Follow Me by Angela Clarke

bloodshot, loomed. His hand, bloody and cold, reached for hers. There was a thud. Freddie jolted. It was dark. She was sweat-soaked. Fabric was wrapped around her, a shroud. Her eyes struggled to focus. Where was she? Freddie could hear Mardling’s blood dripping onto the floor. No! No, it was the kitchen tap. She was home. Alone. Another boom shook through her skull. Ajay? They’d left the bar. There’d been a bottle of wine in the park. Some cans. How’d she got home? She groped for her glasses. Her head reverberated with another bang. The door. Someone was hammering on the door. Ajay? Her flatmates? She stumbled out of bed, grabbed the nearest thing: her H&M Espress-oh’s shirt, still half-buttoned, she pulled it over her head. Dizzying herself with the effort.
    Her eyes were stuck at the corners, she followed the crystallised salt tracks with her fingers. Peeling her Sellotaped tongue from the roof of her mouth, she managed: ‘Coming!’ The word was wet, sodden, heavy, though her mouth was dry. Everywhere was darkness. Another thud landed on her like a punch. How much sleep? Still drunk. Boom: her mind shook with fragments of memory. She tried to rub the image of Mardling’s body from her eyes with her fingers.
Would a murderer knock?
    ‘Freddie Venton!’ a male voice shouted from the other side. Bailiffs? Like before. She tried to formulate her thoughts, sort them into order. What was she to say? The Mac was P-something’s. A flatmate’s. They couldn’t take it.
    ‘Freddie Venton, open up!’ The noise crashed like thunder over her head. Stumbling, she got a hand on the lock, pulled.
    Light from the hallway sent her reeling back.
    Nas was there, in a black trouser suit, white shirt. Her dark hair swept up away from her face. Chocolate eyes flashing in creamy whites. She had chunky boots on. Next to her: the blue puffa jacket guy who’d been with her at St Pancras. Up close, Freddie could see his blonde hair was silvering, thinning, probably why he had it shaved to a bristly number one. Unfortunately his close-cropped hair accentuated the square shape of his head. He looked like a Lego man. He was in pale pink shirtsleeves, jeans, glowing white trainers: ready to pounce. She could see their mouths open and close like fish. The air pressed upon her, heavy, as if she were underwater, words bubbled toward her. Don’t. Be. Sick.
    ‘Venton…you…connection…harm…defence.’ Their fish words didn’t fit together.
    ‘Nas?’
    What was puffa saying? Concentrate on breathing. Don’t. Be. Sick. In. Out. In.
    Nas’s hands gripped her shoulders. Anchoring her. ‘Freddie? Do you understand? You have to come with us?’ Freddie nodded. Her brain shrank away from her skull, dehydrated, a husk. Nasreen’s face came into focus. She looked older. Colder. Distant. ‘Put some trousers on,’ Nasreen said.
    Freddie looked down. She was wearing her Little Mermaid pants. Tufts of mousey pubic hair curled round the edges.
    What was going on? They walked in close formation down the stairs. In silence. Each step an earthquake in Freddie’s body. She needed a Coke. A bacon sandwich. Her stomach tidal-waved. No, no food yet. In. Out. In. Out.
    Outside was a waiting police car. Nasreen held open the back door for her. Nasreen’s patronising hand guided the top of her head. At the edges of her consciousness something flickered. A warning. Freddie leant her head against the cool glass of the window, closed her eyes and willed herself not to vom. She was thankful they travelled in silence.
    They were at Jubilee police station, the aging 1970s jewel in the Tower Hamlets policing borough, a clusterfuck of concrete and white metal-framed windows. She recognised it from the TV news. Nas held the door for her again. Freddie took some steadying gulps of air. The street lights hurt her eyes. The puffa guy strode off. Nas looked pissed.
    Freddie’s mouth moistened enough to speak. The words disjointed. ‘This about the dead