28
It’s humid in the reception of the police station, and the smell of sweat and coffee makes my eyes sting. Outside, buses and cars trundle past, the sound of people shopping chirruping in the background. There is a woman inside, overly made-up and wearing very little. She looks like she should be out working the track, looking for the next John to bend her over the back of a car seat. You must have to be surprisingly flexible to be a hooker. There is no way I could pull it off. I’d have to be set up in a brothel, the type where the lights glow red and the carpet smells like old spunk. But even so, they wouldn’t put me in a window. Nobody wants to see crooked bones and scarred hips grinding uncomfortably against an imaginary dick. Surest way to make your customers go limp. I wouldn’t be good for cash flow.
‘He’ll be back out soon,’ she says to me.
‘Thanks,’ I say, drumming my fingers against the desk. I linger there for a while, run my hands along the surface, slap it with the palm of my hand like a workman. Yep, strong and steady. There is only one other chair, and it is next to her.
‘He’ll be a while,’ she says. I nod again, smile half-heartedly. After another minute I sit down next to her. She smells of cheap perfume and cigarettes, my teenage years. She offers me a cigarette from her pack, and although I don’t want one, I take it anyway. She snatches one up with her teeth, fumbles in her pocket for a lighter. She finds one just as an officer arrives at the reception.
‘I don’t think so, Jules.’ He flicks up a section of the desk and marches over with his chest puffed out. He pulls the cigarette from her mouth, crumples it in his hand. I slip mine up my sleeve like, a teenager caught in the act. When the officer turns his back, she rolls her eyes at me. I roll mine too, nod like, yeah, what a ball-breaker he is, just to show willing. He heads on through the reception, leaving us alone. I feel as if we are outside the head teacher’s office.
‘Dick,’ spits Jules, pulling another cigarette from the pack. ‘Thinks I don’t got no more.’ She quickly sparks up and inhales deeply, sucking through a cat’s-ass mouth. She leaves a red lipstick mark on the butt of the cigarette and the backs of her fingers. In her hurried approach she has smudged her lipstick across her cheek, making her look like a little girl who hasn’t learnt how to do her make-up. She is jittery, and I spot a purple love bite on her neck. ‘Come on, smoke it quick, there’ll be another one along soon.’
She reaches over and snaps a well-trained thumb across the wheel of the lighter, and I pull the cigarette from my sleeve, puff on it like a novice. I want it even less when I catch the whiff of old tobacco on her yellow-edged fingers. I look down so that she doesn’t see the discomfort on my face, and catch sight of her shoes. They are prettier than I imagined they would be, strappy, with a little butterfly on the side. One of the wings is squashed the wrong way, as if it tried to take flight and she swatted it back into place. But as pretty as her shoes are, nothing can make up for her feet. She has made an effort with a slick of red polish over nails as thick as walnut kernels. I guess for some it doesn’t matter how crappy life gets, they never stop trying.
‘So who you here for?’ she asks, like we have a camaraderie through criminal association. ‘Boyfriend?’ she pushes as she eyes up my bare ring finger.
‘Sister.’ She looks surprised. ‘She’s gone missing.’
‘What’s her name?’ Jules asks, as if she might know her. ‘Lots of them go missing, but they turn up eventually.’ She sucks in another long drag of smoke. ‘Of course, not all of them turn up in the same state as they left.’ In her world, a missing girl equals a whore who picked up a bad punter. Might turn up alive, might turn up dead. A disposable life. I can see her going through her mental files. The blonde who disappeared last week and turned up beaten and drugged but otherwise OK. Back out later that same night. The brunette before that with the nose piercing and wings tattooed across her back. The redhead they pulled from the fishing pond on Hampstead Heath, her tits hacked off and the word slut carved in her stomach. I heard about that one too.
‘Elle,’ I say, going along with the story, pretend-hopeful. I wait while the cogs go round until she comes back with a blank.
‘Nah. Don’t know her,’ she says, shaking her head. I take a drag on my cigarette.
