Tattoo

by J G Alva

  He would not fail to meet his responsibilities, unlike his parents. To do so meant eventual ruination. If his father had taught him anything, he had taught him that. And was his mother really happy, all the way up north, away from her own mother and father, her family? He didn’t think she could be, not really.

  He only knew that he was stronger than both of them.

  Of course, now things were so much different.

  He had a family of his own: a wife, a daughter.

  It was amazing how things could change, how you had nothing, and resented anyone who did…and then how you could look up and find you had it all.

  He supposed there was nothing particularly unusual or spectacular in the way that he and his wife had met: she’d been interested in a friend of his at the time, but being stuck with him at a barbecue had been enough to turn her head – or as she put it, “to finally get a word out of the quietest man that any of them knew.”

  If the way in which they had met was not spectacular, then his wife was: she had been Debra Green back then, a dark haired young woman of twenty three, all of a delicate five foot four, with a loud laugh that was totally unselfconscious. She worked as a dentist’s nurse, smoked like a man, drank pints, and she was beautiful.

  And if his wife was incredible, then his daughter was a wonder to him, every day. Lisa Ashbury. He had long said goodbye to a full head of hair, but she was the same blonde as he used to be, when he was a younger man; in all other respects however she was her mother. Small, and intelligent, and not afraid to speak her mind. She did well in school, which he never really had, and wanted to be a vet.

  A vet.

  How the hell did she turn out to be so good with him as a father?

  For a man who had grown up with no real sense of family, he was surprised by how much he needed them, and by the fact that, now, he would not be able to live without them.

  A big thought had smote him one morning not too long ago: that his family was the one thing in his life that was not a difficult task, a testing trial. He loved them, and they loved him. It was that simple.

  Steve had just finished the beer he had opened at dinner, and was helping Debbie to clean up the kitchen, when the knock came at their front door on that Monday night.

  They both looked at each other.

  “Who is that?” Debbie asked, dropping dishes in the water in the sink.

  “One of your many admirers, no doubt,” Steve said, wiping his hands on the kitchen table and dropping it next to the draining board.

  “One of my admirers-“

  “Sure. I have to beat them off with a stick on a daily basis.”

  “Oh, you can be so charming sometimes, Stephen Ashbury.”

  “I bet it’s Sally again,” he said, moving toward the door. “Probably wants to borrow more coffee.”

  “Borrow?” Debbie said, scoffing. “She can hardly give it back. Tell her to go to the shop like the rest of us.”

  Steve smiled, and opened the front door.

  But it wasn’t Sally, their elderly neighbour, on the doorstep.

  It was a man.

  A stranger.

  He was over six feet tall, had short cut blonde hair, and had a long pole in his hand, like a fishing rod.

  Steve frowned.

  “Hello? Can I help you?”

  The man smiled, but there was no warmth to it.

  “Are you Steve Ashbury?” He asked, in a very soft and unthreatening voice.

  “Yes, what can I-“

  The pole came up quickly. Steve saw a blue spark flash at its tip, and then he felt a paralyzing jolt, and everything went black.

  *

  The sound of the telephone ringing was the first thing to enter into his consciousness.

  Then other things started to come back to him: the smell of carpet at his back, a cool air on his face, the strain that seemed to be in all his muscles, as if he had been stretched just shy of breaking point, and then allowed to snap back.

  He sat up, a dull headache at the back of his head. He looked around. The phone…There was one further back in the hall. Why wasn’t Debbie answering it? The house seemed empty, quiet, but for the phone ringing. Where was everyone?

  As he picked up the receiver it all came back to him in a flash, the knock on the door, the stranger, the long pole that obviously had some sort of current going through it, enough to knock him out…

  “Hello?”

  “I have your wife and daughter.”

  For a moment, a fear and hurt so powerful it caught him off guard squeezed his heart, collapsed his lungs, so he couldn’t stand, couldn’t breathe, could hardly think.

  “What? What?”

  “Your wife and daughter – I have them.”

  “Why? What…what do you want? Please don’t hurt them. Please…”

  “Don’t worry, they’re fine,” the stranger said. “I won’t hurt them. Just as long as you do something for me.”

  “What? Anything. Just name it. Just, please, don’t hurt them.”

  And then the voice on the end of the line explained what he wanted him to do, which, to Steve’s mind, didn’t seem to make any sense.

  “I don’t understand. Why-“

  “Just do it, Mr. Ashbury,” the stranger said. “I’m not interested in arguing with you about it. The thing is, you don’t have to understand. Just do what I said, and I’ll let your wife and daughter go. Don’t do it, that’s fine, but I will fucking kill them both. Do you understand?”

  Steve could not speak, was torn in different directions by this impotent rage, he wanted to scream down the phone that he would kill him, whoever he was, if he harmed his wife and daughter in any way, while at the same time he was mindful of the fact that such an outburst might bring about that very thing that he feared the most.

  “And no police,” the stranger continued. “Now. Go. Get it done. I’ll be watching.”

