Wake Wood (3 page)

And that’s why he’d never forgiven himself. While he’d been kissing Louise’s breasts, thighs and mouth, thinking only of his own and Louise’s satisfaction, Alice had stopped outside the massive wooden gates that walled off his surgery and the yard in front of it.

He’d relived the sequence of events so often it had entered his nightmares. Him grabbing his trousers,
thrusting
them on, zipping them as he ran, charging down the stairs barefoot, out through the door into the yard. Seeing the gate ajar. Rushing in and finding the dog’s pen open and the dog worrying and tearing at Alice’s bloodied, inert body. Him fighting the dog, pushing the animal aside.

Carrying Alice out of the pen and locking the dog in, so he could deal with it later.

Scooping up and holding what was left of his daughter close to his chest, desperately willing strength and life into her broken body. He hadn’t needed to look at Alice’s face or into her eyes, or check her vital signs. He’d already known. But his mind had refused to accept the evidence of the images that had rotated in a kaleidoscope of horror around him.

Louise talking at speed into her mobile phone. Blood pouring from Alice’s head and facial wounds, soaking his chest, flooding on to the ground. More blood dripping from minor wounds on Alice’s hands. One of her shoes lying stained and abandoned in the yard. Such a small, inconsequential thing given the trauma of the moment; but he’d noted it, along with the bite marks and imprint of teeth that marred his daughter’s neck, legs and frail body. She’d been plastered in blood and tissue mixed with the dog’s saliva.

But worst of all, her throat, torn wide open, her carotid artery severed. Still dripping blood.

Charging out of the yard holding Alice in his arms, heading towards blue flashing lights. The raucous, head-and-ear-splitting din of sirens. He’d run towards them wanting help. His mind still refusing to accept the
evidence
of his eyes, right up until the moment cool, dry, capable, latex-gloved hands tried to wrest Alice from him.

He’d refused to hand his daughter over. Curling his body around hers, he’d knelt on the pavement, hugging her, keeping her close, willing her to be alive again.

Because he hadn’t been able to bear the thought of losing her.

Not to anyone. Not even to Louise, who’d crouched beside him, her tears falling on his arm, diluting Alice’s blood.

That morning had marked the beginning of his nightmare. He’d relived it every second of every day since. And now –
now
– he wanted it to end.

But was he brave enough to finish what he’d begun?

AFTER ALICE’S DEATH
, Patrick felt as though he’d entered a surreal, grey-tinged world where nothing was real and nothing mattered. What was the point of eating … speaking … moving … sleeping … breathing … when everything and everyone, even those he loved the most, would disappear into the black void of death?

No longer capable of feeling anything except the all-consuming pain of Alice’s loss, he and Louise remained side by side purely from habit. Together, yet separate, rarely communicating unless necessity forced them to, they drifted through bleak days and nights where everyone wore sad expressions and spoke in hushed tones.

All he and, he sensed, Louise wanted was to be left alone to grieve and remember, yet they were forced to make decisions.

Alice had gone from their lives for ever, but her remains had to be dealt with. What kind of funeral did they want? Did he and Louise want a grave? Or cremation and scattered ashes? A private or public affair? Open to all comers or invitation only?

Unable to bear the thought of destroying what little they had left of their daughter, Patrick decided on a
grave
. If Louise wanted to cremate Alice’s body she didn’t voice her opinion. He hoped his decision would end the need for conversation, as well as give him and Louise a physical place where they could mourn Alice. But there were more questions, so many more.

Did they want floral tributes or donations in Alice’s memory that could be used to create a more lasting and charitable memorial? The service – humanist or religious? And if religious, which denomination? Then there were hymns and music to be chosen. And even when the service had been decided there was the grave itself – did they want to mark it with a monumental sculpture or simple headstone?

The smallest of steps involved making a choice. Patrick began answering ‘yes’ or ‘no’ without listening to the questions, simply because he didn’t want to have to think or utter another word.

The funeral director was professional and sympathetic; family and friends supportive. But Patrick didn’t want professional advice, sympathy or support. All he wanted was Alice, beautiful, alive and well again, as she’d been on the morning of her ninth birthday, before she’d left the house. But that was the one thing he couldn’t have.

