Culpability Brown had already accepted responsibility for a divorce and the collapse of a bridge he had never heard of. A parking violation was rather boring in comparison.
It had to be done, of course. When a foreign official blocked a driveway, it would simply be too embarrassing for all parties if the Courts were to hold him responsible.
The Judge had his head in his hand, listlessly turning the pages of some document as the Clerk droned on about the facts of the case. Eventually, the Judge tapped his pen on the hard wood.
“Yes, yes,” he said. Culpability, sitting in the dock, stopped playing with his silver goat pin, the symbol of his guild. “And does Culpability…” He looked down. “… Brown plead guilty to this violation?”
“Very much so, Your Honour,” Culpability said.
“Excellent,” the Judge said, removing his off-white wig and pulling out a bag of sweets from beneath his desk. The Clerk scribbled away in the book before her. “Then I sentence you to twelve hours unpaid work. I give you a 75% discount off your sentence for an early guilty plea. The remaining 25% will be suspended until your death. You’re free to leave, Mr Brown.”
“Thanks, Your Honour,” Culpability said. “Lovely to see you again.”
They chatted briefly about the football game they had bumped into each other at, coincidentally the same day as the violation Culpability had just pleaded guilty to. They laughed about it before the Usher informed the Court that Culpability Blue, who dealt with Serious Crimes, had arrived to plead guilty to the next case. It sounded like some enquiry that had gone on for so long that they had decided to call it a day. Financial reasons.
Sucking on a strawberry sweet that the Judge had offered him, Culpability headed out of the courtroom and passed the broad-shouldered Culpability Blue, whose goat pin gleamed as usual.
“Got any babies yet, Cullers?” he asked his colleague.
Blue tapped his WristWatch. “Jone had a call this morning. Could be any day now.”
“Hope you’ve got the energy for it.”
Culpability wished him luck on the adoption and crossed the marble floor of the entrance hall to the great wooden doors leading onto the street. His watch told him he was a little late to meet Lecrice at the café, but she would be fine. It was the temperature of the coffee sat waiting for him that concerned him.
Culpability left the street of grand courthouses and government buildings and took the usual route into town, passing the restaurants and shops to Café Colonwy. It was a bit ostentatious for his taste with its multitude of arches and pillars holding up nothing, but he knew it was her favourite. And she was paying.
At a small round table beneath one of the arches sat Lecrice, her nose in a cup of coffee and a newspaper in her hands. Another quirk of the café was stocking actual printed newspapers on a planet where everything outside of the Courts was an e-file or a digidoc. Culpability had little interest in quirks himself.
“Afternoon, Cree,” he said, planting a kiss on his wife’s golden head. She put down her cup and smiled weakly. “Sorry I’m late,” he added as he pulled up a chair.
Lecrice waved a hand. “Don’t worry about it,” she said. “I’ve just seen poor Mr and Mrs Farness on the way here.”
“Oh,” he said, taking her hand in his. He gave her a squeeze. “How are they doing? Any news?”
She shook her head. “Nothing at all. It doesn’t bear thinking about, does it?” She took her hand back and gestured towards his own cup of coffee, permitting him to drink. He did so. It was lukewarm and tasted mostly of strawberry. “Bili, if anything ever happened to one of the boys…”
“It won’t,” he said. It seemed to reassure her.
“It’s like the police are giving up,” she sighed, setting down the newspaper. The articles about the poor Farness boy had gone from front page to the smallest column, he noticed.
“They’ll be doing everything they can. I’m sure of it.”
She managed a smile and started playing with the corners of the menu. “Are you back to work this afternoon?”
Culpability took another sip of his coffee. He could almost taste it under the strawberry aftertaste. “No,” he answered. “I’ve already broken up a marriage, blocked a driveway and…” He wracked his memory. “Oh, collapsed a bridge.”
“Huh, I think I read something about that,” Lecrice said absent-mindedly. “Lunch? The chicken’s supposed to be good.”
*
The chicken was tolerable. When the time came to head to the shops for Reece and Cisco’s new school uniforms, however, Lecrice had a smile on her face again. Culpability took her hand and they made their way in the sun, Culpability eventually succeeding in getting Lecrice to admit through gritted teeth that she did not care much for the café’s food or drinks.
