The Jump (3 page)

She went upstairs and opened the door to Logan’s room, careful not to make any sound.

Sam was sleeping on top of Logan’s bed, hands under his cheek, face slack. Ellie went to a drawer and took out a blanket, draped it over him. She pushed his fringe away from his face, tucked a stray strand of hair behind his ear. She let the backs of her fingers rest on his cheek for a while, feeling the movement of his breathing, watching his chest rise and fall, peaceful for now.

There are no second chances.

Inchcolm Terrace was a suburban cul-de-sac like any other. Fifties-built detached houses, pebbledash, steep roofs, garages. Family homes with trampolines and scooters in the small gardens.

Ellie walked along, checking the numbers. She stopped at number 23, Sam’s place, same as all the rest. It had taken ten minutes to walk here from her house at the shore, up The Loan then nipping in to the right, easy enough to find. She’d never been up this street before, but then you wouldn’t unless you knew someone who lived here, it wasn’t a road to anywhere.

She’d checked the phone book, only one McKenna in South Queensferry. She thought about phoning but didn’t, this felt like a conversation that needed to be face to face. She wasn’t even sure what she was going to tell them about Sam, if anything. Where do you start? But she wanted to see their faces, see the family he’d come from, the people who had created and shaped him. Were they worried about him? Had he shown any of the signs of mental-health problems? Where did they think he was right now?

She dragged a hand down her face, felt the slackness of her skin, then walked through the gate and up the path. She rang the doorbell and waited. Nothing. Rang again. Silence. She looked at the neighbouring houses, wondered about curtains twitching but didn’t see any movement. She rang a third time.

She tried the front door. It opened and she leaned in.

‘Hello?’

She stepped inside. Coats were piled on the end of the banister, shoes on a low shelf unit by the door. Looked like four people, including a girl. Perfect little family unit – mum, dad, son and daughter.

She closed the door behind her.

‘Hello?’

A bowl on the hall table with car keys, small change, golf balls, Post-its, a phone charger. The stuff of life. She couldn’t picture Sam as the golfer, it must be his dad. Sanded wooden floor, an IKEA runner rug on top, she recognised it from last year’s catalogue.

She looked up the stairs. Thought about going up there, wondered which room was Sam’s, if it looked anything like Logan’s. What about the sister, was she a chintzy pink princess or old enough to be a moody emo by now?

She heard a noise, maybe a voice, from the direction of the kitchen.

‘Hello, the door was open. Is someone there?’

She crept down the hall, listening. That noise again, a grunt. She got to the kitchen doorway.

‘Holy shit.’

Lying slumped against the fridge was a man with a kitchen knife in his gut. Stocky, receding hairline, in his forties. His eyes were closed and his forehead creased with deep furrows. Blood was soaked into his white shirt and black trousers, and had pooled around him on the tiled floor. He let out a pained breath.

Ellie took two steps forward. ‘Can you hear me?’

He didn’t move or speak. His chest rose and fell, small movements.

She took another step.

The fingers on his right hand twitched. His hand lifted off the bloody floor for a moment, as if he was trying to reach for the knife, then it dropped back down with a little splash of blood.

She looked around the kitchen. No sign of any other disturbance, nothing smashed or broken. Sliding glass doors led into the back garden. They were closed, no obvious sign of a break-in.

She looked at the man. He didn’t look like a burglar. She thought about the bloodstains on Sam’s T-shirt. Looked at the knife in the man’s belly. It had a serrated edge, wooden handle, she had one similar at home.

‘Mr McKenna?’

He gave out a breathy moan.

She stood absolutely still, trying to think.

The man’s fingers twitched again and one eye opened. He looked at her, but his gaze was unfocussed. She didn’t know how conscious he was, how aware. He grunted again then his eye closed and he gave a heavy sigh, as if the effort was all too much.

Ellie heard another noise. The scrape of a key in a lock, then the front door opening, a bag being dropped on the floor.

