by Lynda Renham
‘Was it? I wouldn’t know. I turn me ‘earing aids off at eight,’ he says, before slamming his door.
‘Nice chap,’ says Felix.
‘You attract too much attention. I knew I shouldn’t have brought you,’ says Sylvie.
‘Both me and my bowels wish you hadn’t,’ he shoots back.
We return to the flat and Sylvie starts dusting everything with baby powder. She pulls her phone from her handbag and taps into it. Meanwhile I’ve got one ear cocked for Felix’s signal. My mouth is dry and my heart is hammering nine to the dozen. I’m convinced we’re going to get caught.
‘What are you doing?’ I ask.
My neck and shoulders are aching from the tension and I’m craving chocolate. A shot of that vodka wouldn’t go amiss either.
‘I’m getting confused. I don’t think I’m supposed to do it like this.’
‘You’re joking right?’ I say incredulously. ‘We’ve broken into someone’s flat and you’ve covered the place in bloody Johnson’s baby powder and now you’re saying that you’re not supposed to do it like this.’
‘I’m looking for the YouTube Video,’ she snaps.
‘YouTube?’ I echo.
‘Maybe you’ve got time to watch a DVD darling but my bowels are on a deadline,’ Felix chimes through the door.
‘Shit, I need to start again. Dust off the powder. I need to apply it gently with the make-up brush. I got muddled. I thought that the …’
‘Christ, this is painful,’ sighs Felix. ‘Kojak just walks in with a lollipop and solves the whole thing. I never saw him with baby powder.’
‘Kojak?’ I exclaim. ‘How old are you Felix?’
‘I like watching the re-runs. The old ones are the best.’
‘Can we get on,’ snaps Sylvie. ‘You can share your TV viewing habits later.’
I watch Sylvie gently brush a wine glass and then photograph it with her phone. She does the same to the coffee table and then tells me to clean up. It’s beginning to feel like a normal day at work for me. She kneels by the bloodstained carpet.
‘I’ll try to lift some of this,’ she says. ‘There must be a thousand clues in this rug. Look for stray hairs and bag whatever you find.’
‘How the hell am I supposed to pick up a strand of hair with these?’ I complain, holding up my yellow rubber marigold hands.
‘Remind me never to have you as my assistant again,’ she says irritably as she picks at the dried stain. I struggle to grasp a hair on the carpet but it’s almost impossible in my Marigolds. It takes me all of five minutes and I manage to take some carpet fibres at the same time. Well, you never know do you? They might be useful. In the far corner of the room on the floor beneath the Buddha painting is a card.
‘What’s that?’ I say, crawling towards it.
‘Don’t touch it,’ hisses Sylvie. ‘We may be able to get some prints off it. Here use these. Bag it.’
She’s bossy when she’s got her detective hat on isn’t she?
She throws a pair of tweezers at me. How the hell am I supposed to hold those with these bloody Marigolds? The card is a Starbucks reward card, which after much fiddling with the tweezers I manage to drop into a freezer bag. I’m struggling to zip the bag up when Sylvie groans.
‘Bugger it.’
I turn and gasp. The pea-sized bloodstain is now a potato sized bloodstain.
‘God Sylvie, it stands out like a sore thumb. There’s no way they’ll miss that,’ I say, panicking.
‘I hate to be a wet blanket and spoil your fun, but isn’t this tampering with evidence,’ whispers Felix.
‘Does it look very different?’ she asks.
‘Of course it looks different, are you insane? About three inches different. Men or no men, there is no way they are going to miss that,’ I say, struggling to keep the panic from my voice.
‘Felix, go and get some stain remover. There’s a bottle in the car.’
‘What?’ he croaks. ‘You can’t possibly be serious. Why don’t you spring-clean the place and be done with it.’
‘Felix, just go. Roxie will keep watch.’
I will?
‘I don’t know what it looks like,’ he whines.
‘Jesus wept. Jane Tennison doesn’t have to put up with this shit.’
‘That may have something to do with the fact that she’s a fictional character,’ I remind her.
‘Roxie will go,’ she snaps. It sounds like an order and I don’t like to argue.