And still everything in his life – and, he suspected, Louise’s – revolved around Alice. Even the marble angel they picked out to mark Alice’s grave had been chosen because it resembled their daughter.

Although he wished he could be buried alongside Alice, Patrick survived his daughter’s funeral. Afterwards, he
recollected
it only as a series of disconnected images, most of them hazy.

Alice lying pale and still in the white wood coffin they had chosen, covered by a pristine white silk and lace shroud; the worst of her injuries concealed by the undertaker’s make-up that had transformed her lively, beautiful face into a grotesque mask.

Louise signing the pink card she attached to the heart-shaped floral tribute of pink and white rosebuds they placed on Alice’s coffin.

To our darling Alice, all our love now and ever. Mum and Dad
.

Riding in the back of the mourners’ car, following the hearse that carried Alice’s coffin to the church and later the cemetery. Shaking the hands of the seemingly endless stream of people who attended her funeral. Standing around in the hotel room where a buffet was served afterwards, making small talk to friends and relations, unable to meet Louise’s eye for fear of breaking down.

Worst of all, returning home to a house so empty it echoed. Every room he walked into held heartbreaking reminders of Alice. The book of children’s poetry carelessly discarded on the sofa where she’d last read it. Her coat still hanging on the rack in the hall. Her shoes on ‘her’ shelf in the cupboard under the stairs. Her toothbrush in the lion mug on the bathroom windowsill. And when he went to the window to look out at the garden, the sight of a football on the lawn, abandoned after their last game together, brought tears to his eyes.

Louise hadn’t touched Alice’s bedroom since that last morning. Her pyjamas lay where she’d thrown them on to her unmade bed. Her pillow still bore the imprint of her head. Her shelves were filled with her toys and the hamster in its cage.

Patrick took to waking in the early hours, mouth dry, heart thundering, blood coursing around his veins; believing he was lost in a nightmare. But one look at Louise’s face, tear-stained even in sleep, was enough to return him to cold reality. He began to make what soon became nightly trips to Alice’s room.

Their daughter was gone – for ever. He would never see her again, but there at least he could sit … and remember.

Practicalities dictated that life must go on. He and Louise needed a roof over their heads, food on the table, petrol for their cars; his surgery expenses had to be met. The mortgage and bills must be paid, which meant he had to work. Sick animals needed to be doctored, their pain assuaged.

Patrick returned to work a week after Alice’s funeral and discovered that life was a little more bearable when he was occupied, although Alice was always in his thoughts. He saw her image wherever he went. He couldn’t escape her. Nor did he want to.

It was different for Louise. She had given up work – and gladly – after Alice’s birth, and now she wouldn’t countenance his suggestion that she look for a temporary position to fill the void in her life. Without Alice to care for, she sank into a depression that culminated in indifference to her surroundings and to Patrick. Within
a
month, she retreated to a place where he could no longer reach her.

When one evening he returned from his surgery to the house – he hadn’t been able to think of it as ‘home’ since Alice’s death – three months after they’d buried Alice, to find the place cold and in darkness yet again, his breakfast dishes unwashed in the kitchen sink, and no sign of another breakfast or lunch having been eaten or an evening meal prepared, he went in search of Louise.

He knew where he’d find her. Since their return from Alice’s funeral she’d haunted their daughter’s bedroom by day, just as he haunted it by night. He left the landing light on and walked into the gloom. Louise was curled on the floor, her head resting on Alice’s pillows, surrounded by Alice’s toys, her arms wrapped tightly around Alice’s pyjamas. The turquoise pyjamas he knew Louise hadn’t washed since Alice had worn them last.

He braced himself for an argument. For the first time in his married life he’d made a life-changing decision without consulting Louise. But he’d done it to protect his own sanity as much as hers.

‘We have to move out of this house and away from here, Louise,’ he began forcefully.

‘No!’ Louise’s face was streaked with tears he knew she was unaware of shedding. ‘Here, I’m close to Alice—’

‘No, you’re not.’ He felt a brute for interrupting and contradicting her. ‘Alice isn’t here. She’ll never be here again,’ he added savagely. ‘All that’s here is a museum –
a
shrine you’ve made of her belongings. Clothes she’ll never wear again. Toys she’ll never play with. You’re treating them as if they’re relics. And that’s not healthy.’ He knelt beside Louise and cupped her face in his hands, forcing her to look at him. ‘Don’t you see, Louise? We have to leave this house and this city. Make a fresh start where no one knows us, or remembers Alice or what happened to her … to us.’

