Stephen Leather - Once bitten

The tears were flooding out now and I opened my eyes, letting them flow down my cheeks and wet the pillow. It wasn't the first time I'd cried for April, and I was sure it wouldn't be the last.

"Deborah divorced me about six months later."

"She blamed you?"

"Not for April being the way she was, no."

She said nothing, just put her head against my shoulder and held me. I closed my eyes again. I could picture April lying in the plastic bubble, her eyes open, looking right at me. Deborah was next to me, her hand on the plastic, trying to touch our child. She was crying, and so was I. There was a doctor there, too. He wasn't crying, but then it wasn't his baby.

"Tell me, Jamie," said Terry.

"I can't."

She lapsed into silence again. Eventually I began to speak, to tell her. About the conversation Deborah and I had later, back in her hospital room. About what should happen to April. About quality of life, about how it wasn't fair for her, about how she'd never, ever, have a normal life, that maybe she'd be better off…

"Dead?" said Terry, finishing the sentence for me. "You said that?"

I opened my eyes. "I said it but I don't think I meant it. I'm still not sure. I think I was playing Devil's Advocate, you know, testing her feelings. I remember telling her that the doctors could do it, they could just not try so hard to keep her alive and she'd just go, quietly, no pain. I wasn't saying they should, I just said they could. She went crazy, she accused me of all sorts of thing, she said I was in it with the doctors that we all wanted April dead and that I didn't love her because she wasn't perfect, that I hated anything that wasn't one hundred per cent right. She screamed and slapped me and then she just went quiet and hardly spoke to me again. April died the day after.

Deborah didn't say anything but I knew she blamed me, she thought I'd spoken to the doctors and got them to do it. I didn't, Terry, I honestly didn't. I didn't kill her, I'd never kill a child."

She held me tightly. "I know, Jamie. I know you wouldn't."

"I tried to tell Deborah that, but she wouldn't listen. She never went home, she went to stay with a friend instead and a few months later she filed for divorce. Now she's using her lawyers to punish me."

"She needs someone to blame, Jamie, that's all. If she can blame you then it takes the guilt off her own shoulders. The more she can punish you, the better she feels about herself."

"God, you think I don't know that," I said, unable to keep the bitterness out of my voice even though it wasn't Terry that I was angry about. "I'm the psychologist, remember?"

"I remember," she said. "But sometimes perhaps you can't see the wood for the trees, you know?"

"Yeah, I know. I'm sorry."

"There's nothing to be sorry about, Jamie. And there's no need to feel guilty. You didn't do anything wrong."

"I know," I said, but inside I wasn't so sure. What really made me feel bad was that, deep down, I wasn't sure whether or not I really had wanted April to die. My conscious mind, that was sure that I really had been playing Devil's Advocate with Deborah, preparing her for the time when April would die as the doctors had said she would, but below that, in the black depths of my mind, there lurked the thought that maybe, just maybe, I'd wanted her to be taken away because she wasn't perfect, she was a reminder that things went wrong that couldn't be fixed and that the time would come when my own body would be beyond repair. Deborah knew how I felt about growing old.

She threw that in my face towards the end. The car, she'd said, that's why I spent so much time working on the car, because that was something that I could stop from getting older just by spending time on money on it. But it wouldn't do any good, she said, the car would still be around long after I'd gone. I was the problem, not the car. I was the one that was getting older and I was the one that was going to die so why the hell didn't I just grow up and accept it. Not everything in life was perfect, and not everything stayed perfect. Part of me wanted to explain that to Terry, but I didn't, I just ran it through my mind, round and round like a child's merry-go-round, the golden horses with gaping mouths and staring eyes galloping faster and faster but getting nowhere.

"Easy, Jamie," said Terry, smoothing my brow. "Take it easy. You're breathing like a train."

She kept nuzzling my neck and kissing me softly, murmuring words in a language that I didn't recognise but which were soothing nonetheless, until waves of blackness enfolded me and I dropped back into sleep.

The Visitors When I woke up she was still holding me, and I felt a lot more stable. Telling her about April had helped and there had been no more nightmares and when I awoke I felt refreshed, almost new, as if a load had been lifted from my shoulders even though I was all too well aware that nothing had changed. If anything I had more to worry about after what Terry had revealed. I left the basement before it got light. I'd wanted to stay with Terry but she said she had things to do and it would be easier if I was out from under her feet. She explained that since Blumenthal had discovered the basement she'd decided that she would have to move on, to shed the identity of Terry Ferriman the way a snake loses its old skin. That took time, she said, money had to be moved, assets reallocated and documents prepared. Once that was out the way, she said, she'd be back in touch and we'd go onto the next stage. If I wanted to. After I'd thought about it. I told her that I already knew the answer and that I loved her as much as she said she loved me, maybe more so, and that I was quite prepared to do whatever was required. She kissed me and told me that I had to think about it because once it was done there was no turning back and the next thing I knew I was standing outside in the street.

There was a message on the answering machine from Chuck Harrison and one from Rick Muir.

Rick said he had good news and bad news for me. The bad news was that there was nothing untoward about the hair at all. The good news? Yeah, he'd pulled the waitress. Frankly, neither piece of news surprised me. I felt wrecked, the result of making love to Terry and the mental stress of coming to terms with what she'd told me.

I rang Chuck Harrison's office and got his answering machine. I left a message, telling him to hang fire on any settlement and that I'd be in later in the day. I'd had enough of lying down and allowing Deborah and her lawyer to walk all over me, tired of taking the blame for what had happened to April. I guess that talking to Terry about it, opening up for the first time, had helped me face up to the fact that it wasn't my fault, that nobody was to blame. I'd help Deborah start a new life, I'd give all the financial and moral support she needed, but I wasn't get to let her punish me any more. I didn't tell any of that to Chuck's answering machine, though.

I stripped off and fell into bed. I was drifting in and out of sleep when the doorbell rang. It was light outside, but only just, and at first I thought the phone had rung and I was groping for it when the doorbell rang again. I pulled on a white towelling robe and padded down the hall. I checked the door viewer and saw two uniformed cops looking bored. One was chewing gum, another had his hand on the butt of his holstered gun and I had a feeling that it wasn't a social call.

I opened the door. I didn't recognise either of them. The one with his hand on his gun moved to the side so that he could draw it quickly if I made a threatening move. Behind them, parked by the kerb, was a police car.

"Hiya guys, can I help you?" I said, trying to sound more cheerful than I felt.

"Jamie Beaverbrook?" asked the gum-chewer.

"Yes. Is there a problem?"