I’d wept for my friend as I watched from the public gallery, but he stood resolute, showing no remorse for destroying the site of so much abuse and evil. I don’t agree with the action he took, but I understand why he did it; having had his abuse claims overlooked and ignored, the arson was his way of making it impossible for him to be ignored anymore, even if it had cost him his freedom.
I’ve begged Freddie to let me come and visit him, but he has refused visitations from anyone on the outside. He’s phoned to let me know everything is okay and that he meets with the prison chaplain on a weekly basis, but I can hear the pain in his voice when he talks to me. Given the extent of the damage caused to the site, Freddie was lucky not to receive a longer sentence, and it is a reflection of his good behaviour that he is being released ahead of schedule. Ultimately, the studios had been long abandoned, and having searched the place prior to starting the blaze, he knew there was no immediate danger to life, and the judge had taken this into account. I just hope these last eight months haven’t taken anything more from my friend; he was broken when I met him, and nobody deserves a happy ending as much as him.
I can see movement at the security barrier and a moment later, Freddie appears, dressed in the denim jeans and sleeveless jacket that have become his trademark. The thick beard is certainly a new addition, as is the presence of hair on his head. It reminds me of my first encounter with Freddie when he was sleeping rough on the streets of Weymouth, and I was serving food at the shelter. I hope his time inside hasn’t changed him in other ways too.
Freddie doesn’t notice me at first as he steps into the cool late-morning air, and inhales a deep breath of freedom. I remain where I am, giving him the space to embrace his newfound independence. Eventually, he looks up, and double-takes when he spots me.
‘Emma, what are you doing here?’ he asks, quickly swallowing the distance between us.
I throw my arms open and around his shoulders when he nears, and squeeze him tight. ‘I know you didn’t want a big fanfare, but I didn’t want you to have to make the journey back to Weymouth alone.’
His head nestles in the crook of my neck and for a moment I’m certain he’s weeping, but it ends as soon as it starts and he looks away as we separate. ‘How are you keeping?’ he asks, unobtrusively wiping his face with his arm.
I don’t want to overwhelm him by telling him how much I’ve missed our chats, and how life just hasn’t tasted as sweet without him around. I’ve spent more and more time at the shelter, helping out in his absence, but it hasn’t made the loneliness more bearable. That’s not Freddie’s fault and I’m as much to blame for my isolation as anyone else. Rachel has phoned when she can, but I don’t like to intrude while her romance with Daniella blossoms.
I settle for, ‘I’m well, thank you. And you? How does it feel to be out in the open again, after so long?’
His head snaps round and fixes me with a hard stare. ‘Please don’t do that. As far as I’m concerned, these last eight months never happened. I never want to think nor speak of them again.’ His shoulders soften. ‘Is that okay? It was what it was, and that’s where I want it left. Can we just pretend like we’ve both been asleep since the summer, and now that we’ve woken with renewed purpose we can move on with our lives?’
I’ve never seen Freddie beset with such shame – even when he finally opened up to me about the abuse he’d suffered at the St Francis Home for Wayward Boys. My friend is usually so bouncy and full of verve but today he is flat; I just hope he can rediscover some of his old self once we’re back home in Weymouth.
‘I’m happy to pretend,’ I acknowledge, smiling warmly. ‘It’s what I do for a living, after all.’
He loops his arm through mine and we move away from the prison, in the direction of Winchester town centre. ‘How is the writing going? You were writing about that French girl the last time we spoke. Is that what you’re still working on?’
It was my investigation into the sudden return of Aurélie Lebrun that inadvertently triggered Freddie’s meltdown at the film studios. She was another one with a complicated past that needed unpicking. Having escaped prosecution by the British authorities, she returned to France, and the two of us have been meeting via video call to iron out the finer details of her story. It will probably be at least another four to six months until it hits the shelves, but at least that leaves plenty of time to sharpen the prose and syntax.
‘I submitted the first draft of the manuscript to my agent Maddie last Friday. You remember Maddie, don’t you?’
He nods. ‘She handled the contract for the TV series adaptation of your first book. It’s thanks to her that I had to submit my first ever tax return last year.’
‘That’s her. Well, she has the manuscript now, and will be running her digital red pen over it to bring it up to her very high standards before sending it on to my publisher, which means I am now at something of a loose end. So, like it or not, Freddie Mitchell, you’re stuck with me for the rest of the day. And as you weren’t around to help celebrate my birthday in August, the least you can do is come out to lunch with me now.’
He slows to a stop, taking my hand in his. ‘I’d rather just get home and
