Dark Winter

10

I closed down my cell as we walked into the back garden and put my arm round her. I’d told Josh she was fine, we just needed a bit of time. He said he’d go down to the stores and grab a coffee. Call him whenever.

Last time I’d found her in the hidey-hole I’d taken her hand and guided her gently out. Then I’d picked her up in my arms and held her tight as I carried her into the kitchen. She was trembling so much I couldn’t tell if her head was nodding or shaking. When we drove away from the house a bit later, she was almost rigid with shock.

Dr Hughes had told me some things early on in her treatment, which felt like it had happened a lifetime ago. ‘Kelly has been forced to learn early lessons about loss and death, Mr Stone. How does a seven-year-old, as she was then, understand murder? A child who witnesses violence has been shown that the world is a dangerous and unpredictable place. She has told me that she doesn’t think she’ll ever again feel safe going outside. It’s nobody’s fault, but her experience has made her think that the adults in her life are unable to protect her. She believes she must take the responsibility herself – a prospect that causes her great anxiety.’

We walked over to the swing and she wiggled about to get comfortable on the rubber tyre seat as I lay on the grass beside her.

‘Push me, Nick?’

I got up and stood behind her. She sat there passively at first, not helping me with the momentum, then it seemed to come back to her.

‘What have you done to your finger?’ She had a plaster on the knuckle of her right index finger, and the skin below it looked red and sore.

‘I did something a bit silly in science. It’ll be fine.’

I pushed her in silence for a while. I liked it. It made me think of the great times I’d had in this backyard too.

‘First thing Dad used to do when he came home from work,’ she said. ‘He’d go and give Mom a kiss, then come out and play with us. It was good. Not all dads do that.’

‘Not all dads love their kids as much as he did.’

She liked that. ‘Mom used to bring us out cookies and Kool-Aid. Sometimes we’d all stay out here right until supper-time.’ She grinned. ‘We used to love it when you came visit. Mom would tell us to say thank you if you gave us candy, but to give it to her. She was the candy police.’ As she came back towards me her face went serious again and I slowed her to a stop, my head on her right shoulder as I listened. ‘I used to feel safer when you were here with Dad. Don’t you remember? Mom used to call you guys “my two strong men”. I was always worried when it was just him on his own because I knew people were after him.’

‘That was because he did his job so well.’

‘Did you work together?’

‘We were soldiers together in the army. When he married your mum he came here.’

She looked down at her trainers, then sharply up again, her blue eyes piercing mine. ‘Why did Mom and Aida have to die, Nick?’

We’d never talked about it. I somehow assumed she just knew, maybe that her grandparents or Dr Hughes or Josh had told her. I felt like I hadn’t explained the facts of life to her, and just hoped she’d pick them up on her own. Then again, maybe she did know and just wanted to hear me try to make sense of it one more time.

‘Your dad was one of the good guys. But his boss got mixed up with drug people and your dad found out. His boss killed him – and then he killed everybody who might be a witness.’

‘Mom and Aida?’

‘Yes.’

‘How come he didn’t kill me, Nick? How come I’m the one who got to stay alive?’

‘I don’t have those answers, Kelly. Maybe if the people had come into the house five minutes earlier or later, they’d have got you too.’

‘It would have saved everybody a lot of hassle.’

I lifted my head and walked round to face her. ‘Hey, don’t say things like that. Don’t even think things like that.’ Hunching down in front of her, I held both her hands.

‘Sometimes I feel so shit, Nick. Just kind of disconnected. Do you know what I mean?’

‘I spend most of my life feeling like that.’ I hesitated, drawing her close to me. ‘You know, I saw somebody die when I was eight.’

She sat up straight. ‘You did?’

I described the disused old factory building near our estate. The windows and doors had been boarded up and covered with barbed-wire, but that wasn’t going to keep us out. ‘There was an old sheet of corrugated iron nailed over the frame of a small door down an alleyway, but it was loose. We got in, up on to the roof. I remember puffing out hard and watching my breath form into a cloud.’ It had felt much colder thirty feet up than it had at ground level. ‘I walked to the edge of the roof and looked down at the pools of light underneath the lamp-posts. The street was deserted, there was no one around to see us. It was so peaceful. I’d never known the streets round my way be so quiet. And then there was a sound, a really horrible sound.’

‘What was it?’ She was pressing into my side.

‘Breaking glass. I turned and saw my three mates standing near one of the skylights. There should have been four.’

A split second later, there’d been a muffled thud from deep inside the building. ‘I knew even before I looked through the hole that John would be dead. We all did. We ran back to the roof hatch and down the stairs. He was lying very still, and we just scarpered.’

‘Did the police come?’

‘There were police swarming all around the flats the next day, but we made sure we all told the same story. We thought we were murderers. I’d never felt so scared.’

Kelly looked up at me. ‘Do you ever get scared now?’

‘All the time.’ I chanced a smile. ‘And before you ask, I have absolutely no plans to die until I’m very old.’

‘But no guarantees, right?’

‘Whoa, that’s one for Josh and his Bible college.’

She winced. ‘Not funny, Nick. I know you don’t care what happens to you, but I do. It really matters, you know? I mean, what if people come after you like they came after Dad? What happens to me then?’

I squatted down in front of her, our faces now level. ‘There’d be Josh. They all love you.’

‘I know that. But it’s you I need, Nick. Like I said, Mom used to call you and Dad her two strong men. Now there’s only one of you left.’ She let go of the ropes and touched my cheeks with surprisingly cold hands. ‘Will you be my strong man, Nick? Will you?’ There were tears in her eyes.

She took her hands out of mine and looked down at her trainers again before I could answer, which was just as well because I didn’t have a clue what to say. ‘There aren’t many places I’ve felt safe since . . . well, since I was on my own. I listed them to myself once. There’s the house in Norfolk. Remember, we put up that tent in the bedroom? You nailed it to the floor instead of pegs and I thought that was so cool. I loved that. Then there’s here – sometimes. And . . .’ She looked away. ‘That place you took me to . . .’

I gave her shoulder a squeeze. ‘Dr Hughes?’

She nodded. ‘She understood.’

In the silence that followed, I realized it was time for me to start being her strong man. Josh was right. ‘Would you like to talk things over with her again?’

Her face lit up as if I’d thrown a switch. ‘Could I? I mean, how?’

‘The twin miracles of flight and Mastercard. We could be there tomorrow if we wanted.’

‘I’m supposed to be going to Josh’s Bible college on Friday and—’

I waved my hand. ‘Not a problem. Let’s go to England instead. I’m sure he’ll understand. We can go and see your grandparents, spend some time with Dr Hughes, spend some time together, just you and me.’

Practically falling off the tyre, she threw her arms round my neck and planted a huge kiss on my cheek. Her face was radiant. ‘I feel better already.’ Then she frowned. ‘How did you get here? Did Josh bring you?’

‘Yeah. He’s gone down to the stores for a coffee.’

‘He doesn’t know about Disneyland, does he?’

‘Our secret.’ I gave her a grin. ‘How do you get in anyway?’

‘I borrowed the key way back and got one cut, stupid.’ She couldn’t stop smiling about it. ‘OK, let’s go.’

We walked around the backyard a bit as Kelly looked at the swing and then we locked up. A bird swooped across the grass and up into the sky, and I called Josh on my cell as we headed out of the driveway.