Just then a commotion breaks out on the other side of the doors, and Jules is up on her feet, prowling back and forth, head low, shoulders back, ready for a fight. She drops her cigarette and stubs it out with the butterfly shoe. The doors burst open and an angry dude flies out. Skinhead, tattoos of some kind of bird on the sides of his head, just above his ears. He mutters something under his breath, sounds like a threat.
‘Baby,’ Jules says, fluttering along at his side as he storms out, more pumped than if he was shooting steroids. I see another police officer at the doors, so I quickly drop my cigarette and stub it out, hoping that he hasn’t noticed. I watch as Jules fusses at her baby’s side, running her fingers over his muscles as they head towards a car. Just before they get there, he gives her a shove, then opens the door and slaps her inside.
‘Can I help you?’ the police officer says, breaking my concentration.
After a round of questioning, I make it through the double doors, finding myself in a tiny ice-blue room without any windows. They fix me up with a bitter coffee, Styrofoam cup, and assure me that DC Forrester will be along soon.
‘Thanks for coming down here to assist us with our inquiries,’ says Forrester as she backs through the door. She is carrying a coffee, just as I imagined, a bunch of files tucked underneath the other arm. She sets the coffee down and dumps the files on the table between us, looking at me in a way that I find strange without knowing why. She sits down opposite me, crosses her arms. I wish now that I had called Elle. That way perhaps it would look less like I don’t care. ‘It’s important that you know you’re free to leave at any time. You’re here voluntarily, OK?’
‘That’s OK. Anything to help.’ DC Forrester nods, once. Sharp and definite, as if she expected nothing less. ‘I want to clear this up, find Elle.’
‘I take it that Eleanor hasn’t been in touch.’ I shake my head, sip my coffee. ‘Did you try and get in touch with her?’ She waits for a response, but when nothing comes, she looks down disappointedly at the file in front of her, lets go of a toxic breath. As she rustles through the contents, I see Elle’s face staring back at us.
‘I did call the Guardians and a few shelters,’ I say quickly. ‘Plus I checked the responses to DC McGuire’s Facebook messages. Don’t think there was anything useful, though.’
She looks up, her head resting on her hand. ‘Send any of your own?’ I shake my head and she looks back down at the file. ‘Well, let’s see what we’ve got so far.’
She spends the next five minutes recapping what we already know. Elle’s reported mental illness. The death of my mother. My father. Our trips to the gym, shopping, drinks, disappearances. She scratches her fingers against the table with every new fact, as if carving them in stone like the ancient Athenians.
‘I wanted to ask you a little bit more about the night before your father’s death. Is that OK with you?’ I nod my head agreeably. ‘Good. You told me that you and Elle had spent your days doing normal stuff. Everyday, average stuff.’
‘Yes, that’s right.’ I sit on my hands to stop myself fidgeting.
‘So what is normal for you? What counts as everyday? What kind of things do you do in your life?’
‘With Antonio?’ She nods, drums her fingers against the table. I can feel her foot shaking. ‘We hang out. We go out to eat. Maybe the movies. Normal stuff.’
‘Ever lost anybody close to you before, Dr Harringford?’
I find the question insulting, because I have pretty much lost everything since I was born. But I get where she is going with this, and so I go along with it. ‘Not through death.’ Anybody with any positive connotations to my life is still alive. Uncle Marcus died a few years back, before I lost touch with Aunt Jemima, but th
at doesn’t really count. I didn’t even go to his funeral. I was anxious that my actual parents would be there, or even worse, Elle. No wonder Aunt Jemima doesn’t call me any more. No wonder she didn’t answer my call after Elle vanished.
‘I have,’ says Forrester. ‘Lost my father last year. Took three weeks off work. Took it hard. And I don’t have a husband or kids to look after. Just myself.’ That doesn’t come as much of a surprise.
‘What’s your point?’
‘My point, Dr Harringford, is that losing somebody you care about is tough. It’s a challenge to get past it. Your parents’ deaths could be a good enough reason to go missing.’
