She pulled cream blusher from the Lancome bag, smoothing it across death grey cheeks. Her arm was throbbing, swamping her with pulses of pain. Had swallowed a couple of pain killers, the ones they had given her from the hospital. They’re strong mind, they’d warned her. But her arm still throbbed, and now her head swam, tongue feeling thick and unwieldy.
They were reading a book, the mother and the child and the tiny tears doll, as she checked seatbelts and closed lockers and adjusted tray tables. They were reading the Gruffalo. The little girl had laughed as her mother did the voices, burying her face into the child’s cheek with a low growl and a giggle. Like they had done this a thousand times. Like they would do it a thousand times more.
She should go and get Ben. She should bring him home. Then it would just be the two of them. Here. Alone.
Cecilia sank down onto the bottom step and leaned her head against the bannister. That’s what any normal mother would do. The silence was deafening, tearing at her insides. It sounded like engines and rushing wind. She could pull Ben towards her, holding him tight, forget all about the fact that she was running away, that she had left, that she had taken everything that mattered to her. That she had left him. Because she was here, wasn’t she? She had survived when she shouldn’t have, because she had chosen the jump seat four rows in the right direction, because the plane hadn’t gone down two seconds earlier or two seconds later. Just because. And there must be a reason, because otherwise why would she live and the good mother and her little girl die?
Cecilia pushed herself up again, pushing her chin out and trying to slow her breathing. Twisting a tube of lipstick. Red rose. Smoothed it onto lips that were too dry. He would be glad to see her. Wouldn’t he? She was his mother after all. He would look at her, his face lighter simply because she was there, and this time he wouldn’t turn away, wouldn’t bury his head in his father’s leg, eyes turned sideways towards her, unsure of her. And this time she would know what to say to him, know what he needed, simply because she was his mother. And every time she looked at him, she wouldn’t see the other one. This time she would just see him.
That was when she remembered, spinning on her heel so that her arm seared and lipstick smudged. Cold gripped her, from inside to out. Stepped forward. Stepped back. Then stood there, because there was nowhere else to go. The picture, the unformed foetus was gone, like everything else she had valued enough to take.
Closing her eyes, resting her head against the cool of the mirror.
You take what matters, when you run away from home. You take what you will need, the things that make life bearable. You take your secrets.
She was trembling, trying to breathe. It would be okay. Breathe. Think of Ben. It’ll be okay. Because she had to have survived for a reason, and he’s her son and she’s his mother and this time he’ll be enough and she’ll be enough.
Chapter 14
Tom – Friday, 16th March - 11.27am
The snow covered Libby, tucked in beneath her frozen silver chin. Her head was cushioned by bracken and leaves, chestnut hair fanning out into a halo. Her lips were pressed lightly together into a kiss. Eyes open, navy blue. Seemed that she was staring at him. But then Tom moved, and the illusion shifted, a trick of the light, gaze becoming vacant again. Dead.
They stood on the path, looking down towards the river, the body. A bitter cold wind had crept up, whipping at their white protective suits. The DI a broad-shouldered snowman beside him, his arms folded tight across his chest. Down below, through the snaking embankment of bracken and brambles, white clad scenes of crime investigators moved around the body. They stepped slowly, cautiously, every inch taking more time than would have seemed possible, because one wrong step now and the forensic evidence is gone and they can’t get it back.
“I, uh, thanks. For, you know.” DI Maxwell’s voice tripped on the wind so that Tom had to strain to hear. He wasn’t looking at Tom, was staring down the bank to where Libby lay. Seemed almost impossible from this distance that she could be real.
“Not a problem, boss.” Tom had been heading to the car, mind full of crime scenes and blood spatter and the secrets that lie within the heart of all families. Had pulled up short. The DI had been standing beside his car, his face pale, gaze long. Okay, boss? Looking up like he hadn’t heard him pull in, face pale. Yeah, bad morning. You know. Libby. A heavy sigh. Going to scene now. Tom had tucked his car keys into his pocket. Mind if I tag along?
Tom stared down the bank at the body. There were leaves in her hair, twigs. It was matted, pulled at, as if something had tried to make a nest there. A curtain of blood, swathing her left ear, crawling down her chin, and he wondered if it had been a blow to the head that had killed her. Her left arm was flung out, white shirt hidden against the snow.
