The Sacrificial Man (37 page)

I flinched but didn’t point out that he should call me Robin. He wolfed down two crackers in rapid succession, as if he’d not eaten for a week. His haste disappointed me, as I carefully dotted crumbs from my lips. He was skittish, his body moved in lively jerks, and his eyes darted from me. We were both strained in our conversation, skating on thin ice, afraid to initiate what was pressing for us both.

He cleared his throat to speak, and my hand froze on my knife, poised to slice the cheese in two. “Alice, we need to talk.”

“Of course.” I put down the knife. “But please stop calling me Alice.”

“I won’t call you anything but Alice.” He looked shifty, his Adam’s apple rose in his neck.

“But we agreed.” I was angry. I preferred to be Robin. Alice made me think of my childhood, of a giant girl in a tiny house, of an outsized body in a Mad Hatter’s world. I stood and gathered the dirty plates.

It was all going wrong.

I began loading the dishwasher, briskly cleaning away the mess, chipping plates in my haste. When the table was wiped and everything clean I looked at the clock on the wall. It was a quarter to midnight. Pouring two large measures of Islay malt I took the unopened vial of GHB from the fridge and opened it, tipping the liquid into one of the tall glasses, using the drug instead of soda to make a long drink. I stirred it with my finger, which I licked, satisfied that the drug wasn’t detectable.

I went to the front lounge where Smith was sat looking out of the window and put my arms around his neck. “Let’s talk upstairs over a nightcap. Maybe we should make love first?” I needed to make it right between us. It was time to begin and I watched him take a swig of the whiskey. He winced, “This stuff is so salty. Good though.”

I held up my own glass in a toast. “To love.”

He clinked his glass against mine and finished his drink. I took his glass from him and went to the kitchen, pouring him another whisky and adding the last of the GHB from the opened vial. I returned to him and led the way to my bedroom.

After Smith finished his second drink, I held him tight as we fell on the bed, took him closer than if he was bound to me by rope. He pulled back, removed his glasses, looking so different without them. The skin around his weak eyes was white and perfect, like a child’s.

“God, that whiskey’s strong stuff. It’s gone straight to my head.”

I kissed him, unbuttoned his shirt, stroked my hand over his smooth chest, felt his ribs under my palm, felt his heartbeat with my fingers. Such a thin body; when Jesus died on the cross his ribs could be counted. I stroked Smith like a pianist finding a tune. I found beauty.

“I feel a bit dizzy. Must be all the alcohol,” he said, his voice already slurred as the drug coursed through his veins.

He was tense but allowed me to undress him, watching as I slipped off my knickers. We were soft and smooth, pale and clean, fitting together aesthetically, if not mechanically. The sex was awkward. His penis resisted my hand, my mouth, stubbornly flaccid.

“I’m sorry,” he said, looking towards the window. “I’m so sorry, Alice. I don’t want to die. I don’t want to be a sacrifice. I want to live.” I couldn’t breathe. I felt rage like hot blood. How dare he change his mind? What kind of fool did he take me for?

“I want to travel, Alice. You and I together!”

“Travel?” I spat the word. “Where to?”

“To all the places I’ve never been. I’ve got money. There’s nothing to stop us.” Our plan, I thought, anger overcoming me until I wanted to break bones. What about our plan?

“I’m not going back to London, Alice. I’ve got my passport; I’ve got my American Express card. Anything else we need I’ll just buy.” He was swaying, sweat started to gather on his brow.

“You planned this,” I said. “Why else have your passport?”

“For identification, when they found my body. It was the only thing with my photo in. Believe me, Alice, this is better for you too. I only changed my mind tonight. It’s a sign from God. I didn’t plan this change of heart. I planned to die. I’d even written a diary to explain why I wanted to commit suicide. I was going to leave it here to exonerate you.”

“Where is it now?”

“I posted it to a friend, on a USB. I won’t need it anymore.”

He pulled me to him, his mouth grazing my shoulder then falling slack. I could feel the band-aid on the tips of his fingers grazing my thigh. The plan must go ahead. What he’d said was only words. His actions told me that he wanted to continue, even though he was now pale and his breathing was laboured as the drug worked its magic.

“Smith… this is our dream… this is what we both wanted.”

I took him on his back, made all the motions to drive us together. When his penis was in me I felt it harden, and I knew it wasn’t too late. I looked at the bedside clock – five minutes to midnight. As my own body tensed and began its incremental steps towards the great fall, he thrust into me with a sudden hunger. I saw his teeth, his closed eyes, and closed my own. He was deep inside me when he slurred, “Alice, change your mind. Come travelling with me.”

I bit his shoulder. He still thought he could change his mind.

He pushed into me with a boy’s eagerness, oblivious to my needs. I was wooden in his embrace, and he was too inexperienced to notice or care.

“Oh, Alice,” he moaned, taking me more firmly in his arms, thrusting faster.

It was nearly midnight.

I rolled over, pulling him with me so he was on top. Suddenly poised he shuddered, “Oh God, my arm. It hurts right up my arm.” He looked ghastly, like marble, and every breath was a struggle.

I didn’t let him rest, wouldn’t let him pull away. He was grunting, close to orgasm even as his pale face twisted in pain.

“Kiss me!” I demanded, my hands holding his buttocks as he bucked into me. He was unable to do anything else but give in to the demands of his body, and his kiss was an open mouth, a gasp of pain. As he came I swallowed his scream, and felt his heart give way to palpitations.