‘We don’t know why Elle has gone missing. This is just speculation.’
She picks up her coffee and looks at me, stares into my eyes, searching. It is me who looks away. ‘I am simply trying to understand her actions in the days after the death of your mother, and immediately prior to your father’s suicide.’ She hates me, I can feel it. Every time she makes eye contact, the corners of her mouth turn down, like I’m a bad taste. ‘I am trying to understand her character.’
‘How long have you got?’ I say, realising immediately that what I’ve just said makes me look snippy, like I have got something against Elle, a cross to bear. Nobody needs to have something against a missing person. As if to confirm what I was thinking, Forrester pulls a dissatisfied face, lips all puckered, her wrinkle-set eyes stretched as she arches her brows. ‘Sorry about that, it’s just . . . Elle is kind of complicated. If you knew her—’
‘That’s what I’m trying to do.’ She ignores my apology and says, ‘So, you went to the gym.’ My hands feel sweaty, hot like fire tucked underneath my legs. The left one has offset my hip and it has started to ache. I pull them out, try to relax.
‘Yes,’ I say, wiping my palms on my jeans.
‘Enjoy it?’
‘I guess.’
‘I have a statement from the owner of Sportswear For You.’ I must look confused, because she goes on to confirm for me, ‘You shopped there on your first day with Eleanor. I’ll read it to you.’ She holds up a piece of paper from the file. ‘Two women came into the shop sometime after eleven. I remember them because the tall one was very pretty and had nice hair. She was wearing a pink sports fleece, and I remember thinking it was high-quality sweat-wicking fabric. I wondered who else was selling it in the local area.’ She says all this without stopping for breath. Irrelevant facts just setting the scene. Then she slows down, which is how I know that what is coming is more important. ‘The tall one was in high spirits, kept saying how she wanted to treat her sister. The short one had a hobble, looked upset about something. Everything I suggested was no good, and slowly the tall one, the pretty one, got disappointed. She kept saying, “All I want is for us to be able to do something together.” The short one got tired of her begging, even after picking out a high-end pair of trainers, and in the end grabbed a pair of leggings and a racer bra, which the pretty one went on to buy.’
DC Forrester glances up, looking for clarification about what happened in Sportswear For You. It’s because it doesn’t suit me, the idea of a racer bra. It’s the hobble, which I thought was less noticeable. But it seems that even random people in sport shops notice it. I use my fingers to mark the outline of a crop top, and she nods as if she understood all along.
‘Shall I continue?’ She waits for me to agree, and after clearing her throat and taking a sip of coffee, she picks up the statement where she left off. ‘They had caused quite a scene, and I had seen several customers leave. So when they eventually came to buy something, I didn’t question it when I realised that they were buying the wrong size. I was just happy that they were leaving.’
She rocks back in her chair, eyes me up over the page before setting it back down on the desk. ‘And?’ I ask. I am so used to my relationship with Elle being like this, there is nothing that seems out of the ordinary. She might as well have read, Woman goes to shop and buys sportswear. Although I don’t remember being the one who selected the leggings or the racer bra. I guess I can’t blame Elle for that poor choice.
‘Doesn’t sound much like you were having a nice time. Her begging you. You being . . . what did he say?’ She looks back down at the statement and smiles when she finds it. ‘Oh, that’s it. Tired of Eleanor’s begging.’
‘But that’s Elle. She forces stuff on people, pushes them. I didn’t want to go to the gym.’
‘But you told me you had a nice time there.’
‘Yes. It was OK. But that doesn’t mean I wanted to go. If I had wanted to go to the gym in those few days, I would have taken sportswear with me, right?’
She shuffles through the file and produces another sheet of paper without giving away any opinion. ‘I’ll read another statement for you. From the gym: Everybody knows Elle. She is a happy-go-lucky type. She gets involved in lots of activities and charity events. She is a bit socially awkward, but her heart is always in the right place. I think she is lonely because she seems to want to latch on to men. I think she is looking for a boyfriend. Must be hard living with your folks. I heard she was trying for a baby at one point but her boyfriend at the time backed up. Weird, she has a lot going for her.’ Forrester sips her coffee without looking at me. I reach for mine and bring it to my lips, but it is cold so I set it back down without drinking. ‘You want another one?’ Forrester asks, pointing at the cup. I shake my head. ‘So, does that sound like Eleanor to you?’
