Bones in the Nest (9 page)

There are too many people in the garden, stopping and staring. Chloe tells herself they’re looking at the plants, not her, but it does nothing to calm her nerves. A sticky-faced toddler kicks a ball into one of the herbaceous borders and it thwacks against the stem of one of Bill’s best hollyhocks. She wants to tell the parents to get out and take the little brat with them, but instead she goes inside the shed to get some twine and a cane. While she’s staking it back up, hoping the damage isn’t too severe, she turns round to see a man taking photographs. He has the camera pointed right at her. She turns away and pulls the elastic out of her hair, letting the dyed blonde strands cover her face.

‘Alcea rosea,’
he says.

‘Sorry?’

‘Latin name for hollyhocks. I wish I could get the ones on my allotment to grow like that.’

‘Oh.’

She busies herself with a knot. She doesn’t want to hear
about his allotment. She can picture it without him having to tell her. It will have neat rows of military cabbages and a ‘Keep Out’ sign on the gate. He wears white socks and beige lace-up shoes and he’s probably a leading light on his allotment committee.

There were allotments near where she grew up. She used to go there when she bunked off school with Jay, or after dark when her mum was working in the pub. Some of the plots looked like the gardens of real homes, with paved paths and chalet-style sheds. She and Jay broke into one once and found deckchairs. They pretended it was their own garden and called themselves Mr and Mrs Clutterbuck. He smoked and laughed at nothing on earth. She laughed too, but she didn’t know why. Then suddenly he was crying and she crossed over to his deckchair and sat on his lap. The striped cotton ripped and they ended up on the ground, laughing again.

‘These are a fine bunch of specimens,’ the man with the camera says.

She ties another length of twine lower down the stem of the plant, her face brushing the blousy flower head, and breathes in to see if they have any particular smell. The air’s full of the roses in the neighbouring bed, so she almost feels sorry for the hollyhocks; they smell of nothing. She looks past the allotment man and realises she’s staring at the spot on the strip of lawn where Taheera hopped on one foot, trying to get the stone out of her shoe. It seems like months ago, not Monday. She sounded very upset on the phone this morning. If Chloe was dead, Taheera would carry on as normal, she’s pretty sure about that. She could die now, fade away among the hollyhocks and disappear; Taheera wouldn’t even notice.

A voice in her head says,
you can’t die just to make people feel sorry for you.
She knows that voice, she used to hear it all the time. It was the voice of a bird that flew past her window and told her the truth – or lies – she never really knew. The bird was a jay, which laughed like a crackle of static and flashed her a blue tattoo on its red-pink feathers. The bird and the boy, they shared the same name, the same voice.

‘You look ready for a break.’ Bill’s huge frame casts a shadow over her.

The man with the camera has gone and she wonders how long she’s been standing in the border, half hidden behind the hollyhocks, winding a piece of twine in and out of her fingers. Bill’s voice is reassuringly solid.

‘Why don’t you sit in the shade behind the shed and have your lunch?’

She nods and makes her way back onto the path, not wanting to tell him that she hasn’t brought any lunch. She’ll get a glass of water from the tap and make do with that. If Bill offers her a coffee she’ll put extra milk and sugar in it, but she has no money left for bread or sandwiches until she gets paid. She leans against the shed and lets the water cool her cracked lips. She closes her eyes and sees the face of Taheera’s young man, walking towards them outside the Minster, smiling at Taheera because he loved her. Like a delayed reaction, she feels a shock rip through her. It twists her stomach and forces her forward. She’s vomiting water and bits of bread, then dry retching until she’s crying, sobbing silently, tears stinging her cheeks.

Sean took the bus back from the town centre and went straight to where he’d hidden his moped behind the library. He motored slowly out onto Winston Grove and followed the streets to his nan’s. It felt like the moped knew where it was going, like an old horse. He struggled to keep his eyes open and felt himself leaning forward and jerking back, as sleep tried to catch him.

There was nobody home. Just a note on the table to say Maureen had gone shopping. He went straight upstairs, got undressed and fell into bed, the cool sheets against his skin. It could have been several hours later, or a few minutes, when the dreams started. A newspaper was rolling out, unfurling, like a red carpet, then blowing down the street in the wind. The words were everywhere, but he couldn’t make sense of them. The papers gathered together and blew into a ball like tumbleweed, knocking a young man to the ground. The figure lay, holding a wound in his groin, then he stood up and it was Saleem, brushing the papers off, telling
Sean it was all right, he wasn’t dead after all; it had been a mistake. Then the young man had Mohammad’s face and the newspapers were soaked in blood.

