by Olivia White
The following story is true, insomuch as that I haven't made all of it up.
It was 1994. You know, the year when Kurt Cobain took a shotgun to his face, John Wayne Gacey was executed, OJ Simpson fled from the cops, and it was still safe to walk home from school on a June evening in the outskirts of Birmingham. Well, safer than it is these days anyway.
Most of my memories of that month involve school. The A level years. They were mostly the usual things… field parties, summer balls, teenage awkwardness, rejection, heartbreak. All fairly inconsequential now, but when you're a 17 year old kid… well, a girl saying 'no' is like the end of the world, isn't it?
Anyway, I'm getting ahead of myself a bit. I've never been a fan of writing a journal, or memoirs… 'blogging' they call it these days online.
"Today I stayed in my room all day, listened to some angry music, and posted an update on Facebook."
Repeat ad nauseum. Kids today don't know they're born blah blah blah etc. I wasn't much better at that age though. I fancied myself as a bit of a rebel, listening to the grunge-era bands on my tape deck, and wanting to be in a 100-strong crowd in a basement concert instead of writing out an essay on the Suffragette Movement. I was quite angry at the world, in some respects. You know, typical teenage angst bullshit. I went through a phase where I thought misanthropy was really cool. Then I went through a phase of reading anything and everything by Nietzsche… but we don't talk about that.
The thing was, I kept a lot of this to myself. I didn't hang around with the kind of people who'd be interested in the same things as me. I was quite popular though, but by default. You see, there was this boy… I'll call him James. No… Jim. Jim, yeah that'll work. Jim was my best friend at the time. I say 'was', but he still is really. We don't stay in contact quite as much these days, but the friendship is still pretty strong, I'd say.
Jim was one of those guys. You probably know the type I mean. The kind of guy it was just impossible to dislike, even though there was plenty about him that (jealous) people could be bitter over. He had everything going for him. Really. Not just the usual cliche that means 'he was a bit good at sports' or something. He was GREAT. Sports, academia, socializing Hell, he was even in the Church choir. He was a pretty strong Christian in fact. I used to go to church with him sometimes, during my Nietzsche period. I felt like a hypocrite. It was just nice though y'know, to be part of something, to be accepted by the same people that accepted him outside of our schoolyard social circle.
BUT ANYWAY.
Yeah, he had a lot going for him. Really good looking, blonde hair, blue eyes, that kinda thing. Ubermensch. Very fit. Straight A student, passed his GCSEs with flying colors Top marks. I got Cs I think. He'd helped me study as well. I knew my stuff, I just didn't apply myself very well. His family were very well off too. They always had the latest car, the latest television, the newest gadget that the rest of us just wished we could have.
That makes it sound like my family was dirt poor though. That wasn't the case… I mean, I was at Public school for a start. We were definitely comfortable, but my parents weren't big on spending money on what they called 'frivolities'. It was all structured, sensible. You know, holiday to Spain in the summer, a couple of modest gifts for me and my sister at Christmas, the same for respective birthdays. Nothing like the things Jim would get. I'd worked in a greengrocer in the summer of 1993 to save up enough to buy my stereo… Jim was given his for winning a football match. A friendly, too. Madness.
I didn't begrudge him any of these things. What's the point? Truth is, I valued him too much as a friend to think about any of that stuff. Well, maybe it crossed my mind occasionally, but I never dwelt on it. It's not like he was mean with his pocket money (well, it wasn't 'in' to call it that in 94, it was 'allowance'), he'd always buy the drinks, in McDonald's, the Offy… ah, the amount he must've spent on cans of Tennent's to take up the park for after a kickabout.
Everyone loved Jim, and rightly so. He'd do anything for anybody. I used to think, when I was young and stupid, that he didn't even have the capacity for nastiness. He'd even befriend the kids at school who nobody else would touch with a ten-foot pole. He always had a nice word to say to the retards, the freaks, the weirdos that every school has. There was this one kid in our year called Andy, everyone used to bully him. Shamefully I have to admit that I joined in a couple times. Jim was never judgmental about that either, he'd just calmly tell me that I hadn't been very nice and that was the end of it.
