Kiss Her Goodbye: The most addictive thriller you'll read this year Read online

  I look forwards at the television. They’re just like the parents in this film – full of secrets that are waiting to tear their kids apart. I stare at the screen and think about Dad as the knives slash and the blood pours. None of this seems real. It’s been so long since I’ve seen him. I want to find out exactly what Mum knows, but she puts her hand on Mike’s shoulder and runs her fingers through his hair as though the conversation is over.

  ‘I know where I’m not wanted,’ I say as I get up.

  ‘Wait for the next bit,’ Mike says.

  ‘I’m tired.’

  His eyes are on me as I leave the room and I stop at the bottom of the stairs while he stares back. The sound of screams come from the television and he looks as if he’s about to say something, until she starts to whisper in his ear. When I’m halfway up the stairs, I hear one of her heels drop to the floor, before the laughter starts. They are animals.

  I put New Order on upstairs. The tour will be in Rouen in December and I wonder if Dad will live anywhere near there. My new poster is on the wall and I stare at the black ripples of water behind Gillian Gilbert, before I close my eyes. As ‘This Time of Night’ plays I picture Bernard Sumner on stage. The song reminds me of Dad and I imagine that he’s bought us front-row tickets as a surprise and we’re standing so close to Gillian Gilbert that she winks at me from behind her keyboard. When I open my eyes, the corners of her mouth bend upwards, as though she’s smiling back at me from the poster. If I had the money I’d get on the coach to Dover tomorrow and never come back.

  14

  DS Beverley Samuels

  It’s the day of the autumn carnival and it feels good to be back in my part of Manchester again. The streets are lined with people and there’s a buzz in the air. Girls in coloured headscarves and flowing costumes dance with swinging hips to the steel band, while young lads in tight denim try to catch their eye.

  In my back pocket are photographs of Stephen Fitzpatrick, the man that disappeared here last year, but despite the media campaign no one came forward and we’re hoping that someone’s memory is triggered today.

  ‘We’re wasting our time. Even if we find someone, they aren’t going to remember anything,’ Nick says.

  ‘You don’t know that.’

  ‘They would have come forward.’

  ‘People don’t always do what you expect.’

  As we walk towards the park gates Nick glances down at the red-checked blouse tucked into my jeans.

  ‘What you wearing?’ he asks.

  He’s overdressed in slip-on shoes and smart trousers that look out of place here.

  ‘Whatever, Don Johnson.’

  I’m tired and tetchy. Last night I didn’t sleep well. I woke at 2.00 a.m. with the sheets wrapped around me and my body wet with sweat with the sounds of Moira Timperley’s screams in my head. It’s been worse since we found Kirsten Green’s body and I’m glad of a different focus.

  As I walk towards the park, the sound of music comes through the trees and an officer on a horse nods at us, before riding past on the other side of the road.

  ‘Dad used to bring me here as a kid,’ I tell Nick, but he doesn’t look interested.

  ‘I’ve never been.’

  Dad set the music up for the carnival and I watched the sound checks while the bands rehearsed. I danced barefoot on the grass in my embroidered dress, while Dad and his friends smoked weed on the other side of the field. The music vibrated from the black wall of speakers into my chest as if it were a part of me. His music was his life and I understood that when Mum never did. She only cared about appearances and money – nothing else mattered. We were both an embarrassment to her business friends and I never understood why strangers were more important to her than family. When Mum told me I’d never make it as a police officer it was just to hurt me for seeing Dad behind her back. I can see that now, but it doesn’t make it any better.

  ‘It was just on the park then. There was none of this,’ I say.

  ‘It’s full of wankers.’

  The sounds and smells are like coming home and he has no idea what he’s talking about. I take out the photographs and flick through them. The faces blend together and we’ll be lucky to find anyone from the blurred pictures that we’ve got.

  ‘How long should we stay?’ Nick asks.

  While he’s talking to me, his eyes are on one of the dancers. Her hair flies up in a line of coloured beads and plaits as she jumps into the air. Her skin is glittered and toned. He doesn’t take his eyes off her. It shouldn’t bother me, but it does. We never discuss that night we spent together last year. It’s still there though; I see it in his eyes sometimes. It just happened at the wrong time. I don’t regret it though, despite what happened afterwards. It still meant something.

