ‘episode’, something else, somewhere very different began to stir.

  The Awareness that lasted no longer than a blink of an eye at the time Ben lost his life had begun to develop again. Just as before the Awareness had no senses, it could not see, speak, hear, touch or taste, but it did have a life force which was very strong. It was fighting to change, to develop and mature. It had a story to tell.

  And again, just as before, as soon as the Awareness began, it stopped.

  Chapter twenty

  Darlington

  9.15pm

  Thursday October 8th 2009

  It had been a long drive from Bristol to Darlington. What should have been a four hour journey ended up taking almost six. An accident on the M5, a punctured tyre on their hired transit van and Richard getting lost as he approached Darlington had all added to the longer than anticipated journey.

  “We’re here,” said Richard softly as Carla began to open her eyes.

  Carla had been sleeping for the last hour. Still tormented by visions of what happened in those woods, her dreams were no longer nice ones. She sat up and looked out of the window of the white van.

  “Which one’s ours?” she asked, wondering which house she would be setting up her new life in. She had seen a picture of the house on the internet, but in the leafy street in Darlington all houses looked much the same.

  “It’s that one there,” said her father pointing to the red brick Victorian building in front of them.

  “I like it daddy,” Carla smiled. It was the first time Richard had seen her smile in weeks. He smiled at her as he swept her hair away from her sleepy eyes.

  Richard had no idea why Carla had been so unhappy since the start of last month. In the following weeks he put it down to the move to Darlington as it had happened at such an important time in a vulnerable young girl’s life. He knew she’d have preferred to stay with her friends, especially with her final year at senior school, it would be a massive upheaval for her.

  He had convinced her to visit the doctor as he was concerned about the huge change in her character. The busy doctor had confirmed Richard’s diagnoses. When she returned from the surgery she hadn’t been given a prescription but was told to accept her situation and deal with it. She had been told that her hormones were affecting her, she was already pining for her friends and she wasn’t accepting the move to Darlington. Carla knew the real reason for her low mood and character change, but preferred to accept what the doctor had told her in order to satisfy her father. Richard felt awful to think all of this was down to him. But he desperately needed the work and he couldn’t leave Carla in Bristol. He had no choice.

  As they stepped out of the van and approached the door of their new home Carla felt a huge relief to be there. It was true that she felt like a stranger in a strange land, but it was better than being a loser in a lost land, which is what she had become in Bristol.

  Inside the house the rooms were small but cosy and finished in magnolia, which was the standard ‘blank canvas’ colour that most houses were painted when they were prepared for sale. Carla went upstairs and found the room which was her bedroom. She looked out of her window to the street below and could see her father unloading things from the back of the van. Her temporary ‘inflatable’ bed was still in the back and was yet to be unloaded. Across the street she could see curtains twitch as the locals viewed their new neighbours arriving late in the evening. Carla ran downstairs and into the street to help her father unload their belongings into the house. Richard was beginning to see a change in his daughter. For the first time since he could remember there was a look of enthusiasm about her.

  She got to bed around eleven o’clock. As she lay on her inflatable mattress she began to drift away and for the first time in what seemed like a lifetime she had a restful and dreamless sleep. No nightmares of that awful September evening. She slept well because she felt safe. Safe that she had escaped the torturous time she was experiencing in Bristol.

  But she wouldn’t be safe there forever. Even with Bristol 250 miles away. No matter how far she escaped from what happened on that Sunday in early September, it would never leave her. In fact it would eventually become closer than ever before.

  Chapter twenty one

  Markland Garraway’s house

  11am

  Friday 9th October 2009

  Garraway had booked the day off as annual leave. He had slept well, in fact he had slept a little too well and was surprised when he awoke at such a late hour. He was normally an early bird and was always up before seven, even on a day off. Today he would treat himself to breakfast as he was unusually hungry. Joan was already up and out of the house. He relished the thought of a bit of time home alone. He made himself a bacon sandwich, a pot of tea and poured a large glass of fresh orange juice.

  As he sat in his armchair and ate his sandwich he thought about the night before. It must have taken it out of him as he’d slept like a log. He recalled the clarity of how he’d flashed back to the beach at Ullapool. He had thought about that UFO many times since he was a boy, but the older he got the more distant the memory had become. But last night it was different. He remembered it with pinpoint accuracy. It wasn’t just the memory of what he saw that night which intrigued him, it was how he remembered the sounds and the smells and everything around him. If he’d taken the time to concentrate he probably would have memorised the number plates of the cars which were parked outside his old house.

  Perhaps Polly had been right about what Sarah had told her, maybe he had been selected by some strange supernatural force to take on Ben Walker’s case. It was certainly odd how Tom Strawbridge had been taken unexpectedly unwell that Monday morning after the murder leaving yours truly to head up the case, and it was equally odd how Tom made such a quick recovery and was able to return to work later that month.