‘Don’t be long,’ says Felix as I rush past him.
This is a nightmare. I thought we’d just have a quick look around and leave. If you ask me, we’re leaving more evidence than we’re finding. I have never run so fast in my life. I fly back past Felix and throw the stain remover to Sylvie along with a scrubbing brush. Minutes later, like magic, the stain has gone. Even the small pea shaped stain has gone.
‘Shouldn’t you have left just a little bit?’ I ask.
‘They won’t notice,’ she says, ‘they’re men.’
‘In which case they won’t notice if there is a bottle of that vodka missing will they?’ says Felix. ‘God knows I need something.’
‘That’s stealing,’ says Sylvie.
‘You’ve got strange ideas on right and wrong, love.’
‘We need to get this into a fridge as soon as possible,’ she says, holding up the blood specimen.
‘Whose fridge?’ squeals Felix.
‘Ours of course.’
‘Over my dead body.’
‘That can be arranged Felix.’
‘Can we go now?’ I ask anxiously.
The last thing I need is to be found on my hands and knees in the middle of a crime scene. It really won’t look good will it? A Boy George lookalike gay man standing guard and two hapless women in Marigolds attempting forensics, and as for the baby powder, I’m not even going there. We look as guilty as hell. I’m not sure what of, but we certainly look guilty. I wish I hadn’t mentioned the murder. It seemed like a dream but now it’s a nightmare. I just want to be home in my flat with a jar of Nutella, a packet of trifle fingers and Fifty Shades book three. I’d so love to be sitting cosily on the couch with my boyfriend as if none of this ever happened, just like things used to be. But things can never be the same now, can they? Before I have time to fall into a depression, Detective Sylvie is at me again.
‘We need to check the bins before we go. You’d be amazed at how much evidence is in rubbish bins.’
She hands me a black bag.
‘Empty everything onto the sack. Take out anything you think is relevant.’
‘What am I looking for?’ I ask. All I want to do is get out of here.
She shrugs.
‘Suspicious things.’
Oh right, that’s very helpful isn’t it? I empty the kitchen bin onto the sack and stare at the contents. An empty tin of baked beans doesn’t count as suspicious does it, unless you count the fact it should be in the recycling bin. I carefully poke through potato peel, leftover food and torn up letters. I shove the letter pieces in a plastic bag. Not because they look suspicious but because I don’t know what else to put in there and I somehow think my life won’t be worth living if I don’t produce something. The sound of a police siren immobilises me.
‘Shit, that’s it,’ cries Felix. ‘I have to use the sodding loo. I can’t be dragged to the cells with my bowels in this state.’
‘Shove that rubbish back into the bin,’ she orders, ‘and let’s get out of here.’
Chapter Twelve
We make a beeline to Costa Coffee. Felix dashes to the loo while I order and sit watching a loved-up couple feeding each other strawberry cheesecake. Darren and I have never fed each other anything, period. Not at home or in public.
‘The cheesecake is off the menu then,’ says Felix as he joins me after what seems like an eternity. ‘I can’t tell you what a relief that was. The loo that is, not the cheesecake. I feel like a new man. In fact if you spot one, let me know.
’
The loved-up couple are now kissing in between feeding each other. I hope they don’t start having sex on the table.
‘Right,’ says Sylvie, joining us. ‘I’ve contained the blood sample.’
‘Oh good, I have to admit it was bothering me,’ says Felix sarcastically.
‘I wish we had found more evidence.’
‘We’re not going back,’ says Felix. ‘We should think ourselves lucky the police weren’t coming for us.’
