The Society Of Dirty Hearts (13 page)

The afternoon swept by in the same way as the morning. Julian found himself almost reluctant to stop when the day came to an end. His dad poked his head into the room, looking over his work without comment. “So how have you enjoyed your first day?” he asked with a disingenuous smile

Julian made himself smile right back. I know what you’re trying to do, he felt like saying, but you’re wrong if you think a few shitty jobs will send me running back to university. He didn’t want to give his dad the satisfaction of even that answer, though. “Better than I expected.”

“You want a lift home?”

“No thanks.”

Julian caught a bus into town. He tried his best not to think of Mia. Still, he couldn’t help but feel relieved to note that no posters with her face on them had gone up in place of Joanne Butcher. After grabbing a burger, he went to a pub where no one he knew was likely to be. He drank the evening away alone, staggering home at closing time to sleep it off.  

At breakfast the following morning, Julian’s mum asked the same question his dad had, and he gave the same reply. “Better than I expected.” Instead of a suit, he wore jeans and a t-shirt to work. He didn’t bother asking his dad what he wanted him to do, he just went straight to the ‘Cripples’ room. He actually felt relieved to get in there and close the door, close out everything. After work, he headed straight for the pub and a long swallow of beer.

Two more days passed in this monotonous cycle – wake, slide from beneath sweat-dampened sheets, eat, work, eat, work, eat, drink, sleep, dream. He stopped going outside at lunch. He just stayed in the ‘Cripples’ room all day. Alone in that dim, rumbling place, he felt distant and detached from the world, as if in a trance. If anyone looked in on him – which they rarely did – he’d turn to them blinking and dazed, like someone roused suddenly from deep sleep.

On Friday, on his way to the pub he bumped into Kyle. He thought about dodging out of sight, but it was too late. “Hey, Jules,” called Kyle, rushing over to him, eyes wide with surprise. “What you still doing around here, bro? I thought you’d gone back to uni.”

“I’m not going back.”

“Seriously?”

“Seriously.”

“Why?”

Julian shrugged. “I hated the course. Didn’t like the place much, either.”

Kyle’s surprise gave way to incredulity. “How can you not like London? London’s fucking wild.”

“Guess I’m just a small town boy.”

“But you couldn’t wait to get away from here.”

“Things have changed.”

“What things?”

Julian shrugged again. The last thing he wanted was to get into all that with Kyle. All he wanted was a beer to numb his mind, push reality as far away as possible. “Just things.”

“So, like, what’re you doing with yourself?”

“Working for my dad.”

“No way, dude, I thought you hated the factory.”

“Yeah, well, like I said, things have changed.” Julian sighed, his head aching from the effort of conversation.

“You can fucking say that again. Jesus, you used to say you’d rather do just about anything than work there.” Kyle motioned along the street with his chin. “I’m heading down The Cut. Why don’t you come along? You look like you could do with a beer or five.”

“Nah, I’ve got stuff to do.”

“Are you sure? If you change your mind you know where to find me.” Kyle grinned. “It’ll be like old times with you back here, bro.”

Julian was about to hurry on his way, when Kyle added, “Hey, you heard about that crazy bitch, Mia Bradshaw?”

Julian felt a sharp, tight pain encircling his heart as, suddenly, all the images of Mia lying dead that he’d been blocking out for the past few days ripped through him. His voice seemed far away, as he asked, “What about her?”

“No one knows where she is. She’s taken off somewhere with some guy – at least, that’s the rumour I’ve heard.”

“From who?”

“A girl I know who knows someone she goes to school with. You okay? You’ve gone really pale.”

Julian nodded. “What guy?”

“Dunno. All I know is she’s not been in school all week. Maybe the rumour’s true. Or maybe she’s gone the same way as that stupid bitch friend of hers. Either way, if you ask me, it’s no big loss.”

Julian clenched his jaw, resisting an urge to smash his fist into Kyle’s face. With a shake of his head, he turned away from him and started walking. Kyle called something after him, but he wasn’t listening. His head was swirling with all the things he wanted to say to Tom Benson. His gaze swept along the darkening street at shop windows, bus-stops and lampposts. Suddenly, the absence of posters with Mia’s face on them didn’t seem hopeful, it seemed bewildering, sinister even. He took out his mobile phone, hands trembling as he searched for the detective’s number. As the dial tone rang in his ear, he took a breath, tried to compose his reeling thoughts. “You were wrong,” he blurted into the phone the instant Tom Benson answered, his voice sharp, accusatory.

