The Border Part Three, Page 2

  Sighing, she realized she could hear him frantically cleaning up. “I won’t come in,” she told him with a sigh, shuddering a little at the thought of what she’d see if she did, “but your laundry is in the obvious place, and I’ll be back tomorrow to vacuum and clean the kitchen. I’m sorry I didn’t get around to it today, but I’m kinda rushed off my feet getting ready for Christmas. Is that okay?”

  She waited.

  “Is that okay, Dad?”

  “Yeah, sure. Tomorrow’s fine.”

  “You’re welcome.” Sighing again, she made her way along the corridor and then out onto the porch, before stopping for a moment and closing her eyes. She could feel the morning sun on her face, and for a few brief seconds she actually felt as if the world was calming down a little. All the worries left her mind and she focused on simply breathing in and breathing out, and she tried to imagine the energy of the natural world filling her soul and giving her the strength to get through another day. At least, that was the advice she’d read in a magazine, although so far it hadn’t really seemed to help. Sometimes, all she wanted was to empty her mind and just not think about anything for a few seconds. She waited, letting the last of her thoughts drip away until finally…

  Peace.

  “You doing some hippie shit up there?” a voice asked suddenly.

  Opening her eyes, she saw to her surprise that Ben was standing at the bottom of the steps, with his jacket slung casually over his shoulder and the usual smile plastered across his face.

  “What are you doing here?” she asked, startled.

  “Well,” he replied, making his way up to join her on the porch before glancing into the house, “I figured maybe I should be the bigger man and establish contact. Get it out the way, so to speak.”

  “You’ve come to see Dad?”

  He nodded.

  “Seriously?” she continued. “You’ve come to offer an olive branch?”

  “Is it really that surprising?”

  “I…” Pausing, she seemed genuinely dumbstruck for a moment. “Well, that’s good. That’s really good. I never thought you’d do it, I just thought the two of you would ignore each other, but maybe you and he can patch things up?”

  He shook his head.

  “Ben, just -”

  “I’m not here to patch things up,” he continued, as his smile faded. “I’m doing it for you.”

  She raised a skeptical eyebrow. “For me?”

  “You’re hosting Christmas this year,” he added, “so your stress levels are already going to be through the roof. Plus, you know, I doubt Bob’ll be much help, so I thought that for your sake, to help keep that vein on your forehead from throbbing and maybe even exploding, I’d reach out to the old bastard and try to make sure things are at least civil. Do you think I should dye my hair blonde again? Just to make a point, you know?”

  “What vein on my forehead?” she asked, reaching up and feeling for one. “Do I have a vein on my forehead?”

  “Only when you’re stressed.”

  “For real?”

  “That’s not the key point here,” he continued. “Beth, you -”

  “I didn’t know about this,” she muttered, still feeling her forehead as she headed down the steps. “Jesus Christ, Ben, way to drop something on me without any warning. I don’t want a vein on my forehead. How did I not know about this before?”

  “Well,” he replied, “to be fair, out of all the people around you, you’re the one who sees your own face the least. I guess everyone else just assumed you knew.”

  “I’ll see you at home,” she called back to him. “Good luck with Dad.” She added something else under her breath.

  He watched, smiling slightly, as his sister headed to the car. She was still muttering to herself, and as she got into the driver’s seat she was still feeling her forehead.

  “Have a nice day,” he said quietly, before pulling open the front door of his father’s house and stepping inside. Almost immediately, he scrunched his nose up in disgust. “Jesus, it stinks in here. What is that, cat piss and wank socks?” Sighing, he reaching up and knocked loudly on the inside of the door. “Dad! It’s me! Are you at least half decent?”

  He waited.

  Silence.

  “Dad!” he called out. “Are you ignoring me, or are you being deaf again?”

  Again he waited.

  Again nothing.