  He had so many questions but didn’t know where to turn. Should he keep returning to the hill to see what happened next? Or should he seek a medium to interpret what was going on? He was confused. For the first time in his life Markland Garraway didn’t know what to do. It was true that the case had hit a standstill. It would take a miracle to make any headway. Perhaps the hill could produce a miracle? He sighed as he finished the rest of his breakfast.

  He spent the rest of his day off being particularly inactive, which wasn’t like him. Normally a day off would be a blank canvas for Garraway to fill. There were so many things around the house he should be doing. Joan had been complaining about a few DIY jobs he’d never finished. He should be using this day productively and get at least a few things done, but he was squandering his time.

  By two o’clock he was still lounging around the house, phasing in and out of drowsiness. Despite the marathon thirteen hour sleep, he was still tired. Just as he was about to slip back into another half sleep his phone rang. He picked it up and viewed the number. It was Polly.

  “Hello Polly, how are you?”

  “I’m OK, but you sound knackered,” she
replied.

  “I know, and I feel knackered, it’s my day off and all I want to do is sleep.”

  “I used to get like that every time I’d spoken to Sarah on the hill, the following day I would be so dopey I could sleep for England. I don’t get it any more now, I suppose you get used to it,” she replied.

  “Perhaps that’s it,” he replied. “Anyway Polly, what can I do for you?”

  “It’s more like what I can do for you.”

  “I went back to the hill again today, I’ve just got back. Last night in bed I was thinking about Sarah and the fact that she had little to say about me and her, and that it was more about you. I was selfish and I got off the hill before she had finished talking,” she continued.

  “So are you getting jealous about me and Sarah?” joked Garraway, immediately sensing he’d just said the wrong thing.

  “Yes, I suppose I am, or at least I was yesterday evening” she paused. “As I was saying, I cut Sarah off last night and now that I’ve thought about it I was sure she wanted to say something about the murder.”

  “So you went back to the hill?”

  “Yes, and I don’t think she was happy with me, at least not at first.”

  “Why’s that?”

  “Because it took a long time for me to connect with her.” Garraway could hear her voice wavering.

  “Normally I sit on that hill and it’s like broadband, she’s there instantly, this time it was like dial up. I was just about to give up and all of a sudden she was there.”

  Garraway was amazed by the way she calmly referred to her supernatural conversations with Sarah as if they were as normal as picking up the phone. He assumed she’d just become accustomed to it all by now. He heard sadness in her voice.

  “What did you and Sarah talk about today?”

  “You again, she wanted to talk about you,” said Polly.

  “She told me that ‘they’ felt you were better placed to help solve Ben’s murder than Strawbridge”.

  “Did she say why ‘they’ felt I was better placed?” asked Garraway.

  “She wasn’t specific,” said Polly, “only that you were better placed because your mind is more open than Strawbridge’s”.

  It was true that Detective Inspector Strawbridge did everything by the book and suffered fools lightly, whilst Garraway had always taken on a case and dealt with it with an open mind. All the years he had been a detective he reminded himself of the famous Sherlock Holmes quote:

  'Eliminate all other factors, and the one which remains must be the truth.'

  This had helped him close some rather difficult cases over the years, which other detectives may not have solved so quickly.

  “I don’t think the message was that ‘they’ would be giving you clues, it was more advice to be open minded,” said Polly.

  “Who do you think ‘they’ are?” he asked.

  “I’ve absolutely no idea. I’ve tried to find out, but Sarah seems to phase out as soon as I ask heavy questions”.

  Garraway held his phone away from his ear as he was suddenly struck by a thought.

  “Changing the subject,” he said, “has Sarah ever told you anything about when she died, any names or anything about the hit and run?”

  “She’s told me lots,” answered Polly, “and I’ve volunteered the information to Sergeant Brock and a lot of good that did”.

  “I presume Brock said he couldn’t use it?”

  “It wasn’t so much that he couldn’t use it, he clearly thought I was insane, or that I had been so affected by Sarah’s death I had been hallucinating,” she paused, “I suppose I can’t really blame him, it must have seemed very farfetched.” Garraway nodded, as if Polly could see him.

  “Mr Garraway, perhaps if you had been investigating Sarah’s death more would have been done?”

  He decided not to comment.

  “Thank you Polly, I’ll let you know if anything comes up which may require your, or Sarah’s, assistance.”

  As he ended the call, he deliberated whether Polly would ever move on with her life, or spend the rest of her time having a ‘long distance’ relationship with a ghost. She was spending too much time on the hill and he thought how sad she sounded today.

  He thought about what to do next. He was in no mood for pottering around the house. With Polly’s words still fresh in his mind he decided to go back to the hill, just to see if anything might happen.

