Sin (17 page)

No. That wasn't it. Yes, for the
rape he was a beast. But the rest? It was his reparation. His
repentance. To care and to provide for the woman who he'd torn
apart. To help mend the wounds, even though she didn't know he was
the one who wounded her. It was his purgatory to be reminded each
moment of each day of the vile act he'd inflicted upon her.

Did that forgive him? Did that
make amends for his actions? Did that make him a good guy? A
saviour? Beast become Beauty? Was I defending him in an attempt to
defend myself?
Was
there a defence, or did one's actions
taint one's soul for the rest of one's sorry life?

Ask me another. Anyway it wasn't
Martin's past conduct that had damned him, it was his current. I
wasn't going to let him hand me over. I wasn't going to let the
good doctor get his greasy hands on me again. The drugs don't work,
the Verve once said. Dr. Connors didn't give a flying flip about
that. How Sarah had managed to escape his clutches I don't know.
Perhaps that was down to Martin too. History, and my inner voices,
didn't relate. All hail the laydee.

I had to stop them. I had to.
But by killing them? Could I not have talked to them? Reasoned
maybe? Look guys. I'm not that bad. I'm not crazy. True, I can
teleport and kill people with my mind, but I'm not insane.
Honest!

What would I have said? Hardly
the truth. They would have been on the phone quicker than a rabbit
out of a fox hole, with Connors as the fox and me as the gory
remains of the cute little bunny.

I have a tattoo of a fox on my
upper right arm. It's a symbol, to me, of freedom. But the doctor
is the dark side of the fox. Vulpine instincts drive him. Why kill
the chicken for lunch when you can slaughter the whole coup?

I'd taken three steps towards
the dirt-washed van when I heard it. I might have missed the sound
at any other time. Would have in fact. But around me all had become
suddenly hushed. Mr. Bluebird on my shoulder, or at least the crows
in the fields and the light buzz of insects had been muted as if by
a great remote control. In space only Sigourney Weaver can hear you
scream. Her Majesty the alien queen could have been standing behind
me and I wouldn't have heard her. The sound had been sucked from
the world like lemonade through a straw till not a drop remained.
Were the fauna in the flora biting their collective tongues in
protest at what I'd done? Did it resent me causing the fire that
would soon consume this house and all who sailed in her? Perhaps.
The silence echoed around me, non-existent whispers crawling up my
spine. Not a whistle or a rustle or a caw. Not even the crackle of
a flame.

Except...

A baby.

Crying.

From inside the house.

The spell was broken - the hex
halted. The sound rushed back into the air like the seal on a
vacuum suddenly fractured. Crows yelled from the trees at me. A bee
had given up on bumbling and was spinning around my head in a
crazed dervish. A buzzing had erupted from around me as if the
ground itself was vibrating.

Everything was screaming at me.
THE BABY.

I could tell myself - fool
myself if that's what you want to call it - that Martin and the boy
deserved their fates. In fact I may well have been Fate's own
personal gopher, doing the job's he, or she, hated. Why would Fate
get his hands dirty when I had a perfectly good pair to sully?

Actually, I always thought of
Fate as a woman. Definite female tendencies there, don't you
think?

The baby.

I turned and I ran. The front
door had been drifting shut, a feeble attempt to bar my way. I
crashed it open and took the stairs three at a time. I didn't need
to think about which door to open; my hand took the handle, turned
and pushed.

The nursery was decorated in
yellow and Pooh was dancing across the walls with Piglet and
Eeyore. And in a wooden cot (all the better to go up in flames, my
dear) just inside the door was the baby. She had her mother's eyes
and had stopped crying as soon as I entered. I took her up in my
arms and was back out the front door before I'd taken another
breath.

I stood trembling for the
longest time, still not breathing. I didn't deserve a breath. The
girl, doe eyed and pink romper-suited, looked up at me and...

Cooed. Then smiled.

Her name was Morgan. Morgan
Alexandra to be precise. And she had just forgiven me.

A silver Mercedes was parked to
one side. A car seat was in position behind the driver's. The car
unlocked automatically as I approached and I gently fastened Morgan
into her chair.

