Can't Let Go (22 page)

The light from the kebab shop seemed preternaturally
bright. The pink neon sign outside was
winking at me from across the street. The
fluorescent lights seemed to beckon me in. If the church
wouldn't give me sanctuary then this place would. It was
one in the morning and the bright lights seemed like a gift.
I'd been trying to hide in dark corners but perhaps this
was the safest place for me now. How could I come to any
harm under the glare of a dozen fluorescent tubes?

There were gaudy photographs of the menu, backlit
above the food counter. I stood there, confused and
indecisive. I pointed at one of the photos almost at
random, and then said yes to everything that the man
behind the counter offered me: extra salad, onions, cheese,
yogurt sauce – everything. I grabbed a can of Diet Coke,
fumbled in my bag for my purse and then I took my
yellow polystyrene tray of food across to a white
Formica-covered table in the corner of the cafe, from
where I could see everyone who walked past, and
everyone who came in.

I picked at the food aimlessly. The lettuce was limp and
warm from touching the lamb kebab. The flatbread ripped
when I tried to pick it up. The meat was chewy and the
salad was tasteless, and I was eating for the sake of eating;
eating for the sake of doing something with my hands. My
mind wandered. I thought about Zoey again. The last
time I'd eaten a kebab I'd been with Zoey, here in
Edinburgh. We'd walked into the cafe and she'd asked the
guy behind the counter, 'What's good here?' It was a joke,
of course; she often said it, ever since I'd picked her up on
it that first time. 'What's good here?' But in a way it
wasn't a joke; it was just Zoey being Zoey. Zoey loved
food. She loved to eat. She loved tastes and flavours. She
loved kebabs and curries and chips, and finding new
places to eat, and she always had the expectation or the
hope that maybe the food would indeed be good. She
always had an idea that something on even the most
unpromising menu would be good, would be fun to eat.

I ate for fuel, pretty much. I rarely noticed much about
what I was eating. But Zoey would nudge me: 'Hey,
what's yours like?' Or she'd lean over and steal some of
my food – she'd dip her bread in my sauce or scoop up a
spoonful of whatever I was eating and she'd try it. 'Yum',
she'd say, not always facetiously. 'Here, try mine,' she
would offer. 'Isn't that great?' 'Zesty' – that was a word
she used often to describe flavours. It seemed such a Zoey
word, so full of life and zing and enthusiasm. What would
she have thought of the kebab I was eating? But she
wouldn't have ordered this kebab. She would have tried
the house special, or maybe the plate of food that she'd
never come across before. Right now she would have
been tucking into something spicy and unusual. And I
could have watched her face and I would have known
almost instantly from her expression whether it was
disgusting or delicious.

Friendship is like electricity. Zoey was all exposed
copper wires, fizzing with energy. I was insulated, with
heavy plastic tape wrapped around my nerve endings.
And Zoey had started to unwrap the tape. She'd started to
show me how to fizz and spark against other people, how
much fun it could be.
Oh shit. Don't start. Not now.
More
tears were crowding into the corners of my eyes, and I had
to press my hand hard against my mouth. Even then a few
whimpers escaped.
Can't let go,
I told myself.
Can't start
crying or I'll never stop.

I looked around. No one seemed to have noticed.
There was an older guy eating his way through a huge
mound of meat and salad. There were a few young
couples holding hands and giggling. A bunch of young
men who might have been Turkish were gathered around
the counter, laughing and joking with the guy who was
serving. I wondered how long this place would stay open,
whether it was an all-night place or whether it would be
closing for the night soon. I wondered how long I would
be safe here. I wondered what I should do next.

I fingered the note in the back pocket of my jeans. Since
I'd found Zoey's body I had been all panic and grief and
unfocused terror. Now it was time to put those to one side.
I would grieve again later. I'd be scared again later, I was
sure of it. But for now it was time to think. I made myself
eat my kebab, methodically chewing each piece of food
eight, twelve, sixteen times. And I made myself think
methodically, too. I tried to make a mental list of what had
happened and why it had happened. And I tried to work
out what to do next.

