Jenny didn’t normally have trouble sleeping but she’d woken as dawn nudged at the curtains and lay awake chewing stuff over until she couldn’t stand it and got up to make tea. Schrödinger greeted her as she came into the kitchen. He’d been much more friendly to her since Einstein died. Jenny wondered about grief in animals, Schrödinger was obviously pining.
She picked him up, squeezed him, then let him down, and he followed as she filled the kettle. She went to the window, low sun striping the Links, trees casting long shadows. This was such a beautiful place to live, she was born lucky. She’d been ignorant of that privilege for most of her life, but was finally admitting it now. She was middle-aged, she supposed, but she often felt like a hormonal teen, other times like an old woman with one foot in the grave. Maybe that’s what yesterday with Liam was about, trying to stay more like the former than the latter.
The kettle clicked off and she got her phone out. She’d watched the footage Thomas sent her many times already, but she pressed play again. Vanessa in the bathroom, reaching into the cabinet, taking a long drink from a plastic bottle. Then again, the same. A few more instances until the bottle was finished, then she filled it with water and poured in some liquid from an eyedrop bottle. Took a drink, closed the cabinet door.
Who knew you could kill yourself with eyedrops? Visine wasn’t even prescription, you bought it over the counter, but it contained tetrahydrozoline, which was poisonous. All sorts of symptoms, from nausea and vomiting to weakness, heart palpitations, even hallucinations, seizures, eventually death. She’d drunk it willingly, slowly killed herself.
‘Don’t.’
Jenny looked up to see Dorothy in sleek eastern pyjamas, followed by Thomas, fully dressed. Dorothy had an effortless cool even with a scratched face and bandaged arm. The bandage had been refreshed, her face was healing, and she moved easier. Jenny’s heart caught in her throat at the thought her mum could’ve died. But she would die sooner or later, Jenny would have to go on without her, arrange the funeral, stand by the coffin. The footage on her phone was still playing, Vanessa killing herself over and over again, leaving her children and lover behind. Why?
‘What do you mean?’ Jenny said.
‘I know that’s the footage Thomas sent you,’ Dorothy said, making tea. There was something comforting about your mum knowing what you’re thinking even after almost half a century. Jenny embraced that connection that she’d fought when she was younger.
Thomas hovered at the worktop, didn’t sit, checked his watch.
‘I don’t understand why she did it,’ Jenny said.
Schrödinger went to Thomas, who lifted and nuzzled him. Jenny missed Liam suddenly, wanted him to be here playing with the cat, drinking tea and looking out at the sparrows. She wondered if she would ever have that with him.
Jenny held her phone up to Thomas. ‘You’re sure about this?’
‘We found the bottle, the eyedrops, tested both. The lab went back and tested her body. Tetrahydrozoline doesn’t show up in regular toxicology reports, the lab have to do something called a GC-MS, gas chromatography. She was full of the stuff, it definitely killed her.’
‘How long had she been taking it?’
‘Months,’ Thomas said, letting Schrödinger go. ‘That’s what the lab tech said.’
Jenny shook her head. ‘What about Francesco and the twins?’
‘We’re bringing them all back in for interview, but it looks pretty straightforward.’
‘No note?’
‘Not that we’ve found.’
‘An accident?’
‘How do you mean?’
‘If she wanted to kill herself, why not just do it all at once? Why make herself ill for so long?’
Thomas narrowed his eyes. ‘Maybe she wanted to be looked after.’
Jenny swallowed. Imagined a young Italian man screwing her poisoned body every night. The lack of responsibility, narrowing your world to just staying alive. The attention, the care, love and friendship.
‘Maybe,’ she said.
Dorothy placed tea in front of Jenny, who put her phone away. The footage was killing her. The tea smelled like home.
‘You sure you don’t want any?’ Dorothy said to Thomas.
He shook his head. ‘I’d better get to work.’
She walked over and touched his shoulder, reached up and kissed him. Jenny felt a glow of happiness.
‘Don’t forget the warrant,’ Dorothy said.
Jenny put her tea down. ‘For what?’
Dorothy turned but kept her hand on Thomas’s shoulder. ‘The retired big-cat guy. He felt wrong, he’s hiding something.’
‘You think Whiskers is his?’ Jenny said.
‘Maybe.’
Thomas took Dorothy’s hand. ‘I have to go.’
Jenny shifted gears in her mind. ‘What about Sophia?’
Thomas’s face dropped. ‘We’re still exploring every avenue we can.’
‘That’s what cops say when they’ve got fuck-all leads.’
Dorothy turned sharply. ‘Jenny.’
But Thomas nodded, took on the mantle of blame. ‘We interviewed your suspects, they were convincing.’
‘You mean they had good lawyers.’
‘That goes with the territory of being successful.’
‘We’re chasing them up too,’ Jenny said.
Thomas looked at her for a long moment. ‘As long as you’re not doing anything illegal.’
‘Of course not,’ she deadpanned. She’d done illegal shit in the past and Thomas knew about some of it.
‘If you find out anything,’ Thomas said, ‘bring it to the police.’
Jenny straightened her shoulders. ‘You know, it’s the police’s job to solve crimes.’
‘We’re doing our best.’
Dorothy looked from one to the other. ‘How’s Fiona coping?’
Jenny felt a flush of shame that she hadn’t asked. She’d been obsessing about Vanessa, Liam, herself, not thinking of Fiona alone in Cramond crying her eyes out.
‘Not well,’ Thomas said. ‘We’re still searching the wider area around the house and interviewing her family, school friends, neighbours.’
‘But you know this is Craig,’ Jenny said. ‘The text.’
‘We’re keeping our options open.’
Jenny thought of Hannah following Seb, checking out Charlotte’s rentals. She thought about going back to Karl to shake him down. Thomas was right, this was beyond frustrating.
‘Whatever,’ Jenny said, and regretted how it sounded, petulant and childish.
Thomas kissed Dorothy and left, then Dorothy picked up Schrödinger and sat at the table.
‘A little basic kindness wouldn’t go amiss,’ she said.
‘Sorry, it’s Craig, he does this to me.’ She lifted her phone. ‘And everything else. Who drinks eyedrops until they die?’
Dorothy sipped her tea. ‘We can’t know other people, in the end, we can only know ourselves if we’re lucky.’
‘Is that some Buddhist shit?’
‘Just seventy-one years of experience.’
‘So you’re wise now?’
Dorothy laughed. ‘You make me sound like Gandalf.’
Jenny reached over and touched her mum’s cheek. ‘I can just picture you with a white beard and pointy hat.’
Dorothy went quiet for a moment. ‘I wish I could conjure up some magic answers.’
Jenny patted her mum’s hand, pictured her in a coffin and felt tears coming to her eyes. All this death was killing her.