  ‘Let’s go in,’ I tell him.

  The smell of fried onions and curry on the air makes my stomach rumble and I recognise the man on the stand as the same one who my dad used to go to every year. I’m about to tell Nick, before I stop myself.

  ‘Shall we get something?’ I ask.

  ‘What, food poisoning? No, thanks.’

  Nick’s eyes are on the dancer and not the crowds. I’m about to pull him up on it, until I see someone who looks like Tom and my stomach lurches, but it isn’t him. As a couple walk past arm in arm, it’s hard to remember that we were like that once. Last year, I sat under the trees with Tom, drinking Red Stripe with friends until it was dark. Even when he slow-danced with Jackie I thought we were unbreakable, but I was wrong.

  I grab a pot of rice and peas from one of the stalls and it’s good. I hold out the spoon to Nick and he crinkles his nose in disgust.

  ‘You after a day off sick or something?’

  The taste of the coconut and garlic is like a hug that takes me back to better times. As we walk down the long pathway, alongside the park, it’s even busier than I thought it would be. This is the Manchester that I love. The whole community out and united by music.

  Nick groans. ‘Look at them all.’

  We get our bearings, while a girl twists in time to the reggae band.

  ‘Let’s face it, he got pissed and fell in the canal,’ Nick says.

  I wondered the same. The last time Stephen Fitzpatrick was spotted, he was going the wrong way home by the lock. He was out drinking with friends, until they got split up at the end of the night.

  ‘He was over by those trees before he went missing.’

  We speak to some of the stallholders, but no one remembers seeing him. The man just walked out of the gates and disappeared.

  I recognise some teenagers by the jerk chicken stand as pupils from All Saints. As they hand out leaflets on animal testing their tartan skirts, fishnets and combat boots get a frown from an old lady as she walks past. I look around to see if Hayley Reynolds is with them, but there’s no sign of her.

  ‘From the college,’ I tell Nick, but he isn’t paying attention. He’s staring at a group of chain-covered punks with band names tippexed on the backs of their leather jackets, their green, purple and red Mohicans offering a splash of colour in the crowd.

  ‘Freaks,’ he says, under his breath.

  My shoulders start to tense. I remember how the principal from All Saints cared more about appearances than finding out what happened and I wish Nick were more like he used to be.

  As I look over at the girls from All Saints, I see Moira Timperley in their smiles, their arrogance and their vulnerability: a reminder that I should have done better. She would have liked it here. She was a fun kid and now she’s been forgotten, just like Stephen Fitzpatrick.

  Nick goes over to the beer tent and I stand near the trees where I was with Tom the last time I was here. Hayley Reynolds said that her life had changed when Michael Lancaster came to stay and I can understand it; Tom’s lies changed me too.

  A man with a porkpie hat comes over.

  ‘Hey, gorgeous.’ He smiles, with the side of his mouth.

  I look back coldly. ‘Piss of
f.’

  Nick comes over and he walks away.

  ‘Can’t leave you for five minutes, can I?’

  ‘Just because a woman’s on her own, you lot think she’s fair game.’

  Nick frowns. ‘Us lot? Anyway, it’s a compliment.’

  ‘What? Being harassed? You would say that.’

  We stay for another hour, but there’s no sign of anyone in our pictures and we don’t get anything else from the stallholders.

  ‘Shall we call it a day? We should have finished fifteen minutes ago,’ I ask Nick.

  ‘Yep. He got hammered and went in the canal. We know what happened.’

  Even though it’s probably true, the back of my neck prickles in annoyance. He’s always quick to decide what happened and it’s exactly how he’s been on the Kirsten Green case.

  ‘I’m going to get the train. I don’t need to go back to the office for anything,’ I tell him.

  ‘I’ll drive you.’

  ‘I’d rather walk.’ I point down the road. ‘Brentwood Street and then left.’

  ‘I know where I parked. What do you want to get the train for?’

