Fragile

by Sarah Hilary

  Nothing had ever fallen into my lap.

  Back in the kitchen, I searched for evidence that Joe had been here. I knew his weaknesses: the pills he’d stolen from Meagan when we lived at Lyle’s, and the harder drugs he’d bought on the streets. I found an old mobile phone buried in a drawer, its charger attached, but it wasn’t Joe’s. Meagan had given him a phone, and sometimes pills; he hadn’t always had to steal. There were no pills in any of the drawers or cupboards I searched. The only white powder I found was flour, churning with weevils. I sealed its paper packet and dropped it into the pedal bin. Everywhere, I found signs that his last housekeeper had left without warning. Had they fought? Did he fire her or did she simply stop coming? I considered the envelope of banknotes; he trusted me. Had he trusted her? My heart beat oddly, slipping in my chest. What had happened here, before I came?

  On the windowsill, a fat pigeon was walking on gnarled feet. The grey smell of cigarettes drifted through the gaps around the ill-fitting frame. Next door’s office workers liked to smoke in the street, discarding their butts down our area steps. Given the state of the stove, it was a wonder their cigarettes hadn’t started a fire. I reached to close the window, stopping when I saw a spider sitting there. It had spun a web, tacky with dust and grease, a perfect trap for anything coming into the house from outside. The web was clotted with small black bodies. Shivering, I pulled the window tight, locking it shut before pocketing his cash and my shopping list.

  Outside, it was squally, a whip of wind warning that autumn was on its way. I buttoned my coat over the black dress, instructing my heart to stop speeding. It was Joe’s fear I was feeling, he was the one who couldn’t bear to be cold. I loved the autumn, its colour and crispness, but Joe just saw trees stripped bare, earth frozen under his feet. It was why he left me that night, seeking shelter in the club where she was drinking, in her black satin coat cinched with a belt. She didn’t see me, only Joe. She liked what she saw so she took him, leaving me alone. I couldn’t be alone, any more than Joe could be cold. He knew that but he went with her anyway, never once looking back.

  Dr Wilder’s favourite cheese shop was next to an art dealer with a sculpture in its window of rusty coins welded into the shape of a woman’s body. A glazed pot sat at her feet, sea-green with a lick of white running through it. It made me think of our lake, all those miles away. A pool, Meagan called it, but to us it was a lake. She said it should’ve been condemned. It probably was, now.

  The cheese shop stank of churned earth and abattoirs. I had a sudden craving for burnt fish fingers, Rosie’s favourite: ‘Black and orange fingers!’ The only food she really loved, apart from cake and warm milk. She’d have lived on cake and warm milk, if we’d let her.

  ‘May I help?’ A man in a white coat and vinyl gloves stood poised behind the cold cabinet.

  ‘Yes, please. I’m after . . .’ I searched my pockets for the shopping list, reading out the name of the hard French cheese from Dr Wilder’s rota.

  The man corrected my pronunciation, gently. How thin he was, the bones in his face like knives. He placed the cheese under a wire, quizzing me with a cocked eyebrow as to how much of it I wanted. I gestured with my hands, having no idea how much the cheese weighed. It looked like a stone, and was the colour of an old woman’s heel. I saw Meagan sitting with her feet propped on a stool, waiting to be pedicured. Me kneeling, Joe on tiptoe with tweezers in his hand, searching the crown of her head for white hairs. The pair of us scared silly, our skin stinging with yesterday’s slaps, not wanting worse. I could smell her vinegary skin. It made me shiver.

  ‘Is that all?’ The cheese man wrapped the cheese in wax paper.

  ‘Eggs. No, I’ll get those elsewhere.’ I needed to be out, away from the cold cuts of meat with their strong stink of death. ‘That’s it, thank you.’

  ‘Dr Wilder likes his eggs from here.’

  ‘What?’ I stared, seeing him properly for the first time, the way his hair grew in a widow’s peak, one eye set higher than the other in his face.

  ‘You’re new. At Starling Villas, yes?’ His smile was patient. ‘Dr Wilder is one of our best customers.’ He nodded at the cheese he’d wrapped for me. ‘Shall I box up the eggs?’

  ‘The supermarket,’ I started to say, until he stopped me with a shake of his head.