Sean woke, drenched in sweat. He shook the dream away, sat up and took a drink of water from the glass by his bed. The glass hadn’t been there when he went to sleep. Nan must be home. He turned over on his back and stared at the ceiling. He’d painted it himself and he could see an annoying bit where he’d got yellow paint on the white plastic light fitting.

He stood no chance of getting that little studio flat now. It was a shame because he liked the road it was on, South Parade, tree-lined and full of old houses from the days when rich merchants lived along there. Most of them were broken up into offices and flats, but it was still a cut above. All the clubs and bars were a short walk away and it would be convenient if he ever wanted to bring a girlfriend home. That was a big ‘if’. He rolled back on his side and stared at the wall. A single bed, with his grandmother popping in with a cup of tea in the morning, was nobody’s dream. The last girl he’d dated would have died laughing if he’d brought her back here. Not that things ever got to that stage with her. It crossed his mind that Lizzie Morrison might be impressed with a studio flat on South Parade. Sean sighed. Don’t go there again. She was so far out of reach, she might as well be on another planet.

There was a soft knock on the door and it opened a crack.

‘All right, Nan. I’m awake.’

‘I didn’t want to bother you, love. But your phone’s been ringing. You left it on the kitchen table. I’ve brought it up.’

‘Oh. Right.’ He sat up as she came in. ‘What time is it?’

‘It’s coming up to five-fifteen. Shall I open the curtains?’

‘Aye, go on.’

He took the phone from her and looked through the missed calls. One blocked number, then one from Carly and one from DI Rick Houghton, a drug squad detective he’d known since his first case as a PCSO. Sean selected voicemail and listened. They came in reverse order, so the last two didn’t make much sense until he got to the first message. Carly and Rick were both checking if he wanted to meet up in the pub later. They appeared to know something he didn’t about his shift pattern changing and were offering to buy him a drink. The first message explained why.

It was his unit sergeant, telling him there was good news, or bad news, whichever way he wanted to look at it. For the duration of this inquiry, Sean was being seconded to CID. DCI Khan had asked for him by name. He was to report at 8 a.m. the next morning for a briefing, which meant he had the night off and could he phone him back to confirm he’d got the message?

‘Everything all right?’ Maureen was still hovering by the window, pretending to be interested in something in the street.

‘Yeah, great.’

‘You don’t sound great, you sound a bit worried, love.’

Sean tried to make sense of everything that had happened since he and Gav got the call to attend the flats earlier that morning. Sleeping in the day had an odd way of shuffling time and memory, so he could no longer tell what was today and what was yesterday.

Maureen didn’t wait for an explanation. She went downstairs to the kitchen and soon the smell of bacon was drifting upstairs. Having another breakfast at teatime wasn’t going to help his sense of disorientation, but his stomach was rumbling. He got out of bed and pulled on his clothes.

In the kitchen, one place was laid at the table, and a cup of tea was waiting for him.

‘They’re saying there’s been a murder up at the flats.’

She was wiping down the surfaces, her back to him so he couldn’t read her expression.

‘Who’s they?’ Sean said through a mouthful of toast.

‘I know you’re not meant to say, but did you … was it on your shift?’

‘Did I see him?’ Sean nodded. ‘I found him.’

‘Are you all right?’ She turned and gave him a look that demanded a truthful answer. She knew him too well.

He was all right, or at least he would be if he didn’t have to talk about it. The body curled on the stairs wasn’t the worst of it; the thing he couldn’t get out of his head was the mother’s cry of grief.

‘If I can nail the bastard that did it, then I’ll be all right.’

He told her about being seconded to work on Khan’s team and a beaming smile lit up her face.

‘I’m so proud of you. You know that, don’t you, love?’

That evening, he found Carly, Rick and a couple of others in the corner of the pub.

‘Well, well, if it isn’t Acting Detective Constable Denton, the fastest promotion in the west, or make that the north,
or shall we just call him, “South Yorkshire’s finest recruit!”’ Carly stood up and gave him a huge hug.

‘Steady on,’ he could feel his ears going hot. ‘Not until tomorrow morning, technically. And it’s only a secondment, I’m hardly …’

‘Ah, leave it out! You’ve done well, and I, for one, am going to buy you a pint to celebrate.’ She went over to the bar followed by calls from a couple of others to get one in for them.

Rick leant forward and spoke quietly.

‘Keep me in the loop, mate. Khan’s not known for being a team player, but the victim was part of an old case of mine.’

‘Oh?’

‘Mohammad Asaf seems to have been keeping his hands clean, but some of his associates are still on our radar, including the cousin.’

‘Saleem?’

‘You know him?’

‘We’ve met.’

