Remember Me Page 2

  The note of sarcasm was so subtle it might have been lost on someone who didn’t know him, but Ava caught it. Happy families. She swung away, abruptly ending their conversation. ‘I need to go.’

  He didn’t try to stop her, and she didn’t look around. But she knew he was standing in the shadows, watching her all the way back to the village. It had happened so many times before. Well, this time was different.

  The main street was deserted, even so early in the evening, and her boots echoed hollowly on the tarmac. The neat, ugly rows of pebbledash houses were decorated with yellow-lit windows, and the pub doors were flung open despite the cold. The roar of laughter and clink of glasses mingled with luscious scents of fish and chips and roast lamb. Ava’s stomach growled, but she could just imagine the sensation if she marched up to the bar and demanded dinner and a beer. She’d probably get a punch in the face – and she probably deserved one.

  Ava pushed on past the lights and the company, turning instead up a dirt track to her left. A few rusty car wrecks decorated the roadside, and she forced her cold, aching legs faster up the hill. She was fit enough, and back home in LA she hiked in the hills, did spin classes and kickboxing. But she’d lost that innate childhood toughness and grit required to tackle the countryside around Aberdyth. That, and the fact she was jetlagged up to her eyeballs, and sick with worry about her imminent first meeting with her now-teenage son.

  Despite her good intentions, her mind was flickering back over the events of the past week. Fuck, she couldn’t wait to get back to LA. Here in Wales, the sickly mix of emotions was like a box of dead weights lodged in her heart. Guilt about Ellen, guilt about her son, Stephen. But most of all a nagging fear that by trying to make things right she might tear apart the years of hard work. She would have to tread carefully, but it was far too late to confess to teenage crimes. Too many lives would be irrevocably broken apart, and any precious thread that might remain between her and Stephen would be gone forever. Ava dredged in her pockets and produced her phone. She scrolled down with numb fingers, reaching her folder of photos. Every picture she had managed to scrape from Stephen’s social media sites, every photo she had begged from Paul, was there. Stephen had been told his mother didn’t care about him, and she knew Paul had made her out to be a hard bitch, who cared only for her job.

  When she recovered from the trauma of her teenage years, her counsellor had urged her to build bridges with her son. But Paul was having none of it, and resorted to threats that could have ruined her career. Although she never truly believed he would tell the police about Ellen and their drug-addled childhood, it was the final fence he needed to keep her out of Stephen’s life. If someone told you long and hard enough what a crap mother you were, and that you didn’t deserve a child, eventually you believed it. She sighed, flicking back to her emails, looking for the message that had ripped everything apart.

  Although she was trudging up the hill in the darkness, instantly she was hundreds of miles away, about to start her night shift in LA.

  * * *

  ‘Dear Ava,

  This is a tough thing to write, but Penny feels you need to be told. I’m dying. I expect you are wondering why the hell you should care? Obviously you don’t, but it isn’t all bad news – I will be leaving this earth a bit sooner than I ever thought. The doctors reckon I have two months at the most. Time for you to take on a few responsibilities. Much as I hate to tell you, Penny says our son will need you, and I want her to have some kind of support that doesn’t come from the village, or her uncle. I’m sure you understand that, at least, as you are aware of her situation. Let us know when you will be arriving. I suggest the Birtleys’ for your accommodation.

  Paul’

  ‘Fuck!’ Perching on someone else’s desk, Ava automatically scrolled down to check the rest of her emails, before returning to Paul’s message. He had always written to her in this slightly over-formal, stilted style. It was as though they had never shared a bed, or a life, together. Just like that, her delicately balanced world was being pulled apart.

  He was wrong, she did care – about her son and her ex-husband. It was just buried so deep that the love for them had gotten entwined with other memories. Like barbed wire twisted round a baby’s hand.

  From the control room she heard the clicking of keyboards, and the repetitive murmur of voices as the emergency dispatchers dealt efficiently with incoming 911 calls, their trained responses smooth and calm. There was a buzz of chatter from the crowd round the coffee machine, and through the open door she could see an elderly cleaner in a blue overall pushing a mop round the reception area.

