Where the Memories Lie
By: Sibel Hodge
After I managed to get away, I carried on past the duck pond, pausing in front of it. There was a mother duck swimming with four ducklings riding the fanned ripple of water close behind her.
A memory of Katie flashed into my head. We were probably about ten and we’d brought some bread to feed the ducks, which I’ve since discovered is the worst thing for them. Actually, I’d brought the bread and was trying to feed them. Katie kept nicking it and stuffing it in her mouth like she hadn’t eaten for a week, which, on reflection, she probably hadn’t. I should’ve guessed something, I supposed, even then. The bread was stale and mouldy in parts, but she just picked those bits off and carried on. I was having a go at her for stealing their food, but instead of telling me she was starving, that Rose and Jack didn’t bother to feed her because they spent their unemployment benefit on booze, she just stared out at the pond, chewing quickly and swallowing so loud it frightened a mother 210
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duck on our side, causing it to jump into the water and quickly swim across the pond in the other direction to get away from us.
‘Look, she’s forgotten one.’ Katie pointed to a tiny lone duckling tottering around the surrounding grass on wobbly webbed feet.
A ginger tom cat was right behind it, crouched low in the grass, all muscles taut and ready to launch itself in an attack on the poor little thing. Katie had dropped the bag of food, shooed the cat away and picked up the duckling in her hand. Taking it round to the other side of the pond, she’d placed it gently in the water next to its mum, saving the day and reuniting them.
Katie could be cruel and a bitch. She could be selfish and lie and steal and betray me. But she could also be kind and warm and funny and caring. And no matter what, she didn’t deserve to die.
I swallowed back the tears and carried on to Rose’s house. The curtain at the front window was closed again. I knocked on the door as the moisture evaporated in my mouth and the sweat chilled against my skin.
No answer. I knocked again.
I glanced around, looking up and down the street. When I looked back I thought I saw the edge of the curtain drop back into place. I knocked again but there was still no response so I walked home, head down, palms sweating.
I collected Poppy from our house and walked along the path at the side and into the woods, trying to rid my mind of everything that had happened. But every time I forced the thoughts away, they hurtled straight back. Katie’s baby would be twenty-five years old now if it had lived. What was Katie thinking when she had the idea to run away? She couldn’t support herself financially on her meagre earnings from the shop, and it would be even worse with a baby on the way, but she’d still had the intention to leave the village. She must’ve had a plan, and that plan would involve getting money from somewhere to support herself.
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I’ve got something he wants and I’m going to make him pay.
She was going to blackmail the father, I was sure of it. Her words made total sense now. She must’ve pre-arranged to meet her killer at the barn. But was that person Chris or Tom? We wouldn’t know until the results of the DNA test.