‘Yeah? Well I hope you’ve still got your wallet, he’s a light fingered little bastard.’

‘To be honest, Rick,’ he looked round to check nobody was listening, ‘it’s all a bit over my head. I’ll do what I can, but I don’t really know what’s going on. There must have been someone more experienced available, so why did DCI Khan ask for me?’

Rick took a sip of beer and wiped his mouth on the back of his hand.

‘Because you’re young and impressionable,’ Rick said, ‘and because he’s got no mates.’

‘Funny!’ Although Sean wasn’t sure Rick was joking. ‘Saleem Asaf thinks it’s a turf war. His boys versus the white boys off the Chasebridge estate.’

Rick grinned. ‘That’s your real answer.’

‘To what?’

‘Why Khan wants you on his team. People trust you. They tell you stuff. Wish I’d thought of it first, you could have come along with me.’

‘We’re all in it together, mate.’

‘Are we?’

Carly approached the table with their drinks and the conversation drifted away from the case and on to the scandal of the Doncaster Belles being relegated, simply because the dressing rooms at the stadium weren’t up to standard.

‘It’s bloody typical, just because the men’s game is shit, the women have to suffer,’ said Carly, slamming a swiftly emptied pint glass on the table.

The jukebox was playing David Bowie’s ‘Fashion’ and Sean’s mind was focusing on what the hell he was going to wear tomorrow. Khan and Simkins wore suits. He’d have to dig his own out, and pray he hadn’t put on any weight since the last time he went to a funeral.

Bill lets Chloe ride the mower. It’s not the same model she used at her last place, so he takes her through its attributes one by one, as if he’s selling it to her.

‘Best thing, in my opinion, is this safety feature. Soon as you’re not in contact with the seat, it cuts out. On these slopes, that could save your life if it topples over.’

He offers her a Halsworth Grange baseball hat to keep the sun out of her eyes and she pulls it low, hiding her face.

‘There you go, much better!’ He laughs a big belly laugh, but she doesn’t see why. ‘Only kidding,’ he adds, holding up his big hands in supplication. ‘Don’t mind my sense of humour, no one else does.’

He explains where he wants her to go, behind the house to the orchard.

‘Leave the grass long around the base of the trees,’ he tells her, ‘it’s good for the bees. You’ll have the place to yourself. Closed to the public.’

She nods and wonders if he knows that she wants to
hide. Perhaps he read her disclosure letter before handing it over to his boss, or he’s seen the same headline that she saw in the local paper. All he needs to do is put two and two together. A quick search on the Internet will do that for him in a matter of seconds. She wonders what pictures they’ve got of her, and whether she’ll need to change her hair again.

A pair of magpies spring up as she drives the mower into the orchard. She takes off the ear defenders and listens to their shouts. But they’re not like her Jay, they don’t have any message for her. She smiles to herself. If people knew what was going on in my head, she thinks, they’d lock me up again for sure. Birds don’t talk; everyone knows that.

She puts the ear defenders back on and muffles the noise of the engine as she starts the mower. She guides the machine carefully around each tree trunk just as Bill asked. In her muted world her mind wanders back to the bird with the blue tattoo, laughing like static. The boy and the bird, the bird and the boy, one in the same.

Damn. She’s mown too close to a tree. The circle of long grass and wildflowers is lopsided, more like a half-moon. She hopes Bill won’t be annoyed. Her mind is messing her around; it might be because she’s not eating enough. She’s been trying to ignore the hunger, telling herself she can manage, but other people have noticed, so it’s becoming more difficult. Emma kept some shepherds’s pie for her last night. She wolfed it down cold while her friend stood watching her.

‘You need to get something in,’ Emma said. ‘Some Pot
Noodles or something. I’ll lend you if you’re strapped for cash.’

Chloe said she would, but she knows if she starts borrowing, she’ll have to pay it back with interest. She’s not getting into all that again, not now she’s out of prison. A debt is a dangerous thing. Another protected circle of long grass is cut in half, too close to the tree. She needs to concentrate, but a thought is hanging on, the thread of a thought, pulling her back to sitting in Taheera’s car, outside the smart house that appeared to have been built in an orchard. While Taheera was talking to her brother, there was a man getting into a dark blue car, and the eyes of the man in the car were eyes she thought she knew.

‘Chloe!’ Bill is shouting from the orchard gateway. ‘Lunch break! Kettle’s on, d’you want a brew?’

She snaps back to the present and cuts the engine. When she gets back to the potting shed, ready to confess to making a mess of the mowing, a woman is there. It’s Brenda from the ticket office, Bill’s wife. She’s broad, like him, but not as tall. Chloe feels the other woman sizing her up and not looking too impressed with what she sees.