  But even the yells and crashes of the drunks in the cells couldn’t pierce the sudden mist that engulfed her mind. A male voice came from miles away, but the hand on her backside was much too close.

  ‘Hey, Ava, much as I welcome your cute bum on my desk at any time, I need to get this paperwork, so if you wouldn’t mind, honey…’

  Fighting her way back to reality as the cop grinned before snatching up the pile of printed notes and heading back to the conference room, Ava walked over to her own neatly organised desk. She grabbed her now lukewarm coffee and downed it in one gulp. The Los Angeles sun slashed a golden knife blade through the dirty blinds, picking out the empty takeaway cartons, piles of paperwork, blinking computers, and jumbled family photos that cluttered the other desks. Ava had one photograph, framed in white wood, of her with her parents at graduation. No boyfriends or kids watched her as she worked, or distracted her with ‘I love you, please come home’ phone calls. Usually she didn’t mind; this was her and this was the life she had finally chosen. But today, she would have given a lot to get one of those phone calls. Occasionally, in unguarded moments, she would drift off to sleep imagining an email or text from Stephen that began, ‘Dear Mum…’

  * * *

  The sound of singing snapped her out of her memories. Soft, lilting and slightly disturbing, the voice reached out through the icy air. The track had widened and she was passing the old garage – ‘Mick’s Place’, it had always been called. But now the sign was hanging by one nail, and the petrol pumps were surrounded by a tide of rusty vehicles in various stages of disintegration. The smell of fuel was still strong, and it mingled alarmingly with the smoke from a fire.

  Ava paused, straining her eyes in the darkness, peering past the crackling flames. The fire, in an old oil drum, was bright and pure against the sullen winter evening. The warmth reached out to her. The soft chant continued, but whilst she was drawn by the brightness and promise of defrosting her numb hands, she was repelled by the words.

  ‘From starlight, to flame-bright,

  Who will be burning tonight?’

  The song floated like smoke dancing on the cold air, and the crunch of boots on gravel stamped out the beat. A few moments later a guitar joined the song, its melancholy thrum adding to the menace of the words.

  ‘Burning to the death,

  Until a last dying breath,

  Brings redemption to us all.’

  The singer halted abruptly but carried on strumming his guitar. The fire crackled and spattered a handful of glittering sparks onto the dirty concrete of the yard.

  ‘Oi! You… didn’t you used to be Ava Cole?’

  ‘I… oh, Christ, it’s Rhodri, isn’t it?’ Close up, his mop of red hair was unmistakable, even if his shadowed, weather-beaten face and slumped shoulders were that of a much older man.

  Rhodri stopped playing and set his guitar down. She could see that there were several small animals roasting on a spit over the flames. Or to be more exact they were being burned to charcoal.

  ‘Your dinner’s burning,’ Ava told him, walking across to his side of the fire. The heat scorched her cheeks, and she stretched icy hands to the blaze.

  He spluttered with laughter, ‘That’s not my dinner, love, that’s just a few rabbits from number four. The kids got bored of them.’

  ‘Right.’ Apparently, Rhodri was a long way from the che
eky, freckle-faced boy she had known at school, or even the wayward flame-haired teenager who would sit playing his guitar next to Big Water. Always on the edge of Leo’s group, he would smile vaguely at them, lost in his music, but good-naturedly taking requests for all the latest hits.

  ‘They were still alive you know, when I skewered them. I like it when they turn to black, and then tomorrow they’ll be just soft little flakes that blow in the wind.’ His voice was low, husky, and his strongly accented words seemed to hang in the darkness. He could have been an actor on a darkened stage, revelling in the drama, his audience hanging on to every word.

  Ava narrowed her eyes, studying his face by the light of the flickering orange flames. Clearly, Rhodri had taken something, and was flying high over the valleys tonight. Well, it wouldn’t be the first time. They had all taken pills back in the day – hell, for a while pills had meant everything – but Rhodri had been more than fond of a smoke. It used to make him mellow, not a murderer of small creatures, though.