The loved-up couple are now sharing coffees and calling each other by pet names. Felix mimics putting his fingers down his throat and all I can think of is Darren. The Great Zehilda has been amazingly accurate. She said she saw a hen, or was it a chicken, oh well it’s one and the same thing isn’t it? That the hen predicted wealth from an unexpected legacy and let’s face it, I had no expectations of winning the lottery. Even now I can’t believe it. Then there was the sausage. The sausage tea leaves means the marring of my pleasant conditions. Okay, maybe things with Darren and I weren’t a hundred per cent pleasant but I was reasonably happy with my lot, at least I think I was. Perhaps I wasn’t and it was just too complicated to leave. The truth is I could never afford the rent on a flat myself and it was nice to feel loved. Well, that’s all gone out of the window. But her words I see wealth but also danger. You know something. You will know something. You’ve seen something haven’t you? Or you will see something. Let’s face it, she couldn’t have been more accurate about the murder than if she planned it herself, and even I don’t believe a tea leaf reader would go that far just to prove her predictions. She even got the number ‘6’ bonus ball. I mean, that is really impressive isn’t it? Who’d have thought it? Me, Roxie Brown, having my life changed overnight? I’m still sceptical that I’ve won anything on the lottery though because let’s face it, apart from meeting Ark Morgan in the House of Mirrors, only bad things have happened since I saw The Great Zehilda.
‘Roxie, are you listening?’ Sylvie says, breaking into my thoughts.
‘Where are you going to go? You can’t possibly forgive that little shit again,’ says Felix.
I gape at Sylvie.
‘You told Felix about the first time?’ I say shocked.
‘It just came up one night,’ she says defensively.
‘Over spag bol,’ adds Felix. ‘I was crying into it to be precise.’
I let out a sigh.
‘Felix was having boyfriend troubles,’ says Sylvie.
‘And Darren screwing my friend helped with that did it?’ I say feeling hurt, although I’m not sure why as right now the more people that hate Darren the better.
‘He’s a prick and you’re better off without him,’ says Sylvie. ‘He’s a spendthrift and frankly a layabout. I don’t believe he can’t get more work. Why do you stay with him?’
I shrug helplessly.
‘I’m not sure. I guess I just felt I ought to try and make it work. He was very remorseful after the first time.’
God, that sounds like there have been numerous times doesn’t it? Well, for all I know there has been. Bloody men.
‘And well, where would I have gone and who would have watched DVDs with me and …’
They look at me.
‘I know. I guess it was easier to stay than to leave. After all, we’ve been together five years and he really was remorseful.’
‘So remorseful that he’s done it again,’ says Felix, grimacing at the loved-up couple at the other table.
‘If you need somewhere to stay you can bunk up with us, can’t she Felix?’
Felix chokes on his Caramel Frappuccino.
‘It depends what you mean by bunking up.’
‘She can have the couch,’ says Sylvie, bunching up her hair and donning her cap. ‘Right, we all need to get ready for Hal’s wedding. I’ll get this blood in the fridge and then we need to get it analysed.’
‘Are you sure it needs to go in a fridge?’ asks Felix with a shudder.
‘Yes. We also need to regroup soon. Is everyone free tomorrow night?’
I’ve never heard Sylvie talk like this before. It’s like she really has metamorphosed into Detective Chief Inspector Jane Tennison.
‘And just where do you suggest we go to get blood analysed? Forensics-R-Us?’ says Felix, rolling his eyes. ‘If you ask me the whole thing was a waste of time and not to mention an enormous strain on my poor bowels. It’s going to take days for them to recover.’
‘He’s got a point,’ I say, checking my phone and seeing five missed calls from Darren.
‘Since when were you worried about Felix’s bowels?’ Sylvie asks.
‘I’m talking about the Forensics-R-Us bit, not his bowels. Anyway, I should go home. Have it out with Darren.’
She nods sympathetically.
‘Good idea. Come round when you’re ready. Meanwhile Felix, you and I need to google. There must be someone who can do the analysis. You’re good on the computer – that can be your job.’
‘Ooh, you’re really gorgeous when you’re masterful. I could share a strawberry cheesecake with you while you’re like this.’
‘Although I guess it will be expensive,’ says Sylvie.
‘It’s two pound thirty,’ he says looking at the menu.
‘I meant the analysis, not the bloody cheesecake. They’re bound to charge us a fortune.’
‘I’ve got money,’ I say, the words coming out before I can control them. ‘I think I won the lottery last night.’
Sylvie’s mouth drops open while Felix continues scanning the menu.
‘What, you mean like ten quid?’ he says. ‘Lucky old you, I never win a bean.’
‘I got five numbers and the bonus ball. At least I think I did.’