  ‘Dr Wilder wouldn’t want you to cut corners.’ He began to fill a box, slotting in white-shelled eggs. ‘He’s very particular about his food. These are only a little more expensive than eggs from the supermarket. We’re really very good on price.’

  ‘Do you have pressed cod’s roe?’ I wanted to put a wrinkle in his nose. ‘Or tinned salmon?’

  ‘Ah, no. That is from the supermarket.’

  ‘What is cod’s roe?’

  ‘Fish eggs.’

  ‘Like caviar.’ I nodded at the glass jars on the shelf behind his head.

  ‘A little.’ His smile didn’t slip. ‘Roe is the fully ripe egg masses in the ovaries of fish and certain marine species such as shrimp, scallop and sea urchins.’

  We eyed one another across the cold cabinet.

  ‘Sea urchins.’ We were sharing a joke now but at whose expense I wasn’t sure. ‘I’m Nell.’

  ‘Bradley.’ He nodded, his sharp chin touching his shirt collar. ‘Pleased to meet you, Nell.’

  ‘Thank you.’ I paid for the cheese and eggs with the first of Dr Wilder’s ten-pound notes. Static passed from my palm to his, making the pair of us flinch. ‘Goodbye.’

  Outside, I sucked traffic fumes into my lungs. It was the first time I’d spoken with a stranger since accosting the girl in the diner. Talking with Dr Wilder didn’t count, after two days. Funny, given all the other lessons she’d served up, that Meagan Flack never taught me how to speak to strangers, or warned me not to speak to them. Perhaps she was afraid I’d find my way out from under her thumb sooner than I did. She loved to lecture us about the dangers outside her front door, as if Lyle’s was the tip of a terrifying iceberg and we should be thankful for her protection while it lasted.

  Spying a park, I sat on a bench to catch my breath.

  I’d walked too fast but couldn’t sit for long. The cheese needed to be in the fridge, there was the rest of the shopping to get done and his stairs to be cleaned. Anger prodded at my ribs. Hush. I shut my eyes, thinking of our lake.

  Joe and I used to say there was a drowned village at the bottom of the lake, that if we swam deep enough we’d touch the church spire. In divers’ suits, we would walk through its streets, seeing anemones flowering, shoals of fish squatting in the houses, an octopus behind the grille in the post office. I tried to picture Rosie playing with the sea urchins but it hurt too much, squeezing my throat shut. Small fingers tugged at my leg. I scuttled sideways on the bench, smothering a yelp.

  Not fingers – a greasy chip paper, blown by the breeze. I kicked it free, blinking the wet from my eyes. In the playground, a solitary child climbed on and off the roundabout. Out of a hundred children, not one would remind me of Rosie. Only sometimes, seated on a bus or standing in a queue, I’d catch a whiff of Savlon and feel that pressure building in my chest. Perhaps there was no escape. I’d run and run, and it would always find me, always hurt me.

  Across the park, I saw the spire of a church splitting the sky, putting a path between the clouds where the sun was breaking through. A boy lay on the grass, propped on his elbows. At a distance, he was enough like Joe to hold my attention. My age or a little older, wearing faded khakis and a blue T-shirt, ancient All-Stars on his sockless feet. His face was tipped to the sun, his eyes shut. He lifted the fingers of his right hand to kiss a cigarette, sipping at its smoke. The pressure in my chest was like stones being stacked, one on top of the other. I was afraid to breathe in case I brought them all down.

  Finishing his cigarette, not-Joe climbed to his feet and headed off, away. Where he’d been sitting, the grass righted itself, each blade unbending, shivering skywards. Cold crept into my bones as I stood. Time to get to
work.

  Starling Villas felt safe, silent on my return.

  Down in the kitchen, I divided the shopping between the fridge and cupboards, pleased to know I could lay my hands on everything I needed for Dr Wilder’s supper. Slicing the bread for his mid-morning toast, I slid it under the grill while I ate the discarded garnish from his breakfast, chewing the parsley to take the taste of the cheese shop from my mouth. When the toast had cooled, I loaded it with the hard salted butter he liked. I was hungry enough to wonder whether I could get away with eating a plate of toast myself. There was no time in his schedule, and no cash provision, for meals of my own. I’d be more use to him if I wasn’t distracted by this nagging hunger. But I couldn’t afford to make a mistake so soon into my apprenticeship. The thought of being back on the streets filled me with horror, my body soft and fearful after just two nights. As I cut his toast into triangles, I realized I’d used the wrong word. Whatever this was in Starling Villas, it was not an apprenticeship. Dr Wilder had no interest in my learning, of that I was certain.

