The Wrong Man

Ten years on, what enrages me most is the twenty grand. I’d spent 6 years trapped inside those walls. Then, at the end, they walked me to the front gate, patted me on the back and told me to take care. Spend it wisely, a guard joked. They took 6 years of my life and gave me twenty grand.

At first I didn’t get many details. I heard rumours, Ma was told not to say much or even visit much until everything was sorted out. And I heard stories from the other inmates and Big Jo the warden, and some of the other guards.

He confessed was the main thing I knew. I now know his name was Eli, but at the time I knew nothing about him except he had confessed. There were records of him driving the same car, he looked like me then, although I was now greying and he was bald. Only saw him twice before I was released. Once in court, once in a newspaper. Got to admit, side by side on that cover, you’d swear we were brothers.

I expected some relief when I walked out, but even seeing Gavin, my brother, crying as I walked through those gates – I felt happiness, melancholy, but not relief. I wasn’t done yet. On the day I walked out of Eastmount Prison, I only had one thing on my mind.

Penelope Wilson.

It was a few weeks after the accident before I was pulled in. First I didn’t know what was happening, they came and arrested me on my break in work. In front of everybody. Apparently some girl who shops with us had been T-boned by someone driving my make and model, he’d gotten out to see if she was breathing. She was, one of her boys was, but her baby wasn’t so lucky. Then the fucker got back in his car and drove off. I’d already been pulled over three times for speeding, so the way they figured it, I must’ve driven off because the guy would’ve been speeding and if I’d been done speeding I’d lose my licence.

Of course I argued. Pleaded my case. It wasn’t like on TV. It was unceremonious, procedural. When they pulled me in she said she recognised me but I said she maybe just recognised me from doing her weekly shop, it was dark that night and she’d just been in an accident. She wasn’t thinking straight! But who were they going to believe? The 35 year old single mum who’d been left dead at a junction, or some 19 year old shopboy who already had a record for reckless driving?

It was all done in three months. I’d no an alibi for that night, and my car was dented from me driving into a bollard. Course I hadn’t declared it to my insurance company, so as far as everyone was concerned I must have hit another car. I argued surely it’d be a lot damage more than that dent? - but it didn’t matter. It was a sad and messy case and everyone wanted it done and dusted quickly.

As Gavin drove he talked and talked, more excited than I’d ever seen him. He poured years of anguish and sympathies at me, and jokingly asked what I was going to buy with my £20,000. Last time I’d seen him he was 13, when I was released after my initial arrest. Ma never let him visit me in prison, and I understood. I’d missed him but I wasn’t even thinking about him at the minute…

…Penelope Wilson.

I hadn’t seen her during my release proceedings. She was no longer involved. Took three months to lock me up, but a full year to release me. Didn’t see her once. Big Jo came to visit me in my cell the week before my release. He must’ve been headed home. I’d never seen him dressed in normal clothes, always his uniform. But that night he looked dishevelled, uneasy, and he spoke quick and quiet.

“47 Ashley Way, wee red door.”

I didn’t know what he was talking about at first, but then he pulled a scrap of paper out of his pocket reading; 47 Ashley Way – red door.

“Keep that in your wee black book.”

Then he was gone. Next time I saw him he was back to his cold, familiar demeanour. He gave me a duffle bag, containing a change of clothes and some of my belongings from when I was brought in. None of my old clothes fit me now, but there was a change of sweats. I packed up what little I’d accumulated over 6 years. When I was packed and had it hoisted over my shoulder I realised how light the bag was. My life reduced to some clothes, a lighter and fegs, my house keys, my little black book with Jo’s note wedged inside, and my pocket knife…

…47 Ashley Way – red door…

…Penelope Wilson.

The woman who had locked an innocent man up for the better part of his 20s. The only part of Gavin’s ramblings that morning that I remember well: “She’ll get what’s comin’ to her, Rob, don’t worry. Ma’s been saying this for years - karma.”

I just nodded. I had no doubt karma was coming for Penelope Wilson. I’d written about it in my book over and over. Seemed a good way to organise my thoughts, my frustration and anger and heartbreak, all compiled neatly into such a little black book. If there is a God, I believe I wrote early on, show her the honest truth of what happened that night, and let her suffer on it for the rest of her life while I suffer for the rest of mine.