Andy was tiny. Really tiny, almost a midget or something. He had an oversized head too. Very skinny kid, looked like he never ate. People used to call him all sorts of things.
But yeah, this one time when we were in the last year at school (that would've been 95 then) some of the Year Elevens got a bit adventurous and decided to go after him. Normally even the weirdest kid would be left alone in the final year, but not Andy. It must've been hell for him, now I think about it. I don't think a day went by when someone didn't do something mean to him. I wonder what he's doing now.
So these Year Elevens decided to ambush him on the way out of the library. They'd been watching him for a while and seen he'd been writing a Geography essay. Anyone who did the subject will know how long some of those pieces of work had to be.
So when he came out the library, they snatched that essay straight from his hands and chucked it into the pond out the front of the building. I remember Andy just stood there, eyes wide, looking at the pile of paper sinking into the water.
Me and Jim were walking by, you see. Jim saw all of it too. He was there in an instant, wading into the pond, getting algae and all sorts all over his uniform. He fished the paper out before too much damage was done, took Andy to the tech rooms, dried it off with a hairdryer, then painstakingly copied out the whole ten-page essay for the kid. For no reason other than to be nice. That's the kind of guy Jim was. Still is, from all accounts.
Jim had loads of mates, loads of admirers. I felt privileged that he called me his best friend. He was always trying to set me up with a girl too. He knew I got lonely at times; he thought a girlfriend would help. I always messed it up though. Didn't know the right things to say or do, always seeming like I was preoccupied. I'd get really hung up about it actually. It wasn't until I went away to Uni that I had as much as a one-night stand. But being friends with Jim meant that being a virgin wasn't some terrible thing. He'd been dating a girl called Jennifer ever since year 9. She went to our school and Jim's church. Her father was the vicar if I recall correctly. They hadn't slept together. It was common knowledge that they were both waiting until 'the right time', and everyone respected that. I was best man at their wedding, what… eight years ago now. I think they'd still waited until that night. Commendable really.
I think you get the picture about Jim. I could go on, but I'd rather you kept reading (and kept your lunch).
I remember the date exactly. June thirteenth. A Monday. It was the day after O.J. didn't kill his ex-wife, actually.
Me, Jim, Jen, a girl called Alex and her boyfriend Craig were sitting on the school field at lunch.
"I could kill for a fag," Craig told us, chewing the end of a pencil.
Alex pouted indignantly. "You can't. You've given up."
"Yeah, I have. I'd still love one, though."
Jim was saying something to Jen. I couldn't hear what it was.
I remember thinking they made a cute couple, sitting on the field arm in arm. The great thing about them, though, was that they always seemed genuinely happy to have me around even when they were together. They never made me feel like a third wheel, not at all.
Jim turned to me.
"Do you remember Kirsty?"
"Yeah, sure." I told him.
Kirsty had been one of Jim's attempts at setting me up with a blind date. All told, it hadn't gone THAT badly. Well, not at first anyway. She'd been the type of girl who had a tie-dyed schoolbag and colored her hair in the holidays. She'd been a student at our school, before her family got into financial
problems and she left a year or so before this story takes place.
I remember she'd been into music like The Velvet Underground, Bowie, The Who… music I pretended to like to impress her. I think she knew I was pretending though. At first it seemed like she found it cute, but I could tell by the end of the date that I was beginning to irritate her.
I'd really liked her, actually. More so than any of the others. I was pretty disappointed when, at the end of the evening, she brushed me off and said she'd call me, then didn't. Typical really. The one time…
So yes, I did indeed remember her. More than I'd care to mention to Jim, actually. I don't think I stopped liking her for quite a while, but of course I just told Jim that she wasn't my type. I think he eventually got wise to the fact that really meant 'she wasn't interested'.
"She was that seventies throwback yeah?" Craig asked.
"Yeah, I guess you could say that," I told him. I felt a bit defensive.
