The Day She Died

Four

“Hi!” he shouted as I slipped into the room. I let my breath go. There wasn’t a kitchen door off the hall. Two bedrooms on one side, bathroom at the back, and just one door opposite. So I knew the kitchen had to be off the living room, no other way to get there. I’d told myself they weren’t the type for those big Ikea couches. I was right; the three-piece suite was black and grey vinyl with red furry cushions. Only, a suite that old-fashioned made me think of a vase of bulrushes dyed different colours, and that made me think of pampas grass, and from pampas grass it wasn’t too far to-

So I sprang to the kitchen door-Jessica Constable: super hero-and slipped through and he shouted “Hi” right at me.

Pretty overwhelming, actually, because the kitchen was small. And his grin was too broad, like his voice was too loud. And his eyes were too wide. What big pain you’re in, Grandmamma. It was about to get worse too.

“Can I have a word?” I said. I had the note behind my back.

“PB &J for dinner!” he shouted. “Yeay!”

“Yeay!” shouted the kids. They were sitting at either end of a tiny table squeezed between the door and the larder-it was that kind of kitchen: no work space at all, but a table crammed in-the boy in a high chair and Ruby kneeling up on a stool, feet tucked under. The baby had a sippy cup, nearly empty, hanging from his mouth, the spout held in his teeth.

“And ice cream!” the man said.

“Yeay!” shouted the baby, letting the cup drop. He started banging his hands flat on the tray of his chair. But it had gone too far for Ruby now. She spoke up in a smaller voice.

“Is Mummy coming back?”

He didn’t answer, was still grinning that awful grin.

“Can I just have a quick word?” I said.

When he followed me back through, I closed the door on the kids and put the note in his hands.

“I’m really sorry,” I said. “It was on the dressing table. And her purse was behind it. I mean-I didn’t look, but this is her purse, right?” I handed it over, fat, bulging with cards and receipts. A right mum purse. He unzipped it and I caught sight of a photograph in the plastic bit you put your travel card in if you live in a city. Two babies.

“She didn’t take anything,” he said, flicking though the compartments. Then he put it down and read the note again.

“I think you should call the police,” I told him.

He walked backwards, staring at the paper, until he bumped up against a sideboard-dark wood, but no carvings-and he leaned there.

“Where’s your phone?” I asked him.

“No,” he said, jerking his head up. “She didn’t mean it. She’ll come home.”

“Cos she can’t have had much of a head start, can she? They could look for her car.”

He was shaking his head. He had twisted his hair into a rope-maybe for hygiene, making the sandwiches-but it shook loose again now and he swiped at it. “Listen,” he said. “If I call the police and tell them this and they find her, they’ll take her to hospital.”

“But it sounds like that’s where she needs to be-”

“And she’ll never forgive me. It’ll all be ten times worse. If they find out she left the baby, she might get charged.”

“Not if she’s ill. If her doctor says she’s ill.”

“She won’t see a doctor. I’ve tried. Look, it’s not the first-”

“Daddeee!” A wail from the kitchen. “We’re hungreee! Where’s Mummeee?”

And then the little one started up too.

“Mummeeeeeee!” A peal of sound that rang in your teeth.

“Look,” I said. “I see this at work all the time. People just drowning because they think if they tell, it’ll jump up and bite them. It doesn’t. There’s help. No matter what’s wrong. There’s always help.”

“At work?” he said. “Wheesht, kids! One minute! What do you do, like? Are you a social worker?”

“No! God, no. This is just-just a friendly word.”

“Kids, shut up!” he shouted again. Then he smiled, as best he could. “Thanks,” he said. “It’s just a friend I’m needing.” The next smile was a bit better. “So what’s the name of this new friend then?”

“Never mind that now,” I said. “You need to call the cops and get them looking.”

“I’m Gus King,” he said. “And Ruby and Dillon King are the backing singers.”

I laughed a bit-he deserved it for trying-but I wanted to shake him.

He looked at the note again, out the front window, at his watch, back at me. “You really think I should phone?”

“I really do. Right now.” Inappropriate, unprofessional. What you’re supposed to say is, it’s your decision, I’ll support you but it’s up to you. “Where’s your phone?” I asked and then followed him through to the hall.

The phone was on a kind of hallstand thing, wrought iron and glass, half-hidden under coats and bobble hats. He looked up the number in the book-I’d have just called 999-and dialled, then tidied the coat rack while he waited, pulling sleeves the right way out, balling up gloves and tucking them into a drawer. Then his eyes opened wide and he swung away.

“Yeah, hi, hiya,” he said. “Em, it’s my wife. She’s left in her car and there’s a note and I’m worried about her.” He looked back at me as if to ask if he’d said it right. I nodded and gave him a tight smile. “Hello? Oh, uh-huh. License number, yeah. It’s, em, SD02 ZJY. A Micra. Dark green. I-I don’t know. I just got back in ten minutes ago. Me and my kids.” He gave me a hard stare, daring me to disagree. “I had both the kids out with me and we all got back and she was gone. Becky King. Yeah, Rebecca. King, yeah. She left a note, saying she couldn’t go on.” I reached out and touched his arm, squeezed it a little. “It’s the Stockman’s Cottage at Cally Mains, Sandsea. Gatehouse, yeah. No, no, it’s okay. No, it’s fine.” He glanced at me again. “I’ve got a friend with me.” And he dropped the phone back down as if it was burning him, turned, put both his hands against the wall, and let his head hang down.

“Gus?”

“Jesus,” he said.

“What did they say?”

He stood up and stared at me. “They’re sending somebody round,” he said. “Jesus. I thought they’d tell me not to worry. Twenty-four hours and all that. Check with her friends… ”

“You could do,” I said. “Check with her family. Her friends.”