  And Steve, who had always prided himself on his ability to rally himself to a difficult task, knew that he was being called on once again, that when one trial ends, another one takes its place; but he would not complain; he would not fail to meet his responsibilities.

  Because he wasn’t just responsible for himself anymore.

  Debbie.

  Lisa.

  His family.

  He grabbed his keys and ran out of the house.

  *

  CHAPTER 17

  The diary was cool against the small of his back, and felt like a lie, a betrayal.

  Police had arrived, and were cluttering College Road with their vehicles. The night was lit by the blue and red flashing of their emergency lights. People were coming out of the neighbouring houses to see what all the fuss was about, some people bleary-eyed from being woken by all the activity, wrapped in bath robes and huddled together against the cold.

  Sean was leaning against his car. He looked exhausted. Robin stood next to him, her face a white blob of fright.

  Sutton could feel time running out.

  But it was their problem now.

  He had done all he could for them, had delivered them to Alden King’s door. Realistically, there was nothing more he could do.

  So why did it feel like he was abandoning them?

  Or abandoning her, a small voice whispered in the back of his head.

  “She’s not there,” he said to them both. “At least, I couldn’t find her. I only managed to have a quick look around. Maybe your guys will have better luck.”

  Sean put a hand to his forehead; Robin’s expression looked broken.

  “I can’t hang around,” Sutton said.

  Sean nodded, and then indicated the house.

  “What are we going to find in there?” He asked.

  “Hell,” Sutton said quietly, staring at the house. “Or as close to hell as you’ll come across in your lifetime.” Sutton turned back to Sean. “You don’t need me anymore. You have his house, you know who he is now…you have him. He won’t last long. And once you have him, you�
�ll have her. So…”

  Sean’s expression was thoughtful. Eventually, he nodded.

  “What?” Robin said, rousing herself. “What?”

  She stared at Sutton as if he had lied to her somehow, had broken some promise.

  How come her opinion of him suddenly meant so much to him? It was ridiculous.

  “Robin, I’ve got to go.”

  She stared at him a moment, and then confused, looked to Sean.

  “Don’t they need his statement? I mean-“

  “No.” Sean shook his head. “He wasn’t here. Go, Sutton. I’ll speak to you when I can. When this is all over.”

  Sutton nodded.

  He looked at Robin, who seemed so small and afraid in that moment, and then nodded to her as well, before turning and marching away into the darkness.

  “What’s he running away from?” Robin said, and she could hear the bitterness in her own voice.

  “He can’t stay,” Sean said, shifting slightly where he leant on the car to look at her. He looked terrible, Robin thought; the mark on his face looked red and angry. “He can’t have any kind of notoriety. He couldn’t continue to be as effective at doing what he does if he did.”

  Robin understood then, but continued to stare after Sutton’s retreating figure in the dark.

  *

  The diary sat on the coffee table.

  Back at his flat, Sutton took a shower, trying to sluice away all the aches and pains; perhaps hoping by some miracle to wash away the memory of the house on College Road as well.

  But during the half hour he was in the shower, and the five minutes it took him to dry himself in the bathroom, and the ten minutes in his bedroom it took him to select something to wear, he was aware of the diary, could feel it in the flat, a force exuding influence over him, much like migrating birds are influenced by the earth’s magnetic poles.

  He did his best to ignore it. He dressed, wandered through the Lounge and into the Kitchen, made himself a cup of tea; he fussed around, putting the plates that were on the draining board back in the cupboards, wiping down the sink.

  But why had he brought it back with him in the first place, if only to ignore it?

  Perhaps his mind feared for its sanity; how much more horror could it take, before reaching some kind of a threshold…the diary might send what was left of his mind catapulting over the edge, like a suicidal man off a hotel balcony.

  Stupid.

  Of course the diary would have to be read.

  He must read it, for if there was something in there about Andrea, then he had to know, in case the police – God forbid – didn’t find Alden before tomorrow.

  He sat in the armchair, put his mug of tea on a coaster on the coffee table and picked up the innocuous black book. He stared at the cover a moment, and then let it fall open, and read at random:

  It is not readily apparent to me that murder is a sinful act. No prevention, internal or otherwise, affects me. Am I granted ultimate freedom by virtue of faulty biology, or by the strength of my own will? I have a free reign over those precepts and prohibitive behavioral norms that govern other men’s actions. To be chained in such a way is to be mortal; is it then safe to say that to not be similarly fettered is to be like a god?

  No wonder they can’t catch me.

  Nuts.

  There were many similar entries; it was like a litany of madness. As if Alden King had to convince himself over and over that what he believed was right; it was just that what he believed he had tailored to his own messed up head. It was a complimentary philosophy, part doctrine, part gobbledy-gook, that allowed him to do those things that he loved so much: killing young women.

  And he was fascinated with himself, with the thing that he had become, as if he delighted in exploring his insanity, as if it was a gift, not a curse, and he had been chosen to carry it, one of a special few.

  Sutton read more and could only come to one conclusion: that Alden King was affected with a deep and lasting madness.

  He found again the drawings that he had glimpsed only briefly when flicking through the diary at the house; they appeared to be early concepts for torture machines. Alden had been passionate about creating new and terrifying ways to kill people.

