CHAPTER 16
Stalker
Leaves crunch underfoot as I slip back into your garden.
The seasons are changing, can you feel it?
I walk along the edge of your house. You’ve added more cameras that pan at regular intervals across your lawn.
Three minutes. That’s all I have. I wait until it’s safe to dip underneath the first camera’s radar and along the back of the house.
Did you think these would stop me? You are shaken up, but your response was predictable.
I’ve been doing this for years, and you’ve not been paying attention at all.
I find you at the back of the house, in the dining room with its wide windows and floor-to-ceiling doors.
You do like to be watched, don’t you? You’re in that beige cashmere jumper you always wear when you’re sad, with its big sweeping arms. I’ve watched you twist and worry at the edges of those draped sleeves more times than you’ve realised.
Today, you’re tucked up at the dining room table, your feet bare despite the cold and the sleeves rolled up.
I drop to my knees so only my face, masked, of course, is visible through the furthest window, covered by a plant.
Your phone is sitting on the table, your finger tapping next to it.
I want to reach out and run my fingers over those worry lines.
I don’t have time to sit and watch you, as much as I’d love that.
You would too. I only have three minutes before the camera veers back around this side of the house.
Three minutes to slip in the handy miniscule ‘nanny camera’ I got online and place it somewhere hidden.
It’s disgusting that you can even get these, but I can’t complain.
I tap my watch, and the timer trickles out numbers instantly.
My body vibrates as I get to work. The screwdriver jams on the first try, scratching the paintwork off the top of the window.
It would be easier for me to break this window from the inside and leave it so that it’s permanently jammed open.
But there’s a risk you’ll find it. And then what would we do?
The flathead catches the lock on the second try.
The card slides in with ease, I wiggle it until I hear the click.
Two minutes forty-eight. My fingers slip, and the card fumbles, but I catch it and continue.
I’ve not got time to worry. I can hear movement.
You come into view as I lift my head, but you haven’t moved.
Two minutes and three seconds. I dip my head back down, focusing on getting the card to where it needs to be.
It bends slightly against the lock but I’m slow and steady this time.
With a gentle release of pressure, the window pops open enough for my gloved fingers to work through the gap and pull it wide.
I don’t need much. One minute and forty seconds left.
I work faster. The small black camera is easy to place into the flower pot, it will run for ten hours, perhaps more with the motion alert on.
One minute and eight, seven, six. The timer ticks as I duck to my knees, crawling fast and straightening up so my back hits the brickwork.
I’m getting faster, Ella. For a long moment, there’s silence.
The camera pans and I wait, timing two minutes for it to view the other side of the house.
It only catches me as it passes but it’s not worth the risk.
I close my eyes. Nothing but birds and a gentle breeze to keep me company.
My watch vibrates and I move back to my spot, just as a gentle ringing carries.
Who are you calling?
“Hello?” The voice at the end of the line is faint, crackled and distorted through the speakerphone.
“Mum?” you say. That wobble in your voice is telling. The timer resets.
I don’t know much about your mum, you keep your past close to your chest, and you lie often. More to yourself than to anyone else. But I know two things to be true from this conversation alone: she doesn’t like you, and you need her.
“Who is this?” your mum says. The line isn’t distorted, but she is, her words tripping over themselves. It’s not even dark out, what a shame.
“It’s me, Mum.” You say it so gently, as though she has dementia rather than choosing to forget you.
“How are you?” she says after a moment too long.
I’d love to know the answer to that, too. I chance a glance your way and find your shoulders hunched over the table, your elbows digging into the wood, and the phone placed on the table below your chin, shining brightly on your face. It’s one of hope and fear.
“I–” You run your nail over your top lip to try to catch an area to pull at.
Your Mum coughs down the line. You flinch.
I press my fingers against the glass, leaving a little squeak that is lost under your words.
“Have you heard from Henry, Mum?”
Oh!
The sound of my breath pushes back off the window.
I hold the next one until it burns in my chest. What she says will dictate everything I do.
Why did I not consider your mother? She was never even a name on my list, but she should have been.
Your dad was easy enough. He never stopped looking for his dear boy Nate, but he let you go fast enough. But your mother?