  In the library, he’d put a tweed jacket over his blue shirt. He wore more clothes than any man I’d met. Under the shirt, he was wearing a white cotton vest and blue boxer shorts. I knew this, being responsible for tidying the cupboards in his bedroom. In a slim box, I’d discovered a pair of elastic sock suspenders. Was he wearing them now, under his flannels? Surely not. I didn’t know what to make of a man who wore so many clothes.

  He’d cleared a space on his desk for the plate of toast. When I set it down, he reached for a slice without taking his eyes from his book, the cuff of his shirt riding to reveal the squareness of his wrist where yesterday it touched mine. Had I been poisoning him, he could not have made it easier. He took a bite of toast and then a second while I waited for the coffee press to work its reluctant magic. His teeth had left marks in the butter I’d spread according to his instructions, lavishly. I had longed to cut my own slice from the loaf, spreading this same generous helping of butter before spooning on strawberry jam. I’d eat it delicately, savouring every bite, not as he was doing, his jaw moving mechanically. My head fizzed with hunger. I was poised to pour the coffee when he put his hand across the cup. I faltered, coffee press suspended, worrying I’d made a mistake, deviated from the rota, distracted by my own emptiness.

  ‘Thank you,’ he said, dismissing me. ‘That will be all.’ He glanced up. ‘Do please make yourself a meal. Whatever you need.’

  What did I need? I was afraid to name it. If I did, he would throw me out, of that I was certain.

  It was after midnight before I returned to my attic. I ran a bath, slipping down until the water cupped my chin, kissing the bruises I’d collected on his stairs. The woven bracelet at my wrist turned a darker shade of red in the water. For a while all I could hear was the throaty sound of the tank refilling, water battling air in the pipes before a long, luxurious silence. Nothing to indicate the tank reheating. I reconciled myself to the tepid temperature. No doubt Dr Wilder rationed the hot water, and I’d used my quota cleaning his stairs. I listened through the layers of quiet for the echoes underneath, taking care because listening for echoes was dangerous. The shadows of cars crossed the ceiling. On either side, I felt the spur of buildings that formed my new perimeter. A car backfired, too far away to frighten me.

  Where are you, Joe?

  I’d thought I’d find him in this house, but he wasn’t here. Was he waiting, the way he’d once said he would, or was he too high or low to care? A promise made in the summer cannot count, I knew that. The promise we made was two summers old, but it was carved from a terrible secret. I couldn’t believe he’d forgotten that, or forgotten me.

  Next door’s restaurant was emptying for the night; soon I’d hear the rattle of bottles in its bins. For now, there was only steam knocking in the old pipes, whistling as it fought its way through the narrow arteries of the house. It knocked and whistled and finally it sighed, meeting the air outside with a little swooping whoosh. If I listened long enough, it would start to sound like panting, each puff of steam followed by another in quick pursuit. I flexed my hands, making the water slop and slap in the bath. The other sounds, the echoes, came without warning.

  Joe’s breath as he slept, mouth open on my pillow. The tread of feet on the landing at the start of the day, the huff of her, ‘Hello,’ against my cheek. Sounds I’d lost by coming here. Hiding, here.

  The bathwater was shallow, as if I’d pulled the plug by accident. It was rotting, the rubber plug cracked right across, leaking water while I lay there allowing myself to remember the things I ought never to forget.

  Drying myself, I pulled on an old vest top and shorts before going into the attic.

  The window should’ve let in the street light but it had to struggle past piles of old papers and sagging cardboard boxes. Too much of this house was boxes. Someone had spread old newspapers across the floor. I glimpsed a headline here and there, the name of a politician long dead or disgraced. The papers stretched to every corner, hiding something soft underneath.

  Crouching, I uncovered a rug, rubbing my thumb across its sooty surface. It was patterned with curling stems and thorns, and tiny starbursts the colour of pavements after rain. Stripping more papers out of my way, I followed a trail of crimson feathers and turquoise trees, yellow larks and lizards, to a border of copper links. The rug stretched from wall to wall. I sat back on my heels, surprised and delighted. A whole room of silken rug shining like glass, buried under rotting boxes stiff with pigeon droppings. I wanted to set to work restoring it, brushing the weave to bring up its colours – I’d use the soft-bristled brush I’d spied in the cupboard under the stairs. Not tonight, as I was too weary, and the noise might wake Dr Wilder. But soon.