“No family,” he said. “Well, her dad. But… ” He shook his head. I knew the type. Saw plenty of dads like that at work. Or heard about them anyway.

“Friends?” I asked. He walked back through to the living room and dropped down onto one of the vinyl chairs. They were the kind that the cushion squirts out if you move too fast and he looked miserable, balancing there on the edge of it, feet braced. Those big Ikea couches, at least you can plop into them after a shock.

“Her best friend was Ros,” he said. “But she’s away back home to Poland. She only broke the news a couple of weeks ago.”

“That can’t have helped,” I said. I sat down too, right on the edge of the sofa, on one of the furry cushions, still not sure. But it squeaked like horsehair, so I shoved myself back a bit.

“It didn’t,” said Gus. “But I know Becky. She’ll come back.”

“But… do you mind me asking?” I said. A bit late. “It wasn’t just her friend leaving, was it? What couldn’t she go through again?”

“Depression,” he said.

“Right,” I said. “Christ. Yeah. Well. I’ve never had it. I’d rather have pretty much anything else, though.”

He nodded. “Me too,” he said. Then he looked at me. “Makes a change to hear somebody take it seriously.”

That was a nice thing to say. He didn’t half notice wee things for someone who’d just had something truly enormous happen. So I said no more, in case he thought I was milking it.

After a minute, he cocked his head towards the kitchen. The kids were laughing, squealing a bit. Someone was kicking their chair.

“Yeah,” he said. “Post-natal depression. Ruby was bad. Dillon was worse. And she told me this morning she was pregnant again. Did the test and everything.”

I remembered what he had said on the phone. It’s not forever. It’ll stop. And her note. I can’t go through it again. I can’t go on.

“Oh, Jesus,” I said. He looked up and nodded really slow. “But-” He stopped nodding as soon as I spoke again.

“But what?” he asked me. He looked like he’d been turned to stone.

“She won’t have to go through it,” I said. “She can stop it. If you agree.”

“Think I want to see her in that state a third time?” He was instantly angry. Zero to sixty in a heartbeat.

“So she’ll do that. She won’t just end it all. She won’t just leave you lot.”

“I hope you’re right,” he said and put his head back in his hands, like the flash of anger had never happened.

“Of course I am,” I told him. “She’d never leave them.”

“She left Dillon,” he said, his voice muffled.

And the truth was, I did think that was funny. It’s easy to overreact to stuff that pushes your buttons, and if anything I go the other road to make sure. But a mum leaving her baby was a kicker, no two ways there. And if she’d never done that before and she’d never left a note before, I could see why he was scared. But nothing about this whole stupid mess made sense. What was he even doing in Marks in Dumfries on his own with Ruby on this day of all days? After that news? How could he hear her cry for help and then hang up and smash his phone? Why the hell were they having a third kid anyway, with their boy and girl already? He was talking again. God’s sake, Jessie, at least listen, eh?

“It’s not just the depression,” he was saying and he sat up again, leaned his head against the lace mat on the back of his chair, and looked at me from under his lashes. It should have been a creepy look, really. Sly, kind of. But he just looked wiped, as if he’d been drugged and could hardly stay conscious. “It’s more than that. It’s everything. Everything’s crap.”

I couldn’t help flicking a glance around the room then. “Looks okay to me,” I said.

“It’s not though,” he said. “Happy Families and all that. We weren’t. We’re not.”

“Well, not today maybe,” I said.

“Oh, me and the kids are fine,” he went on. “Me and Becky… Look, come on back through. They’re doing murder in there.”

The shouting started as soon as he opened the door, noise breaking over us.

“We’re starving, Dad!”

“P B a J! P B a J!”

“Can I have syrup instead of jam, but?”

“Jam but, jam but!”

He high-fived Ruby on his way back to the breadboard and kissed the baby. He put a hand down on both their heads and tousled their hair, making a noise like a machine churning, messing her strawberry curls, his blond silk.

“Say hello to Jess, kids,” he said. “She’s staying for tea, seeing Mummy’s gone out.”

But he’d only got as far as spreading marg on the bread when a car door slammed outside. I watched the blood drain out of his face. Becky? Then a second door slammed, and two sets of feet walked up the brick path to the door. Even the kids fell silent, listening to the two sets of feet in heavy shoes, slow deliberate steps. Police. And a crackle from one of their radios made it true, and then Gus was edging round the children’s chairs, gripping them tight, hauling himself along like he was climbing a cliff face. I followed him through the living room and out into the hall, watched as he opened the door.

“Mr. King?” said one of the coppers.

A woman and a man, and the way they stood there said it all.

“Aye?” said Gus.

“You’re the husband of Rebecca King?”

“That was quick,” he said. “Where did you come from?”

“Quick?” said the woman, frowning. Then she smoothed her expression. “Can we come inside, Mr. King?”

“Have you found her?”

“So you did know your wife was missing?” said the man.

His partner scowled. “Can we step inside, Mr. King?”

“I phoned Castle Douglas,” said Gus. “How did you get here so fast?”

“If we could just come in.”

“What do you want?” He was holding the door so hard that the hinge creaked. “If you’re not from CD, what are you doing here?”

“Gus?” I said softly. What was wrong with him? Was this denial? From the kitchen, the kids started whining. The woman copper looked past him and caught my eye.

“I’ll just go and see to them,” I said and backed away.

I couldn’t hear anything over the din of sorting out who stole what and who kicked who and where was their dinner, their daddy, their mummy (Oh God), but I felt him fall. Felt it right through my feet and up to my teeth when Gus King heard the news and hit the floor.