Cath Staincliffe - Split Second

‘Why didn’t you say anything before?’

Declan flushed. ‘It were ages ago. I’d forgotten.’

‘Was this other guy there?’ She tapped the paper.

‘Dunno.’

‘You need to tell the police.’

He sighed, slumped, stared at her, mouth hanging open.

She fought the anger heating her flesh and resisted the impulse to grab hold of him and shake him and tell him to frame his bloody self. ‘Yes, everything you’ve told me.’

‘I’ve not much credit left.’

She bit her tongue. ‘Wait.’ She dialled the number the police had given her, her pulse racing, her stomach knotted and a great weight crushing her heart.

You’d have thought the police would have been falling over themselves to hear what Declan had to say, but they kept them hanging around the reception bit at the police station long enough. Louise gave the gist of why they were there to three separate people one after the other, like it was a memory test.

Finally DC Illingworth, a woman about Louise’s age, glowing with a violent tan and dressed in a purple pinstripe shirt and black slacks, took them into a small room and sat them down. It was just a little box, table and four practical chairs, steel frames and padded seats.

DC Illingworth apologized for the cold and turned on the convector heater. Once she’d established who they were – Luke’s mother, Luke’s friend – and taken their dates of birth and addresses, she asked Declan if he would like Louise to stay or whether he’d prefer to talk to her on his own.

‘She can stay,’ he said ungraciously. Louise could see he was slightly embarrassed at being given the choice. She was relieved. Declan needed a steady hand to keep him on track at the best of times. His mind wandered, making him prone to telling rambling stories that never quite reached their destination. She wondered how stoned he was today and thought about asking for a coffee to sharpen him up, but held back.

‘You recognized one of the e-fits in the paper?’ The detective drew out a copy of the newspaper from the file at her elbow.

‘That one.’ Declan pointed to one of the faces. ‘Tom Garrington.’

‘How do you know him?’

Louise waited while Declan told his story, listening for any deviation from what he’d said earlier. DC Illingworth interrupted a couple of times to ask questions, and each time Declan had to gear himself up to find his thread again. Louise stiffened with impatience. Her legs ached and she realized that she had them twisted and was pressing the top of one foot against the other calf, cutting off her blood supply.

To her credit, the police officer was very patient with the lad and didn’t try rushing him. When Declan got to the end – their swift departure from the party in the empty house and Luke sending the clip round – she turned to Louise. ‘This is what Declan told you?’

‘Yes,’ Louise turned to Declan, ‘but you missed out the drugs.’

Spots reddened on his cheeks and he gave a little twist of his head, sliding his eyes sideways like she was a fool for bringing it up.

‘We need you to be completely honest, Declan, completely open; don’t leave anything out,’ the officer said.

‘’Kay.’ He nodded, bit at a fingernail.

‘So tell me about the drugs.’

‘Just there was a lot there, all sorts. Everyone was high, you know.’

DC Illingworth sat forward. ‘Do you still have a copy of the video Luke took?’

Declan nodded. Louise felt sick. She didn’t want to watch it. She folded her arms and looked down as Declan found the file and passed his phone to the detective.

As DC Illingworth played the clip, Louise could hear the mess of chatter and music, then Luke’s voice clear and close, bubbling with laughter, ‘Say cheese.’

Oh you bloody idiot, Luke. You sweet, stupid idiot. When would he wake up? When would she hear him talk again? Would he be able to talk? Were those to be his last ever recorded words, ‘Say cheese’?

‘I need to make a copy of this,’ the woman told Declan, ‘but it is very helpful to have it.’

Louise understood that it would back up Declan’s story. Declan wasn’t exactly a straight-up guy who you’d buy a used car from, but this was proof.

‘You’ll arrest him?’ She gestured to the phone still in Illingworth’s hand.

‘If our enquiries…’ The detective was hedging her bets.

‘But that’s proof!’ Louise objected.

‘It’s proof of this specific incident.’

‘But that’s why!’ Louise heard her own voice high and tight. Too loud in the small space. ‘That’s why they attacked him.’

‘You’re probably right, but we have to follow procedures. We have to be methodical, meticulous-’

Louise snorted and shook her head, wired with exasperation.

‘If we don’t stick to the procedures, gather sound evidence and build a watertight case, then no one gets justice. And that’s what we’re all here for.’ Illingworth held Louise’s stare.

‘How long?’

The detective shook her head. ‘It’s an impossible question.’

It’s an impossible bloody situation, Louise thought. ‘I need a break.’ She stood up so abruptly that she had to reach out and catch the chair to stop it falling. ‘Is there anywhere I can smoke?’

‘I’ll take you outside. You can stay here, Declan.’ The boy was halfway to his feet. Probably gagging himself. Well he can wait, Louise thought, and then hated the meanness in her.

The detective left her in a small courtyard where a shelter covered a metal bench. Her hand was shaking as she lit her cigarette. Rage. At the delays, at the plod-plod way of dealing with it all. At the whole bloody world. She closed her eyes and smoked.

You’ll give yourself a heart attack . Her grandma’s words to her grandad when the miners’ strike was on and he’d be yelling at the television: ‘I was there; it wasn’t like that, pack of lies!’ The news covered running battles between the police and the pickets who travelled to support the strikers. ‘They were beating us up!’ He’d throw his arms up, his face deep red. ‘A load of southerners working for the Tories, no idea about mining, about what this means, about those communities.’

‘Sit down before you fall down,’ Grandma had said. ‘Why are you so surprised? We all know whose side the press are on, most of them.’

He had fallen down eventually. Louise had found him on the kitchen floor, coffee spilt. Only five weeks after he was made redundant. There’d been a terrible split in the union ranks in the run-up to the firm’s closure. Militants, ‘bloody Trots’ as he called them, dividing the membership, running dirty-tricks campaigns and smears, accusing some of the moderates of being moles or spies, in bed with management,

‘Divide and rule,’ he sighed one night when Louise was helping him fit new vinyl flooring in the bathroom. ‘Oldest trick in the book, and now we’re doing it to ourselves.’

His anger had turned sour and dirty in those last few months, and after he was out of a job he became bitter. Like the fight had gone and all he could do was brood.

Now Louise realized he was probably depressed. Even with all his learning and reading, all his political analysis, the job had defined him. He was a docker, his comrades were dockers, and when that was taken from him, he was a hollow man. His wife and Louise and Luke weren’t enough to complete him.

Her cigarette finished, Louise took a moment gazing upwards, where the shreds of white and pink cloud trapped the sunset against the deep blue of the sky. There was a gap in the rumble of traffic and no other sound broke the silence. No drill or dog or music or voice. As if the city held its breath. Then the drone recommenced, and bone-weary, she went back to join Declan.