Deathwatch (14 page)

Her mum rolled her eyes. “So can I borrow your bike? Please?”

“I suppose.”

“Well, you don’t want me to be a fat slob of a mother, do you? Or drop dead of a heart attack in my prime.”

Cat couldn’t be bothered to do her usual style of reply.
Bit late for that
, would have been one.

“Don’t be cross, Catty. It’ll work out, you’ll see. You won’t lose your friends and the world won’t end. But dreams are worth following.”

She touched Cat’s head as she left the room. Cat mumbled a reply.

Tears pricked her eyes. But she wiped them away angrily and vowed to follow her plan. She
would
find a job and she would slowly drop back on the athletics. Maybe cut the swimming and biathlon stuff and just run.

As she heard her mum’s footsteps reach the ground floor, a sudden thought hit her. The brakes on her bike were dodgy. She’d been meaning to tell her parents but hadn’t got round to it.

“Mum!” she called. No reply. Her mum must have gone into the kitchen already.

Never mind – she’d tell her at breakfast.

DIANA
McPherson pushed a strand of blonde hair back into place. It had been a difficult day, as so often on a Friday. Her patient, David Sorley, was supposed to be going home. Only he didn’t have a home to go to. His parents couldn’t take him. Couldn’t? Wouldn’t. She didn’t really blame them. After all, they had two other kids to think about and David was twenty-two. Twenty-two years old, unemployed, and suffering his first episode of schizophrenia. He wasn’t the worst case she’d come across, nowhere near that. But any case was bad enough for the people who loved him.

Poor David. And his family. Nice family too, by all accounts. She’d met the parents, shock still draining their faces, shock that this was where they were – a grim psych unit in a grim hospital that tried to pretend that it wasn’t grim by placing a few strategic geraniums. They’d been unable to understand how this could have happened to their son. Had his earlier cannabis use played a part? She’d agreed that it possibly had. Though they should not blame themselves, she’d said. Or should they? Maybe they should. Maybe they hadn’t been tough enough. Or too tough. One or the other, who knew?

But today, her task had been to tell them that he couldn’t stay in the hospital. They were worried about what he would do if he came home. Schizophrenia was frightening, and they’d read plenty of newspaper stories. He could be dangerous, they said.

She couldn’t be
sure
he wasn’t dangerous. But he was taking his medication and he seemed to be doing well. There was nothing more she could do while he was responding to treatment, not unless he became violent, which he hadn’t. He’d been out a few times with supervision and, apart from one minor incident when he’d panicked a bit, he’d been no problem. Nothing since then.

So she’d ended up spending too much time that day persuading him that he would be fine out of the hospital – as long as he took his medication and came back for follow-up appointments – and sorting out his care plan. The team had worked hard to find accommodation for him. They had found a hostel but it wasn’t adequate. She knew that and he probably knew that too. But she’d had to pretend she thought it was.

David had wanted to stay in the hospital, cared for. He felt safer. He was frightened about the voices coming back.

“But the pills keep the voices away. You know that, David,” Diana had said.

“But they might not,” he’d said, pushing the straggly hair from his eyes and tucking it into that knitted hat he always wore. His face was thin. He should eat more. He needed someone to care for him. But who would do that? She’d sensed that the mother would have, but the father had put his foot down. Understandably.

He was lost. She knew that and it hurt. It wasn’t what she’d intended when she trained. She’d planned to cure people, find clever paths through their extraordinary and fascinating minds. Funny how things didn’t turn out as you’d hoped.

Then someone had discovered that David had an uncle near by. Presumably he hadn’t said so before because he knew that would be a reason not to stay in hospital. But they’d contacted this uncle, who’d said it was no problem – apparently he’d spent a lot of time with David recently. Members of the team made sure this uncle understood everything and could deal with the medication. And would see that David came back for follow-ups.

Now more than an hour after she had eventually said goodbye to David, and seen his lost eyes for one last time, she packed her things into her bag ready to go home. She’d checked with the staff that he’d be signed out properly and collected by the uncle. And she put David from her mind until his next appointment.