  ‘I’ve got something to do. I’ll see you later.’

  I leave him standing there and walk out with the steady thud of the bass behind me. It used to be good that we weren’t alike. We saw things differently and it worked. Recently it doesn’t feel like that though. I look back to see him go in the wrong direction to where the car’s parked. He never listens.

  I move through the smiling people as the procession goes by with ‘Free Nelson Mandela’ and ‘Dance for Peace’ signs on trucks and banners. They’re cut off from what happened to Kirsten Green and Stephen Fitzpatrick, but I’m not like them any more. The little embroidered dress is boxed up in storage somewhere and the girl that wore it has grown up.

  I make my way back to get the train. The steady beat of the wheels on the track and the gentle sway of the carriage are a relief from the noise of the carnival. A flock of birds scatters into the air like black confetti above graffiti that states ‘There’s no place like Hulme’ as I stare out of the window. There isn’t anywhere that feels like home to me any more.

  The train moves past the grey flats, next to Michael Lancaster’s workplace. He said he came in on Saturdays, yet all the shutters are down and the car park is empty. As the train rushes past the pebbledash walls, I wonder how many lies I’ve been told about what happened to Kirsten Green. Thoughts of secrets rush through my head as the train clicks over the rails on the viaduct.

  It doesn’t take long to get back to Stockport station and when I step off onto the platform, with the river Mersey below me, I know that I need answers. This won’t become like Stephen Fitzpatrick’s case. I walk down the hill and glance up at the imposing chimney of the old factory where the hats were made. Before he left, Dad told me to always look to the sky. As I walk past the impossibly high chimney with the clouds above, I remember it clearly. Hayley Reynolds was right: you can’t make people stay. As I leave the mill behind I wonder if she had moments like that with her dad too. I hope so.

  15

  Hayley Reynolds

  Today is November 5th – my birthday, but I have learnt not to get excited, because my birthday is always shit. I want the camera though: it’s the only thing that I’m bothered about.

  Last night, I stayed awake for hours with thoughts of Dad and Kirsten on my mind. I kept remembering the way Beverley Samuels looked at me by the river too: as though she knew something. It felt as though she could see deep inside me. She said her dad left her too and she’s clever, using it to trick me. I wonder if it was the truth. I’ve got so many secrets inside, bursting to get out and I won’t be taken in. I know what can happen when you tell the wrong ones. They can rip everything apart. It makes me want to pull at my hair until all the thoughts are gone, but I just need to pretend that I am ordinary until she believes it too.

  I only have to hide how I felt about Kirsten for a little bit longer. Beverley Samuels will give up soon. It’s hard when I was there for her and no one else was. I watched her on our favourite bench and sat near her in the college canteen to see what she was eating. I stared through the leaves as she sat by the water and I watched her from afar as she walked home. I watched and watched until I couldn’t stand to just watch any longer. I was the only one that was there for her, but I mustn’t say a word. Beverley Samuels can’t prove anything and people believe what they can see. The kingfisher’s feathers reflect light to make it look blue when they’re really brown. Nothing is what it seems.

  When I go downstairs, Mike is at the table eating his Ricicles, while Mum looks out of the window with her back to me.

  He smiles. ‘Well, well, well, if it isn’t the birthday girl!’

  Mum turns around. ‘Happy birthday, love,’ she says. ‘There are some cards on the table.’ Hearing her say the word ‘love’ makes all the muscles in my shoulder tense up, but I smile back.

  ‘Seventeen years old! Who’d have thought it?’ Mike says, as though he’s watched me grow up from a baby. He moves his chair back and walks towards me.

  ‘Happy birthday, then,’ he says as he bends down to kiss me and as I turn my head our lips brush together. His mouth is cold from the milk and his breath smells sweet from the cereals. He pulls away as though it didn’t happen.

  ‘Your present’s there.’ Mum nods at the table. ‘It’s from both of us.’

  The box is wrapped in red shiny paper and curly ribbons, nicer than any present that I’ve ever had. It takes me by surprise and I look at it for a moment until I say, ‘Thanks.’