‘I’m home.’ A woman’s voice, shouting up the stairs. ‘You lazy gits up yet?’

The man on the floor wheezed.

Ellie stepped over him, careful not to stand in the blood, and ran to the patio doors. She slid the snib up then pushed the door open just enough to squeeze through, gliding it shut behind her.

She ran to the side of the house, out of view, then climbed over a low fence of wooden slats into the neighbours’ garden. At the bottom of the garden were a couple of cooking-apple trees. She sprinted down to them and launched herself at the stone wall behind, scrambling up and over. She dropped down without looking, desperate to get away. She hoped no one was in the neighbours’ kitchen or she was spotted for sure.

She glanced around as she got her breath back. She recognised where she was, Ferrymuir Gait. Over the embankment across the road was the A90, heading to the bridge. Further round the road she was standing on were the visitor centre and the offices for the new bridge. Back the other way was the cemetery where Logan would’ve been buried if they hadn’t decided to have him cremated and scattered in the Forth. Everything so close by, everyone in the Ferry living in each other’s pockets, the road and the railway and the bridges slicing through it all.

She waited and listened. After a few minutes she heard a siren, and imagined the ambulance arriving.

Now she had her bearings she knew there was a quicker way home, past the visitor centre and down the access road, the same road she’d walked with Sam earlier today. She headed in that direction.

She let herself in the back door and went through the rooms, checking Ben wasn’t there. She hadn’t come directly back to the house, instead ducking left off Hopetoun Road on to Shore Road, then cutting down to the beach, avoiding the police station two minutes away from the front of her house.

The house was silent. She listened for sirens from the cop shop. Nothing. You hardly heard them here, the Ferry wasn’t exactly a hotbed of crime. No sound from upstairs either. She went up and stopped outside the door to Logan’s room. Rested her fingers against the chunky wooden letters that spelled out his name. She ran her hand from the L to the O and slowly onwards, stopping with her fingers pressed against the N. The sign had been on Logan’s door for ten years, and he’d moaned about it being childish when he hit his teens, but he never took it down and neither did she.

There was a rough splinter of wood at the end of the N, it had been like that for as long as Ellie could remember. She deliberately snagged her thumb on it, feeling the skelf push against her skin. She remembered for the hundredth time that day that her son was dead, that she would never see him again, then she breathed and pushed the door open.

Sam was still asleep, blanket pulled over him. Ellie sat on the edge of the bed and ran her hands through his hair, brushing against his ear.

He moaned in his sleep.

She moved up the bed, still stroking his hairline along his forehead, behind his ear, letting her hand linger on the nape of his neck for a moment, before starting again. She breathed in through her nose, caught the smell of Lynx and urine and something underneath, his unique scent.

He was coming round. She didn’t want to disturb him, but she had a stronger urge to hear him speak, to hear his voice and reassure him. He looked like he was having a good dream, and she wondered how that was possible. She tried to remember when she’d last had a good dream.

His eyes fluttered open and he looked at her, confused.

‘Shhh,’ she said. ‘You’re safe.’

She saw it on his face as he began to recognise where he was and who he was with, as he remembered what had happened. The confusion turning to distress, panic.

She was still stroking his head, but he pushed her hand away and tried to sit up.

‘It’s OK,’ she said. Her hand lay limp on the bedclothes where it had landed. She looked at it as if it wasn’t part of her.

Sam seemed more together than he’d been earlier, more aware of his situation. He went into the pocket of his hoodie and pulled out his phone. Checked for messages with a trembling hand, then pushed call and held it to his ear.

Ellie could hear it from where she sat. She prayed for it to go to voicemail. Five rings, then it did. Sam hung up without leaving a message.

‘Who are you trying to get hold of?’ she said.

He shook his head, trying to drive the sleep away.

‘Is it your little sister?’ Ellie said, thinking about the coats and shoes in the hallway earlier.

He stared at her. ‘How do you know I have a little sister?’

