Home Truths, page 22
Just before her voicemail cut in, I heard a sound that chilled my blood. I looked up towards her window, tilting my head to catch the very faint tinkle of piano music.
‘Hello, this is Heidi. Please send a text instead.’
I called her number again while making my way back into the house, through the kitchen, up the stairs, into her bedroom. With each step, the music grew louder.
I found her phone on top of her chest of drawers, next to Nicky’s birthday card, its screen alight as it played Moonlight Sonata.
The only place I hadn’t checked was my own bedroom.
A sheet of A4 paper lay on my pillow, weighed down by one of my slippers. And on top of the note, a bunch of daffodils tied with ribbon. Heidi knew I loved daffodils.
Her handwriting was as familiar to me as my own.
Mum,
I’m SO sorry. Dad thinks he’s saving us from a fate worse than death. I didn’t know what to do, I think he needs us. I promise I’ll look after Noah. Please keep yourself safe. I LOVE YOU. Please don’t worry.
XXXX Heidi XXXX
PS I’M SORRY, MUM
•
Pete from next door flagged me down as I was sprinting out to the car.
‘Prime Minister’s making an address to the nation this evening,’ he called over the fence. ‘I think they’re going to lock us down.’
I didn’t care. Priorities.
‘We’ll cope,’ I said. ‘We’ll pull together. I’ve just got to fetch the children, be back soon.’
He stood and watched as I reversed much too fast into the lane, crunching as I changed gear, accelerating away.
•
It should have taken at least fifty minutes to drive to Whitby. I made it in under forty, and felt a surge of hope on seeing lights inside Rum Keg Cottage. The big, silver cat ran ahead of me through the wicker gate and up the stone-flagged steps, plopping in through her cat flap. I glimpsed a twitch of lace curtains as I leaned on the doorbell, setting off an electronic ding-dong followed by a cacophony of barking.
They’re here. Of course they are. He’d just wanted the children near him, to be sure they were safe. I was still spitting with rage, gearing up for a massive showdown—but at least no harm had been done, apart from scaring the life out of me.
I waited, pacing up and down the doorstep. Rang the bell a second time. Waited, paced, swore. Stop messing about, Scott. Leaned on the bell for the third time—this time not letting up—ding-dong-ding-dong.
An outside light was turned on. Bolts were drawn before the door was flung open.
A stooping man with a snow-white tonsure glared out at me, a woman halfway up the staircase behind him. Both were wearing dressing-gowns and indignant expressions.
‘For heaven’s sake!’ the man barked. ‘What the blazes d’you want?’
Acute embarrassment drowned out my rage. I stepped back, stammering abject apologies. ‘I think I’ve got the wrong address. So sorry! I thought this was Rum Keg Cottage. The Milners’ house. I’ve been here before, and your cat—’
‘Right address,’ the man said curtly. ‘You looking for Scott?’
The woman had joined him by the door.
‘We’ve been awake fifty hours,’ she said. ‘We’ve just flown all the way from Australia, more than twenty-four hours in a plane with a stop in Dubai, then we had to drive across from Manchester. So we’re not at our best. You’ll have to forgive us for being a bit grumpy.’
I pressed both hands to my mouth. ‘I’m so sorry. I didn’t expect … I thought you weren’t due back until April.’
‘We weren’t. Pandemic. No need to destroy my doorbell.’ Mr Milner was still in a huff, but his wife became positively chatty, now she’d got over her irritation. She told me how lucky they’d been to get a flight home; they were almost stranded. She described tearful goodbyes to their grandchildren in Sydney, how fellow passengers and even the cabin crew were sobbing as the plane took off.
‘How awful,’ I murmured. ‘You must feel so disorientated. Um … do you have any idea where I might find Scott? I’m Livia, his wife.’
They glanced at one another, shaking their heads.
‘He was already gone when we arrived,’ said Mrs Milner. ‘He left everything in good order. The animals seem very happy. We offered to let him stay on a few days if he needed to, but he left a note saying he had other plans. I’ve got his phone number, but I imagine you do too.’
