In 2011, Toby Soames dies from a freak accident on Hampstead Heath; Charlie Falk simply disappears. Two years later, Australian Adele Soames returns to London to be nearer her son and the places he loved. She is joined in her pilgrimages to the heath by Charlie. Charlie tells her things; unnerving things about his last day alive.
Enter DS Xandra Bentley, a member of Adele’s grief support group at St Bart’s. Xandra has worked on a number of cold cases of missing boys in the area and Adele’s information reignites her interest. As new evidence comes to light, Adele has the creeping dread that she is bringing danger closer to home.
Excerpt
Ex
Alicia Thompson © 2024
All Rights Reserved
Prologue
Exigent
Def. Pressing, demanding.
November 2011
One minute Toby is downing a glass of milk at the island bar while she prepares dinner, the next he is flat on the floor. Adele turns just in time to see her son’s eyes roll back in his head, after he jumped off his stool to demonstrate something from his game.
Her spoon clatters on the floor tiles as she runs to her son. She crashes to his side, her fingers at his neck, her ear to his mouth. Nothing. Her brain goes cold and blank as she swiftly arranges his body and commences CPR, her hands pumping in time to her mind chanting No!…no!…no!
As she goes through the frantic process of trying to revive her son, her glances pinball from one surface to another around the room. Where the hell is her phone? Leaving her son to hunt for it is unthinkable.
Tears of despair run down her cheeks as her efforts produce no response. After what seems like hours, her phone rings. It’s a few feet away just above her head on the buffet table. Clutching at it, she puts it on speaker and slams it on the floor so her hands can fly back to her son.
“—Adele? Are you—”
“Roof! Help me! Call an ambulance. To the house. It’s Toby!”
Chapter One
X Marks the Spot
Def. Ground zero
January 2014
She didn’t want to go, but she went anyway. It was like falling into a rhythm. She locked the door behind her and walked to the end of the street. Brushing past wet rose bushes in a neighbour’s garden on the corner, she walked downhill to South End Green where the shops started, putting one foot in front of the other on the greasy, rained-on pavement.
She averted her eyes from the mothers hurrying along with uniformed children taking them to appointments or for shopping; she plunged her hands deeper into the pockets of her trench coat, focusing on where she walked and the whooshing of passing cars. A melee of food smells assailed her as she ran the gauntlet of the restaurants and takeaway shops. The trip back from the park had always been fraught, with her hungry son wanting her to give in to grease for dinner, not to mention his favourite red velvet cheesecake at Dominique’s. Fish and vinegar smells blended into hot fugs of curry, then segued back into raw fish and seaweed to fried fumy noodles. Already there were mothers at counters with children in tow. But not her. Not today. Not any more.
At the train station, she crossed the road. The street turned uphill, and progress was slow. She had let herself go these last few years living in Australia, even without the excuses of less daylight hours and the higher cost of healthy food.
After passing the car park, she turned up an unmarked entry point into the Heath. She paused and took a deep breath of trees and wet grass, partly to cleanse herself of the polluting streets, but also as if she was entering Narnia and all would be the same as she had left it. The pebbles on the path crunched underfoot and the odd drop of water leaked from the networks of naked branches to hit her glasses or run down the back of her neck.
As she left the path and staggered up a grassy bank, the view opened up and she was there. From her vantage point, she gazed down over an expanse of playing fields backed by thick woods. And there, as she had expected, was an after-school soccer game in progress, small figures running back and forth in bright colours, a few parents on the sidelines.
She had always preferred to watch from the raised bank. Having a redheaded son meant she could easily follow his game, and there was a bench. Her bench.
She walked over to the bin nearby and extracted a discarded newspaper. She crumpled a few sheets and wiped the remaining rainwater off the slats of the bench. She settled down, tucked loose strands of hair back behind her ears, and burrowed her cold hands into her pockets. She could pretend for a little while, at least.
There were no redheaded children in this game—although she looked, of course she looked—which was probably just as well, and time passed as she watched, but didn’t see, the small figures running back and forth, yells and whistles drifting up, providing a disembodied soundtrack to her thoughts.
Some time must have passed when she felt the bench give and vibrate, signalling that she had company. She glanced sideways, not without annoyance, to see a young boy grinning at her as he rustled a paper bag on his lap. Freckles littered his nose and cheeks, and his thin hair fell in shoelace strands over his forehead. He produced a speckled banana from his bag and proceeded to peel it.
