The more I’d thought about it over the past two years, the more I realised I’d always felt somewhat disconnected – from everyone, really – and, quite frankly, Greta had been my only true tether to other people besides, occasionally, my husband. It was always Greta coaxing me to parties, dragging me into university societies, or persuading me to see the film I’d been talking about. Sure, there was Chlo, but she was only ever there because of Greta. Now it felt like we were two bits of wholemeal bread trying to make a sandwich without any kind of filling.
I could feel my stomach begin to churn and my head start to feel dizzy as the alcohol got to work, casually shutting down my neural communication pathways like it was flicking switches inside my mind. I wasn’t about to embarrass myself by throwing myself at people or dancing wildly at the disco. No, I’d just drink until I felt on the edge of a blackout – but keep just enough facilities to be able to call a cab and make it home.
So, propping myself up at the world’s stickiest bar, I scrolled through the various DarkCell forums that I had saved on my phone, as I did every night. My thumb kept sticking against the screen as I saw CerealKillerCornflakes, having just logged on after a few hours offline, spam through his various harangues to me, most of them ending with ‘I told you so’.
He was one of my online ‘friends’. And by friends, I mean some basement-dwelling, vitamin D-deficient cretin on the other side of the world that I communicated with on DarkCell. (Let it be known, I absolutely include myself in the basement cretin category.)
My motor skills were faltering as I attempted foolishly to navigate across my phone screen. I could see missed call after missed call, but I couldn’t focus my eyes for long enough to see who it was from. Instead, I kept reading the photo of the decrypted note that the killer had left with Greta’s heart:
I feel this existence as a cruel jest,
a monotonous rhythm so fleeting and void.
Yet she might have known more sunlight to ripple on her skin.
As I carved the heart from its broken, freed shell,
a tremble stirred within me,
so strange and unwelcome.
Perhaps remorse; which I must deem weakness.
Things so divine feel no such thing as remorse.
Some nights I’d feel so awful, with nowhere to turn, just desperate for some kind of non-judgemental outlet. More often than I’d like to admit, I ended up DMing the Domino’s Pizza account on Instagram, unloading my various woes into the empty void, just to have some kind of outlet, my own personal form of prayer. Reading the killer’s words again brought back the question I asked myself every single day. I messaged the Domino’s account once again, ignoring the tens of unanswered messages I’d already sent them over the past year.
Why did he pick Greta?
SIX
TWO YEARS EARLIER
‘So, I guess you’ve got a pretty major problem, then?’ Sam asked, scratching at his scruffy, patchy neckbeard as he leaned precariously over the desk divider, directly violating all concepts of personal space.
‘I don’t have a problem,’ I said, exasperated, glancing at Tasha in the hope she’d meet my irritated gaze. She didn’t. She was far too busy scolding one of the interns for using the American spelling of cancelled. I turned to face Sam again. ‘I spend nearly fifty hours a week with you all already. I don’t really want to spend any more time with you; thanks but no thanks.’
Sam was… a lot. He worked in Sales and Advertising, which shared a section of the office floor with editorial, and my word, he did not know when to ‘shut up or land the plane’, as Tasha liked to put it. Tasha and I were no longer post-room newbies, where we had reluctantly agreed to be paid tuppence just to pay our dues to break into the journalism industry. Our promotions within the second-most-read paper and media conglomerate in the UK meant we now spent most of our time churning out puff pieces or clickbait in the middle of a billionaire takeover, and getting the worst seats in the office, evidently because we were next to Sam. The only upside to the current events in the UK at the moment was that at least we weren’t the interns recycling articles about ‘five fruits to stop menopause’ into ‘five fruits to get a stonking, long-lasting erection’. Although at the moment, everyone in the office had spent all day working on the TellTale Killer story in some way.
While I hated the idea of optimism being mistaken for naïveté, I think part of me had been a little doe-eyed about journalism when I had been a fresh-faced graduate myself. I liked the idea of being one of those people who could speak truth to power, hold the elite to account, inform the public, and apply pressure to those accountable when needed. But the days of Watergate had shifted; now, only those on the highest rung of the payroll got to write those particular stories. Most of the time, I got to write stories about seagull crime mafias in Devon.
‘Not even for a small glass of pinot grigio?’ Sam asked again.
‘Sam, why are you so desperate to get Ruth drunk?’ Tasha interrupted, swivelling her chair around to parachute into the conversation, her tone cutting. ‘Do you not see the ring on her finger?’
‘I have a girlfriend,’ Sam protested, his annoyingly pinched voice cracking. ‘The hot Swedish one I told you about before. Astrid.’
‘Yeah, I’ll believe that when I see it,’ Tasha grunted, unconvinced, before turning back to the intern, who was nodding frantically, hanging on to every syllable Tasha uttered as though her life depended on it.
‘Sam, again, no. I’m not coming to drinks tonight,’ I said, trying to sound final and absolute in my tone while Sam looked like something resembling a scorned puppy. ‘I’ve already got plans and besides, do you really think it’s a great idea for me to stagger home drunk after dark at the moment?’
It was that which, finally, seemed to shut him up. Sulking, Sam shuffled back to his domain. Tasha tapped me on the shoulder, having awkwardly manoeuvred her chair beside me.
‘Do you think “Astrid” is just what he calls his right hand?’ shewhispered, her wide, mischievous grin plastered ungracefully across her face.
I almost felt bad for laughing. Sam’s clumsy attempts at womanising the entire office were legendary. The time he walked into a pillar and gave himself a light concussion while ogling Esha on the far side of the room had practically become a core part of office legend.
‘Ooh, speaking of arseholes,’ Tasha murmured, nodding toward the door. ‘Here comes our very own golden boy.’