About a mile from home I asked Gavin to pull over. He asked why and I just said I wanted some fresh air. Lies, but it sounded like something someone who had just got out of prison would say. Want to feel the sun on my skin, shit like that. I’m not sure to this day if he believed that. We had been apart for so long, but I reckon he recognised something in my eyes.

I kissed him on the forehead, thanked him for the lift, grabbed my bag and got out.

“Tell Ma I’ll see her soon,” was the last thing I said to him.

I watched as he turned the corner, hesitated for a moment, and drove on. I stood there for a while before I started walking. I didn’t know this town well anymore but I still managed to find my way.

Even when the sun started going down and the orange sky barely illuminated the town and long shadows crossed my path my body moved without conscious direction and my mind raced without cohesive thought. Occasionally I’d pass a dog walker or jogger. The rush hour wave came and went. I must’ve looked like a ghost. No one stopped me, but I caught one or two people doing a double-take.

My case had been one of the more exciting things to happen in our town for a while and it had left a significant scar on the community. Ma and Gavin were scorned. Gavin was bullied in school, to the point where he had to move schools to Regency on the far side of town.

The fees that went into my defence ruined us. Sometimes, looking back, I wonder if it was worth the poverty it launched Ma into for her final years. She’d say it was worth it, it’s always worth the fight, but I’m not sure it was. She lost her home, and her and Gavin spent her remaining years in a council flat. I was gonna downsize eventually anyway, she’d tell me.

I only snapped back to reality when I was stood across from that red door. A nice detached bungalow, beautiful garden and the most obnoxious bright red door. 47 written on a slate to the right of it.

I can only guess how long I stood there, rooted, whether with nerves or fear or anger or sorrow. Maybe twenty minutes. I saw shadows on the inside of the blinds move around inside. I shook myself, and with my duffle bag with the only thing I needed slung over my shoulder, walked across to the red door.

It wasn’t even her who answered. A boy, late teens, came to the door with a beer in hand. He started to speak, but stopped himself, and called for his Ma, who came running.

Penelope Wilson.

She had aged worse than me. Later I’d describe her with a series of unfair words, but the one I stuck to was; tired. It had been 6 long years for me, but it looked like she’d experienced a lifetime since our last encounter. Of course she recognised me immediately.

She began by mumbling what did I want and what was I doing here and everything I expected, and when she started to slam the door I had already wedged my boot in the way. She was weak and her son had already run off to phone the police so with one firm push I managed to open the door again.

I reached into my bag, and her son would later tell police that he knew I was pulling out a weapon, and so he tried to pull his mother back and shove the door. But it was too late.

I pulled out the book and placed it into Penelope’s hands.

“I’ve spent the last 6 years imagining this day, Penelope Wilson, and some days I accepted my situation and then some days I woke up having dreamt I came to your door and I stabbed you in the heart as you opened the door. And I wrote about it all, in here. I wrote about God and I wrote about grief and I wrote about my Ma, and my little brother Gavin. And I wrote about your dear little baby boy, and you. I have spent 6 years thinking about nothing but you Penelope Wilson, and I am tired. So I want you to read what I wrote in this book, and I want you to read every curse I made against your name, I want you to read what you put me through. And then, when you’re done, chuck it in the bin. Or burn it. I don’t care.”

She didn’t say anything but that’s okay because I didn’t want her to. Her son was yelling for me to leave cause he’d called the peelers and I think I said okay. I closed the door for her, leaving her standing motionless, little black book in hand.

I walked to what used to be Smith’s Bakery and ordered a coffee and sandwich. I sat well after I was finished, knowing I’d have to wait for the police. When they arrived they asked what the hell I was thinking and I said I didn’t know, I think I said sorry for scaring her but I don’t think I was. I made some stupid joke that I was expecting a fat paycheck of twenty thousand this month and if I can’t get a coffee and sandwich with twenty grand what was the point in getting it.

Penelope didn’t press charges but I did another night in a cell. I never heard from her again, and a few months on me and Gavin were driving through the neighbourhood and I saw she’d sold the house.

I still write about her, and her poor baby, and Ma, Gav and Big Jo. I’ve filled dozens of little black books, and now, ten years on, I think I’m maybe getting better. I’ve never put these words to paper, or been brave enough to say them to anyone, but I think I’m ready now;

Penelope Wilson. I forgive you.