  Sutton thought back to what Sean had told him about Victoria Jenkins, that she had suffered seventy two stab wounds over her body.

  Has this been the instrument of her torture?

  Sutton turned some more pages and came across another drawing. What the hell was this?

  Alden King was an intelligent man, that was clearly discernable, and that worried Sutton; how long could an intelligent man evade the police? Probably for some time. His insanity was a machine driving him toward recklessness, but with his intellect acting as a control, Sutton was concerned that he would not be found quickly. That it would not be easy to find him.

  He turned another page, and a paragraph caught his eye. He read:

  Buried the head in the back garden, at just such an angle so that it looked up at the house. Forgotten how many there are now, it’s been so long. When I went back inside, the thing called my mother was eating a ham sandwich. She wouldn’t look at me. “Do you know what,” I said to her back, “people look up to you here.”

  My God. How many people had he killed?

  But it was the final entry that seemed to Sutton to be the most terrible, although he could not quite define why it disturbed him so:

  It is as if I am part of some Greek fable, some dark Shakespearian tragedy: a son’s betrayal, a son’s retribution. I thought her death would mean my freedom, but instead what do I feel? I feel only as if I am more alone than I ever was. Oh, but the irony is caustic enough to burn away layer upon layer of skin, until there is nothing but unfeeling bone left. I killed her because I had to. That is the truth. And cutting out her larynx on the kitchen table…Was that my final desecration? My last glob of spit in her face? I bet even God has a sense of humour. With so much power, with so much omnipotence, is there anything left to enjoy but a dark hilarity at the workings of this best of all possible worlds?

  The end is coming. I feel it. The final flight up a dark tunnel to…what? What is out there? Is anything out there? Does the world really exist, except as part of my dream? And if so, what will happen when I wake up?

  Sutton flashed back to the blood stained kitchen table, the discarded lump of unrecognizable meat. What had he done to Eleanor? His own mother? In that moment, it seemed as if there was no evil Alden King was incapable of.

  Sutton could not quite hold back the shudder that rippled through him.

  *

  But in the end, the diary yielded nothing.

  It wasn’t that there weren’t revelations about Alden King’s life to be had – in that, the diary was a bounty – it was just that there was nothing in there to indicate where he might be holding Andrea. Sutton had puzzled over it for two hours before he gave up, leaving the diary on the coffee table while he went into the Kitchen and fixed himself a sandwich, his body still aching in various places. There had been veiled references to ‘subjects’, but nothing beyond that. A dull headache between his eyes from being at it so long was pressing on his sensibilities, along with a superstitious dread that Alden King’s peculiar brand of madness might be catching.

  He went back into the Living Room, avoiding the diary lest the mere sight of it sent him spiraling back into the black abyss of his disappointment…when it moved. He quickly turned back to it, sure he had imagined it, but not wholly convinced it wasn’t possessed of some evil force…when it moved again. This time he felt the vibration through his feet, and accompanying it a deep rumbling sound so low it was only just within the range of human hearing.

  Frowning, he opened the patio doors and went out on to the balcony; he listened, and it was only a moment before he felt and heard the disturbance again, and he turned his head, trying to determine where the sound was coming from.

  The night was cold, and there was a chill wind coming out o
f the gorge and scratching at his face. He waited, hearing nothing but the sounds of Bristol, cars across the river, light conversation from an older couple walking along the promenade directly below his flat, the sound of the water, and he was about to go back in when there was a shout, and someone darted out of a door below and circled the building, disappearing from sight.

  This time, the noise could not be dismissed.

  There was a flat boom that echoed out over the water, like a large piece of sheet metal had been dropped, and then a cacophony of smaller sounds, like an avalanche. But it wasn’t the sound so much that alarmed him, as it was the building itself, which shook very perceptibly all around him. He felt the floor shift ever so slightly under his feet. Good God, what was happening?

  There was more shouting from below, beyond the edge of the building. Sutton left the balcony, racing through his flat to the front door, out into the hall, went to the lift, remembered it was broken, and instead turned to the stairs.

  This time the sound was like a bomb exploding at the bottom of the stairwell. The whole building shook, dust falling from the ceiling on to his shoulders, and the staircase itself gave out a pained high pitched whine, like an injured cat.

  The cold night air was blowing up the stairwell with some force. Sutton went to the banister and looked over its edge.

  He could not quite believe his eyes.

  Two floors down, something sizeable had punched a hole in the outside wall. Bricks and brick dust littered the stairs and the landing around the hole, and the banister directly opposite had been bent out of shape, and large, unnerving cracks radiated out from the hole in the wall all the way up to where he stood on the top floor.

  As he watched, a large metallic arm, from a crane or digger, broke more of the outer wall away, tearing a great chunk out of the concrete steps and dislodging part of the banister, before retreating. Above Sutton’s left shoulder, a large chunk of plaster broke free and smashed itself to pieces on the landing beside him; he had to jump out of the way to avoid being hit by it. Jesus Christ, his world was falling apart around him, what was happening, what in God’s name was happening?