Zoey was dead. She'd been killed by my faceless,
implacable stalker. He had suddenly upped the stakes.
Why? Had there been any real warning that he might kill?
I thought back to the notes I'd received. He was watching
me, the notes had said. He knew where I was; he knew
where I went. There had been a veiled threat that he
would tell Danny what I'd done. There had been nothing
about this. Nothing about killing someone. No warning
that this would happen. But he had called me 'the
murdering bitch'. Perhaps it was inevitable. Perhaps I'd
been stupid not to see that his vengeance would be
murder.

Why now? Why this sudden escalation? The reason
suddenly seemed very clear: the same reason he'd started
writing the notes in the first place. I was happy. I'd
escaped my fear. I was taking baby steps out into the
world of normal people. Despite the notes, I'd been happy
in Edinburgh. I had been out there on the streets, amid the
bustle of the Festival, flaunting my happiness. No wonder
he couldn't stand it.

Why Zoey? The question made me shudder. Why the
hell did he kill Zoey? It was my fault. It was me who had
dragged her into my nightmare. I'd been so careful about
Danny. I'd thought that he could be in danger in some
way. I hadn't even thought that Zoey was at risk. It was
my fault. Zoey was dead and it was my fault. He killed her
because he knew she meant something to me. He killed
her because of what I'd done all those years ago. She did
mean something to me. She meant a lot to me. I knew that
now. She had meant more to me than I'd realised. I loved
her. I sat there in that brightly lit kebab shop and I realised
that I had loved Zoey. She was the best friend I'd had in
years. And that was why he killed her.

I thought about that second note.
Does your new lover
know how evil you are?
I'd assumed he meant Danny. But
the stalker – the avenging angel – had left the note on my
car on the evening that I had driven Zoey all the way
down to Southampton. He killed her in the flat that we
were sharing. Oh Christ, he thought we were lovers. He
thought we were lovers and that was why he killed her. I
had tried to escape him. I had fled to Edinburgh and I'd
thought I had escaped him, but all I had done was sign
Zoey's death warrant.

What next? What was he planning to do next?
Now you
know what it feels like.
You murdering bitch – now you
know what it feels like to lose someone you love. Now
you know what it feels like to be truly afraid. He'd had no
qualms about killing Zoey. It was supposed to serve as a
warning to me. Don't try to escape again, don't try to be
happy, because I know where you are and I will kill you.
I was sure that he would be coming for me next. He was
out there somewhere in the dark – and at that I quickly
looked up from my food and gazed around the cafe. Most
of the young couples had gone. The Turkish lads were
tucking into food now. The older guy must have left. I
hadn't noticed him go. I looked out of the window, trying
to see into the dark night, but all I could see was my
reflection on the window. I looked pale and haunted, with
huge dark circles etched into the skin around my eyes. He
was out there somewhere, enjoying my fear. He would
string it out for a while, but eventually he would strike.

I wondered if anyone had found Zoey's body yet. I
wondered if Suze or Laura had a key to the flat. Maybe
Steve did. Maybe one of the girls would have called Steve
when they'd got no answer from their repeated phone
calls to me. Or, if he didn't have a key, maybe he would
have hammered down the door, calling Zoey's name. He
would hammer frantically, like I had done on the church
door, and he would run at it with his shoulder and the
door would break. Or maybe one of them would have got
hold of the landlord, somehow, and he would have let
them in with his spare key. And then they'd find Zoey. I
thought about her body and I couldn't eat another
mouthful. I didn't want to eat, ever again.

I should have gone to the police. I should have phoned
them and reported what had happened, and I should have
stayed there with Zoey's body until they turned up. It
would have been safer than being out here, at his mercy. I
knew that now. But then there'd be questions, and
probing, and somehow I would have ended up telling
them the whole awful story about Rivers Carillo. And that
would be a disaster. I just couldn't do it.

And now it was too late, anyway. Another awful
thought had struck me. The police would find footprints
in the blood in the hallway and all around Zoey's body.
The footprints were of a woman's size six shoe. There
were bloody fingerprints on the sink, and on the white painted
window frame, and on the front door: bloody
fingerprints that showed I had been all over the flat after
Zoey's death. There was only one conclusion that could
be drawn from the evidence there: I killed Zoey
Spiegelman. I was responsible for her death, and the
police would believe I had done it. There was no escape.
All I could do was to keep on running.

