What You Left Behind (6 page)

Jo’s sigh was a slow river of exasperation. It followed her as she stood up, went to the fridge, and pulled out the half-full bottle of wine, and trailed her back to the table, where she topped up their glasses. It only stopped flowing when she sat down.

Lorraine stared at the bottle as she set it between them. Within seconds it was coated in a layer of condensation. Beads of water dotted the cold glass.

“The lad who killed himself recently was called Dean Watts,” Jo said slowly. “He was only nineteen years old. He stole a motorbike and drove it headlong into a tree. The police said there were no tire marks on the road to indicate he braked. The stories going round afterward were awful. The only good thing is that it was instant.”

Lorraine allowed herself a small nod, a slow arc of understanding. She’d seen hundreds of deaths over the years and couldn’t possibly count them all, let alone recall details of every investigation. While she wouldn’t say that she was hardened to it exactly, hearing about an anonymous person losing their life—through their own will or accident or even murder—didn’t have the same impact on her as it did on someone like her sister.

She recalled the first time she saw a dead body as a probationer. It was a sight she’d never forget. But the feelings of sickness, revulsion, and horror that had reared up inside her had certainly been
diluted by twenty years in the force. It had been a road traffic accident, and the pale corpse of the young woman driving, her face still perfectly made-up after an evening on the town, had reminded her so much of her little sister, Jo. The only noticeable damage on the girl was a thin red line across her neck where it had snapped. She remembered, too, how while sipping sweet tea back at the police station later she’d vowed she’d give it all up, hand in her notice the next morning, say she wasn’t cut out for the job. Somehow, she’d never got round to it.

“It is really tragic,” Lorraine said, knowing how strong the community was in Radcote. “But if you saw the figures nationwide, you’d realize it’s not unusual.” She sipped her wine before continuing. “About five, maybe six thousand people a year kill themselves in the UK, Jo. Having a suicide in your neighborhood is shocking, but on its own, as an isolated case, it doesn’t resonate with what happened eighteen months ago. This area isn’t immune to regular statistics just because it had more than its fair share a year and a half ago.”

Lorraine had been going to add that it was just plain crazy, unbelievable, unprecedented that six kids from the locality had killed themselves within two weeks. It was the kind of thing that happened in hopeless and depressed areas of the country, not in an affluent, well-to-do pocket of rural Warwickshire where clay pigeon shooting and Boden were the norm. But she decided against it.

Instead, she put her hand back on her sister’s, noticing the lines of worry on her face. “But none of that means Freddie’s going to kill himself, OK?”

4

“I’m going to Wellesbury this morning, would you like to come?” Jo asked.

Lorraine was sitting at the kitchen table, drinking coffee. Freddie hadn’t emerged from his bedroom yet, and Stella was lazing in the garden with her book. The day was a pleasant one, but the pattern for the last week or so had been rainy, sometimes thundery, afternoons.

“I’d love to,” she replied, sipping her drink. Jo always made it strong. “Errands to run?”

“Kind of,” Jo said. “I promised Sonia Hawkeswell I’d pick up some leaflets from the homeless shelter in town. I said I’d hand them out.”

Lorraine nodded slowly. She didn’t recall such a place, but she hadn’t been there in a while. As a young kid, Wellesbury was always
an exciting source of candy and toys for her and Jo, as well as trips to the market or the library with their mother. When she was a teenager, she saw it for what it was—a rather boring Midlands town with nowhere cool to hang out. But on the few occasions she’d visited as an adult she had found it charming, with its stone shop fronts, interesting boutiques, and cobbled pedestrian areas.

“Sonia volunteers at the shelter,” Jo continued. “Actually, she virtually lives there. She works really hard. They’re having a fund-raising event, so I said I’d help promote it.”

“That’s very commendable,” Lorraine said. “Of course I’ll come.” She was keen to meet Sonia Hawkeswell, to see if she could find out a bit more about the man who’d upset Stella yesterday.

N
EW
H
OPE
H
OMELESS
Shelter was housed in an old church hall on the south side of town, only a short drive from Radcote. Lorraine stared up at it as they got out of the car, squinting at the austere building as it sparked a memory. They’d parked opposite, outside a fish-and-chips shop, which was just opening up; on the other side of the road was a dog-grooming business. The rest of the properties were small terraced houses.

“God, I remember this place,” she said with a grin, eyeing the new sign above the door. “We did Girl Guides here for a while, didn’t we?”

She linked her arm through her sister’s, giving her a squeeze.

“We did indeed,” Jo said. “Until they kicked us out.”

“That was your fault,” Lorraine said with a laugh.

“It was not!” Jo said indignantly, but then fell quiet as they approached the steps of the church hall. She drew to a halt. “Look, before we go in, you should know something.”

“Oh?”

Lorraine put up her hand to shield her eyes from the sun. Jo appeared serious all of a sudden.

“Sonia has devoted her life to this place since … well, since she lost Simon. It’s not only her time she gives, but money too. And by that, I don’t just mean all the fund-raising work she does. She’s donated a load of personal cash recently.”

“That’s very kind of her,” Lorraine responded, wondering how anyone could possibly cope after losing a child in the way she had.

“But it’s way more than a financial investment,” Jo continued, her voice low. She glanced at the door. “Sonia’s suffered no end, and she’s become very emotionally attached to all the lads who stay here. She told me once she sees a bit of Simon in each and every one of them. It’s really sad, like she’s trying to bring him back.” Jo paused, looking uncomfortable. “By working here, it’s as if she wants to … to make it up to him somehow. As if she blames herself. She can’t seem to let go.”