  “Welcome home,” Ben muttered, heading across the hallway and then stopping to look into the front room, which had been the dining room back in the days when the family had lived together. The place was filthy now, with old newspapers and dirty dishes piling up, but for a moment he saw it the way it had once been: clean and welcoming, with all the touches his mother had brought to the place while she and Harry were still together. Whereas the others had witnessed the decline slowly, Ben’s sporadic visits home meant that he’d seen it in snatches, making the impact more visceral and more gut-churning.

  A moment later, he heard a door creaking open in the corridor. Glancing back, he saw his father shuffling out of the spare room and making his way to the bathroom, while clutching a batch of paper tissues around his groin. The old man was clearly unaware that he was being watched.

  “Poor bastard,” Ben whispered, feeling a hint of genuine pity.

  Still unaware that anyone else was in the house, Harry disappeared into the bathroom.

  “You need help in there?” Ben asked, not whispering but not shouting either.

  No reply.

  “Deaf old man,” he continued, heading to the kitchen and finding that this room, too, was a mess, although he could see where his sister had tried to make it tidy. Fresh cleaning supplies had been left in a basket on the counter, so he figured Beth was planning to come back at some point.

  A moment later, he heard shuffling footsteps coming closer. Stepping back, he watched as his father headed to the fridge, still apparently unaware that he had company.

  “You want me to make you some tea?” Ben asked.

  No reply, as his father reached into the fridge.

  “Not got your hearing aid in, huh?”

  Taking a carton of milk, Harry shut the fridge door and then headed to the front room.

  Sighing, Ben shook his head. “What am I supposed to do?” he asked out loud, wincing as he smelled something foul from the fridge. “Shout until you notice me? It’s like being a -” He paused, feeling a shudder run through his bones. “It’s like being a ghost in my own childhood home. What a day for metaphors this is turning out to be.”

  Making his way to the next door, he looked through and saw that his father was in one of the armchairs, tipping several pills into his mouth and then washing them down with the milk.

  “You know,” Ben said after a moment, “the milk might affect the absorption of the medication. You should watch out for that, maybe use water instead.”

  Reaching over to the coffee table, Harry fumbled for the remote control.

  “What are you gonna watch?” Ben asked. “Still obsessed with Judge Judy? Or do you, like me, feel that her most recent seasons have become a tad predictable? Still, it can be fun to catch up with the old dear from time to time.”

  Harry pressed a few buttons on the remote, before realizing that he had it upside-down. Somehow, as he began to turn it, he seemed to sense that he was being watched, and finally he looked over at Ben and their eyes met.

  “Hey, Dad,” Ben said with a smile, raising a hand and giving a little wave.

  Harry frowned.

  “It’s not an illusion,” Ben continued, stepping into the room, “and I’m not a ghost, not yet, not quite. Pleased to see me?”

  He waited for a reply, but instead a kind of calm, pressing silence fell between them.

  “You’ve really made some changes around the place,” Ben said finally, looking down and using his foot to push some old plastic bags aside. “You’ve put your own stamp on the old family place.”

  Again he waited.


  Again, nothing.

  “Wanna know where I’ve been?” he asked. “God, that’s a big question. In nine years, I’ve been… a lot of places. Met a lot of people. Done a lot of things, too, some of them good, some of them bad, most of them just mind-numbingly mundane. I’m still waiting for the big wave to hit, so to speak.”

  “Big wave?” Harry replied, rolling his eyes. “Sounds good.”

  “You know, the point to life.”

  Harry chuckled at this.

  “Come on, Dad, I…” Pausing, Ben let his voice trail off for a moment.

  “What exactly are you doing here?” Harry asked.

  “So far, nothing particularly inspiring.” Stopping next to the sofa, he paused again. “To be honest, I figured I should come and break the ice. It’s Christmas next week and -”

  “I’m not going.”

  “To Christmas?”

  “Bugger Christmas,” Harry replied, turning the TV on and then flipping through the channels. “I heard you were back, Jack told me. I don’t need another Christmas, not at my age. You lot enjoy yourself.”

  “Without you?”

  “What?”