“Okay, but it is pretty,” she laughed. Culpability, who did not agree, agreed that it was.
His WristWatch buzzed as they climbed the steps to the indoor shopping centre.
“Perfect timing,” he said, letting his wife’s hand go as he checked the screen. They did not usually pay him quite so quickly, but it was not unwelcome.
And indeed they had not. On the screen was a message from the Courts, requesting his attendance for a hearing in Serious Crimes. He stopped and read the message to Lecrice.
“Serious Crimes?” Lecrice repeated. “That must be a mistake, unless you’ve been promoted and not told me.” She sounded hopeful, but he shook his head.
“They don’t make mistakes.” He was speaking more to himself than Lecrice. “And I haven’t been promoted,” he added. She grinned.
“Well, you’d better get going,” she said, pecking his cheek. She waved their joint PayCard as she backed into the shopping centre. “Mrs Brown, unsupervised!”
“Behave,” he ordered, pointing a finger at her in mock seriousness. Then she was gone, swallowed by the crowd, and he retraced his steps back to the lonely street where the Courts stood.
*
“Welcome back, Mr Brown,” the Usher said as Culpability climbed back up the stairs to the entrance hall. “If you wouldn’t mind taking your seat.” He gestured to the bench outside of the courtroom and disappeared back inside.
Culpability sat down and had a scroll through his WristWatch, a photo of a bright red scarf soon popping up from Lecrice with an apology for her accidental purchase. He smirked and sent her back a photo of an exaggerated scowl.
Eventually, the courtroom doors opened and the Usher escorted out Blue, who rolled his eyes as he sat next to him.
“Kicked out for the likes of you, am I?” he joked. “No taste, these people.”
“It’s not easy being the favourite, Cullers,” Culpability said, stretching his arms wide as he stood up and followed the Usher inside. “Shan’t be long.”
Blue grinned, but his brow was furrowed. He was just as confused as Culpability was.
The Judge was absent when he entered. The Clerk gestured him into the dock and he took his seat, finding a scrap of paper waiting for him with “Pub later?” written in Blue’s scrawl. The Usher produced him a cup of water.
The invisible door in the wood panelling opened and the Judge emerged and took his seat, a whiter wig with an excessive number of curls sat on his head. Culpability bit his finger until the laughter rising within him subsided.
“Oh, I thought we’d seen the last of you, Mr Brown,” the Judge said, spotting him. Culpability waved a hand in the air. “Let’s get you gone, shall we? If you’d read the charges, dear Clerk?”
“Of course, Your Honour,” she said, getting to her feet. She cleared her throat. “Culpability Blue, you stand accused—”
Culpability laughed. Now he understood. “There must have been a mistake,” he said. “I’m Culpability Brown. Blue’s the guild’s Serious Crimes guy.”
“The Courts don’t make mistakes, my boy,” the Judge said as the Clerk looked through her papers. “If you’re here then you’re meant to be here. My Clerk must have misread her own handwriting.”
The Clerk picked up a pen, crossed out a single word and wrote something else. “Indeed, Your Honour. I apologise,” she said. The word did not look handwritten, though. It looked typed. “Culpability Brown, you stand accused of the murder of one Lio Sholan Farness of 53 Starling Close, the facts being…”
“Yes, I know the facts,” Culpability said. He had no wish to recall them. “The Farnesses live a couple of doors down from me. My wife and I know them quite well. Lio used to play with my sons.”
“Good, then we can skip ahead,” the Judge said. “Do you plead guilty to the murder of this boy, Culpability Brown?”
He opened his mouth but no words came out. “It really should be my colleague Mr Blue in here, Your Honour,” he stammered. “He deals with Serious Crimes. He’s sat just outside if you’d like me to get him.”
“If you were summoned here then you’re meant to be here, Mr Brown,” the Judge sighed. He popped a sweet into his mouth. “If you could just give us your guilty plea, we can move on.”
“Your Honour, I can’t,” he said. The Judge and the Clerk exchanged a puzzled look.
