His & Hers

I hurry along the landing to my sister’s room, but she isn’t there. All the bedroom doors are ajar, and I soon discover that each one is empty. The bathroom door is closed. When I try to turn the handle, it doesn’t open.

We haven’t locked this door for years due to an incident when we were children, and I don’t know where the key could be. I can’t remember ever seeing one. The rule in our house was always that if the door is closed, you don’t go in. I knock gently and whisper her name.

‘Zoe?’

It’s so quiet that everything I say and do sounds loud.

I try to peer through the keyhole, but see nothing but black.

‘Zoe?’

I say her name a little louder this time, before banging my fist on the wooden panels. When there is still nothing but silence, I take a step back and kick the door. It swings open, its hinges crying out as though in pain. Then I see her.

My sister is lying in the bath.

One of her eyes is open, and appears to be staring at something written on the wall; the other one has been sewn closed, a needle and thick black thread still dangling from her eyelid.

The water is red, her slit wrists visible just below the surface.

I’m sickened by the fact I already know what this is supposed to mean: turn a blind eye.

I’m sure the normal response would be to rush to the side of the bathtub and pull her out, but I can’t move. My sister’s head is slumped to one side at a disturbing angle, her hair is the same colour as the perfectly still bloody water, and I don’t need to check for a pulse to know that she is dead. Zoe’s mouth is open, and I can see the friendship bracelet tied around her tongue from the doorway.

I stay in the hall, as though my feet can’t cross the threshold. I feel bile rise up my throat, but swallow it down. I should call the police but I don’t. I try to think of a friend I could call for help – it feels like that is what I need right now – but then I remember I don’t have any left. Nobody wants to be friends with the couple whose baby died.

I surprise myself then by calling Priya.

In my drunken, shocked state, my colleague seems to be the closest I’ve got to having someone who cares. I don’t know what I say when she answers, but it must have made some kind of sense, because she tells me she is on her way. It looks like my sister wrote a name on the tiled wall, using her finger as a pen and her own blood as ink before she died. I didn’t mention that part to Priya. I couldn’t say it out loud.

I slide down onto the landing floor. Time slows to a painful standstill while I wait, punctuated only by the sound of the tap dripping. It’s been doing that for years, but it never bothered me until now. I watch as tiny ripples spread themselves across the surface of the red water, my eyes inevitably wandering to Zoe’s. When I can’t bear to look at her disfigured face anymore, I stare at the name my sister wrote in blood above the bath:

ANDREWS.

Her

Wednesday 23:30

‘Anna Andrews, BBC News, Blackdown.’

We film the last piece to camera of the night, then wait for a clear from the newsroom. By the time we get one, the engineers have packed up and are ready to go. They waste no time heading back towards London when the call comes, leaving Richard and me alone in the woods. It’s been relentless today, and I’m so glad I had a couple of hours to myself earlier, even if I did end up walking to Zoe and Jack’s house. Seeing that place again, and knowing she was inside it, made me lose myself for a while. Some wrongs can never be made right, and it’s been a very long day.

I don’t really want to get in a car with Richard again – it’s hard to explain, he’s been acting strange all night – but I don’t have a lot of choice without the Mini. I can’t seem to stop myself from shivering, and when he notices, I blame the cold. There’s something different about him, but it’s less than five minutes to the hotel so I try to shake the feeling.

We drive in silence. I don’t think either of us is going to want to share a conversation or a drink tonight. I try, but I can’t think of anything I’ve said or done today that would have offended him, so I put the undeniable tension down to us both just being exhausted. I’m looking forward to a hot bath and getting reacquainted with the minibar.

‘What do you mean you don’t have a reservation?’ I ask when the hotel receptionist stares blankly back at me across the desk.

She’s so tall, she can’t help but look down on us. Her long brown hair has been restrained in a neat French plait, the end of which rests on her young slim shoulders like a tail. She appears to have eaten half a box of chocolates single-handed so far on her nightshift, and I wonder if someone gave them to her, or whether she bought them herself. She stands a little hunched over, as though she wishes she were shorter, like a flower who has been leaning the same way towards the sun for too long.

I’m certain the newsroom booked two hotel rooms for us this afternoon. I’m sure I received a confirmation email, so I ask her to check again. Her body language does not inspire confidence, and she keeps us waiting for a painful amount of time. I don’t think I was ever that skinny, even when I was her age, despite the diet pills Helen bullied me into taking. This girl is as thin as my patience right now.

‘I’m sorry, but there is definitely no corporate booking from the BBC on the system for tonight,’ she replies, staring at the screen as though expecting it to verbally back her up.

I take out my purse and put down my credit card.

‘Fine, I’ll pay for two rooms and claim them back afterwards.’

She glances at her computer again, then shakes her braided head.

‘I’m afraid we’re completely full. There’s been a murder. Two now, actually. Lots of press in town and we’re the only hotel.’

‘You don’t say. It’s very late and we’re very tired. I’m sure someone booked us two rooms for tonight, can you please check again?’

Richard says nothing.

The receptionist looks weary, as though being asked to do her job exhausts her.

‘Do you have a booking reference?’ she says.

I feel a surge of hope. Then I find my phone and feel a rush of despair; my battery is dangerously low – only five per cent left – and I remember that my charger was in the overnight bag that was stolen from the Mini earlier.

‘My mobile is about to die, can you check yours?’ I ask Richard.

He sighs, then reaches for his pocket. His expression changes immediately and he starts to pat himself down and search inside his bag.

‘Shit, I don’t have it…’

‘Maybe you left it in the car?’ I reply, and concentrate on finding the email before my phone is completely out of juice.

When I do, I show the receptionist the screen with an inflated sense of triumph. She takes an extraordinary length of time to stab the reference number into her computer, using just one finger.

‘A reservation was made for you this afternoon, two rooms…’

‘Thank goodness,’ I say, and start to smile too soon.

‘… but it was cancelled this evening.’

The half-formed smile slides right off my face.

‘What? No. When? By who?’

‘It doesn’t tell me who made the call, only that the rooms were cancelled at 18:30.’