I walked as calmly as I could
back to Martin's van and climbed in. As I drove away the couple in
the kitchen slowly stood and left the house, collecting the keys to
the Mercedes on the way. The flames in the kitchen died as they
smiled at Morgan Alexandra and started the engine. I turned left
out of the gate, knowing they'd turn right, and knowing that they
were just going into town to buy a few essentials. Disposable
nappies. Toilet roll. Baby wipes. You know the sort of thing.

It would be three days before
they noticed the van missing. Probably a week or two before they
decided to redecorate the kitchen. It was looking tired. Needed a
face lift.

"A bit like me," Sarah would
joke.

They wouldn't see the scorch
marks or the smoke damage. And they wouldn't remember me.

Two miles? Three? No more than
that. No more than three miles before I had to stop, open the door
and vomit my bacon breakfast onto the side of the road.

Shame, that. I'd enjoyed it.

My shaking stopped after a few
more minutes and I could get my breath and think again. I'd still
not passed any signs or indication of where I might be. I needed to
stop and get my bearings.

The van had almost a full tank
of petrol, which I was sure would get me to some semblance of
civilisation. Guessing that Martin's farm wasn't just a single dot
of life in a vast expanse of nothing, I'd have to find a town or
village eventually. Wouldn't I? I could drive until I did, of
course, but I preferred to have some sort of warning as to what I
might encounter. The glove compartment was suddenly very
inviting.

A couple of CDs, old when I was
still in the land of the living - before my incarceration. A small
unopened packet of tissues. A cigarette packet with four fags left.
A pen. Blue. Leaked. That was it.

I slumped back in the seat and
flipped the glove box shut. The latch didn't catch and it fell open
again, one of the discs slipping out and falling into the footwell.
Sighing I leaned down to pick it up, and saw a corner of white
stuck under the passenger seat. An envelope. Maybe Fate was lending
me a helping hand. Perhaps the glove box was supposed to fall open
and let a disc drop out. That would be the only way I'd find my
salvation - if salvation was what it was.

The envelope was dirty and water
stained and had the look of something that had been kicked out of
the way, forgotten about for a long time.

"A bit like me," I joked to the
magpie that was watching me from a few feet away. It stared at me
then dropped its gaze to the puddle of sick on the road. Was it
hoping for a free lunch, or was it calling me a disgusting slob?
Maybe a bit of both - I was a disgusting slob who'd just provided
lunch.

The envelope had been opened.
Inside was what appeared to be a bank statement. Hadn't this guy
heard of identity theft? Wasn't leaving something like this just
lying around, an invitation to be robbed blind? I felt sure that
even the most casual thief would have a credit card, flat screen
television and designer wardrobe by the end of the week based on a
find such as this. Luckily, at least for Sarah and Martin - my
latest victims - I wasn't a casual thief. Nor was I an experienced
one. Their statement would serve only to give me an idea of where I
was and that was all. I wasn't interested in fleecing what was
essentially an innocent couple.

Yes. Innocent. Martin had been a
monster, but he was trying to repair the damage. I didn't believe
he was still the same man. Perhaps it was a case of Jekyll and
Hyde, that old horrific double act whose sense of humour was
surpassed only by the Two Ronnies or Morcambe and Wise. Would it be
a case that, if Miss Temptation walked in front of him, wiggling
her sexy little behind, Martin's dark side might re-surface, the
monster reborn?

I didn't think so. Just like my
father's abuse of me was another life, the farmer's abuse was dead
and buried, complete with a marble headstone reading: "Here's lies
the black heart of Martin Collins, beloved husband, father and
rapist. R.I.P."

There was I, again, defending
what some people would call the indefensible. Martin had torn young
Sarah's life apart. String him up, slit his throat and leave him to
rot. I couldn't say those people were wrong. But I... I knew him.
Or I knew that part of him. I'd felt it. Another aspect of that
darkness permeated my own soul. Was I, again, trying to forgive
myself?

Who cares! Whether I was
innocent or guilty of mass murder was irrelevant. I'd gone and done
it, guv'nor. Fair cop. String
me
up, why don't you?

But I was just trying to live my
life. I was trying to escape from the death and the devastation. I
didn't want it to happen. So go easy on me, ok?

Anyway. The envelope.