She tried to put her hand on his, but he slipped away from her touch.

‘I just want to make sure you’re OK,’ she said.

‘How do you know about Libby?’

‘Libby, that’s a lovely name. How old is she?’

‘I asked you a question.’ He shuffled back against the headboard. ‘Who are you?’

‘You know who I am,’ Ellie said. ‘Do you remember being on the bridge earlier?’

‘Of course.’

‘I found you. Brought you back here to get you sorted out.’

He glanced at his phone then rubbed his face. ‘How do you know about my sister?’

She looked at him, held his gaze. ‘I’ve been to your house.’

‘What?’ He seemed younger than his age suddenly, had the scared look of a toddler in trouble.

‘I was worried. You fell asleep. I wanted to get in contact with your parents, let them know you were safe.’

He rubbed at his fist with his other hand. ‘And?’

She shook her head. ‘I didn’t. At least . . .’

‘What?’

She took his hand. ‘Why don’t you tell me what happened at home?’

He pulled away from her and sat up, swinging his legs off the bed in a tangle of blanket. ‘I need to speak to my sister.’

She put a hand on his thigh, felt his muscle through the material of her son’s jeans. ‘Wait, I can help. Tell me what happened and I’ll help you find Libby.’

He looked at her hand on his leg. ‘I can’t.’

She stood up, positioning herself between him and the door, arms folded across her chest. Not that it would do any good if he wanted to leave.

‘Let me tell you what I found,’ she said. ‘I went to your house, 23 Inchcolm Terrace. There was no answer but the door was unlocked, so I went in. I found a man in the kitchen with a knife in him. I think that man is your dad. He was still alive. I heard your mum come in the front door and I ran out back. A few minutes later I heard an ambulance arrive, then I came home.’

He looked down at his lap and played with the zip on his hoodie. Ellie thought about the bloody T-shirt underneath.

‘Now your turn,’ Ellie said.

‘Do you think he’s still alive now?’ Sam said, his head staying down.

‘I don’t know. I think so. He opened his eyes when I was there.’

‘He saw you?’

Ellie nodded. ‘But I don’t know how aware he was of anything around him.’

Sam sat in silence.

‘Is he your dad?’ Ellie said.

A nod.

‘Who attacked him?’

Sam rubbed his hands.

‘Was it you?’ Ellie said.

Sam closed his eyes, pinched at the bridge of his nose.

‘I saw blood on your T-shirt.’

He nodded again.

‘Was it an accident?’

Sam raised his head and looked at her. ‘No.’

Ellie thought for a moment. Sam looked at his phone.

‘Is this to do with Libby?’ Ellie said.

He picked up his phone and tried to call her again. Still no answer. He nodded as he threw the phone on to the bed.

‘Were you protecting her?’ Ellie said.

Sam hesitated. ‘I was trying to.’

Just then the front door opened downstairs. Ben was home. Sam tensed up at the sound and Ellie put her hands out to placate him.

‘It’s just my husband,’ she said. ‘He doesn’t know you’re here, doesn’t know anything about this.’

A voice from downstairs. ‘Ellie?’

Ellie walked across the room, placed her hand on the door handle. ‘Stay in here, it’s safe. I’ll go and speak to him. I won’t tell him about you.’ She looked at the floor. ‘Don’t walk about or we’ll hear you downstairs.’

She opened the door, looking at Sam. ‘OK?’

‘OK.’

Ben spoke as she entered the kitchen.

‘Something’s happened.’

He’d already flipped open the laptop on the table and was typing in their password.

Logan1.

Ellie’s hands had typed that password into countless computers and online accounts over the years, she could hit the sequence of keys every time at speed without thinking or looking. A muscle memory, completely subconscious. If she slowed down to think about it, it felt clumsy and awkward, and she would get it wrong. Like glimpsing something in the corner of your eye that disappeared if you tried to look at it directly.