"Well, she's missing," Jim told us. "Since last Friday apparently. Told her parents that she was going to a friend's for the evening, and didn't come home. They called her friend, she hadn't planned anything with Kirsty."
"Run away from home," Alex stated.
"Maybe. I don't think so though. Her mother was speaking to mine this morning. Poor woman's distraught. She said that Kirsty had been really happy lately, she was doing better at school and everything."
"Yeah, sure…"
"Craig, don't be mean," Jen snapped at him. "This could be serious."
"I suppose they've told the police?" I asked, then immediately realized that of course they would have, it was obvious.
Jim nodded. "They've been checking with all her friends, anyone who she hung out with in the last year or so. As of yet, nothing."
"You don't think she's…" Alex shuddered.
Jim looked grave. "I don't know." He brushed his hair from his eyes and squinted against the sun. "It's terrible though. I just hope she HAS run away or something."
"Yeah, that's probably it," I said, not believing it.
"Well, uh… let us know if you hear anything, mate." Craig took the pencil out of his mouth. The end was little more than chewed splinters now. "I REALLY need a fag. I'll quit next week."
Alex shot him a withering look then stood up.
"Oh, what the hell, I'll have one too."
"See ya." Jim told them. Jen waved. I nodded.
The couple walked hand in hand to the back of the field, the usual smoking spot.
The three of us sat there in silence, thinking of Kirsty perhaps.
Nigh on two weeks came and went, and Kirsty still hadn't resurfaced. Jim passed on second hand info, gleaned from his mother. The police weren't really making any headway. No leads, no clues, not even sure what they were investigating… a missing person? A runaway?
Nobody wanted to say 'a murder'. We were all thinking it though.
It was a Friday. I remember watching the clock during English, counting down the minutes till the end of the school day and the beginning of the weekend. Me and Jim were going back to his that night, to hang out, listen to some music, whatever really. It wasn't often we went to each others' houses. We were at the age where being 'out' was more fun. But Jim was going away to some Christian camp for the weekend, so we wouldn't have had time to do anything much. I was going there to have dinner, then he and his parents would be heading off. His older brother was a guitarist in a Christian folk band and they'd be playing there. I'd heard them, they weren't bad actually… for a Christian folk band. Jim could play guitar too, his brother had taught him. I could just about manage the triangle.
So yeah, the bell went, we left school.
Walking back to Jim's house, I brought up the subject of Kirsty again. I remember Jim seemed disinterested, which struck me as odd. He'd been so verbal in keeping us up to date.
I was talking about the usual stuff, wondering where she was, if she was okay, still skirting around the issue that she was probably dead by now.
I realized Jim was looking at me intently.
"You really liked her, didn't you?" he asked, taking me aback.
I thought about this for a moment. There was no point lying.
I looked down at my shoes, watching them scuff the pavement for a while. "Yeah. I guess I did."
After a moment's silence, I felt Jim's hand pat my shoulder.
"I'm sorry, man," he said quietly.
I stopped and looked at him, and I distinctly remember smiling sadly. "We don't know FOR SURE, do we? She might still be alive…" It was the first time any of us had directly referenced the fact she could, well… not be.
"Yeah…" Jim said quietly. I could see something in his eyes. At the time I thought it was sympathy. I know differently now.
Back at his house, me and Jim just sat around reading comics in his room. He was so engrossed in those pulped pages that he didn't notice the fact that my own eyes kept straying from the old copy of Amazing Spiderman onto his face.
I often found myself studying him intently. It wasn't like that, you understand. He just fascinated me. Even his face was perfect. He'd caught me doing it sometimes, and I could tell it made him uncomfortable, but we never spoke about it. He's never brought it up, even now. Jim's nice like that.
It made me feel a bit guilty really. I didn't like making him uncomfortable, nor did I want him to think I was, you know… But I couldn't help myself sometimes.
Eventually he did look up from the comic. I'm not sure if he caught me staring or not; I quickly looked away, pretending that the adventures of Peter Parker were the most exciting thing in the world.
"You wanna see something cool?" he asked me.
