1974

fantasised I’d finally get to fuck that waitress called Jane.

Twenty-five minutes to kill.

Outside in the rain, I headed on up to the Bullring, past the Strafford Arms, the hardest pub in the North, past the hairdresser’s where my sister had worked part-time and met Tony.

Twenty minutes to kill.

In Silvio’s, my mother’s favourite cafe and the place where I used to secretly meet Rachel Lyons after school, I ordered a chocolate eclair, I took out my damp notebook and began to read through the scant notes I had on Mystic Mandy.

“The future, like the past, is written. It cannot be changed, but it can help to heal the wounds of the present.”

I sat in the window and stared out at Wakeh’eld.

Futures past.

It was raining so hard now that the whole city looked under water. I wished to Christ it was, that the rain would drown the people and wash the place the fuck away.

I had killed all the time I had.

I drank down the cup of hot sweet tea, left the eclair, and headed back up to St Johns, a tea-leaf stuck to my lip and a feather in my pocket.

Blenheim Road was one of the most beautiful in Wakefield, with big strong trees and large houses set back in their own small grounds.

Number 28 was no exception, a rambling old house that had been subdivided into flats.

I walked across the drive, avoiding the holes full of puddles, and went inside. The windows in the hallway and on the stairs were stained glass and the whole place had the stink of an old church in winter.

Number 5 was on the first-floor landing, to the right.

I looked at my father’s watch and rang the doorbell. The chimes sounded like Tubular Bells and I was thinking of The Exor cist when the door opened.

A middle-aged woman, fresh from the pages of Yorkshire Life in her country blouse and country skirt, held out her hand.

“Mandy Wymer,” she said and shook hands briefly.

“Edward Dunford. From the Yorkshire Post.”

“Please, come in.” She pressed herself into the wall as I passed, leaving the front door ajar as she followed me down the dim hall, hung with dim oils, into a big dim room with large windows blocked by larger trees. There was a litter tray in one corner and the whole room smelt of it.

“Please sit down,” said the lady, pointing to the far corner of a large sofa draped in a tie-dyed cloth.

The woman’s conservative appearance jarred, both with the Oriental-cum-hippy decor and with her profession. It was a thought I obviously couldn’t disguise.

“My ex-husband was Turkish,” she suddenly said.

“Ex?” I said, switching on the Philips Pocket Memo in my pocket.

“He went back to Istanbul.”

I couldn’t resist. “You didn’t see it coming?”

“I’m a medium, Mr Dunford, not a fortune teller.”

I sat on the far end of the sofa, feeling like a twat, unable to think of anything to say.

Eventually I said, “I’m not making a very good impression, ami?”

Miss Wymer rose quickly from her chair. “Would you care for some tea?”

“That’d be nice, if it’s no trouble?”

The woman almost ran from the room, stopping suddenly in the doorway as though she had walked into a plate of glass.

“You smell so strongly of bad memories,” she said quietly, her back to me.

“Pardon?”

“Of death.” She stood in the doorway, shaking and pale, her hand gripping the frame of the door.

I got up. “Are you OK?”

“I think you’d better leave,” she whispered, slipping down the frame of the door and on to the floor.

“Miss Wymer…” I went across the room towards her.

“Please! No!”

I reached out, wanting to pick her up. “Miss Wymer…”

“Don’t touch me!”

I backed off, the woman curling into a tight ball.

“I’m sorry,” I said.

“It’s so strong.” She was moaning, not speaking.

“What is?”

“It’s all over you.”

“What is?” I shouted, angry, thinking of BJ and these days and nights spent in rented rooms with the mentally ill. “What is, tell me?”

“Her death.”

The air was suddenly thick and murderous.

“What are you fucking talking about?” I was going towards her, the blood drumming in my ears.

“No!” She was screaming, sliding back on her arse up the hall, her arms and legs splayed, her country skirt riding up. “God no!”

“Shut up! Shut up! Shut up!” I was screaming now, flying up the hall after her.

She scrambled to her feet, begging, “Please, please, please, leave me alone.”

“Wait!”

She turned into a room and slammed the door on me, trap ping one of the fingers of my left hand in the hinges for a second.

“You fucking bitch!” I shouted, kicking and punching the locked door. “You crazy fucking bitch!”

I stopped, put my throbbing left fingers in my mouth and sucked.

The flat was silent.

I leant my head against the door and quietly said, “Please, Miss Wymer…”

I could hear scared sobs from behind the door.

“Please, Miss Wymer. I need to talk to you.”

I heard the sound of furniture being moved, of chests of drawers and wardrobes being placed in front of the door.

“Miss Wymer?”

A faint voice came through the layers and layers of wood and doors, a child whispering to a friend beneath the covers.

“Tell them about the others…”

“Pardon?”

“Please tell them about the others.”

I was leaning against the door, my lips tasting the varnish. “What others?”

“The others.”

“What fucking others?” I shouted, pulling and twisting at the handle.

“All the others under those beautiful new carpets.”

“Shut up!”

“Under the grass that grows between the cracks and the stones.”

“Shut up!” My fists into wood, my knuckles into blood.

“Tell them. Please tell them where they are.”

“Shut up! Fucking shut up!”

My head against the door, the tide of noise retreating, the flat silent and dim.

“Miss Wymer?” I whispered.

Silence, dim silence.