  Mum sighs, as though I have ruined the birthday already. ‘Open it, then.’

  ‘Oh, a camera!’ I say, after I’ve taken off the lid.

  ‘Don’t be disappointed that it’s not a Polaroid. Mike says it’s still good.’

  I lick my lips, because I know how special it is. People don’t always believe words, but a picture never lies and I wonder how Dad felt when he got his first camera. The ribbon matches the paper and I know that Mike has taken his time to make it nice for me. When he smiles, I smile back and for once it’s real.

  ‘It’s brilliant.’

  ‘Really? Right, better get off for work,’ Mum says.

  ‘Is that it?’ I ask.

  ‘Actually, it’s not,’ replies Mike as he picks up a large square present from next to the table. As I open it Mum shakes her head as though I’m ungrateful, but I’m not. I just hoped that there was something from Dad, but there’s nothing: not even a bar of chocolate.

  ‘I just meant…’

  When I take off the wrapping paper I’m surprised.

  ‘Rio?’

  I put the Duran Duran album on the table and Mike smiles. I can tell that it was his idea.

  ‘I used to have this, but I lost it.’

  ‘I know. You told me in the car.’

  Dad bought it for me for Christmas a few years ago and it reminds me of him. For a second, everything is good. Mike looks embarrassed, because he can tell how surprised I am. I only mentioned it in passing.

  ‘Right, I’ve got to go, I’m going to be late,’ Mum says as she clips her handbag shut, before kissing him wetly on the lips. ‘Have a nice birthday,’ she says to me. ‘Maybe you’ll stop playing that dirge music now.’

  As she says it her shoe crushes the red bow from my present that has fallen on the floor as though it’s meaningless.

  ‘What about the photos we took on yours?’ I ask Mike, when she’s in the hall.

  He laughs. ‘Don’t worry, I’ll start using my camera again so you can have them.’

  *

  I get to college early and sit on the wall near the car park as Dr Tibbs gets out of her car. She sees me and as she walks over I wonder if she’s going to wish me happy birthday, but she doesn’t. She just nods at my cigarette.

  ‘Got a light?’

  ‘Sure.’

  As I go to light it for her, she leans towards me.
/>   ‘So,’ she says as she exhales, ‘how’s things?’

  ‘Fine.’

  ‘Fine’s all right. Good is better.’

  She’s the one who told Beverley Samuels I got the bus with Kirsten, so it’s her fault that things are messed up.

  ‘Yeah, well, I’d just rather be somewhere else.’

  ‘I know the feeling,’ she replies as she stares towards the hills. It’s all about her as usual. I wonder how many other people have tried to speak to her and been ignored. The smell of her flowery perfume mixes with the smoke from her breath and I think about being held under water until you can’t breathe. Thoughts of the things that I’ve done float around my head until her voice becomes like distant static.

  ‘Hayley? Are you listening?’ she asks, and I wonder how long she’s been talking. A long tube of ash hangs on the end of her cigarette and I guess it must have been a while.

  ‘Can people ever change, miss?’

  She looks back at me, as though she’s working out what to say. ‘Anyone can change. President Lincoln used to be a barman. You can do anything you want.’

  I look thoughtful and press my lips together before I lean forwards. ‘Being a barman isn’t something bad though. I mean really change.’

  ‘Perhaps. Perhaps not. Depends.’

  There’s so much in my head that I just want to get rid of.

  I inhale. ‘I have nightmares about Kirsten Green. I dreamt I was trapped under a frozen river and I couldn’t get out.’

  I turn my hand over to look at my nails. In the dream they were a bloody mess from trying to claw my way out of the ice. It felt so real. No one could hear me through the thick ridges of frozen water as Kirsten circled. Her hair trailed across my face and wrapped itself around me, until I couldn’t move. Through the frozen river, I saw tree branches move in the wind as she pulled me down into the darkness. It’s a relief to finally say it, but Dr Tibbs looks away as though it’s unimportant.

  ‘Dreams are just our way to make sense of things.’

  ‘I didn’t know her that well, but I liked her…’ I pause ‘…really liked her?’