I left the weary travellers in peace, wishing them a good night’s sleep. They weren’t staying up to listen to the prime minister’s address to the nation. They said nothing would wake them now, not even the devil himself pounding on their door.
•
Back in our cold, silent home—phone in one hand, searching Heidi’s room for any clues—I called the police non-urgent line.
‘So these children are with their father?’ asked the efficient-sounding woman who took my call. ‘Uh-huh. And there’s no court order in place? No order applied for? And he’s got no history of violence at all?’
I imagined her filling in an incident report on a desktop.
‘Okay …’ I heard the click of a mouse. ‘And does he have a gun licence?’
‘No.’
‘Any reason to think he’s armed?’
‘Armed.’ I blinked. ‘You mean with a gun? I don’t think he’s ever touched one. Then again, he never used to think some evil cabal was about to take over the world.’
She took Scott’s vehicle details, but I knew she was fobbing me off. She sounded distinctly underwhelmed.
‘Might be more a matter for the family courts,’ she suggested. ‘This person they’re with is their father, is that right? You were sharing a home until January, there’s been no family violence or personal protection issues. Without any kind of court order, he’s got as much right to have the children with him as you do.’
I’d sat down on Heidi’s bed, touching the bare sheet with my free hand. I imagined her watching me leave this morning before packing for herself and Noah, writing that note, picking the daffodils to say sorry. She’d forgotten Noah’s flare-up kit, so she must have been in a state.
‘But he lied to the childminder,’ I protested. ‘He’s not answering his phone. I’ve no idea where my children are right now.’
‘If one of our units spots his vehicle, they’ll have a word with him.’
Ending the call, I let myself flop over sideways to lay my head on the place where Heidi’s pillow ought to be. No help from the police, then.
Think, think, think.
I ran downstairs to check in the bottom drawer of the filing cabinet where we kept our passports. All four were there, so at least he wasn’t planning to skip the country.
I logged into my banking app, scanning our accounts for activity that might give me a clue to where he was, where he’d been. ‘Oh, Scott,’ I muttered as I ran my eye down the list and saw that the last transaction was before the weekend: £500 cash withdrawn from an ATM in Whitby, shortly before his surprise visit here. Since then he hadn’t bought a thing with his cards. No fuel, no groceries, nothing. He must be using cash. Clearly, he’d been planning this for days.
Where’s he taken them? Where could he go? If they were staying in a hotel or Airbnb he’d soon run out of cash and be forced to use a card, and then I’d know which town he was in at least. He could be camping, I supposed. He might have driven all the way up to Scotland to find shelter with Dr Jack.
I made several phone calls in quick succession: to Geraldine’s care home, to a couple of teachers, to the Espinozas, to Anthony. Nobody had seen hide nor hair of him.
‘I’ve not heard a peep out of Scott in days,’ said Anthony. ‘Is he not still pet-sitting for those people in Whitby?’
‘They came home. Covid. This is dire, Anthony. He’s got it into his head that he and the children are on some kind of a hit list. D’you think he might do something desperate?’
‘Like what?’
I didn’t want to vocalise it. Dad thinks he’s saving us from a fate worse than death. He thought there was nowhere left to run. Every nation had been infiltrated. Every police car was looking for him, every ambulance was a literal death trap, everyone he met a potential spy. He must be terrified out of his wits.
Anthony sounded maddeningly relaxed. ‘He’ll just be holed up somewhere, staying with friends.’
‘He’s got no friends. He’s alienated everyone. You’re the only one left.’
‘If I hear from him, I’ll let you know.’
I was about to ring off when Anthony added, ‘Hang on—you near a TV? The prime minister’s about to come on.’
•
I’d always found it difficult to take Boris Johnson seriously. But tonight, as he gazed into the nation’s living rooms via almost every terrestrial channel and solemnly announced that we must stay at home, more than twenty-seven million people were listening. It felt momentous. I later learned that it was one of the most-watched broadcasts in the history of the UK.