Lorraine nodded her understanding. “Grief affects everyone differently.”

They went inside the small entrance porch. Empty wooden crates were stacked neatly to one side as if they’d recently held bulk amounts of food—potatoes, bags of carrots, loaves of bread—and were waiting to be collected. The black-and-white checkerboard floor looked as if it had been recently mopped, and a lavender scent hung in the air. There was a noticeboard attached to the wall with a colorful handmade banner saying, “Welcome to New Hope.”

“This won’t take long,” Jo said as they went in. “Sonia puts me to shame with all her volunteer work. It’s the least I can do.” She clutched at her cotton skirt, bringing the hem up to reveal her tanned knees in a way that reminded Lorraine of her as a little girl. For a second, her eyes sparkled.

They went into the main room of the building, which was nothing like how Lorraine remembered it from their Girl Guide days. Gone was the dusty wooden floor, for a start. Stripped and polished boards now gave a light and airy feel to the place, especially with the sun streaming in through the tall arched windows, and all the walls
were freshly painted in white. It was the complete opposite to the inner-city equivalent Lorraine had occasionally visited in Birmingham. Somehow they exuded a kind of fake hope rather than the real thing, as in this place.

They walked between several rows of beds, each one made up with a plump pillow and clean sleeping bag. A small table between each bed separated the bunks, and Lorraine noticed that there were little vases of flowers or china ornaments on some. She raised her eyebrows, impressed with the attention to detail.

“It’s nice,” she whispered to Jo as they headed to the rear of the hall.

Jo answered with an I-told-you-so look.

There was a smaller area at the back reserved for a couple of settees and a television. A low table with books and magazines sat on top of a rug that looked as if it had come from an antiques shop.

“Hello, Sonia, it’s me,” Jo called out toward another room beyond. Her voice echoed around them, getting lost in the vaulted ceiling.

The place seemed deserted, even though the front door had been unlocked. For a moment Lorraine wondered if all the homeless people of Wellesbury and the surrounding area had been miraculously re-homed. The reality was, as she later learned, they got sent out for the day and weren’t allowed back in until six p.m.

Jo’s voice rang out again amid the avenues of sunlight that sloped through the Methodist chapel’s tall windows.

“Odd. She said she’d be here.”

Then they heard a noise coming from the other room, and soon after that a figure emerged through the doorway. “Sorry, sorry,” the woman said in a flustered voice. “I was lost in what I was doing.” She offered a small smile.

“Sonia, this is Lorraine, my sister,” Jo said, and Lorraine was struck by the note of pride in her voice.

Lorraine approached the woman and shook hands. She was extremely thin, her skin tinged gray and almost see-through, as if she’d
not eaten in months. The pale blue jeans she was wearing would have once fitted snugly, likewise the white T-shirt that hung loosely from her slight frame. The jade-green silk scarf looped around her neck lent a small splash of color to an otherwise washed-out appearance. Lorraine could tell she’d once been a beauty, perhaps not so long ago, but that recently taking care of herself had not been a priority. There was a tangible air of sadness about her, an aura of grief that was gradually consuming her.

“You’ve done a great job with this place,” Lorraine commented, and noticed the way Sonia’s eyes dipped briefly to the floor. Her hair was thin, once-blonde, but now the gray was pushing through at the roots, suggesting she’d not been to a salon in a while.

“I try my best,” she said coyly. “I don’t know what they’d do otherwise.”

There was a slight pause.

“She means her boys,” Jo said fondly. “The homeless lads. And there are a few girls too.”

“They must be very grateful to you,” Lorraine said.

Sonia picked at her nails nervously. Lorraine noticed several were broken.

“You have no idea how excited Jo has been about you coming to stay,” she said. “She’s been telling me about your visit for ages.”

“She might not be saying that by the end of the week,” Lorraine responded with a laugh.

“Freddie took his younger cousin up to your place to see the horses yesterday,” Jo said.

“Yes, Lana told me she’d bumped into them.” At the mention of her daughter, Sonia smiled and her shoulders dropped an inch.

“Stella’s no rider, that’s for sure, but she enjoyed seeing them. She told me she thought your home was beautiful.” Lorraine wanted to mention Stella’s “nasty man” incident, but wasn’t sure it was appropriate to bring it up without asking Jo first.

“They’re welcome anytime,” Sonia said. “Lana would be happy
to see them.” It seemed as if she’d been going to say more, but she didn’t.

“Well, we won’t keep you any longer,” Jo said, breaking a slightly awkward silence. “I’m sure you’re busy.” She cleared her throat. “I just came to pick up the leaflets.”

“It’s nice to have a break, actually.” Sonia walked over to a shelving rack next to the television and took down a stack of flyers. “I was going over the shelter’s accounts. Here.” She handed the pile over. “It would be fantastic if you could spread them about. The event’s not until the end of August.”

“Of course,” Jo said, quickly scanning one. She nodded her approval, then slipped a hand onto Lorraine’s shoulder. “Right, let’s make a move.”

Lorraine nodded and opened her mouth to say goodbye but was interrupted by a deafening crash. It came from the kitchen. Sonia screamed and Jo jumped while Lorraine, immediately switching into work mode, dashed past them both to see what had happened. It sounded like breaking glass—a window perhaps? Might it be an intruder?