I thought I knew what fear was. I had lived with it for
half my lifetime. I knew what it tasted like, I knew
the hollowed-out feeling it gave me under my ribs
and in my stomach. I knew how it could make every hair
on my body stand to attention, like a sensor or an early warning
system. I knew the varying degrees of cold that
fear could make me feel. But nothing I had ever
experienced before could have compared to how I felt
when I woke the next morning.

When people in films are in dire straits – chased,
cornered, fleeing for their lives – someone always
says to the heroine, 'Get some sleep,' or 'Get some
rest.' Someone did a survey once, and found that the
sentence was the most used in films – of any sentence.
More even than 'I love you.' As if whatever monster
is chasing you, whatever disaster is around the
corner, sleep will somehow make it better. As if the
next day you will wake up and everything will be
brighter.

In fact you wake up the next day and things are worse,
because nothing just gets better by itself. And now time
has gone by and your fate is closer, and you're still
unprepared. The day dawns with its harsh light that peers
into all the shadows, and all it does is make the terror even
more relentless and real.

The sky was grey, with a bright white band low down
in the sky over to the east. The air felt big and empty. No
one else was around. I felt as if I had stepped outside the
known world and now it was just me and him, a fight to
the death. He was waiting for me somewhere; I didn't
know where. But somewhere, out there, he was waiting
with a knife or a gun to kill me, or a fast car to run me
over. There was no one to protect me now. I had to face
this on my own.

It was cold: damp, shivery dawn-cold. I pulled my
green velvet jacket closer around me and I felt a shudder
go through my whole body. I was in a doorway in a little
alleyway at the top of the Royal Mile near the castle. I had
spent the night there, half-dozing, half-wakeful, just
counting the hours until Edinburgh woke up and I could
try to get lost in the bustle again.

There was a tall, dour-looking house across the street
from where I was sitting. I recognised it: Deacon Brodie's
house. We had stopped there on the bus tour. Had that
really been only twelve hours ago? I had sat upstairs in
that green open-top bus, in the middle of the festival
throng, and they'd told us the story of Deacon Brodie, the
man who lived a double life: respectable cabinetmaker by
day; ruthless thief by night. His story inspired Robert
Louis Stevenson to create Jekyll and Hyde. I wasn't sure
how much of what the bus driver told us was true. It all
got mixed up in my head with the stories of Burke and
Hare, the body-snatchers. So many stories of crime and
gruesomeness round here. I was telling myself this stuff in
my head to stop myself thinking about Zoey, lying like a
rag doll in that pool of blood.

The streets around me seemed post-apocalyptically
empty: just a couple of homeless men asleep in doorways,
on bits of cardboard and old blankets. The nearby shops
were all boarded up with metal grilles across their
windows and doors. I was tired and I was empty, and I
could not stop shaking. Somewhere out here, in this city,
was someone who wanted to kill me; someone who had
already killed my friend; someone who was prepared to
slash open the stomach of a woman he didn't know and
didn't care about, just to teach me a lesson. And I didn't
know who he was. I didn't know what he looked like. I
didn't know who it was that I was supposed to be afraid of.

I stood up and staggered away from my doorway. My
legs would barely carry me. I was walking – staggering –
looking behind me with almost every step. Could I hear
footsteps, or just echoes? I needed somewhere else to
shelter; somewhere to sit while I worked out what I
should do next. I found a cafe in a little side street, the kind
of cafe that stayed open all night. I went in and took a seat
in the far corner, so that I could see everyone who came
and went. I ordered food that I didn't want. I tried to eat
my full Scottish breakfast, but the yolk on my half-eaten
fried egg unsettled me with its shiny viscosity. It
reminded me of the blood.

I left some money on the table and found the tiny toilet
at the back of the cafe. I thought I was going to be sick, but
when I leaned over the toilet bowl and started to heave,
nothing happened. I looked at myself in the mirror, and
tried to wipe off the worst of the smudged mascara with a
piece of damp loo roll. There was still a little bit of dried
blood on my face, and I rubbed at that too.

And then, as I went back into the cafe, as I walked
towards the door, I noticed a man sitting at a table right by
the door. Had he been there earlier? Had he followed me
here? He was watching me, intently. He was watching
every step I took towards him. He had straggly long grey
hair and piercing eyes. He was wearing an old corduroy
jacket that was frayed and worn around the collar and
sleeves. I could feel my legs start to shake but I forced
myself to carry on. He hissed at me, beckoned me towards
him. I stopped where I was. I stared at him. Was this him?
Again, he beckoned me closer. I stepped towards him. He
stood, suddenly, and put his face close to mine. His breath
smelled of alcohol. 'Have you finished wi' your breakfast?'
he said, in a Scottish accent. 'Mind if I finish it?'