“Can’t?” the Judge repeated. He leant forwards. “My boy, you plead guilty and the dead-end investigation can be closed, police time freed, money saved. You’ll receive your 75% discount for an early plea and the remainder of your sentence will be suspended until your death. You’ll receive a payment far more lucrative than your parking violation this morning.” He gestured lightly with his pen. “It’s all very straightforward.”
“I understand, Your Honour.” Culpability thought back to Lecrice’s words at the café, every awkward greeting when he saw the Farnesses in the street, the shrinking news articles. “But if I plead guilty, they’ll stop looking. Mr and Mrs Farness need to know what happened.” He knocked his knuckles together. “I plead not guilty.”
The Judge leant backwards. “Clerk, my ears fail me. Could you please ask the accused to repeat his plea?”
The Clerk turned to Culpability and nodded slowly.
“I plead not guilty,” Culpability repeated, putting his hands to his side.
“Very well,” the Judge said. “You are released on bail and will receive notice shortly of your next hearing. Any PayCards in your name will be frozen until midnight tonight as your bail is finalised. After that, you will be unable to receive incoming funds until proceedings are concluded. You are forbidden from leaving the city and from coming within one mile of the Farness residence.”
“But I live on the same street.”
“Then you have 24 hours to find alternative accommodation,” the Judge said.
“And I haven’t been paid yet for this morning.”
“That isn’t the concern of my courtroom, Mr Brown.” The Judge removed his white wig and swapped it out for the greying one sat in one of his drawers. He sniffed. “Usher, show him out. Clerk, where’s my next file?”
“In front of you, Your Honour.”
“So it is.”
Culpability stepped out of the dock and followed the Usher, his legs moving on their own accord. In the entrance hall, the Usher told Blue that the Judge was ready for him and disappeared back inside. Culpability stood there on the marble.
“That was quick,” Blue said, poking him in the rib as he passed. “To be a favourite!”
Culpability’s WristWatch buzzed. He raised his arm to check it. Blue, halfway through the door, looked over his shoulder.
“PAYMENT BLOCKED,” the screen said, flashing the details of the joint account. Then the words blinked out, replaced with an alert that Lecrice was calling him. Blue’s smile faltered.
“I don’t think I’ll make it to the pub tonight, Cullers,” Culpability said.
*
Culpability did not tell Lecrice right away why she was unable to pay for the boys’ uniforms. He asked her to meet him at home, promising he would explain everything there. Blue hovered beside him and Culpability gave him the quickest outline he could manage. He listened but he did not say a word, his face betraying none of his thoughts. He disappeared into the courtroom when the Usher returned.
Culpability watched him go.
He left the building and walked to the station, pocketing his goat pin. It was only when he reached the barriers, when he tapped his card and the barrier lit up red, that he realised he would have to walk home.
He walked as quickly as he could but the city felt larger than usual, the pavements stretching out further than they ever had before. Starling Close had never been so remote. By the time he reached the red door of the house, his legs were aching and his shirt was sticking to his back. He swiped in with his WristWatch and the door opened.
He suddenly felt like the walk had not been long enough. He had thought about everything Lecrice had said at the café, about the suffering of the Farnesses and the police forgetting about poor Lio. She would understand.
He stood in the hallway for a moment, listening to the soft clink of glass, and then entered the dining room. Lecrice was sat at the round table, rearranging the paint splash of flowers in the vase in its centre. Her smile did not reach her furrowed brows.
“Bili, what—?” She got up and inspected his shirt, damp with sweat. “What’s going on?”
Lecrice led him into the conservatory and sat with him on the wicker sofa. The sunlight streamed in through the glass, giving Culpability the feeling of being under a spotlight. He caught his breath.
“There’s no need to worry,” he said with a smile. “Any PayCard with my name on it is frozen at the moment, but we can start spending again from tomorrow. I won’t be able to receive any money for a little while, though.”
“But you’ve been at work,” she said. “You’ve done work you haven’t been paid for yet.”
“I know, but it’s temporary. We’ll just have to be a bit careful with our spending.”
