The Day She Died

Postscript

Think Sandsea’s grim in October? Try it in February, when it’s rained every day for three weeks and the beach is covered in seaweed and lumps of sodden driftwood and the odd rotting seal. My stomach lifts and turns.

“It’s dead,” says Dillon. “It might come back, though.” It’s not a bad lesson to learn at two years old; bound to make him turn out optimistic about life in general. Ruby was the one who really bust a fuse.

“You lied!” she screamed. “You told me Mummy was dead! Where’s my daddy? Where is he? Bring him back. Now! Now!”

But there was no children’s visiting in the remand centre. They talked on the phone and he wrote to both of them, sent Dillon pictures and wrote Ruby poems. Becky saved everything for them.

“He’s still their dad,” she says.

“Don’t you worry… ” I want to ask her. It’s easiest to talk when we’re walking on the beach, when we don’t have to look at each other, when we can both watch the kids instead. “Don’t you every worry that they’ll-”

“Turn out just like him?” says Gus, the real Gus. “Why should they? He’s not going to bring them up, and they’ve only got half his genes. I’m a clone of Gavin, Jessie, and I’m nothing like him.”

“I suppose you’re right,” I say. And I hope it’s true. Hope more than either of them could know, because I haven’t told them.

“I’m going to miss this place,” says Becky. “I do love it here.”

“And as soon as the conversion’s done, back you’ll come,” says Gus. He’s making a loft-like a real artist would live in-in half of the bothy, keeping the other half for a studio, adding a wee bit on. He made a lot of money selling Pram to some ghoul. So Becky and the kids will have the cottage.

“Yeah,” says Becky. “And I need to be with my mum and dad for a bit. I need to try to explain why I cut them off like that.” She glances at me. “Think of something to say they’d believe. No point in trying to get the truth past them.” I squeeze her arm. She’s right about that. I heard the same thing from Dot. Sister Avril too. Why did she stay? Not ever Why did he take her away from her family, mess with her head, kill her friend, keep her prisoner? No, it’s always Why did she stay?, like it’s love and hope and trust that are the puzzle. Not whatever’s wrong with Gavin.

“Evil,” said Father Tommy when I asked him. “There. A nice plain answer everyone can spell.”

“It doesn’t explain much,” I said.

“Neither does sociopathy,” Father Tommy pointed out. “It just gets a higher Scrabble score. Lust, sloth, gluttony, pride, envy, greed, and anger. Hit all seven and you’re evil. Gavin King’s well on his way.”

“You could be right, Father,” I told him.

“Ah, Jessie,” he said. “Have you thought any more about what I asked you?”

“I have. Would it matter if I was turning Catholic partly to bug my mum? Could we ‘God’s mysterious moves’ that one away?”

“You’re a terrible girl,” he told me.

“Well, I’ll let you know,” I said. “You’d have to carb up for my first confession, mind.”

“And then I could say your wedding mass.” He was chuckling, teasing me.

“You’re quite a romantic for a celibate priest,” I said. “Dream on.”

Kazek’s gone to Poland with Ros’s ashes. He’ll be back in Dumfries for the trial. He might stay at my place. He phones me a lot. We get on quite well-even over the phone-for two people who basically don’t share a language. I think about Gav and his silver tongue and wonder if it’s better this way.

But I have to decide what to do. Would Kazek still be interested in me if he knew? Should that matter? Do I really believe the evil of Gavin King will come out in his children? Is it best not to chance it? But if I commit a mortal sin, can I still be a Catholic after? Or is this latest news just one more thing that’s far too good to be true? Like Jesus.

Tell me the story of how I was born, Mum.

Well, I was immaculately conceived, my son. And you were the child of the holy ghost. Mm? Oh, don’t worry about who he is. I’ll tell you when you’re older. And I was still a virgin and there was this census, see? And a stable, a star, and a donkey or two. Three wise men with the shittiest notion of presents for a baby. There were shepherds involved. Somehow. Just your usual boy meets girl, angels, kings, and farm workers, really.

What would I say? Well, Mummy was a headcase and couldn’t trust herself to have a baby in case she couldn’t take care of it and it killed its granny one day. And Daddy wanted to wipe out his other family and not have to go to jail for it.

Yeah, right.

But if it’s a girl I could call it Ros, and if it’s a boy I could call it Wojtek. And no matter what it was, if I gave it life then we’d be square, the universe and me.

As every single one of those endless bloody therapists used to say.