The statement was in Martin's
name. A quick glance, out of curiosity rather than possible
profiteering, told me that his account was in exceptional order. He
could keep his wife and child in a very healthy lifestyle for a
long time to come. But that didn't interest me, not really. It was
his address.

Martin Collins

Shadow Hill Farm

Grainthorpe

Lincolnshire

LN...

My eyes barely registered the
postcode. They'd noticed the town and they'd noticed the county.
Home Sweet Home - give or take a few miles or so.

I knew the name Grainthorpe.
From somewhere it swam about in my head, hinting at its location.
I'd been there, or at least I'd been through there. A few houses, a
main road. Perhaps a small shop. I could just about grasp
fragmented images. But even if I hadn't known the town - although I
knew it was only a village that might have aspired to township -
Lincolnshire, in all its green and pleasant glory, I knew well. The
town I'd grown up in, Grimsby, was slap bang in the middle. OK, it
was slap bang to the side. On the edge of falling into the North
Sea and swimming away to sunnier climes. But let's not be pedantic.
Euphoric yes, but not pedantic, if you please.

Lincolnshire, or more generally
Lincs if you happened to be an envelope or a postcard, was split
into more then one county. North, North East and simple Plain Jane
Lincolnshire. I didn't know where the Southern part had disappeared
to - perhaps it was on holiday in those aforementioned sunnier
climes. Parts had lost their way for a while and called themselves
South Humberside, but they'd recovered and reverted to their proper
name eventually. Grimsby, named after the Dane who'd settled there
to protect the heir to the Danish throne, wasn't as Grim as the
name might suggest.

Ok, so the fishing industry had
floated away, but it was still prospering. Or so I thought anyway.
I'd lived in nearby Scunthorpe, a town held hostage to its steel
industry, for a good few years and Grimsby might have faltered
along its path while I was away, but I'd grown up there and both
Joy and my parents had remained there. I'd moved back after Joy had
died, taking up residence in her house. Maybe I did that to bring
myself closer to my sister and maybe it was because I needed the
cocooning blanket of somewhere that wasn't mine. Joy's house, which
would still hold a connection to her, could offer some illusional
protection against my demons.

Or not.

So.

Grainthorpe, Grainthorpe,
Grainthorpe.

I wiped a small dribble of vomit
off my chin and flicked it towards the magpie. It regarded me with
watchful eyes, much like HG Wells' Martians. Was it drawing its
plan against me? One for Sin, two for Joy, wasn't it? Sorrow, Sin -
it was all the same. Why did I know Grainthorpe? Lincolnshire had a
million small villages scattered about, some no more than a house
and a post box, some lacking even the post box. So many of them
were less than dots on a map to me, so why did I remember this one.
Then I remembered why I remembered.

Ice cream.

I scream, you scream, we all
scream for Armageddon. Or Robbie Williams. Or vanilla with cinder
toffee and a flake. On the road (A18? A16?) out from Grimsby to
somewhere else was Applebys Ices. Applebys was one of those old
family run businesses that was soon to be celebrating or recently
had celebrated its centenary. Ice cream made the way it used to be
before Walls and Nestle muscled in. A hundred different flavours,
ranging from mint choc chip to Magic Mandarin and beyond. I
couldn't remember exactly which post box it was near, but I was
sure you had to pass through Grainthorpe to get there. That meant,
if I followed this road, with all its bends and wiggles, I'd either
be scoffing a 99 or hitting my old home town.

I could have, should have,
appeared in the middle of a furnace. I could have popped up in a
nowhere town in a country I hadn't heard of. The potential was
there, I supposed, for me to resurface on the event horizon of a
black hole. That would have been some event - me, my very own
Sin
gularity point. But I didn't. I'd
hop-skipped-and-teleported to just down the road from an ice cream
parlour. And a good one at that.

Who'd have thought it?

With a smile, the first really
real one of the morning, I gave the eye-spy-my-little-magpie the
one finger salute and pulled the van door shut. The engine growled
into action and I started along the road. One bend was basically
the same as another, each too close to get much past about 35 miles
an hour, but that was fine by me. I had the window open, the crisp
morning-after-the-storm smell of the air singing in my nostrils and
I knew where I was - give or take. Dennis Hopper could be riding
nice and easy along sweet old Route 66 and it wouldn't feel this
good.