Ben fired up Twitter. He was much more internet savvy than she was, all that time in obscure conspiracy chatrooms and the like. Ellie thought about Logan’s Facebook page, felt a familiar itch to check in and see if anyone had posted anything. Then she thought about Sam upstairs. When she got a moment she would look him up on Facebook, his sister too, find out all about his life, family, friends, whatever it was that had brought him to her. She looked at the ceiling. How many inches away were his feet? The ceiling was covered in grease and cooking stains, cobwebs strung across the corners. Who ever cleaned their kitchen ceiling?

Ben was typing away. Ellie didn’t do Twitter, didn’t understand the appeal. Just lots of celebrities showing off, and angry, lonely people shouting into the void. Every second news story these days was about people being abusive on Twitter, misogyny, racism, all the bitter bile of humanity in one handy place.

‘What’s happened?’ she said.

‘There’s police everywhere,’ Ben said.

She looked over his shoulder.

He typed in: ‘Why are there police all over South Queensferry?’

Then he searched #queensferry #police.

He turned to her. ‘I was flyering up The Loan when three cop cars went bombing past, sirens and lights on. By the time I got to Kirkliston Road one of them was parked across Viewforth Place blocking the street. I spoke to the officer but he wouldn’t tell me anything, just that there was an incident and they’d cordoned off the area. So I went round the back way, but Loch Place and Lovers Lane were blocked too. That means about ten streets are closed. That’s some incident.’

He didn’t wait for a reaction from her, but turned back to the laptop, his conspiracy brain kicking in. Before the jump, Ben had not exactly been a passive acceptor of authority, but since Logan died he didn’t trust anything that anyone in power told him. Watching the news, he provided a running commentary on the lies they were being told and why it was exactly what they wanted you to think, how big corporations or government or the police were covering up dark secrets, misdirecting public attention, treating us like idiots. Ellie had some sympathy for the point of view but he’d gone too deep. You had to trust someone or something at some point, didn’t you, or else how do you go about living in a society? Of course, how you went about living was a question she hadn’t yet found her own answer to.

Ben pointed at the screen. ‘Look at this.’

He scrolled down through the feed. A handful of people had posted.

‘What do you think?’ Ben said.

‘I have no idea,’ Ellie said.

Ben clicked Refresh again and again. One or two new posts appeared but no new info. Ellie thought about the people in white suits going over the garden, the house, the kitchen. Her fingerprints on the doorbell, the front door handle and the glass of the patio. She tried to remember if she’d touched anything else. What about the neighbours, had anyone seen her walking down the street earlier, going up the path, opening the front door? Or running out the back and over the fence? Had they seen Sam or Libby running from the house earlier? Was there CCTV around there, or neighbourhood watch? She thought of the footage of Logan on the bridge. She thought about being up there this morning with Sam, there would be footage of that too. We are always being watched.

The Twitter feed began to fill up with news flashes. Local STV and BBC services were reporting an incident, but they were an hour behind the action, as always. Then Ellie read something that made her fists tighten.

Cop killer. This was instantly picked up by other tweeters, the network going at it.

The speed of it all terrified her.

Ben was on Refresh.

Refresh, refresh, refresh.

More opinions, more facts, more bullshit and nonsense, teeming into the ether like an airborne virus it was impossible to escape.

She turned away from the laptop and went to the window, looked out at the Forth. The sea was a constant. Changing all the time, yes, but somehow also reliable. It took her son and it would take others too. If sea levels rose, this house would be one of the first to go, submerged beneath all that implacable calm. She pictured water pouring in through the doors and windows of her home, imagined being swept up in it, the taste of salt on her lips as she swallowed it down. Maybe a handful of molecules from Logan’s ashes slipping down her throat.

The sea had almost taken Sam this morning but Ellie had stopped it, she challenged the water and won. She was scratching at her most recent tattoo. She pushed her sleeve up and looked at the patch of red skin. Maybe it would never heal, maybe it would stay raw and bloody forever.

‘What do you think?’ Ben said.