I walked downhill, heading towards the big green area
of Princes Street Gardens. I found a wooden bench near
the National Gallery. I looked around, peered into the
bushes of the park behind me. I listened, hard. I heard
nothing. I let myself sit down. I curled my legs up under
me and pulled my jacket tighter around me. I took out my
keys and I jabbed them into the palm of my hand so that I
didn't fall asleep. I sat there, poised, primed to spring up
and run away; or primed to spring up and stab my keys
into someone's face: whatever it took. I wasn't safe, but I
would never be safe. It was somewhere else to sit for a
while.

I didn't know whether my life was worth anything any
more. I wasn't sure it had been worth anything for years.
It was just a bunch of bits and pieces: fake name, fake
friends, fake smile, fake pleasantness. My life was a tatty
plastic bag, tied up with string, full of stuff that I had
accumulated along the way, stuff that I thought was
important to me. But at that moment, on that morning,
sitting on that bench in the centre of Edinburgh, I realised
that it meant nothing at all. I was nothing; I was worth
nothing and no one would miss me because no one really
knew me at all. Except him: the watcher, the killer. He and
I, we were players in a particularly violent computer
game. I was nothing but his target. I could run, I could
hide, or I could come straight out and surrender. Or I
could finish the job myself.

I was cold. I was in shock. I'd had almost no sleep. I was
sitting there on a bench wondering if I should kill myself:
really obviously, really publicly – so he would know that
I was dead; so he would leave all my loved ones alone.

Loved ones. What loved ones? My own family didn't
even know me. It was like they just gave up on Lizzie
seventeen years ago and accepted Beth instead because
she was so much simpler to handle. They loved me – if
they loved me at all – because they had to, because I was
a member of their family and custom dictated that they
should love me. Loved ones. Maybe Zoey had loved me,
a bit. But Zoey was dead. Who was there left who loved
me for me, for who they thought I was? And then I
thought about Danny. And for just a second it was like the
sun coming out.

Danny. My friend Danny. Those dark eyes; that steady
quiet voice; those strong hands. Danny, so calm, so
reassuringly dull. Danny the grown-up with the proper
job. Danny would know what to do. Danny would sort it
out. Thank God for Danny. 'I'll call Danny; that's what
I'll do.' It seemed so simple when I said it to myself. I
would call Danny and tell him everything. But not yet,
not yet. Too early. Far too early. I wasn't ready yet.

Time passed. I heard cars drive past along Princes
Street. A man painted all silver – silver clothes, silver face
– sat on the next bench along and smoked a cigarette: an
off-duty living statue preparing for the day ahead. I
wondered if it was the same one who had tried to outstare
me the other day. A woman strolled along the path, a little
terrier on the other end of the lead she held. The dog tried
to sniff me; the dog-walker pulled it away. She frowned at
me and walked on. I was aware that I was rocking to and
fro like a madwoman. I was thinking about Zoey and how
her hands were holding her insides in. I remembered how
I touched her there, how I tried to put everything back in.
The blood, everywhere. Her head, lolled back awkwardly
like that. Her eyes open and staring. And only the day
before, there she'd been on stage, funny and caustic and
totally in control. 'Now you know what it feels like,' the
note said. And I could feel it; I could feel the pain deep
inside my own stomach.

I'd have to tell Danny the full story. It was as simple as
that. I had to tell someone; I couldn't go on like this. I'd
have to tell Danny what I did all those years ago. It
wouldn't matter what he thought of me; he hated me
anyway for the way I'd treated him. Danny would know
what was best to do. He would tell me that I'd have to talk
to the police. I knew that. I would have to tell them how I
found Zoey's body. I would have to tell them about the
note, the one I found on her body. And all the other notes,
too. I'd have to explain it all; how I killed Rivers Carillo
all those years ago. I'd have to tell Danny, and then the
police. What would happen then? Was there some kind of
statute of limitations? Could they charge me with a killing
in another country seventeen years ago? Would people
have to know about it? Would my parents have to know
about what I did? What was going to happen to me?