The A44

After the crash the police had traced the driver and begun collecting witness statements. A quiet hush had fallen over my life. Hattie died from her internal injuries sustained in the accident. I kept remembering. I remembered the tranquil sound of tinkling glass, the hot smell of engine intruding into the cabin. Hattie screaming…I wish I could forget it. I remember the sensation of having control, my hands on the steering wheel, road in my grip. I was an Inspector with West Midlands Police. I was the all-knowing, all-reaching, Dad. This fact puffed me up beyond comprehension. She needed me, gave me a reason to get up every morning. And I remember the sudden realisation that grew terror from the pit of my stomach; the illusion of control, I so cherished, shattered with the passenger side window. I tried to remember the man’s face, the man who forced us off the road and apart. He was less than extraordinary. In fact, the banality of the man who killed my daughter deeply unsettled me. We could have been friends, acquaintances down the pub. I used the sympathy of the Ceredigion Police Liaison Officer to grant me unofficial access to the witness statements. I read with a focus I had never felt before. He had been drinking. He sustained superficial lesions on his face from impact with the driver’s side window and a seat belt burn on the right hand side of his neck from collar to behind his ear.  This was followed by the interviewing Officer’s summary of the suspect, ‘…regrets his actions with the utmost remorse’, and the rest of what will form his solicitor’s opening statement in court. I do not doubt his sincerity and his remorse evoked the beginnings of forgiveness. At this realisation the intensity of my self-loathing was unbearable and I swore off any feelings of absolution. I needed to be focussed. It was two months after the collision when I decided I would not let the system have him. It would not be enough. I called the man’s solicitor tipping her off to the breach of security with regards to the witness statements, the backbone of the prosecution. Among the witness statements were personal details and contact information. I committed everything to memory. After my meeting with Ishmael at the Forensic Pathology department I drove to the address I had taken. I waited for it to get dark, aiding it by bricking the nearside lamp post. All the while I was repeating in my head what had become my mantra for the past year. Birmingham. Smethwick. Cape Hill. 34 Carithorn End. Haines, V. My purpose. My revenge.