“Who’s this?”

“Julian Harris.”

“Ah. Yes I know I was.”

“So what’re you doing about it?”

“Believe me, Julian, everything we can.”

“Then why haven’t I seen any appeals for information or anyone searching the forest, like with Joanne Butcher? Why haven’t you hauled me down the station?”

“This is a completely different case.”

“Different how?”

“Well, for starters we’ve good reason to believe Mia Bradshaw’s run away.”

“What reason? A rumour?”

“Something a bit more substantial than that. I can’t discuss the specifics of an ongoing investigation. What I can say is that we’re keeping this one out of the newspapers. This is an extremely sensitive matter, considering all that’s happened recently. So I’d appreciate it if you’d keep this to yourself for the time being. And as for hauling you down the station…” There was a meaningful pause, before Tom Benson continued, “You didn’t keep anything from me, did you?”

“No.”

“So what would be the point? I’d simply be wasting precious man-hours that should go into finding Mia Bradshaw.”

Julian had no reply to that. He recognised the sound of the detective inhaling through his nose. “You remember what we spoke about before?” said Tom Benson.

“Of course I do.”

“Good, because I’m sticking my neck out for you, Julian. Don’t make me regret it.”

Am I supposed to be grateful? Julian felt like retorting. Tom Benson seemed to have Mia, his and the town’s best interests at heart, but there was something about the business that made him feel used and manipulated. Remembering the red car that’d seemed to follow his dad’s car a few mornings back, another thought occurred to him. Maybe the detective was playing him. Maybe all that stuff about protecting him and the factory was a load of bollocks. Maybe the real reason Tom Benson hadn’t hauled him down the station was because he was waiting to see if he’d lead him to Mia. Julian glanced around, half-expecting to see the same car lurking nearby, but the road was empty.

His face faraway in thought, Julian made his way to the pub. His beer sat untouched as, over and over, his thoughts followed the same track – I should’ve never listened to that fucking policeman. I’ve got to do something. But what? What can I do? “You can get up off your arse and start looking for her,” he muttered at himself, standing to leave.

The curtain of dusk had fallen low, but the streetlamps hadn’t yet come on. Julian glanced about for a taxi. His gaze locked on a car parked further along the street – a red car. But was it the same car? It was hard to tell in the gloom. Squinting, he slowly approached it. His head snapped forward as something hit him hard from behind. He fell over, instinctively flinging out his hands to break his fall. Hands grabbed him and rolled him over. A hollowed-out face and shaved head swam into focus. Wolfish teeth leered at him. “What the fuck have you done to my sister?” demanded their owner.

“Nothing.” Pain lanced through Julian’s neck as he tried to sit up. A whole galaxy of stars burst in front of his eyes when Jake Bradshaw knocked him back down with a punch to the jaw.

“Fuckin’ liar!”

“It’s the truth.”

Jake raised his fist for another punch, but a shout from somewhere nearby drew his attention. Like a startled wild thing, he straightened and sprinted away. “Wait, I need to talk to you,” Julian gasped, fighting off waves of dizziness. A second later two men’s faces loomed into his line of sight.

“You okay?” asked one of them, reaching to help him to his feet.

“Yes,” answered Julian, swaying a little, licking his lip and tasting blood. After a moment, he thought to look for the red car and saw that it was gone. He thanked the men and staggered to a taxi rank, wondering who’d put Jake Bradshaw onto him. Most likely, he realised, it was Weasel or his girlfriend. During the taxi ride, his eyes scanned the streets constantly for Mia, without hope. By the time he got home, the grogginess had cleared, but the pain in his jaw and neck remained. His mum was in bed; his dad was asleep on the couch. He took some painkillers, quietly lifted his dad’s car keys from the coffee-table and left the house. The fact that Mia’s brother didn’t know where she was had brought home to him even more sharply that she might be beyond finding. But that didn’t matter to him anymore. All that mattered was that he tried to find her, and kept trying as long as he could. And fuck Tom Benson, fuck the future, fuck anything or anyone that got between him and his search.