I nodded. Jim always had cool things to show me. Some of them were pretty outlandish too. I mean, he'd had a floor safe installed in his room, 'just because'. He had a pinball table downstairs, a Robocop one. His house even had a pool. Actually I guess that doesn't seem so weird any more. It did back then though, when we were kids.
"Lets go then!" he exclaimed, jumping up from the bed with a burst of energy. He replaced the comics in their dust sleeves and put them in the box (Jim's room was always very meticulous – mine was a tip in comparison) then led me out the room and down the hall. We went into the living room.
It always seemed really convenient to me, to have a bedroom on the ground floor. You could sneak out whenever you wanted. Not that Jim ever did things like that though.
He walked over to the television cabinet, opened it, and switched the TV and VCR on.
Jim had a huge television. Whenever there was a football match (or rugby, or cricket for that matter) on television we'd all pile round to his to watch it on the cutting edge set. They were good times. Before High Def and things like that though. The telly would probably seem rubbish these days.
"Ah good, it's still in here. I was showing Jen yesterday." Jim had pressed play on the VCR. The sound of a chattering crowd came from the television speakers. I looked up and saw myself, waving into the screen.
"Ah, nice one!" I smiled. Jim had bought a camcorder the month before, specifically to make what he referred to as 'the documentary', but really it was just footage of his 17th birthday party. The party had been that month, and it was excellent. It'd been incredibly warm for May, so mostly we hung out around the pool all evening, drinking cocktails. Jim's parents left us to it; they didn't mind us drinking in their house, as long as we were sensible. Nobody ever took advantage of their kindness, it never even occurred to people to mess things up for Jim. It was just Something You Didn't Do.
We sat and watched the party video for about ten minutes. The quality of the recording was pretty good. I hadn't liked to ask, but I assumed the camcorder had been expensive. From the looks of it, I was right.
The on-screen party was just getting going. Jen and Alex were dancing to the Stone Roses. I could see myself sitting on a chair in the corner of the pool courtyard, drinking something red. It was a bit surreal.
Jim's mu
m came in, and cleared her throat. She greeted me then turned to Jim.
"Honey, you need to get ready. We have to go soon."
Jim nodded and told her he'd be ready soon. We both stood up.
"Hey, Jim…" I said
"Yeah?"
"Can I borrow that video? I'd like to watch the end of it. Would that be okay?"
He smiled. "Sure. There's more than one tape though. The other two are in the top drawer in my room. Just go ahead and get them, I'll shut off the telly and everything."
With the three unmarked videotapes in my bag, I waved goodbye to Jim and wished him a good time at camp and told him I'd see him in school on Monday.
For the first time in a long while, I went to the park alone instead of going straight home. I must've sat on a bench there for a good long while, just thinking about things and people. I often wonder now how differently my life might have played out if I'd gone straight home. I don't like thinking of 'what ifs', but you can't help it sometimes can you?
When I got home my mother told me that Jim had called twice, and had asked if she'd get me to call him back, quite urgently. By this time though, him and his family had already left for camp and I'd missed him.
I went upstairs and threw my schoolbag onto a pile of clothes.
The year before, I'd found an old Commodore 64 in a junk shop and snapped it up, along with a bunch of those text adventures. Zork, Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy, things like that. I used to love them. Most evenings, if I wasn't with Jim or doing homework, I'd sit at my desk playing those games. Jim had a Super Nintendo. It was a lot of fun, but there was something about the mystery in the text adventures that I loved. I read a lot of books back then too. Still do. I've always had a soft spot for Agatha Christie's novels, if I'm honest.
I was engrossed in one of the games, I can't remember which, and completely forgot about the videotapes in my bag. It wasn't until I looked at the clock with stinging eyes and saw that it was gone midnight, that I remembered they were sitting there. I had an old TV and VCR in my room, so I figured I'd watch one of them with headphones on before bed. I pulled a tape out my bag at random and slid it into the machine, set everything up and began to watch.
The next moment changed my life. I'll try to describe it here, but you have to understand how hard it is. I've never told anybody this before. There are some details that I just can't reproduce. Some things I'd really rather forget.