  “Without you?” Ben asked again, raising his voice a little. “Come on, Dad, for Beth’s sake -”

  “That’s where they’re having it this year,” Harry replied, interrupting him. “At Beth’s.”

  “I know, Dad.”

  “So go and have fun. Don’t worry about me, I’ll be fine, same as always. It’s not like I’m used to people coming to see me, I’m happy enough like this.”

  “Wallowing in your own filth?” He sighed. “I’m not asking you to do this for me, Dad, and I’m not suggesting that we’ll be buddies by the end of it. I just think that for Beth’s sake, it would be real nice if we could ease some of the tension. Maybe you haven’t noticed, but she seems to be in a bad way at the moment. That vein on her forehead is looking a little scary.”

  “It pulses sometimes,” Harry grumbled.

  “Exactly.”

  “I’m sure Beth doesn’t need you to look after her,” the old man muttered, turning the TV’s volume up. “She’s a grown woman and she can look after her own vein.”

  “She’s my sister and I’m worried about her.”

  “Well, then why did you -”

  Ben waited for him to continue. “Why did I what, Dad? Why did I come back?”

  “Well? Why did you?”

  “I’m starting to wonder that,” he replied with a sigh. “I don’t know, I just thought nine years was maybe long enough for… something to have happened. For something to have changed. Every time I go away, I leave it a little longer before the next time I come back, because I keep thinking that eventually I’ll find the magic threshold that erases all the bullshit and magically sorts things out, but I guess nine years isn’t long enough. Next time I’ll have to try ten, huh? And then fifteen. And then, I don’t know, I missed so many birthdays, how old are you anyway?”

  Instead of replying, Harry simply turned the volume up a little more on the TV.

  “I hear there’s been another murder,” Ben continued, raising his voice accordingly.

  No reply.

  Sighing, he reached down and grabbed the remote control, quickly hitting the mute button.

  “What did you do that for?” Harry scowled, trying to snatch it back.

  “Oh, I don’t know,” Ben replied, “I just figured it’s been a long time since we saw each other, so maybe you could keep the TV off for five fucking minutes and be civil.”

  “So that’s why you’re here? To cause trouble and speak to me with that foul mouth?”

  “I hear there’s been another murder,” Ben said again, as the smile faded from his face. “I was wondering if you wanted to frog-march me down to the police station again.”

  “Go to hell,” Harry hissed, reaching out and trying to grab the remote control.

  “No, you go to hell,” Ben replied, with a hint of genuine grit in his voice. “Can’t you be civil, old man? Sitting here surrounded by your own filth, with your own daughter having to come twice a week just to make sure the house doesn’t get condemned, can’t you at least be nice?” He paused. “There’s been another murder. Nice girl, I happened to see meet her not long before it happened, can you believe that? Can you, Dad? Can you believe that there’s been yet another coincidence?”

  “What do you want?” Harry asked, his eyes filled with anger.

  “I don’t know,” Ben replied darkly, staring at him. “Honestly. I don’t know what I want. Maybe I want an apology for what you did fifteen years ago. Do you think that could be it? I mean, I get where you were coming from, but I wasn’t the only blonde-haired kid in town. So do you think that could be the issue here? Do you think it’s that simple? I want an apology for what you did, and for how you…” Pausing for a moment, he finally sighed. “And here we are again. You’ve drawn out the worst of me, the whiniest, and we’re at each other’s throats again. That’s the problem, Dad. When these things are so close to the surface, it doesn’t take much for them to come through.”

  “So maybe you should have stayed away,” Harry replied.

  “How long for?”

  “Forever!”

  Ben nodded. “Maybe that would have been a better idea.”

  “Sometimes things just don’t work out,” Harry continued. “There’s no point pushing ‘em, either.”

  “What doesn’t work out? Relationships? Whole lives?”

  “Give me my remote.”

  Heading over to the window, Ben looked out for a moment at the street where he used to play as a child.

  “Give me my remote,” Harry said again.

  For a few seconds, all Ben could think about was the time Mr. Ryman chased him down the street after catching him picking roses. He allowed himself a faint smile, and he wondered whether Mr. Ryman was still alive.