He drove to the crossroads where he’d crashed, and followed the road to the edge of town. He didn’t see the black Merc, didn’t see anything that struck him as suspicious, all he saw was row after row of neat suburban houses, then fields and the forest edge. He cruised around aimlessly for a while, before heading out of town to the bridge. He scrambled down the bank under the eaves of the huge steel and concrete structure. There was almost no daylight left, so he squirted fluid from the same can Mia had used over the sooty remains and held a lighted match to them. In the light of the flames, he studied his surroundings. He didn’t know what he expected to find, but there was some profound connection between Mia and the place. He felt sure of it. And he felt sure, too, that if he could find out what that connection was it would bring him a step closer to finding her.

Julian noticed something at the base of one of the bridge’s concrete feet. A small, multicoloured Indian-style purse. Inside was a tenner, some loose change and a school identity card with Mia’s unsmiling face on it. He stared at it a moment, hardly breathing, before returning it to the purse. Looking to see if there was anything else of hers there, he spotted words scrawled on the bridge – words that that seemed to confirm the dreadful fear his heart was already sinking under the weight of. They read ‘Mia Bradshaw, May twentieth, two thousand and ten. R.I.P.’. The day after he’d last seen her. “Oh God,” he murmured.

Hesitantly, as if afraid what might be waiting for him there, Julian approached the water’s edge. The river was its usual inscrutable self. He tried to imagine what drowning would feel like – the water sliding over you like an icy blanket, the bursting lungs, the obliteration of consciousness, of everything. He pictured Mia amongst the sludge and weeds at the river bottom, fish nibbling her flesh. Swallowing a thickness in his throat, he phoned Tom Benson. “You got it wrong again,” he said, trembling between anger and tears. “Mia hasn’t run away. She’s thrown herself in the river.”

“What? How do you know that?”

“I should never have listened to you. I knew you were wrong all along. I fucking knew it!”

“Calm down, Julian. Where are you?”

“The High Bridge.”

“Stay there. I’ll be there soon as I can.”

Julian made his way back up to the road. He took out the ID card again. “I’m so sorry, Mia,” he said, his voice choked with shame. Tears ran down his face. He swiped them away when Tom Benson pulled up alone, and brandished the card accusingly at him. “I found this under the bridge. And there’s something else down there too.”

Tom Benson took the card and frowned at it. “Show me.”

They clambered down the bank, Julian lighting the way with a torch the detective handed him. Tom Benson studied the writing in silence for a full minute, as if trying to decide on its authenticity, before turning the same scrutinising gaze on Julian. “How did you find this?”

“I came here with Mia a couple of times. This place seemed to mean something to her.”

“Oh this place meant something to her alright. This is where her mother died.” The detective traced a line with his finger from the bridge’s railings to the water. “She jumped. She was only fifteen.”

“Fifteen,” Julian parroted, shaking his head as the grim symmetry of it all became clear to him. “What happens now?”

“We’ll drag the river, see what we find.”

“You really think Mia’s killed herself?”

“Looks like it. I can’t keep you out of this anymore, I’m afraid. I’ll need a statement.”

Julian followed the detective up the bank, his legs heavy as wooden posts. He suddenly felt bone tired, as if he’d grown old under the dusty, graffiti-scarred eaves of the bridge. Fifteen, he kept thinking, fif-fucking-teen. He gave his statement mechanically, then asked, “If she’s in there, will you find her?”

Tom Benson shrugged. “The current’s strong here. As I recall, her mother surfaced after nearly a month, a good thirty miles downstream.”

Something about that shrug sparked Julian’s anger again, but he said nothing. He was too drained for recriminations. All he wanted to do was sleep, blank everything for a few hours. “Can I go now?”

“Yes, but don’t go too far. I’ll probably need to talk to you again.”

Julian gave the river a lingering glance, before returning to his car. He didn’t drive home. He didn’t want to have to explain to his dad why he’d taken the car. He drove to the forest and, wrapped in its silence and secrecy, slid into an uneasy, dream-wracked sleep.

Chapter 12

Julian awoke long before dawn to a gnawing pain, not in any one place, but all over and all through his being. She was nothing to you, nothing at all, he tried to tell himself. But it was no good. Mia had been something to him – something he didn’t understand, but something nonetheless. She’d felt that nameless connection, too, and reached out to him – consciously or subconsciously – for help. And he’d failed her – and, in doing so, failed himself.