by Tammy Cohen
Nevertheless, I got off the Tube at Wood Green station, the longer route home that took me past the police station. Even right up until I arrived there I wasn’t sure I was actually going to go in. I started walking past, determined to go straight home, but that image of the moving blur in my parents’ hallway stopped me in my tracks when I’d gone a few yards up the road, and I turned back, borne on a sudden tide of rage.
‘Mrs Hopwood. How are you?’
Detective Byrne’s greeting was polite, but there was a new guardedness in his manner.
‘You’re going to think I’m crazy,’ I began, knowing instantly that it was the worst possible way I could have opened the conversation. Still, now I’d started I had to press on, bringing Detective Byrne up to date on what had been happening: the death of my father, the blurred shadow on the webcam footage.
The detective’s face grew still as he listened to me, his expression setting hard as concrete.
When I’d finished he rubbed his middle finger slowly across his right eye. Then he looked at me.
‘Mrs Hopwood. I’m sincerely sorry for your loss. I lost my own father last year to cancer and I still think about him every single day. However …’ He emphasized the last word and then left a pause which said everything I needed to know about what was going to come next.
‘This obsession with James Stephens – and make no mistake about it, obsession is what it has become – has got to stop now. If it continues, you could find yourself facing a harassment charge and a possible custodial sentence.
‘Read my lips. I’m only going to say this once. The man from the CCTV footage on the night your daughter was attacked was not James Stephens. I’m not really supposed to tell you that, but I don’t want to see you getting into any more trouble, and if I lodge a formal complaint from you, that’s the way it will go.
‘Go home, Mrs Hopwood. Grieve for your father. Look after Emma. And please get some help. There are people trained to deal with this kind of trauma. Find one of them.’
I felt numb as I left the station. The fact that Byrne’s last comment echoed Nick’s words almost exactly disturbed me. Was I really losing hold on reality? Was it a psychiatrist I needed, rather than a policeman?
On the walk back I kept going over what the detective had said about Stephens not being the suspect they’d identified from the CCTV footage. Hadn’t there been something strange about the way he’d phrased it? As if the man from the CCTV might turn out to be separate from the man who attacked Em?
And, thinking about it, what was to stop him lying to me about it? As far as the police were concerned, the case was closed. They’d spent the resources and hadn’t got a result. The last thing they wanted now was me raking it all up again, causing a public nuisance, making more paperwork.
I liked Detective Byrne, but I knew my accusations were making him nervous.
Nervous enough to lie to my face?
At home, I sat down at the kitchen table and, out of habit, went to the computer to watch my parents on webcam before remembering there was no one there to watch.
Then I put my head in my hands while rage and guilt erupted from me in an almighty howl of pain.
When the doorbell sounded I ignored it. To be honest, I was in such a state I couldn’t even be sure the noise wasn’t in my head. Then it sounded again, a longer ring this time.
I thought of all the people I didn’t want to see on my doorstep. James Stephens had once stood on the pavement opposite and taken a photograph of my house and my dog. It might be him. Or else Frances, and I really wasn’t in the mood for her. Then I remembered the night of the attack, when I’d found Emma sobbing on the doorstep, and how she claimed to have been standing there for ages.
I hurried to the door and flung it open.
For a split second I stared at Kath and Mari as if they were strangers, while all the hurt and upset of the last week surged to the surface. And then suddenly I crumpled and they were both scooping me up, their arms around me, and we were all crying.
‘Why didn’t you come?’ I asked when we were finally back inside the house and sitting huddled up together on the sofa, as we had so many times over the three decades of our friendship.
‘Come where?’
Kath was looking at me in surprise, her eyes startlingly blue against her cheeks, which had gone the deep puce colour they always did in the sun – the perils of being a redhead in a country where heat is not introduced incrementally, giving your skin time to adjust, but rather flung about like a squash ball, one day there, next day gone, new tans peeling off like flaking paint.
‘To the funeral, of course. I waited and waited for you to show up.’
Now they were both gazing at me in astonishment. ‘But you specifically told us not to come,’ said Mari, leaning back so she could survey me properly. ‘In your email you said you were keeping the funeral deliberately small. Family only. And you didn’t feel up to talking to either of us yet. You just wanted a little space and time to yourself to grieve “with your nearest and dearest”. I remember the exact words you used, because, well, we both found them pretty hurtful, to be honest.’
‘Yeah, I was all for getting in the car and going straight over and having it out with you there and then, but Mari convinced me to give you some time.’
I was looking from one to the other, waiting for the fog to clear and everything to fall into place, the explanation that would make sense of what they were saying. I knew the issue would turn out to be with me, because grief had made mincemeat of my thoughts. And yet nothing shifted.
‘I didn’t send you anything like that,’ I said. ‘The last message I sent was a text with all the details of the funeral.’
Now Kath and Mari exchanged a look.
‘But the email came the day after that text. You said you’d been thinking a lot about it and you’d decided to limit the funeral to just family.’
‘That’s ridiculous.’ I was getting upset all over again. ‘I’ll prove it to you.’