‘No.’ She silently mouthed the word.

‘If we stay here we’ll both go mad,’ he prophesied.

She shook her head. He knew she didn’t want to think about leaving the house, much less listen to the plans he’d made. But he persevered.

‘I applied for a job, helping a disabled veterinary in a small country town, Wake Wood. I went there today for an interview and had a good look round. It’s a pretty place,’ he elaborated. ‘Surrounded by woods and fields. It’ll be a different kind of work from what I’ve been doing here. A challenge, treating more farm animals than pampered pets. There’s a pharmacy in the town. It’s been closed for a while because they had no one qualified to take it over. We could take a lease on the shop. Buy it, even. You could work again …’

‘I can’t leave this house. I can’t, so please don’t ask me to.’ It was the longest sentence she’d spoken since Alice’s death.

‘I’ve been offered the job and I’ve already given my word that I’ll take it,’ he said flatly.

‘You’re leaving?’ Her eyes were dark, bruised with misery.

‘We’re leaving, Louise. Together. I start in a month.’

‘How could you …?’ She started crying. Silent tears that brought the realisation that he could feel something besides the pain of Alice’s loss after all.

‘I had no choice, Louise. This house and its memories are killing both of us.’

‘But this house … your surgery …’

‘I talked to an estate agent when I came back this afternoon,’ he cut in impatiently. ‘He’s had an enquiry from a veterinary looking to set up here. If we sell this house and my surgery we’ll raise enough to buy a cottage I saw in Wake Wood and the freehold of the pharmacy. Prices are lower there than here. You’ll love the cottage, Louise. It’s everything we dreamed of when we were in university. It’s old, big enough to be called rambling, with ten rooms, nooks, crannies, and the original fireplaces. It has a huge garden, outbuildings, and it’s surrounded by trees—’

‘No.’ She was vehement.

‘Louise.’ He continued to hold her head.

‘No.’ Her voice dropped to an almost inaudible whisper.

‘If we don’t move out of here we’ll both go crazy.’

‘Alice—’

‘Alice will always be in our hearts and our memories,’ he broke in. ‘Nothing can change that.’

‘We’ll know no one in this town.’

‘It’s called Wake Wood,’ he reminded her. ‘And that’s the attraction of the place. We’ll make new friends. You’ll like Arthur, my new partner. He introduced me to some of the locals. They’re kind, helpful without being intrusive. Slightly reserved, the way most country
people
are.’ Patrick wished he could believe that a move would dispel the numbing emptiness that had become their lives. But whether the move would culminate in success or failure was immaterial. He’d made the decision because he could no longer allow the past to outweigh the present and destroy what was left of their marriage.

Louise’s voice was filled with pain and anguish. ‘You really want us to move?’

‘Yes.’

‘To live in this Wake Wood,’ she echoed despondently.

‘Yes,’ he affirmed, feigning a resolution he couldn’t feel. ‘Yes, Louise, I do. And it’s time we started packing.’

Less than four weeks later they were ready to drive away from the house they had lived in all their married life. Patrick had spent most of his time during the preceding week nagging the estate agent and solicitor to expedite the sale of their property and the purchase of the cottage and pharmacy in Wake Wood.

Men from the removal firm had carried out the bulk of their furniture that morning and it was on its way to Wake Wood in a van. The back of Patrick’s estate car was piled high with personal possessions neither he nor Louise could bear to entrust to strangers.

Patrick had been ready to leave for over an hour, but Louise was still busy. Careful to keep her back turned to him, she was stowing black bags behind the front seats of the car. Her body language told him that she resented him watching her.

He stepped into the hall and looked around. Stripped of his and Louise’s possessions – and Alice’s – the house appeared bleak and forlorn. He found it difficult to believe that they’d ever been happy within its walls … until he remembered Alice. He pictured her running down the stairs, calling out to him, laughing as she raced into the kitchen to thrust open the fridge door …