Gatherings were banned. All non-essential shops and institutions were to shut down. Everyone was to stay indoors. Emergency laws would give the police increased powers. Listening to all this, I had a vivid glimpse of the monster under the conspiracists’ bed: the priceless fragility of freedom, the ease with it could be smothered under the guise of emergency response. I lived in a modern democracy, I’d followed the course of the pandemic and understood why nations were pulling out all the stops, yet even I could imagine this broadcast to be the opening scene of a dystopian thriller.
Bethany phoned within minutes of the broadcast ending. ‘Did you see the PM?’
‘I did.’
‘I can’t believe we’re doing this. I’m sure it’s the right decision, we have to flatten the curve, horrific when you look at what’s happening elsewhere. But … my God. Pretty drastic. Where does it end?’
‘I don’t know.’ I didn’t care either. Not at that moment.
‘You all okay? How’s Scott doing?’
‘We’re not okay,’ I said. ‘Actually, we’ve got a crisis.’
Bethany listened, murmuring in horror, while I put her in the picture.
‘I’m sitting in an empty house,’ I said. ‘I don’t know whether I can drive around searching for them, since the whole country just went into lockdown. PC Plod might already have roadblocks up.’
‘But why would Scott do such a crazy thing?’
‘He thinks they’re all in terrible danger. A fate worse than death.’
‘Hang on, James is with me. I’ll fill him in.’ I heard muffled voices before she was back on the line. ‘I’m driving up to be with you, Livia. James agrees. He’ll hold the fort here. If I set out now and travel through the night, I’ll be in Gilderdale by four or five tomorrow morning.’
I was so tempted. I longed to know my sister was on her way, that she’d be with me by morning. But I turned down her offer.
‘We’ve just had Boris telling us all to stay at home! You’ve got your own family to think about. Anyway, I’m probably overreacting. They might walk in any moment now.’
I heard her relaying my reply to James, and his voice in the background. ‘Give her my love, will you?’
When Bethany came back on the line, she sounded breathlessly anxious. ‘I don’t like this, Livia. It’s such off-the-wall behaviour for Scott. You don’t think he’s deluded enough to … No, of course not. Ignore me.’
‘Go on,’ I prompted.
‘I’m probably overreacting.’ She hesitated again. ‘But there’s no way he could be thinking about murder–suicide, is there?’
THIRTY-FIVE
Livia
Nightmares reign in the darkest hours of the night. When there are two empty beds in the house, and not a whisper of news from your family, and the whole world is trying to bar its gates against a virus—well then, those nightmares become indistinguishable from reality.
You lie down fully clothed, you shut your eyes, you open them. You check your phone, you call Scott’s number yet again. You run to the window every time you hear a vehicle in the distance. You tell yourself a thousand times: He adores them, he’d give his own life for them in a heartbeat. Trust him. It’s all fine. But fearful warning lights flash in every corner of your mind. He’s gone mad, he has nowhere to run. It’s not fine. Nothing is fine.
In the darkest hour I wrapped myself in Scott’s dressing-gown, which somehow still carried the spirit of better days, and made tea. Sitting in the rocking chair, I opened my laptop, steeling myself to watch Dr Jack. This was the video Scott sent me last Friday, a link I’d never bothered to open. I was hoping for some clue as to what had driven him over the edge.
Here we go. A trio of charlatans peered out of their little Zoom boxes on my screen. Dr Jack was wearing scrubs and that featureless rubber mask. He sat with the green wall behind him, the Z-shaped crack in the plasterwork. His guests were Gary Tey, the CIA man with the porn star moustache, and a nerdy bloke who claimed to be a security expert based in Canada.
Dr Jack was having the time of his life. The man was clearly high on his own sense of importance, even though he was wearing a mask that made him look like a cheap mannequin. It would have been hilarious if it weren’t so dangerous. The voice-changing software was clever, though.