Lecrice’s eyes darted only for a moment to a full shopping bag on one of the chairs. The end of a red scarf was trailing over the side.
“Why?” she said simply.
Culpability licked his lips. “You were right about that job this afternoon,” he began. “There was a mistake. I shouldn’t have been there. The job was to take the blame for an unsolved murder.” Lecrice nodded slowly. “Lio Farness’s murder.”
“Oh, Bili,” she said, taking his hand in hers. His sweaty hand threatened to slip out of her grip.
“I pleaded not guilty, of course,” he said. “His mum and dad need to know what happened. There’ll be a hearing soon, but I’ll have to move out until then…”
“You can’t.” Tears were forming in her eyes. “How am I going to tell the boys that daddy isn’t going to be home? They’ll be home soon.”
“It won’t be long.”
“And the money?” She wiped her eyes and got to her feet, pacing to the windows and back before she could look at him again. She looked up at the glass ceiling and breathed. “Right, you need to get in touch with work and let them know you’ve changed your mind. You’ve never been in Serious Crimes before and you made a mistake and you want to plead guilty.”
“I’m not going to do that, Cree,” he said, standing up and resting his hands on her shoulders. “If I said I was guilty, they’d stop looking for who did it.”
“And the Farnesses would be free,” Lecrice said, shrugging his hands off her. “Every day this investigation goes on kills them a little more. How will they ever be able to move on with it hanging over their heads every day of their lives? Can you imagine living like that?”
“At the café you said the police were giving up. You said the Farnesses deserved answers. That it didn’t bear thinking about. That’s why I did it. Because it’s right.”
“Bili,” she said, rubbing her temples. “You said it yourself. It was a job for Blue. You take the blame and we all get on with our lives. What isn’t right is Reece and Cisco losing their daddy while mummy doesn’t have any money for food. What’s everyone going to think?”
Lecrice started pacing again, the soles of her bare feet sticking to the hot tiles. Culpability looked past her and into the garden. Beyond that bush and over a couple of fences was the home of a family without answers.
“I thought the truth mattered,” he said flatly.
“It did.” She quickly corrected herself. “It does, but now our family is in danger because of it.”
“So that’s the point that Lio Farness stops mattering, is it?”
Lecrice’s face tightened, her tears red hot. Culpability stood unmoving and silent until at last she wiped away her tears and spoke again. “Go and get some things together. I’m going to call Jone Blue and see if you can stay with them tonight. Tomorrow, you’re going to go down to the Courts and sort this. You won’t choose a dead boy over our sons, Bili.”
Culpability let out a small sound, not quite a laugh and not quite a sob. By the time he could think of a response, Lecrice was in the kitchen using the comms panel to reach Jone Blue. He turned away and headed upstairs, Lecrice’s voice fringed with apology and embarrassment echoing through the walls as he stuffed as many clothes as he could into a duffel bag.
The pencil drawing of a smiling family of four looked down on him. He avoided their gaze and zipped the bag shut.
*
Culpability’s bag had barely touched the floor of one of the Blues’ spare bedrooms when his colleague told him he could stay only the one night.
Blue was standing in the doorway with his thick arms crossed, his usual grin disappearing the moment Jone had gone downstairs to make dinner. “You’re a mate, but you know how it is,” he said. “You’re on bail and people talk. I can’t risk getting in any trouble with the Courts and it’s bad optics and that.”
“I get it,” Culpability sighed, sitting amongst the bed’s uncountable throw pillows. In truth, he neither got it nor knew how it was, but he was sure that “optics” was a very recent addition to his vocabulary. Perhaps his husband was the one with the problem.
Of course. The adoption.
“Come with me to the Courts in the morning,” Blue said. “We might be able to get you listed for a change of plea and you can be back home by the end of the day.”
Culpability looked at the duffel bag by his feet. “Maybe.”
His old friend began to turn away, then stopped. A moment passed. “You’re not the only Culpability to have doubts,” he said. “But you can’t afford them. Not with a family.”