“Yes. I have, why?” she says, indignant.
“He’s been released,” you say.
“He’s been out for months.” She corrects you in a way that makes you flinch.
This tennis match of bitterness is intoxicating.
“Have you seen him?” You ask, your fingers tugging at your bottom lip.
“What is this? Did you call me up after all these years to tell me not to speak to him? After everything you’ve done, can’t you leave him alone?” Her words are unnaturally spaced, tumbling fast and then slowing down inexplicably.
Yes, Ella. After everything you’ve done.
“I want to know where he is. To apologise,” you say. See, you are always lying.
I duck down, scrambling in the mud, aware that the camera will find me again. My fingers reset the timer.
Your mum says something that I can’t quite catch, but your voice carries: “It’s not like that.”
Interesting. I move back, pushing against the window until you come into view. Your fingers work nervously over your skin for any more snags.
“Elsie, I don’t want any more problems,” your mum says.
You drop your hands then, placing your elbows on either side of your phone and bringing your head close to it.
“I miss him too, Mum. That’s why I want to see Henry. Has he said any more about Nate?”
I wonder if that’s the truth of it. You want the stalking to end, for your world to go back to normal. But you also want your brother back. And Henry knows what happened to him that night.
“No,” your mum says after a moment, and you close your eyes. From this angle, you look almost poetic. As though you are posing for a painting. The heartbreak showing through your hunched form.
There’s a silence that neither of you fills. A vibration from my watch tells me to move but I can’t risk not hearing more. I duck down, waiting to see if the camera spots me as it scans across the lawn.
The gods are on my side.
When I return, you’ve got the phone in your hand. “He’s been doing so many programmes and the rehabilitation has worked wonders for him.”
Your foot taps on the floor. Oh dear, it sounds like your mum has been sending Henry money.
“Have you seen him?” You’re trying not to sound controlling and judgemental but you fail. You swing back on your chair, one leg tucked under and one pushing you back.
“Yes.” Your mum is guarded now. That was a bad move, wasn’t it?
“At the prison?” you say.
There’s another moment of silence. Your mum isn’t as good at lying as you are, is she? And it’s taking you a very long time to connect the dots.
“Has he been at your house, Mum?” There it is, the little hitch in your voice as you realise how close they are. I didn’t know either.
“He’s changed! And he honestly doesn’t know where Nate went that night but he promised to keep looking. He’s been trying to find him for years now.” Your mum warbles on, bouncing between frustration and disinterest.
You pull your feet up so the chair slams into the carpet. The connection finally falls into place.
“Have you been seeing him?” The cover hiding your indignation flies off, leaving it bare in the middle of this conversation. You’re going to lose her.
“It’s not what you–”
“He murdered someone.”
“It was an accident. Manslaughter, if I remember.” She doesn’t remember.
“He knows where Nate is.”
“And he did his time.” You both talk over each other.
“He’s stalking me,” you shout, the phone held tight in your hands.
There’s a pause before your mum replies, “No, he’s not.”
And there it is, the final straw which will break you. I push my face against the glass, my gloved fingers leaving smudges. I can’t look away from this tableau of aching. I’ll make it better, but, of course, that means one of you will have to die.
“He is.” You say it slowly now, rising to your feet.
I don’t catch what your mum says as a small regular beeping sound comes from inside your house, filling the space where your conversation was.
The camera!
I was so caught up in your family drama that I let my concentration go.
You stop the moment you hear it, but there’s no time for me to dwell on the way you look or how the light might catch the tears in your eyes.
I grab my bag, ramming the tools back in as I sprint until I reach the fence.
This is the wrong direction, my escape route sits to the right of the house.
But I sling my rucksack onto my back and pull my cap low.
I can either hide out or make a run for it.
Your gate is high, but it’s something I’ve scaled before.
My feet work fast as the siren fills the air.
You’re probably scrambling to find me, looking out the back while I race to the front.
I’m lucky, the hedges that divide your and your neighbour’s space are growing bare, and there’s enough room to push through.
The branches rip up my clothes and stab my face, but with a few decent kicks, I am through, slipping along the edge of their house where their gate is much lower.
Within seconds, I am on the street, my face burning with small scratches and my eyes watering.