I marched into the kitchen and grabbed my laptop, bringing it back to the sofa. Logging into my emails, I went straight to my ‘sent’ folder and scrolled back a couple of weeks. I didn’t have to go far – I’d hardly sent any emails since Dad’s death.
‘Stop,’ said Mari, leaning over my shoulder to point at a message in my ‘sent’ folder.
It was there. Exactly as they’d described. A brief, abrupt email telling them I’d changed my mind about the funeral, that it was to be a small, private affair. Exclusively for family.
‘But I never wrote this,’ I said. ‘I wanted the two of you there more than anything. I was so devastated when you didn’t show up.’
Mari was looking at me strangely.
‘Tess, you’ve been under a lot of stress recently. Are you sure …’
‘I didn’t write this,’ I repeated, almost shouting in my frustration. ‘It doesn’t even sound like me. I don’t know what happened, but …’
I stopped short.
I did know what had happened.
Whatever software Frances had put on my computer to counter the spyware Stephens had installed, it hadn’t worked. He’d been able to get my new email password to send messages as if he were me.
I suddenly remembered that strange email I’d supposedly sent to Nick. The one I had no recollection of writing.
The world tipped sideways and I felt myself falling.
41
Everything felt like it was happening to someone else. Someone who looked a bit like me but couldn’t be me because the actual me was packed away in a padded box where nothing could get through to her.
The mystery email left me shocked and so shaken up that Mari and Kath insisted on staying with me until Em came home. Even then, they were reluctant to leave, especially once they’d heard about the blurry shadow I’d seen on the webcam, crossing the hallway.
Did I imagine the look that passed between them when I told them what I suspected – that Stephens had deliberately t
ampered with my dad’s medication to get back at me?
‘I think you should talk to someone,’ Mari said, in an echo of Nick and Byrne. ‘You’re not yourself.’
‘Good,’ I said grimly. ‘Myself is the very last person I want to be.’
After they’d finally gone, Em brought her laptop and books down to the living room. She didn’t know about the weird email or how my dad had died, but she sensed I was fragile.
‘You don’t have to keep watch over me, darling. I’m fine,’ I said.
‘I know. I just fancied a change of scene.’
It bothered me that she so obviously thought I was about to break.
‘You know how much I love you, don’t you?’ I told her, feeling suddenly awkward. ‘You know I’ve only ever wanted to keep you safe.’
Em nodded, looking as if she was about to cry.
‘I miss Grandad,’ she said.
‘Me too.’
That night I felt emotionally exhausted and, for once, slipped gratefully into sleep almost as soon as I got into bed, only to dream again of my father. I was chasing him through a cityscape, knowing I had to catch him to stop him injecting himself, but even though he was old in my dream, as he had been before he died, he was always just out of reach.
I woke with my heart thumping, the sheets drenched in sweat, then lay awake for hours, too scared to close my eyes.
‘I think I’ll go and visit Grandma today,’ I told Em over breakfast, trying to sound like it was something I was looking forward to, rather than dreading.
It was a mixture of guilt and frustration that was driving me to Oxford. I knew I was unlikely to get any answers from my mother, but in the absence of anyone else who might be able to provide proof that I wasn’t going completely mad, that someone had come to the door just before my dad died, she would have to do. Besides, I was still beating myself up about having left her in the home, even though there hadn’t been another choice.
By the time I was on the Tube to Paddington, I was regretting my decision. I still felt strangely detached from my life, as if I were doing everything from a distance, operating my body remotely. What help could I be to my mum in this state?
The train had just pulled away from the platform when I heard my ringtone from my bag.
‘Kath, I’m on the train,’ I said before she could speak. ‘So it might cut out at any time. Listen, I know you’re worried about me after yesterday, but I’m fine now. Honestly.’
‘I am worried. But that’s not why I’m …’
A shadow as we passed into the tunnel and dead air on the other end of the line.
When we emerged, I tried calling back, but her phone was busy, obviously calling me. After a few minutes of this, my phone rang again.
‘Sorry, Kath. We got cut off. What were you saying?’
‘I meant to tell you yesterday, but then it went out of my head. The thing is, don’t be cross, but I did some checking up on Frances Gates.’
For a moment I thought the crackling line had caused me to mishear.
‘Frances? Why would you do that?’
‘I just think there’s something strange about the way she’s latched on to you and Em. I thought it was worth finding out a bit more about her.’
I was nonplussed. Yes, it was a bit odd that Frances had turned up at my dad’s funeral. But a part of me still felt protective of her. As if saving Em from Stephens had made her family, with the allowances that confers.
‘And?’
‘I remembered you said she worked at some investment bank called Hepworths. So I called them.’
‘What do you mean, you called them? God, Kath, I hope you haven’t been making trouble for her at work.’
‘No. I just wanted to confirm that she really does work there. And guess what?’
An icy finger traced its way along my spine.
‘She hasn’t worked there in four months. So, then I rang them back again and pretended she’d applied to me for a job and given them as a reference.’
‘Kath! For fuck’s sake, that’s completely unethical.’
