11
Daniel
Barnack
2nd January 2018, 1.42 a.m.
I had sat paralysed for over an hour trying to work out what I had taken all those years ago. I thought about me being mixed up in something bad and couldn’t see it. Was I a bad person? Had I been involved in scraps as a kid? Surely everyone has at some point, especially adolescent boys, but something like this? Something that created an unimaginable backlash? Something that meant two of the most important people in my world were now in danger? I couldn’t get there and because I couldn’t, I struggled processing the reality of what was happening. I fought with my memories, only seeing outlines of shadows as they hid from me, mocking me when I couldn’t find them. I could almost hear them laughing. Taunting in their tones, ‘You’ll never know what you did.’ It felt impossible to move. I wrestled with the grey spaces in my head, trying to pull something clear from it. But my past was like a bait ball, circling quickly, and changing direction before I could grab hold, confusing me. Yes, I’d managed to grab small moments in the past year, lots coming in the last week, but there was nothing to suggest my past was caught up in something that was worth kidnapping for.
Something worth killing for.
The image of Sean’s mutilated body was there with each alternate blink. Every other being Rachael and Thomas in the van. Blink, a dead friend. Blink, my child and his mother, her fear etched on her face. I tried not to close my eyes until I had no choice. My vision blurred out of focus, eyes stinging through forcing myself to blink as little as I could. My mind, empty. The shock setting in. Then, from a dark corner of it, I heard a voice, quiet and disrupted as it echoed from the deepest, darkest parts of me. It told me to start the car. Get moving. He sounded like a soldier in one of the war movies I loved. Another moment of confabulation. But it was right. Sitting and waiting for something to happen was not going to help anyone. There was nothing I could do for Sean, he was dead. But Rachael and Thomas needed me. Katie too. I wanted to call her, but her number, along with every other I had, was on my phone which was now broken. Foolishly, I had done as I was instructed without making a note of her number. So, going onto the Safari app, I logged in to Facebook and sent her a direct message. I told her to send me her number when she could. I told her to not leave the hospital, under any circumstances. After I hit ‘send’ I felt more in control somehow and I knew the first thing I needed to do was get rid of my car. The police would eventually discover Sean and when they did, they would see the struggle also, telling them Rachael and Thomas were gone, and then, they would want to talk to me. My registration plate would be the first thing they would look for after they had banged on my door and discovered I’d taken flight. That part would be easy to do. It almost felt natural to hide. Driving from the layby, I looked for somewhere discreet to leave it. Ideally, somewhere close to my mum’s house. Then, I needed to speak to her, ask her questions about before 2003. I had to ask her about Michael.
Up ahead I saw an entrance to a lane which led to one of the many fields on the outside of Stamford, near Barnack. I veered off the road and drove for about a mile, looking for a gap in the wall that surrounded the Burghley estate where I could dump my car. It didn’t take long to find one. Pulling onto the verge I turned off the headlights and carefully drove behind a line of trees.
I got out of the car and went to the edge of the road and looked back. The rear of it could still be seen, so releasing the handbrake, I pushed it further behind. I checked again, this time satisfied. From there I figured it was about a mile, as the crow flies, to my mother’s, and at this hour, moving across the grounds of Burghley House, I was unlikely to bump into anyone. So, lowering my head I began running across the lifeless, frozen dirt, the cold air making it impossible to control my breathing.
My slippers made it impossible to run properly so I took them off and carried them. Within moments my bare feet completely numbed, like two slabs of raw meat on the end of my ankles, But at least I could move quicker. After about ten minutes of running and stumbling, I stopped and doubled over to catch my breath, wishing I had looked after myself better in recent years. But I didn’t let myself stop for long. Instead I ran onwards across the uneven, frozen ground until I tripped on a stone and hit the unforgiving earth face first. Dirt broke off from the frozen soil smearing across my face, my teeth knocking together. I could feel blood form and drip from my lip. But that didn’t matter. I got up and started to run again harder and faster until my lungs screamed, and the uneven soil was replaced by tarmac.
In the street light I could see blood on my jumper. I wiped my mouth, and more blood came. Feeling my bottom lip with my finger and thumb I could feel the tear where I had bitten clean through it, but I ignored it, it wasn’t my priority right now. Trying to move as quickly and discreetly as I could back down into the high street I heard a car coming towards me and had to duck into The George pub’s ancient archway that led patrons to the heavy oak front door. My brain immediately jumped to the conclusion that it was the police. But it wasn’t, just some kids in a small Ford Fiesta, vape smoke, or possibly the smoke of a joint bellowing out of one of the windows. I watched as they passed, talking and laughing, two girls in the back dancing to the loud music that seemed to power the small motor up the hill.
They didn’t have a care in the world. Not one.
After they had passed and I could no longer hear the baseline of whatever track they were listening to, I stepped out of the shadows. The road, town and sky were all silent. Poor Sean hadn’t been discovered yet. If he had, there would be more happening. Stuffing my hands into my pyjama pockets, and keeping my head low, just in case someone saw my muddy, bloodied face, I headed towards my mum’s. Most of the houses were in total darkness but a few had upstairs lights on. One had light coming from the lounge and another from the window directly above. I saw through a gap in the curtains that it was a nightlight making stars on the ceiling. There was a baby in that house. Asleep, and warm. His or her parents safe in the knowledge that no harm would come to them. I hoped that would always be the case. Walking away I forced back a tear. There wasn’t time for that now. I could cry tears of joy once I had them back.
A few minutes later I was at my mum’s front door. I took my keys out of my pocket and let myself in, closing the door quietly behind me.
Daniel
Stamford
2nd January 2018, 1.58 a.m.
Mum was asleep, I could hear her heavy breathing as I moved around the house. I looked up the stairs as some light spilled over the top, coming from her room. Her TV was still on but whatever programme she had been watching on catch-up had finished. I knew this because she had always fallen asleep this way, ever since I could remember at least. Quietly, I moved into the kitchen and pulled the door to. I turned on the light and it blinded me temporarily. I knew I needed to wake her up and talk about the things we never spoke of, but I needed her not to get upset. She had to be able to think, remember something that would tell me what I had done. Seeing me in the state I was wouldn’t help. With the light on I could see myself clearly in the kitchen window. My lip was worse than I had thought and opening my mouth I could see I had also broken one of my front teeth. I ran a tea towel under the tap and pressed it on the cut. The cold water slapped against the exposed nerve sending white heat through my jaw. I wanted to cry out, but I took a deep breath. Then something from the depths of my brain told me what to do.
Super glue.
I had no idea where the thought came from, and at first didn’t know what it meant. But then I thought about it. Glue would stop the bleeding and cover the exposed nerve. I didn’t know why I knew that. Rummaging through Mum’s junk draw I found a small tube of it and going into the toilet under the stairs I pinched my bottom lip together and applied some. My hands shook as I did, the tube slipping in my fingers as my blood ran onto them. I continued to pinch for another minute and then let go. It seemed to work.
Opening my mouth I then applied some to my front tooth which hurt so much that my vision blurred. Using sticky, crimson fingers I rubbed it in, forming a layer over my broken tooth. I could feel my pulse throbbing