  He drove to the woods and became mesmerised by the little pine air freshener hanging from the rear view mirror. The thing was rocking to and fro as he drove towards Doncaster Road and it was almost sending him to sleep. Suddenly he snapped out of the stupor just as he came to a zebra crossing with a mother and her small child slowly trying to get across the road. He slammed the brakes as the woman gave him a vile stare. He was still dead tired after the previous evening’s event on the hill.

  He locked his car and walked over to the hill. A group of children were kicking a ball. He looked at his watch and saw it was time for the school to empty out. There was no way he could concentrate with a few hundred kids making their way home, screaming and shouting. He decided to explore the woods whilst they made their way home. He hoped in fifteen minutes or so the place would be quiet again, and hopefully Doug Plummer, the school caretaker, wouldn’t be hanging around either.

  As he walked through the depths of the woods he took time to appreciate how beautiful the place was. Over the past few weeks he’d been through every square foot over and over again, but until now he hadn’t noticed the intricate wonder of the woodlands. This was the first time he’d taken a step back and appreciated it. It occurred to him how he took for granted the beauty that was on his doorstep. From the interviews with Ben and Liz’s friends and family no one knew they were dating, so the day Ben died could have been their first get-together. Garraway could appreciate why Ben would have taken Liz here. It’s the sort of place he used to take Joan way back in their courting days.

  Twenty minutes later he was back at the hill. The school kids had gone and, apart from the occasional dog walker and jogger, the place was quiet. He scrambled his way to the top and sat in the same place as the previous evening. This time the ground was dry. He switched his phone to vibrate and sat and waited, and waited, and waited. But nothing was happening. He glanced at his watch, three forty five. He decided to give it another few minutes. The jogger went past again, paying him no attention. He lay back and looked up at the cloudy sky. He was feeling drowsy as a breeze blew gently, which kept him from falling asleep. As the breeze died down Garraway began to drift. Pleasant dreams drifted through his mind as he lay.

  Whilst he was in a light slumber, something else, somewhere very different began to stir. The Awareness was evolving within its own dimension and it was developing with more urgency than before. It was still void of senses, but this time its need to be known, to be accepted and to be heard was greater than ever. It needed to develop a voice. It had no physical body but it did have an essence which took a virtual form, floating in a void of darkness. As it floated it kicked and it wriggled, it struggled and it fought like a newly conceived blastocyst determined to break through to a dimension where it could flourish and have a resolve to thrive.

  As the Awareness battled like an upstream swimmer it developed its first perception of emotion. It felt like it had been fired from a cannon and blasted out of its dimension and pulled into another. As it soared out and through to the other side its need to be heard multiplied a thousand times. The Awareness had a determination to release four simple words which had been pent up and were now boiling under pressure like a volcano ready to erupt.

  Garraway was lightly sleeping when he was awoken by such a force it almost knocked him from the hill. He sat bolt upright. Beads of perspiration where on his brow as four words were ringing in his ears. Four simple, basic, pleading words. Four words which sounded as if they were being shouted by an innocent but condemned man.

  PLEASE – HEAR – MY – VO
ICE.

  He jumped up and looked around. There was no one. The words were still ringing as if someone had crept up and shouted into his ear. His whole body ached. He slowly climbed to his feet and walked around the hill to make sure there was definitely no one around and as he moved his body hurt badly. It felt as if there was sand in his joints. He sat back down to digest what had just happened.

  -----------------------------

  Maria Jameson’s home

  3.47pm

  Friday 10th October

  Maria was in her favourite chair holding Christopher closely while he gently slept. After five weeks he had developed so much and she could see changes in him every day. There was an unconditional love that only exists between mother and child.

  She gently rocked him and smiled contentedly.

  Christopher suddenly awoke and with penetrating blue eyes stared at his mother. He jerked his head to one side and let out a blood curdling scream as if a firecracker had exploded next to his ear. Maria jolted forward and instinctively held him closer. He cried an agonising wail which quickly ebbed to a soft whimper and then he went back to sleep.

  Maria stared at him and wondered what on earth had happened.

  -----------------------------

  Southmead Hospital

  Liz Mason’s ward

  3.47pm

  Friday 10th October

  Liz hadn’t moved for four weeks. She had shown no signs of life other than her chest rising and falling as she gently drew in and exhaled breath.

  Her mother Anne sat beside Liz, drowsily reading a copy of Closer magazine. Anne was in a state of permanent jet lag. One day was morphing into the next and she had little idea of which day was which. Time had lost its purpose.

  Had she been more alert, instead of half reading a story about Jordan’s latest Botox treatment, she would have seen Liz’s eyes impulsively open. They darted from left to right as if she was consciously panicking, then they settled as she stared at the light in the ceiling above her bed. Slowly her lids closed as she returned to the state she had been in for the last four weeks.