Outside, wind scurried the leaves along the pavement. She remembered a comedy programme she’d seen once, with a sketch involving a pile of leaves that followed a woman home along the pavement. Although it had been very funny, it had also been frightening: the eerie leaves with a mind of their own, chasing the woman in Hitchcock fashion along the empty street. She couldn’t remember what had happened in the end – perhaps the leaves overpowered the woman and smothered her to death or something. It didn’t really matter.

She was the last to leave the unit, setting the lock on the door before pulling it shut behind her. The street was empty, twilight settling on the leaf-strewn pavements and hanging in the thinning trees. This was partly hospital grounds, partly public road. Cars were usually few, though fast, ignoring the ten miles per hour signs.

The smell of hops from the brewery was rich this evening and she breathed deeply. It was an Edinburgh smell that she loved.

Diana squeezed her bag inside the rucksack she’d borrowed from Cat that morning, as she’d set off on her short cycle to work. The cycling – suggested by her daughter some weeks ago because Diana was moaning about being unfit – rarely actually happened. There was always a reason not to: the weather, a meeting, tiredness. But today she had vowed to do it, appalled by the extra layer of flesh she’d been aware of all week. “Muffin top,” as Angus had helpfully said.

Diana had already changed into her jeans for the purpose of her return journey. The actual route home was too short to be worthwhile, but she was going to head in another direction and cycle for about half an hour before coming home.

Her daughter had explained the circuit to her when she’d first suggested cycling. It was based on the route Cat usually did on a Friday evening. Cat always took her bike to school on Fridays, so that after hockey she could do this testing ride involving the university campus on the hill. Exposed for most of the way, it was quite safe and Diana and Bill had been reasonably happy for her to do it, though she should stop now for the winter: the clocks would go back this weekend, Diana realized, and it would be much darker next week.

Of course, Cat had planned an easier version of the route for her mother, who had only cycled a couple of times since starting the new fitness kick.

“Don’t want you to kill yourself,” Bill had teased.

“You could do with coming yourself,” Diana had retorted. And it was true. He wasn’t exactly the hard-muscled, athletic being she’d married. They could both do with getting fitter. It was just that the time never seemed right.

Today, the time had seemed right. Or unavoidable. Cat didn’t need her bike because she didn’t have hockey, though she’d given her permission rather grudgingly the night before, Diana thought. Teenage strop, and a bit of frustration about too much training. She’d get over it. Diana didn’t want to pressurize Cat too much but everyone needed a push now and then. It was a parent’s duty, wasn’t it? Besides, wouldn’t anyone need a push to get out of bed for the early morning swims that Cat did several times a week?

And Cat’s grandfather, Diana’s father,
would
have been proud. “Don’t just follow your dreams,” he’d have said. “Grab them with both hands and pull yourself towards them.” She remembered the glitter in his eyes when she was a little girl and he’d talked to her about running, and the sheer joy of winning. Not that she’d been that interested then. She’d never been one for running herself. Sweat was unattractive and unpleasant.

There was a lot of him in Catriona, she thought. Determination, fire. Which was why she’d been so surprised at that outburst of doubt yesterday. It was so unlike her. Maybe they shouldn’t push her so hard. But how were you to know what was right? Too much or too little: you couldn’t know until it was too late.

Diana had left the house earlier than usual that morning, before the kids were up, and had wobbled the short distance to work. In the few times she’d done the journey so far, she had discovered something painful about cobbles and bikes. She’d not yet relearned her ancient cycling skills.

But she’d got there. Safely. And now, work finished, she was going to do what she had planned to do: Cat’s evening route. Or Cat, Bill and Angus would never let her forget it.

She placed Cat’s neon yellow helmet on her head. Flicked the bike lights on. And set off. Left onto the main road. Along to the big junction. Left again. She hadn’t known this was a hill. It had looked quite flat from the driving seat of a car. Wind in her face. Against her. Sweating already. Breath painful in her throat. Cars roaring up behind. A heavy feeling in her legs. But she would do it. She changed gears and it became easier. She could do this.

The brakes seemed sticky but she could cope. Maybe just use her foot if necessary.

