then you can see the sun set from the beach on the other side. It’s one of the top-ten things they list in the guidebook for people to experience. But once you’ve seen one sunrise, you’ve seen them all.
Emma: When I saw what was on the clifftop that morning, I almost laughed. There was a single traffic cone sitting close to the edge. That was how they’d marked the place where Dad had fallen. I thought about all the people who complain about health and safety culture in the UK – and what they’d make of it. Would even the solo cone be too much for them?
There was a man standing close to that cone with his back to me. I could see the smoke from his cigarette drifting away and assumed it was someone from the hotel who had snuck out for a smoke. It was only when I got across to the cliff edge that I realised I knew him.
I honestly think he was wearing the same black trousers from nine years before. They were the sort you’d wear to an office – but way too baggy on him. He had on this plain white shirt but had sweated through the sides and it was all so familiar. The same man wearing the same clothes – but nine years apart.
Jin turned to me, looked me up and down, and then spun back to the ocean. ‘Ms McGinley,’ he said. ‘Fancy seeing you here.’
I think he was trying to make a joke, but it didn’t feel like that.
‘Jin’ (Galanikos head of police): I didn’t think they would ever be back. Would you, after what happened the last time?
Emma: I never knew whether ‘Jin’ was his first name, last name, or a nickname. It was pronounced like the drink and that’s what he told everyone to call him. He was the head of police when Alan had fallen and it looked like he was still doing the job.
We were standing side by side and I followed his stare along the coast towards the cliff from where Alan fell. It’s a little further away from the hotel, where there’s a path that winds down to the beach below. Alan landed on rocks, while Dad had apparently been found on the sand.
Neither of us said anything for a while, but it did feel as if there was a connection. Like we were in the same place and thinking the same thing.
Then he said it.
Jin: ‘Here we go again.’
Emma: It was flippant but not mean. I knew where he was coming from.
After Alan fell, Jin got a lot of abuse for apparently ‘botching’ the investigation. I imagine that all took a long time to die down. He might have thought his career was over. Then we come back after all this time and, yeah… Here we go again.
Jin: I told her what time her dad had been found – and asked where she was for the hours before that.
Emma: I said I was in a bar. He wanted to know if I was with anyone, so I said ‘yes’, without giving a name. He didn’t push for more and didn’t write anything down. It wasn’t a serious inquisition.
Jin: I can’t talk about who was a suspect and who wasn’t.
Emma: I asked why there was no fence.
Jin: It’s never the locals who fall.
Emma: I didn’t like it when he said that. It was dismissive, as if the tourists who come to the island don’t mean anything. That they’re the only ones stupid enough to fall.
Jin: Who would pay for this fence? Do you know how long it would have to be? If you don’t want the danger, don’t go near the edge. Everyone who lives here manages to figure that out.
Emma: He’d annoyed me, which is why I told him that he’d have to do some work to find a real suspect this time. I knew what I was saying. I wanted a reaction, but he continued staring out over the ocean.
Jin: She knows nothing.
Emma: When Alan fell, the only named suspect was Dad. That wasn’t based on anything particular, simply that there was a small discrepancy about times – and that Jin didn’t want to do his job. There was no evidence, which is why no charges were ever laid.
It had made the news back home and, because Dad had been named, the rumours took a long time to go away. It’s no wonder people say the investigation was botched. It ended up