  ‘Don’t try and freak me out, Rhodri, because it never worked. I don’t give a shit if you roast the entire rabbit population of Aberdyth.’

  ‘I suppose not, but it was always fun trying to play games with you. So why are you back? Because of Paul, I suppose. I heard he asked you to come back, but I never thought you would. Is it strange, being the angel of death riding in to kiss your ex goodbye before he drops down to the fires of hell? Why bother to bring Ava back, when she probably wants to kill you anyway, I told him. Nobody could fight like the two of you, could they?’

  ‘I’m sure that went down well. I have never wanted to kill Paul, and I certainly haven’t come back to argue with him. Bit of sympathy for a condemned man, Rhodri.’

  ‘Paul knows I’ve got his back, and I don’t give him all the shit the others do. They carry on with this “I’m sure you’ll pull through” crap. Like Penny, she keeps chirruping on about miracle cancer patients, who just get better and nobody knows why. Well, he won’t. I’ve seen it before and when you’ve got that death sentence you just have to deal with it in any way you can.’

  Ava vaguely remembered that Rhodri had a close family member he had lost to cancer when they were at primary school. His aunt, maybe? She didn’t want to probe what was obviously still a painful, bitter memory. He was entitled to his opinions. ‘I’m back because of Stephen, not for Paul. He’s got Penny,’ she corrected.

  Rhodri shrugged, reached down and grabbed a bottle of beer from a crate. ‘You never cared about the kid all these years, so why now? You know, you sound like an American. That’s crap, cariad. Your Welsh has all gone. Want a drink, love?’

  She barely hesitated, lifting a beer quickly from the crate. ‘Thanks. I always cared about Stephen, I was just screwed up and he was better off without me.’

  ‘You left him in Aberdyth, love. How is that better? You should’ve taken him with you. Paul was pissed off when you went to America. He thought you’d come back.’

  ‘I know.’ She was fighting the painful coils of guilt that wormed their way through her chest. Rhodri have never been one to skirt around a subject. Why hadn’t she taken her baby? Because at the time she was blinded by her feelings of inadequacy. At one point she had become sure she would kill her own child, checking him constantly night and day, fussing over formula milk and sterilising bottles over and over again until Paul yelled that she was a crazy cow.

  ‘You seen Leo yet?’ His glance was sly now.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘You gonna fuck him while you’re here?’ Rhodri screwed up his eyes, peering at her in the firelight, his mouth wet with drink. He dragged a sleeve across his face, waiting for her answer.

  Surprised, she lowered the bottle from her own lips. ‘No. Not that it’s any of your business, but Leo and I were over a long time before I married Paul. It’s ancient history.’

  He studied her face, eyes knowing, smirking like he knew something she didn’t. ‘Aw don’t get mad, love, I remember the two of you when we were at school. Everyone knew you were Leo’s girl, and he never looked at anyone else. Although Penny and Ellen wouldn’t have said no, would they? Especially Ellen, she was always trying to get with him.’

  It was a challenge, and she brushed it neatly aside, sidestepping his words. ‘Is your dad still here?’

  ‘Died a few years ago.’ Rhodri waved an unsteady hand, allowing himself to be diverted. ‘All this is mine now, love. Mine to burn to a crispy fucking cinder if I want to. You got any pills?’

  Clearly Leo was the only one in Aberdyth who kept up with her life. On second thoughts, maybe Rhodri did know about her job, and that was a cutting little reminder of their shared past. ‘I’m not a teenager any more, Rhodri.’ Ava finished her beer and stood up. He started strumming his guitar again. His fingers were gentle and rhythmic on the strings, but he watched her with wild, haunted eyes. His ‘musician look’, she remembered suddenly.

  ‘See you around.’

  ‘Nos da, Ava.’

