"You're a charming young man, aren't you?" Jenny said. "Saying hello to random people at the bar, completely unprompted?"
I smiled. It wasn't forced. I found it funny because she only looked a year or so older than me. She had the perfect opportunity to make me feel small, but she chose to do the opposite. Suddenly, I was standing head and shoulders above the other people at the bar still waiting to be served. I was instantly and unusually comfortable speaking to her. Still, she ignored me for a few moments as she ordered her drink (even though I was sure I was at the bar before her). "Less of the young, please," I said. "I'm old enough to drive, although I can't. I'm old enough to drink, although I can't do that very well. I'm old enough to do plenty of other things that, surprisingly, I am very good at..."
Jenny raised her eyebrows and laughed. My last statement could very well have been true: I was still a virgin and so, for all I knew, I could turn out to be the greatest lover in the world. I longed to pull the photograph out of my wallet, just give it a quick glance, make me feel stronger, but I couldn't. I knew I had to do this on my own.
"Well, it sure is a shame you can't drive," Jenny said. "I was looking for somebody to chauffeur me around, to be Clyde to my Bonnie."
"I'm not sure Clyde was best known for his driving skills," I said. "Do you come here often?"
"Is that a chat up line?"
"Depends..."
"On?"
"How well you respond to it."
Jenny glanced over my shoulder, smiling. I yanked my head and was met by a group of girls waving in our direction. Jenny fumbled in her handbag. She pulled out a pen and a strip of white paper. She used the bar to write on the paper. "Listen," Jenny said, "I've got to go back to my mates. But you seem nice, and harmless enough. Not openly weird. If you fancy meeting up for a drink sometime, give me a call."
I was numb as I returned back to my boisterous group on the other side of the pub. They were young guys in suits, mainly traders on the floor who all earned a multitude of my salary. Traditionally, I faded into the background.
"Where you been?" one of them asked, arm stretched over the back of the chair.
"The bar," I replied.
"Where's your drink?"
I looked down at my empty hands. "Oh for..."
I was interrupted by a chorus of raucous laughter. This was the first time I'd been the centre of attention. It was a good night.
Now, nearly thirty years later, I return to the boat smiling. The dry, claustrophobic cabin is of startling contrast to the fresh air outside. I crack eggs on the frying pan and lay bacon under the grill. Cooking is usually therapeutic. Any distraction that is even remotely interesting usually is. The thoughts invade my mind, though. I want to swat them, like an annoying fly - just like the one Richard talked about - hovering with intent around the fried food; I know this merely makes the thoughts stronger. I need to ignore them. It is painfully difficult, however, to avoid the metaphorical elephant in the room.
Who was it who called me Jeffrey Allen? And why, thirty years to the day since the first killing?
Fortunately - thank God - there is a close and welcome distraction. I don't even need to go looking for it. There is a gentle rustling of sheets on the bed. I observe movement underneath the duvet, like a mole furrowing beneath a lawn. A long sigh. And then a yawn. Smiling, I pour two cups of coffee and perch on the edge of the bed.
A hand appears from under the duvet and grazes along my thigh. The hand didn't need to wander, to search for me; it instinctively knew where I was, where to find my naked leg. Erica knows my body like it is her own. I imagine Erica under the duvet. She sleeps on her front. She sleeps naked. Her face will be buried deep in the pillow, her black hair nestling on the nape of her back, just above her pert buttocks, curved like a ski slope.
Her naked body remains motionless. Her hand, though, continues stroking my thigh. Continues rising. She takes me in her hand. I stiffen.
Momentarily, at least for the next five minutes or so, the overwhelming compulsion to find out more about what happened yesterday afternoon vanishes, just like I did, thirty years ago.
DAY THREE
3RD JUNE 1988
Yvette nurses her cup of tea in her dressing gown and slippers at the round, oak kitchen table, early morning daylight just beginning to fill the room. Glancing at the clock, she momentarily wonders whether young John King had slept in again, bless him; she wasn't sure that an early morning paper round suited the young boy in the village who carried a sleepy demeanour with him wherever he went. Still, it was Friday morning and so he could have a lie in tomorrow, couldn't he? The thought passes; the rustle at the front door and the thud indicates the paper has safely dropped on the mat.
The morning paper is delivered at about seven and then the South Wales Echo is pushed through the letterbox at about four in the afternoon. Yvette was more than happy to walk up to the shop in the afternoon, stretch her legs, but the last thing she wanted was to deprive the paperboy of some extra pocket money, put the kid out of a job.
