Page 74 of Insomnia

My insides–I’ve been stabbed, oh god I’ve been stabbed with a shard of glass just like Mum stabbed herself with a shard of glass—throb as I picture what would have happened if I’d gone to live with her family. Caroline as my big sister instead of Phoebe. What accident would have befallen me there? Out of the frying pan and into the fire. Frying pan? Can I maybe ease a pan out of a cupboard? And do what with it?

I lift one hand away from my wound to open the cupboard next to me, but she moves fast, stomping my fingers with her shoe. The pain is white hot and I shriek as I yank my hand back.

“Then the other car smashed into ours and everything changed,” she continues, as if nothing has happened, as I wheeze in agony on the floor. “In the aftermath, as I listened to my father gasp out his last breaths and heard my mother’s rattled sobs as she drifted in and out of consciousness, and before I’d realized just how much my own life would be fucked from then on, I wanted to lean between the seats and say, “Well there you go. That’ll teach you.

“Fate. No, I never believed in it. Not untilthatmoment. Hearing your name in the hospital corridor.Emma? Patricia Bournett’s other daughter?I couldn’t believe it. Emma Bournett. It was like a bucket of cold water on my head. I’d been too young to remember your surname, you see. I’d heard it only once or twice. I’d searched my mother’s paperwork, but she’d got rid of anything from the foster agency after the accident. After a while, I’d made my peace with never knowing who or where you were. But then as soon as I heard it in the hospital, it came right back to me.Emma Bournett. That was your name.”

“None of this is my family’s fault,” I say. “It’s not my fault. I didn’t even know about the accident. I—”

“Oh, stop fucking whining, Emma, this is my moment.” She glances at my wound. “And you can press that as much as you like, I’m pretty sure I got your liver. Sadly. I was hoping you’d survive. Take the blame. But hey ho.” She tosses me a tea towel. “In fact, this may help keep you alive a little longer. I want you to hear this.”

My liver, oh god, my liver.I press the towel hard anyway. Maybe she missed. I twisted slightly as she came at me. Maybe I’ll be okay.Maybe, maybe, I think as the cold creeps outward from my belly.

“I followed you. I had to see what you’d made of your life after so casually annihilating my mother’s and mine. Within an hour I’d already seen you argue with Phoebe and then some poor woman outside your work. Hardly wearing your feminist spurs.As long as you’re all right, Emma,I remember thinking as I keyed your car.Then fuck the sisterhood, eh?I scribbled the note and left it under your windshield wiper. Crude, for me, but to the point. BITCH. It felt good. Fate had brought us together for a reason. So of course I followed you home. I saw this house. The husband. The children. The friends. All so fucking perfect.”

“Nothing’s perfect,” I say.Except my children. Oh, my babies. Where are they? Where is Robert? Why wasn’t he protecting them?

“Some people don’t deserve what they have,” she says. “They take everything and just breeze on by, untouched. You weren’t going to breeze past me, untouched. It was so easy to pay those kids to take your wallet so I could meet you face-to-face. To slash your tire. Following Robert was a godsend too. That bar? Perfect. And then I had this elaborate plan to maybe become a client or make friends with you, but you were so needy you did it all by yourself. Texting me. Then the first time you turned up and stayed in the car, I thought youknew.But no, you were just pathetically trying to make me your friend.”

“Don’t hurt my children. Please. They haven’t done anything to you.” She’s got the knife within reach and I’m in no position to rush her. I’m not sure I could even get to my feet. I have to do something. But what? I was sodrawnto her. I felt safe around her. I felt safe because when I was with her it meant I knew whereshewas and what she was doing. That leaking future at work again.

“I watched your sleepless nights from the bottom of the garden. They were a gift. I just had to feed your paranoia. The broken milk bottles, the call to the school about you shaking that kid. And it was easy to make those client phone calls to your office and then set up meetings with other firms in case anyone checked. Everything ready to leave those reviews just at the right moment. To send you over the edge.” She grins at me from behind her wineglass. “Just like I sent Phoebe over the edge of that sidewalk in front of the van. Nurses are strong. We shove hard.”

Phoebe. Poor Phoebe, once again nearly dead because of this night.

“And, of course, there was Patricia,” she says. “It was a matter of moments to put her out of her misery. All I had to do was goalong the corridor from my own mother’s room and take care of business once you’d left. She didn’t put up a fight as I pressed the pillow over her face. Her arms twitched. That was it. I’ve had worse.”

The internal cold is reaching my toes and I start to shiver. She killed my mother. She tried to kill Phoebe. She’s going to kill my family. I look at the clock on the oven. It’s 2:08. The next significant time is 2:18. Maybe there was never anything I could do about it. We look for meaning in everything and maybe there isn’t any. A glitch in time with no purpose. The random chaos of the universe. One of my hands, fingers like ice, drops away from holding the tea towel in place, and flops on the floor. I don’t think I’ll see 2:18. I think maybe I’ll have died here on my kitchen floor by then.

63.

Caroline

I go over to where she’s slumped on the floor and crouch beside her. Even in the gloom I can see how sickly pale her skin has become.

“Not long now, Emma,” I say. “You know, I wasn’t going to hurt them. That wasn’t the original plan. I thought you’d be arrested for killing either your mother or Phoebe, and that would be that, but fate had other plans. On reflection, this is so much better. If you hadn’t told me about your mother’s birthday and how you’d been so afraid of repeating what she did, I’d never have had the idea. You told me some, and Robert filled in the gaps. I’m going to do those things for you. I’m going to suffocate them all. On your fortieth birthday. Happy birthday, Crazy Emma.”

“You’ll get caught.” Her words are barely more than a whisper. Our talking time is nearly over. She can barely keep her eyes open. Unconsciousness and then the endless sleep are waiting for her. Her other hand falls away from her wound and her breathing is slowing.

“Oh, you know, I don’t mind that so much. Selling the house will leave me with nothing. I’ve maxed out my bank cards. And over the years I’ve taken my frustrations out on a few older people and not always as smoothly as I could have. I’ve noticed some ‘concern’ when I take on new elderly patients. People are starting to look when one dies, and you know people, when they look, they will find. Prison will be perfect for me. Private space. Heating bills taken care of. Only my own arse to wipe. So, please, let them catch me.”

I see her fingers twitch against the ground. Her eyes close. I listen for a moment. Silence. She’s stopped breathing. I look at the oven clock.Time of death, 2:16a.m., Doctor. I get to my feet, my knees cracking—yes, prison will be better for my joints too—and turn to face into the house. Time to find the boy.

I’m about to go to search their ridiculous living room when I see the wine bottle I dropped on the hallway floor. I look next to it. A small door to an under-stairs cupboard. Of course. Where else would a child hide?

I’m right. He’s pressed himself against the wall, his knees up under his chin. Lightning flashes bright behind us. I tilt my head to one side, looking at him from behind long strands of my wet hair.

“Ah, there you are,” I say, soft and calm like I’m talking to one of my patients. I shuffle back on my heels and hold out my hand. He looks at it for a long moment, and then reluctantly comes out. I smile down at him as he takes my hand and I block the view to the kitchen, where his mother’s dead body lies. Children are so strange. They nearly always do what they’re told, no matter how much they think they shouldn’t. Get in a stranger’s car. Eat the sweets. Hold someone’s hand. I lead himto the stairs, and he comes with me as I start to climb. They creak beneath us.

“Back up to bed,” I say softly. He doesn’t reply. I put my earbuds back in and smile.

“Look, Look, a candle, a book and a bell...”I feel calmer already. Soon it will all be done.

64.

Emma

I am not dead.

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