Ben Cheetham - Blood Guilt

Again, Harlan peeped through the curtains. The preacher was walking away. “He’s gone.”

“Thank fuck for that.” Pulling out another cigarette, Susan added a touch guiltily, “Don’t get me wrong, I’m grateful for everything Mr Gunn’s done, but…the thing is, I’m sick of listening to all his God bullshit. I keep wanting to say to him, what kind of fucking God would let this happen? How am I supposed to believe in a God like that?”

“I remember thinking the same thing when Tom died.” The words were out before Harlan realised it. Straight away, he wished he hadn’t said them. He’d never really spoken about Tom’s death with anyone other than Eve. Not even Jim. Like Kane’s anger, his grief possessed him, and he possessed it. Part of him wanted — was desperate — to let go of it, but another part of him recoiled from anything that might cause him to do so.

“Who’s Tom?”

“He was my son.”

“What happened?” Seeing the pained look that passed over Harlan’s face, Susan added, “You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to.”

Harlan was silent a moment, then, almost whispering, as if he didn’t want to hear his own voice, he told Susan what’d happened. When he finished, he saw that she was looking at him with a new understanding on her ravaged face, as if what he’d said had completed a puzzle she’d been struggling to solve. “So you know how I feel,” she said with a softness he hadn’t heard before.

“I know how it feels to lose a child. I don’t know how you feel, and I never want to find out.” Exhausted, more from talking about Tom than from his wound, Harlan lowered himself onto the sofa. “Do you mind if I close my eyes for a while?”

“Go ahead.”

Harlan slipped into an uneasy doze. He lay half-sleeping, half waking, drifting in and out of dreams he didn’t want to remember, thinking thoughts he didn’t want to think, cracking his eyelids every few minutes to check his phone. And with every time he saw that there were still no missed calls or new messages, a heaviness grew in his chest, until it seemed as if a concrete block was resting on it. The fingers of sunlight probing the curtains had been replaced by the cindery glow of streetlamps, when Susan’s raised voice brought him to full wakefulness. “How did you get this number?” she was saying. “No, I’m not fuckin’ interested…I don’t give a shit…Don’t fuckin’ ring here again.” She stamped into the living-room and slammed the phone back into its cradle. “Fucking bastard journalists,” she said to Harlan, her voice taking on that same edge of hysteria as earlier. “I’m going out of my fuckin’ head waiting to hear if my little boy’s dead or alive, and they’re calling me up for a fuckin’ quote.” She took out a cigarette and lighter. When the lighter wouldn’t ignite, she yelled, “Fuck,” and flung it across the room.

Harlan retrieved the lighter, shook it and got the flame going. He held it out to Susan, and she sucked her cigarette into life. “Thanks,” she said, her voice a little calmer. As she smoked, Harlan took his next round of pills. Susan switched the telly on. The evening news was just beginning. Like a child watching a horror movie, she put her hand to her face and peered through her fingers. There was nothing new reported — the police were still searching the woods, still questioning an unnamed man. Susan switched the telly off and flung the remote aside. “Christ!” she groaned, her voice raw with emotion. “How much longer? How much longer?”

Not much longer, thought Harlan, not if they’re going to find Ethan alive.

Susan pressed her hands to her head as if to keep it from bursting. “I don’t know how much more of this I can take.”

“You can take it,” Harlan said evenly. “You can take it because Kane needs you.”

Susan took a breath and took hold of herself. She lit another cigarette, leaning back against the armchair, inhaling deeply. “Will you stay here tonight? I don’t want to be alone if…if they find anything.”

Harlan nodded.

“I’ll make you up a bed on the floor.”

“The sofa will do me fine”

“No it won’t. Not the state you’re in. There’s a fold-down mattress-” Susan broke off at a knock on the door, her eyes twitching with nerves. “Who the fuck’s that now?” she hissed in a low voice.

The knock came again. It wasn’t like Lewis Gunn’s knock, it was loud and insistent. This time Neil’s voice accompanied it. “Susan it’s me,” he shouted. “I need to speak to you. Please let me in. I’m begging you. I just want a chance to explain everything.”

Susan looked from the door to Harlan, as if seeking his permission to open it. He said nothing.

“Please, Susan, please,” continued Neil. “I love you, and I love the kids. I’d never hurt any of you. You’ve got to believe me.”

Susan rose to her feet, mouth working in mute uncertainty.

“I’m so sorry, Susan.” There were tears in Neil’s voice now. “I’m so sorry. Please don’t leave me. Please give me another chance.”

She approached the door, put her hand on the handle, but didn’t lower it.

“I won’t give up on us. You’re my life, Susan. I’d rather die than lose you. Do you hear me?”

Susan pressed her forehead against the door, eyes closed.

“I’d rather die, I’d rather die.” Neil’s words came in a sobbing murmur. There was a moment of silence, then the sound of a car door clunking shut. Peering between the curtains, Harlan saw that Neil had got into his Volvo. The car began to pull away. Suddenly, Susan came to life, unlocking and opening the door, rushing out into the street. “Wait,” she called, but the car didn’t stop.

She came back into the house, looking tentatively at Harlan. “What do you think I should do?”

“I think it’s none of my business to say what I think,” he replied, returning to the sofa.

“Christ, I hope he doesn’t do anything silly.” Susan sat down, but couldn’t keep still. “I want a drink. Do you want one?”

“I probably shouldn’t, not with all the pills I’m on,” said Harlan, but it wasn’t the thought of the pills that made him hesitant, it was the memory of what’d happened the last time he’d drunk around Susan.

“One won’t do you any harm. Come on, don’t make me drink alone.”

Harlan sighed. “Alright, just one.”

“Is white wine okay with you?” Before Harlan could reply, she added, “It’ll have to be because that’s all there is.”

Harlan shuddered involuntarily as, in a flash of remembrance, Robert Reeds words came back to him, I’ll have a lager, she’ll have a large white wine. Susan fetched two glasses of wine. The smell alone nauseated him, but he forced himself to swallow a mouthful. Susan drank quietly, her brow creased, seemingly grappling with some internal debate. Suddenly, as if she’d come to some decision, she gulped her glass empty, stood and returned the kitchen. There was the sound of glass clinking against glass as she poured herself a refill. Followed by the sound of tears bursting from her. Each low, racking sob jerked at Harlan’s heart. He considered going to her, but quickly decided against it. What would he do if he did? Hold her to him? Murmur reassurances into her ear? No. Those were things he couldn’t do. After several minutes, she stopped crying with a hitching breath. She returned to the living-room, her eyes dry, but red-rimmed and puffy. “Sorry,” she said.

Harlan shook his head to indicate there was no need to be. They sat in silence, cradling their drinks. “Jesus,” Susan sighed, after a while. “How did my life get here?”

How did my life get here? Harlan asked himself that same question almost every day. He’d had so many plans, so many things he was going to do with Eve and Tom. And now what did he have? Sweet-fuck-all, that’s what. For years he’d railed at the unfairness of life. And where had it got him? Here, that’s where. Here in this room, stuck up to his neck in a quicksand of guilt, where the more he struggled, the deeper he sank. So what was the answer? To just accept whatever life threw his way? The idea appalled him. Maybe there was no answer. Perhaps suffering was all there was left to life. Perhaps that was all there’d ever really been, even when he thought he was happy.