Here To Stay

by Mark Edwards

‘He’s allergic.’

Jeff and Lizzy were both smirking at me,

im sure

I hadn’t brought my epi pen with me because it’s rare to encounter bees in winter. I would just have to hope the waitress was right.

oh god

Gemma was drinking even faster.

smh

‘Just a bit of a headache.’ Oh, for goodness’ sake. If he told us he was going down with the mystery virus, I’d chuck my wine glass at him.

Jeff laughed. ‘You’re like a bloody broken record, Elliot.’

Gemma made a gulping sound and turned bright pink, her eyes watering.

something you wanna say?

He stood up and started to move around the table, arm raised to slap her back, and Gemma did something that would, over the coming weeks, play on my mind: even though she was choking, she cowered. Like an animal that was used to being beaten.

mm..

That huge, meaty hand of his, primed for violence.

I stared at him, unable to shake the image of him striking Gemma.

Was that why she had self-harmed? Was that why she had been so unhappy as a teenager? Because her dad had hit her?

‘Lovely. Why don’t you order for me? I’ll only be five minutes.’

bye id go follow him

It seemed to me like an extreme way of avoiding the subject of estate agents.

I was itching to ask Lizzy about the estate agent but was sick of hearing myself talk about it.

I decided that I would have a word with Gemma when we got home, tell her that she needed to speak to them. They were her parents, after all.

Lizzy let out a filthy laugh. ‘Yeah, something like that. French oral a speciality.’

stunned.

I wished he’d regale me with his life story!

the exclamation point is sending me

‘I went to the university of life,’ she said. ‘And the school of hard knocks?’

but when I look at you, Gem, I think I must have done something right.’

side glance.

And for the next ten minutes he rambled on about all the things he’d do to my house if it were his.

elliot, open your eyes.

I checked the cat flap. It was locked again. Last time I had blamed this on an accident, but now I was certain. Lizzy hated cats, and she was locking mine out deliberately.

My neighbours’ back door was half-open. In the summer, this wouldn’t have surprised me, but it was freezing. All the lights in the house were off too, as if they were either in bed or had gone out. So why was the door open? Had they been burgled?

call them

I opened them and my breath snagged in my throat. There was blood spattered across the wall. Actually, more of a spray than a spatter.

oh shit oh shit

More drops of blood clung to the glass surface of the frame.

And there was blood on the wooden floor too. Thin lines and fat spots. A trail of crimson that led towards, and into, the living room.

omg im gonna cry

There was blood on the mirror, spattered across the wallpaper, clinging to the tiles. I could smell it, sharp and metallic, and I could smell something else, sweeter and more cloying, like a soiled nappy.

Fleetingly, I detected another smell too, so faint I thought I might be imagining it, but then I looked down, past the sofa, and all thoughts of smells and anything else were obliterated by what I saw. Edith was lying face down on the rug before the fireplace. The rug was soaked in her blood, as was the back of her sweater. So much blood. One arm stretched out before her, like she was reaching out for help.

oh nooooo

I turned away, the sight of her burning my retinas, but not before I saw the back of her head. The hole there, as if someone had struck her with a hammer, hard and repeatedly. The smashed skull and the blackness within.

im telling youuu her dad did it

I didn’t want to have to step over her. And I didn’t want to leave the house before I found George. He might need help.

I strained to listen and heard a groan coming from upstairs. It was George. I was certain it was George.

George was lying on his side on the carpet beneath the window. Like Edith, he was covered in what had to be his own blood. There was more spatter on the walls here, on the carpet, smeared across the foot of the bed. His hair was no longer white but red. His arms were stretched out in front of him, his head on the floor. He coughed, blood spilling from his lips.

Later, I would revisit this scene many times in nightmares, and he would open his eyes and tell me it was all my fault, that I had brought death into this quiet street. But now, in reality, he didn’t move, apart from the faintest rise and fall of his breathing.

But George was trying to say something else. These could be his last words. I couldn’t deny him the chance to have someone hear them.

I don’t think, before then, he knew who I was, who was here talking to him. But I saw recognition bloom, followed by alarm. His outstretched fingers twitched and, not knowing what else to do, I took his hand in mine.

His grip on my hand tightened and he tried again. ‘Not w—’ Again the blood drowned his words, but the tightness of his grip made me sure he was trying to warn me about something.

‘George, who did this? Who was it?’ He made a rasping sound and closed his eye.

damn it

PART TWO

‘What, around here? Besides, when was the last time you saw an internet cafe? It’s not 1997.’ ‘All right. There’s no need to be an arse about it.’

Jeff handed her a pack of baby wipes. ‘Clean yourself up, brush your hair. I need you to look presentable.’

The miserable expression on her face, the pout, made him want to slap her harder.

im sure

He probably stank, and he ran a few of the baby wipes over his own face, the back of his neck, reaching up beneath his shirt and cleaning his armpits. That would have to do.

????

‘Just follow my lead,’ he said. ‘Be friendly.’ He needed her with him for two things. Firstly, to translate. Secondly, because he knew anyone hearing a knock at the door this early – or at any time, really – would be suspicious of a man on his own. But with a young woman by his side, with another woman standing in the background by the car, he looked safe. A family man.

mm...suspicious

The truth was, he’d made Chloe throw her phone away as soon as they’d left the scene of the incident. And he and Lizzy only had an old pay-as-you-go mobile, which was unregistered and untraceable.

mm...

Jeff couldn’t understand her so he was having to trust Chloe not to tell the truth.

The woman was taking ages.

where you even in a rush to go...

He had already told her what to do, but he needed to get the woman out of the way so she didn’t see Chloe open Gmail.

‘I’m rubbish with computers,’ he said in English and laughed, pulling a self-deprecating face. The woman looked at him blankly.

LMAO

‘And . . . you are a grand-mère?’

and he was happy about the language barrier. It meant there was no need to attempt to fill the quiet.

‘A bedsit? Pathetic. Try Stuart.’

thats rich coming from a dude living in his car