He headed downstairs and left the door half-open, as though closing it fully would imply a level of hospitality that he could not offer. Culpability lay back amongst the crowd of pillows and remembered the sweet smile of little Lio as he tumbled in the garden with Reece and Cisco. Sometimes he could hardly tell the three of them apart.
For the briefest of seconds, he hated the boy. He wished the Farnesses had never brought him to Starling Close. He wished they had never let his sons play with him. If he had never been born, Reece and Cisco would still have a father asleep in his own bed tonight. If they had kept a closer eye on him…
He caught the shameful thought and pushed it into the back of his mind. It was a thought that belonged to someone else, a meaner and smaller version of himself. He pressed the heels of his hands into his eyes until white shapes bloomed in the dark, as if he could rub the thought back out of himself.
When he took his hands away, nothing had changed. There was still a boy who would never come home and parents who would spend the rest of their lives not knowing why. Lecrice was still halfway across the city in the home they had made together, telling two boys that she did not know when their dad would be home.
Culpability let the memory of Lio’s smile replace those thoughts, though it did not come as easily this time and did not stay as long. He slept only in fragments, never long enough to forget.
*
In the morning, Culpability descended the stairs with his duffel bag. Blue, fully dressed and with his goat pin on his lapel, was sat at the table with a cup of coffee and gestured towards the breakfast spread Jone had laid out for them. He looked just as tired as Culpability felt. Jone’s absence did not go unnoticed.
An envelope was sat next to an empty plate. An actual paper envelope, cream-coloured, stamped and bearing the name of Culpability Brown. The address, however, was not Starling Close.
Blue shrugged as if reading his mind. “The Courts,” he said. Culpability took his seat and picked up the envelope. It was heavier than he had imagined, the paper thick and official. “Jone found it on the mat this morning.”
Culpability’s fingers traced his name and the Blues’ address, then he slid a thumb under the flap. The glue gave way with a soft crack.
Inside was a folded piece of paper, thick and cream-coloured like the envelope, and embossed with the seal of the Courts: a gavel encircled by a snake devouring its own tail.
Notice of proceedings in the matter of The City vs Culpability Brown, it read.
“There’s a hearing today,” Culpability said. Blue took a sip of his coffee, unsurprised. “Have you spoken to anyone? Told them I was here?”
Blue shook his head. The letter was lengthy but nowhere did it seem to mention the purpose of the hearing. Culpability checked the back of the page in case the Courts had hidden the reason there. They had not.
“Am I going on trial?” he asked. He put the letter as far away as he could. He felt sick.
Again, Blue shrugged. “Even if it is a trial, you can still change your plea before it starts.” He helped himself to a piece of toast. “You going to eat?”
Culpability sniffed. The smells of toast, sausages, bacon and butter only nauseated him further. He declined wordlessly.
“You don’t have to come,” he said.
“Of course I do,” Blue said. He finished his coffee in silence, glancing out of the window into the back garden. Culpability’s eyes followed his towards the summerhouse where he could make out the silhouette of a man sat inside, a self-imposed exile.
“He’ll be alright.” Blue picked up his empty cup and plate and headed into the kitchen. “Get dressed and we’ll head off.”
Culpability nodded, but the sight of the lonely shadow in the summerhouse made his stomach twist harder than the pervasive smell of bacon.
*
They left with enough time to walk to the Courts, which were much closer to the Blues’ house than Culpability’s own. Holding his duffel bag over his shoulder, his feet felt heavier than ever as he walked beside Blue in a silence broken only by the occasional buzz of Blue’s WristWatch. Culpability’s remained silent.
As they passed under the shade of the trees lining the quiet street of government buildings, the Courts came into view, leaning over them as they got closer. The two men passed through the open doors and climbed up the steps to the entrance hall where the Usher stood waiting.
“Mr Brown, you’re almost late. Everyone’s waiting for you,” the Usher said. “Please take a seat.”
Culpability sat down on the bench whilst Blue stayed on his feet, pacing on the cold marble and checking his WristWatch.
“How’s Jone?” Culpability asked. Blue ignored him.
After a few more minutes of silence, the door to the courtroom opened and the Usher called them in, directing Blue to sit in the gallery. Culpability followed the Usher to the dock facing the Judge’s empty chair, set his bag down and turned around to look at the spectators.