  “Give me my remote,” Harry said for a third time.

  “Do you think it’s true?” Ben asked, turning to him. “Do you think we’re really born onto this rocky of a planet with no means of leaving a legacy?”

  “What are you talking about now?”

  “I’m talking about a bigger legacy than just kids or a splash of fame, I just…” He paused again. “I refuse to believe that we don’t have the chance of making an impact on the cosmos.”

  Harry shook his head in despair.

  “Too deep for you, Dad?”

  “Too stupid. Give me my remote and -” Before he could finish, the remote control was tossed into his lap.

  “I was lying,” Ben continued, staring into his father’s eyes. “I didn’t come here to get an apology from you. I know you never apologize for anything. I didn’t even come to get an apology. I know you never apologize for anything. I came to smooth things over for Beth’s sake, but obviously that’s not going to happen, is it?” He paused. “Because you don’t think you were wrong. You think you were right. Still, after all those time, you think I did it.”

  “Get out of my house,” Harry replied.

  “Aren’t you going to ask me?” Ben added, stepping over to him. “I’ll make a deal with you, Dad. If you have the balls to ask me straight out, I’ll answer honestly. I’ll tell you the truth.” He waited for a moment, before crouching next to his father’s armchair. “Ask me if I killed those girls, and I will tell you whether I did. I will tell you the absolute truth.” Another pause. “Go on, Dad. Just ask.”

  He waited, as Harry stared back at him.

  “What’s wrong, Dad? Don’t you want to know the truth? Ask me.”

  II

  “I’m not saying Gary’s death was the best thing that ever happened to me,” the woman on the TV said, “but…” She paused, before starting to smile. “Well, I definitely found a whole new lease of life after he was gone. I became a new me.”

  The studio audience clapped approvingly. Some even cheered.

  “Lucky bitch,” Beth muttered, running an iron ove
r Lucy’s uniform with one hand while still feeling her own forehead with the other.

  “Widows get a good deal,” the woman continued as the applause died down. “If your husband dies, you get a lot of sympathy and a lot of help. Plus, you know, financially it makes sense, provided you’ve been together for a while and he has a life insurance policy. I don’t want to sound mercenary, but you have to think about that kind of thing.”

  “You have to think of your children,” the host pointed out.

  “Absolutely,” the woman continued. “When Gary died, there was a little period when people wondered whether I’d… Well, you know, people can be suspicious.”

  “You were investigated on suspicion of murder?”

  “Right.”

  “But the investigation was dropped, right?”

  “Of course. But for some people, mud sticks.”

  Glancing at the desk over by the window, Beth remembered the policy Bob had taken out a few years earlier. She couldn’t quite recall how much it was supposed to pay out, but she was pretty sure it was seven figures, maybe even more. The whole thing had seemed abstract at the time, and a little ghoulish, but now… However much it was, it would be enough to put Lucy through college, enough to ease their worries. For a moment, she caught herself fantasizing about a world in which Bob suffered an accident. She knew it was wrong not to be horrified by that idea, but deep down she felt a wriggling knot in her stomach, a sensation that actually, being free of Bob would be wonderful.

  “No,” she whispered, focusing on the ironing once again. “Just no, just -”

  Hearing a noise nearby, she turned and looked over at the door, where her younger nephew Oliver was standing with tears in his eyes. She hadn’t heard him entering the house and she had no idea how long he’d been there, and for a moment she wondered if she was hallucinating.

  “Hey,” she said, forcing a smile, “you okay there?”

  Oliver nodded, even as a tear ran down his cheek.

  “Okay,” she continued, setting the iron to one side and heading over to him, “you’re clearly not okay. What’s wrong, are you hurt?”

  He shook his head.

  “Then what is it?”

  “Mum and Dad are at work,” he told her, “and…” Reaching into his pocket with a trembling hand, he took out his mobile phone. “Stuart showed me some pictures on the internet.”