One year has passed since we last saw Rachel. We have survived Christmas, the New Year and her birthday. All of these were very bad times for us but perhaps the worst was New Year’s Eve. I counted the hours from dusk till dawn, remembering each event that happened on that terrible day a year before.
Rachel’s headstone is now in place at the spot where she lies. It is beautiful, unique and all that I hoped it would be. I know she would approve: ‘That’s rail [sic] nice, Mam!’ Ray still visits her every day and lots of people take the time to stop and say hello to her, often leaving flowers or other little gestures. We are deeply touched by their thoughtfulness.
Her portrait is completed and now takes pride of place in the back lounge. Ryan, the artist, has done a fabulous job, working only from a small photograph. He never met Rachel but he has captured her likeness to a T. Each time I enter the room, I see her smiling down on me, her eyes seeming to follow wherever I go. When I am feeling very low, or have a problem, I speak to her life-sized image and can almost believe she answers me, in her own carefree way.
Even though a painting can never compensate for the reality, it does give me a modicum of comfort – comfort that I especially needed on the sad, bad day when her personal belongings were returned to me. Having to check and then sign for each item recovered was soul-destroying. Seeing the mud on the ones that had been dragged from the drain was particularly stressful for me. Her crucifix now hangs around my own neck and is there to stay, until the day I join Rachel. The other remains of her bright, promising life now lie packed inside two black refuse sacks up in her old room – a terrible, grim reminder of that which was, but was fated never to be.
And so the story of Rachel reaches its end, my story, a mother’s story. This is a memory I wanted and needed to share, for myself, for Rachel and for her many family members and friends, some of whom have not yet been born, but all of whom will be able to read this in the passage of time. I ask no more than she is never forgotten.
For many, this will be the final chapter, but not for Ray and myself, her parents. Not for Mark, her first and only love. Certainly not for her sorrowful, grieving sisters and brother, nor for the many people who knew and loved Rachel. There will never, ever be a final chapter for any of us. For the majority of good people in this city of ours, justice has been seen to be done. But, for those of us left behind to grieve for Rachel, justice will never be served, even though the law of the land has been implemented. While the Michael Littles of this world continue to live out their lives in relative comfort, there will be no comfort for us. We are the secondary victims of crimes such as his.
Life as we knew it ended on the eve of New Year 2003 and nothing will ever be the same again. For, in losing Rachel, we have also lost a part of each other and it is hard to imagine there will ever be a light at the end of the tunnel for this family. Little has robbed us, not only of Rachel but also of ourselves. For us there will always be unanswered questions. For us there will never be closure while Rachel’s killer continues to protest his innocence. We can never forgive him. Only God and Rachel can do that.
I would give my life to know exactly how he lured Rachel into his lair but have accepted that I will probably never find out. At some point in his incarceration, he may decide to say how and why he did what he did. I know, however, that, if that were ever to happen, it would be for his own devious motives, not to help us. In any event, I would not believe anything he might say; a leopard never changes its spots.
Meanwhile, we try not to dwell upon him. Instead, we put our thoughts to better use – to Rachel, to what she stood for, to the joy she brought us and the years we had with her. These can never be taken from us.
Were I to be given the opportunity of confronting the one who took her life, I would only say this to him: ‘Wherever you may be incarcerated, I pray that you will never walk free, if only to save the life of another such as Rachel. That you, too, live to dread each waking moment as do we, her family and loved ones. Even as a Christian, I make no excuse for wishing that your life be as unbearable as ours surely will be from now onwards.
‘You have stolen from us the most precious of gifts but, in doing so, you have robbed yourself too. Not only will you pay the price by losing the best years of your life, you will never have the joy of knowing the girl who was Rachel. In this, you are the loser, not us.’