‘No, it isn’t. They’re not to know any different. Anyway, the first woman I spoke to in HR gave me the official line – how long she’d worked there for, the date she left. Nothing contentious. But then, listen to this, about half an hour after I’d hung up, the phone goes and it’s this guy from Hepworths. Reluctant to give his name at first, but said he wanted to give me an unofficial “heads up” about Frances. That’s the phrase he used. He said she’d—’
I cursed under my breath as the train hurtled into a tunnel and the line once again cut out. The woman opposite me glanced up from her laptop and gave me an empathetic ‘what can you do?’ shrug.
By the time I finally got back to Kath, she told me she was about to go into a meeting.
‘But what did he say? The guy from Hepworths?’
‘Just that Frances had been “borderline inappropriate”. That was how he described it. Nothing that put her in breach of company law, I don’t think, but she’d … oh, hang on a minute, Tess.’
I could hear the sounds of voices in the background. Then Kath came back on the line:
‘Sorry, Tess, but I really have to go. I’ll call you tonight, okay?’
After Kath had rung off I couldn’t settle. I stared out of the window, determinedly not catching the eye of the woman opposite, who seemed to be waiting for an excuse to say something.
I was so fixated on Stephens and what he might be capable of, I just didn’t have the emotional energy to start stressing about Frances as well. If I was honest, my pride was a little hurt that she hadn’t felt comfortable enough with me to admit she’d lost her job, but maybe she was just embarrassed. Obviously, she’d left under some sort of cloud, so I couldn’t blame her for not wanting to talk about it.
Still, I felt uneasy, and whenever I thought about what Kath might have been about to tell me, I felt a pressure on the underside of my ribs.
My discomfort intensified when my phone beeped with an incoming text message and Frances’s name appeared on the screen, almost as if she knew Kath had been checking up on her.
She wanted to know how I was. She was concerned about me, she wrote. Grief could be so destructive. If I ever needed to talk, I knew where she was.
Suddenly, I felt short of breath, as if I was being suffocated.
On impulse, I dashed off a reply.
Frances, please don’t be offended, but I think I need some time to focus on me at the moment. And on Em and Rosie too. I’ll get back in touch when things are on more of an even keel.
After I’d sent it I felt guilty, but also lighter, as if I’d offloaded an unwanted task I’d agreed to do for someone else. I knew we owed Frances a massive debt, but her presence in our lives was feeling increasingly intrusive.
When I arrived at the care home I had a chat with the manager, a tall, skinny woman with very straight blonde hair cut into a blunt fringe and eyes that had the giveaway bulge of a thyroid problem. She reassured me Mum was settling in perfectly well.
‘She’s even made a friend,’ the manager said proudly. ‘There’s a lady in here your mother knew some years ago, apparently. It’s the gift that keeps on giving, really. Every time they meet each other they’ve forgotten about the last time, so they get to be delighted about their reunion all over again.’
Mum was in the lounge when I arrived, on the end of a row of armchairs in which sat an assortment of old women in various stages of diminishment. She was wearing a jumper I’d never seen before with a jazzy black-and-gold diamond pattern on it. They were in front of one of the biggest televisions I had ever seen, which was blaring out a cookery programme.
I crouched down in front of Mum and tried to get her attention.
‘Mum, it’s Tessa,’ I said, taking her hand. It felt shockingly fragile, something made from tissue paper.
My mother hardly glanced at me. Her eyes stayed trained on the television.
‘Are you the physioth
erapist?’ her neighbour, a tiny, hunched figure, asked hopefully.
‘No,’ I said, smiling. ‘I’m her daughter.’
‘Only my knee has gone again,’ the woman went on, as if I hadn’t spoken. ‘I’ve been doing those exercises, but it just went. Pop! Just like that. Pop!’
‘No,’ I said again. ‘I’m her daughter.’
A woman two chairs along leaned painfully across.
‘Your mother is wearing my jumper,’ she whispered conspiratorially. ‘The laundry woman is clueless, I’m afraid. I’ve tried to tell her, but she won’t listen.’
I wondered if either of the women was the friend of my mum’s from her old life. If so, I wondered if the two of them ever questioned what had happened to the women they used to be.
I waited until the programme was finished and then asked Mum if she wanted to come for a walk. To my surprise, she got straight to her feet and followed me docilely out of the lounge and through the lobby, with its photo montage of residents in party hats posing with visiting schoolchildren or local celebrities.
Outside was a large, square lawn bordered by flower beds and a path that went around the entire perimeter with wrought-iron benches at each corner. I led Mum to the only one which was in full sun. Despite her fair skin, she’d always loved the warmth, never caring if she burned.
I still wasn’t completely sure what kind of mood she was in, but when an elderly man passed by on the opposite side, pushed along in a wheelchair by a young male carer, my mother suddenly called across to them, ‘This is my daughter, you know. She edits a magazine.’
I looked at her in astonishment. I hadn’t imagined the pride in her voice. It didn’t matter that she was two years behind the curve with my employment history. She knew who I was.
‘Mum. Are you okay?’ I asked, as we sat side by side on the bench. I still had her papery hand in mine.
‘I don’t like my room. The bed is too small.’
‘That’s because you’re missing Dad.’