At the university campus, she followed Cat’s instructions and didn’t go far up the hill, took the easy route. And then down again. Bit scary with the sticky brakes, but she wasn’t going too fast: she knew she could stop easily enough. Wind in her face again. Always against her. How? But this time downhill. Exhilaration. A long, lonely road sweeping round. Onto Morningside Road, past the traffic lights, another hill, a bad one this time, possibly the need to stop. But no, she
could
do it.

She did it.

Turning left. Flat road now. Her legs like lead even so. This was horrible. She really didn’t like this. Why did people like to get sweaty? Well, at least she could have a glass of wine without feeling guilty.

And now there she was near the psych hospital, almost back where she’d started. If she turned left she’d be at work, but this was Friday, the weekend, time to relax. So, glad to be nearly home, Diana turned right, as Cat would have done at pretty much the same time every Friday, being quicker than her mother and having done a longer route.

Diana probably did see the thin figure peer out from the lane on her right as she approached quite slowly. But she wouldn’t have thought anything of it. Just someone smoking or something. She didn’t have time to take in whether she recognized the face. The thin face, the long straggly hair. And by the time the figure had leapt out, it was too late to stop, or even begin to apply the brakes, or turn, or avoid her assailant. Or even scream.

Her world went black.

THE
phone call when it came was horrible. Her father’s anguished, “Oh my God!” as he listened to the voice on the other end. Followed by the words, “Yes … yes … where? Are you sure?” Cat had been on the landing and had heard. She hurled herself down the stairs. Angus ran out of his bedroom. And then their father spoke the shocking words, “Mum’s had an accident. I have to go to the hospital.” A blinding panic flooded through her.

“We’re coming!” said Angus.

“No, you’ve got to stay here.”

“You can’t leave us, Dad!”

“What’s happened to her?” asked Cat.

“She fell off her bike. Hit her head.”

Cat grabbed the banister. “We have to come, please, Dad!” She wanted to ask how serious it was, but she just couldn’t.

Angus asked. Their father shook his head harshly, pulling on his coat, fumbling for his wallet, phone, keys. Grabbed the dog lead, stared at it, put it in his pocket. Took it out again and dropped it on the stairs. “They don’t know or can’t say, I don’t know. She’s in A&E and she’s having tests. Come on – get your coats. Cat, check the back door. Quick!”

So she wasn’t dead. She wasn’t dead. She wasn’t dead. Having tests. What tests? Like X-rays? Not in Intensive Care then. But what did Cat know? She was clutching at straws but somehow she couldn’t take in the fear.

And the horrible, black, heart-clutching realization that she had not told her mum about the brakes.

One minute of rushing round the house, locking up, getting phones, leaving lights on, and they were on their way. Little was said in the car. Their dad’s curse when the traffic lights were against them was almost silent, bottled up inside. Fifteen minutes with each of them hidden away in lonely thoughts. Every now and then, their dad would say things like, “It’ll be OK; they’d have said if she wasn’t. Wouldn’t they?” It was as though all his own professionalism went out of the window and he knew no more than them. They needed him to know more, to be reassuring.

“She’ll be OK, won’t she, Dad?” asked Angus, his voice small and tight.

“Course she will. Amazing what they can do nowadays.”

Angus turned and looked out of the window. Was he reassured? Cat knew that she wasn’t. Her brain felt frozen.

The hospital: new, white, smart. Full of the latest technology, it must be. Huge car park, no space near the A&E entrance. Sudden fury from their dad as he realized how far from the doors he’d have to park. Parked. Sorted ticket. All of them running towards the entrance. Three smokers outside, one in a hospital gown. Looking at them with some kind of pity. Through the doors, which slid slowly open in a delayed reaction. And now his authority as a doctor took over as he explained quickly who they were and asked to be taken to Diana McPherson straight away.

They were asked to sit in the waiting area, where a shambling drunk with dirty grey jogging bottoms shouted abuse at a fat boy and his mother, who were kicking the vending machine because it wouldn’t give up the cola they claimed to have paid for. Three people had blood on them, one with a closed and bloodied eye. Most were silent. One small child sniffed repeatedly, exhausted in his mother’s arms.