Lecrice was sat in the front row with their two dark-haired boys, Reece chewing one of his sleeves whilst Cisco gave him a confused wave. They should have been in school. Blue had sat next to them. Some rows behind were sat the Farnesses, dressed in black, their expressions defying analysis. Culpability could not look at them.
He returned Cisco’s wave with a small smile and caught Lecrice’s eye.
“What are they doing here?” he mouthed, his eyes darting back at the boys. Lecrice produced a cream piece of paper from her bag and waved it apologetically, showing him the Courts’ seal. She mouthed something that he could not make out. He nodded.
The invisible door in the wood panelling opened and the Clerk stepped out.
“Court rise!”
Everybody did so as the Judge entered, wearing the immaculate and faintly ridiculous Serious Crimes wig, and took his seat, at which point everyone but Culpability sat back down.
“Are you Culpability Brown?” the Clerk asked once the room had settled down. He confirmed that he was. “You have pleaded not guilty to the murder of Lio Sholan Farness of 53 Starling Close. Please confirm that this remains your position.”
Culpability opened his mouth. He could feel the gaze of a dozen eyes on him and could hear nothing but the soft crumpling of thick paper behind him. The Clerk raised her eyebrows.
“No, it’s not,” he said. A weight was lifted from his shoulders and yet somehow it felt as though the world was collapsing around him. The last time he stood in this dock, he had felt powerful. Now he felt small. “I’d like to change my plea to guilty.”
The Clerk nodded and sat down, making a note in the huge book before her. The Judge cleared his throat.
“This matter could have been resolved yesterday, Mr Brown, saving the Courts’ time and the taxpayers’ money,” he said, pointing his pen at him.
“I’m sorry, Your Honour,” Culpability said. He tried to subtly turn his head to look at his family, but the Judge tapped his pen loudly on his desk.
“Well, let’s not drag this out any longer, then,” he said. “If found guilty at trial, you would have been sentenced to imprisonment with permission to request a review after forty years. An early plea of guilty would have permitted me to grant you a review after ten years and to suspend imprisonment until your death, allowing you to leave my court a free man.
“However, this is not an early plea. You have waited until the last possible opportunity to accept guilt and I am thus unable to suspend your sentence or offer you a discount of more than 5%. As a result, you will be imprisoned with permission to request a review in…”
“Thirty-eight years, Your Honour,” said the Clerk.
“… thirty-eight years,” the Judge concluded. “I understand you’ve already packed.”
Culpability looked down at the duffel bag at his feet. There were confused whispers in the gallery behind him, or possibly in his mind.
The Judge leaned towards the Clerk as she whispered something else, then leant backwards in his chair. “Oh, yes, and you’ll be removed from the Guild of Culpabilities and stripped of your name. Do you have another name you go by?”
“My wife calls me Bili,” Culpability said. The Clerk scribbled another note.
“Bili.” The Judge tasted the name. “I had a couple of suggestions, but very well. The Bailiffs will now escort you to the cells to await transportation to the City Correctional Institute. Good day, Bili Brown.”
Two Bailiffs stepped up to the dock, appearing from nowhere. One reached for the duffel bag as the other gestured for him to step down and follow him to the cells. His legs obeyed.
The red-eyed Lecrice had her arms around the boys, a ball of cream paper crumpled up in one hand. Reece was sobbing into his wet sleeve and Cisco had his lips up to his mother’s ear, whispering question after question. Lecrice said nothing and shushed him, meeting Culpability’s eyes.
She muttered something, words chosen just for him. He could not hear them.
A door that had never been there before opened in the wood panelling near the gallery. The Bailiffs directed him through it and down the stairway into the overlit labyrinth below. The door closed behind him.
*
Accounting turned out to be rather like riding a bicycle: once she remembered how to balance, the rest followed, and there were fewer scraped shins along the way.
Lecrice Brown finished totting up the figures just as the hovertrain pulled into the station. She shut the book, tucked it into her bag and alighted, wrapping her red scarf closer around her as she stepped into the winter chill. A wave of her PayCard let her through the barrier and, minding her step on the icy pavement, she made her way through the streets full of people in bobble hats and imitation cotton coats.
