The night jealousy boiled over
Elaine Smith
Wednesday 26th September 2007
It was with a heavy heart I turned the key in my front door. My best friend, Eddie McEvilly, 43, jumped up from the settee.
'I'm back!' he grinned.
'Great to see you,' I smiled.
Four months earlier Eddie had sold his house and set off on a round the world trip. Before he'd left I'd handed him a key to my house and told him he could move in when he returned. So here he was. Only things had changed.
'Tell me your news?' he said.
'Well…' I began. 'I'm dating a bloke. His name's Alan.'
Eddie's smile froze.
'I'm very happy for you,' he said sarcastically.
How had I known he'd take the news badly? Eddie, a former Labour councillor in Liverpool's Sefton district, and I were best mates, but it hadn't always been that way. Seven years earlier we'd dated for a year. Then tragedy had struck…
At the time I was a single mum to my rugby-crazy son, Ben, 9. Then one night, in February 1999, I'd poked my head round his bedroom door and found him dead. We tied his dog, a Staffordshire Cross called Sasha, to his door by a rope. Somehow Ben had tangled it round his neck and strangled himself.
In many ways my life ended that night too. Grief stricken, I relied on anti depressants and sleeping tablets. My relationship with Eddie ended but he'd stuck by me as a friend and helped me through the dark days after I attempted suicide four times by overdosing.
'You know we'll only ever be friends,' I'd warned him countless times.
'I know,' he'd shrugged.
When he'd gone away travelling in November 2005 I wondered how I'd cope. But do you know what? I'd thrived. I'd stopped taking the tablets and started going to the gym instead.
Then, on the anniversary of Ben's death, I met Alan Harrison, 43. Instead of moping around my friend, Tracey Bamber-Thomas, 41, had persuaded me to go out for a drink in 'The Vines' in Liverpool and I'd got chatting to Alan. He was easy to talk to and found myself telling him about Ben.
'I'm a lot stronger now,' I told him.
It was true. Now, it was March 2006, and Eddie was back. Over those following weeks it was obvious he resented the fact I'd found happiness.
'Why don't you come out for a drink with me and Alan?' I suggested.
'He's not my friend,' he snapped back.
After that Eddie shut himself in his room whenever I invited Alan round. Was he jealous? After all these years surely he didn't still hold a torch for me, did he?
'He's a plonker,' Alan decided. 'Ask him to leave.'
When Eddie and I started rowing over the silliest things I did just that. Eddie looked stunned.
'After everything I've done for you…' he gasped.
Suddenly I felt awful. After his support following Ben's death wasn't I indebted to him a million times over?
'Stay here as long as you like,' I backed down.
But as the months passed the atmosphere in the house grew unbearable. Eddie started communicating through notes. Then he began living with a friend, only staying on Tuesday and Thursday nights.
By February this year, Eddie had been living with me for 11 months and I was miserable. To cheer myself up I decided to spruce up the house. My Labrador, Jack, had scuffed my wooden stairs so I bought a tin of pale green paint.
Everyone had to be upstairs for the night before I could paint. But it was 11pm before I heard Eddie's key in the door. As he stomped passed he barely grunted a greeting. Bleary-eyed, I set to work and I'd almost finished when he came out from his bedroom.
'Where are you going?' I asked.
'To make a cup of tea,' he snapped.
'The paint's wet,' I told him. 'You can't.'
'Oh, great!' he snarled, slamming the door behind him.
As I slicked on the last bit of paint I heard him noisily rummaging around in his drawers. What was he doing in there? Who cared? It was almost midnight and I was exhausted.
I popped my head round my bedroom door and noticed Alan was awake.
'I'm going to jump in the bath,' I said.
But I'd only just closed the bathroom door when I heard the strangest of noises…like an animal grunting. Wrapping myself in a towel I hurried out onto the landing. The noise was coming from my bedroom.
Pushing open the door, I stood for a second, frozen to the spot. At first the horrific scene in front of me was impossible to take in. Eddie, standing over Alan, plunging a knife into his chest…
'No,' I thought. 'This can't be real.'
Up, down, up down - the blade swooped through the air. Alan, dressed in black boxers, was lying on my white sheet that was now soaked red. Blood spurted up my lilac walls, across my white floorboards.
'He's stabbing me!' Alan's voice suddenly snapped me into action.
'Leave him!' I screeched, jumping onto Eddie's back.
He swatted me off and I fell hard against my bedside table.
Scrabbling to my feet, I saw Eddie plunge the knife into Alan's stomach and this time when he pulled the blade out a lump of white stuff flopped out. Alan clutched his stomach. Oh, my God… Was that his intestines? If I didn't do something quick he'd die.
I threw myself on Eddie's back again. My towel dropped to the floor but I clung on, naked, for dear life.
'Run,' I screamed at Alan.
As he slid off the bed blood spurted up the walls like a fountain. Then he was gone, out the door and onto the landing. Eddie threw me off again and raced after Alan.
Alan's eyes bulged in shock as he scrabbled about on the wet paint, intestines spilling out of his wound, red blood splattering onto green paint. Then Eddie caught up with him and rammed the knife into his neck…
'No!' I screamed.
I managed to jam my foot into Eddie's groin. It gave Alan the chance to hobble down the stairs and out the front door.
'I'm going to cut you to ribbons,' Eddie screamed after him.
Suddenly he broke free and chased after him.
Jumping to my feet I ran back into the bedroom and called the police. Then, pulling on my tracksuit over my blood and paint splattered skin, I ran after them. Bizarrely, I spotted Eddie sitting on my neighbour's doorstep across the street. But where was Alan?
I didn't have to look hard. It'd been snowing outside and as I looked up the street my eyes followed a trail of bloodstained snow. I raced after it and found Alan lying in the snow. It looked like he'd been dipped in a vat of red paint and he had his hand clamped over his bulging intestines.
'I'm here,' I wept.
Neighbours were rushing out of their houses but, thankfully, the ambulance arrived within a couple of minutes. As Alan was bundled into the ambulance a policeman pulled me aside. They'd arrested Eddie.
I rushed to Fazakerley Hospital, in Liverpool.
'He's in theatre,' a nurse told me when I arrived.
Tracey came to sit with me but it was seven hours before we heard news.
'He's going to be OK,' the nurse announced.
Alan had suffered two punctured lungs, lost five pints of blood and needed 101 stitches to patch up his wounds - but he'd survived.
'A miracle,' I cried.
By the end of the week Alan could hold a conversation.
'I'm so sorry,' I wept. 'I should have asked Eddie to leave.'
'How were you to know what he'd do?' he replied.
It was true. Eddie, my oldest, best friend had turned into maniac for no apparent reason.
After 11 days Alan was sent home. A week later, on the anniversary of Ben's death, we spent the day together - and that's when I started to think. When I'd lost Ben my life collapsed and I'd relied on Eddie. Was this all about control? Had he wanted to take Alan from me to see me disintegrate again? Or was he just driven crazy by jealousy? Who knows.
In July this year, at Liverpool Crown Court, Eddie pleased not guilty to attempted murder. Alan and I gave evidence but we stayed away for the verdict. My victim support worker phoned with the news.
'Guilty,' she said. 'He's got 14 years.'
It seems a long time but he'll be out before we know it.
Alan and I've decided that we'll move away from Liverpool before that time comes and start afresh somewhere new. It's the only way we'll ever feel safe from the evil clutches Eddie. And to think I once called him my best friend.
Want to read more gripping real life from Pick Me Up? Try:
Had my son been killed by his girlfriend?
Whatever happened to... the family of Andrew Lewin who died in a car in Spain?