I didn’t mean to shout, but in a millisecond after the umpteenth time Gareth had paused and then told me that I didn’t kill O’Neill and not to worry, what had become something of a mild, irksome annoyance suddenly festered into anger, which evolved into a fearsome rage, which expressed itself in me abruptly and spontaneously combusting. The idea that Gareth, even for a moment, could entertain the idea I might be a murderer filled me with a feeling I didn’t think I could even name.
Gareth carried on driving silently as I crossed my arms and twisted my body to look out the window.
‘Sorry, Beryl,’ Gareth said.
We had both admittedly forgotten that Beryl was still in the car, holding onto Tony, who had just come back from the vet’s. We had seen her walking through the torrential rain as we were driving back from the cinema and had offered her a lift. We didn’t want to ask what was wrong with Tony, but through careful eye contact that we had refined over the years of marriage, we thought that it may have been a broken penis since he had a strangely shaped cast around that general area.
‘Not a worry at all,’ Beryl said, her voice clearly a little shaken by the quick shift in tone on my part. ‘It is a bit stressful, isn’t it? A murder in our neighbourhood. Like something you’d watch on telly.’
We pulled into the driveway as Gareth, ever the gentleman, opened the car door for Beryl. Cradling Tony tenderly like a newborn, she slowly began to amble across the road towards her house.
I lurched out of the car, closing the door behind me swiftly to get some space from my husband, but found myself spinning around and jogging after Beryl.
‘Hey, Beryl,’ I said, calling after her. ‘Is Tony…okay?’
Okay, all right, I’ll admit it. Maybe I liked Tony a little bit. Maybe there was a small part of my being that actually cared for the well-being of the world’s most vicious and horny dog.
‘Well, we always thought that he hated Dalmatians. Turns out, he was quite physically attracted to them.’
‘Was?’ I asked.
‘He attempted to consummate his relationship with one, and it all ended rather painfully, shall we say,’ Beryl said politely, and then, as subtly as she could – for the sake of Tony’s pride, I’m sure – motioned her finger towards his man parts.
‘Enough said. Well, thanks, Beryl,’ I answered. I didn’t need to know any more. She wished us good night and walked across the road and into her house.
I paced into the house silently, walking into the kitchen, filling up the kettle, and as violently as I could, slamming down the switch to set it to boil. Gareth walked in behind me and gently placed his hand around my arm.
‘Hey, my love, are you okay? I’m sorry I went on about the whole thing for too long. I’m really sorry,’ he said, rotating me around to pull me in for an embrace. ‘I know between my job, the pregnancy thing, O’Neill, this has all been so stressful.’
He wrapped his arms around me, and I felt the anger in my body melt as I lifted my arms up around his shoulders and squeezed him tight. I was sure that it was just that he didn’t want me to worry, but I couldn’t help but think that maybe, deep down, Gareth thought I was the murderer. Of course, I was. But maybe it wasn’t so much about not wanting Gareth to know I’d killed O’Neill, but more about the lens of a murderer I feared he’d see me through if he knew the truth about everything.
‘I’m sorry,’ he said again, muffled, as he pressed his face into my shoulder.
‘It’s okay,’ I said, my fury beginning to dissipate. I squeezed him tighter. ‘You don’t think I did it, do you?’
I just wanted him to still see me ashisFran,his wife, not as a suspect in a case.
Gareth gave a chortle, placed both of his hands tenderly on my cheeks, and gently pushed his forehead against mine.
‘I’ve known you for years. Do you think I’d ever believe you could ever even hurt a fly?’
Somehow, the elation of knowing that Gareth loved me outweighed any kind of guilt I had lurking around in my subconscious. It was nice to pretend that I didn’t have this weighing over me for a brief moment. We held each other in thekitchen for a little while longer, both of us not wanting to be the first to let go.
‘Just remember, you’re not guilty, so there’s nothing to worry about, darling,’ Cecilia said as she walked out of the cubicle and joined me in washing her hands in the sink. I refused to call her ‘Cis’, the nickname Gareth had coined for her during training camp.
‘Yeah, thanks,’ I said, disinterested as we both stood uncomfortably at the sink, the sound of our hands squelching the ancient hand soap echoing around the bathroom. I was grateful to use the absurdly loud hand dryer, its mechanical roar cutting sharply through the awkward silence. One of the many uneasy moments Cecilia and I had experienced together since Gareth had first introduced us at a very tense board game night.
I left the toilets and hoped I might have lost her while she took the time to use Zeus’s almighty hand dryer, but alas, she suddenly reappeared behind me before I had a chance to get my bearings in the corridor.
‘Interview Room B, right? I’ll show you the way.’
I didn’t even have a moment to respond before she placed a still-damp hand on the small of my back and gently but firmly steered me down the police hallway. Interesting technique, but I’d be damned if I let Cecilia get any sort of power play over me.
‘So, has Gareth been investigating this case?’ I asked her point-blank.
She may have been shocked by the question, but she didn’t really show it. She just tilted her head to the side, trying to articulate an answer.
‘I think this is the kind of case a lot of us have had some sort of involvement in, but Gareth isn’t leading the investigation, for obvious reasons.’