The forensic team inched around her, struggling to erect the protective tent on the precipitous bank, pure snow churning to mud. The whine, flash and click, CSI lowering the camera, her face grim.
“Jesus.” DI Nate Maxwell’s words were soft, barely audible.
“Yeah.”
It wasn’t a great place to dump a body. She would be found. In an hour or a day, hard to say in weather like this. But it seemed that they had made little attempt to hide it. More like they had made a nest for her, had lain her where she would be comfortable rather than leaving her on ice hard ground.
Tom watched Libby, thought again that Libby was watching him. She looked like Cecilia. A little. Or maybe she didn’t. Maybe it was the snow and the blood and the death making him think of his wife. They had the same lips, full, wishful. Hair that waved, thick. Cecilia was darker. Or maybe this was just what happened when you went to a murder the day after your wife died and then didn’t.
The CSI was leaning in closer now, zooming in on Libby’s face. Click. Snap. This way. Beautiful.
A line of disturbance ran through the bracken, just to Libby’s left. Where someone would have walked, climbing their way down the embankment. Tom leaned over, chin out, assessing. Tough climb with a body. Especially when you could have dropped it, pushed her off the side, achieved pretty much the same result. But that hadn’t happened, someone had struggled down the bank. They had carried her to where she would rest.
“How long before they get her out of here?” asked Tom.
The DI shook his head. “They’re saying 24 hours. Maybe more.”
Tom stared at Libby. Thinking that Death doesn’t always come where he’s expected. That sometimes your world shifts, and your brain begins to work, and already, without you even meaning to, it’s reordering your life, moving parts to fill up the sudden vacuum. And then, just as suddenly, stability reasserts itself, and everything goes back to just the way it was before, and you’re left feeling just a little bit out of time, like maybe you woke up in the wrong universe today. But it’s only because Death changed his mind. He visited somebody else instead.
The DI cleared his throat. Shook his head. “Sorry, Tom. Tough one, this.”
Tom still didn’t look at him, could hear the ragged edges to his voice, so let his gaze travel down the steep bank, onto the river, a knot of ice. “Yeah. Different when it’s someone you know.”
The DI nodded, slowly, stubble grazing against his shirt collar. “Her father, good friend of mine. Jim, you know Jim?”
“By reputation. I’ve heard good things about him.” Tom glanced down at his feet, almost invisible, the white suit buried in the snow. Not looking at Libby. Someone’s daughter now. And now, instead of Cecilia, he’s seeing Ben. “My father. He knew him.”
“Of course. He would have done. I, I was there. This morning. Had to, ah…” DI Maxwell gestured towards Libby, still not looking at her. “Had to break the news.”
Tom nodded, that sudden sickening thought of a heavy knock on the door. What it would be like to hear someone form those words. Your child is dead. Shaking his head, trying to concentrate.
He looked at where Libby lay, the way her body had been half-hidden, brambles haphazardly uprooted, arranged across her torso, her legs. Falling snow doing the rest. The river ran past, sluggish, banks capped with ice. An inch or two away from her toes.
“You see him much?” The DI had folded his arms across his chest, feet scuffling at the snow.
“Boss?”
“Your Dad. Get to see him often?”
Tom shook his head. “No. Not much.”
He scanned up from the body towards the bank, turning, eyes running along the cycle path, back down to the river Tawe, watching as the current carried along a stick. Its own private game of Pooh sticks. Thinking about the walk he had made when they arrived at the crime scene. Leaving the car on a patch of roughened ground. Through the outer cordon. Up an incline almost overgrown with brambles, weeds. Watching the river flow past them, down towards the distant sea.
“Have the search teams done the river yet?”
The DI was looking past him, still down at Libby. “Huh? No. They’re just starting at the outer cordon. Why?”
“Do you mind if we…” Tom gestured back along the way they’d come. “I’d like to have a quick look.”
The DI sighed, nodded. One last look at Libby, a last shake of his head. “No. Come on.”
They walked, heads down into the wind. Tom blinked, eyes watering with the pressure of it, but he wasn’t paying attention to that. His eyes were fixed on the river itself.