‘I see what you mean, Bill; there’s nothing to her.’

Chloe is frozen to the spot. Brenda Coldacre must have seen the newspaper reports and she’s come looking for a killer, a monster, but she’s just found a woman with no strength at all, a woman with bones like a bird who can be snapped in two with one hand.

‘I brought you this.’

Brenda Coldacre is holding something out to Chloe.
She expects it to be a newspaper or a printout from the Internet. She’s sure Mrs Coldacre will say,
I know who you are
. Maybe it’s a noose to hang herself with. Someone sent her one once in prison, but it got intercepted.

‘Go on, open it,’ says Mrs Coldacre.

Chloe shivers and makes herself look at the object. She sees a brown paper bag.

‘Cheese and pickle, in case you were a vegetarian.’

Chloe walks slowly back into the orchard, not wanting to gobble down the sandwich in front of them. She still has some dignity. At the furthest row of trees she chooses one where she mowed too close to the trunk. At least she can sit on the short grass without fear of disturbing any wild bees. She leans against the tree, letting it press into the centre of her back.

The smell of the pickle starts her salivating. The cheese is sharp, strong enough to make her suck her cheeks in, but wonderful, and the bread tastes better than any she’s ever experienced. There’s something nutty and clean about it. She’s sure it’s home-made. Her throat tightens, but she fights the urge to cry. She should be happy. Surely this is as good as it gets. Live in the moment. Who said that? Jay was fond of saying it, but she was sure he got it out of a book. She remembers sitting like this in one of the allotment sheds with the sound of rain on the corrugated roof. They were safe inside. There was no need to talk.

Jay had a packet of orange Club biscuits from his mum’s cupboard. He said she would only buy biscuits in wrappers, so she could be sure they were clean. Chloe thought that was daft because how could she know the people in the factory
hadn’t picked their noses before they wrapped them? The biscuits could last them all day if they were careful. They sat against the wall of the shed in a corner by an old filing cabinet. Its drawers were marked ‘Top Secret’, ‘Middle Secret’ and ‘Bottom Secret’. They found a bottle of whisky in ‘Top Secret’, but she didn’t want any; she thought the smell was disgusting.

She thought this might be the time that Jay would kiss her, but they weren’t touching. They’d held each other once, hugged, sort of, but she wasn’t sure if it meant anything. Jay was upset. He wouldn’t tell her what about, but he cried for ages. She felt like a mum with a little child, not like a girl with a boyfriend. It wasn’t really certain that he was her boyfriend, even though everybody thought they were going out and it was written on the back of the toilet door at school.

That day in the shed he was very quiet, quieter than his normal quiet self. She shuffled a bit nearer to him so that their thighs, where they sat with their knees drawn up, were close enough that they could be touching by accident. He flinched and wrapped his arms tighter round his knees. The space opened up between them again.

‘What’s up?’ she said.

‘Nothing.’

‘D’you want another biscuit?’

‘I’m all right,’ he said. ‘Have one if you want one.’

‘I’m all right.’

The rain pattered harder above them and it was a while before he spoke again.

‘I wish I could fly.’

‘Yeah?’ she said. ‘Yeah. That would be cool.’

‘Any time I wanted to, just up and out. I do it sometimes, in my head.’

She laughed and wished she hadn’t, because he folded over his knees and hid his face. She thought he might be crying again, but there wasn’t any sound. His curly red hair fell forward and she wanted to stroke it. On the back of his hand, where it clasped his leg, there was a mark she hadn’t noticed before: a red disc of blistered skin. She looked more closely and realised the same marks were on his knuckles.

‘Who’s done that?’

‘No one.’ He didn’t lift his head, but she sensed he was watching her from under his hair.

‘Did you do it to yourself? That’s flipping stupid, that is.’

‘Why would I do that?’

She didn’t know. Other people did stuff to themselves, she’d seen marks on girls’ arms. She didn’t think lads did it though.

He raised his head and looked at her. His eyes were dry, but there was something different, as if the light had gone out of them. She was looking at him, but it was like she didn’t know him any more.

‘Chloe?’ Bill is standing in front of her, blocking out the light. ‘You were fast on.’

‘Was I? I’m sorry, I’m not sleeping so well at night.’

‘Aye, well. Brenda’s got the kettle on. Come and have a cuppa.’

She pulls herself up to her feet and follows him.

‘You know what they say, don’t you?’ He calls over his shoulder. ‘Them that lie awake at night have a guilty conscience.’

He’d no sooner said it than he hesitated, missed a step and mumbled to himself.

‘Brain before mouth, Bill, brain before mouth.’