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We move to the front of the house, all of us tacit in the knowledge that the noise will come from the rear. Through the front window, we see the van arrive. Men in helmets and protective gear, ear defenders hooked around their necks, bring out electric drills. Matt draws the curtains closed. I don’t stop him.
‘Next door must have cleared out early,’ he says. ‘They’re staying in a nice hotel, I suppose.’
No one replies.
When the rumble of machinery starts, we close our eyes. Fred is unusually restless. As if he knows what horrors are to be unearthed. I hold him close, let him suckle.
Later, another police car. Matt spies it through the crack in the curtains. Like a nosy neighbour, he turns to me and announces it with a sigh. I know how helpless he feels because he keeps telling me so and because I feel it too. We have never known such helplessness. Even that day, we were consumed – by fear, by hope. We were distracted by action. Now, this inertia is all there is. This waiting.
‘Farnham,’ Matt says. ‘She’s getting out of the car. She must’ve gone away and come back.’
I follow him into the hall. He opens the front door and is about to step out, but then, somehow, he is backing up, Farnham striding forward. She doesn’t lay a hand on his chest, doesn’t push him, but the whole thing unfolds as a kind of surrender. A second later and the front door has been closed and Farnham is showing us into our own living room, everything about her exuding an assertive calm.
‘Let’s wait in here,’ she says. ‘Let us do our job and let’s make it as bearable as we can for everyone, OK?’
‘OK.’
We are the guests. We are the strangers. We are the puppets.
A moment later, another rumble from next door. I have changed my mind. We should have got out of here today. We should have gone to the park, to a café, anywhere other than here.
As it is, we sit. We do not turn on the television. Hours accumulate into minutes, minutes become seconds, until Farnham takes a call and leaves us.
I bury myself in Matt’s arms. ‘My baby. My little girl.’
Farnham returns, though I have no sense of how long she has been gone. Through my tears I can see she is trying to give nothing away, but the merest nod to Matt and the year we have lived in agony shrinks to no more than a flash.
‘Have they found her?’ I am on my feet.
‘I know this is difficult.’ Farnham is gently restraining me. Lorraine is sitting me down. Farnham is crouching in front of me as you crouch in front of a child who is hurt.
‘Please,’ I sob.
‘I’m very sorry,’ she says. ‘They’ve found her.’
‘I need to see her.’
Farnham transfers herself to the sofa beside me. Lorraine has hold of my hand.
‘Let them look after her now,’ Farnham says. ‘They’ll take good care of her, I promise.’
I can hear Matt crying. On his sheepskin rug, Fred kicks his arms and legs and coos.
After a moment, Farnham stands. ‘I’ll call you as soon as there are any developments. Best thing to do now is try to get some fresh air, try to pass the time if you can. You’ve got my direct line. I’ll check my phone as often as I can, all right? We’ll be in touch.’
Forty-Three
Neil
Neil rests the back of his head on his hands, the thin mattress hard against his shoulder blades. Outside the cell, the noise of a police station at night jangles and jars; the smell of disinfectant on lino makes his nose itch. Cigarette smoke drifts in through an open window; someone shouts abuse in another cell. But none of this distraction can keep him from the torture of his own crowding thoughts: Bella, Matt and Ava, his mum, his mates down the rugby club, his sister Bev, her husband, his family, his old school teachers, his clients… his entire town. Everyone.
There were so many awful moments. The crawl of the zip, Jasmine calling for him from the other side of the door, showing the copper round the work site, trying to keep it together. Testing the weight of the bag that afternoon when the dogs finally cleared out and he found a moment to return, rehearsing the excuse of securing his tools. He feels the weight of that bag, feels it now, as if the strap were still cutting into his hand. He can carry it without strain is what he’s thinking; no, with therightamount of strain, that’s the main thing. That terrible afternoon. It’s 3 p.m. The dogs have sniffed his house, his shed, his van, and now he’s here again, a place he’d prefer never to come back to as long as he lives. It’s now or never. If he can get her into the van and stick his bike in, he can take the van up to Richmond on the excuse of leafleting a bit further out. Then all he has to do is cycle home and somehow sort the rest out later.
The chucka-chuck of a helicopter passes overhead. He thinks of Bella and begins to cry. He doesn’t know if he can do it; doesn’t know if he has it in him, and if he does, what that says about him, but he will never be able to give her a baby, a family, a home if he doesn’t see this through. He will lose her. He will lose his life. Nothing he can do will bring Abi back. He loved her; he loved her like his own. But he can’t save her. He can’t make this right. Making this right will make everything else wrong.
In the hallway, he composes himself in front of the mirror, pushing back his hair, blowing out short breaths of air, over and over.
‘Come on.’ He squares his shoulders, tries to look himself in the eye. ‘Come on now.’