  She hesitated at that, drawn into tasting the language again. The moment passed, and she forced herself to ignore it. It was over and done with. Any thread of pleasure at finding an unthreatening, familiar face had vanished, and she was now shivering. The yard, full of the skeletons of dead vehicles, and now this half-recognisable face from her childhood, stirred unwelcome memories. But the darkness of the road, broken only by a few lonely houses, welcomed her like an old friend, and she took a deep breath of the raw, freezing air. How many times had she and Ellen made this journey, giggling hysterically with the after-effects of illicit alcohol, sharing a cigarette, hand in hand? Rhodri’s softly spoken words followed her, whispering on the cold night air.

  ‘From starlight, to flame-bright,

  Who will be burning tonight?’

  Chapter 3

  She’s back. I can hardly believe it. I’m sure she will appreciate the treat I have in store for her. One last time, Ava Cole.

  Of course, I was prepared for her to have changed. I knew she would be harder, stronger and less of the wayward, but malleable, teenager I remembered. She has no idea that I have been watching her for years, skimming neatly below the surface of her social media accounts, her work intranet, and even her personal emails. I have access to her life, and up to a point it has kept me fed and entertained. I know her so well, but I don’t know her in the flesh anymore. I remember her taste, her touch, but the memories are dull, like faded flowers.

  I tell myself this makes the rediscovery all the more exciting. I do like a challenge, so I just need to rearrange the board and we can start. Ava has no idea what I have planned. In fact, she doesn’t really know me at all. Not like I know her…

  The only thing that always annoyed me is that her conscience pricks her a little too much. She would never join me in the ultimate hell slide to the finish, when you can taste the fear, and feel the hot blood slick on your body. Something in her soul is different to mine and I don’t like that, if I’m totally honest.

  I always wanted Ava to admire me, to see me as more than an equal, and for a while it was wonderful. When she went it was terrible. If I was being poetic, I’d say she ripped my heart out. But you know what? I don’t think I have a heart, or I wouldn’t have been able to play my games the way I do.

  Even whilst I’m thinking about Ava, I’m carefully tending to the fire. My boots are soaking from walking up the hill and down to East Wood earlier, so I should probably put some newspaper inside to dry them out.

  I remember Ava at eight years old, when her parents first moved from Florida to Wales. She had that dumb American accent then, and she seems to have got it back. That’s too bad. She needs to keep her Welsh, or she’s going to struggle out on the game board. I was in the same year as Ava at school. I let her share my desk and helped her with the language. I let her share my pencils too – as soon as I saw that she used to absent-mindedly suck the ends when she was thinking hard.

  When she put one down, I would pick it up, as casually as I
could, and slide it into my own mouth. I could taste her sweetness, and from then on I made up my mind to own her.

  I used to wait at the gate, after I helped my mum get dressed and all that shit. Ava would come running down the hill, in those blue denim shorts and a tight T-shirt, black hair flying out in the breeze. Then she’d smile at me. It was a proper smile, from a proper person – not like one of these fucking losers who just bare their teeth. She was real. And then I lost her.

  If I look out of the window, I can see nothing but darkness. But I know if I went out, I could stand peacefully in the icy air, under the moon. The village would be spread before me like a chaotic nightmare, but as I watched, the stars would come out and create perfect order. The dark squares of houses criss-crossed with pale squares of gardens are like squares on a board. I see games everywhere.

  There is a box of dice on the side, and instead of making a coffee I select a couple and idly give them a roll. They clatter and click across the surface before coming to rest next to the piano. I peer down. A double six. Of course – it would be. Satisfied, I pack them carefully away, revelling in what is to come.

  ‘Ava Cole, ydych chi’n dod allan I chwarae heno?’

  ‘Ava Cole, are you coming out to play tonight?’

  Chapter 4

  ‘Are you going out to see Paul now?’ Mrs Birtley poked a scowling face out of the living room, and for a moment Ava was engulfed in the sickly waft of her perfume. The TV was blaring a comedy theme tune, and she caught a glimpse of Mr Birtley ensconced on the overstuffed pink tweed sofa, sipping his cup of tea.

  ‘I am. Can I have a key please, so I don’t have to disturb you when I get back in? I think you must have forgotten to give me one earlier when I signed in.’ Ava tried for a sincere smile, forcing her expression into a kind of frozen politeness.