‘THEY SAY IT’S like slicing through warm butter, when you cut into young flesh.’
For a second, the counsellor was still. ‘And is it?’ she asked.
‘No, that’s complete rubbish.’
‘So, what is it like?’
‘Well, granted, the first part’s easy. The parting of the skin, that first rush of blood. The knife practically does it for you, as long as it’s sharp enough. But after that first cut you have to work pretty hard.’
‘I imagine so.’
‘The body’s fighting you, for one thing. From the moment you cut, it’s trying to heal itself. The blood starts to clot, the artery or vein or whatever it is you’ve opened is trying to close and the skin is producing that icky, yellowy stuff that eventually becomes a scab. It’s really not easy to go beyond that first cut.’
‘It seems to be largely about the first cut for you, would that be fair to say?’
The patient nodded in agreement. ‘Definitely. By the time the knife touches skin, the noise in my head is close to unbearable – I feel like my skull’s about to blow apart. But then there’s that first drop of blood, and the next, and then it’s just streaming out.’
The patient was leaning forward eagerly now, as though the act of confession, once begun, was unstoppable.
‘I’ll tell you what it’s like – it’s like that first heavy snowfall in winter, when suddenly everything’s beautiful and the world falls silent. Well, blood does exactly the same thing as snow. Suddenly, the pain means nothing, all that noise in my head has gone away. Somehow, with that first cut, I’ve gone to another place entirely. A place where, finally, there’s peace.’
Gently, almost apologetically, the counsellor closed her notebook. ‘We’re going to have to stop now,’ she said. ‘But thank you, Lacey. I think, at last, we’re getting somewhere.’
PART ONE
1
Thursday 14 February
THE SADNESS WAS inside him always. A dull pressure against the front of his chest, a bitter taste in his mouth, a hovering sigh, just beyond his next breath. Most of the time he could pretend it wasn’t there, he’d grown so used to it over the years, but the second he felt his focus shift from the immediate on to the important there it was again, like the creature lurking beneath the bed. Deep, unchanging sadness.
Barney waited for Big Ben to strike the fourth note of eight o’clock before pushing the letter into the postbox. The sadness faded a little, he’d done everything right. This time could work.
Important task over with, he felt himself relax and start to notice things again. Someone had tied a poster to the nearest lamppost. The photograph of the missing boys, ten-year-old twins Jason and Joshua Barlow, took up most of the A4 sheet of card. Both had dark-blond hair and blue eyes. One twin was smiling in the picture, his new adult teeth uncomfortably large in his mouth; the other was the serious one of the pair. Both were described as 1.40m tall and slim for their age. They looked exactly like thousands of other boys living in South London. Just like the two, possibly three, who had gone missing before them.
Someone was watching. Barney always knew when that was happening. He’d get a feeling – nothing physical, never the prickle between the shoulder blades or the cold burn of ice on the back of his neck, just an overwhelming sense of someone else’s presence. Someone whose attention was fixed on him. He’d feel it, look up, and there would be his dad, with that odd, thoughtful smile on his face, as though he were looking at something wonderful and intriguing, not just his eleven-year-old son. Or his teacher, Mrs Green, with the raised eyebrows that said he’d been off on one of his daydreams again.
Barney turned and through the window of the newsagent’s saw Mr Kapur tapping his watch. Barney kicked off and in a steady glide reached the shop door.
‘Late to be out, Barney,’ said Mr Kapur, as he’d taken to doing over the last few weeks. Barney opened the upright cool cabinet and reached for a Coke.
‘Fifty pence minus ten per cent staff discount,’ said Mr Kapur, as he always did. ‘Forty-five pence, please, Barney.’
Barney handed over his money and tucked the can in his pocket. ‘You going straight home now?’ asked Mr Kapur, his last words drowned by the bell as Barney pulled open the door.
Barney smiled at the elderly man. ‘See you in the morning, Mr Kapur,’ he said, as he pulled the zip of