The video began in a forest. There was a time stamp in the bottom right corner of the screen. 10/06/94.
The camera was moving, with a girl walking with her back to the lens, her feet crunching through a carpet of leaves. Her face wasn't visible. She had long brown hair that reached beyond her shoulders, nearly to the small of her back. She was carrying a familiar-looking bag.
Eventually she stopped and began inspecting a tree. She pulled what appeared to be a knife from her pocket and, I can only assume, proceeded to carve something onto the trunk. I later found out what this was. I saw it for myself.
The camera was placed down and attached to a tripod, I guess. A male figure walked into shot. At a suitable distance away, he turned to the camera. It was Jim.
Jim walked up to the girl and placed his hands on her arms, gesturing to the camera. Their voices were muffled. She turned, and looked.
Kirsty.
I remember, then, my heart pounding in my chest so hard that I thought I'd pass out. My head was ringing. I couldn't understand the images on screen.
I kept watching.
Jim kissed Kirsty on the lips, and she kissed him back. They embraced passionately, leaning back against the tree. Jim pulled off Kirsty's brown jumper. She wasn't wearing anything underneath. I thought she looked cold.
They carried on kissing, Jim's hand groping Kirsty's breasts hungrily, pinching her nipples until she moaned. He pulled his own t-shirt off, and the two of them rubbed up against each other, Kirsty's back to the tree, her eyes occasionally flicking over Jim's shoulder to the camera. It felt like she was looking at me.
I could see, now, Jim fumbling at Kirsty's belt. She pushed his hand away, the ghost of a smile on her face. She shook her head. It looked like she was saying "not here". She pointed at the camera.
Jim's hands went back to her belt. She pushed them away again, harder this time. She pointed at the camera again, and Jim looked back at it angrily. He grabbed Kirsty's shoulders and shook her. She pulled away from him and slapped him. The crack of her palm hitting his cheek was audible on the tape.
Jim raised his hand and hit Kirsty. She stumbled backwards. The detail wasn't clear, but I was sure I could see tears welling up in her eyes.
Jim pushed her, square in the chest. Already stumbling, Kirsty fell back, her head hitting the tree.
I felt the blow myself. My stomach felt weak. I was suddenly very, very cold.
Kirsty crumpled to the ground. Jim glanced back at the camera again, then knelt down and shook her. I saw him put his hand on the back of the head, then inspect something on his fingers. Blood, I figured.
By now, I thought I'd already guessed how this would end. But I was wrong. It was far worse than I could have imagined.
I watched. I watched the whole disgusting, sordid ordeal. He lasted about two minutes, the on-screen timer said. It felt like a lot longer. I wasn't sure if she was dead already.
She wasn't. Her hands rose up and began beating a weak rhythm on Jim's back. I could see her trying to push him off her, could hear muffled moans of pain.
Jim raised his shoulders back and punched her in the head. Her hands pushed at him once more, then she was still.
Jim rolled off her, exposing his nakedness to the camera. I remember noticing he was smaller than I'd expected. It's strange what you think about when you're scared, I guess.
He stood up and pulled his trousers up, buttoning them. Crouching down again, he reached into Kirsty's pocket, her jeans now bunched around her ankles. I could see she was breathing, albeit very shallowly. Her breasts rose and fell gently.
She looked peaceful.
Jim pulled the small knife out of her pocket. He didn't even stop to think. He did, however, look at the camera and smile. His winning white smile.
It chilled me to the bone. It was the scariest thing I'd ever seen in my life, that smile. I still don't think I've seen anything worse.
But yeah, he didn't even stop to think. He just walked over to Kirsty's head, bent down, and jammed the knife deep into her throat, jumping away quickly before the blood came.
I was watching. There was surprisingly little blood. He must have pierced her windpipe rather than an artery, I figured. Just a tiny pool of blood on a few dead leaves.
Kirsty didn't breathe again.
Jim got up and walked to the camera, out of shot. For a few seconds, the image of Kirsty lingered on screen. It was her. No doubt. Then everything turned to snow.