Felix’s head snaps up.
‘Close that darling. Who knows what might drop into it. There are enough germs in this place to sink a battleship,’ Felix admonishes Sylvie, pointing accusingly at her mouth.
‘You are kidding?’ Sylvie says finally.
‘No, these places are known for it,’ says Felix. ‘You can’t trust those hygiene certificates they stick on the wall.’
Sylvie sighs.
‘You honestly won the lottery, you’re not kidding?’
I shake my head.
‘The Great Zehilda predicted everything from the break up with Darren to the lottery and even the murder.’
I don’t mention the Ark Morgan bit.
‘Have you double checked?’ asks Felix, pushing his Caramel Frappuccino to one side.
‘No. I’m too afraid to.’
‘What were your numbers?’ he asks, tapping into his phone.
‘49, 1, 3, 4, 11 and 6,’ I say before holding my breath.
Felix stares at his phone.
‘Bloody hell,’ he says. ‘You really did win.’
Chapter Thirteen
I can’t believe my life has changed in just a day. I’m all geared up to confront Darren only to find a note telling me he’s gone to watch Arsenal play a friendly, and the cheek to ask where the fuck have I been all morning and don’t I check my phone any more? He’s totally forgotten the wedding. I could cry. What a wanker. Who forgets his friend’s wedding? I’m going to look a total idiot sitting alone at the reception.
The lottery people confirmed I’d won. My winnings total seventy-five thousand. I’m gutted that I put Mrs Patel’s number six instead of my lucky number two, but hey, I’m seventy-five grand better off than I was on Friday, so I can’t complain. They are sending someone to see me, to check I am who I say I am. Not that anyone would ever pretend to be Roxie bloody Brown.
I’m terrified I’ve left my DNA at the murder flat. It wasn’t until I got home that I discovered my socks were fraying. That will teach me to buy from Poundland. I had a sodding great hole in the big toe, which means I’ve probably left toe prints all over the place. Then, to top it all I’ve also lost an earring. I daren’t tell Sylvie, she’ll go absolutely ape shit. The chances are I’ve lost the earring somewh
ere else but visions of it laying on the floor of the murder flat haunt me. I’ll most likely just get the lottery money and then be incriminated in a murder. I throw the frayed socks into the bin and rummage through the kitchen cupboard for some camomile tea. Typical that we don’t have any isn’t it? There’s only green tea with lemon. God knows why I bought that. I hate green tea and it certainly isn’t going to calm me down. I unscrew the Nutella jar and scoop out a large dollop with my finger. Fifteen minutes and half a jar later I’m feeling a whole lot better. I pull my phone from my bag and send an angry text to Darren.
‘It’s Hal’s wedding in …’
I check the time and see that, shit; it’s in an hour and a half. Fuck it. I’ve not even showered.
‘An hour and a half, honestly Darren, you are such an arsehole at times.’
I send the text and fly into the bedroom and throw shoes, make-up, hair tongs and the wedding present into a carrier bag. There must be more I need. Oh yes, the card. Bugger, this couldn’t have happened on a worse day.
I skid out of the front door. I don’t have time for the stairs so I run into the lift only to find the damn thing is out of order. I dash down the stairs and sprint to the Fiesta where I finally slump into the driver’s seat. Please start, I beg and, miracle of miracles, it actually does.
‘Christ, I was about to send out a search party. Where have you been?’ Sylvie greets me.
I can’t see her face for the green avocado mask. If I didn’t know better I’d think she was going to the wedding disguised as Shrek.
‘I’ve not showered,’ I say, trying not to panic.
‘Bloody hell Rox.’
She pulls me upstairs and bangs on the bathroom door.
‘Are you going to be much longer in there? It’s Hal’s wedding not Cannes bloody film festival.’
Felix opens the door with steam and Dior aftershave billowing behind him. He lets out a shriek.
‘Are you trying to give me heart failure? Jesus peanuts, Sylvie love, your face is a shock most mornings but you’ve never looked like Kermit the frog before.’
‘Just get your arse out of the bathroom. Roxie is all behind for a change,’ she says rolling her eyes. ‘I’ll get our dresses ready.’
