Cath Staincliffe - Half the World Away

I wake Lori and tell her the news. She covers her face with her hands.

Isabelle rings. ‘We’re going to be asked to comment. Do you want to discuss what you say with Lori, Nick and Tom?’

‘Yes, of course,’ I say. ‘Nick’s still away, though.’

‘I see. OK.’

‘What are we supposed to say?’ Lori looks between Tom and me.

‘We’re glad he was caught, glad he’s been convicted,’ I say.

‘Glad he’s dead,’ Tom says.

I stare at him.

‘I don’t feel glad about any of it,’ Lori says.

‘OK,’ I say. ‘Maybe that’s not the right word.’

‘We say the absolute minimum.’ Tom pulls a piece of paper over and takes a pen.

I have a flashback to his hotel room, those days of leafleting, the list we made about Lori’s last photographs.

‘ “Lorelei and her family are…” ’ Tom looks at us. Lori shrugs.

‘Relieved?’ I say.

Tom screws up his mouth but obviously can’t think of anything better.

‘Isabelle can always tweak it,’ I say. ‘ “Lorelei and her family are relieved that the matter has been concluded-” ’

‘Sounds like a boundary dispute,’ Tom says. ‘ “… relieved that justice has been done and now wish to concentrate on looking to the future.” ’

‘That’ll do,’ Lori says.

There’s a ghastly sense of anti-climax to the whole thing. I’ve no desire to cheer, raise a fist or even sigh with relief at the conclusion of the legal process. Bradley Carlson may be dead but we are still here, swirling in the aftermath of his violence. Still haunted.

We get a letter from Chengdu, addressed to Mr and Mrs Maddox and Miss Maddox. A franking mark tells us it’s from the consulate. Inside there is another envelope, thick yellow vellum, embossed with pictures of koi carp. I open it and pull out a note.

Dear Mr and Mrs Maddox and Miss Lorelei Maddox,

I am translating for Mr Bai and Mrs Wen who wish to thank you for your most kind thoughts. We send you hope for health and prosperity and happiness and we thank you for your kindness and assistance.

Warm regards.

They have signed their names in Chinese characters, delicate pen strokes, in rich black ink.

My eyes fill and the writing swims. I cannot swallow. I look away, out of the window, where dark clouds, huge like galleons, race across the winter sky. And seagulls wheel below them. I think of the Chinese girl with the daisy chain and the large sunglasses, setting out on her life, and how it was stolen from her. So brutally. Of the endless sorrow that her parents must bear. And how in the midst of that grief they could consider us, choose a card, decide what to say and arrange to have it sent. Such human kindness. I think of Lori and her pain, the wounds that may never heal, the invisible ones.

And I weep for us all.

We are making dough, the four of us, for Christmas decorations to hang on the tree. Reindeer and penguins to be baked, then iced. Benji patrols around the table for bits of raw pastry. Isaac keeps sneaking bits for him.

I had expected Isaac to be even more unsettled in the wake of everything that’s happened but he’s actually much better. We’ve gone a whole term without any concerns about his behaviour. Sebastian moved schools and Isaac has a new best friend, Imogen. They spend hours drawing and making things together. He can still be gloomy and petulant, quick to take offence and slow to rally, but I think that’s just his personality. I dread his teenage years, especially if I’ve to deal with him on my own, but that is a way off – God knows what might happen between now and then. Because you never really know what’s round the corner, do you?

Lori is back to her normal weight, still skinny, but she has lost that awful gaunt look. In the aftermath of the trial she was interviewed for a feature in the Guardian magazine. Isabelle identified other opportunities but Lori was clear she wanted to limit what she did. Lori said the interviewer was really easy to talk to and Lori trusted her not to misrepresent anything. It was hard to read that feature. Lori has never talked to me in any detail about that time: most of what I knew was from the police statement she gave. One thing she’s said since then has stuck with me: that the worst thing was the helplessness, the total loss of control.

Finn is singing along to the radio and Isaac clamps his hands over his ears and says, ‘Too loud, tell him, Mummy.’

‘You’ve got floury hair, now,’ Lori says to Isaac.

‘What flowers?’ Isaac frowns.

‘Not flowers – flour.’ Lori pats the bag and a puff of white escapes. ‘You’re going white, like a ghost.’

‘Scooby Doo,’ Finn says.

Isaac plunges his hands into the flour and pats it over his head and face. I feel a flash of irritation at the prospect of even more mess to clear up, then Lori laughs, that yelp of pleasure I cherish so, and the mess just doesn’t matter any more.

Finn chuckles. ‘Make me a ghost, too, then. Go on.’

Isaac obliges, leaving Finn dusted white and sneezing.

‘OK, enough,’ I say, before they go any further.

‘Take a picture,’ Isaac says.

‘Wait, then.’ Lori goes upstairs. She comes back with two bed sheets and her new camera, bought with the money she’s been saving up.

She wraps the sheets around the boys and gets them to pose. ‘Spooky faces,’ she says, and reels off a sequence of snaps.

‘Shower,’ I say, ‘both of you.’

‘What about the decorations?’ Isaac says.

‘They can go in the oven now and we’ll do the icing in the morning. Are you at work?’ I check with Lori. She’s been working for Tom, doing admin for tenancy agreements and filing, and more recently taking viewings, showing people properties in Manchester.

‘Yes, ten till four. You two can show me what you’ve done when I get home,’ she says.

The boys trudge off, trailing puffs of flour.

Lori and I put the trays into the oven.

‘Aphrodite’s moving in with Dad,’ Lori says, taking the cookie cutters to the sink.

I feel a pang of dismay but chastise myself. What did I expect? For Tom to carry on rootless, restless, unattached for ever? ‘Really?’ I say. ‘Wow. What’s she like?’

‘She’s nice, actually, really nice. She’s doing business studies at Manchester Met.’

‘I thought she was a model,’ I say. A hand model. The time we had in China, Tom and I, seems like a mirage now, rippling in the haze. Unreal. And that night, that precious night, when we found sanctuary together amid the horror, it feels like it happened to other people, in a parallel universe.

Losing Lori, looking for her, threw us together and forced us to move beyond the confines of our past. Brought us to a new understanding. Did I ever wish it might be more than that? At times, if I’m honest. I cannot speak for Tom. He never gave me cause to hope. And, realistically, I think we’re still too different, and that those differences would rankle and chafe and soon corrupt any shared future we might have together. Better to cherish the memory: desire in his eyes, the beat of his heart, the warmth of his skin. That love, as if we would call her back to us.

Lori runs the water, squirts in some washing-up liquid. ‘Yes,’ she says, ‘but she wants to do the other stuff and help Dad build his empire.’

I laugh. ‘When I met your dad I never for one minute imagined he’d become a property developer.’

Lori closes the tap. She turns. The smile fades from her face. ‘Mum?’

‘Yes?’

She looks so serious. I don’t know what’s coming. She rubs at her shoulder. She’s had a tattoo done there, a Chinese phoenix.