She clenched her teeth and turned away from the bridges.

‘About what?’ she said.

He pointed at the laptop. ‘All this.’

She shrugged. ‘I don’t think anything.’

She heard something, a movement upstairs maybe. She went over to the kettle and switched it on to cover the noise, glanced up at the ceiling once Ben had turned back to the screen.

The air filled with the hiss and rumble of water boiling. She went over to the washing machine. The load from earlier had finished, Sam’s jeans and pants inside. She could see them bunched in the bottom of the half-empty drum. She wondered about forensics and evidence. She found herself reaching over to push the door button on the washing machine, force of habit, not wanting to leave the sodden clothes in there to go mouldy. She pulled her hand away from the button and turned.

She should go to the police station round the corner and give Sam up, that was the right thing to do. Then again. She tried to work out the different paths the future could take, depending on what she did right now. The multiverse theory. But there were too many variables, too many potential futures, she couldn’t get her head round it. She just needed everything to settle down, needed time and space to think it all through, then she could be sure about making the correct decision.

Meantime she had to keep it a secret, even from Ben. Before Logan died she could never have imagined keeping secrets from her husband, they were such a tight unit, best friends as much as lovers. Their relationship didn’t feel like either of those things now. She didn’t want to keep this a secret from him but the truth was that it would be easy. Their lines of communication had been eroded so much it made her want to weep right here in her kitchen, in the house they shared. But mostly, right now, she wanted him out the house so that she could deal with everything at her own pace.

Ben shook his head. ‘Mental.’ Refresh, refresh. ‘Doesn’t look as if there’s much new info coming out.’ He straightened up.

‘Why did you come back?’ Ellie said.

‘What?’

She pointed at the laptop. ‘Couldn’t you have checked all that on your phone?’

‘I needed to get more of these.’ He pointed at the pile of flyers on the far corner of the table. ‘I ran out quicker than I thought. Still got a fair bit of leafleting to do.’

The kettle had boiled.

‘Don’t you want to stay for a cuppa?’

He looked at her. ‘I can’t believe you’re not more interested in this thing up at Inchcolm Terrace.’

She shook her head. ‘We don’t know any of the facts. I prefer to wait until I know what’s happened before I get outraged about anything.’

‘But someone’s been stabbed, ten minutes up the road,’ he said. ‘A cop, that’s crazy.’

She slung a green teabag into a mug, poured in the water, felt the steam swirl around her face.

‘Maybe,’ she said.

‘Don’t you want to know what happened, the details?’

She shook her head as she dipped the teabag in and out of the mug. ‘Dwelling on the details doesn’t make any difference to the truth, does it?’

She felt him looking at her as she kept her head down. It made her uneasy, and she couldn’t believe that being watched by her husband, the man who was supposed to be the love of her life, made her feel like that.

‘You’re talking about Logan now,’ Ben said.

She sighed as she carried the teabag to the bin, her other hand under the spoon to stop drips on the tiles.

‘I’m always talking about Logan, Ben. Everything is always about Logan, you know that. You know what it’s like. It’s always there, in every single word that comes out of our mouths.’

He came towards her and she felt the muscles in her neck and back tighten as he stroked her arm. His hand was right where the new tattoo was. She wondered if that was deliberate, if he was trying to hurt her. No, just an accident, his touch was meant to be supportive. He was rubbing at the ink under the surface of her skin, and she felt like she deserved the discomfort. She flinched but didn’t move away.

‘I know what you mean,’ he said. ‘It’s just . . .’

He squeezed her shoulder, more pain under her clothes, then he placed his lips against her temple, kept them there for a second. For a moment his bulk was reassuring, the smell of him, and she felt a remnant of the gravitational pull that used to draw her to him.

He pushed himself away, checked Twitter one last time then closed the laptop. Picked up the flyers from the table and put them in his bag.

‘I’d better get going,’ he said.

She stirred her tea. ‘OK.’

He hesitated a moment, silence between them, then left.