. . . I’m not a man. I know that. I’m not a man because I can’t make anything and Jodi knows I’m not a man and you know and. And. You see. She. How she was. You know? That dress . . . Al, I never meant to. I thought she wanted to. That dress. Flirting. Christ, she’s such a tease when she wants to be. We called her that. Karen the Pricktease, back then, only, only, Mikey, she wasn’t teasing him. Never told me. His best friend. Never told me. But I saw. I saw it on his phone.’
For a moment I thought he was going to cry with self-pity, poor old Cal, that no one had told him and he wasn’t a man. ‘. . . I thought she wanted. She was so. So, so. You know. And I saw her on the lawn and her legs were all bare so I went up to her – I thought she wanted. And she didn’t stop . . . she didn’t say no. You know Kar. She likes rough. You can tell. Dirty, like. Tell from looking. So we . . . and I went over and I was so drunk and then I . . .’
I felt frozen. I could see the glass of whisky in front of me, diluted by melted ice cubes, but I didn’t know if I could lift my hand to touch it. All I could see was Karen that night. Blood on her thigh. Callum. Crashed out on the sofa in the living room, as if he’d been there for hours. But for Mike’s sake, I needed to be clear. I needed to be very very clear, even if having this conversation felt like putting my hand into a flame. ‘Cal. You’re saying that you and Karen . . . that you had sex with Karen . . . that night?’
He nodded up and down, like the dog in that ad. ‘Thought she wanted it.’ Sorrowful. ‘Feeling bad. Jodi up the duff . . . not a real man. Not mine.’
‘So you . . . Cal, she was hurt. She was bleeding.’
He shrank, like a boy being told off. ‘Thought she liked it. She didn’t say stop. Was awkward though. She kept kicking, like kicking me, and I had scratches. Hurt. Wildcat.’
I had to be very very clear. ‘Did you . . . when you were with her, did you . . . finish?’
He shook his head sadly. ‘Can’t. Couldn’t do it.’ Could there still be DNA though, from skin or hair or something? My stomach turned.
I wondered if the police and lawyers felt like this sometimes. If it was simply too exhausting to even imagine building a case again, and going through all the evidence, the pages of text and sad little bags of bodily fluids, if they ever wanted to just throw up their hands and say, guys, you’ll have to sort it out between you. Because how did you solve this kind of crime, which when you open one eye is sex, two old friends having drunk sex on a lawn, a laugh and a shameful giggle, then you open the other and it’s a terrible assault, it’s years in prison. It’s lives ruined. It’s a woman who can’t sleep in a room with a window any more. I tried to let it all sink in. This happened. Karen felt this. It was done to her. ‘Cal . . . you have to tell the police,’ I said, and I tried to sound reasonable, like I was talking to a sane person. ‘Mike might go to prison.’
‘But he shagged her! He shagged her for years! That day he shagged her! Saw it when we got there, look on their faces.’
‘I know. But she . . . she wanted him to. It’s not the same.’
He pouted. ‘How was I meant to know she didn’t? Never said so.’
And there it was – the attitude I’d been fighting so hard against for years. That it was on us to say no, even if we were too drunk to move or speak or too afraid or couldn’t breathe. And for Karen, I’d been the one to say: she was drunk. And, look at her dress. And, well they’d had sex before.
‘So – Mike didn’t do it.’ My voice was low, calm.
He shook his head.
‘And – Cal, what about Martha? Did you – do you know what happened to her?’