Cath Staincliffe - The Kindest Thing

I lick the sweet, dark crumbs from my fingertips. ‘Nearly,’ I admit.

I will be back to Minshull Street for sentencing in two weeks’ time. The women speculate as to how long I will get. Estimates range from a suspended sentence to five years. But it is much more likely to be the former, as I was not responsible for my actions. And I will be free.

They swap war stories, verdicts and surprises, reversals of fortune. Their voices blur and swell, salted with laughter. I let it all wash around me. I feel a rush of love for these women with their chaotic, fractured lives, the grim burdens they bear and their sparky, bloody-minded, frail resilience.

It is almost seven thirty and PO Clarkson comes to remind us she needs to lock up soon.

Patsy and I clear the plates as the others drift away with words of congratulation and jokes; the atmosphere in the house is warm with good humour.

‘So the jury believed yer?’ Patsy says quietly. ‘That you were off yer head when you did it?’

‘Yes.’

‘But yer weren’t really, were yer?’

I freeze, my hand on the cupboard door. A prickle of fear needles through me. Will she tell? Could they try me again? My mind soars back to that summer afternoon. I look her in the eyes and I trust her.

‘No, I wasn’t.’ I was in a hard place.

She wipes the sink. ‘You were just being kind, really. Anyone’d do the same, if they really loved someone. It shouldn’t be counted like murder.’

She is right.

I leave my curtains open and watch the tree. A pitch silhouette against the luminous sky. The moon is almost full and hangs fat and low, blue-white like milk. I long to be home, to be gone from here. Home, where I will roam the house and garden, drink in the sight and smell of my son, begin to find a way to bring my fine fierce daughter home.

I peel back the sheet and mattress cover. Take a black felt pen. Add my own mark: Deborah Shelley and Neil Draper . Our names will always be linked. Not just in private but in the public domain: on search engines and in legal casebooks, in people’s memories. The dying man and the wife acquitted of his murder, her reason lost. The ill-starred lovers.

But I am not going to climb on any more pyres for you, Neil, not hurl myself from a tower or slip my neck in a noose. What you have put me through has been more than enough for a lifetime. You will have to wait for me. I will rewrite our ending. We will be Baucis and Philemon, beloved wife and husband, who give shelter, food and wine to the incognito Zeus when others shun him. Rewarded, we are led from disaster and granted a wish – to stay together for the rest of our lives, to die together. And then we become two trees, an oak and a lime, side by side, our roots tangled in the earth, our branches intertwined, our leaves kissing in the wind. For ever.

Cath Staincliffeis an established novelist, radio playwright and creator of ITV’s hit series, Blue Murder , starring Caroline Quentin as DCI Janine Lewis. Cath was shortlisted for the CWA John Creasey Best First Novel award for her acclaimed Sal Kilkenny series, and for the Dagger in the Library award in 2006. Her latest stand-alone novels all focus on topical moral dilemmas. She was joint winner of the CWA Short Story Dagger award in 2012 for Laptop . She is a founding member of Murder Squad, a group who promote crime fiction.

www.cathstaincliffe.co.uk