So, to clarify for people watching, what we’re seeing here is the problem–reaction–solution paradigm …
‘Tragic bloody losers,’ I yelled. ‘Doctor, CIA agent, intelligence expert—bollocks you are. I bet you’re all eating pizza in your mothers’ basements.’
You have to admire the orchestration of this fictional crisis.
They mocked dying people on ventilators, they scoffed at mass graves and quarantined Italians who cheered the world by singing on their balconies. I ground my teeth at the pompous pseudoscience of this panel of mansplainers, their know-all sarcasm, their pretence of expertise. I hated them. I hated them. As a direct result of their arrogance and ignorance, I’d lost the man I loved and our children had become pawns. The games these people played had consequences.
I watched right through to the end, snorting as the masked Dr Jack made his solemn pronouncement. What a jerk.
Be ready. You are the Resistance. Protect the vulnerable however you can. They’re first in line.
The comments from viewers would also have been funny, except that they weren’t.
— When will the sheeple wake up? Just had a fight with my son about this. He won’t smell the coffee. He’s afraid of the truth.
— Anyone else heard that the US forces are on their way with 50,000 personnel and weapons systems to put down any resistance in the UK? Invited by the Queen. My source is in the RAF. They’ve been grounded, told to turn a blind eye to troop movements etc
— Happening as predicted. As of 21.00 today the whole UK is under house arrest. IT HAS BEGUN. MOBILISE NOW!
My fingers were itching. I too typed out a comment: Funny kind of hospital where doctors can slope off and put on silly rubber masks and make videos in their tea breaks.
But I didn’t post it. There was no point in being a keyboard warrior; I had no chance of changing the minds of these cult followers. All that mattered was to find my children.
So instead, I deleted my comment and posted a plea.
— Dr Jack, do you have any information about where my husband Scott Denby has taken our two children? He’s disappeared with them since watching this video. I know he’s been in private contact with you. Is he with you now? I’m extremely worried. Please, please help!
Within minutes my polite request had begun to gather abuse, much of it in shouty capital letters. I was a SHILL. I was the enemy and a LIAR. I was, in fact, a man. I HAD NO children—I was a team of secret agents working for the New World Order, tracking down their Resistance leader.
More disturbing were comments from those who assumed my family were victims of a purge: THE FIRST DISAPPEARANCES. Had I checked the makeshift morgues? Checked the so-called Nightingale ‘hospitals’?
But not a word from Dr Jack himself.
THIRTY-SIX
24 March 2020
The rising sun smiled at the new day, its glittering path reaching for the sand-and-shingle beach of Topsham Cove, several miles north of Whitby. The first dawn of lockdown was a calm one. Clear sky, light winds. Two hours ago the entire beach had been underwater; now the tide was racing out, leaving smooth sands strewn with ridges of rock and salty clumps of seaweed.
A couple in their eighties picked their way down the steep path onto the sand. Later they would explain to the police that they often visited this beach at sunrise, bringing a bag for gathering any rubbish that had floated ashore. It was their favourite time of day. Recently they had another reason to be out and about so early: the cove would be deserted. They wouldn’t end up on one of those ventilators.
At first they thought the dully gleaming object in the surf might be a stricken boat or even a beached whale. But as they drew closer they realised they were looking at a car, a hatchback, abandoned in the foaming water. The sea had tipped it into a nosedive and washed under its wheels. The passenger’s door stood open, bent right back to the bonnet; the driver’s door was nowhere to be seen, presumably ripped away by the currents.
The couple peered through the spray, dreading the worst. It looked as though the car belonged to a family. One of its back windows was covered by a sunshade decorated with cartoon giraffes, and children’s things lay scattered through the shallows and up the sand. Small clothes, disintegrating school textbooks. A booster seat seemed almost alive, struggling and somersaulting in the breaking waves.
Judging by its position and condition, the car had been fully submerged at high tide. Anyone inside would have drowned, but trying to escape in darkness might have been just as lethal. This stretch of Yorkshire’s coast was notorious for treacherous tides and rips. Even now, the North Sea surged and bullied under and over, charging through the open doors.