There was a deathly stillness. He struggled, gurgling and gasping, as I pushed him off me. He was doubled in agony, his arm held straight as his whole body shuddered, his heart giving in to cardiac arrest.

“This was what you wanted, Smith, remember? To cease upon the midnight with no pain.” He coughed, struggling to breathe. A war in his chest.

“The whiskey,” he gasped, “you drugged it.”

“You were afraid, but I helped you to see our plan through. You’re glad now, aren’t you?”

There was no fear in his eyes, and when they stopped rolling I saw peace. His body shuddered with the final tremors of life. I am a woman of honour. I didn’t go back on my word, even when he’d done so. A deal was struck and I had agreed to taste him. I took the knife from under my pillow.

It wasn’t easy to lay him straight and I wasn’t so gentle as I would have liked, but his body was awkward. It was hard work to get the angle right so that my grip on the knife was firm. He was still conscious when I took the bloody blade and coaxed his shrunken penis from the pink shell of his foreskin. I held firm and cut away a slice of skin.

Who would have thought there would be so much blood? Such a small piece of meat – I must have cut a vein.

I sucked the blood. I tasted him.

It was like eating the dead skin from a scab. It was nothing. It was rubber and salt. Looking at him, I swallowed and his mouth made a shape that I believed was a smile. He was leaving me, disapearing into himself.

I took the blade to the side of his penis and in one strong motion cut across the flesh. It was swift and bloody, the white cotton sheet bloomed with red petals. My face was splattered. My cheeks were wet as if with tears. Smith’s head hung to the side, a broken toy. His eyes rolled in their sockets, and a word of air came from his mute mouth. I wanted to close his eyes, which were fixed on me, the moon reflected in his iris was our only witness, but I was afraid to touch his face, afraid that he would suddenly right himself. How could I be scared after what I’d done? I looked down at the knife where beads of blood dripped onto the bedding. I lifted my finger to my lips, tasting salt and iron. Colour drained from his face like the beach at low tide, until he turned to alabaster.

I knew he was close to death.

“You’re happy now, Smith, aren’t you?” I whispered, “This is what you wanted.”

I lay beside him and kissed his cheek, putting the knife in his hand. I had never loved him more.

I was no longer afraid. I placed my head near his heart, listened to the silence, the moon outside lighting us with her gaze. I closed my eyes, waited for his body to cool and for Mummy to come back to me. I was with her again.

My heart was finally whole.

As usual, Cate Austin is late. I’m upstairs when I hear the knock, and not yet at the top of the stairs when she knocks again. When I open the door she practically falls into the hallway. She’s full of energy and she bounds into my home, breathless. I lead her into the breakfast room, and she perches in the same place on the pine bench that she took a month before. A lifetime ago. She’s here to deliver her verdict and she looks tense, her fingers drumming on the table. She’s frowning and breathing heavily. “How are you today, Alice? Looking forward to the finale tomorrow?”

There’s something in her tone, hostility that I’ve not heard before. “I’ll feel better when I know what you’re recommending in your report.”

“Ah yes,” she says, her eyes glinting, “my report. I imagine you’re expecting a favourable conclusion. After all, our meetings have gone so well. So very smoothly. I imagine you’re dying to know what my report will say.”

“Yes, I am,” I confess, sitting opposite, “you know how much depends on it.”

“And do you think you deserve a favourable report, Alice?” Her tone is taunting, and too loud.

“I’ve attended all our appointments, I even came to your dismal office. And I’ve talked to you.”

She takes a sheaf of papers from her bag. The papers look too many to be a report. “You’ve certainly talked, Alice, that I won’t deny. And I’ve listened. You’ve had the opportunity to explain your motives and persuade me to propose an alternative to prison. You’ve killed two birds with one stone, so to speak.” There is an accusation in her narrowed eyes. I feel my colour rise. “He changed his mind, didn’t he, Alice? He didn’t want to die.”

She pushes the pile of papers across the table. On the top sheet, it says, Robin & Smith. I know immediately what it is. His diary. I knew he was keeping one though I never saw it. How the hell did she get it? I feel suddenly light, like I might faint.

I see from the rise of her chest that her heart is beating a rapid rhythm but her voice does not betray her. “You killed him anyway.”

I look at the pile of paper in front of me. I touch it with a finger, then pull away as if it’s hot. I don’t read the words, but look at Cate’s face. It’s as pale as a child’s, and I recognise something new: she’s furious with me.

“He advertised for a lover to help him die, remember?”

She breathes deeply, still maintaining her composure. “Yes, but that advert was in January. By the time he actually died he’d changed his mind. He didn’t want to die. He wanted you to travel together. He wanted to be with you.” I want her to stop, but she continues. “Read his diary, Alice. It’s all there. His doubts. That he changed his mind.” The new arrival of softness in her voice makes my limbs tense. “His illness.”

“Illness?” I have no idea what she means, though my pulse heeds the warning, begins to jog. The dull ache begins at the top of my spine and I know the headache is returning.

Now she speaks softly, every syllable urging my heart to sprint, to break into the tearing pace that I know as panic. “The tragic thing is, Alice, he was dying anyway. You didn’t know that, did you? It was ironic that you invented the story of the cancer for your parents when he actually was terminally ill. He had Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease, and maybe just a few weeks left to live. At first he thought that by choosing when to die he was taking control over the illness. Then he realised that he didn’t want to put you at risk. He’d decided to protect you. He wanted you to travel with him, to South America. He wanted to swim with dolphins. He wanted to live.”