  I climbed to my feet, kicking the papers back into place. The rug would keep. It would be my secret, a piece of the house which was all mine. It felt good to have a secret. The rug had been hiding up here for years. I stood with my thumbs pricking, eyes searching. What other treasure was hidden here? His childhood toys? Photo albums of Dr Wilder as a young man in cricket whites, or racing across a beach on the skinny legs of an adolescent?

  I thought I’d known what I was hunting for here but now I let myself imagine a different plan, one where I restored his beautiful house and in return he gave me shelter and food and kindness.

  A ripple ran across the floor, finding my fingertips. Her ghost, or Joe’s? I stood very still, listening, but Dr Wilder had gone to his bed, and the house was quiet.

  7

  I woke not knowing where I was, mattress springs prodding my ribs. For one long skin-pricking second I was terrified, slick with sweat, eyelids quivering against the rough ticking. Then I sat up, shaking the fear into anger. I hated being scared, shouldn’t be – couldn’t be – after all the things I’d done to escape it, the bridges I’d burnt and hearts I’d broken, including my own.

  Last night, I’d dragged the mattress to make a bed under the attic window. My throat was full of damp, my skin gritty. Why hadn’t I changed the bedding? I’d been too busy washing his stairs and shopping for his stinking cheese. This was his fault, Dr Robin Wilder who wanted his breakfast in an hour and would not tolerate any deviation from his rota. Hauling on my clothes, I cursed him, not stopping until I was down in the basement struggling to light his ancient stove.

  Breakfast was scrambled eggs. The beating of eggs in a bowl helped to rid me of the rage. By the time I set the tray at his elbow, I no longer hated him. His hair was damp from a shower. I could smell his shampoo, and last night’s wine working through the pores of his skin. He was reading a book, his thumb keeping his place as he waited for me to unload the tray. The library curtains were drawn against the day. It was my job to open them after he’d finished his breakfast. Was it superstition underpinning his rituals, or had something happened to make him fear change? Death or disaster, or heartache of another kind? I shook the puzzle away. What did his heartache matter to me? I was going to search the libra
ry as soon as the rota said it was safe to do so.

  Dr Wilder plucked the parsley from the eggs and set it at the side of his plate. The rota insisted on the garnish, even if he never ate it. He liked a teaspoonful of Dijon mustard whisked into his eggs. What bliss it’d been to lick that spoon, my tongue shivering from the mustard’s heat. Behind me, the library clock tsked its tongue. I’d search inside it, behind the cogs and wheels. Perhaps I’d break it, by accident of course. Dr Wilder didn’t speak a word, eating my eggs and drinking my coffee with the curtains closed. I waited in the hall until it was time to return and uncover the windows to a white sky where the sun crouched out of sight. Rain was coming to relieve the pressure, I could feel it in the joints of my fingers. I reloaded my tray with his empty plate and cup, the French press with its grounds silted inside like a black clot of earth.

  In his bedroom, I took up each pillow in turn, hitting it with the heel of my hand. His sheets wouldn’t need changing for another two days but I wanted to strip the bed and remake it with the linen in the airing cupboard. The sheets needed ironing but I’d been doing that since I was seven. Meagan shouted the first time she saw me with the iron, as if she’d thought me helpless, a child like all the others. I wasn’t sure I’d ever been a child, unless it was with Joe, the summer before we kissed. I was nearly fifteen then. It seemed a lifetime ago, but it wasn’t even four years.

  In his bathroom, I rinsed the basin, polishing the taps and tidying bottles of shampoo and shaving cream. When I ran my finger around the rim of the basin, it squeaked.

  None of his clothes were lying out in the room but I opened the door to his wardrobe anyway, slipping my hand between the hang of jackets and shirts. His suits were smooth tweed and glassy flannel, the rail overloaded to the left where an evening jacket hung, black with peaked lapels. Sliding it along the rail, my fingers met the sudden chill of satin. I reached to remove the plush hanger, its wire neck wound with pink ribbon. Hanging from its padded shoulders was a silver evening gown. It slinked from the wardrobe, flooding my feet.