She had left work only half an hour ago, yet it was almost dark already, leaving the city to be illuminated by the reds and greens of the festive lighting. The pillars of Café Colonwy were barely visible beneath the tinsel wrapped around them and the interior was a nightmare in emerald and gold. She bought a newspaper from the lady at the till, exchanged a few pleasantries and left before she could be asked why she was no longer able to visit every day.
Buying a pair of reasonably priced coffees from a busy stand on the street, Lecrice had a quick look at the front page of the newspaper before tucking it away. Grieving Parents Criticise Courts, it read. The coffees warmed her hands as she walked, the steam rising into the cold air.
Across the street, she spotted Jone and Culpability Blue outside a shop, their daughter in a lilac coat and a pair of snow-white earmuffs, blinking at the colours in the sky. The two men kissed. They took their daughter’s hands in theirs and disappeared into the crowd, smiles on their faces. For a moment, their happiness stung.
She shook the thought away. There was a brief time when she had been suspicious of the Blues. How had the Courts known that Bili was with them? How was the adoption arranged so quickly? But she had long since chosen to accept that, when it came to the Courts, she would not always have answers. Nor did she need all of them.
She turned off the main street, the crowds thinning as she walked and the festive lights giving way to the steady glow of apartment windows. The Orsain Building, a deliberately anonymous tower nestled amongst identical siblings, stood at the end of the road just where she had expected.
Lecrice reached the door, set down the coffees and bit her lip as she scanned the buttons by the side of the door. Eventually, she found the one she was looking for and pressed it. A tone sounded.
“Hello?” said the tinny voice of a woman.
“Hi, Mrs Farness,” Lecrice said. “It’s me, Lecrice Brown.”
“Come on in,” she said. “The lift will bring you up.”
With a click, the door opened. Lecrice picked up the coffees and headed into one of the lifts at the end of the short hallway. When the lift’s doors reopened, Mrs Farness was stood in her doorway in an overlarge cardigan, her hair tied back neatly. She greeted her with a quick hug and let her into her apartment.
The room was littered with cardboard boxes, some emptied and some unopened, all evidence of a life uprooted and replanted. Lecrice handed a coffee to Mrs Farness, who received it as though it were the most thoughtful of gifts, and felt a little guilty for not getting something more expensive.
They sat amongst the boxes on a sofa still wrapped in its delivery plastic at one end and talked. Not about anything important. Lecrice told Mrs Farness about the nice young couple that had moved into 53 Starling Close, not that she had spoken to them since they had moved in. She told Mrs Farness how Bili had volunteered as a typist at the Correctional Facility and that the mistakes in his typed letters were slowly disappearing.
“I suppose he’s got thirty-eight years to get it right,” Lecrice said with a small smile, but it was a mirthless one.
Mrs Farness cast her eyes down, looking almost guilty. Lecrice quickly asked about her husband whom, she learnt, had returned to his woodwork for the first time since Lio was born.
“I couldn’t stay on Starling Close,” Mrs Farness said, turning her coffee cup slowly between her hands rather than drinking it. “Everyone there still looks at me like I’m about to break. The Orsain’s better. Nobody here knows my name unless I tell them.”
“And do you tell them?”
“No, I don’t,” she said, almost smiling.
Lecrice’s eye fell on one of the opened boxes, a slew of official-looking paper spilling out. She could see the Courts’ letterhead and the snake curled around the gavel. Compensation forms. Resettlement allowances. The kind of paperwork that arrived in place of an apology.
“I could have a look at those for you,” Lecrice said. “I spend all day trying to make sense of that sort of thing.” She laughed weakly, conscious that it might be the first laugh inside those four walls since the couple moved in.
“Thank you,” the woman said sincerely, but she shifted uncomfortably, putting the paperwork behind her as though it would all disappear.
“Perhaps in the new year,” Lecrice said.
Outside, the last of the festive lights were coming on across the rooftops, indifferent, as they always were, to who was watching them from below.
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