“Are you here to watch the game?”
Momentarily distracted by his bony knees and thin bare legs, one wrinkled grey sock around his ankle, the other halfway up his calf, as he banged his school shoes against the bar underneath the bench, she wondered if he was cold. She looked back at his face, watching him stuff banana into his mouth.
“Yes. Yes, I thought I would. Just for a bit.”
He nodded. He had the unpleasant habit of talking with his mouth full, and through the banana and the gap in his front teeth, she saw as well as heard him say, “I’m Charlie Falk.”
His forwardness made her smile. “Well, I’m Mrs Soames.”
Charlie clucked his tongue and grinned. “Yes, I know. You’re Toby’s mum.”
Her heart lurched and suddenly, he seemed different to her: not a cheeky half-urchin invading her peace, but a window onto something…something…
He was still banging his feet in a rhythm on the bench rung, a thrumming beat and vibration that now seemed to portend that something. She swallowed, trying to release the sudden tightness in her throat.
“You—you knew Toby?”
He nodded vigorously, chewing his last gob of mushy fruit as he put the skin in the bag and screwed it up into a ball. “We played football together.”
“Oh…I see.” It was hard to believe this scrawny child was the same age Toby would have been now. Her son had been big for his age, true, but more than two years on, he would have been almost twelve now. She gazed out over the playing field, vaguely aware of little moving figures, seeing only her redheaded son dashing around, kicking the ball. He had loved soccer—football, she mentally corrected herself. He was always scolding her for that.
“Mrs Soames?”
She jerked her head back in Charlie’s direction.
“Are you all right?”
“Yes, yes, I’m fine.” She fossicked in her coat for a tissue. She removed her glasses and dabbed at her cheeks. “It just makes me sad coming here. Happy and sad at the same time, if that makes sense. It makes me remember things.” She stood up, feeling the cold and the hardness of the bench, wanting to be home in the warm.
Charlie got up as well, walked over to the bin, and lobbed in his scrunched-up ball. He turned to look back at her, his face suddenly serious and wise. “It’s good to remember things.” He zipped up his jacket. “Goodbye, Mrs Soames. Maybe see you again.”
She half lifted her hand as he turned and walked off down the slope, round a clump of bushes, and out of sight. Walking back down the slope to the dirt path, she marvelled at all the loose threads that had pulled her back to this knotty place. Penelope must start over and weave up the unravelled mess. Again.
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Meet the Author
Alicia Thompson grew up on a farm in country NSW. She has a Masters in Creative Writing from UTS along with some financial and accounting qualifications. She has worked as a bookkeeper, photographer, editor, adventure tour leader in the Middle East and China, business analyst, writing teacher and general herder of cats. Her published work includes numerous book reviews, travel articles, and short stories. She lives and works in Sydney. More can be found on her website www.aliciathompson.com.au.
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Ornery Owl's Review
Rating: Five out of Five Stars
This book is not an easy read and is definitely not appropriate for readers under the age of 18. While nothing is described in graphic detail, it contains realistically depicted sexual encounters between adults, child molestation, and the murder of a child. It is a gritty, powerful book delving into difficult topics that are, unfortunately, all too real.
The friendship that develops between grieving mother Adele and the spectral Charlie, a boy whom she comes to believe was murdered, is beautifully dramatized. Adele's decision to date Stephen, the man who was coaching the boys' soccer team on the day her son Toby was struck in the head with a ball and suffered a brain hemmorhage, leads to an uncomfortable bedroom scene.
Stephen is the kind of man who likes to be in control. He wants to engage in acts that Adele isn't comfortable with. The encounter reminds me of an interview with a woman who was involved with Ted Bundy and was horrified when she learned the truth about him, appalled that he had been in her bed and in the house with her daughter. But do Stephen's sexual proclivities and his pushiness mean he is a pedophile or a child murderer?
Finding an author who dares to write about complex topics is refreshing. Even fiction for adults tends to be overly sanitized in modern times when people are afraid to use words such as murder. Sometimes, I think if I hear "unalived" said by anyone but Deadpool one more time, I will start unaliving those who unironically use that term.
Fortunately for everyone who goes around with "unalived" on their lips, I'm not motivated enough to actually go through with this threat. Fortunately for those readers who want to read a story that dares to be gritty, raw, and sometimes uncomfortably realistic, Alicia Thompson wrote Ex. I recommend giving it a read.
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