Installment 24

I woke with a start. The car wasn't moving and the driver had gone. I sat up on the back seat, squinting and my eyes re-adjusted to the light. After a minute or so, I pushed the passenger seat forward and tried the door handle. The door was locked this time. I had a quick look around for the key, but didn't really expect to find anything; and, indeed, didn't find anything. Anyway, I didn't really want to steal the car. Murder, manslaugher, accidental killing, whatever – that's enough criminal/potentially criminal activity for now.

I pulled the door lock up, and the car alarm sounded. I quickly grabbed the handle and jumped out of the car. Someone was walking toward me fairly quickly. I thought about running, but she just carried on past me muttering something about “bloody car alarms” and how they go off for no reason. Dodgy technology working in my favour.

***

I walked down the street, unsure of where I was or where to go. I knew I needed a police station, but I didn't know what town I was in, let alone where the police station was. I wished I had my phone. I wished that I hadn't been so rash in destroying my sim card. I could pick up a new sim, I supposed, but I wasn't sure whether it had any power, and I didn't think I'd brought a charger. I also wasn't entirely sure how having a phone would help me know where to go.

I continued to walk down the street, feigning nonchalance, but, in reality, I was scared every time I saw anyone who was vaguely the same size or build as Janet or Elena. I knew it was damned near impossible that they were here, but something deep in my stomach told me that they knew where I was, even though I didn't.

I walked down what looked like the main shopping street. I glanced in the shop windows, pretending that this was the purpose of my being there. There was a shoe shop full of shoes that looked more like torture devices to me, with the high heels that would quickly lead to sore feet and sore back. Kelly used to love looking at those sorts of shoes. She thought that she liked wearing them, but I knew better. She seemed to forget immediately that she'd taken them off that she'd spent the whole evening complaining about the pain they caused her and leaning on me to take the weight off her feet a little. The number of times I'd tried to persuade her to wear less painful shoes. I wondered if anyone actually enjoyed wearing those shoes. People probably just forgot how much they hated them once they'd taken them off.

Next to that, there was a camping shop. I loved camping shops, with all the random gadgets. Something to solve every problem you never realised you had, and probably never would, but you just knew that if you didn't get that gadget, you almost certainly would. From when I was only about 8 years old, I wanted a pen knife. For my 12th birthday, I got one. It was black with a horse etched into the metal casing. I used to carry it with me everywhere, although it was so blunt it was next to useless. Later, I longed after the big swiss army knives, with their 20 different functions, or the Leathermans with all that and pliers too. I stared at the display now with the same longing I'd had when I was 15.

I was brought out of my daydream by a glimpse in my peripheral vision of my so-called guardians. I turned to check, and sure enough, they were walking slowly down the street. How the hell did they find me? Maybe the pendant did draw them to me, but, no, that felt wrong. I turned away from them and walked quickly back down the high street. The didn't call out or run after me; perhaps they hadn't seen me. Perhaps they didn't even know I was here. That seemed too much of a coincidence, though.

I needed to find the police station before they found me. I turned left onto a busy street and ducked into a newsagents. I picked up a chocolate bar and took it to the counter.

“50p please, love.”

I handed over the money, then said, “Could you tell me where the police station is, please?”

The woman behind the counter looked at me slightly suspiciously, but after a moment or two replied, “Turn left out of the shop, then up to the top of the road, right down Maple Street and it's on your left after about a hundred yards.”

She seemed to want to ask more, but I cut her off with a word of thanks, then walked swiftly out of the shop, following her directions to the police station. There was an almost empty pub on my right that caught my eye. Maybe one last drink before I go down. No cider in prison. I wandered in. There was hardly anyone in there. I went to the bar and ordered a bottle of nice cider. Normally I'd just drink whatever was on draught, but as it was my last, I thought I may as well have something nice.

The bottle was tall and thin and I declined the offer of a glass to go with it. I never understood why someone would take a glass with ice when you can drink it from a chilled bottle that will stay cold much longer than in a glass and doesn't mean you're drinking watered down cider.

I sat sipping the cider, breathing in the atmosphere. I loved empty pubs. I never understood why people chose to frequent busy pubs for the “atmosphere”. Nowhere to sit; can't hear your friends; no space to dance even. The idea of spending the evening stood nodding at your friends doesn't strike me as a sociable evening.

The cider went down surprisingly quickly. It tasted truly lovely compared to the mass-produced rubbish I was used to. I went to the bar and ordered another one. I decided to savour this one and not just knock it back, but it too went down all too quickly. I'd barely been in the pub 40 minutes and gotten through 2 bottles. The more I drank, of course, the more I wanted. Pretty soon, I'd gotten through 5 or 6 bottles and finally decided that I needed to leave. I thanked the barman and left.

The police station was not far from the pub. There seemed to be a lot of commotion inside. The receptionist was on the phone and waved his hand at a set of chairs. I sat down. Once he was finished on the phone, I stood up, as did 3 other people. I sat down again, realising I was quite far back. Before anyone could speak to the receptionist, the phone rang again and he waved his hand to dismiss them again.

When he came off the phone this time, he stood up and said loudly, “OK, people, there's been a huge incident that we're dealing with here, so if you're here for anything that can wait, you might be better coming back later, or phoning in to the station.”

Two people sat on the opposite side of the room from me conferred for a few seconds, then got up and walked out. Another person who had been sat next to me followed them after two or three more minutes. That left me and one other person.

After about 20 minutes, the phone stopped for long enough for the other person to try to report the theft of their camera. The receptionist seemed annoyed and gave him a phone number to call. I stood up, but the phone rang again, so I sat down once more. I felt my eyelids growing heavy from the cider. I kept pinching my arm to keep myself awake. After about another half hour, I was beckoned up.

“Hello, madam, how can I help you?” the receptionist asked wearily.

“My name is Fiona Barnes and I am wanted for the murder of Kelly Wheatley.”

He looked at me with disbelief bordering on contempt, “Madam, are you wasting my time?”

“No, I... I'm turning myself in. I... well, I guess it might not be murder. I mean, it was an accident if I'm honest, but I've not been about to explain, so I figured that they wouldn't realise...” my voice trailed off and I realised that I sounded like a child trying to justify eating sweets between meals.

He sighed, typed something into his computer, then looked back at me, “I have no record of either name. I do, however, have a station full of students who decided it was a good idea to attack the Dean of the Science Faculty in the hope that it would stop the university doing animal testing which, as far as I can tell, they don't. I also have a faceful of what smells like cider breath coming from your mouth. Can I suggest, therefore, that you go away, sober up and come back when you make more sense before I fine you for wasting police time?”

“I...”

The phone rang, he picked it up and gestured angrily at the door. I waited a minute or so, and he turned away, continuing his phone conversation.

After a little while, I walked out of the police station. I decided that it would probably be better to come back when there was someone else on reception. As I stepped out of the door, I felt a pull around my neck and a bag over my head. I struggled and tried to tug at the thing which was choking me, but before too long, I passed out.