I hit the Stop button on the VCR. I remember thinking "Jim… my Jim, what have you done?" and it sounded so melodramatic, but I'd never felt so sick in my life. I went to bed, as if hoping that it would all turn out to be a dream.
It wasn't, obviously.
I told my parents I was sick. I stayed in my room for most of the weekend. And I watched the tape maybe ten times. I'm not ashamed to say this. I didn't get some kind of morbid enjoyment from it. Each time I watched it, I felt worse. But I had to, I had to understand. It was as if I was hoping that on one repeat viewing, some hitherto unseen answer would be revealed. That there would, one time, be a final scene where it was all some big joke. That good, Christian, kind Jim hadn't just killed the girl I used to love.
Nothing changed, did it? Of course not. The only revelation I had was that Jim must know I had the tape. That must have been why he'd wanted to speak to me so urgently.
I probably should have felt afraid then, for my own safety. But I didn't. I think, even after what I'd seen, that I expected Jim to have an explanation.
I could have gone to the police with it.
I could have ended it that weekend. I don't know why I didn't. I was a seventeen year old kid; making sensible decisions wasn't my strong point.
On Monday I went to school. Jim was standing by the lockers when I got there. I could feel his eyes on my face from half-way down the corridor. I walked up to him and stood there in silence. He looked me up and down. He must have sensed that something had changed.
"Come to mine after school," was all he said. We didn't speak another word to each other all day.
We didn't walk to his together. I arrived a bit later. Jim let me in. Nobody else was home, but it didn't occur to me, even under those circumstances, to be afraid. It was Jim. My mate. The one who always stuck by me. He wouldn't do anything to hurt ME…
"It's not what it looks like… right?" I asked him when we were sitting in his room. He was cross-legged on the bed. He looked then more like a little boy than a man. I'd never seen him so vulnerable.
He shook his head. "I'm afraid it is." His eyes shone.
"What happened after? After the tape ends, I mean?"
"I walked home. I brought the camera with me. I just left her there, to start with. Deep in the woods. Then I went back later with a spade. I dug, and dug, until I'd dug the deepest hole I could. Deep enough so she'd stay hidden. I rolled her in there. I didn't even dress her, man. The knife was still in her throat, for the love of God. It still is. I feel so, so terrible about that more than anything. I put the bloodstained leaves in next. And then I buried it all. Over six feet deep." He breathed out heavily, like telling me this had taken a lot of effort. It probably had, to be honest.
"Surely they could have found her?"
"I don't know. Maybe. She's pretty deep."
"Where?"
"Right there. By that tree. Please don't go there, man…"
I looked at him.
"Why, Jim? Why did you do it?"
He looked sad. Mortified. Genuinely guilty. "It's hard being me, you know?"
I looked at him skeptically. I didn't know.
"I mean, it's hard being so perfect all the time. It's not an act, far from it, I LIKE being a nice person. I like going to church, doing good things, being good at things, treating people well. I think I love Jen. I want to marry her one day. But sometimes, y'know… being me becomes a bit oppressive. I snap. I do crazy things."
Things. Plural. I didn't ask. I don't think I'll ever want to know.
"Jim, Jim, Jim…" I said. It sounded stupid, but what else was there to say?
"What are you going to do?" He looked terrified. "You obviously haven't told the police. They'd have been here already. Have you kept the tape?"
"I have it with me," I told him. In retrospect, it was a very stupid thing to say. He could easily have overpowered me. But instead, he just sat there on the bed, rocking slightly. Tears were threatening to overflow from his eyes.
"What are you going to do?" he asked again.
Well… what could I do? He was my best friend. Still is. I took the tape out of my bag and handed it to him.
"Don't worry," I said, a dopey grin on my face. "I haven't copied it or anything. It's yours. We'll… pretend it never happened or something."
I knew, in my heart, that I could never do such a thing. But it was Jim, you know? I couldn't lose him. For all the things he'd done for me over the years, I actually felt good about being able to do something in return.