“What are you thinking?” The DI asked.
“Just, the river. She’s right by it. I just wanted to see…” Tom stopped, leaning over the edge of the embankment. “Do you…you see that, right?”
The DI squinted, frowning. “I see something.” He pulled out his radio. “I need a search officer here, now.”
They waited as a white clothed figure worked its way along the path. The man stopped short of them, waited patiently as Tom pointed out the dark patch hooked onto bank just above the flowing water. Began making his way down the bank.
They stood, staring after him.
“Your missus okay?” Asked the DI.
“Boss?”
“Cecilia. Terrible thing, that crash. Terrible. The village…I mean, they’re all reeling. You don’t expect it, in a place like that. He shook his head. “Or any place.”
“Yeah.”
“You were lucky, mind. Really damn lucky.”
The world shifts, and you think it’s going to land one way, and then it spins, and it lands another. Now your world is left, just where it had been, and somebody else’s crumbles instead.
“Yeah.”
“So she’s doing okay?”
“Yeah, thanks boss. She’s doing well. Really well.” Tom watched the search officer in his white suit, leaning down towards the river, one hand grasping a branch, the other fishing around in the frigid water.
“Very, very lucky. Thank god, eh?”
Tom didn’t answer. Was watching the search officer study the dark object. Saw him slip out a plastic evidence bag, placing whatever it was inside, and begin the climb back up the slope. Tom felt his heart beat a little faster.
“Well, you were right.” The search officer’s voice came out uneven as he struggled for breath. “It’s a glove. Large.” He held out the evidence bag. A winter Thinsulate glove, dark grey almost black. “And look.” He ould have been the palm sat a fat ring of blood.
Chapter 15
Freya – Friday, 16th March – 11.28am
Freya pulled open the door, cold air rushing in, wrapping itself around her ankles. The snow was falling heavy now, drowning the world in a bitter white.
The two men stood at the end of the drive. They hadn’t seen her yet, were leaning in towards one another, deep in conversation.
Freya wondered if her mother was still sleeping, if she was escaping the worst of the dreams. Hoped that her brother remained in bed. They didn’t need this, not on top of everything else.
“Excuse me.” Words came out, sharper than she had intended. Cleared her throat. “Hello?”
The shorter man, the younger one, turned, painting on a too-ready smile.
“Hello?” He was walking towards her, wide stride on the snowbound drive. “Mrs Blake?” Doubtful, scanning her up and down, taking in the pyjamas, the lack of make-up. Her youth.
“No. I’m her daughter. Freya.”
He smiled, simpered almost. Had a soft look, flesh moulded from dough, dark hair swept severely aside, grey at the edges. “Of course. Of course. How are you, Freya?” Face contorted, going for sympathy; failing. “I’m sorry, silly question. It’s a terrible time.”
“Yes. It is. Can I help you with something?”
The other man was there now, a slower walk up the drive, breathing like a freight train. Camera forcing creases into the shoulder of his leather jacket. He smelled of stale cigarettes. Freya looked down the lens, red light blinking.
“Oh, just…we just wanted to see how you were doing. Terrible time, I know.” His head was canted to one side. “But how
are
you all coping?”
“Okay, I guess.” Freya folded her arms across her chest, snow seeping through her cream slippers through thick woollen socks.
“I know, I know. It’s an awful time.” Leaning in conspiratorially, washing Freya in a wave of musk. “You have no idea how many people I’ve spoken to in situations like yours.”
“You mean, plane crashes?”
“Well, ha, no, I mean awful, awful tragedies.” Puts his hand on her shoulder, leans in so close that she can see the row of black fillings that line his teeth. “People make it. You would be amazed what people can survive.”
Her mother, her world crumbling beneath her. Her brother, face stripped bare with shock.
“I know this is such an intrusion, but I have to report on it. I mean, I know you understand, it’s such an important news story, and I wanted to make absolutely sure I got my facts right.” His hand was heavy on her shoulder, damp through the cotton. “It’s bad enough for you guys without the extra insult of factual errors.”
She could have turned, shut the door in his face, and she almost did. But then they would come back, and next time it would be Richard that they would speak to, or her mother. “Okay. What do you want to know?”