‘Not much,’ I say.
‘Not to me either. But only if I believe the version of Eleanor that you have described. Here’s another. Now this one is from a psychiatrist,’ she says as she slides another piece of paper from the file. ‘You will want to listen to this one.’ I nod my head energetically, certain that she is right. If anyone can shed light on Elle it will be a psychiatrist. I edge forward in my seat. ‘It says: I have known Elle in the capacity of her doctor since last year. She first came to visit me because she was struggling with the idea that she would never have a child. She was moving from one meaningless relationship to the next, looking for somebody to love her. I concluded that her relationship with her mother was poor, but that she adored her father and was in many ways looking for a replacement. She was doing well in life, socialising at her local gym and working as a volunteer at the local cat and dog sanctuary. She was financially secure, her income coming from the family estate. She required minimal assistance and guidance with understanding that not every man was a potential candidate to be the father of her child. Her biggest issue, besides the poor relationship with her mother,’ and this is the point that Forrester looks up at me, ‘was her sister.’
I must look dumbfounded, because she gives me a moment to take that in before she continues.
‘Elle describes her sister as a loner, not keen on family bonds. She has made several attempts at forming a relationship with her, and has spent the last six years trying to reach her, to no avail. She blames her mother for this loss. She describes her sister as bitter, spiteful and crazy.’
I can feel a bead of sweat forming on my brow, and I reach up to wipe it away. Elle has made me out to be something I’m not, and these idiots who have made statements are providing the foundations for her imaginary world. Of course she would be able to fool a psychiatrist. It’s so obvious, yet I never imagined it. Never saw it coming. This was her plan all along. She’s fucking set me up.
‘I’ll have another coffee,’ I say.
29
Listening to Forrester read out the statements makes me feel ill. I want to run. I want to be sick. I want to scream at her that she couldn’t be any more wrong. I do none of those things. I am wrapped up in Elle’s web of lies, so much so that I am starting to wonder if they are my own.
‘Now that doesn’t sound much like Eleanor either, does it?’ She ignores my request for a coffee and pushes a photo of Elle towards me, taps out each word with her finger. ‘At least not according to you.’ The tall pretty one runs around in
my head. She describes her sister as bitter, spiteful and crazy.
‘No,’ I say. ‘No, it doesn’t.’
‘Plus there is no record of her ever having received treatment for mental health issues in the past. We have a full disclosure of her medical history and there is nothing in there except a couple of visits to her GP, and this doctor who made the statement. He saw her privately, and essentially concluded that she was fine.’
‘That’s impossible,’ I say, remembering her telling me herself that our parents had placed her in a clinic. ‘She has had treatment. Must have. I know she has.’
‘How can you be so certain? You haven’t seen her in years, according to this. Even now, when she is missing, you haven’t tried to call her. Have you called anybody else?’
‘Yes.’ I jump, pointing a finger at her, which looks a bit too accusatory. She holds her hands up in a way that suggests I back off, as if I was about to attack. I sit back down, calm myself. ‘Witherrington. I know who he is. He’s the lawyer dealing with my father’s estate. I spoke to him.’
‘We know very well who he is, Dr Harringford.’ She pulls out a photocopy of what looks like my father’s will, highlighted with yellow and pink lines, little sticky Post-it notes marking important and interesting segments. I spot that Article 4 has been both highlighted and emphasised by a Post-it note. ‘The reason we know of him is because of this, a will signed by your father the day you arrived in Horton. It was found at your parents’ home. Now your home, right? I presume you have seen it before.’
I consider lying, but figure there is little point. It could do me more harm than good. ‘I have seen it, yes.’
My Sister Page 21