Jim looked at me through his tears. For the first time that day, he smiled.
"I love you, man."
My heart lurched.
"I love you too, Jim."
He put the tape in the floor safe. I asked him why he'd kept it in the first place, and why he wasn't just going to destroy it now. He told me, with what I believe to be genuine remorse, that destroying it would feel like killing her completely. At least she was still here, in some small part.
He asked me to change the combination of the safe and never tell him the code. He also asked me not to look inside as I did so. I was more than happy to comply.
I still remember the number I changed it to. Ten Thirty Ten Eighty. It was one of those old dial safes. Jim showed me how to change it, while I did my best to avert my eyes from the other things in the safe. I thought I could see Polaroids. I really didn't want to know.
The floor safe was under a floorboard, which in turn was under a rug. He nailed the floorboard back in place. He told me, as he did so, that nobody would find the safe unless they were looking for it. He also said something about Kirsty being at peace in there. I have to confess, I thought he was a little crazy. I didn't say anything though. Let him appease his guilty conscience like that if he must. God knows, he's done enough GOOD things too.
I think I would have made a good actor. The performance I pulled that summer was fantastic. Not once did anybody think that anything had gone on between Jim and I. We never even mentioned the incident to each other. Never. Not once, not to this very day. After a time, the performance became reality and we were best friends again. Nothing had ever come between us, and hopefully nothing ever would.
We finished school. My grades weren't bad. Jim's were excellent. He gave the leaving speech at our school ball. We even drunkenly shared a dance together. Everybody laughed. It was funny.
We went to different universities, but we stayed in touch. We met up in the holidays, back home in Brum, in our cozy little suburbs. We hung out at Jim's house, sometimes in his room, both of us knowing what lay beneath the floor, but neither of us giving voice to the knowledge. Ever.
One day, in my third year, I went against Jim's wishes. I went to the forest. It took me the best part of three hours to find Kirsty's final resting place. There was the tree, carved with initials over the years. Hundreds of knife marks etching out young love. And in amongst the meaningless letters, I saw, carved there, KJ 4 JH.
Kirsty Jacobs for James Harrington.
I hadn't considered until then that she had loved him. I'd never asked him why they were even there in the first place. I guess it's not my place to know…
Jim lives in London now, an ocean apart from me. I live in the Land of the Free. But I was back in England a couple weeks ago actually, on business. I paid Jim a surprise visit. He was pleased to see me. Jen's pregnant now. It'll be their second kid. Their daughter's lovely. She's five. Really smart. Takes after her dad, I guess.
I paid a visit to my folks while I was home too, and drove past Jim's old house. New family living there. I can't help but marvel at the fact that after all these years, the floor safe hasn't been found. Not to mention Kirsty's body. After a while, the police stopped looking. She's still reported as a missing person, I think. I guess it would take a decent tip-off for them to reopen the case.
I don't ask, but I wonder… does Jim exercise his crazy side these days? He's not such a saint any more. Maybe he doesn't need to. Working in the legal profession, you can't afford to be Mr. Nice Guy all the time, can you? He's a partner in a law firm. An old outfit, Renfield & Sons or something. Jen's an interior designer. They're doing very well for themselves. I'd like to say I'm happy for them…
I've just given away too much, haven't I?
I can't really deny it any more, I guess. I want people to know. I can't live with the guilt of keeping his secret any more.
I'm sorry, Jim. Not all of us can handle things like this.
I've sent an abridged version of my confession to Scotland Yard. Abridged in that it would be extremely hard to identify me. I don't know if I'd be guilty of conspiracy to cover up murder or something. I have no idea how the law works there. Jim would know I suppose, he's a solicitor. Can't really ask him though can I?
I've told them everything I'm willing to share. The combination to the safe, the location of the body. If they follow my lead, they'll soon have the tape in their possession. I should imagine an arrest will follow. They should, eventually, find her bones. I doubt any of Jim's DNA will be found though. That might work in his favor But I doubt it, the rest of the evidence is pre
tty damning.
Jim. I'm sorry.
Goodbye.
