See Me Fall by Susan Wilkins

Author:Susan Wilkins [Wilkins, Susan]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781739249304
Published: 2023-01-23T13:00:00+00:00

33

Wednesday, 1pm

Returning home a second time is bittersweet for Emma. She didn’t expect to be back so soon. She gazes around her tiny flat; it’s still a mess. Her life is a train wreck. She feels exhausted and shaky.

You nearly ended up confessing to murder. How?

She knew in her heart that she hadn’t killed anyone, or at least she thought she did. But she allowed Rachel to persuade her otherwise. Why? It’s mad. Why didn’t she stick up for herself? She just seemed to lose all volition. It was easier to give in. Or maybe she was just completely knackered? And why would her own sister think her capable of such a brutal act?

She said she was trying to protect you. But was she?

When Rachel gets an idea in her head, it’s hard to dislodge it. She insists she’s open-minded, but that’s not true. Even when they were kids, Rachel always thought she was right. And over the years, people have admired her conviction and her confidence. It’s seen as a virtue, which in Emma’s view has made her sister worse.

Rachel will argue that she was only trying to help, and in her mind that’s probably true.

Emma wanders into the bedroom, dumps her bag and collapses on the bed fully clothed.

The police have returned her phone. It’s still sealed in a plastic evidence bag. Emma wonders if they’ve been through the dating apps as well as her address book and texts. She’d been required to give them the password. But if she hadn’t, they’d’ve cracked it open somehow. How many random strangers have been through her phone, her flat, all the private corners of her life? Recording, analysing, judging. They searched her wardrobe and so they’d have found her two vibrators. They must’ve all had a good laugh about that.

With the shame of it all swirling round in her head, she falls asleep. When she wakes again, it’s dark outside. Her mouth is dry and she has a thumping headache. She goes into the kitchen and fills a glass with water from the tap.

Then she notices that the french windows at the back of the room are not completely shut. She let Rachel in that way this morning. Did she not lock it? She looks around for the key. It’s not in the door; it’s not anywhere.

She feels uneasy.

Outside, the garden is black and full of the spectral forms of the overgrown shrubs and trees swaying in the wind. The garden is communal to all four flats, but no one can be bothered to take care of it. The couple upstairs keep a mower in the dilapidated shed at the end, which they use occasionally, but it’s only so their dog has somewhere to shit.

Since she moved in a few months ago, Emma has confined herself to the small, rectangular patio outside her flat. There’s room for a deckchair. For a short period in the late afternoon, the back of the flat gets some sun. She’s sat out, but only a couple of times.

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